Disclaimer: No, as much as I wish I did, I do not own Harry Potter. Anything you recognize from the books belongs to JKR, and anything stupid probably belongs to me.

UPDATED:: Thanks to my reviewers of the first chapter!

padfoot-dreamer :: Wow! I was wondering how long it would take for someone to pick up on why I named him Dan. I was at a loss for what to name him for quite a while. One night I was watching CoS and I was like, I should name him Dan...

a hopeful writer and smilie:-)chick :: I'm really glad you guys like my fic! Hopefully there will be another update soon!

s h i n i n g m e a d o w1 :: Thanks for the positive feedback! I was thinking Dan's mother should be an OC so that there would be no hard feelings for killing her off. I'm not sure what her name will be yet, but she definitely WON'T be Cho Chang! Sorry to any Cho fans, but the girl really pisses me off...

James-Padfoot :: I'm a HUGE L/J fan, so the Lily/James love/hate was what exactly what I was going for... Glad you noticed the resemblance!!!! 

******

"Rush!!!!" Kate leapt out of the silver Toyota Camry parked in the drive, and fairly tackled Rush. Almost as quickly as she had hugged him, she let go of him.

"This is my friend Lian, from Surrey." She gestured towards the brown haired girl who had followed her out of the car.

"Lian, this is Rush... oh..." she had just noticed someone else standing next Rush. "...And this is Dan Potter." There was a definite change in the tone of her voice as she said the last part of this sentence.

Lian nodded and smiled at them both anyway. There was a slight silence as the two boys nodded back.

"So... I'll show her where we stay then?" Kate said to Rush.

"Sounds good."

Rush and Dan helped the girls unload their luggage from the trunk of Kate's car, and Kate lead Lian into the house and up the many stairs towards the guest bedroom. It felt good to be back at the Burrow. Rush had lived there since he was born, as had his father before him. Kate felt like she lived there as well, having spent so much time with Rush's family as a kid. As they continued to head upward, Kate realized that Dan hadn't said a word to her yet. Usually he would have made some witty greeting, but he had remained quiet. This struck Kate as odd, but maybe he had finally gotten the hint she'd been trying to get across; that he should definitely shut up for a while.

"Well, this is it," said Kate as they reached the top floor and pushed open the first door to the left.

"Wow, it doesn't seem this roomy from the outside," said Lian. Kate smiled and put her suitcase down on a bed.

"Magic will do that to you," she said. "Come on. I'll give you a tour of the place before dinner."

Lian followed Kate around Rush's house, Kate pointing out which rooms were which. They were passing through the hall on the third floor when Dan stepped out of Rush's room. He took one look at the girls, and put his arm around Kate's shoulders.

"I don't believe I've given you a proper welcome, have I?" he said in a mock thoughtful tone.

"Not that I care," she said, trying to shake him off.

"Hit me with insults if you want, but I know that deep down, you can't resist me!" he said and tilted his head to one side. Kate was about to say something when Rush walked out into the hall. Dan glanced at him, and Kate took advantage of this momentary lapse in concentration. She stepped on Dan's foot, causing him to let go of her.

"Ow! What was that for?" he asked, although it was kind of a rhetorical question, considering that fact that they both knew the answer. Rush just looked at them, not even bothering to ask. Before the scene became more violent, Rush said,

"Lets go downstairs and get some dinner."

Kate gave Dan one last glare and followed Rush down the stairs. As soon as she arrived in the kitchen, a blur of bushy, short brown hair was upon Kate, giving her a hug.

"Kate! How nice to see you! I had no idea you'd arrived."

"Hi Mrs. Weasley. It's nice to see you too. We only arrived a bit ago, and I don't believe you've met my friend Lian," Kate said. "She's from Surrey, and she's a Mug-- non-witch. Lian, this is Mrs. Weasley."

Lian smiled, shook Mrs. Weasley's hand, and "Nice to meet you's" were exchanged.

"I've got dinner on the table for everyone!" Mrs. Weasley said and led everyone into the kitchen. They all sat down at the table and began to eat Mrs. Weasley's amazing feast.

When dinner was finished, Mrs. Weasley began magicking dishes into the sink. Kate watched her for a moment, and then, having been taught the rules of a good guest, said,

"Anything I can do to help, Mrs. Weasley?"

At this Dan could not resist mumbling,

"coughSuckupcough"

Kate stepped on his foot again. He acquired a pained expression but didn't say anything else. However, Mrs. Weasley had seen the little argument, and thought about Rush's descriptions of their frequent disagreements. They sound just like Ron and I when we were their age, and we ended up getting married. They could be great friends if they would just stop and see how the other feels...

