Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.

Hate Also Means Love

Katie Bell was sitting at her usual table in the Gryffindor tower, facing the window with her back to the portrait hole, when someone came up behind her and tapped her nose. She didn't move at all, just continued to move her eyes down the page of her Arithmancy book. She heard a half groan/half sigh behind her, and allowed a small smile to play across her lips as the person behind her shuffled their feet.

"Katie?" the person said. Katie studiously ignored them and turned the page after jotting down a few notes on her parchment. "Katie?" the person said a bit more urgently. She merely switched the arm she was propping her head on, making the person move to the other side.

"Katie!" now they were tapping her shoulder but she just yawned and covered her mouth. "Katie Bell!" the person's head was now on her shoulder, talking into her ear. Katie started humming, making the person grumble.

"Oh geez, Katie-cakes!" the person said, and Katie angrily snapped her head to look at her determined pesterer.

"You got a problem, Georgie-Porgie?" she asked him sharply, her fingers moving away from her book and resting on her trusty wand.

"Harry wants us on the field in ten minutes," George responded, although his ears turned red.

"Thank you," Katie said and went up to her dormitory.

Angelina and Alicia were already changing into their practice robes when Katie came in and started shuffling through her trunk. When she had finished changing, took off her Head Girl badge, and grabbed her broomstick, and she saw the other two girls looking at her strangely.

"Is it true that you like George?" Alicia asked her.

"Me, like George? Ha, are you kidding? You are so mental, did you know that, we hate each other!" Katie said, crossing her fingers behind her back.

"Yeah, but you only started hating each other this year," Alicia pointed out.

Katie was silent for a moment, it was true that at the end of last year she and George had almost kissed and since then they had been sworn enemies, both afraid of feeling that kind of emotion. "We had a fight at the end of last year," she explained shortly.

"I didn't believe it, heard from Clarissa or whatever her name is," Alicia said, waving her hand towards one of the other two beds in the room.

"Well, it certainly isn't true," Angelina said, observing Katie's passive face carefully. Katie merely pretended to look mildly curious, hoping her best friend couldn't see through that.

"I think Harry wanted us?" Katie said and the girls trooped down to the Quidditch pitch.

When they arrived the twins, Harry, and Ron, their new Keeper, were already waiting in the locker rooms. Harry immediately started explaining some new moves while they took seats. Katie and George somehow wound up to each other, which made neither of them very happy looking on the outside. Angelina and Fred looked very happy on the other hand, and she had her head propped on his shoulder while he grinned at her.

Harry started lecturing Ron on some new moves and Katie took the opportunity to lean over a bit to George and spoke in a pitying voice. "George-Porgie pudding and pie, kissed the girls and made them cry, when the boys came out to play, Georgie-Porgie ran away."

"Yup, although I made the girls cry for another reason," George said, making a show of grinding his fist into his palm.

"Oh no, I'm quaking in my high-tops!" Katie said sarcastically.

"You should be," George said simply.

"Do you two have a problem?" Harry asked them angrily, glaring at them as they sprang apart.

"Nope, captain, no problem," Katie said and George nodded.

"We're just peachy," he added.

"Good, we're playing Slytherin on Saturday and we need everyone to be on good relations," Harry said.

Katie snorted at the idea of everyone being on good relations, but quickly turned it into a coughing fit. "Sorry-that chicken at dinner's catching up with me," she apologized to them while Angelina tried not to laugh.

"Are you sure that's all it is?" George whispered while Harry continued.

"I don't think you ever could," Katie retorted.

George pretended not to hear her. "I think you're finally realizing your undying love for me."

"Keep dreaming, that's the only place that'll happen," Katie said.

"You're just scared, hiding behind your walls," he continued.

"Scared? Of you? You've got to be joking because that is hilarious," Katie said but refrained from laughing while Harry looked at the Chasers.

"Aha, so you admit I have an excellent sense of humor!" George said triumphantly.

"I think you're the one that's scared," Katie told him.

"I could take you on anytime, anywhere," George said cockily.

"Fine, tonight after practice, on the pitch. You think you can catch me? We'll find out," Katie said, and walked out with Alicia.

Practice that night went extremely well, and Katie got the pleasure of watching George fall off his broom and into the mud when he was trying to dismount. He had gotten mad though, and soon she was in the mud as well. It took them a moment of glaring at each other before they both started to hurl mud at each other while the rest of their team watched with interest. Soon the two of them noticed their friends were laughing and started to throw mud at them, so they ran up to the castle but Katie and George stayed behind.

"So, is this the part where you say you've been secretly in love with me since the first day we met?" George said as he and Katie kicked off into the air.

Katie laughed, registering the fact that what he said was true. "No this is the part where I totally humiliate you by beating you into the ground."

"Oh, okay, but I think you'll be more humiliated," George said simply and they raced off to the hoops at the end of the field and started circling around the field.

"Ten loops around the pitch, we'll see who's better," Katie said and they shot off.

"We tied?" George said as they stopped their loops at the exact same time right next to each other.

"I guess so," Katie said her voice full of amazement.

