Chapter Two
"And she was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen."
"She's dating Blake St. Clare."
"She had these eyes…so warm and kind…"
"She's dating Blake St. Clare!"
"And I think we really connected! You know, on a deeper level!"
"Ron!" Ginny cried, snapping her fingers in front of her brother's face, getting his attention at last. She grabbed the sides of his head with her hands and cranked his head toward the Ravenclaw table. "Blake St. Clare!"
The laughter if Blake St. Clare and his buddies filled the Great Hall as the rest of the students filed in for dinner. The two Gryffindors could hear them quite clearly from their table.
"She's dating THAT guy. She's out of your league. That's it. Over. Done with!" Ginny snapped angrily.
Ron inclined his head as his sister spun around to talk to her friends. Feeling terrible, he looked up at the Hufflepuff table, and there was the auburn hair and startling green eyes smiling around at her peers.
Ron's heart leapt. He stared at her, happiness beginning to fill him slowly, soon replaced by an extreme longing for her to be in his arms.
Lieca looked up from her table and, catching his eyes, smiled excitedly and waved happily.
Ron looked behind him, wondering who she was waving to. When he looked back, she was still waving and mouthing, "Ronald!" She was calling to him!
He flushed deep crimson, and, smiling back at her, waved shyly.
Before anything more could happen, Dumbledore gave the signal for the dinner to begin, and both Ron and Lieca turned to the food in front of them.
"Ron," came Harry's voice, making Ron's head shoot up in his direction quickly. "You've been in a daze all afternoon…what's up?"
Ron watched Harry pick at his chicken, waiting for Ron's answer. He hadn't told Harry about his brief encounter with heaven, only that he had sprained his ankle and that's why he was absent for Transfiguration. Presently, he shrugged and replied, picking up a bowl of mashed potatoes,
"Just the meds from Madame Pomfrey, I guess."
"Well, straiten up, mate!" Harry told him sternly. "We've got Quidditch matches coming, and I've heard Hufflepuff got this amazing chaser…"
But Ron stopped listening to his friend as his eyes rested on Lieca again, as he dreamily watched her laugh, smiling dopily.
Wednesday came and went quickly, s did Thursday, and soon Ron was waking and staring at the canopy of his bunk. He rolled out of bed groggily, pulled on his robes, and stumbled with Harry down to the Great Hall for breakfast on Friday.
He plopped himself onto the seat, and began to shovel sausages into his mouth, only grunting in reply to Harry's words, and….well… acting like a complete Neanderthal. As he swallowed a large amount of pumpkin juice and was about to let out a huge burp, there was a soft tap on his shoulder. He turned around grumpily, and was about to yell at the individual for interrupting his feeding frenzy, and finish off with a caveman belch, but instead he swallowed his pumpkin juice and began to turn red, staring, and silent.
"Um, hello, Ronald," Lieca mumbled, blushing. She looked nervous as she twirled her silky hair around her long fingers. "Sorry to interrupt you."
Ron shook his head a little too quickly. "N-no! Not at all!" He tried to keep his mouth closed as much as possible; for fear that maybe the belch might escape after all.
"Oh, good!" She said, giggling and smiling happily. "Well then, I was just wondering…um, if I could apologize for your ankle and buy you a butterbeer at The Three Broomsticks tomorrow?"
Ron couldn't control the wide grin that spread across his face. "R-really?" He choked out, feeling his heart fly.
She nodded cheerfully. "Sure! If you'd like."
"Yeah!" His voice cracked as it reached a high note and he cleared his throat and continued with, "ah… I mean…. Sure, why not?"
"Oh, terrific! I'll see you tomorrow then, hm?" She concluded, clapping her hands together. "So long, Ronald!"
Ron watched her depart, still grinning broadly.
"AHA!" Came Harry's voice from no where, making Ron jump several inches in his seat. "So THAT'S it!"
Ron spun around wildly to look at him. "What? Huh?"
Harry smirked, folding his arms and leaning back in his chair. "You Like her, don't you?" He asked smugly.
Ron shook his head frantically, waving his arms back and forth. "That's not true! What on Earth are you blabbering on about, Harry? I have no clue what you're talking about." And with that, he continued to scoop up large amounts of mashed potatoes into his open mouth.
Harry "psshawed" him, still smirking.
But despite his previous argument about not liking Lieca, she was all he could think of for the entire day. He achieved little in any of his classes, and there was to be found, on the corner of his history of magic paper, tiny hearts doodled all over.
