Chapter 12

"Have fun with your girlfriend, Harry!" Katrina offered a parting shot as she waved her hand jauntily to him. It was a testament to how frantic Harry was that he completely ignored the woman's words, instead making due haste towards the door, which he soon bolted out of.

In the quiet that now pervaded the room, the only sound that stirred was the gentle thrumming of the air conditioning unit.

"So..." Katrina broke the silence, turning to the seventy year old martial arts master standing a few feet away. "Any idea who won this time?"

XoX

Harry cursed himself as he ran towards his best friends house. He was running half an hour late. No doubt Lisa would not be too pleased with him when he finally showed up on her doorstep.

How could he have possibly forgotten what time it was? Harry normally had an incredible sense of time. His internal clock was so precise that he was almost always able to tell exactly what time it was based simply on how many hours his mind remembered passing within a twenty four hour period. To forget something as mundane as the passage of time was troubling to him.

Perhaps there really was something to that old adage 'time flies when you're having fun'. Harry knew that he sometimes tended to delve into his studies and training to the point that he needed to remind himself of how much time had passed, but those points were few and far between. Far enough that he never thought much of them.

He could only assume the difference lay in who he was sparring. Katrina was a dream to spar against. She was an incredible martial artist. Not as good as Master Wei, but closer to Harry's own level of skill. That made her his favorite sparring partner because it wasn't so ridiculously easy to fight her it was not worth it, but he didn't get outright beaten either.

Of course, now he was late because of their spar and Lisa was sure to be upset at him.

Sure enough, Harry arrived to see Lisa standing outside of the door to her house. Her longer hair was braided in french braids and she was wearing a light blue sundress and sandals on her feet. The charm bracelet he had gotten her was conspicuously absent.

That was the first sign he saw that she was upset, but it was not the last. Her left foot was tapping on the ground, her arms were crossed over her chest and her lips drawn into a thin line. All of these were signs of agitation and anger. She was most definitely not pleased with him. A fact that only became more known to Harry when her eyes caught sight of him and narrowed.

"Lisa..." shifted uncomfortably, not used to the stare down she was giving him. Perhaps because the few times something like this had happened in the past he had not cared as much. It was hard to say. "I am so sorry. I got caught up sparring with Katrina and hadn't realized how much time had passed."

"Oh? You got caught up sparring with Katrina, did you?" she asked, her tone clipped. Harry didn't quite manage to withhold his wince. "I see. Well, I suppose I could understand. I mean, it's not like you had promised your best friend you would take her to see Aladdin today." Harry didn't even bother trying to hold his wince in this time. He knew he had screwed up terribly. All he could do now was run damage control.

"I'm so sorry," Harry walked up closer to Lisa so he could grab her hand and rub it consolingly. She withdrew her hand before he could even grab it however, the act hurting much more than he thought it would. "Lisa..."

"Let's just go," Lisa's tone was still clipped, still angry, but the anger was just being used to mask the hurt she felt. Harry knew this, which is why he felt so horrible. Even though it wasn't like he had forgotten his promise to her, the fact that he had made a promise and ran late enough that he might not be able to keep it was just as bad in many ways. It made him seem callous.

Harry sighed as he followed Lisa into the house and towards the living room where Misses Crawft was speaking in hushed tones with Mister Crawft. Harry could not hear what they were saying. He could have probably enhanced his sense of hearing using the enhancing abilities his animgus form had given him, but felt it would be a violation of their rights so refrained.

The two adults noticed him and Lisa, and while Mister Crawft's lips thinned in barely masked annoyance, Misses Crawft smiled. A smile which left when she noticed that Lisa and Harry were not holding hands like they usually did.

"Are you two ready?" she asked.

"Yes," Lisa answered crisply, causing Misses Crawft to furrow her brows in concern as she looked back and forth between the two. Mister Crawft on the other hand, looked intrigued by this new development. Harry could only imagine how happy the man would be to learn his daughter was upset with him.

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