Part Five: Oliver Wood & Katie Bell
This Clock Never Seemed So Alive…
Leaning against the stone castle wall in a casual kind of grace, Oliver looked on in amusement as the five people in front of him waged a vicious snow war against each other. Shrieking as a snowball hit her in the side of the head, Katie shook her tousled mane of chestnut waves letting the snowflakes fall gently from her hair and settle back onto the ground. Grinning, she picked up a fistful of snow and using her well-honed Quidditch skills, faked a left then a right, before hitting redheaded George square in the face.
I taught her that… Oliver remembered proudly, snorting as Katie did a little victory dance, giving slight but fast Alicia time to exact revenge on her boyfriend's behalf, pouncing on her and burying the taller girl in the sea of snow.
'Come join us Oliver!' Katie yelled out to him after she'd managed to clamber out of the slushy mountain she'd been buried in.
Shaking his head, Oliver grinned.
'Nah, I'd rather watch you get pummelled, Katie my love!'
Smiling and shrugging, she dived back into the fray just in time to be taken out by tall and powerful Angelina. Yelping as Katie fell on top of him, Fred laughed manically before throwing her across the courtyard to land in a giggling heap on a soft cushion of the frozen powder.
I'm gonna miss this lot so much… Oliver thought to himself with a bittersweet smile. Especially Katie… He laughed as she pegged another snowball. Yes, especially Katie…
What day is it? And in what month?
This clock never seemed so alive…
As he watched his friends frolic in the snow, he realised with a shock, that it was less than three months until he graduated, meaning leaving the five of them behind at Hogwarts while he entered the real world… he had less than three months to make the most of something he'd taken for granted most of his school life, or in the case of Katie, his life in general.
Looking at her now, Oliver could hardly believe Katie was nearly sixteen. True, she looked older than sixteen anyway, with her deep, searching eyes, and well, dare he admit it, rather lovely body… but the fact remained, that it didn't feel like sixteen years since his life had been invaded by a screaming, red-faced little "bundle of joy" that belonged to his father's best friend, Andrea Bell, who had died barely a week after the so-called bundle was born.
Yes, though it pained him to admit it, Oliver was losing track of time.
For someone who was rigidly vigilant about things such as being on time for Quidditch practice, and being able to do a lap of the pitch in under a minute; this was excruciatingly unbearable.
…I can't keep up and I can't back down
I've been losing so much time…
'Hello? Earth to Oliver!'
Shaken out of his reverie by the sound of Fred's voice in his ear, Oliver turned quickly to see the redhead waving a frozen hand in his face.
'Wh-? Oh, sorry. What's up?'
Shaking his head, Fred looked at him sadly.
'If you like her, tell her, coz you're leaving soon and she's very popular.'
Frowning a little, Oliver looked at him strangely.
'What are you talking about Weasley?
Raising an eyebrow, Fred gained a more boisterous look on his face.
'You're in love with pretty little Kit-Kat, aren't you Ollie?'
Grimacing at the use of the prissy nickname, Oliver shook his head sternly, though his insides were squirming around worse than Flobberworms in mating season. 'I'll have you know, Weasley, that I happen to be woman-free at the moment… taking a while to reflect on what I have and the like.'
'Well then, that's ironic,' commented George, walking up behind him and throwing an arm around his neck, 'because I hear our dear Miss Bell is tired of being single.'
'Sh-she is?' he asked, cursing his stomach and whatever higher power had created love and all its quirks… such as butterflies and loss of speech.
'She is.' affirmed Fred with a smile, glancing at George whose face split into an identical grin, and without any warning whatsoever, they pushed him off the edge of the steps.
Letting out a strangled yell as he fell from the little ledge, Oliver landed with a thump in the snow beside Katie, who, he noticed, was looking particularly stunning this afternoon, with her cheeks all flushed like that.
'Oh, well thank you.' She said with one delicate eyebrow raised, her cheeks going a little redder.
