Finally! I've got to give Fred and Tori some of their own time. I can no longer pretend I am not just simply in love with them. Because I just simply adore them. This one is simply just going to be a series of oneshots and drabbles relating to the two of them (their relationship, their childhood, etc.) and will fall in no particular order (i.e. not necessarily chronological). Any additional plot comes from my Trial and Error series, but I don't believe it's one hundred percent necessary to read that in order to understand this one, although I always appreciate new readers!

As far as the rating on this one goes…I am rating M to be on the safe side. I have not yet determined how much detail I'll be going into in terms of the romance, to be totally honest (I've never written anything graphic before, but it is a constant debate of mine, so we shall see, I suppose). Also, given Tori's mother's death (which I will likely dive into in far more detail in some of the chapters), it seems the safer option depending on how much I choose to flesh that out. That being said, each chapter will have its own rating, which I will list at the beginning in the event that anyone prefers to skip over particular details if I do choose to go that route.

Also, for anyone who does not read my other stories, I do tend to lean heavily on psychology in some situations — I have a Psychology degree and I am a strong advocate that mental health is both real and important. It plays a big role in my other story, truthfully, so there is always the chance it may do so here as well. Though I have not decided if or how much it will play a part in this particular story, I'll mention it anyway in the event that sort of thing just doesn't float your boat.

Also, I have several ideas for chapters for this one, but if there's ever anything in particular that you're interested in seeing of their relationship, please feel free to reach out (PM or review) and I will consider it.

That being said, enjoy and review if you'd like!


Title: Chasing Rainbows

Summary: He could name a hundred reasons why the two of them would never work: They were both notoriously blasé about everything, and they drove each other mad. She was the daughter of Sirius Black, she was infuriating, and she was his best friend. His best friend who had grown up with him after her mother had died, and had been raised as his adoptive sister. Loving her might be the stupidest mistake of his life, but he was already in far too deep. Now all he had to do was convince her that he was what she needed.


Disclaimer: I'll do this once to avoid doing it every chapter. I do not own any of the characters in this story other than my OCs. All Harry Potter storyline plot and characters belong to J.K. Rowling and/or Warner Bros. I make no profit from this story.


Rating for this Chapter: T

Timing of this Chapter: PoA - Between chapters 24 and 25 of Through Thick and Thin.


Chapter One

Fred Weasley should be ecstatic: they'd won the Quidditch Cup not three hours ago. He'd gotten to wipe the stupid smug smirks off of the faces of the Slytherin Quidditch team, and the party around him was raging and wild. Wild in the way he typically enjoyed, too. The entire house was celebrating, even Percy, who had begged them to turn the music down at the last party they'd thrown after their match against Ravenclaw.

Fred Weasley should have been celebrating; he was Beater and the likelihood that they'd win the Cup this year had been low after Harry had fallen off of his broom against Hufflepuff. This should have been the happiest he'd been in quite some time — possibly in all his life. But instead he was sitting in the corner of the room, holding a glass of Firewhiskey and glaring across the room at Oliver Wood.

He'd never quite recognized how much Oliver looked like a prat. He should cut his hair — it made him look like a ninny. Nevermind the fact that Tori clearly did not think so. Not if her sitting half in the man's lap was any indication. Fred didn't see what she saw in him at all — he'd cried after they'd won the match for one thing. For another, he was a lunatic that had practically run them into the ground for the last three months and she'd spent all of her free time complaining about him.

And yet there she was…snogging the bloke. Right in the middle of the bloody common room. Absolutely no regard for the fact that people could see them either. It was making him wish he'd tried harder to hit Wood with a Bludger at practices. He'd not tried nearly hard enough if his nose was still so straight.

Rolling his eyes and taking a large sip of the firewhiskey in his hand, he grimaced at the burn, training his eyes elsewhere in order to give himself some sort of reprieve from watching the woman he loved snog one of his friends.

The woman he loved.

How had he gotten into this position? One day she was his best friend — his incredibly annoying, rage-inducing, lunatic best friend who lived with him. The next day he couldn't stop staring at her because she was breathtaking to look at. All of a sudden, bickering with her was some sort of weird foreplay that gave him a great deal of satisfaction, especially when she refused to back down. It was maddening at this point because now he couldn't help noticing how nice she smelled or how the sound of her laugh made him grin like an idiot or the fact that her eyes were like looking into the ocean's gray depths moments before the sun's rays hit the water and turned it blue. And it was all just completely out of nowhere — like a switch that had flipped in his head suddenly and made him wonder if he had always felt like this and just never noticed. It colored every memory he had with her and he was one step away from yanking Oliver Wood off of Tori by his pretty boy hair.

