I don't own Harry Potter. I just like writing about Harry and Katie. This time a two chapter story.
Fourth year student Katie Bell was ready for redemption. She was bouncing on her feet ready to come out of the changing room and play Ravenclaw. The conditions in the previous match against Hufflepuff were horrendous and her teammate, Harry Potter, probably only failed to catch the Snitch because of Dementors of all things. The team had been undefeated when they all played together until that day. Katie was determined to make sure that would be the only loss they ever suffered. That began with beating Ravenclaw in this game.
The team was coming off their best practice ever just the day before and Harry Potter had a Firebolt. Katie had seen the remarkable speed of the fastest broom in the world up close. The Snitch was right next to her during practice and Harry crossed the entire pitch in mere moments to catch it. Katie was sure they were going to collide but then Harry was able to stop immediately after grabbing the tiny golden ball, wearing the infectious smile he always wore when flying. Katie had replayed that moment in her mind over and over the past 24 hours and she was not entirely sure why.
Clearing her head from yesterdays events, Katie and the other girls on the team, Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet, walked from the girl's changing room towards the entrance tunnel where Harry and the other boys were waiting. As always, Katie stood right next to Harry and listened diligently to Oliver Wood as he began his traditional pregame speech. During the first team practice of Katie's second year—her first on the team—she and Harry had paired up as the newcomers to Quidditch. The other five players all knew each other already so it was natural for Harry and Katie to become close. This year however, Katie felt strangely drawn to her younger teammate and wanted to spend more time with Harry outside of Quidditch than ever before.
Wood's speech continued ("Fly like you did at practice…") the content was not really different from the other half-dozen times she had heard it. Still, considering the gravity of this game made Wood's words feel more important than usual.
Katie glanced at Harry who looked just as determined as she felt. Katie had never been more sure in a victory. Gryffindor was going to beat Ravenclaw. She and Harry would make sure of it. As the team began to march out onto the pitch to wild applause, Katie knocked shoulders with him and confidently told her friend, "We got this, Harry!"
Giving a determined nod in response, Harry replied, "Yeah, we do. We're going to…win…"
Katie was confused why Harry trailed off until she followed his line of sight towards Cho Chang, the only girl on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team and Harry's rival Seeker for the day. Cho smiled at Harry and Katie felt a strange surge of annoyance at her fellow fourteen year old. Katie had shared classes with Cho during her four years at Hogwarts and had only ever had positive conversations with the girl. At this moment however, Katie could only think of the Ravenclaw Seeker as her enemy.
'We'll see who is smiling after the game!' Katie thought angrily to herself. Katie did not know why she was so angry at the girl but she needed to make sure to turn her anger into fuel to score as many goals as possible in this game.
Katie rolled her eyes as Harry took one more look over his head at Chang before they all launched into the air; Harry and his Firebolt going higher and faster than the other thirteen players.
Soon Madam Hooch blew her whistle and the game began. Katie zoomed faster than every other Chaser and caught the Quaffle. While it was critical Harry caught the Snitch, Katie and the Chasers needed to close the gap on Slytherin before their climatic match in two months. Katie was up to the challenge and played the game of her life. She scored the first goal of the game (Harry provided textbook Seeker interference to disrupt Ravenclaw's Keeper) and never looked back.
Soon enough Gryffindor led eighty points to zero with Katie scoring six of the goals alone. Ravenclaw managed to score a few goals in a comeback attempt when the Snitch was seen by everyone hovering next to Oliver and the Gryffindor hoops. A hundred and thirty points was not an ideal amount but if Harry did not catch the Snitch now, Chang probably would.
In a split second decision, Katie bailed out from Angelina and Alicia. The two were experienced enough to run a two Chaser formation and right now, Harry catching the Snitch was all that mattered. When Katie arrived to run interference for Harry, she heard Wood yelled at Harry to knock Cho off her broom.
'Great idea, Oliver!' Katie thought to herself.
