Hello all!
I would like to dedicate this chapter to the lovely Resa who wrote me the most adorable review ever. Thank you again.
I would also like to thank my dedicated reviewers (you know who you are) for being there at every chapter - and to all of you out there who are reading this. I love you all dearly and I wish I could bake you all cookies (even though they would be disgusting because I'm really bad at cooking).
I don't really like this chapter, it's sort of a weird-filler, but there are a few cool things happening. Let me know what you think!
Enjoy! Marianne x

wildest dreams
VOLUME II

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The first Saturday of October was to be the first visit to Hogsmeade of the year – the first official one, anyway. The twins had some errands to run at Zonko and other shops for their products – I had planned to go to the Three Broomsticks with Angelina and Alicia, but our plans changed on Friday afternoon – as me, Fred and George had a free period, we were going to work on the mail orders when we crossed paths with Hermione.

"Hey. Do you three have a minute?" she asked us.

The twins narrowed their eyes at her.

"Is this about our –"

"No, it's not. It's about something else."

She hesitated, glancing around her as if to see if we were alone – the hallway was empty except for a group of sixth-years who were laughing loudly a few meters away – they weren't paying any attention to us.

"What is it, Hermione?" I asked her, frowning – her attitude was making me curious.

"We had an idea, with Harry and Ron. You know that Umbridge is never going to teach us any useful defensive or offensive spells –"

George snickered.

"She's never going to teach us anything."

"Well we thought that Harry could – give us lessons, I mean."

"In defensive magic?" I asked, my eyes widening.

Hermione nodded, a little smirk on her lips.

"But Umbridge will be furious!" I exclaimed.

"That's why we have to keep this quiet. She can't know. Nobody except us can know."

"'Us'?" repeated Fred.

"I invited a few people. Tomorrow, at ten, at the Hog's Head. We'll have a meeting, discuss the whole thing. Can I count on you three?"

"Absolutely" answered Fred and George simultaneously.

"Of course, Hermione, we'll be there," I smiled.

She smiled back, looking sincerely glad.

"You can invite more people, too. But not too much – and only trustworthy people."

We nodded.

"Alright. I'll see you tomorrow."

She walked away, and the three of us immediately ran upstairs to the Common Room to tell the others – they were all very excited at the idea. Harry teaching us magic – that sounded absolutely incredible. I couldn't wait for the next day – fortunately, it came quickly.

It was a beautiful day – despite the coldness in the air, there was barely any wind and the sun shone high in the blue sky. We walked slowly to Hogsmeade – all us of talking and laughing. Even though Angelina and Fred weren't on the best of terms, they could at least now talk to one another without shouting or running off. There were things only time could heal, and we had to let it heal them.

The twins insisted to go to Zonko before we headed to the meeting – and I decided to follow them, anxious that they might forget about it if I didn't remind them. The girls and Lee headed off to Honeydukes to help the latter buy his 'monthly snacks'.

Zonko was quite empty at that time of day – it was barely 9:30. We passed the front door, and there was nobody in the shop except for a sleepy cashier. Fred, George and Lee crammed as much stuff as they could in their arms and then proceeded to pay for it all. As the cashier put everything in bags, another employee appeared from the back of the store – I let out a small groan.

"It's Ben! Look, Addy, it's Ben!" said Fred, giving me a nudge on the shoulder.

"Hey Ben," I muttered half-heartedly.

"Hello, Addy!" the young man replied with enthusiasm – too much enthusiasm, if you asked me.

The twins were snickering behind their scarves – they had always found Ben's fondness of me very entertaining. Ben had been working at Zonko since our fourth year – and since we went there often, he had gotten to know us, and had also, according to Fred, 'developed a serious case of Addy-osis'.

"What can I help you with today?" he asked, his wide eyes fixed on me.

"Nothing, we're alright – we're actually paying."

"Let me know if I can do anything!"

Fred suddenly dramatically gasped, pointing Ben's bright red Zonko uniform.

"Merlin's Beard! Is that an 'Employee of the Month' badge?!"

His fake amazement would have made me laugh in any other circumstance, but not in this one. I only rolled my eyes.

"It is!" exclaimed Ben. "Isn't that great?"

"It's brilliant, Ben! Isn't, it George?"

"I'm really happy for you, mate," nodded George.

"Yeah! Me too!" continued Fred, looking way too excited. "What about you, Adds?"

I glared at him, before smiling awkwardly.

"Of course. Cheers, Ben."

"T-t-thank you, Addy. Ooh! That reminds me – I thought about you the other day."

My eyes widened slightly – I ignored Fred and George who had to hide their laughter behind oddly similar coughing.

"Did you?" I hissed between my teeth.

