Title Pounding Heart, Moving Feet Author Kaitee Theme Frank Longbottom Prompt Word Slip
It was plain for everyone to see that Frank Longbottom was more than a little fond of Alice Stone. Unfortunately for poor Frank, every time she came around, he always seemed to make a fool of himself.
It started in the beginning of his fifth year.
Frank was in the Gryffindor common room, standing near the fire with a few of his friends. They were making jokes about an unfortunate looking girl in the year above them, but Frank paid little attention. His eyes and mind were focused on the pretty fourth year across the room--Alice Stone. He had never really noticed her loveliness before, and if he had thought of it then, he would have wondered how that would have been possible. His heart suddenly started to race, and he felt like spiders were crawling over his feet. Frank was by no means a “ladies man” but he wasn’t a total failure when it came to dating. Taking a deep breath, Frank made the semi-conscious decision to go over to her and talk to her.
His friends noticed him go, and commented, but Frank ignored them. He was trying to fight with a wrinkle in his school shirt with one hand, and tame his sometimes unruly hair with the other. He was no more than two feet away when a first year he passed dropped his quill onto the floor. The rogue quill caused Frank to slip, sending him right onto his bottom. He heard his friends roar with laughter as he got up, making a point not to look at Alice. Part of him wanted to see if she was laughing too, but when it came to her, it seemed that he didn’t possess enough Gryffindor courage. Frank walked right past her and circled the common room until he reached his friends again. He turned his back to Alice, just as he punched one of his mates in the shoulder. His bright red face made it clear that he was mortified, but when asked about it, he said nothing. How could he explain that simply looking at Alice caused his heart to pound and his feet to move? He couldn’t, and even if he could, he wouldn’t have bothered. They wouldn’t understand.