WHO: Zach Sloper & Brianna O'Hara
WHAT: First kisses
WHEN: May '78
WHERE: Hogwarts grounds

Brianna hadn't thought it was possible to get any more frustrated, but upon slamming her journal closed after talking to Fiona, she had found that she was. She had always, always felt like she could go to her sister to talk about things and to get advice so she could feel better, but what--'The people who matter won't believe any of that rubbish?' Bloody--Fiona had always acted like she was the Brianna's mother or something, but she wasn't looking for a mother right now, and that had been so--so parental that she could just scream. She'd lived almost her whole life without a mum and she didn't need her sister, who was supposed to yell and tell her to go kick some arses over things like this, to keep acting like she was hers.

Okay, so she knew her mini-rant about Fiona had been spurred by her current anger at the situation between she and Zach and what the whole school seemed to think was going on between them, but she couldn't help but be pissed off about it all. Whatever. She could rant about whatever she wanted to in her mind, that was the beauty of it all. And right now she needed to rant, just so that she wouldn't go crazy and explode and go out and find whoever the hell had started those rumors and really, seriously kick some arses because she would and she was so consumed in thinking how she might actually get up and do just that she almost didn't notice when someone came up beside her and stood against the wall she was currently slumping against and fuck it, with her luck it was the Head Boy or Girl telling her to go back inside because it was dusk and she was going to get a detention and then she'd really go apeshit and rip a head off and this was just what she didn't nee--

"Oh... Zach."

She didn't know if it was someone showing up beside her at curfew, out on the grounds, or that it was Zach that had shown up beside her at curfew, out on the grounds, but either way, she was surprised. Shocked, even. Especially after their conversation in her journal, she figured he probably would avoid her for a while--at least a few hours, like he usually did when she blatantly rejected him. She was about to tell him just that, to sod off and come back tomorrow if he really wanted to, but, well... he didn't look so cocky. Actually, Brianna noticed, Zach didn't look much at all like his normal self and she wondered for a moment if she'd really done that to him, felt bad for a moment... and then came to her senses, quite abruptly. Right. Her mess with Zach Sloper's cockiness? It was preposterous, impossible even, and she could hardly believe she even let the thought cross her mind. Right.

It was as if the world wanted to make him suffer even more. He had been on a walk and taking a big risk staying out after curfew especially since the game was this weekend but he'd needed to get out of the dorm before he ended up hexing someone. So, his plan hadn't worked. Not at all. Zach was a little upset that his plan hadn't gone so well but he was more upset about Brianna's reaction to it. He'd been pretty much flying high all day and then with her journal entry... it had hurt a lot more than he'd been expecting it too. He was a Slytherin and he was Zach Sloper, you didn't turn either of those down and he shouldn't feel so hurt.

Because she was just a bloody girl and one that didn't matter and no matter how much he told himself this, Zach still felt really deflated and when he'd seen her out walking too, he'd decided to give her a piece of his mind. Only, she wasn't paying any attention when he came up and wasn't that just fitting? He was just about to leave when she spoke, kind of startling him.

Oh? That... was it? He'd been expecting maybe anger or resentment or... something else. But, he'd also been expecting something else to come from this other than being rejected. Again. So maybe he needed to, stop thinking so much about it.

"Yeah, just me," was all he could muster, shoving his hands in his pockets and looking down at his trainers, watching her out of the side of his field of vision.

As hard as she might try, Brianna couldn't quite smother the itching at the back of her mind that was worried by his tone of voice. Now she was sure he really wasn't himself and she really wished she could get up the gall to yell at him for something, anything--sneaking up on her, being out past curfew, whatever, just to yell would make her feel better about this situation. But she couldn't, Brianna felt drained, almost, like there just wasn't any will anymore to yell at him. At her sister, maybe. At the people who had started all that gossip, definitely... but not at him.

It was strange, and maybe a little more than slightly alarming a feeling.

"What're you doing out so late?" she asked, not knowing what else to really say. It was kind of awkward, when she couldn't just raise her voice and damn him to hell. "It's past curfew, you know." Not that she had any room to talk. Well, she was a prefect, of course she could make up an excuse if she wanted to, but nothing really legitimate.

Zach just raised his eyebrow at her. They were both prefects and both had quidditch this week, so it wasn't like she had any room to talk. If they both got caught, well... he would just say that he thought the schedule was something different and they were out on patrol, and it wasn't their fault someone changed the schedule without telling everyone and really, could they be blamed?

"I know. I needed a bit of air. Thought about sending an owl to my brother, but Bertram's owl is probably asleep by now," Zach shrugged, cringing at the fact that he was talking about owls and wasn't that the lamest thing in the entire world. "Same could be said for you, but if you don't give me detention, I'll do the same," he joked lightly, even though he wasn't feeling quite up to actually joking around.