Katie swooped around the posts and charged straight in the direction of Harry and Cho who were zigzagging following the erratic path of the golden ball. Just as Katie was about to peel off to avoid a direct collision with the Ravenclaw Seeker—only because they could not afford a foul—three Dementors appeared in between her and Harry. Strangely, Katie did not feel the despair she usually felt around the nasty creatures but she felt her heart clench in fear for Harry. Harry, who had passed out in their presence twice. She knew he had been working on a way to deal with the Dementors; she just hoped whatever he had planned would work as he pulled out his wand from his Quidditch robes.
"You can do it, Harry!" Katie yelled instinctively. She had not meant to say that aloud but she was not embarrassed. All she cared about was Harry's safety.
Still, Harry took a peek towards her, nodded once, and with a determined expression bellowed "Expecto patronum!" at the three hooded creatures. As a giant white pulse went through them, Harry plowed ahead towards the Snitch—not even pausing to look at his brilliant charm—and made the catch without further difficulty.
As Katie watched the event unfold, it became more and more clear the hooded figures were not Dementors at all. It was Malfoy and company. Katie was angry and wanted to hex the lot of them but her anger was drowned out by the joy of Harry clinching the match. Katie changed direction as quickly as her broom could muster and charged straight towards her…friend.
Harry waved the Snitch wildly in the air and motioned for Katie to join him for the traditional victory lap victorious Seekers perform. While she flew up to Harry, feeling the smile plastered on her face, Katie suddenly felt her heart flutter when Harry made eye contact with her; the thirteen year old boy grinning like they had already won the Quidditch Cup. At that moment Katie realized why she had been so annoyed with Cho at the start of the match. Why calling Harry her friend did not feel quite correct. She fancied Harry Potter.
When she reached Harry, the two youngest Gryffindor Quidditch members wore matching smiles. Katie would figure out her feelings soon enough. Right now she wanted to talk to Harry after the team's brilliant victory.
"We did it! You were awesome today, Katie!" Harry told her. "That was probably the best individual game by a Chaser since we've been on the team!"
"I don't know about that." Katie said modestly. She would think about that later. She was sure it was the best game she personally had ever played though. But for Katie, thinking about anything besides Harry was extraordinarily difficult at that moment. "I was just focused on winning. You ran distractions for me and I did it for you. We're quite the duo, Harry! That was perhaps your greatest catch ever! At least the greatest one where you caught the Snitch with your hand. And that charm was amazing!"
Smiling at her crush, adrenaline and instinct (and hormones) took over and Katie gave Harry a kiss on the cheek. Harry went wide eyed before giving a bashful smile in return. Katie meanwhile was mortified and embarrassed by her actions.
'Why did I do that?! Everyone in the stadium saw that! I've got to think of something!' Katie thought desperately to herself.
"Umm. Good game, Harry. Let's take our victory lap." Katie said, bolting off again.
Katie did not hear a response from Harry for a brief moment and Katie was afraid she had royally screwed up. But then Katie heard laughter behind her and Harry zoomed forward and caught up in mere seconds. The Firebolt really was a marvelous broomstick. Harry made eye contact again and blushed himself with a soft smile.
The two proceeded to begin their lap in silence—driving Katie crazy—when Harry spoke up. "Hey Katie!" Harry said while they were halfway around the pitch, "You earned this today, too. Catch!"
Harry then tossed the Snitch ahead as far as he could without further warning. With a burst of speed, Katie's Chaser instincts from catching long passes took over. She zipped ahead and caught the tiny ball out of the air.
"Nice catch, Katie!" Harry said proudly when he caught back up with her. "Maybe next practice we can swap positions for a couple drills."
"You know, if you wanted to give me the Snitch you could have just handed it to me instead of throwing it like that." Katie replied amusedly as they began their descent with the lap finished, the Snitch tucked away in her pocket. Katie was immensely thankful the silence had been broken. The easy banter and flying with Harry—a return to the normal—slightly lessened her embarrassment of her kiss.
"Maybe. But this is more fun! Flying with you is the best part of Quidditch." Harry turned pure red as if he had not wanted to say that. Katie could feel the heat radiating from her face and knew she was equally blushing. She felt supremely happy at Harry's compliment but was literally too speechless to respond.
