The final score was 450 to 290. Argentina had won after catching the Snitch with just over two hours worth of some of the most intense Quidditch that Victoire had ever seen. She would have never thought anything would have distracted her from what had just happened before the match, but she had been surprisingly wrong.

"THAT WAS THE GREATEST MATCH EVER!" Dominique continued to yell around the campsite later that evening. She was practically hoarse, but she had to yell due to the sheer amount of noise and celebration that was occurring all around them.

"I can't believe Sabatino didn't catch the snitch," Jack mumbled, the paint on his face now streaked with finger marks from where he had been gripping it during the match.

"So, you made some money off the match, did you?" George asked Louis. "Did you actually get paid?"

"I did," he said proudly as his hat continued yelling, "Argentina!" over and over again. "One hundred galleons."

"Mum and dad will kill you when they find out how much you gambled," Victoire said as she sat eating bacon sandwiches with Lily and Rose.

"They don't need to know," he said. "And even if they do, can they really be angry at me for winning!?"

"You know," Ron joked as he patted Louis on the back. "There's a fee for us letting you sleep in our tent."

Hermione laughed as some fireworks went off overhead. She turned to the younger children, "Perhaps some of us should think about getting ready for bed?"

"Aw, Mum…" groaned Hugo.

"Let them stay up, Hermione," George said. "How often do they get to see this?"

"Never!" Hugo shouted happily just as another fireworks display went off overhead; illuminating the night sky.

"That's one of mine as well," George announced proudly. "In case you were wondering."

"They weren't," Angelina teased as she picked up a sleeping Roxanne and carried her toward the tent. Even with all the noise, she had managed to fall asleep right there on the spot.

Dominique had turned to Victoire then. "Are we going, then?"

"Going where?"

"Don't play dumb. You're terrible at it."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she lied.

"Going where?" Louis said as he plopped down next to his sisters.

"Do you want to go over to Ted's camp?" Dominique asked. "They're celebrating."

"Sure." He swatted Jack. "Hey, mate, you want to go over to Ted Lupin's and see what's going on over there?"

"Is something going on over there?" Jack asked.

Dominique nodded before smiling at Victoire. She knew exactly what Dominique was doing. Strength in numbers. The more people she could convince to go, the more she could use against Victoire to force her to go.

"Sounds good," Louis said. "Are we going now?"

"I don't know," Victoire began to mutter as Louis and Dominique stood, clearly ready to take off right then.

"You don't have to come," Dominique challenged. "I'll be happy to have a chat with Ted."

Victoire glared at her. "You wouldn't."

"Yes I would," she said, not looking the least bit intimidated by Victoire's death stare. "I'm over all of this shit. If you won't do anything about it, I will."

"Why wouldn't you want to go?" Louis asked. "You're not still angry with Ted over what happened before we left for France are you?"

"No, but—"

"Then there's no reason not to go," Dominique said. "Unless there's another reason you may not want to see him…"

"What other reason would there be?" asked Louis.

"Alright," Victoire said before Dominique could push this any further. "Fine. I'm just going to go and change my shirt. Go and tell someone where we're going."

"Don't take an hour," Dominique called after her as she disappeared into the tent to find her bag.

As she sat herself down and began brushing her hair out, she wasn't even sure why she was trying so hard to distance herself from Ted. Even if he did reject her, she'd at least have peace on the matter. She could move on and work on just being friends again. Truthfully, she was almost afraid of him not rejecting her as much as she was the opposite. What if he did tell her he felt the same way about her? Then what? What do they do? Would things change…?

"Of course they would," she said out loud to herself as she grabbed the shirt that she had intended to wear tomorrow and changed quickly. She knew she'd have to wear it again in the morning, but her choices were limited and anything was better than the stale smell of perspiration and bacon sandwiches. She gave herself a quick once over in the mirror before she wandered back outside.

"Be safe," Ginny said once she saw Victoire. "Your parents will kill us if something were to happen."

"They're only down at site 490 or something," Victoire said. "It shouldn't be a very far walk."