"Deal," Brianna replied, the side of her lips quirking up for a split second in just a ghost of a smile. But she wasn't feeling all that happy and ready to joke, either, and it was hardly a time to be feeling so, honestly.

But now they fell into an uncomfortable silence again. Brianna was a loud person by nature and silences had never boded well with her, especially the kind in which she felt impossibly awkward with anything she could say, or otherwise couldn't think of anything to say at all. And Zach was no help, talking about owls of all things and his his roommate's was asleep and--what was that? Completely unhelpful. But that meant he was feeling awkward too, and guh, now she couldn't help it any longer. She didn't even know why she cared, but--

"Are you alright?" Brianna asked quietly, turning slightly to look at him.

No, no he wasn't all right. He was messed up and just torturing himself more by standing here next to her and Zach didn't know what to do, so he fell back on his stand-by and lied. It wasn't like she really cared, so why should he even bother?

"Yeah. I'm fine," he said with a slight shoulder shrug, sounding anything but fine. But he couldn't exactly say why he didn't feel all right, and he definitely wasn't going to tell her that. He'd thought they were... getting along, especially with him showing her the 'magic' card tricks, but, clearly he'd been wrong. He couldn't muster up the strength to be mean, though. "Why? Are you okay?"

"No, but as long as we're lying--" Brianna said, trying to sound sarcastic but just ending up sounding halfhearted. She looked up at him, turning fully towards him and resting her side against the stone wall of the castle. She sighed and crossed her arms, leaning her head tiredly against the wall but keeping her eyes on him the whole time. "Come on. You're kind of obvious."

Brianna pursed her lips together, perplexed even more by the fact that she had a genuine curiosity to know, now that he was denying it. "Actually--let's make another deal. If you tell me why you're not alright, I'll tell you why I'm not." She arched an eyebrow hopefully. "Yeah?"

He looked down at her, a blank expression on his face as he hesitated, deciding what to do. Zach liked that she knew he was lying and, well it wasn't that obvious, but. He didn't want to get his hopes up again, thinking that she actually cared that he was upset and why. Feelings weren't something Slytherins talked about; it required a lot of trust and, she should be lucky that he was even being civil to her, after her blatant and PUBLIC rejection. It was one thing when it had been by owl, but another where everyone could see.

"I dunno," he said quietly with another shrug. "I mean, I don't know why. I thought." Zach had thought since they'd been getting along things had changed, but he was obviously wrong. "I thought, things were different," he said looking back down at his feet, feeling all of ten inches tall under her gaze.

Of course the first thought that came to her mind--oh, oh so frustratingly--was that he might be talking about... well, them. But why would he be? She sighed again, following his gaze to the grass below them. Why would he be? Yeah, okay, he had seemed really weird after her journal post, definitely not all cocky and he hadn't even pursued things past four comments, but--but--

"I see," she replied simply, softly, not really seeing anything at all. If anything, she was more confused than she had been before. "Well--I'm sorry, ah... about my journal post, earlier. I know that's not, what--I mean, but it couldn't have helped your mood and... yeah, I was mad and I shouldn't have written that there. I mean--yeah, like I said, I know that's not what you're talking about, but you didn't sound right after it all and...right."

She would really have done shutting up while she was ahead. Honestly, Brianna hated it when she rambled.

She didn't get it. Zach didn't look at her, because she was the reason his mood was so foul in the first place, the journal entry had been the entire thing, not just a contributing factor. He hesitated again, wondering if he should play stupid with her or correct her and either way it meant saying more stuff and he... really didn't feel comfortable without knowing why she felt so crappy too. But, yeah. Right. It felt like he had a bad case of indigestion, only he hadn't eaten dinner so he knew it couldn't be that.

Zach rubbed his chest, absentmindedly and shook his head, still not looking at her. "I mean. My mood was fine before," he said quietly, meaning the journal entry. "but, like you said, we don't have to go over that stuff again." About how he was a horrid person and how she hated him and, right, definitely not helping his mood. "Your turn."

Brianna did see it clicking in her mind now, and--oh Merlin, he really had been alluding to what she had said earlier and well now she felt like crap because--and--sigh. For someone she really couldn't stand to be around nintey percent of the time, he sure was getting good at making her feel all strange and horrible.

"Actually... I guess I kind of, that journal entry is my problem, too," she admitted, determined to keep her head down where her expression was hidden behind a curtain of red hair. Because she was blushing because he made her feel like she was a shitty person--and she couldn't even yell at him and--this was so stupid.

Zach swallowed hard and fidgeted with the hem of his t-shirt. He didn't want her to feel bad, well not really. There was some part of him that did, because he felt crappy and therefore she should too but, well, he didn't feel guilty all that often but he kind of did now. Kind of.