His eyes landed on George and Vanessa on the makeshift dance floor Tori had made at the start of the party. His twin was having a much easier time with his love life, although Fred did not understand how when he'd been such a prat for the majority of the year. Vanessa Potter was a saint and his twin did not deserve her. Truthfully, his brother was a bonafide moron. But he had to admit the git was pretty smooth with her, as he twirled her around and around the dance floor. Fred paused before taking another sip of his whiskey, staring at the two of them together, and trying to ignore the pang of longing in his chest.

George and Nessa had always made sense to him, despite how very different they were. There was a sort of balance to the two of them — George the calm, carefree one, and Nessa the rational, tense little lunatic. They were the sort of couple that made the rest of them look ridiculous. The fact that it took his twin so long to realize what they were was a true testament to how far his head had been up his own arse.

That being said, watching them now was more painful than Fred expected. Nessa and George made sense, but it was simply a reminder that he and Tori were likely never going to end up with that same level of security.

He groaned and took a much larger sip of his Firewhiskey this time. The burn at the back of his throat as he swallowed was nowhere near being intense enough to mask the depressing nature of his thoughts.

Vanessa had told him that he needed to speak to Tori — tonight — and the alcohol was supposed to make him feel more…loose. Or at least loose enough to have some insane conversation with the woman whom his parents had always told him was no different than Ginny. Logically speaking, this was not true, but there was a very high likelihood that he would say something to her and she'd tell him that she only thought of him like a brother. And wouldn't that be the most awkward conversation on the planet. He and George should have nicked far more alcohol if he was really going to do this.

Looking back over at Tori and Oliver, he tensed. They were still sitting far too close together and she was looking at him in a way that was entirely inappropriate. He should have told Nessa that having this conversation tonight was just not going to work — not if Tori refused to part with Wood before the evening ended. He did not like the direction his thoughts took at the idea of the two of them spending the entire night together.

All of a sudden he was pissed off, and before he could talk himself out of it, he was stomping across the common room toward them.

"Alright, we're done with this," he snapped angrily, grabbing Tori by the arm and pulling her off of Wood's lap.

"What the hell is your problem?" Tori snapped at him, struggling to pull her arm out of his grasp.

"I need to talk to you."

"Can it wait, you prat?" she said angrily, growling in irritation when his grip did not loosen on her arm. "Fred, what is the matter with you?"

"It can't wait," he said, pulling her toward the portrait hole despite her protests.

"Fred, mate —" Wood began anxiously.

"If you like your nose where it's at, Wood, then I suggest you shut up," Fred snapped before losing patience with Tori's incessant struggling. "Find someone else to snog because you're done here."

Suddenly irritated by Tori trying to lean back in his grasp in order to make herself harder to pull, he stopped and grabbed her around the waist, throwing her over his shoulder instead of trying to drag her. Her struggling did not cease and she was becoming more and more irritated with him, but it was much easier to get her out of the common room with her over his shoulder. She was going to be enraged when he finally set her down, but it still seemed much better than dragging her across the common room for twenty minutes because she refused to cooperate.

Despite her excessive squirming and loud swearing, he managed to get them down to an empty classroom in a very short amount of time. By the time he set her down in front of him, she was practically steaming from her ears. It took a great deal of concentration to remember what he'd even brought her down here for because she really was breathtaking when she was glaring at him like that.

The fact that he thought so was surely just a sign that he had issues.

She pushed herself away from him immediately, so hard that he stumbled back toward the door.

"Have you completely lost your mind?" she shouted. "Did you get hit with a Bludger at the match? Because I cannot for the life of me figure out what would possess you to manhandle me —"

"Don't be so dramatic, Victoria," he said, rolling his eyes.

Using her full name was a sure way to anger her more and watching those eyes of hers darken like roiling thunderclouds was the reward he got for doing so. She was always so fiery. She always had that lively sort of passion that made his heart pound and his mind race. Merlin, it was hard to concentrate with her looking at him like that.

