XVII
Firewhisky, Tabletops and the
Mother of All Hangovers.

-x- Katie Bell & Fred Weasley –x-

'I'm going to have to drunkenly
confess to you
That you drive me crazy
And you know it's true
And yeah, maybe
I might have to kiss you.'

The Gryffindor Tower was in a state of enjoyable chaos as one Fred Weasley clambered into it via the portrait hole at eight o'clock that night.

Covered completely in scarlet and gold and crowded to the point of claustrophobia as almost every single Gryffindor student in the school partied away, the Common Room exploded with cheers when he walked in, still dressed in his muddy quidditch robes and a huge grin plastered across his dirty face as he, George and Katie Bell dumped their armfuls of "borrowed" food and drink upon a couple of coffee tables.

'WE WON THE CUUUPPPP!' roared Lee Jordan over the cheers and instantly the whole room seemed to quake as everyone began to scream, if it were possible, even louder.

Laughing raucously, Fred allowed himself to be smothered in hugs and claps on the back before frowning slightly and breaking away from the crowd as his captain, the Scottish maniac Oliver Wood sprinted through the mass of scarlet-clad students and swept Katie up into his arms, spinning her around with joyous yells. Shrieking with laughter, she gripped his forearms tightly as he spun around and around, knocking people over left, right and centre.

Scoffing, Fred rolled his eyes and cracked open the bottle of Firewhisky he had nicked from the kitchens when Dobby had had his back turned. A sour look on his face, he poured himself a shot and chucked it down his throat, wincing slightly as it burned on the way down, instantly warming him from the inside out.

'Pour me one, Fred?' he heard someone call and he turned to see Angelina Johnson, of all people, standing a few feet away with an expectant grin.

'You?' he spluttered, staring at her, 'you want alcohol?'

'Why not?' she replied with a shrug, 'you only party like this once.'

'We might win again next year,' he argued before catching the look on her face and hastily pouring one for her and another for Alicia who standing beside her smiling dreamily as George and Lee practiced their vaulting skills on the fading scarlet lounges to the tumultuous applause of the crowd.

'Here,' he said, walking over and handing the two girls their shot glasses.

'Eurgh, no thanks Fred,' said Alicia with a grimace, handing the glass back to him, 'why don't you give it to Katie? You know she'll try anything.'

'Um, she's also younger than us,' Fred remarked pointedly, the alcohol not his only concern as he watched his young friend talk animatedly with their seventh year Captain, who was looking a little too engrossed in the conversation for his taste.

'Aw, c'mon Fred, don't get all protective on her, she's only a year behind us,' said Alicia, a glint in her pale blue eyes that annoyed him, 'besides I bet she's really funny when she's drunk.'

Shrugging, he ambled over to Katie, who was now having her thigh slapped by Oliver in what Fred felt was an unnecessary kind of way and handed her the glass. 'Here Kates.'

'Are you trying to get me drunk, Fredrick Weasley?' she asked obnoxiously with a grin, accepting it and sniffing it suspiciously.

'Yep,' he replied with a grin, feeling his stomach roar with approval as Oliver looked slightly put-out.

'Don't you think she's a little young for Firewhisky?' said the older boy with a glance at the amber liquid, 'she's only fourteen.'

It took all of Fred's strength not to immediately fire back with "well apparently she's not too young for you", but he managed to successfully hold it in, instead duplicating Katie's shot glass and handing the new one out to him.

'Here, now you don't have to be jealous.'

Katie snorted with amusement and threw back her shot, coughing a bit as it went down. 'Ooh, that's strong.'

As he raised one ginger eyebrow, Fred felt a deliciously evil plan formulate in his brain. Reaching out for her glass, he refilled it and then duplicated it, raising his own in a toast. 'To the Cup!'

'To the Cup!' Katie echoed and together they threw back their shots, a disgruntled Oliver scowling as they did so.

'Nice of you to include me in on the toast, I'm only your Captain and all,' Oliver said dejectedly, getting up from the couch and grinning at Katie, 'I'm going to go and spike Percy's butterbeer, want to come?'

Thinking quickly, Fred flicked his wand wildly and music began to play, swiftly filling the Common Room. Startled but pleased, many of the students began to dance around them, gyrating and swaying to the beat.

'Want to dance?'