'What?' Oliver asked, before shutting his mouth and clambering to his feet. He always had the habit of saying what he thought when he was a little shaken.
…Cause it's you and me and all of the people with nothing to do
nothing to lose
and it's you and me and all of the people
And I don't know why, I can't keep my eyes off of you…
Grimacing as he heard Fred and George emit identical snorts of amusement, he grabbed a handful of snow in each fist and threw them as hard as humanly possible in their direction. Each taking the snowball in the face, they smirked. It was on.
Chaos erupted all around.
Oliver was bombarded with snow from every direction, and bleary-eyed and unable to see, he stumbled in the slush, running into something about a head shorter than him, and taking both himself and the object down with him into the snow.
'What the!?' the object squeaked in a familiar voice, which Oliver soon realised was Katie.
'Sorry… couldn't see… slipped.' He muttered in answer to her jumbled string of cursing, as he tried to untangle his limbs from hers.
The snow was still pounding the pair of them; a relentless storm of snowballs and laughter.
'What the hell is going on?' Katie spluttered through a mouthful of slush.
'I think…' Oliver muttered, undoing his overly large trench coat and bundling her inside, 'that the twins, Ange and Alicia have decided to do a spot of matchmaking.'
'Oh?' Katie said with a little frown of puzzlement, recoiling further underneath the tent-like jacket, 'but why us, of all people?'
'Erm. Well, you see the thing is…' he started before breaking off with a self-disgusted sigh, 'um, I don't know.'
…All of the things that I want to say just aren't coming out right
I'm tripping on words
You got my head spinning
I don't know where to go from here…
'I think I have erm, an inkling,' she replied quietly, with a mysterious grin, 'but now is not the time to discuss it.'
'That's… well, that's fair enough.' Oliver said with a shrug, retreating under his coat so that they were both crouching underneath it like a tent, 'I pretty much love my grandmother for giving this to me.'
'Me too.' Katie agreed, with a little smile, as they fell into an awkward silence.
'You know,' he said finally, after the silence had become overbearing, 'there's something different about you… something I can't quite place.'
'That's funny,' she mused, tapping her nose (which made her look thoughtfully cute, mused Oliver), 'because I was just about to say the same thing about you.'
Raising an eyebrow at each other, they retreated back into the silence, which this time was less awkward and more companionable.
Watching her discreetly as she fell into a reverie of her own thoughts, Oliver smiled as she wrinkled her nose… she had no idea the little things that she did; the little things that drove him crazy for her.
…There's something about you now
That I can't quite figure out
Everything she does is beautiful
Everything she does is right…
'Have I got something on my face?' Katie asked after a couple of minutes, startling him into wrenching his gaze away from her.
'No…' he sighed, searching through the pocket he'd found that he hadn't even realised had been there, and pulling out the various items it contained.
'If you have something to say, just say it. I'm here, I'm listening, and although there's no more inescapable storm of snow outside this coat, I'm assuming we're still not safe.' she said, with a gesture of her hand that clearly invited him to speak his mind.
'I, well, the thing is…' he started, but was interrupted when their shelter was rudely stripped away from them by Fred, who along with the other three, was towering over their sitting forms.
'I cannot believe you pair.' said Angelina with a mournful shake of her dark head, 'you've been under this coat for over five minutes, and you still haven't snogged yet.'
'Perhaps there are more important things than snogging people.' Oliver said abruptly, getting up and stealing one last glance at Katie, who was looking confused but still beautiful, in a way that drove him mad, 'I have to get plays ready for tomorrow's practice… I'll see you all later.'
'Oliver…' Alicia called to him quietly as he walked away, shivering with the absence of his trench coat.
'OLIVER COME BACK!' yelled the twins in unison, to no avail.
'We should go and kidnap him.' said Angelina evilly, with a snicker.
'There's something he needs to say to me, but he just can't bring himself to say it.' Katie said softly, all wrapped up in her thoughts, 'And you lot all seem to know what it is, even though I'm the one that knows him the best… and no matter how hard I try, I can't figure out what it is.'