"You've already pissed me off, Fred, I really don't recommend making it worse," she snapped, clearly unaware of his thoughts. "I have far better things to do than argue with you —"

The words angered him again, a nice reminder of the reason he'd been so abrupt in bringing her down here in the first place. He was almost entirely certain that when Nessa had advised that he talk to Tori, she had not meant to start an argument with her, but suddenly the image of her kissing Wood was flashing behind his eyes and he was too impulsive and irrational to care much about the implications of the entire thing.

"Better things to do," he scoffed angrily. "Like snogging Oliver, you mean? I'd hardly call that of dire importance. He's a git."

"He's your friend, moron," she snapped with an eye roll.

"Exactly! You can't just go about snogging him —"

"I can do whatever I very well please, Fred Weasley," she said, stepping closer to him, her glare intensifying. In most situations, people backed away from Tori when she got like this. The only person who didn't was Vanessa, and only because she was the only person who could calm her once the anger had risen. Fred, however, liked to live his life on the edge. So he did not do what normal people might have done and stood his ground, his own stare narrowing on her face and straightening his stance to prepare for her wrath as she approached him. "You have no right to tell me what I can and can't do or who I can do it with."

"You are not snogging Oliver Wood, Victoria," he said, his voice low with a warning she paid no heed to. Her eyes flashed at him and her fists balled at her sides, but he refused to give her the satisfaction of getting her way on this one. He took a step toward her himself and she laughed dangerously low, as if she were seriously considering hexing him in the middle of this classroom. He had a death wish, if the excited pounding of his heart was any indication. "One word from me and he won't touch you again."

Tori swelled with indignation at the words and he braced himself for the impending explosion.

"What goddamn difference does it make who I snog?" she yelled, throwing her hands up in the air and clearly trying not to throttle him where he stood. "You have never in your life cared who I was snogging before —"

"I've made it very clear I didn't want you gallivanting around with Wood, so I hardly think that's true! You did it anyway —"

"I am perfectly capable of making my own choices, Fred! It's not like I've got any interest in dating him! It could be much worse!"

"This is the worst it's going to get, believe me," he scoffed. "I don't care if you just want to snog him —"

"I was thinking about taking it a bit further than that, actually, since you're so concerned," she said.

His nostrils flared and he pointed a finger at her in warning. He knew what she was doing. That tone of her voice was always his indication that she was attempting to anger him, and he made it far too easy for her to do on far too many occasions.

"Stop trying to piss me off, Tori," he said.

"Stop trying to tell me what to do, Fred," she snapped back. "You snog just as many people as I do, and you don't see me throwing a fit about it!"

"This is not a fit," he said, trying to breathe through his nose despite the burning anger in his chest. He had to get this entire thing back under control. Suddenly, pissing her off was seeming like a very poor idea — telling her he had feelings for her was already going to be complicated enough. Nessa should never have let him do this on his own. "Listen, Tori, I'm not trying to be a prat —"

"Of course you aren't," she said with a roll of her eyes. "You don't have to try at something that comes naturally."

Fred huffed in irritation. She drove him mad. Absolutely, unbelievably mad.

"For Merlin's sake, can you just listen to me for once in your life?" he snapped. "What do you even want to do with him, Tori? He ignores you for two years —"

"Because you and George were always nosing around —"

"If he's afraid of me and George, he certainly isn't worth snogging," he said with a roll of his eyes.

"Everyone is afraid of the two of you," she replied. "You threaten to turn people into cockroaches when they piss you off. If I went based on that logic, I'd have no one to snog at all."

"Sounds great, do that," he said, only half-joking.

"This is ridiculous," she huffed. "I'm done with this conversation, Fred."

"We aren't done with this conversation, actually," he snapped, grabbing her arm when she went to shove past him. "I haven't even said half of what I wanted to talk to you about —"

"Yes, well, I haven't gotten to do half of the things I wanted to do with Oliver, so I guess we'll both just have to —"

She gasped when he pulled her roughly toward him so that she was forced to catch herself with her hands on his chest.

"Do not push me, Victoria," he said softly. Her eyes flashed at him again and he was suddenly very aware of how close she was standing to him. He could smell the rose and vanilla scent of her and the skin of her arm was soft against his hand, and hot — likely from working herself up so much when arguing with him. "Can we have a rational conversation for half of a second, please?"

"Let me go, Fred, or I will hex your bollocks off," she snapped, pulling her arm from his grasp. "And if you wanted to have a rational conversation then perhaps you shouldn't have thrown me over your shoulder like an ape!"