"Yes! We received these incredible earrings that transforms into little snakes, y'know – they all sold out so quickly, but I kept you a pair – I knew you would like them."

"That's…" I hesitated. "That's really nice of you."

"Really nice of you," repeated Fred, nodding his head.

"I have them in my bag, I'll get them for you – oh, and if you want, I can show you the back of the store, give you a tour, and –"

"OH!" I suddenly cried out loudly.

Ben stopped talking, his smile fading slightly. I let out a nervous chuckle.

"Bloody hell! I'm sorry, Ben, it's just – I just remembered about this meeting we have to go to… We're already late… Right, Fred? Right, George?"

"A meeting?" said George. "I can't remember any meeeeee-"

I gave him a hard nudge in the ribs, making him stop talking.

"Yes, of course," he said instead, glaring at me, rubbing his side. "Our meeting. Our very important meeting."

"Oh – alright, then," said Ben.

"We'll come back, don't worry," smirked Fred.

"Later, Ben!" I exclaimed as I grabbed the bags, pushed the twins outside, closing the shop door behind me.

I sighed loudly, walking away quickly.

"I'm never going in there again," I muttered.

"You say that every time," chuckled Fred.

"Did you have to hit me so hard?" moaned George, who was still rubbing his side.

"Yes I did. 'Give me a tour of the backstore'? C'mon. You're supposed to be my boyfriend, you twit."

But of course, the twins didn't listen to me – only laughed, the whole way to the Hog's Head.

We left the pub about an hour later, our heads a little heavy, but our hearts light. A secret club – we were now officially part of a secret club. It almost made me giggle every time I thought about it. There really was something exciting about breaking the rules to me, some sort of feverishness – probably one of the reasons I had become friends with the twins at the onset.

The wind had turned bitterly cold, and we all decided to head back to the castle to get some warmth. We all settled in the Common Room, near the fireplace. As most Gryffindors were still in Hogsmeade, and as Fred, George and Lee had gone to their secret room to do some paperwork for the mail orders, the room was quiet, and I was able to concentrate on homework for the better part of the afternoon. When it was almost time to go to dinner, a voice rose from the silence, and my eyes travelled from my parchment to the intruder.

It was Ethan – he, however, wasn't looking at me, but rather at Alicia who was already blushing.

"Hi, Alicia."

"Hi, Ethan."

"What are you working on?"

"Potions" she replied vaguely.

"Brilliant."

I listened to their interaction without uttering a word, not wanting to disturb them. But as Alicia looked down at her book, Ethan's eyes travelled to me. He looked incredibly nervous – and I understood what he was aiming to do. So I smiled, and shook my head feverishly in direction of my friend. Do it, I told him silently. He nodded sharply, inhaled, and cleared his throat. Alicia looked up again.

"I – er – I was just wondering if I would like to go to Hogsmeade with me tomorrow. Grab a Butterbeer – or – or something."

I couldn't help but smile, and waited for Alicia's reaction. But she only stared back at him.

"What?" she said.

It was Ethan's turn to blush.

"I said – I was wondering if you would like to go to Hogsmeade with me tomorrow" he repeated with slightly more confidence.

Alicia blinked, as if unsure of what she had heard – and then looked at me. I kept smiling – and then came the blush. Her cheeks, which had already been pinker than usual, turned bright red to mirror Ethan's.

"Er –"

She looked at me again – I nodded, encouraging her.

"Er – okay. Yes, sure, why not."

Ethan's lips curled into a smile – the brightest smile I had ever seen him wear.

"Brilliant! All right. We can meet here after lunch?"

"Sure."

"Great. Brilliant. See you tomorrow, then."

"Yeah, see you tomorrow."

He walked away, almost bouncing his way to the portrait of the Fat Lady. I giggled.

"Seems like you made someone very happy," I said.

"I can't believe it. I never thought he was interested in me!" said Alicia, dumbfounded.

"Really? He had made it kind of obvious lately."

"He had? Wow. I am really bad at this."

I laughed, shaking my head.

"And now I have a date. Bloody hell, Addy, I have a date! What am I going to wear?"

"Not this, for sure," I said, pointing her old Quidditch jumper. "I'll help you pick something."

"Thanks, Addy."

There was a short silence – my eyes had gone back to my parchment, but I really couldn't care less about Wolfsbane Potion right now.

"You want to do it now?" said Alicia after a few seconds.

"Yeah, definitely."

We picked up our things, giggling, and ran upstairs to ramage through Alicia's wardrobe. We had been so focused in the task that we nearly missed dinner.

The next day, Alicia was restless. She spent all morning reading – but her eyes barely moved and she had turned maybe two pages in the course of two hours. When it was finally time for her to get ready, I helped her curl her long hair and reassured her.