"I want to go," James said eagerly.

"You can go to bed," Ginny offered. "Or you can stay up here for a little longer and enjoy everything going on with us."

James grumbled, but said nothing more as the others set off through the dark toward where they assumed Ted's campsite was. Jack and Louis had set off a few paces ahead, leaving her and Dominique coming up the rear. Victoire had been hoping that her slow pace would have annoyed Dominique enough to want to catch up with the boys, but apparently not.

"You look nice," Dominique teased.

"You're really pushing it today."

"That's my job."

"You're such a brat."

"I haven't been a brat," she said. "I could be much worse. If I was really being a brat, I would have asked Ted myself how he felt and then tortured you with the fact that I knew. But I haven't done that, have I?"

"You are truly amazing," Victoire said sarcastically. "I'm blessed to have someone as kind as you are as my sister."

"You really are," she agreed as they continued walking through the crowds of happy and angry people. They passed a fight between two men that looked as if it could turn into something really bad, but no one had any interest in sticking around to find out whether it would. After that, Victoire had to drag Jack and Louis away from a group of men who were offering them some of their special draught that would apparently allow them to have the most fun night of their lives; then again she had to drag Louis away from a tent of girls who were beckoning him and Jack to come and join them.

"Go on ahead!" said Louis as he dawdled behind. "I'll be right here!"

"There's something not right about those girls," Victoire said as she pulled her brother by the arm and noticed they had entered the nineties section of the campsite. "Anyway, their camp should be around here somewhere."

"There," Dominique pointed, "the tent next to the really loud group of people waving the Argentina flag and yelling. Isn't that Simon's friend?"

"It's his girlfriend," Victoire said as she recognized Susan and Rachael talking to some of their neighbors who were throwing a Quaffle around. "That's the place, then."

"Well, at least it looks like a good time," Louis said as he set out toward the group. "It would have to be for me to pass on those girls back there."

"Oh, cry about it some more," Dominique said as she rolled her eyes and followed him and Jack, leaving Victoire standing on her own.

She pursed her lips as she took in the scene. It was crowded and energetic. She didn't see Ted, but he was around here somewhere. One way or another, she was figuring this out tonight. No matter how awkward it was.

"You came!" Susan said when she noticed her approaching. "I'm so glad!"

"Yeah," she said as she glanced at Rachael. She was smiling, but Victoire could only muster a polite smile in return.

"This is Carlo," Susan said as Victoire glanced at the man they had been talking to. "He and his friends came all the way here from Argentina."

"That's quite the trip," Victoire offered.

"Worth it," he said with a thick Spanish accent.

"Neither of us speaks Spanish well, so we've been trying to work through the language barrier," Rachael said. "I think they want us to play a game."

"What kind of game?" Victoire asked.

"Dunno," Susan said. "They keep gesturing to the Quaffle and then pointing at all of us."

"You play, too," Carlo said as she pointed at Victoire.

"He knows more English than we do Spanish," Susan said, just as this Carlo started speaking to her very quickly. She stared at him blankly but seemed to be trying to decipher what was being said.

Rachael took a step towards Victoire, clearly done with the language lesson happening beside her. She gave her a quick smile. "So, you're still in school?"

"Yeah," Victoire said as she glanced around the campsite. "Yeah, I'm going into my last year."

"I miss school," she said. "I loved it."

"I'm ready for it to be over."

"I used to think that too, but trust me, you'll miss it."

"Perhaps," she said with a weak smile.

"And you met Simon at school?"

Victoire nodded. "Through Ted."

"You grew up with him right?"

She nodded again.

"Were you neighbors or…?"

"Family friends," she said. "My uncle is his godfather. Plus, my parents knew his parents and so on."

She nodded and Victoire suddenly felt weird talking about Ted with her. It almost seemed as if she was pressing her for information, but she was probably just reading way too much into the situation.

She glanced over at Rachael again, but noticed that she wasn't looking at her. She was looking at something just behind her.