She was likely true about that and he was not too proud to admit that, although it didn't make him feel better about the situation. He really should get better about controlling his impulses, but he was weak when it came to her. It was maddening and infuriating and confusing, and seeing her with Oliver was like having his heart ripped from his chest. A fact that confused him even more because he had never cared if she snogged other people before — she wasn't the dating type, so he never really had anything to worry about. Maybe it was because it was his friend this time or maybe because he was coming to the realization that he was in love with the stupid lunatic in front of him and he had nowhere else to hide anymore.

Rationally speaking, it was likely within his best interest to let her walk away and distract himself for the rest of the evening in order to calm himself down for a conversation he knew would be far more painful than their current one. He'd told Nessa he would talk to Tori tonight, but he was entirely certain that if he explained why he hadn't, she'd agree with him that continuing on the trajectory they were currently was a poor decision.

"Fine, Tori," he said, suddenly exhausted with the argument, and her, and himself. "We can talk about this tomorrow."

"Not likely," she scoffed. "Unless you're going to stop being such a prat about Oliver —"

"I will if you stop snogging him," he smirked as she stomped her foot in frustration.

"You do not get to tell me what to do, Fred Weasley. You do not get to tell me who to be snogging or judging me for wanting to snog someone who wasn't interested in me until tonight. I could care less about that — I'm not interested in him for any other reason than a good time, so he can go snogging whoever else he wants tomorrow. So unless you're going to tell me why you're making such a big deal about this then, personally, I just don't —"

She talked so much, truthfully. Her tirades had been known to last eons, especially when it had something to do with him. Normally, he just smirked at her stupidly and let her rant for ages. And then, he'd cut her off midway with something he knew would irk her further, so that he could watch her swell to her full height and close the distance between them to glare directly into his face.

He liked playing with fire.

But at the moment, he found her entirely distracting. Maybe it was the fact that he'd finally worked up the courage to tell her how he felt. Maybe it was his residual anger from watching her kiss one of his friends. Maybe he actually had been hit with a Bludger at the match and his remaining brain cells had fallen out completely. Maybe it was the stupid Firewhiskey he'd thought would be a good idea to imbibe in before this conversation.

Or maybe it was just because she really was the most beautiful person he'd ever seen in all his life.

She was tall — only a head shorter than him — and blemish free. She was the sort of beautiful that turned many heads in the corridors and earned her a lot of distaste from other women. Despite her very crass and brazen personality, she had soft features and softer curves that he found entirely too distracting on a great number of occasions. Her eyes were heavy-lidded and gray like the ashes of a fire that he could still see sparking in her wrath. Or rolling thunderclouds moments before a downpour. She had very symmetrical features and her hair was long, black as coal, and fanned around her face in the tight spiraling curls that he enjoyed pulling and releasing so that he could watch it pop back into place like a spring.

Not to mention that stupid rose and vanilla scent of hers that fogged every logical thought he possessed and the fact that she was standing so close to him now that her chest brushed against his with every one of her heaving, angry breaths.

She was distracting and infuriating and beautiful and brave. And he was a moron, just like his twin.

Because instead of walking away from the argument like he should have, he stepped closer to her so that there was no amount of space between them. Instead of taking a breath and de-escalating the situation, he felt the anger cloud his vision again and decided to prove a point to her that would very likely lead to further problems down the road. He couldn't help himself, really. He was impulsive and stupid and reckless and rash.

So he ignored the little voice in his head that was screaming at him to stop and think through what he was about to do. He ignored the fact that Nessa was going to kill him when she found out — assuming that Tori herself did not. He disregarded the knowledge that this would only make things more complicated than he needed at the moment and maybe make things a little more difficult for her to accept.

He ignored the entire thing, and, before either one of them had any idea what he was doing, his lips crashed against hers before any of those thoughts managed to come clawing back into his head. He pulled away for half of a second because he could feel her going stiff as a board against him and the feel of her lips against his, while electrifying, had somehow pulled him from whatever idiotic, impulsive place he'd been in just a moment before. His eyes met hers — swirling blue clashing with a bottomless gray — and he held his breath for whatever she was going to say next because he was absolutely — without a doubt — the stupidest person he'd ever known and whatever she had to say, he would definitely deserve.

His body was as tense as hers as they stared at each other, both of them still barely an inch apart, her breath hitting his face in quick, harsh breaths, which he was not entirely certain were still from her temper at this point. There were several long seconds that passed as they stared at each other that felt like an eternity and he was starting to think that she wasn't going to say anything at all.

