Chapter Two: First off - Memories
The girl who steps through the smoke and the noise of Platform 9 ¾ is very short. Dwarfed by the majority of students bustling around her, she struggles valiantly with a trolley nearly as tall as she is, and a pile of luggage twice her height.
"That one'll be in Gryffindor," a nearby Ravenclaw remarks to her friend, with the eyeroll of one who knows how foolish they can be. She notices the presence of a redhead with an inane grin plastered on his face, and hurries away, unconscious of the small bird that seems to have magically appeared on her curly head, and which is singing, rather loudly, an inaccurate rendition of one of the muggle songs that have become so popular.
The twin catches sight of the pixie-like face and the short blond hair, which swings around her face in a silky waterfall that only enhances the impression. Her mouth is open in a wide grin, but she's hiding it now that the Ravenclaw is looking round for the source of that song. A busy student catches her robes as he strides past, too busy to realise that she's stumbled now, and that the train is getting ready to leave.
"'Ere, Forge, get your backside over here! There's a lady that requires our assistance!"
He gallantly assumes the role of her Knight-in-shining-armour, levitating her birdcage and a suitcase (only a little shakily) off of the trolley. His brother now appears on her other side, but he doesn't bother to levitate the trunks – merely pushes them haphazardly off the metal trolley and grabs one in each gangly arm. He grunts and lifts them, gesturing for her to get on the train.
"Why is it that girls always bring so much damn luggage with them?" he grumbles, and then seems to notice the bird which she has relieved from Fred's rather questionable levitation charm. "Falcon?"
"Peregrine," she nods.
"Bit of a weird name. Why not something short, like Pig?" He smiles wickedly. "Always wanted to call a bird that." The train is lost in a haze of blue smoke, and the first year seems to realise that the shrill whistle piercing the air is a signal that it's about to leave.
"Yeah, better not hang about," his twin confirms, uncannily reading her thoughts. "Here, take this case, will you? What's your name?"
"Katie." She gives up with the birdcage and discards it, feeling only a slight twinge of guilt because her aunt gave her the wretched thing. Mel's sat on her shoulder, and she barely feels the prick of his talons through her thick jumper and robes. She makes a silent note about putting on the shoulder pad on the train at some point.
She feels a little lost. The boys (who look about second-year) have disappeared through the blue smoke, and she doesn't know where to go. Memories of Leanne telling her about Hagrid surface, but even he seems to have gotten on the train now.
Katie feels a vicelike grip on her shoulder (not the one that Mel is sitting on, thankfully). She meets two pairs of very blue eyes.
"Aren't you coming, then?"
Present Day
Katie's POV
Two pairs of hands descended on me from out of the cold, grey dawn. They shook me mercilessly, accompanied by voices I could only liken to vultures faced with the particularly juicy remains of a wildebeest.
"Katie!" they hissed, and the hands clawed at my shoulders again. I muttered; made some sort of incoherent noise that translated as BACK OFF! and promptly felt, with satisfaction, the punishing wakefulness recede. Muffled voices, distorted through a dozy haze, conversed in quiet tones. I snuggled deeper into the warmth of my bed, not caring about the noise as long as I wasn't being shaken anymore.
The bedclothes were ripped mercilessly off my curled up form. I shivered with the unexpected cold, cracking my eyes open to glare at my tormentors.
"Alicia and Angelina! You're fifth years. Why are you in my room?" I asked, bewildered.
"Quidditch practice," Alicia informed me gleefully. I peered at the Muggle alarm clock Leanne had perched precariously on her bedside table. The glowing digits taunted me.
3:15am.
The sun wasn't even up yet. "You two," I growled, shivering from the cold, "are about to experience my wrath." Alicia took one look at my tiny form, my feet encased in particularly lumpy socks (compliments of our house elf at home), shivering pitifully in the middle of the huge four poster, and burst into raucous laughter. Angelina soon joined her. Leanne woke up, glared at the two and yelled,
"PIPE IT DOWN! Some of us are trying to sleep here!" They subsided a little. Leanne could have been a darn good beater if we hadn't already had Fred and George.