"Hey," said Ted's familiar voice as Victoire turned as he saw him approaching. "What are you all doing over here?"

"Trying to communicate," Rachael said as he stood next to her and observed Susan and Carlo's conversation. Victoire continued to watch him, but he barely acknowledged her.

"Does anyone here speak Spanish?" Susan asked him.

"Not that I know of. Ask him if he speaks French." He gestured towards Victoire without looking at her. "You can speak it, right?"

She furrowed her brow at this. Had he seriously just asked her if she could speak French? Seriously? He'd actually asked her that, despite having seen her speak it hundreds of times before? Despite knowing nearly everything there was to know about her? What the fuck was that?

"You know I can," she said, doing all she could to bury the sudden rage and confusion she suddenly felt.

He glanced at her and shrugged. "Just checking."

Just checking…? Was he serious? She could curse him. She could honestly curse him right now.

"Do they speak a lot of French down in Argentina?" Susan asked rather skeptically before she returned to Carlo.

Victoire had stopped paying attention to their attempts though, and was now glaring at the back of Ted's head. He was playing dumb on purpose. Was he getting something out of trying to be a dick?

"You can speak French?" Rachael asked her.

She nodded absently, still staring daggers at Ted. "Yes. I can."

"How fantastic. I've always wanted to know another language. I've just never had the patience."

"Oh, well, my mum's French," she said a little louder than she would have in normal polite conversation. She wanted to make sure Ted could hear her. "So, I've been speaking it MY ENTIRE LIFE."

Rachael smiled a bit, even though she was clearly unsure of what had caused the sudden change in Victoire tone. Carlo threw his hands in the air in a gesture of surrender as he gave up trying to talk to Susan and Ted and walked off back toward his own tent.

"Perhaps later, then!" Susan called after him before turning toward everyone else. "Oh well…"

"Nice effort." Ted yawned as he stretched his arms. "I think I'm going to go and sit."

"I suppose we'll go with you," Susan said as she nudged Rachael on her side and gave her a knowing look. Rachael seemed confused by what Susan was insinuating, but Victoire knew exactly what she was trying to say. Particularly after Susan turned—once she knew neither Rachael nor Ted was looking—and winked at her in a knowing sort of way.

"Ted," Susan called after him. "What's your schedule like next week?"

"Working I'm sure," he said as the four of them neared the larger group, Victoire trailing behind the rest.

"You have to have some free time?"

"A few hours here and there."

"You work too much," she said as she cast a look at Victoire. "Doesn't he?"

"I guess," Victoire mumbled. With the way he was acting right now, she rather took pleasure in the idea of him being forced to work grueling hours all the time.

"Well, it's a living," he said as he stopped and let the rest of them catch up. Victoire had been about to breeze right past him, continuing ignoring him since that's what he seemed to want, when he suddenly—without even looking at her—reached out and gave her arm a gentle and rather affectionate sort of squeeze. He didn't even stick around to say something or address her. He'd squeezed and left, following after Susan.

Victoire stopped dead in her tracks and stared down at the spot he had just touched. He had done that on purpose. He had made an actual effort to touch her without attempting to disguise it as an accident.

She looked up for him, but he had continued walking without as much as a glance behind him. She arched her eyebrow as she watched him sit with some friends. Was he screwing with her head now? One minute he's being a git and the next he's making flirty little gestures? What the hell was going on?

Ted's behavior only continued to remain odd throughout the night. When he wasn't busying himself by talking to everyone else but her, she would occasionally catch him staring in her direction only to look away the moment she noticed. Even when she made a point of getting near enough to him to see if the opportunity to talk could arise, he would either pull himself away or be pulled off in another direction by someone else.

She couldn't remember if it had always been this hard to corner Ted, but then again, in the past this wouldn't have been an issue. In the past, neither of them would be acting like this and she would have easily been able to pull him off on his own…But this obviously wasn't the past.