"Tori, I —"

He grunted in surprise when she hurled herself at him, her lips clashing with his again. There was a momentary shock wherein he tried to determine if this were a dream he'd conjured before his back hit the door behind him and shocked him from the reverie completely, and he had the sudden realization that he should probably be responding to what was happening in front of him. Jolting back to his senses, he wrapped his hands around the narrow part of her waist, pulling her tightly against him as his senses flooded with everything that was…her.

If he'd thought her passionate at any point before, he had been sorely mistaken. She came alive in his hands — like a firecracker or a live wire or a match that ignited under his touch. His heart was pounding and it felt like there was nothing he could do to get her as close to him as he wanted. Nevermind the fact that the only way she could be any closer to him at this point was if she crawled inside him.

His grip tightened on her waist as she fisted his shirt in her hands, seeming undecided on whether she wanted to pull him toward herself or push him back against the door. She was much smaller than him in build, but she was holding herself in such a way that his knees felt a little weak and he couldn't think straight as her mouth slanted over his repeatedly. The kiss lacked finesse, truthfully, their noses bumping together and their teeth clashing as the desperation to get closer and closer overrode any sort of skill or control on his part.

He was kissing her like a man who had been starving for months, like someone gulping down air after breaking the surface of water. He was so desperate for her, for this, that he didn't bother thinking before he spun her around so that she was pushed against the door instead, his senses coming back to him enough to know that he was not putting up nearly enough in the fight for dominance she was currently having with her lips against his. She did not waver when he began insisting with his lips, despite the noise she made in the back of her throat that lit his blood on fire and nearly made him lose his head entirely.

She didn't give him an inch as his lips slanted over hers again and again, taking as much from him as he did from her and he didn't know why it surprised him. The two of them were always battling for dominance in everything they did and she had as much fire in her as he did. She'd never given him an inch in her life, and she clearly wasn't about to start now. And damned if that didn't send a thrill down his spine.

She would be the death of him.

She was going to kill him.

She was going to bring him to his knees one day and he couldn't decide if that was exhilarating or frightening.

He groaned when her tongue came into contact with his own, with absolutely no warning at all. He repaid her for this by using one of his hands to tangle in the wild curls of her hair and tilted her head back so that she had to relinquish some of her precious control to him. He tried very hard — really, he did — to withhold his smirk when she made a noise of frustration mixed with reluctant pleasure in the back of her throat.

She could say whatever she wanted, but she enjoyed the chase and the bickering just as much as he did.

Somehow, however, the noise seemed to shock her out of whatever had possessed her to kiss him in the first place and she was suddenly gasping sharply, pulling her head back from him and pushing him back.

He took a step back without a fight. And then another. And another.

By the time he'd made it halfway across the room, his thoughts were coming rushing back in and he was staring at Victoria with a sort of shocked horror.

Merlin's beard, had he actually just —

"What the hell was that?"

A very good question, he had to admit.

This had suddenly gotten extremely more complicated and it was hard for him to think through an acceptable response to that when she was standing there, her cheeks flushed, her lips red, and breathing hard. It made him want to kiss her again, really, and that was quite possibly the stupidest thing he could do at the moment.

God, Vanessa was going to kill him when he told her how badly he'd botched this entire thing.

"I — er —" he stuttered. She was staring at him, still breathing harshly and touching her lips with a shaking hand as if she were trying to confirm what had just happened. Meanwhile, he was just gaping at her like a moron, trying to control the racing of his thoughts and still somehow find a way that would make this less…huge, for lack of a better term. "This wasn't exactly how I wanted to tell you, to be honest."

She froze completely, her eyes wide and her body rigid, as if he'd just told her he was a vampire.

"Tell me what?"

Okay, back to the thinking then.

He had to tell her now — of that he was entirely certain because you didn't just go about snogging your best friend for kicks and giggles. Or at least there was not a chance that he could swing that unless he went back up to the common room and snogged Nessa and Lee too. Which he was not stupid enough to do — he didn't think, anyway. George would throttle him for touching Nessa and Lee was…well, Lee. So, yes, entirely out of the question.

But that left him with the truth which was not much better, honestly. She'd kissed him back so that had to be a good sign…he hoped. But Tori was notoriously afraid to get close to people. He didn't entirely blame her — her mother had been murdered only twelve feet in front of her by Death Eaters a few years after the war; her father was a mass murderer that had escaped Azkaban: a fact with which she had only learned recently because his parents, who had raised her as their own after her mother's passing, had kept it a long, painful secret from her. A fact which had left her confused about who she could trust.