"Why?" he asked, his voice still quiet. Did she... regret saying what she did? Or was Zach just getting his hopes up again? Brianna was pretty good at being able to make him feel really bad and even Juliet wasn't been able to make him feel this down, ever.

Oi, she hated loaded questions like that. It wasn't like--well, it.. she couldn't tell the truth. Hell, she couldn't even accept the truth herself. Rather, she didn't want to accept the truth because that would just make things worse and more confusing and then he would just go back to being stupid and uncivil all the time and she didn't want that because she liked him when he wasn't and... How ironic.

"I'm just--I'm sorry I said that. You know. It was immature and uncalled for. You've got no control over what rumors are spread about you, after all."

"Right," Zach said, swallowing again. He didn't want an apology, not really. He shoved his hands into his pockets, visibly unhappy with that response. Because yes, he had gotten his hopes up. Maybe... maybe it just wasn't such a good idea then, if he was going to get this hurt over it. But Owen had told him that it was probably worth it if it hurt, because then you had some kind of something invested in it and Zach was beginning to realise that he did fancy her, but, clearly she did not fancy him back.

Zach pushed off from the wall and took a few steps before turning around and looking up into the quickly darkening sky before dropping his gaze onto her. "Maybe," Zach said, just loud enough for her to hear, "maybe I wanted to make you jealous," he admitted after struggling with himself for a moment, before turning away again. Like a coward, but, if she wasn't going to. Then. what was the loss?

Brianna blinked a couple times at this revelation. "You just wanted to... but why--" she paused in her speech for a minute, unable to think of a reason why it would be important for him to make her jealous. After all, if he really fancied her, he wouldn't have shied away from asking her out, right? No, that made no sense because you didn't just go around trying to make jealous someone you didn't care about enough to ask out when you had the chance glaring you in the face.

"Why do you care about making me jealous?" she asked, narrowing her eyes at him slightly and turning a bit, pushing herself off the wall slightly. "You don't care about me enough to be decent half the time, so why does making me jealous take so much precedence?"

Zach didn't turn around at her words, only shrugged as he stared off across Hogwarts' grounds, trying to either come up with the words to tell her or to come up with a suitable lie. He didn't know why he did it (well...) but he just liked it when Brianna looked at him and talked to him and was focused on him. Making her jealous had seemed the best way to get that and to find out if she liked him back. Because if she was jealous, then, that meant she did. But she wasn't, it was even the opposite.

"You don't know me," he finally said, turning around with an edge to his voice. Even when he was 'decent' or whatever, she'd never given him the time of day, so to Zach, it was easier to get her attention when she was mad at him. The quickest way to get Brianna to look at him was a rude joke or to say something nasty. "You don't understand."

Brianna sighed and shook her head, trying very very hard not to get mad at him because that wouldn't accomplish anything and... and when had she stopped wanting to be able to yell at him? Somewhere in the last ten minutes or so, it had to be, because she had definitely wanted to scream her head off at him more than anything just a few seconds ago. Holy crap, this was not right that he could confuse her so badly...

Running a hand through her hair, she sufficed with a roll of her eyes--but even then it was somewhat halfhearted. "Whatever. Maybe I don't understand," she conceded. "I just know that if you can't expect a girl to ever fancy you at all, you can't just go around doing everything you bloody can to piss her off, or say everything that you know is going to offend or hurt her. At least not this one, and not anyone that's got an iota of respect for herself."

Brianna bit her tongue and hesitated for a moment before deciding to say what she knew she would probably regret later. "I fancy you fine when you're nice."

Zach boggled at her. Did she just say. She fancied him? He conveniently ignored the last part of her statement, because. She fancied him. The thought made his heart skip a beat or two.

Wasn't that just perfect! Zach had to stamp down the flare of indignation that she was telling him this now after she'd told him what kind of person she thought he was and she'd turned him down and. Zach ran his hands through his hair twice before letting out an angry breath and looking up at the sky. She didn't pay attention to him otherwise, but now she wanted him to be nice? Nice wasn't something he did; there was not being mean, and, hadn't he been doing that lately?

Why was she so frustrating? Zach dropped his hands and looked down at her, biting his bottom lip. "Please don't say that," he said quietly. "You say that, and, then you're going to tell me you hate me or something and-and," he dropped his gaze to his feet, "that hurts."

"I tell you I hate you when I feel like you won't listen to anything else," she said, a twinge of frustration in her voice that she was very much trying to smother completely. "I don't--I don't know that I hate anyone, truly, but you know, you do all this stupid crap and you're rude and you're arrogant and you're relentless in bothering me and you treat me with no respect or regard and all I can do is to yell and tell you that I do hate you and--and the only bloody reason I tell you to leave me alone is because you aim to get on my nerves in the first place and I can't stand that."

