Memories of Ced
Chapter 5
Love and Learning. What a Mess We're In!
"Neville!" Katie ran after him, brushing tears away. I was shocked. I didn't mean this to happen! "Oh my Jesus...I'm so sorry. I didn't mean it, it just slipped out. After all...the trip was that originally. I...I..." Oh gawd. Now I was crying. George slipped a hand over my shoulders, patting me reassuringly. I looked up at him, my mascara running down my cheeks, like two twin waterfalls. I looked bloody awful.
"Hey," George muttered. "Let's go outside." The rest of the gang was looking at me sympathetically. Harry whispered something to Kaitlyn, and she hit him on the head. I laughed, smiling at the two.
"I'll go get Katie and Neville," Kristen said, standing up slowly. "They need to hear the real story. Poor Neville..." She waved a quick wave, and ran out. George and I continued out. Kristen was running towards the left, so we turned to the right. Silently we walked, walking past staring students. A few snickers surfaced, but one glare from George sent them off. Finally, the hallway filtered down to about two people, who quickly left. We now were standing in the hallway, all alone. All. Alone. Hiccuping a bit, I cleared my throat.
"She did originally love him...but obviously her feelings changed...I'm so stupid! I don't have any right to call myself a friend." Tears silently swam down my face. George took a tissue and wiped off the streaming mascara.
"It's not your fault. Everybody's awful at reading emotions. And in a few amount of days, all of your...all of our feelings have changed. Mine included. Jordan...I...I..." George's face was as red as his hair now. He took a deep breath. Dammit, just say it! I thought. We both know what the answer is. We both know what you want to say. "It's not your fault."
"I just wish that I could erase that statement...I wish that I never said that. Oh poor Katie." I broke out in loud noisy sobs. George leant in towards me, slowly, and kissed me. I was shocked. He kissed me! On the lips! I shot my eyes open, but closed them. You know what? I liked it. It felt right. We became lost in the passion of the kiss, lost like two star-crossed lovers finally meeting. After what seemed like ages, we broke apart. (In reality though, it was only about ten seconds. Still, that's long. Have you ever measured ten seconds?)
"I hate it when you cry," George said, smiling weakly. "And as you can probably tell, I love you. Now, let's right this wrong. Let's go help Neville and Katie sort this mess out."
"Okay!" I said, smiling. "Let's go. And I love you also. If you couldn't tell."
"Neville!" I yelled, chasing after him. He was fast. I never expected this. "It's not what it looks like!" I yelled, swerving around a corner. A teenage girl shrieked, and backed against the wall. She obviously wasn't expecting a thirteen year old blonde to come charging at her. "Cedric's over! He's dead! I moved on to somebody else! There's a new person in my life, and I'm yelling at him right now!"
"Well, why didn't you tell me about Cedric?" he snapped, as he spun around to face me. "I thought you told me everything...I thought that we were close. Why did you keep this from me?"
I sighed. "I really don't want to say this, but I guess I have to. Cedric never was a real love." There. I had said it. "You can never love a person that you've never met. You have to spend a good while with them in order to love. If you've never met them, then it's just a crush. And crushes always get crushed." Boy did that sound stupid.
"That's why they're called crushes," Neville said, chuckling weakly. "You get crushed. But with real love...there's only one person. What was it called? The blue thread or something..."
"The red string of fate," I said, smiling. "It ties you to your destined partner. And I think I've found mine."
"I've found mine also," he said, lightly. He put his hand on the nape of my neck, and I wrapped mine around his waist. We didn't need to kiss. This was enough. "I love you Katie," Neville said, putting his second hand on my head. As I looked into his eyes, I noticed how tall he was. Much taller than me, at least by three inches.
"Just think. All this time, I thought we were the same height," I said, laughing. I buried my face into his shirt, inhaling deeply. The sweet smell of his cologne filled my nostrils. "I love you so much Neville." Suddenly, my dad's voice rang in my head.
"Boys at this age are hormonally insane," it said, ringing in my head. "Boys at this age are hormonally insane. Boys at this age are hormonally insane." We had the condensed version of 'the talk' (condensed because I didn't want to go into...everything. And you normally do it with yer mom, so Dad sort of made me feel...weird.) about a week before Project R.I.P.C. And what a fricken good time to remember it!
"Neville," I said, pathetically. "You aren't going to get me pregnant or anything of the sort?" Please say no, I thought.
"Why the hell would I do that?"