She'd lost a lot at a very young age, and it had taken a toll on her. Not even he could deny the complexity of all of that. Telling her that he was in love with her was certain to freak her out. Potentially cause her to run screaming for the hills — he knew that with absolute certainty. The only person he knew better than Victoria Hastings was his twin, and anything he said from here on out was going to be a huge, horrible avalanche of emotions.

He had to choose the safest route in this case, if he wanted to talk to her about this.

"I —" he cleared his throat roughly because his voice had come out rougher than he'd intended. She was still just staring at him as if she had never seen him before. "I really don't know how to say this."

More with the staring. It was a true testament to their current predicament that neither one of them had any idea what they should be saying or doing. He'd never been this at a loss for words before. He was just going to blurt it out — it couldn't possibly get worse than this.

"I've been thinking about you…differently, is all."

Merlin's beard, that had to be the most awkward thing he'd ever said to anyone in all his life. He'd always been good with people, but suddenly he wasn't entirely sure he remembered how.

"What does that mean, differently?" she said, some of the panic bleeding into her voice.

He blinked at her.

"Considering what just happened, I feel like that's fairly self-explanatory," he said baldly. She flinched at the reminder and he tried not to take that too personally. "Look, Tori, it — I really didn't want it to come out like this. It's — it's a big deal —"

"A big deal," she said, laughing sardonically, her voice breathless. "That's putting it lightly, Fred. That's — Oh my God, please tell me this is a nightmare. A fever dream. A — a — I don't know what! We can't — you can't —"

"I can't help how I feel, Tori," he said softly.

She looked like she might start crying and it was seriously making him consider carving his own heart out of his chest. He hated when she cried — there had yet to be anything in his life more painful than watching Victoria cry. And he'd broken his arm twice, lost a fingernail when George had dropped a rock on it when they were kids, given himself second degree burns when his mother had made caramel on the stove once and he had been too impatient to wait for it to cool.

But, Merlin, seeing her cry was like all of those things happening at once and still somehow a little bit worse.

Worse, this time, because he was the reason for it.

"You — you feel — I don't understand — you never said before — we — this whole time!"

He hesitated; He had no idea when it had changed for him. Really, truly, the change had been so subtle a shift that he'd not even had the time to consider it. He sort of wondered if the two of them had always been this way — circling each other, fighting and bickering and supporting each other, without even realizing how much different their relationship was from the one she shared with the rest of his family.

But then again that sounded just as insane as the fact that he was having this conversation with her right now.

"It — no, not the whole time," he said, trying to think through every memory they'd made together and sort out which one had changed things for him. He had nothing, really. "I don't know when it happened, Tori. It — I don't know. It doesn't really feel all that different from before except for the — er —"

"Not that different?" she exclaimed. "It's — it's very different, Fred! You — we — you're my best friend —"

"I know that, sunshine —"

She flinched again at the endearment. One he had coined for her as a joke when they'd been much, much younger, and he'd found her incredibly annoying and a pain in his ass. Well, she was still a pain in his ass, really, but he was no longer jealous of her relationship with George, so it had balanced out somehow. The endearment had stuck regardless.

"Don't call me that," she whispered brokenly and the words made him feel like his chest was going to cave in. "You can't just — just kiss me, Fred. It's — it's entirely inappropriate, is what it is."

He rolled his eyes before he could stop himself.

"That's a bit hypocritical, Victoria, because I wasn't the only one doing the kissing," he said dryly. It felt a little better that her eyes sparked at the words, although it faded quickly back into the same horrified surprise as before. "And why is it inappropriate?"

She gaped at him.

"Are you — are you joking?" she said blankly. "Is this one of your jokes that I don't understand?"

He sighed heavily.

"No, Tori, it's not a joke," he said seriously. "I'd never joke about this — about you. I just mean that — well, I know it complicates things, but it's not —"

"We live together," she said, as if he were too stupid to remember this fact on his own. "Your parents — they raised me, Fred. In their home. They raised us as — as —"

"Do not say siblings," he said hastily. "We aren't siblings."

"They raised us to treat each other that way," she said firmly. "Maybe we aren't biologically, but they — they would kill us, Fred. They — this is not — you can't look at me differently. You just can't."