"I'm so nervous, I might throw up," she moaned as she put on her boots.

"Everything will be just fine, Ali. Just be yourself. He already likes you, that's a good start."

"What if he realizes I'm horrible? What if he starts to hate me?"

She threw herself on her bed, hiding her face.

"Why am I like this? I don't even know him!"

"It's the 'date' effect. And no one could hate you, c'mon, even less him. You could throw a Butterbeer at his face, he would still like you."

None of that reassured her completely – but it calmed her down, and she seemed all right when we came down in the Common Room. Ethan was already there waiting for her. He smiled as his eyes landed on her – and they walked away, smiling shyly at one another. Sighing, I threw myself down on the couch next to George, who had been talking with Lee.

"I see Alicia's gone on her date."

"Yes" I sighed. "I kind of envy her."

George shot me a weird look.

"I mean – you know. The first date. It's so… exhilarating."

"Exhilarating?"

"Yeah. You only have a first date once."

"Wow, great deduction, Adds," nodded Lee.

"Piss off" I chuckled.

"I remember our first date," said George, squeezing my hand.

I let out a laugh.

"Oh, me, too. How could I forget it? You nearly set the kitchens on fire."

"What can I say? I was too busy snogging you to care about those stupid candles falling on the blanket."

I chuckled, stealing him a quick kiss. Lee cleared his throat, but he had a smirk on his face.

"I think I'll leave you two lovebirds alone and make sure Fred hasn't made himself puke to death."

I watched him leave the Common Room – as soon as he was gone, I kissed George again.

"You know what I'd like right now?" he said, stroking my hair.

"What?"

"If we were back in that hotel room…"

I smiled, blushing slightly.

"Me too."

And for a moment, it almost felt like we were – the room was silent, and the fire burned brightly beside us – but soon a group of second years entered, laughing loudly.

"Want to take a walk?" suggested George.

"Yep," I nodded frenetically.

We grabbed our coats and went outside – there we walked around the park for an hour, maybe two – I didn't keep track of time. I had so much homework to do but I didn't care – I only wanted to be with George, and enjoy his company, and enjoy the frantic beat of my heart when he looked at me. The sun was setting on the horizon when we went back inside – we were walking hand in hand to the Gryffindor Tower, wondering how Alicia's date had gone, when we were interrupted.

"George! I want to talk to you."

I stared at the dark-haired girl – Cassandra Burton. What did she want? I hadn't forgotten how she had flirted with Fred and George back in September. George seemed a little surprised by her words.

"Huh, okay. What's up?" he simply answered.

"Well, you see, one of my friends from Hufflepuff would like to get one of those Snackboxes of yours – but she's too shy to ask you, so she asked me to do it."

"Oh – yeah, absolutely. Well I don't carry those in my pockets –"

He was interrupted by Cassandra bursting into laughter, pushing her long hair over her shoulder. I felt my eyes narrow as I squeezed George's hand tighter.

"You're so funny!" she said, giving him a slight shove on the shoulder.

George chuckled awkwardly back, but he really did seem flattered – I held back a shove of my own – a real one.

"Right – but I can bring you one tonight in the Common Room. After dinner, maybe."

"That sounds perfect. I'll see you there. And thanks again."

"Oh, no trouble. Don't hesitate if you have more friends that want them."

"I won't."

There was a short silence, as Cassandra and George exchanged a smile. I loudly cleared my throat. George shot me a look.

"Right. I'd better get going," he said quickly.

"Me too. I'll see you tonight."

He nodded – and Cassandra's eyes travelled to me for the first time since the start of their conversation – as if she had just noticed me. I gave her my best fake smile.

"Nice to see you, Abigail."

My smile faded as she walked away, her long hair swaying behind her like a veil. Abigail?

"What a pretentious b-"

"Woah!" laughed George. "What's gotten into you?"

"What's gotten into me? What's gotten into you?!"

"What?"

"She was clearly flirting with you, and you flirted back!"

"I didn't flirt back!"

"Yes you did!"

"Adds, she's a client – I was selling her a Snackbox."

"Sure, 'cause that's all she had in mind – a Snackbox."

George let out a sharp sigh.

"I didn't flirt with her. Get that out of your head."

"Well she certainly was. All that bloody hair flipping –"

"Are you jealous?" he said, interrupting me, a smirk on his lips.

"Ugh, no!" I exclaimed. "It's just – didn't you see what just happened? She openly flirted with you in front of me. I was right there! And you – you smiled and you made that stupid joke and –"

"It wasn't even a joke!"

"It doesn't matter!"

"Bloody hell, Addy!"

I stared at him, sighing. All right, maybe I was overreacting. But I hadn't liked the way she had just ignored me – and how George had seemed to forget about me, too.

