The Way to a Man's Heart

The first time he saw Molly Prewett was at the Opening Feast during the Sorting. She was short and plump, with round cheeks and round chin and round eyes that tried to take in everything surrounding her.

Yet when her name was called, she walked toward the stool and the waiting Hat with a steely determination, sitting down briskly and tugging the brim over her eyes. He wasn't at all surprised when she was placed into Gryffindor.

She had red hair as well, he noted after she joined them at the table, as red as his own, only hers was worn in a neat plait down her back. It was kind of nice, knowing someone else who was cursed with such a riotous shade.

He held out a hand near the end of dessert, over a plate of blancmange. "I'm Arthur Weasley," he said politely. "Second year. Pleased to meet you."

She took his hand and shook it once, up and down. "Molly Prewett. I'm Gideon and Fabian's sister. The blancmange is good, isn't it? Almost as good as mum's."

Her eyes were brown instead of blue, but that was all right. Arthur knew already that he'd made a new friend.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Molly, Arthur quickly learned over the next few years, was a headstrong young lady with a temper to match. She was always quick to forgive and let bygones be bygones, however, and wasn't the sort to nurse a grudge. She often came to him after an outburst, apologetic and contrite, needing reassurance that she'd done no lasting damage to this friendship or that.

"You never lose your temper," she told him once while working on their Charms homework. "Don't you ever become cross or angry?"

"Of course I do," Arthur replied, looking up from the quill he was trimming. "I usually try to talk it out. There's nothing wrong with a bit of diplomacy or tact now and then."

"Diplomacy," Molly repeated dutifully. "Tact."

She tried, Arthur noticed. She truly did; but in the end her temper almost always won out. He found he didn't mind. There was something almost endearing about the way her eyes flashed annoyance, or the high spots of colour that bloomed on each cheek.

~*~*~*~*~*~

She brought back all sorts of goodies after the Christmas holidays every year to share with her housemates. There were typically six or seven different kinds of biscuits; rich buttery shortbreads; decadent fudge; rum-soaked mini-fruitcakes and more. The largesse of sweets made Molly Prewett quite popular with the younger students, not to mention pubescent boys who would eat anything that didn't eat them first.

"I wish my mum could cook like yours," Arthur confessed to her his fifth year, late one night over a plate of shortbread and cups of hot chocolate the house-elves had sent along following a midnight raid on the kitchens. "It's not that she doesn't know her way around pots and pans or anything, but it's not the same. It's not the same at all."

Molly blushed charmingly behind her cup of chocolate, and pushed another piece of shortbread across the table to him. "Have some more," she said. "Don't tell the others, but I made those myself."

And she winked.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Sometime between the end of Arthur's fifth year and the beginning of his sixth, Molly changed. She was still soft and round, with red hair and bright brown eyes. She arrived at Hogwarts with more treats for the other Gryffindors, particularly the new ickle firsties away from home for the first time, as she'd done in years past.

Sometime over the summer holidays, though, Molly had acquired curves. There were new softnesses, rearranged softnesses, a not-so-subtle restructuring that unaccountably haunted Arthur's dreams every night and left him either showering very early or very late in the mornings so the other blokes in his dorm wouldn't see just what effect those dreams had on him. They were friends, for Merlin's sake! He shouldn't be having those kind of thoughts, should he?

Molly didn't seem to notice the fact that his image of her was no longer fraternal, or even platonic, for that matter. She treated him just as she always had, teasing him while they did their homework, sharing the sweets from home her mum owled on a regular basis, asking his opinion on everything from the best way to mulch screechsnaps in Herbology to whether or not so much crystallised pineapple could be good for any one person, especially someone like Professor Slughorn.

And if Arthur sometimes caught her watching him from the corner of his eye on occasion, he didn't give it much thought. He was the one having strange ideas, not her.

~*~*~*~*~*~

When Arthur's entire family fell sick with dragon pox just before Christmas, Molly was the first to extend an invitation to spend the holidays with her own family. He got on rather well with her brothers, and was more than happy to accept.

Molly's family was as warm and tempestuous as she was, and went out of their way to make Arthur feel at home. He participated in one or two of Gideon and Fabian's pranks, when he wasn't the recipient of one or two. Mr Prewett treated him with grave courtesy, and her mother plied him constantly with sweets. Mrs Prewett looked just like Molly, sweetly round, yet no-nonsense, unafraid to rap either of her sons on wrist or head with a wooden spoon when they stepped out of line.

Arthur received a knitted jumper, mittens and a scarf Christmas morning, among other things. The jumper was too long, and one sleeve was longer than the other; but they were minor imperfections easily fixed with a few charms once he'd tried it on. He found out later that day from Fabian that Molly had taken up knitting only a few months earlier. The jumper was her first major completed project.

"I think she fancies you, mate," Fabian confided. "Whatever you do, don't break her heart. Gideon and I..." He cracked his knuckles to prove his point.

"We're just friends," Arthur protested weakly. "She's never given me a reason to think otherwise."

When he caught Molly and Mrs Prewett whispering together in the kitchen, and later when Molly handed him an enormous slice of his favourite mince pie that she'd baked herself, he wondered if perhaps Fabian wasn't right.

~*~*~*~*~*~

They began seeing each other two months later, after a cosy Hogsmeade weekend in February. The only person who seemed surprised at this turn of events was Arthur himself.

Not that he was complaining.

~*~*~*~*~*~

The rumours and horror stories of the war grew ever more rampant and widespread throughout Arthur's seventh and final year at Hogwarts. Molly fretted constantly over his safety once he left school, and he constantly tried to soothe away her worries.

"I'll be working in the Office for Misuse of Muggle Artefacts," he explained again. "I'll be behind a desk most every day. Yes, I'll be working with Aurors on occasion, but they won't put me in any danger at all. I promise."

"They had better not," Molly said, laying out the picnic lunch she'd prepared. There was roast chicken with lemon slices under the skin, which had been crisped just as he liked it, strawberries and clotted cream, field greens dressed with a vinaigrette of Molly's own creation, and a lemon meringue pie.

"They won't," Arthur said, pulling a small box from his pocket. "I have other plans. They can't hurt me for at least another year while I wait for you to finish school. You will wait for me?"

Molly looked at the box, then to Arthur with wide eyes. He thought it was maybe the first time he'd ever seen her bereft of speech as she opened the box to reveal the diamond ring inside.

"Oh yes!" Molly threw her arms around him, kissing him soundly. "Oh, yes, yes, yes!"

"I love you, Mollywobbles," he said, kissing her back before sliding the ring onto her finger. "Now, let's celebrate with this lunch!"

Molly only smiled. It had taken six years, a hand-knitted jumper, and untold batches of baked goods, but her mother had been right in the end. The way to a man's heart really was through his stomach!