He didn't really know what he'd expected. He'd known she'd not take it well. He hadn't taken it well, for fuck's sake. But it was still hard to hear the words said out loud, as if he had any control over the situation at all. The entire thing was asinine, really, and he had no idea how he'd stumbled into this mess in the first place. And he wanted to make her happy, in whatever way he could, but now that he'd kissed her…

Christ, it was going to be the only thing he could think about now. The two of them were so blasé — about love interests and the future and life in general. The two of them together were like throwing gasoline on a fire or being caught in a riptide. Being with her was like the moment right before he chose to plummet on his broomstick, the dive so sharp that he could feel his heart in his throat. It was like slipping into bed when the sheets were still warm from being washed or into a warm pond on a very hot summer day.

Everything about them was complicated and complex and intense, and it confused him more than anything else in the world ever had. But she was…perfect. Perfect in a way that any human being could be perfect, really. She excited him, and challenged him, and soothed the chaotic edges of his personality, at the same time that she drove him to the brink of madness.

He'd do anything for her.

But now he'd kissed her and he couldn't walk away from this. He couldn't walk away from her. Loving her was complicated and messy…it would enrage his mother and confuse his siblings. It blurred the line of their friendship and made a mess of everything he'd ever thought of the world. Colored it in hues of gray that upended the natural order of things. Loving her might very well be the biggest mistake he'd ever make in all his life, and had the potential to destroy him completely.

But he loved her anyway.

"I can't help how I feel, Tori," he repeated, his voice firmer this time, more solid and stronger than it had been previously. "You're still my best friend. I — I didn't mean to make this so…so complicated. But I can't pretend like I don't want something more just because Mum will lose her head. It — it's a bit more important than all that."

She was staring at him again, but he could tell she was going to run for it. She had no idea what to say and she was shaking and he was entirely certain that it was the sort of news that required more thought than she was going to get if he were looking at her.

So, he didn't stop her when she made a choking noise and disappeared through the doorway.

Instead, he groaned loudly in frustration; he just had to go and do something stupid, didn't he?

Nessa was really going to kill him.


"Stupid, stupid, stupid," Tori muttered to herself in frustration. "Stupid fucking Fred. Just snogging people out of the blue…what kind of moron —"

She needed a distraction, that was what she needed. It had been a week since he'd kissed her in that stupid classroom and everything about the entire ordeal was still running rampant in her mind. She couldn't close her goddamn eyes without seeing the entire thing again.

She was suddenly very aware why her female counterparts found him so appealing…

No, absolutely not, Victoria. We are not going there.

A distraction. A male distraction.

Shouldn't be too hard to find, really. Not when she looked like she did, anyway. And the male population of this school had no control of their raging hormones.

A nice, stress-reducing snog was exactly what she needed. At worst, she'd hate herself because now, suddenly, she felt guilty for thinking so when she knew Fred was 'looking at her differently.' At best, it would be a nice reminder that Fred Weasley was not a good kisser. Not a good kisser at all. Not at all distracting her or confusing her or making her wonder if maybe she should just throw caution completely to the wind and drag him into a broom cupboard to —

Not helping, Victoria.

Right, focus. She needed focus.

Looking around the library covertly, she looked for someone she could pull into the stacks and distract herself with for the next ten minutes. Preferably someone she hadn't snogged before, but at this point she really did not care. She needed her sanity back.

She'd been hiding out here during all of her free time since the debacle with Fred, as a means to ignore her own feelings about him and the situation. She hated it in here too. It smelled like books and rotting parchment. And it was far too quiet.

Her eyes landed on Troy Peterson as he was looking for some book in the Transfiguration section. He was taller than Fred, blonde hair, brown eyes, a bit more scrawny than lean. He was about as far from Fred Weasley as she could get in the grand scheme of things.

Before she could convince herself not to go through with her plan, she was marching across the room, and grabbing Peterson by the back of his robes with a determination she didn't want to ponder all that much.

"Hastings, what in the bloody —"

"Merlin, please don't talk, Peterson," she snapped before crushing her lips against his.

He dropped his book in surprise, but didn't push her away, so she took this as a sign of safe passage. She forced herself to let him set the pace of the kiss, to walk her back against the wall of the dark corner she'd pulled them into. She forced herself to remain as pliant as possible because it was what men preferred — they liked being dominant and in charge. She might not have tolerated it under any other circumstances — she didn't tolerate it under other circumstances, actually — but it was the only way for her to really scratch an itch and it was a small thing to give up in the grand scheme of things.