I ran down the hall. Neville was nowhere in sight. Neither was Katie. "Neville!" I yelled, looking around the hall. He wasn't there. I ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time. My ponytail bobbed in time with the rest of my body.
"Door up ahead," I muttered, licking my lips. I ran out of it, looking around. "Katie! Neville!" I yelled, now a bit less enthusiastic. Running up five flights of stairs takes a lot out of you. Unfortunately, I couldn't see any of them. However, someone else caught my eye. "Fred!" I yelled, running towards a mop of red hair.
"Correct!" he said, smiling at me. "What can I do you for?"
"Have you seen Neville Longbottom or Katie Gill?" I asked, panting. To be honest though, it sounded more like this: "Have...haff, huff you...pant pant...seen Neville...huff huff haff...Longbottom or Katie...big breath Gill?"
"Katie Gill? Blonde girl who wears glasses? Gets way too exited about the simplest things?" Fred said, rubbing his chin.
"That's her! And I take it you know who Neville is, seeing as you're both in the same house." I smiled, panting still.
"Too true. Back to your question, I'm sorry but I haven't seen them anywhere." A scream interrupted our conversation, followed by a burst of laughter. "And now, I believe somebody has found and eaten one of our Canary Creams. Care to look?"
"Sure," I said, although a bit apprehensively. Canary Creams? I knew better to eat anything just laying out or anything given by a Weasley twin, so I wondered what heck this person went through. As I turned the corner, I saw. A rather overweight canary was fluttering about on the floor, next to a school bag. A group of Slytherins and a few Ravenclaws were laughing their heads off. I started to laugh also.
"Oh man, did Crabbe get it!" one of the Slytherins chortled.
"I guess now he'll think twice about eating random food," Fred said, laughing himself.
"Who was the canary again?"
"That Slytherin over there said Crabbe."
"Then I doubt he'll ever learn.'
"Eh, too true. Shall we go back to the Great Hall?"
"Sure!" I said, smiling. "Let's go!" Before we could move a muscle, a voice stopped us.
"Kristen!" It was Kaitlyn, running towards me with a worried look on her face. "Oh man, we've got trouble!"
"Is it about Katie and Neville?" I said, fearing for the worst. "Has something gone wrong?"
"It's not that," Kaitlyn said, sighing. "They're great. It's just...come to the Muggle Studies room. The boys have discovered the Internet."
"Oh my god..." I said, stifling giggles. "Oh man."
"Internet? What's that?" Fred said, frowning a bit. "Is this a Muggle thing? I never took Muggle Studies, I figured having Dad around the house would solve all my Muggle-related incidents."
"Both of you, just follow me." And for the second time in less than half an hour, I was running. Somebody up there wanted me to get more exercise. Various thought ran through my head as we descended flights of stairs. 'I wonder what they're looking at? Oh god, did Katie show them my Xanga? I really hope not. But...oh no, what if they're looking at porn? That would scar their little minds,' I thought, temporarily forgetting the youngest of them was fourteen.
"Go on in," Kaitlyn muttered, now out of breath. Running down stairs does that to you. As the three of us entered the room, I made a bolt for the computer screen. What in heaven's name were they looking at!
"Bother, bother, bother, bother, bother..." the computer said, to the utter delight of the six extra people, who had been in the Hospital Wing, plus Ron. Everybody was laughing their heads off. Seven chairs were crowded around the computer, Jordan and George sitting awfully close. Cat was trying the same technique Jordan was using, but she tried it with Ron.
"What the heck is that?" I said, shocked but amused.
"Potter Puppet Pals," Katie said, in mid-chuckle.
"I liked the part where he stopped moving," Pixelated-Puppet-Harry chimed. Real-Harry started to snicker.
Tense silence. "Let's do it again!" Pixelated-Puppet-Ron said. Real-Ron let out a snort of laughter, along with everybody else in the room, including me.
"Oh man, this stuff is good!" Jordan said, chortling with laughter.
"I told you it would be funny!" Katie said, grinning. "And next, we're going to Albinoblacksheep! It's full of equally funny crap!" Katie swelled with pride. Her knowledge of Muggle web sites proved to be superior in this one (and practically only) case.
"Oh yeah, ya'll have got to see the Llama Song," Kaitlyn said. "It's utterly funny."
"You know, I don't think I've ever seen the Llama Song before," I mused. "How does it go again?"
"Here's a-" About three hands clamped Kaitlyn's mouth shut. There was an awkward silence, as the five muggle boys in the room really did want to hear how the Llama Song went.