Katie, torn, looked from one to the other before leaping to her feet.
'Actually, I'm going to go and talk to Ange and Alicia.'

Oliver's face fell, but Fred felt his light up. His plan was working just how he wanted it to…

Over the course of the next couple of hours, Fred hung back behind the main crowd of people, watching with amusement as Katie got more and more tipsy with every distant refilling charm he placed on her shot glass. He could tell that Oliver knew exactly what was happening (the back of his head felt disturbingly prickly, as if the two large brown orbs of the Scotsman were boring holes into it), but had apparently decided that Katie was out of bounds and was now chatting up Angelina, who was apparently as delighted with this idea as one could get.

There was, however, one slight flaw in his plan – a flaw that he had failed to notice and therefore remedy – and that was the constant stream of Firewhisky he was consuming himself. Every time Katie struck up a conversation with a guy that wasn't him, Fred, in what could very nearly be deemed as unconscious action, would throw back a shot, and as Katie was quite the social butterfly, this was quite often. In fact, by the time the school clock tolled eleven, he was having trouble aiming his refilling charms properly and had already accidentally set Hermione Granger's cat Crookshanks on fire twice.

'Not looking too good, brother of mine,' remarked a voice from beside him and he turned in a slightly groggy fashion to see George standing beside him with a wide smirk on his freckled face, 'you're a git, you know that? Never think about anything, do you?'

'I have the sudden urge to do something incredibly brave and impressive,' muttered Fred, completely ignoring his twin, and with an unsteady salute, strolled off towards Katie who was now accidentally sloshing firewhisky all over a disgusted looking Percy.

'Kate-ayyy!'

Turning unsteadily at the sound of her name, Katie began to giggle hysterically.
'Hey Freddie! Haahaa, I was jusht telling Pershy the funniesht joke ever… you haff to hear it.'

'Dance with me, love?' he asked, apparently able to hold his firewhisky, and consequently his vocabulary, a bit better than the now totally trashed little blonde.

She scrutinised him with glazed eyes for a moment before nodding, throwing her arms around his neck. 'I don't like thish shong much though.'

Fred laughed.
'What d'you want to listen to?'

'Michael Jackshon,' she replied firmly and then bursting into giggles at the bemused look on his face.

'Who the bloody hell's that?' he asked, bewildered, as she laughed at him.

'Muggle shinger,' she said, grabbing his wand and pointing it at the small music contraption that was humming away happily in the corner, brandishing it wildly and accidentally blowing it up, 'Oopshs.'

'Never mind, Kates,' he said, snorting with laughter and gently extracting the wand from her grip, 'c'mon, why don't you sit down and I'll get us some butterbeers?'

Nodding complacently, she sat down meekly upon the abandoned scarlet lounge and watched with half-conscious interest as he walked over to the table and cracked upon a pair of butterbeers, bringing them back and sitting down next to her with a smile.

'Fanks Freddie,' she said with a wobbly raise of her bottle before taking a swig from it.

'You, my dear Katie, are completely trashed,' he remarked, taking a large gulp of the slightly off-tasting butterbeer.

'Am not!' she protested, sloshing a bit of her drink onto her filthy quidditch robes, 'am not, am not, am not!'

'Mmhmm, sure,' he replied, rolling his eyes and exchanging looks with Oliver, who was sitting in the armchair next to them with an unusual glint in his brown eyes.

'He's right Kates,' said their captain, 'you're completely tras-'

'And this butterbeer tastes funny,' remarked Fred, glancing down into the tankard with a shrug, talking straight over the top of Oliver, 'ah well, I've been drinking firewhisky all night, probably just forgotten how it tastes…'

It was apparent about half an hour later, however, that there had indeed been something funny about his butterbeer when he had the sudden, completely drunken urge to clamber atop the nearest coffee table and bellow "OI!" as loudly at the crowd of students as he possibly could.

Shocked, they all stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at him as he swayed unsteadily above them, a huge, stupid grin plastered across freckled, somewhat flushed face.

'I proposhe a toasht to Katie Bell,' he slurred, brandishing an empty tankard above his head wildly, 'becaushe she ish the mosht beautiful girl in thish room!'

There was a moment of bewildered murmuring, in which the crowd seemed to discuss this before they all raised their assorted beverages and shouted 'To Katie!'

