Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to The Princess and the Frog. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction.

As ever, thank you to everyone for reading and reviewing and all that good stuff. Thank you. :) And look, an update! And it's not even a week since the last one! One step at a time.

This story is, uh, a thing. AU. Fusion with Harry Potter. I don't even know.

Sweets

Charlotte latched on to her arm. "Tia, honey," she said, bubbling over, "I need you to hold my sweets for just one minute. There is a drop-dead gorgeous Ravenclaw looking the toffees over and I just have to say hello."

"Oh, that does sound urgent," said Tiana. "But just a minute, all right?"

"Oh, Tia! Tia, you are just about the best witch I've ever known," Charlotte cried, managing somehow to drop her confectionaries in Tiana's arms and engulf her in a bruising hug all at once. "And don't you worry, honey," she said, "it won't take me more than one."

In the late afternoon crush of students at Honeydukes Tiana soon lost sight of Charlotte, who flitted through the crowd in hot pursuit, her yellow-and-black scarf streaming behind her like a banner. Tiana balanced the stack of sweets against her shoulder, set her chin on top of the box of chocolate frogs, and sighed once.

"What a horrible sound," someone said, very near to her. "Perhaps if you didn't try to carry so much all at once?"

Naveen leaned down and around her shoulder. He grinned up at her, his teeth brilliant in their (charmed) whiteness, his hair artfully mussed. "Would you like a hand?"

"That's very sweet," she said, "but I got it."

The crowd shifted around them and Naveen leaned against her, his chest broad and very warm against her arm. "How serendipitous, that we should meet like this," he said, straightening. "Where is your friend, Miss LaBouff?"

"She's off charming Ravenclaws. If you try," Tiana said, neatly sidestepping a hooting third-year, "you can still catch her by the toffees."

"Miss LaBouff is very charming, this is true," he said, "but I would much rather talk with you." He swayed with the throng: his thigh pressed to hers; his arm brushed her back.

The skin low on her back prickled; it tingled. "It's your loss," she said. Tiana studied the box of chocolate frogs. She didn't know why Charlotte loved them so.

"I shall do my best to overcome," he said gravely, then in a much lower tone, one that broke through the constant white noise of the crowd and rolled over her skin, he said, "This is very short notice, I know, but I was wondering. Will you be attending the winter formal?"

Tiana looked at him sharply, but he forged on, heedless.

"If the answer to this question is yes, then I must also ask, will you be attending the winter formal with someone..." He paused. "Special?"

In her chest her heart thumped and thumped again, and Tiana wished it would just stop already. They'd been through this before.

"Shouldn't you be asking some lucky witch in Slytherin those questions?" she said.

"Why must I deprive all the women of Hogwarts of my love?" he said, wondering. "You a Gryffindor and I a Slytherin, but what does it matter? These House rivalries, they are so needless, no? So much better to love instead."

Tiana rolled her eyes, for her benefit if not his. She shifted the sweets in her arms and advanced in the line, Naveen sauntering unhurried after her.

"You should try a little less loving and a little more studying," she said. She turned on him suddenly, nearly knocking the chocolate frogs off the top of her stack. He caught them in his long fingers. "That reminds me," she said, then, as he replaced the frogs, "Thank you. How'd you do on the Potions exam?"

"Very well. It was a resounding and somewhat unexpected success." He smiled at her. "I have my exceptional tutor to thank."

"You're welcome," she said, smiling back at him.

Naveen took advantage of a break in the crowd to swing around before her. "You must allow me to thank you properly. A dance, perhaps? I'm an accomplished waltzer and you won't find anyone who can do a Merlin's Jig quite so well as I, I guarantee."

He smiled at her still, but there was an odd awkwardness to it: a corner slightly lower than the other, perhaps a little less tooth than she was used to seeing. Thump thump thump, went her heart, like it hadn't learned a thing.

"I might be willing to save you a dance," she said.

Naveen twisted around her, his feet slapping the floor, each step the note to a song.

"Just one dance!" she said, turning to follow him. "That's all!"

"One dance is all I ask," he said. "But should you ask for another, I will not say no." He bowed theatrically, displacing two third-years and a display.

Tiana covered her mouth to keep a laugh from falling out; she pressed her fingers hard to her lips.

"I will see you tomorrow," he said, recovering as best he could, "in Potions, yeah?"

"You'll see me there," she said.

His smile flashed, so bright; it lit up his face. He bowed again, less extravagantly, first to her, then to Charlotte, who swept up to them with her cheeks ruddy and her hands flapping.

"Oh, Tia!" she said. "Tia, Tia, Tia! Malcolm, that's his name, you know, Malcolm Cavanaugh, and I -- oh, he-llo, Naveen." She wriggled her fingers at him and threw a sly look at Tiana from underneath her lashes. "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

Tiana pulled herself upright, then together, beneath Charlotte's knowing gaze. "As a matter of fact," she said, "Naveen was just heading off."

"Yes, regretfully, I have a previous engagement at The Three Broomsticks," he said to Charlotte. "I only wished to say hello to Miss Tiana as I passed through."

"Aren't you a sweetheart?" Charlotte crooned. "Tia, darling, he isn't just the sweetest? Well," she said, "I think so anyway."

"You are too kind, Miss LaBouff," said Naveen. He smiled again at Tiana, a slow, small smile, private and very warm, even in the crowded, heated store. "But though it pains me, I take my leave."

"Bye-bye!" Charlotte cooed. She elbowed Tiana, nearly dislodging half the confectionaries.

She caught them on her shoulder and gently, gently nudged them back into place. "Try not to have too much fun," she said to Naveen.

"Impossible!" he said. His smile deepened. "You can never have too much fun. Abinaza!" Naveen tossed off a lazy salute to them both before pulling his green-and-black scarf up over his long mouth. He vanished into the crisp December air, his hands deep in his pockets and his elbows swinging loose, his steps jaunty even as he crossed through the snow.

"Must've been some hello," Charlotte murmured.

"Take your frogs, Lottie," said Tiana.

This story was originally posted at livejournal on 12/21/2009.

Hahaha, oh, man. This story. So, a month ago I was chatting with some friends on-line and the subject of Sorting fictional characters into the various Hogwarts Houses comes up, as it so often does; as we were all jazzed up about the wide release of The Princess and the Frog, that was the direction our conversation took. I feel quite strongly that no House would fit Naveen quite so well as Slytherin: he's cunning, he's manipulative, and he's not above using his charms (or Charms, if you will) to get what he wants.

But Sorting isn't really an objective science and really, an argument could be made for any other House. I mean, hey, I picked Gryffindor for Tiana because I thought it fit her best, but a friend of mine made a very compelling defense for Tiana as a Hufflepuff. Sorting is pretty arbitrary! (And sketchy, too: dividing children into highly competitive Houses on the basis of a select two or three character traits they evidenced at the age of eleven? Problematic!)

That said, Charlotte is so totally in Hufflepuff.

I imagine I will soon be writing a much longer Harry Potter fusion AU starring Tiana and Naveen, because oh boy do I have some ideas. Too many ideas. A surfeit of ideas.