Chapter 7 – Love at first sight
George's stomach was filled with thousands of nervous butterflies as he waited on his date to arrive at the Leaky Cauldron in Diagon Alley. This was the first time George would meet his partner he had been paired with for the marriage law. George had been a bit conflicted about his paring, part of him was happy enough but the other part of him was gutted he hadn't been paired with someone he knew and liked such as Katie Bell. He did know a little bit about Laura Jones from their time at Hogwarts and he had played quidditch against her as she once played for the Hufflepuff team.
Finally the brown haired girl appeared, walking up the alley way with another younger girl. George's first impressions were that she looked very pretty in a flower print sun dress, cream coloured shoes and a black cardigan. She had teamed her long brown hair with a pink hairband.
"You must be Laura." George said in a cheery voice.
"I am indeed." Laura replied with a small smile.
"Hello there. I'm George." George introduced, holding out his hand for Laura to shake.
"It's lovely to meet you George." Laura replied.
"Shall we go on inside?" George asked.
"Yeah sure. I think we have a lot to talk about." Laura replied.
George led Laura into the pub and found them a table they could sit at in the corner of the room. It wasn't overly busy which both of them were glad about.
"Where do we start?" George asked in a nervous tone.
"From the beginning I guess." Laura answered.
"How about I get us a butterbeer first?" George offered.
"That would be great, thank you." Laura replied.
George got to his feet and headed over to the bar to get them both drinks. Moments later he returned with two glasses of butterbeer.
"Thank you." Laura said, accepting hers.
"So I guess we've been paired by the Ministry." George spoke, not beating about the bush.
"Yeah. It was a bit of a shock when I got my letters." Laura answered. "I didn't think I would be included since I'm technically from Northern Ireland."
"We thought that about my brother Charlie because he has lived in Romania and only came back over here to fight in the war." George said.
"My sister got paired too but thankfully she got paired with a guy she is good friends with. She was three years below us at Hogwarts." Laura said.
"How are you feeling about this marriage law then?" George asked Laura.
"Despite the shock, I'm very annoyed by the fact we're being forced to marry. It's not fair at all and because my parents are muggles they don't understand it." Laura answered.
"I think we're all feeling the exact same. My Dad works at the Ministry and has tried to talk some sense into Kingsley on numerous occasions." George said.
"Why exactly are they doing this to us?" Laura wondered out loud.
"The only answer we've gotten is that they want to protect magical blood." George answered. "Which is such a rubbish reason if you ask me."
"They might end up spilling more magical blood if people decide to fight against it." Laura said.
"I have a feeling the Ministry will have an uprising on their hands with people making a stand and yes you're right, more lives might end up being lost." George said. "Like if we don't agree to this they'll snap our wands and send us to Azkaban, surely that'll mean loss of magical blood too?"
"Exactly. It makes you wonder if they've seriously thought about all of this and the affect it's going to have on all of us. My sister is only 17 for crying out loud and this means she'll have to be married and have at least one child with magical blood before she's 20." Laura ranted. "What happens if the couples end up having squibs too?"
"I don't think they care about us at all because if they did, they wouldn't want to put us through more hell. Most of us have just came out of fighting in a war, we lost friends and family and should be focusing on rebuilding our lives and not worrying about planning weddings to someone we don't know or love." George ranted. "Who knows what would happen if the couples gave birth to squibs."
Despite the fact Laura and George didn't know one another, it appeared they were on the exact same wave length and had the same opinions on the marriage law. It was their ranting about the marriage law that appeared to break the ice between the couple and helped them fall into easy conversation.
"How is your sister taking the news?" George asked, showing some concern.
"She's distraught about it all, even though she knows the guy really well and they get on." Laura answered. "Mum and Dad want us to do something about it because she's so young but I don't know what we can do."
"You could always try and appeal against it." George suggested.
"Wouldn't she be paired with someone else then?" Laura wondered.
"Yes, she probably would. I don't know if you can appeal to be exempt from it completely." George said.
"There's got to be some loophole in this, some way that we can stop this from happening to help people like my sister." Laura stated.
"Hermione has already tried looking it up in her many books but hasn't found anything as yet. She's trying her best though to find some sort of a loophole." George said.
"How are your family doing?" Laura asked.
"Bill is exempt because he's already married. Charlie seems happy enough but he's not one to sit back and wallow about things. Fred got paired with Hermione and Ginny got paired with Harry so she's over the moon of course." George replied. "Oh and Percy got paired with his girlfriend so that's all good."
"What about you?" Laura asked.
"Me? Honestly I'm fine. Shocked at first like everyone else but I'm sure we'll get along nicely." George answered with a smile. "I just wish we had more time, you know?"
"Yeah. Don't we have to be married within a year and have at least child within three?" Laura wondered.
"Something like that. A year isn't a very long time to get to know someone, well not properly." George said.
"What do you think we should do?" Laura asked.
"I guess we should make a start on getting to know one another properly." George answered. "I know the situation is not ideal for either of us but I grew up trying to see the light in the dark times and the best in a bad situation." George answered.
"I suppose it could be much, much worse. I mean this time last year my sister and I went into hiding because we feared for our lives as muggle borns." Laura said.
"Where did you go too?" George asked.
"My grandmother's house in Northern Ireland. One of my friends from Hogwarts, came over and helped put every protective spell known around the place as her parents are very skilled in protective spells. I became secret keeper for it." Laura explained.
"Were you completely safe there?" George then asked.
"Thankfully we were. Our house was never attacked nor was our grandmother's house we were hiding out in. It could have been because we were in Northern Ireland and not over here but we were very, very lucky." Laura replied.
"You were very lucky indeed." George said.
"I just wish I could have did more to help. We offered my friend and her family a safe house to stay in which is our family's holiday home at a local sea side town as her Mother is a muggle born witch, her father is half blood. Thankfully they were also kept safe but some weren't so lucky." Laura explained.
"That was a very kind thing for you and your family to do." George said.
"It was the least I could do. Another friend of mine who is also muggle born came to stay with us too while her family fled to America for the time being. They're all back together now though, safe and well." Laura said.
"Wow. Imagine if someone had set up a safe house for all the muggle borns to live in, somewhere that was completely protected against death eaters. That would have been a brilliant idea." George said. "It could have been set up somewhere in Ireland or a completely different country. Many innocent lives could have been saved."
"If only we could have thought about this sooner." Laura said with a defeated sigh. "My family would have jumped at the chance to help people."
"My family could have helped too with the protection of it all." George said. "Hopefully you muggle borns won't ever need to do that again or go through what you all went through. Hermione has already said she'll be fighting for your rights from now on."
"Hermione is an amazing witch. It would be brilliant to have someone like her as an ambassador for us muggle borns. It's also good to hear that not all pure bloods hate us." Laura said.
"I was brought up to respect everyone whether they were pure blood, half blood or muggle born. Maybe not death eaters though." George replied.
"When I told my Dad you were a pure blood wizard, he freaked out even more because he thought you'd hate me but I told him that you and your family weren't like that." Laura said. "I said that you were a very respectable wizarding family and that you were friends with a muggle born witch."
"That was very kind of you, thank you." George replied.
"I've always believed that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover or by their blood status." Laura stated.
"And that is a very good statement to believe in." George agreed with a grin.