Raising an eyebrow, Angelina exchanged a look with Alicia before bursting into a fit of laughter.
'What?' she asked, glancing from Angelina to Alicia, who was now laughing as well.
'He's in love with you!' Angelina burst out through her laughter, 'He's madly, crazily, one-hundred-percent dying from the effort of being completely in love with you!'
'Oh.'
Dropping her gaze to the coat she was now sitting on, Katie pursed her lips in thought, before emitting a louder 'Oh!'
'What? What is it?' Alicia asked, startled from her laughter.
'That's what's been different about him!' she cried, a grin splayed across her face, 'And that's what's been different about me! That's what he could see in me, that he couldn't before… because I – oh no.'
Leaping to her feet, she scooped up the coat, and ran, full pelt across the courtyard and back into the castle, slipping and sliding in the slushy snow.
'The moment of dawning realisation?' offered George, as the four of them walked in Katie's direction, purposefully slow to give her time to do what she had to.
'Definitely.' agreed Fred with a snort, that sent the four of them into hysterics.
&&&&&&
'OLLLIVERR!'
Her call to him was a little punctuated by the jolts of her strides as she ran after him, but it was still undoubtedly her voice. Turning around, he smiled slightly as she came bolting up the steps, taking them two at a time.
'I figured it out!' she cried joyfully, coming to a halting stop that made her crash into his chest on the slippery marble floor.
'Figured what out?' he enquired, puzzled.
'What it is that's different about you.' She replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, which, Oliver realised a split second too late, it was.
'And?' he prompted, a hesitant smile playing on his lips.
'I love you.' She said simply, with no embarrassment or a single trace of hesitation.
'Ah.' He replied, a little taken aback, but evidently pleased, if the large grin plastered across his face was anything to judge by.
'And you..? Did you figure out what it was that was different about me?' she prompted him unashamedly, probing for the answer she needed to hear.
'Yep.' He replied, his grin growing wider, but gaining a fragile edge to it.
'AND?' she cried, grabbing hold of his arms and shaking him wildly.
Not saying a single word, he winked, before taking hold of her arms in return and pulling her towards him roughly, planting a large kiss on her lips.
'Answer enough for you, Katie my love?' he asked with a laugh at the look on her face; a look that was something between shock and inexplicable joy.
'Not quite…' she answered with a rogue grin, before kissing him in return.
…Cause it's you and me and all of the people with nothing to do
Nothing to lose
And it's you and me and all of the people
And I don't know why, I can't keep my eyes off of you…
Coming to a halt at the bottom of the staircase, Fred, George, Angelina and Alicia let out an almighty cheer.
'ABOUT TIME!' the twins roared simultaneously, startling Oliver and Katie out of their kiss momentarily.
And to think I was worried about making the most of my life in the next three months, thought Oliver affectionately with a smile.
'What are you smiling about?' Katie hissed, poking him in the ribs, 'I'm not a ridiculously horrible kisser, am I?'
'Au contraire mademoiselle,' her replied with a hint of cheekiness, 'I was just thinking about how many of your precious seconds I can steal to spend lip-to-lip with you before I graduate.'
'As many as you can handle, Captain of mine.' She assured him, her voice taking a sultry tone which he immediately interpreted as an invitation to kiss her again.
…What day is it?
And in what month?
This clock never seemed so alive…
A/N: Lyrics included "You and Me" - Lifehouse.
Hi!
I'm so sorry i haven't updated this in forever...
in fact, i havent done a lot of writing lately, at all.
i was suffering from a seemingly incurable case of writer's block.
but i'm back, so all is good, lol.
Anyway, if you like review and let me know. it makes me happy -smiles-
And if you don't.. review anyway. it still makes me happy -smiles again-
Oh, and if you're wondering whether i'm ever going to update 'In Love And War', the answer is that i'm not.. and that i can't.. coz i took it down of the site. to see full reasons for this rash action, see the profile and / or message me.
love muchly,
Ash xx