I sighed. "Why don't you listen to me like that?" I asked pathetically.
"Because you're not truly angry, imp. It's only when you're furious that there's a need to run away from you." The voice emanated from the doorway, and sounded decisively twinnish.
I shrieked, snagging the bedclothes forcefully from Alicia's slack hands and burying my body into the mattress. "YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE IN HERE EITHER!" I yelled from beneath the covers. Fred made his way over to my bed and twitched the blanket so all I could see were a pair of irritatingly cheerful blue eyes.
"We're your best mates, George and me!" he said, sounding hurt.
"HUMBUG!" I cried, shutting my eyes again. "No one who wakes me up before dawn in spring can call themselves my best friends!" I sighed, whining: "No one respects me around here."
"You were already awake when we got here," George pointed out, gesturing wildly with his broom. "It's them you should be hating. We're simply your partners-in-crime." His comment was well calculated, and his smirk as I sat bolt upright in bed told me that he knew it. Smooth prat. However, I couldn't help but love the anticipation rolling in my gut.
"Alright," I announced, and Fred patted his brother on the back. Good work, he seemed to be saying. They retreated to the doorway as I leapt for the robes tumbled so messily on the chair near my bed.
"You know," commented Angie thoughtfully, "it was always my guess that you are supposed to hang your robes up when you aren't using them." A white smile crinkled her beautiful face as the twins and I turned to her in stunned shock. She does have a point though, my inner voice prompted as my eyes glanced guiltily at my Quidditch robes, bespattered with mud, creased from use, and grass stained.
"Scourgify," I muttered in their general direction, choosing to ignore Angie's smug look. "Everybody out so's I can change," I ordered a moment later, and this time no one argued. "I have a certain Quidditch captain to liquefy." Fred, George, Alicia and Angelina all stopped at that.
"No one's doing any liquefying today, little imp," George said carefully. "That's definitely not in the plan. The prank's tomorrow, and we have a little special harmless occasion for our dear captain at practice today. Harmless," he reiterated. "Except to his pride."
Alicia nodded, agreeing with her boyfriend. "We don't want you to get hurt, Katie," she said, though the look she shot George clearly said what 'little special harmless occasion'? Why haven't I been told?
"HURT?" I yelled, my tones piercing the air. "You can't possibly be enough of an idiot to think that I'm afraid of Wood, can you?" Angelina sent me a reproving, unbelieving stare, which was in unison with the other looks sent my way. "What?" I queried, exasperated.
"Totally clueless," Fred muttered. His brother agreed with him. Angelina took the role of telling the little girl (moi) what she hasn't quite realised yet. Which, incidentally, is always really irritating.
"Haven't you noticed that Oliver's got about half the population following him around like hapless puppies?" she asked me tentatively.
"Why would anyone want to do that?"
"The – the female side of Hogwarts, you daft girl!"
I was still totally incomprehensive of what they were trying to imply. I said as much.
"I don't get it."
"Now who's being the idiot?" Alicia said smugly. I ignored her, silently pleading the twins to help me, but they had a cornered look I rarely ever saw except when they were faced with an angry Molly Weasley.
"It's girl stuff, imp," George said hurriedly, and turned to Alicia for help.
"Katie," Alicia began slowly, with the air of one who is laden with the task of explaining something difficult to a small child. "Katie, haven't you ever noticed that Oliver Tobias Wood is good looking?" As I continued to look at her blankly, she made a frustrated noise.
"Gorgeous?" Fred supplied, still looking unsure, but game to join in and help.
"I was thinkin' more along the lines of way up there with regulation hotties, Gred," George said. Fred gave him a weird look. "I think it's an American expression," he explained with a shrug. "Heard about it from those movies Dad's always in ecstatics over."
"Moo-vees?" I asked. My mind was refusing to work. "What're they?" Angelina shot George a glare.
"That's not important right now."