By the evening, he could barely contain himself. He bid goodnight to Harry, Dean, Seamus and Neville, and crawled into his bed, but not before pulling the hangings around him. He grinned at the canopy above him. It was decided. Tomorrow, Ron would tell her how he felt about her. SHE'd asked HIM out, which meant she definitely liked him. And when he told her, she would run away with him and leave Blake St. Clare with naught but his muscles and his coolness to keep him company.
Ron stopped in the hallway and looked at his reflection in the mirror. His hair was combed, his teeth brushed, his face rigorously scrubbed. He straightened the collar of his hideous maroon jumper. He truly wished he had something more attractive to wear, but he really didn't. He grinned briefly at his reflection, then spun on his heel and continued down the corridor, finally reaching the front doors, and exiting the castle into the courtyard, where hundreds of other students waited.
"Hurry, Mr.Weasley, we wait for no Wizard!" called Prof McG.
Ron scurried past her and entered the gaggle of students queued at the front. At last, the horseless carriages arrived, and they began to file into them. Ron stood on his tip-toes, scouring the area for Lieca. Then, from behind him, a soft voice called out, like a gentle ripple on a pond,
"Ronald! Oh, Ronald!"
He spun around to find Lieca waving her hand at him, being pushed and shoved by her peers. She apologized to them and excused herself as they pushed her rigorously aside to get into the carriages.
Ron fought his way through the crowd towards her. A rather large Slytherin girl pushed him, and he went flying into Lieca. To stabilize himself and Lieca, he grabbed her shoulders, pulling her close to him. As their bodies pressed against each other, Ron caught the flowery smell of her orange hair. Holding her with both arms, he raised one hand to the back of her head and held it to his chest. He could feel her soft, silky hair beneath his fingertips. He could feel her small hands curling into fists as they pressed against his chest. Holding her like this felt so good. Shivers ran up and down his spine, and her smell was like an intoxicating perfume, putting him under into a state of utter contentment. Her presence alone was like a drug that provided him with an incomparable high. And then she spoke, her crystal-like voice echoing into his ears pleasantly…
"Ronald!"
He was startled at her surprise and instantly let go of her, stepping a few feet away. Oh man, he thought, scratching his neck as the last of the crowd dispersed around them. How long had he been holding her? Oh man. Her it comes. He was dead.
"Oh, look! It looks like Blake is waiting for us in that one!"
Ron's mind didn't fully comprehend at first. He still felt lost in some strange world where he was king and Lieca was his fair queen. He turned his body slowly to see what she was pointing at, and his mind went blank.
Blake St. Clare was waving to them from inside a horseless carriage, a big grin plastered on his stupid, handsome, Ravenclaw face.
Ron was about to accompany his love on a date with the man she loved. … Who wasn't Ron. At all.
When Ron and Lieca reached the carriage, Blake was waiting with open arms. He grabbed Lieca around the waist and held her for a moment, then lifted her into the carriage to sit beside him. He reached out a hand toward the tall, thin, weak frame of the pitiful Ron.
"Need a hand up, Ron?" he asked.
Ron shook his head fervently and pulled himself into the carriage, sitting at the far end, on the other side of Lieca.
"Oh, gosh," gasped Lieca, putting a dainty finger to her lush lips. "I'm sorry! Do you prefer me to call you Ron?"
Ron stuttered, turning pink. Up until now, he hadn't really noticed that she called him Ronald, where others called him Ron. Usually, he rather disliked being referred to as Ronald, but that was, of course, before he met Lieca.
"What ever you'd like," He told her shyly, and turned to look out the window.
From outside somewhere, someone blew a high note on a whistle, and the carriages jolted into action.
"It's so early!" Lieca said with a yawn.
Ron turned to smile at her and chuckled softly when he saw her tipping forward in her seat, eyelids drooping. She yawned again, and the contagious action spread to Ron, making him burst into a large yawn as well. The wide yawn triggered some sort of sleep switch in his brain, and he fell sideways into the wall of the carriage and closed his eyes to rest them. It really was quite early…
"Ron! Lieca! Wake up, guys! Gosh…"
Ron opened his eyes slowly to find Lieca was asleep on his shoulder. He blushed as Blake looked over at them, but he had no jealously on his face, he was frustrated, however, that they wouldn't wake up as quickly as he had hoped.
"We're here, c'mon!" He said.
Rubbing her eyes and cooing gently, Lieca awoke, pulling herself up from the seat to look out at the long and windy main drag of Hogsmead Village.
Ron followed her and Blake out of the carriage, and the three of them began to make their way towards the Three Broomsticks pub and inn. On the way, however, Blake was distracted by something in the window of a shop and stopped to gaze at it. Rona and Lieca slowed to a halt beside him. Blake pressed his finger against the window.
"No way!" He said enthusiastically, "the Harpies are in there, signing autographs!" He looked back at Ron and Lieca, grinning from ear to ear. "You wanna?"