After an hour passed, she found herself bored and frustrated with his behavior. Off on her own, she leaned against a nearby tree just outside of the campsite and observed everyone from afar. Ted was sitting with Susan and Rachael—as he had been for the last several minutes. He was laughing about something and as he did, Victoire felt her annoyance rise. How nice it must be for him to not be able to give a second thought to what had happened that night before she had left for France. How nice it was for him to just be able to completely ignore her. How very, very nice for him...

"Why are you over here?" Dominique asked, having found her leaning against her tree.

She nodded towards Ted.

Dominique laughed. "Aww, you're jealous."

"What?"

"That girl over there. The one Simon's trying to fix Ted up with." She added, "Simon mentioned it," once she noticed Victoire's expression.

"I'm not jealous," she began. "Not of her really, just of the fact that—"

"Ted's talking to her and not you?"

"Ted's talking to everyone but me."

"It's sort of hard to talk to you when you're way over here."

"It didn't matter when I was standing over there either," she said defensively. "I've made myself totally available quite a few times."

"But have you just asked him to talk?" she suggested. "I know generally when I want to talk to someone, I ask them. Or I tell them. Sometimes I just shout in their direction..."

Victoire sighed. "I…"

"How is it that you've never had this problem with boys before, yet when the boy becomes Ted you've suddenly become a confunded idiot? I mean, is that it? Were you confunded by someone? It would explain a lot."

Victoire couldn't help but laugh a little at that. "Am I that bad?"

"You're an idiot."

She sighed. "I'm starting to agree with you."

"Admitting it is the first step," she said, laying her hand on Victoire's shoulder. "The second would be to go over there and talk to the person you've known your entire life and remember that it's just boring old Ted. The same Ted who used to whine and threaten to beat us up because we hid his Gobstones from him when we were kids."

Victoire laughed as she remembered. "He used to threaten to beat us up a lot."

"We hid his stuff all the time. I always thought it was funny."

"You're right," she said, taking a deep breath. "About going over there to talk to him, that is."

Dominique crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, don't let me keep you."

She nodded and stood up straighter. She had the sudden urge to ask Dominique to come with her, but she knew she didn't have to. She could feel her a few feet behind her as they walked. She couldn't have paid her sister to miss something as potentially embarrassing as this.

The group was all still chatting happily around the fire, everyone looking to be having a grand old time. Only Susan seemed to notice them approaching. She smiled at them and offered up a pleasant, "Hi there,"

"Hello!" Dominique said rather enthusiastically as she grabbed a nearby lawn chair and placed it down next to Ted with a large smile. "What's up, Lupin?"

"Not much," he said skeptically, seemingly picking up on Dominique's overly friendly nature immediately. "What's up with you?"

"Oh, nothing," she said. She turned back to Victoire. "Anything up with you, Vic?"

"Not really, no," she said, trying her best not to laugh. For some reason, her sister acting like a complete loon was very calming.

"Liar," Dominique mumbled before she turned back to everyone else with a smile. "So, Rachael and Susan, is it?"

They both nodded.

"You two both went to school at Ilvermorny, right? What was that like? I've heard terrible things about it."

"Terrible?" Rachael asked.

"Oh, yeah," Dominique continued, laying it on thick. "That it's really not such a great school and a miserable place to be."

"Where'd you hear that?" Susan asked. "It wasn't at all. I mean we," she gestured in between Rachael and herself, "loved it."

"I don't know," Dominique said with all the doubt she could possibly muster. "I've heard some pretty shitty stuff."

"Like what?"

"That the students get hit and that the facilities are poor."

"What?!" they both said in unison.

"That couldn't be further from the truth!" Rachael laughed.

"Well, tell me about it," she said, faking extreme interest. "I would hate to have the wrong idea."

She stood up and smiled at Victoire before pointing at her now vacant seat next to Ted. "I'm going to go and sit down by them so I can hear them properly, so feel free to take my seat." She smiled. "Well, that is unless you're about to go off and have a private conversation somewhere else, in which case you may as well stay standing."