"You know, the gardens do need de-gnoming. I must say they're getting quite out of hand. Rush, why don't you get to know Kate's guest a little better? You can show her how to de-gnome the front garden. Kate and Dan, why don't you two take care of the back gardens?"

Dan grinned at Kate; she glared back and pushed open the back door. This had not been a good idea for Mrs. Weasley to ask the two of them to work together. Plus, Kate didn't know how to de-gnome, but she was not about to tell Dan that.

Meanwhile, Dan was silently thanking Mrs. Weasley for making Kate work with him. Suddenly, she stopped walking, and he almost bumped into her. When she didn't start up again, he walked around her and knelt down in front of one of the bushes. He looked up at her to see if she would do the same. She just looked at him, as if observing the procedure. At that moment, an idea occurred to Dan. He got to his feet and said,

"You've got no clue how to de-gnome, have you?"

Kate had not expected him to notice this, but she tried to act unembarrassed.

"No, which is likely to be the reason I'm standing here instead of doing something productive."

"I'll show you," he said. "Just stick your hands into the bush like this." He reached underneath the lowest branches. "If you grab 'em by the feet, it surprises them and they don't try to bite you as much." He demonstrated by pulling a wriggling gnome out of the bush. "Then, you stand up, and swing it around your head, and when you've got a good rhythm going, you just let go of it, and hope it doesn't hit anything on the way." He swung the gnome over his head, let go, and it flew over the hedge in the distance. He noticed the appalled look on Kate's face and said, "Don't worry about hurting them, they'll recover and be back in a few days."

Kate was still not sure about the whole thing, but she knelt down next to a bush anyway, stuck her hands underneath, and pulled out a gnome. Dan watched her as she did this. She stood up and began to swing the gnome over her head, but it was harder than it looked.

"Here, try putting one hand over the other, like this," Dan said. He gently placed his hands on hers and moved them into the right position. He was surprised that she let him do this. Usually she never would have accepted help from him, or let him touch her for that matter.

Kate was equally surprised at herself, but she let him help her. He actually wasn't being a jerk for once, and she wanted it to stay that way.

"There, now try again," Dan said. Kate swung the gnome over her head, and this time she let go. The gnome flew over the hedge, almost further than Dan's.

"Bloody hell, that was good! Where'd you learn to throw like that?" he asked.

"Being a Chaser comes in handy sometimes," she replied.

They spent the next hour or so having a contest to see who could throw the gnomes the furthest. Kate had caught on quite quickly, and was fair competition. When the garden was almost completely de-gnomed, she said,

"Looks like we've pretty well finished it. Just a few more and we'll be done! I getting pretty good at this de-gnoming stuff."

"I think it's obvious you learned from the best," Dan said and ruffled his hair. Kate did not hear the kidding tone in his voice. She gave him the usual glare and stepped on his foot. Hard. Then she walked off back into the kitchen, leaving Dan to finish off the rest of the gnomes. Dan massaged his foot.

"The same foot three times today," he mumbled. "Maybe I am a prick..."

*****

Kate stormed up the stairs into the guest bedroom. Obviously, Rush and Lian had already finished out front, because Lian was sitting on her bed, reading Gone With The Wind. (A/N: I'll explain this at the end of the chapter.) This was of course her favorite book, and she had made Kate watch the movie with her. Kate had been fascinated at the time; being from an all wizard family, she had never seen a movie before. However, the story line was just too ironic for what had just happened. Lian looked up as Kate stomped in.

"What happened to you," she asked.

"Potter."

"Oh."

Kate had told Lian all about Dan and how much she despised him.

"What did he do to you?"

"Being a prick, just like usual. I can't believe I thought he'd changed! He was being so... so... normal when he was teaching me how to de-gnome, but then he started showing off at having taught me so well! He just can't stop thinking about himself, and it makes me so mad!"

With that, she stormed off into the bathroom to take a shower.

"He's trying to impress her but he just doesn't know how," Lian said to herself. She went back to reading her book, a plan forming in her mind...

********

Ok, I chose Gone With The Wind for Lian to read because she's being modeled after one of my friends, whose favorite book is Gone With The Wind. I've never read the book, but she made me watch the movie with her, so I know the storyline. For those of you who are not familiar with it, the main characters are Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler. Rhett is in love with Scarlett, but she's in love with someone else. Even so, Scarlett and Rhett get married, but she still doesn't love him, and he ends up leaving her. There's a bunch of stuff in between (the movie is three and a half hours long) but that's the basics of it. I thought it was really good irony for the Kate/Dan situation.

Warning, the next update might not be till next weekend. If you read my profile, you'll see I'm kinda swamped. Next chapter will be pre Arran's wedding (remember him from the last chapter?), and maybe wedding day.