I wrote this story a few months ago and found it on my hard drive tonight! I remember being too nervous to post it but after re-reading it tonight, I kinda like it! "The Real Rose Weasley" will still be my main focus but I think I also want to finish this story too. I can't imagine anything motivating me more than posting it, so that's what I'm doing :). Please review :D.

Love Like This

August 27, 2015

"TEDDY!"

"Come on Lil, just one more hour of sleep," I mumble as I feel my mattress being jumped on by the 7-year-old menace.

"Lily, what did I tell you about jumping on the beds?" I hear Ginny asking sternly.

"Sorry," Lily responds meekly as I feel my mattress return to the soft, pillowy blissfulness it was before it was trampled on. Mama G for the win!

I turn over pumped for another hour to get rid of my hangover. Then I hear the loud rip of my curtains being opened as my eyelids are accosted by a harsh redness.

"No, Gin," I say while grabbing a pillow to block the sunlight. "No, Gin, why!? It's like 7 am!"

She laughs at me. "Ted, it's noon."

I finally open my eyes and look up at her. She has an eyebrow raised with her arms folded. Since my grandmother passed away two years ago, I've being living with the Potters. I honestly could not have asked for a better set of people to be my godparents. Harry and Ginny took me in like I was one of their own. They went through the trouble of expanding a guest room in their house to make my room more spacious. Gin followed me around for weeks with Wizarding Home Goods magazines making me pick out bedspreads, furnitures, and paint despite me urging her that the guest room furniture was enough. The Potters made being an orphan hurt a lot less than I'm sure it could have.

One complaint I do have: Ginny Potter is a lot sharper than my grandmother. So this look she's giving me? It's the "I know you were out pass curfew on that death machine you call a motorcycle" look.

"Sorry", I mumble. She shifts and gives me another intense look. This time it's the "Then why do you always do it? You'll be helping me with dinner and the dishes tonight… without magic!" look.

"Got it," I mumble this time.

She rolls her eyes and finally grins at me. She can never stay mad at me for long. When she was younger than me, she was dodging killing spells. My biggest fear: deciding where Lawrence Thomas and I will party for the night.

"There's a girl here to see you," Ginny comments still grinning. "She's in the foyer."

"Vic?" Since when does Victorie Weasley use the front door and need Gin to announce her arrival?

"No," Gin says, "another girl."

"I don't like her!" Lily comments bluntly.

"Lily Luna Potter!" Gin exclaims, "That is extremely rude."

I laugh as I roll out of bed. I head toward the door ruffling Lily's hair as she smiles at me.

"Teddy, you could put on a shirt!" Gin yells at me as I'm walking out of my room.

"Nah! I'm good," I shout back. I head down the the large hallway to the landing above a wooden grand staircase. I look down to see… Sadie Wright?

Don't get me wrong, I know Sadie… intimately. She is friends with Vic but before this summer we barely spoke to each other. That changed at the beginning of the summer. Lawrence and I hosted a party at the Potter-Weasley beach house, a tradition we started the summer before our fifth year. (I'm fairly certain Harry knows about this little tradition of ours but as long as the house isn't in complete and utter shambles, he usually gives me these nights.) During the party, Sadie dragged me into one of the bedrooms and just started snogging me. At first I thought, "wow, this is strange." Don't get me wrong, I get a lot of attention from girls. Vic tells me it's the "hair color changing thing" and the "weird morphing thing you can do with your face." Thanks Vic, thanks a lot. But none of them have just started snogging me without saying anything.

Sadie is also a looker. She has straight brown hair and pearly white teeth. She wears a lot of eye stuff that draws attention to her hazel eyes. So when she started snogging me, I snogged back. Throughout the summer, we continued to snog in dark corners at different parties. She wanted to keep whatever we had going on a secret which makes her visit even stranger.

"Hey Sadie," I say while sliding down the railing.

She smiles at me. "Hi, babes!" Babes?

"What are you doing here?"

She seems slightly taken aback by my bluntness but recovers quickly. "I was hoping to talk to you, can we go somewhere to chat?"

"Gin's a little mad at me so I probably shouldn't leave the house but we can head to the backyard," I offer.

"That works!" she says linking arms with me.

I look down at her hands on my arms. I'm fairly confused by this whole situation but I smile anyway.

We head through the kitchen to the backyard. "This house is beautiful, absolutely stunning," she whispers while darting her eyes around.