Katie herself was half-asleep by this time, the firewhisky really taking its toll on her body and she was lying sprawled across the lounge giggling quietly, amusing herself now and then by flicking bits of chip and cake at Oliver who was sitting in the armchair beside her watching on with an expression crossed between amusement and disgust.

Nodding self-satisfactorily, Fred cleared his throat.
'Katie, I haff somefink to shay to you… ahem, I lurve youuuu – whoa, argh!'

Toppling off the table, he landed spread-eagled beside the lounge, looking up at her with a drunken smirk. 'Kishh me, Katie?'

'Alllll riiight then,' she slurred in reply and bestowed a rather wet, completely misaimed kiss upon his nose.

-x-x-x-

'Get up, you stupid git.'

Awoken in a most unpleasant way by a violent kick to his ribs, Fred blinked blearily up at three identically blurred versions of George, all of whom were looking down at him with a mingled expression of amusement and disgust.

'Whatsatime?' he muttered, groaning painfully as a blinding headache hit him with full force.

'Time you got a brain,' replied his brother who exchanged a glance with three Lee Jordans, 'you do realise Oliver made you look like a complete fool?'

'What's Oliver got to do with this?' Fred asked as he sat up slowly, 'I just thought I had the mother of all hangovers.'

'He spiked your butterbeer,' answered George as a feeble female groan issued from somewhere to Fred's right – or was it left? 'by the time the party was finished last night you'd screamed your undying love for Katie about four times and even managed to have a really messy snog with her underneath the coffee table – something that, hopefully, she won't remember, being the only other person more trashed than you.'

'I kissed her?' Fred echoed in wonder, glancing around at the lounge where the topic of their conversation was batting Lee away with one shaky hand, the other holding her pounding forehead gingerly.

'Not really, no,' replied George, 'more like drowned her in saliva.'

'Oh.'

Clambering to his feet with the help of his twin, Fred shuffled over to Katie and sat down gently next to her sprawled body.
'You all right, Kates?'

'I feel like someone hit me in the skull repeatedly with a beaters bat,' she replied sourly, grabbing his shoulder for support and sitting up slowly, 'you're a git, I can't believe you got me drunk.'

'I'm sorry Kates,' he said quietly, moving so that he had an arm around her to support her, 'I just – never mind, you're right, I am a git.'

'A git that's in love with me though, eh?' she replied with a weak laugh as he paled visibly, 'turns out maybe I wasn't more trashed than you, after all, huh Fred?'

He groaned, pressing his forehead into her shoulder with mortification.
'You remembered? Fred Weasley, you're an idiot.'

'True, true,' she said stroking the back of his ginger head with one shaky hand, 'but a lovable one, so it's okay.'

Looking up at her, he grinned.
'Really?'

'Really,' she affirmed, placing a chaste kiss on his lips.

'Right, well I'm just going to go and help Lee locate Oliver,' said George from a few metres away, a grimace on his face, 'and then maybe later when you feel up to it Fred, you can come and free him from the broom shed and beat him senseless..?'

'There's no need,' Fred replied happily, grinning broadly, 'he's a good guy, is old Oliver.'

George stared at him.
'I think Oliver put worse than alcohol in your butterbeer… Lee! Quick! Find Dobby! We need a hangover cure and an antidote for Essence of Insanity!'

'So, I'm thinking,' said Katie softly when George had finished noisily vacated the building, 'that we should probably win the Cup next year so we can have another party and get Alicia and George together.'

'That's my girl,' Fred replied, beaming at her before starting to ham it up with his usual theatrics, 'I'm so proud, you're growing up Katiekinns.'

'Shut up Fred, Merlin you're an idiot sometimes,' Katie said, rolling her eyes and leaning in to kiss him.

'Ah,' murmured Fred into her mouth, still grinning, 'but I'm a lovable one, so it's okay.'

A/N: lyrics used - "Love List" by Eskimo Joe.

the last one! -sniffs pathetically-
i'm kinda going to miss these.. hmm. but yes, all over.
oh, and sorry this was a day late, Giddy, by the way.. i was doing so well until yesterday. lol. i hadn't missed a day yet.

ah well. hope you enjoyed it darlin' and thanks so much to everyone else who reviewed - you guys are so awesome! made my day for seventeen days, pretty much, those great reviews! thank you!

love,
Ash x