"Naked time!" Pixelated-Puppet-Dumbledore exclaimed, breaking the silence. The silence broke up, to fits of laughter. Everybody was laughing their heads off.
"All right, now it's time for trouble at Hogwarts! Ron, you'll enjoy this one," Kaitlyn said, hitting the back button, and clicking on the 'Trouble at Hogwarts' icon. The loading bar flashed for a moment, then the animation started.
"These computers obviously have Road Runner or something," Cat remarked.
"Yeah, People PC takes about five minutes to load this," Katie mused. I was about eighty percent sure she was silently cursing her Internet connection.
"And Katie? How did things work out between you and..." I made a head gesture towards Neville who was completly engrossed in the animation.
"I love you as a friend," Ron remarked to Harry after a very awkward pixelated scene. Fred and George were laughing their heads off about it.
"It turned out well," Katie remarked, smiling. "We made up, I explained to him what the deal was, and now everything's peachy. Nobody hates each other, everything's great, oh and by the way, we confessed our love to each other."
"Did you kiss?" I said, hopeless romantic popping out of me.
"Nope!" Katie said, smiling. "I'm alright though. There are more ways to show you love someone than holding someone tight and giving them kisses. Quietly watching over them from afar is another sign. Quote by Sailor Pluto, Sailor Moon manga volume six."
"Your nerd is showing," Cat yelled over her shoulder.
"At times like this, I wish I had a love. I'm fairly sure Kaitlyn and Cat feel the same," I said, smiling. Almost instinctively, my mind turned to Fred. I blushed heavily. 'Why did I think of him?'
"Shoot him!" Pixelated-Puppet-Ron yelled. The whole room exploded with laughter. Neville was wiping away tears of mirth, and it looked like Harry was making a mental note to actually try this on Voldemort.
"What is all this noise?" The only sound now was the sound of the computer. Ten bodies slowly turned around, ending up face-to-face with Severus Snape.
"We're in trouble, right?" Ron said, weakly. Neville had gone pale.
"Yes, Mister Weasley, you are in trouble." He turned to look at the computer.
"We love you Snape!" Pixelated-Puppet-Ron exclaimed. Snape frowned, as he turned the monitor off.
"We love you Snape?" Jordan offered, weakly.
"What is this..."
"Animation," Katie replied.
"Animation," Snape responded, sneering at Katie. She cowered under his glare.
"Potter Puppet Pals..." I said, grinning feebly. "It's really funny..." Even though the monitor was turned off, sounds of the animation still escaped from the speakers.
"Alas, a cornucopia of love," Pixelated-Puppet-Dumbledore said. Everybody, minus Snape, blushed.
"Teachers on this hall have complained about the large amount of noise coming from the Muggle Studies room," Snape said, looming over all of us. Neville emitted a little 'eep' of terror. "Be thankful that it's a Saturday, and that no classes are going on. I think that a detention per person and fifteen points per person should be taken away from all six of you."
"Don't do that!" I blurted out. "It's not their fault."
"Yeah!" Cat retaliated. "It was all five of us girls who insisted that the boys watch the animation. They didn't do anything wrong!"
Snape was quiet for a second, then turned to us. "Fifteen points per female, and detention for all of you. Now, what house are you girls in?"
"We're all in the same house," I offered.
"Which is..." Snape said, his penetrating stare staring straight through our souls.
"Hufflepuff," Katie remarked.
"Gryffindor," Cat quipped.
"Slytherin," Kaitlyn stated.
"Ravenclaw," Jordan said. Unfortunately for me, they all said their answers simultaneously.
"Which is it?" Snape icily said. Awkward silence.
"I guess Snape should hear the truth," Jordan muttered, frowning. The rest of us shakily nodded. George, Harry, and Neville all stood up and gave us 'don't do it' looks. Fred and Ron looked puzzled.
"Yeah," I said, smiling shakily. It took about five minutes for the whole story to be explained. "And that's why we're here," I finished, with some help from the others, and leaving out the bits about George/Jordan and Katie/Neville. "Are we in trouble?"
"You are in more trouble than you can ever imagine."
What shall become of our plucky heroines? Will they survive the wrath of Snape? Why didn't they lie? Oh wait, Snape's a Legilimense. Will Kaitlyn, Kristen, and Cat get boyfriends, or will they be expelled first? Why didn't they watch the Potter potter song instead of Potter Puppet Pals? A Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Weasley, Weasley!