A/N: I was fancying a bit of a challenge, & I've always wondered what it would be like to write someone falling in love with the infamous Cedric Diggory; I of course chose our dear Katie for the task, & I think she's up to it. It's obviously going to be a bit different from my other stories because of that, but read & review & let me know what you think anyway please. Cheers!

Our ever-devoted team captain Oliver Wood mentioned Cedric Diggory, and I and my loyal chasers were lost to a fit of giggles.

"What?" Wood asked, faintly annoyed.

"Oh nothing," Alicia Spinnet said, sighing slightly. "He's that tall, good looking one isn't he?

"Strong and silent," I added, and the girls and I erupted again.

The boys looked irritated; Fred Weasley looked especially disgusted.

"He's only silent because he's too thick to string two words together," he said nastily to me as he shoved my broom towards me. I had been making him carry it to me for the last two weeks in return for my taking notes for him in Astronomy as he drooled on my shoulder.

"Enough," Wood said. "I don't care who you girls fancy, we cannot lose to Hufflepuff, do you understand me? It's my last chance to win the cup!"

"We understand, cool it, Ol," I laughed, flicking a stray bit of my dark fringe away from my forehead. "We'll concentrate."

"And," I added, hoisting a leg over my broom as I settled by Fred, "Diggory is not thick. He got twelve OWLs, which is probably twelve more than you and George'll get between the pair of you. Have a lovely practice!"

And I kicked off before he could say anything, leaving him with a wide open mouth and an outraged expression. This gratified me.

"Well, good work, Katie," commented Angelina as I flew up to join her and Alicia. "Now if you have a Bludger hurtling toward you at seventy miles an hour, he's not going to help you."

"Yeah," Alicia chipped in. "And it's not really the best way to recommend yourself to him."

"But he looks so adorably frustrated," I grinned, passing the Quaffle to Angelina. "Now I know he likes me for sure."

"So will you make your move then, or continue to pretend to like Diggory?" Angelina asked, raising an eyebrow.

I laughed. "I'm waiting for him to make his move. And I think the Cedric stuff is working. It's at least made him realized what he'd be missing if Diggory and I ever dated…gag me…Good idea, Ange. Cheers."

I, Kathryn Bell, have been harshly opposed to Hufflepuff Cedric Diggory and his band of fawning admirers for years, but have recently adopted a fake crush and have been using every opportunity I get to publicize it—mainly in front of Fred Weasley. Fred and I have been friends since the age of eleven, and I started to have feelings for him this past summer. Yet, he never really seemed to notice me in that respect. Angelina had suggested using Cedric Diggory—whom she knew the twins despised—in order to stir some jealousy in Fred. And it had worked—so far.

"I don't know how you can say that," Alicia gushed. "He's beautiful."

Alicia loves Cedric. So does Angelina, come to think of it. And of course, the rest of the Hogwarts female population. And—in theory—so do I. Except not.

Then, at the insistence of Wood, we actually began to practice.

XxX

After practice, I stripped off my quidditch robes and threw them in a pile in my locker. I'll be honest—I'm not the world's neatest person. Perhaps that explained the pair of extremely crumpled dark jeans I pulled from my duffel bag and slipped on. I proceeded to strut around the locker room in a wife beater, pulling up my choppy dark hair with a red ribbon. I was celebrating my victory at increasing Fred's jealousy. Though my marks don't always read as such, I'm pretty brilliant. I began to loudly sing a recent hit from the Weird Sisters into my hair brush, sliding around the locker room floor in my socks and bothering Angelina and Alicia.

"Very nice, Katie," Alicia said dully, pulling out her shampoo. "Are you even going to shower today?"

"Later," I said. "But I'm going to dinner in this." I hate showering after practice just to go to dinner and then taking off my makeup and undoing my hair again to go to bed an hour later. It's stupid. I mean, I clean up a bit. Just not a ton. I don't really have a reason to—you'd probably think my attraction to Fred would cause me to have concern over my appearance, but it doesn't. Fred has seen me in just about every circumstance imaginable, and I know for a fact that he doesn't shower after practice—so why should I?

"Well you'd better borrow a sweatshirt or something, or McGonagall will have you thrown out again for indecent exposure," Angelina drawled.