"Subtle," Victoire muttered as Dominique moved to the other side of Susan and proceeded to ask them more random questions about their schooling. She had to hand it to her sister. She had always been good at commanding an audience when she wanted one.

As she glanced at Ted, who also, not surprisingly, seemed all too aware of what Dominique was playing at. He smiled awkwardly as Victoire sat down.

"She's too much sometimes," Ted said, smirking as he nodded toward Dominique.

"Sometimes? Try all of the time," Victoire muttered, exhaling.

They both fell into a lull, where neither of them spoke, even if everyone around them was louder than ever. It was Ted who broke their silence with a forced sounding, "So, what's new?"

She shook her head. "Nothing. You?"

He shook his head. "Not a thing."

More silence. This time she pushed to end by joking, "My how exciting we are."

He smiled and nodded without looking at her.

"Work's good, then?" she asked, racking her brain from something to say. Their tones were amusingly polite and formal, as if they had just met for the first time that evening.

"Yeah," he said as he straightened up. "You know, busy but good."

"That's good."

More silence. About ten yards away, Simon was holding court and telling some very animated story that had a handful of people looking very amused. A part of Victoire wished she could simply be that carefree at the moment; just a girl at a gathering with no pressure.

"How was France?" Ted asked.

"Great. Really great."

"Glad to hear it."

She sighed and looked away. "Fantastic…"

"Wonderful," he quipped in return.

She smirked a little. "Brilliant."

"Magnificent."

"Outstanding."

"Glorious."

"Stupendous."

He looked at her. "Is that a real word?"

"Of course it is," she said, finding it funny he had to ask that. "You know it is."

"I've always thought it sounded so made up," he said as let his expression grow pensive. "I know it is, but you know how some words just don't sound real? No matter how many times you hear them?"

"Would you like me to think of another, more Ted Lupin approved word?" she joked. "I can keep going."

"Yeah, I bet you could," he said as a familiar pleasantness filled between them. For a second it really did seem like nothing had ever happened between them, but just for a second. They were both delaying the inevitable and they knew that, but neither seemed to want to say anything.

"What'd you think of the match?" he asked.

"It was exciting," she said as she started bouncing her knee anxiously.

"Yeah, it was crazy. I bet Albus is angry, though. He loves Sabatino and was really pulling for Italy."

"He threw his hat away on the walk back. You know the annoying screaming ones?"

Ted groaned. "The bloke sitting in front of me had one of those on and I was ready to throttle him. I would have thrown Al's away for him if he hadn't done it."

"Your toys used to be just as annoying." She laughed as she remembered what Dominique had said just minutes before about the Gobstones. "Which is probably why we hid them."

"What?" he asked as he adjusted his leg so it was now resting against hers.

She looked down at their now touching legs. As casual as he had tried to make the gesture seem, it appeared to be too calculated to have been an accident. She stiffened up a little, having already forgotten what they were just talking about. She could pretend that his leg touching hers wasn't the only thing she was now concentrating on, but it wasn't worth the effort anymore. She was tired of it all.

"Look, can we talk?"

"Are you thirsty?" he asked as if he wasn't paying attention to her.

Was she thirsty? That had been his response? How far was he going to take this pretending everything was fine rubbish?

"What?" she mumbled before he stood and walked toward the tent without another word. She watched him disappear inside and hesitated only briefly before she decided to stand and follow him. She was determined not to let this continue to brood.

As she pulled the entrance to their tent back, she noticed the inside was surprisingly nice and much newer than what she was used to seeing. There were a few bedrooms, comfortable looking sitting room and a small kitchenette area at the back where Ted was currently standing. She slowly made her way toward him.

"Want anything?" he asked.

"I'm good, thanks," she said as she crossed her arms over her chest and glanced at the people who were sitting on the sofa talking. A couple among them abruptly stood and started walking towards one of the rooms.

"That one's mine," Ted said as he pointed towards a room on her left. He tapped on his empty glass with his wand and filled it with water.