"Yea, Gin has to host a lot of people here with Harry being Harry and all so she goes all out. But Sadie, why are you whispering?"

"Is he here?" she asks continuing to whisper.

"Uh, Harry? Yea, he should be. Do you wanna meet him? He's probably with James and Al in the…"

My sentence gets cut off with a piercing squeal from Sadie. "Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! I couldn't like I just couldn't. I'd freak!" she scream whispers.

I shrug and motion toward some chairs on the patio. We take two seats and I look out across the Potters' backyard waiting for Sadie to explain why she randomly showed up at my house.

"So," she says. I look over at her and she is batting her eyelashes as she looks at my bare chest. I grin. Apparently, the push-ups Lawrence and I have been doing are paying off.

"So…"

"Teddy, I was thinking that we should make 'us' official."

"What? I thought you wanted to keep us hooking up a secret. You didn't even want me to tell Vic." There's also the fact that we never talk.

She pouted. "I know, I feel super bad about the whole secrecy thing. Sorry, babes."

"Um, it's fine, I just didn't know you liked me."

"What!? Of course we like each other. We've been snogging and doing other things all summer!"

"Right," I say feeling guilty. Welp, I read this all wrong. She didn't seem to have feelings for me at all.

"So, it's settled then! We are dating!" she shouts and then smashes her lips against mine. I think about protesting or saying anything at all but she's wrapping her arms around my neck and pulling me close.

I hear someone clearing their throat behind me. I pull apart and see Harry squinting at Sadie probably trying to figure out who she is. Sadie pops out of her sit when she sees him.

"Hi!" she exclaims.

"Hello," Harry says slowly, "I'm Harry."

"I know, I know, I know," she says nodding vigorously.

There's silence as Harry continues to look at her smiling awkwardly. He looks at me raising an eyebrow. I look back at him and shrug. He squints at me. I stare back at him furrowing my eyebrows. What's happening right now? He rolls his eyes.

"Teddy, you want to introduce me to your friend?" Harry asks.

"Ohhh yea! Harry this is Sadie."

"His girlfriend," Sadie chimes in.

"His girlfriend?" Harry asks with wide eyes looking at me.

"Uhh, apparently," I reply dumbly as Harry rolls his eyes at me again.

Sadie smiles at me and takes my hand. "We just became official," she tells Harry. Harry nods slowly.

"Your grades just came in," he tells me while handing me an envelope.

"And?" I ask him.

He sighs and then grins. "You can get that new broom."

"YES!" I shout while pumping a fist into the air.

The money I saved from my summer job was nearly all spent on fixing the motorcycle that Harry had given to me. When Gran left me the house and some money in her will, she made sure I couldn't spend any of it until I graduated and got a real job so when the Nimbus 3000 came out, I begged Harry to get it for me. The agreement was that as long as I got good grades, I could have my pick of any broomstick before the school year started.

It was actually fairly easy. I enjoy reading. I don't advertise it because ladies love the whole rebel without a cause thing but I do have a nook in the corner of Hogwarts library that only Vic and Lawrence know about. And apparently being an undercover nerd was getting me a new broomstick so cheers all around.

"Don't tell Ginny I promised you the broom, yet," Harry adds. "She's not happy you broke curfew again."

I grin back at him. "Sorry about that! Thanks!"

"Yea, you seem sorry," he mutters. He looks at Sadie and then at me. "We will talk later," he says giving me a pointed look.

"Yup, got it, Harry," I respond quickly looking away from him while he walks back into the house.

Sadie gives me a huge smile. "I think he likes me," she says while flicking a piece of her hair.

Was she conscious five minutes ago? "Yea, I'm sure he does," I agree weakly.

"Great!" she says and then kisses me on the cheek.

This probably would have been a perfect time to end our very short "relationship." But Sadie is a hot girl that just started snogging me and asked to be my girlfriend. This is just entirely too easy to pass up. And contrary to popular belief, I'm not really a player. Sure, I'm told that girls have crushes on me but acting on those crushes is an entirely different story. I suck at flirting and making "the first move" isn't really my forte.

So… looks like I've got a girlfriend.

"Umm. Do you want to stay for lunch or something?" I ask her.

"Oh no, I have to go," she responds while standing up. She gives me a quick kiss on the lips.

"I'll let you tell Vic," she says while smiling sweetly.