"She's just – she's a groupie."

"What?" I muttered, confused.

"She's a groupie – a fan. She's only interested in me because of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. We've had a couple of them since the beginning of the year – she's the first one that's a first year, though."

"Wait, wait, wait – I don't get it. Fans?"

"Fans of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, yeah. Asking for pictures and stuff. It's really weird, but you know. I guess fame and money really are attractive to people."

"And you haven't thought of telling those groupies that you have a girlfriend?"

"They're good for business, Adds. They buy so much stuff, you wouldn't believe."

I bit my lower lip. I guess I should have expected that – but I really hadn't.

"Look. They don't matter to me, they really don't. You've said it, you're my girlfriend. I love you. All right?"

I stared back at him – my heart had stopped beating.

"What did you say?"

"I said you're my –"

"No, after that."

He frowned, confused.

"You said – you said you love me?"

There was a short silence, where I looked at him and he looked at me. The world had seemed to stop around us. I didn't breathe, I couldn't. Then, after what seemed to be a whole eternity, George smiled.

"Yeah. Looks like I do."

My mouth broke into a smile, letting out a small gasp. I approached him, sliding my arms around him.

"I do too."

"You do?"

"Yeah. I love you."

I guess we already knew that we loved each other, in a way. But saying it aloud make it official, made it a truth, made it a promise. So I kissed him, and I realized that he was everything to me, and that not only I loved him, but that I always would.

When we finally got to the Common Room, Alicia was there – I pulled her into our dorm with Angelina so that she could tell us everything. Her date with Ethan had gone tremendously well, she said – and they would see each other again.

"Soon, I hope," she added, smiling.

"Oh, I'm so happy for you!" said Angelina, hugging her.

It seemed like everything in the world was just right – Angelina and Alicia were happy, I was happy – and the future looked bright ahead, with Quidditch matches soon arriving and with the prospect of our Defense lessons with Harry. I had a feeling that everything could and would be just fine from now then – but of course, that feeling couldn't last.

It was hard to miss the sign that had been put up on the notice board Monday morning. An announcement from the High Inquisitator, it read – that all student organizations were 'henceforth disbanded'. I stared at the sign with despair – this couldn't be a coincidence.

"How did she know?" muttered Angelina beside me. "Hermione was so careful."

"Someone must have snitched" groaned Lee.

"We were so close! I can't believe it!" I sighed.

"Oh, c'mon" said George. "We'll do it anyway. It's Harry we're talking about."

"Yeah, bloke's probably broken more school rules than us" nodded his brother.

"But what about –"

"Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no."

We all turned to Angelina, who had went horribly pale.

"You all right, Angie?" asked Alicia.

"Don't you realize what this means?" she replied, staring at us. "All teams of three or more people, meeting regularly. Teams!"

"Yeah, despite what you all think, I can read," said Lee, confused.

"Lee! Think!"

It took us a few seconds to understand – and then I felt my face drain out of blood, too.

"The Quidditch Team!" shrieked Alicia.

"She can't do that!" exclaimed Fred and George.

"Oh, you think? You think she wouldn't do it?" laughed Angelina.

"We can't let her!" I cried out.

"You need to go see her, Angie. Sort this out," said Lee.

"I will" she nodded. "Don't worry, I will."

She looked like she was going to burst out crying. I couldn't blame her – what if Umbridge really did disband the Quidditch teams ? Worst, what if she only disbanded the Gryffindor Quiddich team ? I wasn't sure my heart would take it. We had already been robbed of Quidditch last year, it couldn't happen again.

I couldn't concentrate in class all day, with the threat of the dismemberment of the Quidditch team lurking over our heads. After dinner, Angelina headed for Umbridge's office – when she came back, she didn't have any good news.

"She said she needs to think about it. Until then, no Quidditch practices."

"What?"

"Think about it?"

"What the bloody hell does that mean?" I sighed.

"I know it sounds bad," said Angelina in a small voice. "But we can't give up. We need to show her we deserve it. So I want you all on your best behavior, all right?"

I knew that Fred and George were going to say something, but I shot them both a look that prevented them from doing so. Angelina was already anxious enough. Instead, they decided to try and lighten to heavy mood that was taking over the whole Common Room and make demonstrations of their Puking Pastile – on themselves, this time, in order to prevent Hermione from stopping them.

It was hilarious and disgusting at the same time – and quickly a whole crowd started to watch them, clapping at every spurt of puke. I spotted Cassandra Burton in the crowd, laughing and flipping her bloody hair – but I only smiled at the sight of her. A groupie. It didn't matter than she fancied George – because George loved me. And I loved him too, I thought, as I saw him vomit in a bucket in front of a dozen people – I really did.