"Oh, right." I tugged at the tousled strands atop my head. My face lit up, and something clicked. "Sorry, we were talking about how Oliver Wood's hot and how his fan club might be baying after my blood like a pack of werewolves if I so much as harmed a hair on his bonny wee head. ¿Eso verdad, mis capitanes?"
"Got that one reet."
"Got it in one, lass."
"Ye've got a guid sortae noggin on that neck o' yourn, impie."
"ENOUGH WITH THE PAINFUL SCOTTISH ACCENTS!" I yelled. "I need to get ready, or Wood will have our backsides!"
"You saying you don't like our dear captain's accent?" Fred gasped as he was forcefully shoved through the door, along with the others.
"I'm saying that any accent belonging to anyone at half-past-three in the morning merits its owner worthy of execution by beheading," I concluded, and with a tired grunt of exertion clicked the door closed behind them. I didn't get back to my robes in time to miss Fred's satisfied comment.
"The captain isn't going to know what's hit him."
Indeed he isn't, I thought grimly.
"Line up," Wood barked, his cheeks stung red from the cold. Everyone was shivering, but it wouldn't be like that for long - not if our dear captain had anything to do with it. It was only half past three, after all, and late spring in Scotland is nothing like spring in the Bahamas. He soon had us executing practice drills to warm up, Harry darting around the top of the arena, looking a little apprehensive, and Fred and George batting a bludger between them just a little lower down.
I could understand Harry's nervous glances at the sky around him. It didn't surprise me that he had slipped his wand in his pocket, just in case. Dementors aren't terribly fun spectators for our noble sport. They tend to get in the way a little.
I jumped as Wood swooped past me, bellowing for me to catch the Quaffle and get up towards the goalposts. I caught the dark red-brown ball under one arm (a mite dazedly) and streaked down towards the posts, where Wood was circling almost lazily. My eyes narrowed. Today, my captain would not be able to accuse me of not giving my all. When I'm actually paying attention, and not larking around with Fred and George, I can score pretty well. Just not against - him. It's no wonder that Puddlemere United are so excited that he's graduating. He's a damn fine Keeper.
I felt the twins' eyes on my back, encouraging me. Even Alicia and Angie were finding it difficult to keep their attention confined to the exercise they were doing. I felt power coursing through my veins, filling me with eager, assured confidence. This time my dear friend was not going to catch the Quaffle. If I had anything to do with it, he was going to miss.
With my arm bent back and the wind whipping all around me, I lunged to the side as though going for the left hoop, but, in the midst of my dramatic leap off of my broom, swivelled as my hand latched onto the solid wood, and threw the Quaffle towards the right. Fred, George and I had been practising this for weeks. A feint never threw Oliver, and neither did simply passing it with force right towards his face, and we had known that he was almost impossible to fool. Angie and Alicia hadn't known about this. Neither had Wood. With both hands free, I swung back onto the broom with a feeling of ecstasy swelling up in my gut. The Quaffle had soared gracefully through the exact hoop I had aimed for.
I hadn't expected it to work. I had expected a rather bone-crunching fall, possibly, or the even more gut-wrenching thought that Oliver would manage to save it after all of that, but it had worked.
"Bell, LOOK OUT!" Fred roared from behind me, just as the bludger which they had completely forgotten made hard contact with the back of my head. Pain erupted in a tidal wave as blackness claimed me.
White. Why is it that whenever someone who has been wounded wakes up, the first thing they usually see is white because one or other of their friends carried them up to the hospital wing? It's just so - clichéd.
It's also the worst colour for someone who has a head-splitting migraine.
I groaned as I saw the potion gripped in Madame Pomfrey's square hands, with the top already unstoppered. Any further complaints were muffled as the tip of the bottle was shoved in my mouth, forcing me to swallow the burning liquid. It wasn't too unpleasant, if you compared it to the bone-growing stuff she keeps in her cupboards, but it had a distinctly thick, cloggy feel to it. It tasted patently like other pain-relieving potions Madame Pomfrey kept in her cupboards, but just a few levels nastier. I registered the fact that I was alone (apart from the Mediwitch) as soon as I had finished choking.
