Walking around the Gryffindor Tower, Trinity Paz thought long and hard. While traversing from class to class, there was always something on her mind. It's her fifth year at Hogwarts, and she probably still gets confused by the grand castle. No. she's been thinking about George Weasley, Ron Weasley's older brother and Fred Weasley's twin. Oh, Fred Weasley, she thought. No matter how much she secretly loves George, she hates Fred to the bone. Although the boys are identical, it's possible that she figures out who's who by how they act. Fred would pass by, say "Hi", but Trinity would shrug him off like vapour. When George would pass by, and she'd pay close attention to him, spark up a conversation, and actually spend time with him. See, the twins have different rucksacks.
Funny how this works, see. George only sees Trinity as a friend; a really good friend he wouldn't see as a girlfriend. Fred, however, feels the other way around…
"Finally!" Trinity muttered, finally shutting Dementor in New York, a bulky novel that she's been working on for ages. It was just a short moment afterwards that she'd noticed everyone in the library looking in her direction. "What?" Everyone carried on working.
Returning the colossal book to the counter, she collected her things and headed for the Great Hall for supper. As she sped through the vast hallways of the school, Trinity felt a mysterious surge of excitement as she approached her destination. A few more steps ahead, she bumped into a tall, red-haired student, and dropped all her stuff on the floor.
"Sorry," Ron mumbled, trying to help Trinity on picking up her potions books and ingredients.
"Watch it next time," Trinity shrugged. Ron reached for the jar of unicorn hair rolling on the floor, while at the same time, so did Trinity. Noticing their hands touch, there was a small spark when his fingers touched her hand. She moved it quickly, then slapped Ron lightly on the cheek.
"Never do that again," she scolded. "Do that again and I swear I'll hex you!" She drew out her wand threateningly at young Ron Weasley, who simply smirked at her.
"What would you do if I was George?" Ron teased.
"Whaddiyamean?" Trinity blushed.
"It's not like it's not obvious," Ron laughed. "I know how you look at my older brother."
"Whatever," Trinity shrugged, elbowing Ron.
"Ow!" said Ron, stroking his cheek as if it was that injured. "But don't worry, I won't tell. I promise."
"I still don't know what you're talking about, Weasley, and you can't blackmail me for an idea that only exists in your pea-sized red head" said Trinity, turning from red to scarlet.
"You know what I'm talking about," replied Ron. "You totally fancy George." Just then they were interrupted by an older-looking Weasley in the fifth year.
"Who fancies me?" George asked Ron. Ron just laughed.
"See you two," said Ron as he walked away.
"Sorry about my brother, Trin." said George. "Little joker, he is. I guess Fred and I aren't the only jokers in the Weasley family, innit?"
Trinity giggled a bit. There was a huge rush of adrenalin in her body, her cheeks getting redder by the second. There were so many things on her mind. There George stood in front of her, and she looked like such an idiot right now. "I… I have to go to dinner."
"Oh, so do I," added George. "Wanna go?"
Trinity nodded in total approval. The Great Hall was busy as usual as hundreds of students dug into their food. The four house tables were line up in their order: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. It was a typical Hogwarts dinner for all, and Trinity and George took their seats next to each other. Fred appeared next to Ron, who was sitting with Harry Potter and Hermione Granger.
"I thought you were at the common room, George," he said, gazing on a certain someone sitting next to his twin brother.
Professor Lupin walked past the Gryffindor table towards the faculty table. Fred and George were sniggering at him while he walked past them.
"Oh, can you just lay off him, Fred?" Trinity exclaimed. "Can't you do anything besides making fun of the teachers?" Fred suddenly stopped, and continued eating.
"Relax," said George while eating his roast pork dinner. "We're just having a bit of clean fun around here."
"Fine," Trinity sighed. "Just… I'm hungry."
They continued dinner. Trinity saw Ron smirking at her and whispering something to Harry. Both of them stared at Trinity like they knew something. And probably they did.
"Dish liquid," said Fred and the fat lady swung the door open.
The Gryffindor common room was quieter than usual when Trinity and the Weasley twins got there. They were followed by Ron, Harry and Hermione. Everyone was already probably at bed, but it wasn't even their curfew yet.
"Probably at the courtyard," suggested Ron.
"Oh well," said George, "we have the place to ourselves now."
Hermione sighed. "I'm going to bed."
"This early?" asked Ron. "It's only 6 o'clock!"