Brianna pushed foward and walked over to him so that she was in front of him, making him look at her instead of up at the sky. "Haven't you noticed that when you do decide to show me the nice, unannoying part of you, that I don't mind being around you? That we can talk without my wanting to rip your head off? I just--I don't know what you expect, Zach--if you don't want to be hurt, you'd better stop hurting me. Because that's all you've done these past six years, and it's about time you figured it out."

Okay, she might be a little right (or a lot) and it took Zach a lot to admit that, but, being annoying to her was the only way he knew to make her listen to or talk to him. He looked down at her but couldn't look into her eyes. Zach felt about two inches tall with the way she was speaking to him. What did he want, anyway?

He couldn't think of anything to say to any of that; so he did the first thing that came into his mind. He kissed her. Not hard or deep; just a swift, sweet kiss, because Zach could do stuff better than he could actually say things. He was sorry she thought of him like that and that she felt bad, but, he didn't have to say that aloud, did he?

Brianna was surprised by the kiss, mainly because it had seemingly come out of nowhere--his head had been down, he had looked like a reprimanded child (which, she kind of had to admit, was a bit satisfying after all these years), and then all of a sudden he kissed her. Too quickly did he draw back for her to respond, and as a result, she was left dazed for a moment, all her satisfaction gone away because he had just left her standing there trying to figure out if he had really just don ethat or not.

Wow, but he had and--was that like, his way of an apology or something? Honestly, it was a pretty nice apology if that's what it was, even if it was too quick to have enjoyed. Brianna looked up at him after a moment, her eyes shining in a question that she couldn't quite bring to words. She didn't know if she could speak now anyway, after that and instead reached out softly and put her hand on his upper arm, to let him know... if it was an apology, she forgave him, completely.

He flinched just a little as her hand came out, because he'd totally been expecting her to slap him again or something. When she just touched his arm, he relaxed visibly. Because it wasn't a smack and it was actually pretty nice. But, now he didn't know what to do. At all. It was rare when Zach didn't have a thing to say or do that would be right and... this was all really heavy with 'feelings' and he was starting to feel just a little uncomfortable.

Zach gave her a quirky little smirk and flexed his arm for her, "Now, I know you've been dying to feel them, but don't you think this way was a bit dramatic to just get to touch me?" It was a bit cocky sounding, but he was grinning at her to show he was just teasing.

She rolled her eyes back, but there was a small smile there. "Don't flatter yourself, Sloper, I've touched much nicer muscles than your own," she said. Taking her hand back, Brianna crossed her arms over her chest again and turned around, heading back towards the castle.

"Come on," she called behind her. "It's way past curfew and you have rounds tonight. Vivica's probably wondering where you are."

Zach boggled after her for a moment before jogging to catch up with her. Saucy witch! "The Zach is a once in a lifetime experience, I'll have you know," he said, playing along with her and shoving his hands into his pockets with a grin as he walked along next to her.

"And Viv's a big girl, she can handle herself. Or, she's probably snogging Amycus in the third floor broom cupboard. But I suppose if you're going to send me away, I might as well do rounds," he gave a huge, put-upon sigh and pulled the castle door open for Brianna.

Brianna scrunched her nose at the thought of Amycus and Vivica snogging because--ugh, not a mental image that she really needed. She tried to shake it out of her head quickly, and stepped inside the castle, listening to him talk the whole time.

"I think you need to do rounds," she told him, waiting until he was inside as the door was closed before she continued. "I don't want to get in trouble for keeping you out late, after all... and I've got homework to finish in the Library."

Zach sighed again but kept smiling at her. Of course he had to do rounds but. Well, he really didn't want to right now. Still, Zach leaned forward to give her a kiss on the cheek and squeezed her shoulder with one hand. "I've got, um that project with Selphie on Wednesday but uh, we could hang out or something. After that?"

Not the smoothest way, but, she had to say yes, right?

Her lips quirked up into a smirk. "What? You're asking me out and not denying it--Merlin, I think the sky might start falling," she teased lightly, before turning a little more serious. "But, ah--yeah. That sounds nice. Seven o' clock you think?"

Brianna had been about to turn away and say goodbye, when a thought came to her mind. Looking at him for only a split second before deciding to do it, she got up on her toes and bit and gave him a kiss--this one slightly longer than his first. Hey, she'd never gotten a chance to finish what he'd started.

Zach flushed at her teasing and had been about to retort, because it wasn't like he'd denied it, he'd just been worried that she would say no and, well that didn't matter because she was kissing him and it was much better than before, because it was longer, giving him enough time to close his eyes. When she pulled back and turned away, he stared after her for a moment before going his own way, one hand touching his grinning mouth.