Ron nodded heartily. "Yeah! You bet!" He beamed as Blake tore open the door of the shop and stood in line with the others. The Harpies were an amazing Quidditch Team. It was lucky for them to be here now. Ron smiled at Lieca, who returned it briefly, and stood out of the line-up, her arms crossed as she merely gazed out the window. Ron cocked his head to the side, confused, but shook off the confusion quickly as the Harpies keeper signed a copy of Quidditch Through The Ages in his name. He held the book close to him, elated, as he followed Blake outside.
"Awesome!" Blake whooped, gazing at the book fondly. "Lucky, eh, Ron?"
Ron nodded happily and continued with them down the street.
"What's say we stop off at Honeydukes?" Blake continued, to Ron's agreement and Lieca's brief nod. "Ha ha… Harpies!" He went on, grinning. "Best team EVER!"
Ron had to disagree, but before he could speak his mind, Lieca had spoken up.
"I beg to differ."
Blake's smile vanished and he groaned as he ran a hand through his curls. He rolled his eyes towards Ron and muttered, "Oh, don't start."
"Their beating is slipshod, their seeker's a cheater, and their keeper might as well be blind." Lieca explained, sounding miffed. "I've said it before, Blake, and I'll say it again: The Chuds are the ONLY team."
Ron's jaw dropped. Not only was he surprised and impressed by Lieca's passion for her team, but her team just happened to be Ron's favourite team, too, the team he had been about to protest with, before she had brought them up.
"Chud… Chudley Cannons?" He said in a quiet voice.
Lieca rounded on Ron. "You got a problem with the Chuds?"
He shook his head roughly. "No! No, not at all!" He assured her, waving his hands. "I love the Chudley Cannons!"
"Oh, great," Blake muttered, slapping a hand to his forehead. Lieca, however, beamed at Ron as they stepped into the open door to Honeydukes sweetshop.
After purchasing bags full of sweets, Ron, Blake, and Lieca made their way to Zonko's, still chewing on Chocolate Frogs and debating Quidditch teams. Inside, Blake shocked Lieca into anger with a rubber spider, and surprised Ron with a fake flobberworm he'd wanted. It sure was kind of him to buy it, Ron thought. He couldn't help noticing how little Blake and Lieca had in common and how much Ron and she had in common. He paused several times to wonder how on Earth they'd wound up together.
Meanwhile, Ron was realizing he liked Blake St. Clare.
"I just have to use the ladies room, find a seat, okay?" Lieca told the boys as they entered the Three Broomsticks.
Blake nodded and ordered three butterbeers from the waiter, before leading Ron to a table across the room.
"So, Blake," Ron piped up, eager for conversation. "I guess you and Lieca spend a lot of time together, huh?"
Blake sniffed. "Mmm, yeah, I suppose."
Ron frowned a little. "You suppose? Lieca isn't good company?"
The other man snorted and made a rude thrusting motion. "No, she ain't good COMPANY. I get my COMPANY elsewhere!...from the rest of the chasers on the Hufflepuff team, for instance!" And he slapped his knee jovially, guffawing as though this were the most spectacular joke.
Ron, however, was beginning to feel slightly sick to his stomach.
"You mean like… cheating on her…? But… you told me you love her!"
Blake shrugged. "That's what love is, ain't it? You get dinner see… but sometimes you want a little desert on the side!" And he continued to chortle like the disgusting pig he was.
Ron was shocked and horrified. "No, man…" he shook his head, but thought it better not to continue. Love… that wasn't love! Love is…inexplicable feelings, uncontrollable desires, for another person. When she's the only girl on your mind. You want to know everything about her, everything she loves and hopes for. You want to be with her to witness her every move, hear her every word, and feel her every touch, every breath. When it's enough to just lie in bed and hold each other… love is…
Ron stopped his thoughts short, just as he realized that everything he had just explained were his exact feelings for Lieca.
"But… this is just between us, right?" Blake confirmed, punching him softly in the arm. "We're buddies, right?"
"Y-yeah…right…"
At that moment, Lieca came from the bathroom, looking just as stunning as ever, and sat down beside Blake. The waitress meanwhile, brought their Butterbeers, and Ron saw, with extreme disgust, Blake was watching her and licking his lips.
"What were you guys talking about?" Lieca asked.
Ron hesitated, looking from Lieca to Blake. Blake squinted his eyes a little in an 'ImgoingtohurtyouifyoutellWeasley' look.
"I…um…" Ron sighed heavily, looking down at his drink. "…Nothing," He said at last.
And they went on sipping their Butterbeers, and Ron felt his heart burst.