Except she hadn't had to do that at all with Fred. And if his groan had been any indication, he really hadn't minded all that much —

For fuck's sake, pay attention to what's happening, would you?

Peterson was…fine. A bit handsy, but they all were, really, and she wasn't exactly shy or innocent, so it never really bothered her. Except this time, she couldn't even pretend to be into it. His lips were not chapped enough, not demanding enough. He balked on the few occasions that she tried to take charge and seemed to prefer her as the more submissive of the two of them — which had never bothered her before, but suddenly was extremely irritating. His hair was not as soft or as red as she would have preferred and he was not as stocky.

The entire thing was boring in comparison to the kiss she'd shared with Fred.

Fred had let her control the kiss for a great deal of time, actually, practically melting into her in a way that she had to pretend to do with all of the guys she'd kissed before him. He'd taken every bit of her rage and her passion, as if it were simply the easiest thing he'd ever done, and had not backed down from her at all. Although, truthfully, he never had. Which, again, was very irritating.

With a groan of frustration, she pulled away from Peterson.

"This isn't working," she snapped.

She couldn't get Fred Weasley out of her head at all and it was maddening. The entire thing was maddening. She'd never once considered a relationship with him — of the casual or serious kind — but all of a sudden, she couldn't think of anything else.

"Sorry?" Peterson panted in front of her, clearly confused by her sudden change of heart.

She pushed him again and he was forced to take a step back from her.

"Just — nevermind," she muttered. "Off you go, Peterson. I'm sure you have Transfiguration homework."

He looked like he might argue with her, but one hard look from her and he was scurrying around the corner.

Pathetic. Fred never ran from her like that.

The thought alone made her smack her head back into the wall in frustration.

What was her life becoming? Her best friend — her rock, despite his ridiculous personality quirks and infuriating behavior — had feelings for her.

What was she supposed to do with that information?

The entire thing was horribly confusing. She'd never even harbored the idea of him and her as anything more than friends, but she could hardly deny the way it had felt to kiss him. Like being struck by lightning, maybe. Like her blood was boiling. Like she might die if she didn't take the opportunity to climb him like a tree.

And, Merlin, she'd known he was attractive before, but suddenly it was incredibly distracting to her, even though it hadn't been before. She wasn't exactly blind, even if they were just friends who had grown up together their whole lives. He had the sort of ruggish, volatile quality she preferred in men. He was spontaneous and reckless and wild. It had always meshed so well with her own wildness. The two of them had always been that way — somehow stable and precarious all at once.

He'd driven her mad as a child, but after her mother had died, he'd been…everything. And had been everything she needed since. Other than Vanessa, he was the closest to anyone she ever got. That alone scared the hell out of her and had from the day she'd crawled into his bed at five years old and refused to leave no matter how much Molly insisted she sleep in Ginny's nursery. Their dynamic had changed that day, although they'd still butted heads a great deal of the time.

Still did, really. He knew exactly every one of her buttons, and he enjoyed pushing them. If she were honest with herself, she'd admit that she liked it as much as he did. He was softer with her than he was with anyone, and she'd always known that he was the one she could pout at to get exactly what she wanted.

She'd always assumed it was because he hated seeing her cry, but was it really because he was attracted to her?

She'd have much preferred if he'd not kissed her at all. Nevermind the fact that she'd kissed back. Nevermind the fact that she'd enjoyed it far too much. Nevermind the fact that she had to make a list to herself of reasons why snogging him again would be a horrible, horrible idea.

She'd never thought of him like that before, but that kiss had broken some sort of barrier in her head and now she was wondering if she'd misread her feelings about him the entire time.

It was entirely maddening, and she didn't even know where to begin in order to sort through everything she felt about him now. She didn't know how to tell if the butterflies in her stomach when she looked at him were nerves or giddiness. She didn't know if that stupid smirk he always wore was enraging or intoxicating.

And snogging someone else was clearly not going to help the situation at all.

"Fucking Fred."


The first kiss is always such a hard thing to write. Made harder by the trope of this one, really, and the fact that Fred and Tori are both my absolute opposites. But here we are anyway! Finally finished.

I debated with myself for a very long time about starting with this chapter or starting with a childhood memory of them instead to sort of lay the groundwork, but it'll all come with time, my friends. See you soon!