She watched him for a moment before she took a few steps toward his room to look around inside. She wasn't sure why she did this seeing as there wasn't anything special inside, but it was something to do besides stand awkwardly in the sitting room staring at him.

As she investigated, he suddenly brushed past her on his way into the room and pulled on a rope that looked to be holding open the canvas flap entrance. He motioned for her to enter before he let go. She did as she was told and watched as the flap fell to the ground.

This suddenly left the two of them standing there.

"If I don't do that everyone and their brother will just come walking in," he said.

She nodded slowly as he crossed the room and sat down on the bed. He was quiet as he cracked his knuckles before looking at her. "So, why'd you run off?"

"Why did I run off?" she asked, surprised by the question.

"That night after I read—"

"I knew what you meant," she said. "I'm just surprised you're asking. I thought the answer was fairly obvious."

He looked away. "I waited for you to come back."

"I know," she said. She looked down at the floor.

"I thought it would be better to get this all out before you took off for a month, but I guess you didn't."

She sighed. "I was humiliated, Ted. I didn't know what to say to you. What was I supposed to say?"

He shook his head. "Anything. It's not as if I was going to think any less of you."

"Given the way you've been acting tonight, it's apparent you don't think any more of me, either."

His eyes shot to hers. "I didn't say that."

"You haven't said much of anything." She felt herself getting worked up. "You've pretty much been avoiding me."

He stared at her incredulously, almost as if she'd gone and grown another head. "You ran off to France without a word and I'm the one avoiding you?"

"Don't act as if I ran off to France to escape this," she said as she crossed her arms in front of her again. "You know that's not true at all."

He didn't say anything.

"You're angry at me for running off, then?" she asked after a moment. "That's why you wouldn't talk to me or why you're pretending to barely know me?"

"Pretending to barely know you?" he asked in disbelief. "What on earth are you talking about—?"

"' Hey Victoire, can you speak French?' " she mocked. "' Just checking. '"

"Oh, that," he mumbled. "I was annoyed."

"So, why did you ask me to come tonight?" she asked as she felt her voice rising. "If you're so annoyed and want to ignore me, why did you want me to come?"

"Because we obviously needed to talk," he said defensively. "And now we are, so…" He trailed off.

"So what?"

"So I don't know," he said as he started rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands. She watched him before she moved forward and sat down on the bed, leaving a sizable gap between them.

They sat in silence as she continued to stare at the floor. She and Ted had only ever had one real fight before and this was starting to seem similar to it. He would dodge the questions while she would stubbornly refuse to back down or take any of the blame. The last time they fought, they had stopped speaking to each other and she knew she couldn't let it get to that point again.

Her heart began thumping loudly. She wasn't surprised given what she found herself about to say.

"What I wrote," she said without looking at him. "I meant it. And I still do. I wrote that letter as a way to get everything out so that I could stop thinking about you, but you weren't supposed to read it. I wanted to tell you in person and not have you read it in a letter."

He turned and looked at her, but she still refused to look at him. She knew she'd lose her nerve if she did.

"And I've spent the last month terrified of what you would say and of what you thought, and I'm terrified of losing my best friend, but I couldn't not tell you and just pretend like everything was normal. I would have exploded. I needed you to know how I felt, and now you do." She paused and took a deep breath. "And that's it."

It was quiet. He didn't say anything, but she could feel him still looking at her. Between that and the letter, she had said everything she had wanted him to know, and that was really all she could do. Everything else was beyond her control.

"You wouldn't have lost me," he finally said.

She turned to him and he was smiling at her. He also sat up straighter and sighed very heavily, which Victoire didn't know how to react to. He opened his mouth to say something, but just then someone pulled the entrance flap to his room back.

"Hey, there you are, mate," Simon said. "Do you think you could—?"

"Sort of busy, Simon," Ted snapped. Even Victoire had to admit she was surprised by the bluntness of his response.

"I…" he looked surprised as he glanced between Ted and Victoire. "Am I interrupting something?"

"Yes," they said at the same time.