"Well, if you don't know, Ronald, we happen t have a Defence Against the Dark Arts test tomorrow. You don't want to look totally stupid in front of Professor Lupin, do you?"
"Stupid? Wasn't he always stupid?" teased Fred. He suddenly whispered an "ugh" after Ron elbowed him hard in the stomach.
"You're such a git, Fred," said Trinity, who hadn't spoken since they got back to the common room. "I have a Potions exam tomorrow and I don't want to fail it, so I'm going to bed. Let's go, Hermione." She tugged Hermione towards the girls' dormitory.
"She never fails her tests," said George. "But why do girls get all the wits?" he added as they watched the two girls walk to bed.
Both Hermione's Defence Against the Dark Arts and Trinity's Potions exams turned out well. They were wandering around the courtyard until they met up with Ron and Harry, who had glum expressions on their faces.
"Hey," said Trinity to Hermione, who was apparently scolding Ron for totally failing the exam. "I have to go… you know, meet up with the twins." She winked at Hermione, who knew about Trinity's growing infatuation with George Weasley (and probably told Ron along the way).
Hermione nodded in approval, and continued reprimanding Ron for once again, acting like an idiot in class and almost embarrassed Gryffindor.
Trinity walked on, ignoring everything she passed. All she wanted to do was get to her Divination class, which she had with Fred and George. Scrambled thoughts filled her head, from her crammed-up schedule to her thoughts of George, to finally being part of the Quidditch team. At the fact that she was already tardy for class, Trinity started speeding across the empty hallways and broke her heel along the way. As she skidded to the classroom (forgetting about the Reparo charm) she felt a surge of embarrassment. What if George saw her? What if he'd think she was a clumsy freak and ditch her as a friend? She screamed at her terrible thoughts as if she was possessed, and the doors of the Divination classroom swung open. There stood Professor Trelawney, who obviously just stopped while in the middle of another boring lecture, her eyes greatly magnified by her huge spectacles, with her puppy-dog face staring directly at the mess Trinity was in. The rest of the class looked at Trinity as if she was a ghost.
"Reparo," a voice shouted from one of the tables. Trinity's broken heel suddenly snapped back into place.
"Ah, thank you Mr. Weasley," said Professor Trelawney in appreciation. Trinity looked around, expecting to see George with a smile on his face. It wasn't as she expected.
It was Fred.
Trinity sped to her table with a friend from Ravenclaw, Cho Chang, which was next to where the Weasley twins were seated.
"I could've done it myself," Trinity said correctively to Fred. "Reparo. That wouldn't have been too hard to do." She clutched her rucksack and dropped it firmly in the floor.
"Sorry" Fred replied. With a wave of a wand Trinity's heel broke off again.
"God, Fred!" shouted Trinity. The whole class was staring at her strangely, almost in a grateful way. Clearly, she had once again interrupted one of Professor Trelawney's humdrum lessons.
"Is there a problem, Miss Paz?" asked Professor Trelawney, a look of disappointment on her face. Trinity shook her head, and silently whispered a "Reparo" to fix her shoe. At the next table, Fred and George were laughing at Clyde Bingraff's distorted nose, comparing it to Snape's.
"Callate, chico" said Trinity in Spanish to Fred.
"Why can't you lay off me?" questioned Fred. "I do have a brother, you know."
Trinity stopped in her mind. She had to think of an excuse. 'Oh, Fred, the only reason why I don't pick on your twin brother is because I like him.' No. Cancel that thought. That would be a terrible thing to say, especially in front of the whole class. It would be embarrassing, especially if she said it in front of George. She decided to shrug him off as if he didn't ask her anything. She started talking to Cho, who had been listening to the whole conversation but seemed like she didn't even exist that whole time.
The rest of the day passed awkwardly and, for Trinity, it felt shorter than it was supposed to. She saw neither Fred nor George for the rest of the day, nor did she have any classes with them. At supper, Trinity didn't eat, but went straight to the common room. Seated at one of the desks in her dormitory, Trinity examined her right kitten heel shoe whose heel snapped off, repaired, and snapped off and repaired again. At the surface of the rubber sole, inscribed into the tar-black rubber, Trinity saw her name written on the part of the heel that snapped off. She checked her other shoe only to find out that it didn't have anything on the sole. Without any clue who or what had done so to the sole of her right shoe's heel, Trinity set the pair aside and climbed into her pyjamas to her bed.
She couldn't sleep. Her already jam-packed mind now had one more item on the list: whoever inscribed her name on her shoe.
End of chapter