marmalade → g. weasley

thirteen

Fred's face lit up with the widest grin Marigold had seen on him in a long time. "Don't be so sure, Johnson."

He climbed onto his broom, looking to Marigold expectantly. "The hospital wing, you said--?" But Angelina had already taken off into the darkness of the corridor.

"Oy!" He took off after her, the sounds of his gleeful yells echoing off the walls.

"Don't make too much noise!" Marigold called after him, the bubble of tension in her chest easing. That could've gone worse.

In her peripheral vision, she noticed George laughing. She turned to him, "And what's so funny?"

"'Live on the edge a little'?" He laughed harder and Marigold rolled her eyes at him, blushing slightly.

"Yeah, so what? I'm allowed to say that."

George shook his head, he couldn't help notice how her cheeks had reddened in embarrassment. "You've been hanging around too many Gryffindors."

Marigold nodded, "You're probably right. After tonight I'm cutting you off, that'll do me some good."

Not for the first time that night, George glanced down to meet her eyes - he couldn't help find it endearing how she had to crane her neck up to meet his gaze. "You couldn't get rid of me even if you wanted to, which you don't."

"Try me." She dared.

In that moment, with their gazes locked and with the silence of the empty corridor ringing in their ears, George was filled with the strongest urge to take Marigold by the chin and kiss her pouted lips. Mind you, he was about to do it when the squawk of an owl just outside the open window in the corridor pulled Marigold's gaze off of him.

He stepped back slightly, as if awoken from a trance. 

What was he thinking? He didn't know if Marigold liked him, he couldn't just go around kissing people that didn't fancy him. Even though he really wanted to. 

Shaking the thoughts from his head, George brought himself back to the moment. "So, this was your plan? To make us race each other?"

She turned her gaze off the black night's sky beyond the window back onto George, "Yeah, I thought it would be fun." She was smiling again and George's stomach started to froth.

"And I hoped it would clear the air between Ang and you guys. As I've come to learn, it's pretty hard work avoiding the two biggest idiots at Hogwarts."

George didn't even bother pretending to be offended, "Yeah, yeah. Just admit it, you missed us."

"Fine. I'll admit, I did miss Fred." She teased, suppressing a grin. "Striking young lad that he is."

"Not half as handsome as myself, unfortunately." He grinned.

Looking at him, Marigold pretended to examine his face before shrugging. "Debatable."

At that, George took slight offense. He really was hoping that at least a small part of Marigold found him attractive, but he quickly shrugged it off. "You'll have to take that back after I beat you in this race."

Shaking her head, Marigold laughed. "You couldn't beat me on a broomstick if I was blindfolded."

"Someone's confident."

She grinned.

As much as she was enjoying the banter, the distance between the astronomy tower and the hospital wing wasn't that long and it dawned on Marigold that Angelina and Fred should have been heading back this way by then. She glanced down the dark corridor, there was still no sight of them. "What's taking them so long, you think?"