Before any further awkward moments between the young teenagers could occur, the Chaser and Seeker landed, victory lap concluded, where the rest of the Gryffindor Quidditch team were waiting for the two best players of the day. Angelina and Alicia in particular beamed at the two of them. Oliver acted like a proud father repeatedly saying "That's my boy!" and "Six goals on six shots! Seven steals!" to Harry and Katie over and over.
After a brief teamwide celebration, Harry was intercepted on the ground by Ron and Percy Weasley, Seamus Finnigan, Hagrid, and Professor Lupin who proudly talked about Harry's impressive Patronus and game clinching catch.
Katie meanwhile was pulled aside by Alicia and Angelina and knew an interrogation was coming. The two older girls quickly without Harry present seemed like the best way to handle her situation. Katie knew they were going to ask her about kissing Harry's cheek, better to handle it on her own terms, away from everyone else.
"Well you sure seemed to enjoy the win, Katie." Alicia said with a satisfied smirk.
"I'd say so, Alicia. Our little sister here has grown up so fast." Angelina added on, wiping an imaginary tear. "Kissing a boy after a Quidditch match. A little cliché Katie, don't you think? And you skipped our Chasers fly around to go with Harry and he gave you the Snitch. So cute. When's the wedding?"
Katie knew her face was completely red from embarrassment. She still could not believe she had impulsively kissed Harry. She had hugged him after wins and one time after he convinced Wood to end practice. But she knew a kiss, even to the cheek, meant something more. And she wanted it to mean more too, Katie was not about to admit that though.
"I don't know what you two are talking about. I was just happy we won the game. It was a big win." Katie told the girls half heartedly.
Katie tried to deny the obvious hoping against hope one of Alicia or Angelina would buy it. Their identically amused reactions told Katie they did not.
"When did you two start acting like the twins? Save the creepy 'know what the other is thinking' thing to them."
"Stop deflecting." Angelina and Alicia said simultaneously. "Huh. That is creepy." Only Angelina spoke this time.
"Listen, Katie, if you like our bespectacled Seeker, tell him!" Alicia said louder than necessary. The crowd was still making noise as they were filing out so Katie was pretty sure no one could overhear but she desperately wanted Alicia to keep her voice down.
"Or! You two can kiss him too!" Katie exclaimed with a brilliant idea. "Then it won't be weird that I did it in the first place. He really was awesome out there. The play where Alicia lobbed the Quaffle up to me, Harry was able to get the Beater's attention and took on the Bludger while I could go on a breakaway. I think Wood needs to create a play for him and I to link up; we are really dynamic working together." Katie was smiling again as she reflected on Harry. "And you saw the Patronus followed by catching the Snitch; he didn't hesitate at all. He deserved a kiss."
Quickly her smile turned to a scowl when she saw her friends' self-satisfied expressions.
"How about this: We'll agree to kiss him." Alicia spoke up this time. "But then we have Granger and the twins' sister kiss him too. Maybe Cho Chang as well for giving him good competition today. I saw she smiled at him before the game. Does that sound good?"
"No!" Katie shouted much louder than she should have.
Cho's smile to Harry irked Katie before the game. Now that Katie identified why she was so bothered, the idea of Cho kissing Harry twisted Katie's gut to a degree she could not have imagined.
"Party! Gryffindor common room, now!" George (or Fred, it was hard to tell from a distance) declared loudly as the four boys on the team walked briskly towards the Chaser trio.
"Tell him. You'll both be happier." Alicia whispered.
Harry walked straight to Katie and, to her joy, put an arm around her shoulder, still grinning the same smile he was during their fly around. As she turned her head towards the boy and looked into Harry's brilliant green eyes at the start of the team's (and the rest of Gryffindor House) march back to the tower, Katie felt millions of butterflies swirling in her stomach. The noise coming from the cheering of the team and her house was completely drowned out while she looked at Harry, Katie's heart beating faster than the Snitch's wings can flap. A nearby loud, excited barking sound ('Hagrid's dog?') broke the moment and Katie looked away; realizing they had been staring at each other while walking for way longer than anyone should.
'I'm going to talk to him tonight.' Katie decided. 'There is no way he doesn't like me, right?'
Katie was nervous, but she had never looked forward to a victory celebration as much as this one.
A/N: Follow up chapter coming soon.