A/N: Just a little drabble I wrote. There's not really a plot, but the idea popped into my head and wouldn't leave me alone till I got it out. Enjoy!

Eating your words is rarely a pleasurable experience. I suppose it might not be so bad if the things you said were always sweet and gentle. But how is a girl supposed to eat years' worth of verbal abuse and censure, however true and deserved they were at the time?

It's harder than it should be, really. After all, it would only take three words. They're not even long ones, and I've said them all before, though never in that particular combination. If I could force myself to say those three little words, I could take back hundreds of insults and rejections.

This is the first time that my words have failed me.

Though perhaps I shouldn't blame the words themselves. There would be much more to saying that one little sentence than opening my mouth and pushing air over my vocal chords. I would have to swallow my pride and admit, to the whole school, that I'd been wrong about James Potter for nearly seven years. Not completely, of course; he was a bit of an arrogant git, and he did plenty of idiotic things that I know he now regrets. The problem is that for years I refused to admit that there was any good in James. It's not that I didn't see it before, exactly. I saw glimmers of it here and there: his intelligence and loyalty, his bravery, his persistence. No, I saw the good in James Potter. I simply refused to acknowledge its existence.

Acknowledging it would have meant that I would have had to admit, both to the school and to myself, that my reasons for refusing James were much less solid than I made them out to be. I would have had to admit that, at times, there was a part of James that I had feelings for all along: the part that made me laugh, the part that made me feel special. The part that made me feel like I was me, and that it was more than enough.

And then this year, he had to go and let that part overpower his previously aggravating qualities and make me fall completely, insanely, ridiculously in love with him. The bloody prat.

And that is why I'm left with a horrible dilemma: it was easy to swallow my pride enough to be friends with him once I saw that he had finally grown up, but it's a completely different matter to admit that I'm actually in love with him. Especially when he doesn't seem to have any non-platonic feelings for me. He hasn't asked me out in months, and he seems to be completely comfortable around me – no more running his hand through his hair in that once-despised nervous, and yet completely adorable, habit.

If I knew that he returned my feelings, maybe I would be able to eat my words. If it meant I could finally be with James, something I've been dreaming about for months now, swallowing my pride might not be so bad. But what if it ended in total humiliation and rejection? That is why I can't bring myself to say those supposedly simple words.

So, I'll just have to hope and pray that I'm not imagining the glint in James' eyes when he looks at me sometimes, or the way he'll occasionally blush when we bump into each other. It would be just like my imagination to fabricate those details, purely for my own torment, but maybe, just maybe, they're true. Maybe, just maybe, they mean something. But, for now, I'm stuck with waiting… Waiting for the opportunity to eat my words.

Soooo... what'd you think? It's definitely not my favorite, but I figured I'd post it anyway.

Review? :)