"Wow, I guess we're even then," George said.

"In everything?" Katie asked him quietly and for the first time since last June they were talking with no hatred for the other.

"For everything and anything," George said just as quietly. They were flying rather close now, and Katie could feel her heart hammering against her chest.

"How did we ever let ourselves do this to each other?" Katie asked him with a small laugh.

"I think we were both scared, Katie," George said seriously.

"Yeah, I guess we were," Katie said, and she felt their knees knock together but they didn't back away.

"I know I've been a bit of a jerk lately..." George said and hung his head.

"I've been more of a jerk," Katie said.

"Okay, we've both been jerks, and I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry too George, I feel like a little kid being caught with my hand in the cookie jar," Katie said and smiled at him.

"Yeah, a very large cookie jar," George joked and it amazed Katie how very blue his eyes were when she was looking at him from this close.

"I believe this is where we were last summer?" Katie asked him quietly as they leaned over on their broomsticks.

"Mmm hmm, right before we jumped about a mile away from each other," George said with a laugh.

"And started screaming our heads off at the other!" Katie added.

"Maybe we should finish what we started," George said and their lips met in a long and loving kiss.

They pulled apart and grinned sort of stupidly at the other. Katie pushed her dirty-blonde hair around her ears and felt her heart flutter. "Took the words right out of my mouth! Maybe we should have finished that last summer!"

"Woulda saved me a lot of sleepless nights," George said with a laugh and held her hand as they continued to hover in the air.

"I'm touched George, you lost sleep over me?" Katie said happily.

"Well, sorta, I guess you could say that," George said a bit sheepishly with a shrug.

"Well I was no Sleeping Beauty myself," Katie admitted.

"Isn't that that Muggle movie you made me watch in sixth year?" George asked her interestedly, since she was a half and half.

"Yep, that's it. One of my favorite Disney movies," she said, oddly enough not feeling embarrassed to tell him that.

George started humming and it took Katie a few moments to realize what he was doing.

"You remember that song's melody?" she asked him incredulously.

"I know you, I walked with you once upon a dream," he started singing and Katie laughed. "I know you, the gleam in your eyes is so familiar, a gleam. Yet I know it's true, that visions are seldom all they seem. But if I know you I know what you do, you love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream."

Katie could only laugh when George finished his slightly off key version. "You're so sweet!" she said and pulled him into a hug on their brooms.

"The guys are not gonna believe us," Katie said shaking her head a bit at their odd situation.

"Who cares? I've got you and that's all I want," George said and she couldn't help but kiss him again.

"Why were we so stupid? If we had only realized this last year," she said to the air.

"Dunno what would have happened," George said, studying her face.

"Look, the sun's setting," Katie said and they turned to watch the orange sun sink behind the Forbidden Forest. "Almost as perfect as you."

"Aww, shucks Miss Bell," George said, his ears turning red as she looked at him.

"Look at this mud! We look so stupid!" she said, trying to wipe some of the mud off her scarlet robes.

"You want to go back?" he asked her.

"Not really," she sighed. "But I've only gotten ten detentions in my entire seven years at Hogwarts and I don't intend to make it uneven."

They landed, and walked hand in hand back to the castle. They earned an odd look from the Fat Lady as they approached Gryffindor Tower, but she allowed them inside.

There were only a few people in the common room, and while they stared at the two of them for a while after they came in, they soon went to bed.

"Hoorah, we got it all off!" George said, looking over his clean robes happily.

"They don't call me Spell Bell for nothing!" Katie said, pocketing her wand and smiling proudly.

"Spell Bell isn't nearly as good as Katie-cakes," he said as a joke.

"Ugh, you know how much I hate that name," Katie said with a sigh, but punched him playfully on the shoulder when she saw he was joking.

"Oh no, you have killed me!" he said, falling to the floor and holding his shoulder in faked agony. "I don't think I...can make it...I'll miss you Katie," he said, closed his eyes and stopped moving.

Katie sighed and then decided to play along. "George! No, wait I can save you! The kiss of life!" she shouted and dropped to her knees next to the 'fallen' George. She tried not to laugh when she rolled his head up and saw his lips puckered, so she poked his cheek with her finger and he stopped. She leaned over and kissed him deeply. Soon his hands were around her neck and she pulled him to a sitting position.

"Hark! You have saved me!" George said and they both stood up.

"Hark?" she said and they started laughing.

"Hey, it's been an eventful day," George said and shrugged his shoulders. "Say, Katie, would you like to go with me to Hogsmeade in two weeks?"

"George, I would love to go with you to Hogsmeade." Katie said and he grinned at her. "Well, I would like to go to bed now, if you don't require any more reviving."

"No, I'm pretty sure I won't die for a long time," he said and they hugged each other.

"I know it's kinda early for this, but I love you," she whispered in his ear.

"I love you too," he whispered back and she kissed his cheek before heading over to the girl's staircase.

George started humming as he climbed the boy's staircase, knowing Katie would recognize it, and he soon heard her humming with him. Katie giggled a bit as she climbed, but kept to the song.