"Madame Pomfrey," I rasped, feeling the mind-numbing pain in my head begin to recede to a pulsing beat even as I spoke. "Where are the others?" She sniffed.
"I sent them back to their dormitories, dear. They couldn't stay here the entire night. They were driving me up the wall, Wood especially." She paused. "They are outside, if you really want to see them," she admitted grudgingly.
Wood? I stared at her dumbfounded, then realised after a moment what she was saying. I agreed eagerly, still a bit preoccupied with why Wood, of all people, would have driven her up the wall. He's fairly good with authority, except when said authority interferes with Quidditch - but honestly? He's just not the rebellious type, exactly. The smooth, charming, Quidditch-obsessed, smarter-than-anything, player Scotsman type, perhaps. My thoughts were abruptly stopped as the team bundled into the ward, spewing anxious questions (the girls' part) and congratulations (the twins') that I had pulled it off.
"Sorry about the bludger, imp," George said, a little apologetically, reaching out a hand to ruffle my hair. I grabbed his hand, keeping it away from my sore head.
"Erm, remember, George? Bludger plus Katie's head equals big migraine and not-good-to-ruffle head," I informed him, still looking warily at his hand. He had the grace to look a little guilty - even if the emotion only stayed on his face for a few moments. I realised Wood was missing.
"Where's our dear Captain, Angie?" I asked.
"In the showers," she informed me sheepishly. I was gobsmacked.
"I'm far from wanting his concern, and even less his praise for that rather spectacular goal (though I do say so myself) - but why in the name of Merlin's pink woolly PYJAMAS isn't he up here? I just got hit with a bludger in the back of the head!"
"I didn't know he had pink pyj-". George's quip was muffled into silence by the withering glare sent by an irate Angie in his direction.
"George," she warned him. His smirk left her infuriated, but cheered me up a little. Good to see my friends were here. Even if that good-for-nothing Captain of mine wasn't bothered whatsoever with my well-being.
Please don't get me wrong. The only opinions I remember ever having cared for are the twins', on occasion Angie's and Alicia's, and the professor of the only subject I'm really good at - which happens to be Flitwick. Charms is something I can relate to, considering that I really like using certain spells in the pranks the twins and I pull. But Wood is different. He let me onto the team in second year, which was an impressive feat until Harry came along (not that I minded), but honestly - if his head isn't preoccupied with being a player (and I'm not just talking about Quidditch), then he's furiously scribbling in that infernal match journal of his, working at plays.
It just hit me. The prank. Supposed to be this morning. Me - incapacitated in the Hospital Wing. Twins - still alive and kicking, and more than likely wanting to exact full revenge for the crack-of-dawn torture yesterday - Friday - morning. My irritation evaporated, and pure glee set in.
"How does our dear Wood look like with a prince's silky blond locks, mes capitaines?" I asked, a purely impish look beginning to dawn.
"Don't know yet, Kates. If you'll remember, it's up to him to do the dirty deed." George nodded solemnly in agreement with his twin's statement. Ange and Alicia just looked confused.
"We slipped a certain form of ladies' peroxide into his shampoo and conditioner," I explained, suddenly filled with an understandable urge to head towards the common room.
"That's not particularly original," Angie said, raising an eyebrow. Fred gave a gleeful look.
"That's not the trick."
"It's not?"
"No, Alicia, it's not. It's just supposed to make him incensed enough to make a rare entry into the common room."
I was finding it difficult to concentrate. There was a pounding in my head that made my eyelids feel heavy and my neck feel sore. If I was allowed to get out of this infernal hospital wing, I wouldn't complain of it! Madame Pomfrey glided over as though she had heard my desperate plea. She looked at my cheeks, possibly flushed, pressed an expert hand to my forehead, and then felt my wrist. She raised an eyebrow, and asked, "Does your head hurt?"
"There's only a small pain nagging at the back there," I fibbed, avoiding her gaze so she wouldn't be able to tell just how much it really hurt from my dilated pupils, which I was sure were making up overtime for me being unconscious for more than 36 hours. The potion I had just swallowed had relieved me for an impressive total of five minutes. The mind-numbing pain was back with a vengeance.
