Mistletoe
A/N: I am so pissed off at Fanfiction right now. It's so not a pretty picture. Their technical difficulty nonsense results in my posting three stories/new installments up at once. Anywho, just a little holiday bit of fluff for you here. It's sort of an unusual couple, but those are the ones that need voices. Enjoy - and Happy Holidays.
Nobody ever found out who planted the mistletoe right above the Gryffindor common room exit in the middle of the holiday season, but Oliver Wood didn't particularly care, either, until the day he found himself trapped with Alicia Spinnet underneath it as the Weasley twins, catching them in the act, laughed uproariously behind them.
"Well go on, Wood!" Fred—or was it Fred—roared delightfully as Oliver felt his ears turn pink. "Plant one on her!"
"Make it nice and wet," The other one—George, perhaps—added, just as gleeful.
Oliver turned to Alicia, who looked just as horrified as he felt. "I—I can't do that," he protested, "She's on the team!"
Fred raised a brow. "And your point is?"
"Personally, I think a bit of kissing would do you some good, Captain," George said.
"Yea, loosen you up a bit, no doubt," Fred agreed.
George elbowed Alicia in the side. "Maybe after this we'll even stop having practices at dawn, eh, Alicia? Think of all the good you're about to do!"
When Oliver still hesitated, Fred frowned and attempted to nudge him closer to the now furiously blushing brunette in front of him. "Well come on then, Wood, out with it!" He prodded Oliver in the back. "We know there's a bit of hormonal drive in there somewhere..."
"Stop it," Oliver snapped, but Fred continued poking him in the back anyways, George soon starting on Alicia as well for good measure. As a result, the two were soon only mere inches apart from each other, and Oliver could practically feel the heat emanating off her body.
"Kiss her you fool!" George shouted impatiently, now blatantly pushing Alicia towards him.
"Err—but I—" Before Oliver had a chance to finish, Alicia hastily cut him off.
"Ooh, Oliver, it's okay—I mean, you really don't have to," she insisted. Fred started poking Oliver harder, but Oliver ignored him.
"I—really?" He asked hesitantly. "You're sure?" Girls were never very straightforward these days; when they said one thing they almost always meant something else, and instead of trying to figure them out, Oliver dove even deeper into Quidditch.
Fred gasped. "You mean you don't want to kiss her, Wood? But she's so pretty!"
"It's not that—"
"Ooh, so you dowant to kiss her!" George interrupted, looking smug.
"I never said—"
"Oh stop being a git, Wood, and tell us what you really mean! Do you or do you not desperately want to snog Miss Spinnet here?" Fred asked, tapping his foot on the floor exaggeratedly. George gave Alicia one final good shove in Oliver's direction, but she shook her head.
"I can do without, Oliver, it's fine," Alicia repeated emphatically, and she looked towards the portrait hole. "I need to get to class, anyways."
"Err… all right then." Oliver felt fairly certain she meant it. Alicia was never one to play those loony little mind games. So after a good look into her blue eyes, he pulled himself away from the Weasley's loud protests and felt fairly justified in watching her rush away.
-o-o-o-
Six hours later, he wasn't so sure anymore. What had at first been overwhelming relief had, throughout the course of the night, subsided into confused disappointment. Lying in bed, Oliver turned over onto his left side yet again, restless. What did she mean, anyway, she could do without? 'She could do without' as in she didn't want to kiss him because he wasn't kissable? Was he unkissable?
He certainly hadn't given it much thought before; he'd kissed a fair few girls in his day and none had ever proclaimed him 'unkissable' after that, or at least to his face.
But now, with nothing but black night and uncomfortable sheets between him and his thoughts, Oliver grew more and more frustrated by Alicia's few sentences until he finally kicked his covers off and sat up in his four-poster.
The next time he saw her he would do it, he thought to himself. She surely did want to kiss him; it was just that she was trying to make him feel better at the time, wasn't she? Or did she only see him as their bossy, snappish Quidditch Captain who yelled too much and drilled them all too late into the night? Maybe he should stop waking them up so early in the morning to practice… but other than that, he was a decent guy, wasn't he?
And now that he thought about it, she really was very pretty. He had always liked her smoothish brown hair and big blue eyes. He wouldn't really mind kissing her. Just as long as the Weasley twins weren't there hooting at them.
What did she mean, he didn't have to do it? Was she rejecting him or just taking the pressure off? Oliver frowned. Girls! They really were trouble.
He couldn't sleep. Standing, Oliver slid into his shoes and made his way down the staircase and into the common room. The fire was burning low, and at first, he thought the room was deserted, but upon closer inspection, he saw that there was actually a small shape curled up in an armchair by the fire.
She noticed him as he came around the corner. "Hi," Alicia said, and averted her eyes. "Forget something?"
Oliver froze. He didn't think that the next time he'd see her would benow. "Err—oh, yes—my Quidditch tactics."
She was silent for a moment, long enough for Oliver to feel a bit awkward looming over her chair. Finally, as he was contemplating sitting down on the floor, she spoke again.
"Why didn't you want to kiss me?"
"I—what?" Oliver goggled at her. Alicia looked quite indignant for some reason, her brow now firmly furrowed as she scowled up at him.
"Today, under the mistletoe, why didn't you want to kiss me?" She repeated. Oliver raised a brow.
"Well—I, err—but you said I didn't have to…?"
"I know," Alicia narrowed her eyes. "But why didn't you just do it anyways? Is there something wrong with me?"
"No, but—"
"Because personally, I've always thought I've been an okay person to kiss—I mean, I'm no Penelope Clearwater, and you're probably out of my league, but I can really hold my own, you know—I'm decent looking, and I think I've got a good personality, and I don't have bad breath but I—"
Oliver began to feel that familiar sense of relief wash over him. Except this was of a different kind.
"—and I would trust you to tell me if there's something completely off with me, Oliver, wouldn't you? Only—what are you doing?"
"Alicia," Oliver said, and dragged her over to the portal where the mistletoe was. He took a breath. "I do want to kiss you."
She stared at him.
And the next instant, he was leaning in and doing precisely just what he had promised himself to do. And if he'd known all along how good it felt to kiss Alicia Spinnet, he thought blurrily as she started to kiss him back, god knows he would have done it years ago.
Finis