Protégée (George Weasley)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

It was hard seeing Noel actively avoiding Lisa, Angelina thought to herself as she watched the brunette girl steal glances at her brother a few ways away from where they were seated.

It was breakfast, and usually their most active time of the day. She didn't think it was possible for anyone to be as big of a morning person as her brother was until Lisa walked in to their lives. They had always been so compatible, so in synch. Maybe that was why her brother fell hopelessly in love. Noel always liked things that fell right in to place in his life, and for him, Lisa was the only person who did that.

She hated seeing her brother so heartbroken, in more than one way; not getting the same feelings reciprocated and having to force himself to ignore the one girl that knew him better than his own family. And she hated seeing Lisa be so upset as well. To Angelina, she was blameless. Her brother was nice to her, but feelings can't be forced. She liked George, and Angelina sensed that the first time they spent the afternoon together.

Angelina watched as Lisa stole another glimpse at Noel, before she looked back at Katie Bell sadly, this being the breaking point of her silence, "Okay, this has to stop. You can't keep freezing her out like this." she told Noel, who spared her a single glance before averting his gaze back on to his plate, "I'm trying to protect myself, Ange. I can't keep doing the whole friend thing with her when I feel this way. It hurts too much."

She stared at him, mouth slightly agape, "This isn't just some friend thing, Noel, Lisa's your best friend. You two have never fought this badly and frankly I can't stand how one-sided this is."

"One-sided?"

"Yeah!" She whisper-yelled, "She's hurt. She's hurt because she's hurt you even though she's never meant to, hurt that you won't talk to her, hurt that you disapprove of the person she likes, hurt that she has to stop seeing that said guy so as to not hurt you even more."

"You know what, I'm not even surprised at this. You've always taken her side over mine ever since I can remember," Noel stated, "Even though I'm your brother."

"Don't you make this all about you." Angelina said, now getting irritated, "You know what, Noel? I think you need to hear some tough love; you had every opportunity to tell her how you felt before. And you didn't take any of those chances despite Katie and I telling you repeatedly that you should. You could have had her, Noel. You had all that time when you were the sole receiver of her undivided attention. Now some bloke swoops in to her life and gives her all the adoration she deserves, and you're mad about it now? When you could have gotten your shit together ages ago, told her how you felt, and be the one to give her all that love and adoration." Angelina said, her voice raising slightly, causing some heads to turn at the scene that was unraveling.

"Now you cry because you've lost your chance, and now you're shutting her out because you were too afraid to make your move when you had the clearest shot." She finished, her eyes now over-bright. She stood up, slinging her book back across her shoulders, "Now you sit there, simmer on my words, and think of how idiotic you sound moaning about something you did to yourself."

With that, Angelina walked out of the Great Hall, Alicia Spinnet quickly grabbing her book bag and following after her.

Noel's shoulders sagged, tossing his fork onto his plate and slumping his chin on the palm of his hand, feeling his appetite for breakfast vanishing in to thin air.

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Lisa could feel her limbs burning as she tried to keep up with Ginny's running pace. It had been impossible the first few practices they had together, when they were training for their match against Ravenclaw, so she was rather happy to see that her cardio was not as crappy as it had been, but it was not enough to consistently keep up with Ginny shoulder to shoulder.