"Nothing a small shot of common headache potion won't handle," I added, fixing a thoughtful expression onto my face and wishing that she'd turn that perceptive look elsewhere. The greying, red-cheeked Mediwitch in front of me nodded hesitantly, but said, almost severely,
"I'm afraid that that headache potion wouldn't do a jot of good, Miss Bell. The injury was induced from outside causes - not covered in a mild potion like that." She busily crossed over to a chair on the other side of the room, and I recognised my Quidditch robes (clean!) in her arms. "However, if the pain is more than you vouched for, Miss Bell, I think it might be wise for you to stay a few days longer. You would probably be able to go back on Monday morning."
Miss my weekend, and come back after the results of the prank have probably been stripped (quite literally) out of Wood's hair? I inwardly snorted. Not likely, Madame Pomfrey. Thanks for the offer though. Real appealing.
"I'm fine," I assured her out loud, standing up as steadily as I could, and telling my protesting body that it would all be worth it to see Wood's hair. I would scream into an obliging pillow later, perhaps.
Wood strode confidently into the room, seemingly unaware of his bleached hair. I was sat at a table before the fire, playing Exploding Snap with the others, which incidentally I was losing. I nursed blistered fingers as the flurry of cards suddenly slowed, followed by Fred nudging me slyly with his elbow.
I, preoccupied with trying to forget the pain in my head, failed to realise at first exactly what his gesture meant, but it hit me (rather forcefully) as I looked up. And I mean literally. I let out a loud oomph as the cushion he'd thrown with such deadly accuracy smacked me in the face. I threw it to the floor as Wood stomped up and growled,
"What do you think you were doing?"
"Well gee, I don't know Wood," I replied. "Repaying you for the oh-so-lovely torture sessions you ordered at dawn for the past month?!" His face assumed a puzzled expression.
"I'm not talking about the Hollywood beach style makeover you gave me!" he practically snarled, ignoring the perfectly good reasons I'd just given him magnificently. "I'm talking about that stupid, dangerous prank you pulled at the pitch!" His Scottish brogue was becoming thicker as he spoke. "I dinnae ken why ye'd do such a thing, ye stupid bairn!"
"Don't call me a child!" I yelled back. My forehead was pulsing with a vengeance. "If you weren't so damn good at Keeping then I might not have to resort to drastic measures! Besides, you needed taking down a peg or two!"
"And I suppose ye thought you were the one for the job?" His voice was dangerously low. and I suddenly realised how close he was. His dark eyes were burning, and I felt a sudden flutter in my stomach.
"BOTTOMS UP!"
The twins, who were standing behind him, now upended an entire bucketful of levitated Quick-Grow Grass-seed onto his curly head. The charmed bright green seeds lodged in his tanned skin, quickly taking root to form a luscious furry coat of grass sprouting in clumps on his arms, hands, face and head. I stood there, stunned that it had worked. I was practically unaware of the twins' ecstatic pumping of my arms in congratulations. We'd been working on that formula for weeks, but for the first time in all our years of pranking, it had been mostly my work.
"BE-LLLL!" the green Wood before me roared.
"Someone get Madame Pomfrey!" a sixth year prefect commanded. A first year hastened to do so, scampering through the door with the air of a startled rabbit. I was already leaping for the girls' dormitories, knowing that if I got to the top of the stairs, I would be safe. My lungs felt like exploding as I reached the landing, looking down in time to see my furious Quidditch captain tumble down the newly formed slide.
"Weasleys and Bell: 1; Quidditch-obsessed seventh year - zilch!" I declared in a sing-song voice. Beneath furry green eyebrows, dark brown eyes glared resentfully at me. I realised only as the first of the ornaments shattered to the ground at my feet that although boys might not be able to pass, charmed vases were not included.
So I did the only sensible option left.
I ran.
AN: Ah, that was fun to write. Did you enjoy it? Yes? No? Would you please review! REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW!
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Thanks to all the reviewers from Chapter One! You're very much appreciated.
- Colour Me Stunned