I chose to make no response, and opened the door that connected to the men's locker room. I was planning on stealing George's Gryffindor team zip-up that had shrunk three sizes in the wash last week, as my own was desperately in need of a wash. I knew McGonagall the old bird too well to suspect that she would let me dine in a wife beater and jeans. Strictly speaking, I wasn't supposed to enter the dining hall in anything other than a school uniform, but she had stopped disciplining me for this years ago when her taking of House points had failed to produce the desired effect.

"GEOOOOORGE," I called, still spinning on my heels.

No one responded, however. I shrugged and continued to shout, admiring the way my voice echoed off of the walls. Convinced that the lads had already retreated to dinner, I continued to give my private concert. I have a god-awful voice, and particularly enjoy using it.

I slid down another aisle of lockers, singing loudly. I whipped my hair around as I turned a corner, hit something hard, and fell onto the floor. And then my brown eyes grew wide as I flicked my bangs back and stared up at what—or rather who—I had run into.

It was none other than Cedric Diggory, half-naked and confused.

"What are you doing here?" I blurted. I was half annoyed to find him here. Probably doing his little Prefect, Quidditch captain game of outside practice for himself…I wouldn't put it past him. It was things like this that turned me off to the lad, whilst turning on every other female in the castle. He was damn handsome though, I'll give him that. And he didn't look bad with his shirt off, either.

His handsome face cracked into a grin at my blatant inquiry.

"I might ask you the same thing," he returned, offering me a hand and hoisting me up. "This is the men's locker room."

"I was looking for George," I said coldly, leaning onto one of the lockers. "I wanted to borrow his sweatshirt to wear to dinner and I sort of assumed he'd be in here seeing as how our team just finished practice. And instead, I find Cedric Diggory. You didn't join the team while I had my back turned, did you?"

"Nope," he answered, turning back around and pulling on a shirt. "Still a Hufflepuff. I was just spying on you lot."

"I have to think that Wood will frown on that," I smirked, imagining the way my captain would go ballistic if I informed him of Diggory's supposed treachery.

"Just joking, Bell," he grinned. "I was running the track around the pitch. You didn't see me?"

I didn't, actually. I vaguely remember a blurry outline of someone who was possibly running the track, but I couldn't quite recall. And yet, Angelina and Alicia were drooling throughout most of practice, so it was quite possible that Diggory had really been there.

"I guess I didn't," I admitted, shrugging. I was proud to say this, hoping to wound his self-image a little, but he actually smiled at this.

"So that's why you didn't wave back," he laughed. "Your teammates did."

"I'm very intense with my practices," I lied easily. "Angelina and Alicia prefer to stare at men who run around the pitch with their shirts off."

Diggory laughed as he shoved the rest of his things into his locker. "I forgot how funny you were, Bell," he remarked, closing the door and leaning against it.

"Yeah, I'm a real riot," I drawled, having to forcibly restrain myself from rolling my eyes. "Anyway, I'd better go find something to throw over my shoulders so McGonagall will get off my ass. See you around, Diggory."

I flipped around on my heel and began to walk toward the door carelessly.

"Oh, Bell?" Cedric shouted. I turned around.

"You should think about giving concerts, that's a great voice you've got there. It reminded me of my grandmother's cat."

He smirked and tossed me his quidditch jacket. I laughed a little, involuntarily, and shook my head in amazement as I exited the room.

So Cedric Diggory could be a smart ass. Who knew?

XxX

Cedric's jacket was yellow and black, with a picture of a badger and his last name sewn on the back. His number was seventeen.

Ordinarily I would have burned it, or traded it with Alicia for a week's worth of Transfiguration homework, but I slipped it on to piss off Fred and headed to dinner. An added bonus was that most of the girls I hated glared at me during dinner. And, it actually smelled good.

"You're being a spectacle," Ange stated dryly.

"You think I don't know that?" I hissed. "It's all part of the plan, believe me."

"How did you even get that?" Alicia said, eyes popping out of her head.

"I memorized his locker combination and raided it," I said sarcastically. "What do you think? I ran into him and he offered it to me. No big deal."

"Fred seems to think it's a big deal."

I grinned as Fred moodily stuck his fork into the Shepard's Pie before him.

"Cedric is so nice," I gushed, shoving my face full of food.

XxX