"Oh, sorry, then," he said with a shrug as he began to let himself out. "Just come find me when you're done."

He let the flap fall back down as he exited. Once he was gone, Ted mumbled, "Sorry about that."

Victoire shrugged sheepishly. She suddenly felt very vulnerable.

"So..." he began.

"Just be honest with me, Ted," she said. "I'm just tired of wondering if—"

"Can I ask you something?"

"What haven't I told you?" she asked with a nervous laugh. She had poured her heart out to him and yet he hadn't said much and continued to dodge questions. It was making her anxious.

"When," he began as he cleared his throat, "did you realize you felt…You know, about me?"

"I'm not sure," she said as she thought back. "It sort of just happened. I smelled you back in January in the—"

"Wait, you what?" He suddenly pulled the front of his shirt up to his nose to sniff himself. "You smelled me?"

She laughed as she watched him. "No, don't laugh, but it was in the Amortentia. I didn't know it was you right away, though. I had to figure it out."

"Seriously?" he asked, that response apparently taking him by surprise. "What do I smell like?"

"Sort of like potions," she said, searching for the proper way to phrase it. "It's probably just like you smell right now."

He smelled his shirt again. "I don't smell anything."

"You're probably not going to be able to smell yourself."

"My shirt smells like soap," he said as he held out his collar towards her. "See for yourself."

"I really can't explain it, Ted," she said as she leaned forward to smell for herself. "It's just sort of—"

And then he kissed her. As she leaned in to smell his collar, he'd met her lips with his and had grabbed the side of her face to pull her closer.

Her mind went blank and her body went numb as the realization of what she was doing now swept over her. She could feel his lips. She could feel his lips on her lips and that was about as much as her brain could process at the moment. She was so surprised she had almost forgotten to kiss him back. She'd practically forgotten how to do it.

"I didn't smell you in anything," he said quietly once he pulled away after thirty seconds or so. "But I just sort of knew."

"You…" She stammered and blinked a few times in a disoriented manner. "What?"

He smiled at her. "I just sort of knew. I told myself I was making it all up, but then when I realized that I was attracted to you on top of everything..." He paused and laughed awkwardly. "Okay, this is going to make me sound bad, but remember when you were smashed at my flat?"

She nodded. She did remember that, though she was having a hard time remembering anything else right now. Her mind was positively reeling.

"Well, um, you took off your jumper because you were hot or something, and something in me just sort of stopped functioning properly because I couldn't get that image of you out of my head for days."

Her mouth dropped into a surprised smile. He actually started to blush.

"You have to realize," he said, smiling a little, "you were in my bed, taking off your clothes, and I never realized that you could look like that." He laughed and looked away. "What was I supposed to think?"

"I can't believe…" she said still in a state of disbelief given everything that was happening. "You know, I wanted to kiss you that night. I really did."

"Don't say that." He groaned. "You were drunk though, so I wouldn't have—"

"I know." She smiled. "Trust me, I know."

He puffed up his cheeks and released with a laugh. "So…"

"So," she said. "What now?"

"What now…?" he mumbled. "Well, we can do a few things. We can pretend none of this ever happened—"

"I'd rather not."

He smiled. "Me neither. Well, we can just continue snogging like mad, which is always fun."

She smiled and nodded thoughtfully.

"Or we can actually do this," he said seriously. "You and me."

"The third option sounds good," she said as she pretended to think things over. "But I'd like to hear the second one again."

"We could always combine those two," he said with a smile. "I wouldn't be against it."

"Then I'm sold." She smiled.

He grinned at her before he reached down and grabbed her hand in one fluid motion; she couldn't help but smile when he started running her thumb over hers. They were holding hands. She'd never really noticed how rough and worn his hands looked before now.

"Is your dad going to kill me?" he asked.

"It's a possibility," she joked. "I'd be more worried about my mum."

"Lucky me, then," he said as he pulled her toward him and kissed her again. This time she managed to retain feeling in her entire body and get properly involved. This time it lasted much, much longer than thirty seconds.