She sat with the rest of her house during breakfast, lunch and dinner, but only talking when spoken to or otherwise. Yes, she had friends, but she wanted a distance to be kept. She had good friends, not best friends. She was the only real competition for the brain of , Hermione Granger, who wasn't even in the fourth year, but the third. She kept to herself, but she still joined in on group jokes and conversation. She just preferred time to herself. Only joining Hogwarts in the Fourth year due to an illness, she thought she was behind time. But who knew that this extrodinary girl was much more advanced in her work. She was sorted into the house of Maroon and Gold like her whole clan of wizards and witches.
She kept her hair hair slightly above her shoulders and tucked her fringe behind her ears, giving people the impression of immediate innocence. But no… She could be sly and cunning if she wanted to, she was always slick with her tongue when it came to insults and diplomatic arguments with the Slytherins. She had the large oriental brown eyes of her mother which did not show her double eyelids, only when she blinked or looked in other directions, her double eyelids were prominent. She hair was black like any other Chinese, but shone the colour of deep hazel with streaks of light brown. Christine Lin was no ordinary girl, with the attractiveness of a true Asian…
On a cold January's morning, she sat herself by Ginny Weasly and Hermione Granger and started to eat her stale porridge. She was quietly listening to Ginny and Hermione's conversation but didn't join in. They were talking about lessons conducted by the new Defence against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor R.J Lupin. After eating her extremely uninteresting bowl of porridge, she swung her bag over her shoulder, accidentally knocking over a glass of milk. She cursed under her breath, bending down to pick the glass up and clean the milk with her wand when another hand appeared in view…
" Here, let me get that for you," a smooth voice said.
She looked up, annoyed, and saw Cedric Diggory's pretty boy face. She took the cup from his hand and muttered a short "Thanks" .
" I'm Cedric by the way, and you are…."
" Christine Lin Zhang Qiu" she replied.
Not being used to a mixture of English and Chinese names, he asked, " So is it Christine, or Zhang Qiu?" saying her Chinese name without any particular Chinese accent on the name.
"Beats me." She shrugged.
Being two years younger than him, she was slightly less than half a head shorter than him, but given the fact that tall and handsome included "tall", she was also considered tall too compared to the rest of the students. She pointed her wand and the milky mess on the cold granite floor, vanishing it. She stowed her wand back into her robe and curtly muttered that she had to be at Transfiguration. She hated the way girls swooned at him, she hated the way he smiled (for some reason) , she hated that he was of an equal intellect as she was (although she found it rather hard to admit) , she hated his character and the way it permited him to behave : friendly, and warm, which was something she never had. She found all these qualities annoying.
Pansy Parkinson jeered at her on her way out of the hall, calling her a half blood freak. Half in a way which made her an Eurasian. Christine stopped and looked her in the face, a fluent string of Chinese swear words emerging from her well shaped lips. She knew that darling pretty boy Cedric Diggory was still looking at her from the corner of her eye. She cast a detestful look at the Slytherins who were laughing and walked away, knowing she could get in trouble for swearing (although no one really knew what she said). Walking out of the hall while brushing her fringe away from her brow with a little more force need, Cedric caught up.
" I have to hand you two demerit points for swearing," he said in a strict voice.
" You, mister know-it-all, didn't even know what I said," she said coolly, carrying on walking.
"You were swearing!" he said in a firm voice, catching her arm and firmly holding her to the spot. People gathered and started to watch.
" PROVE IT!" Christine shouted, wrenching her hand from his strong grip.
" What is going on?" asked a slick voice.
Glaring at each other, Cedric said " Nothing Professor Snape, nothing."
Christine narrowed her eyes and left in the direction of Transfiguration classroom 2. She buried her anger and dislike into studies, taking notes twice as fast and attempting practical assessments with more rigor. After lessons, she headed for lunch, right hand sore for taking down too many notes.
Ginny caught up and said " What went on back there?"
" Nothing much. I just put someone in his place, that's all. How is your day so far?" she asked.
"Pretty fine, I cut my hands which shelling the beans of a Dagger Bush," Ginny answered, trying to hide her shock at being asked something friendly by Christine.
Both of them went into the hall, plopping their bags down. Oh great thought Christine when she realized she sat facing Cedric Diggory. Their eyes locked for a mere second before she turned away, breaking the bond. She propped a gigantic book, describing the difficult arithmancy problems including the factorization of fractionated-algebraic equations, concealing her face from Cedric. Realizing that she was not able to multi task by holding the over weighted book and eat, she shoved the book into her bag, took another bite at shepherds pie, and got up. Saying a short "goodbye" to Ginny, she headed for the library. She headed up a staircase in the mid course of changing its destination and realized someone was calling her. Cedric jumped onto the staircase with his trained flexibility of a Quidditch player. She arched her eyebrows, turned around and carried on walking up the stairway. He caught her on the arm and turned her around.
" I don't have time to argue, fight, or even have a mere debate or conversation with you Diggory. Honestly, I don't care about what you think about me…" she started.
" I just wanted to say I was sorry. Sorry for jumping into conclusions this morning. I was wrong, I admit it."
Shocked, Christine said in an indifferent voice, " Well uhm….You wouldn't want to know what I said anyway…" she turned around, determined to break free from his grip, only to be held back.
"So am I forgiven?"
" Whatever." She said coldly.
She now put her free hand on his wrist and pushed it off her arm, avoiding his eyes and went on her way, leaving him standing there. She layed her books infront of her and started on her homework assigned to her by Professor Mcgonagall and Professor Snape, finishing everything by the time the bell rang. She got up with her bag in hand and ran to the green house, knowing she was late due to the distance between the library and the green house, skipping steps here and there, and sprinting across the lawn, hitting someone from Hufflepuff….
" OH IN THE NAME OF DAMNATION GET OFF ME IM LATE FOR HERBOLOGY!" she screamed, scrambling off the grass, desperate to not get any points deducted from Gryffindor .
Then it came. She looked at the bloody face, I mean, red, bloody, face, of Cedric Diggory. Blood flowed like a river from his nose, dripping onto his robes and onto her hands as she tried to stem the flow of the maroon fluid.
"I love you, but I'm sorry" she whispered to the intricately woven handkerchief, given by her mother to her.
She rammed it up his nose, only to hear an "OW" from Cedric.
"I'LL VISIT YOU IN THE HOSPITAL WING LATER ON I PROMISE!" yelled Christine and she blitzed across the grounds and into the green house, leaving Cedric running off to the Hospital Wing, bloody faced.
She felt guilt plaguing her throughout the unplugging of the webbed bushes and the practicals of Spell Work. Her robe front was tainted a bright red and her left arm had a crust of Cedric's dried up blood. She skipped dinner and ran back to her common room, flinging her bag onto her bed and then sprinting off to the hospital wing, only to burst in on an empty chamber and an angry Madam Pomfrey.
" I'm so sorry Mam' , but there was a boy this afternoon, with I think a broken nose, I just wanted to…"
" He's no…" started Pomfrey, only to be interrupted again by Christine.
" But he can't be discharged so quickly!" she said exasperatedly
" You barge in here with the audacity of a troll and not even allowing me to speak? Get out! Mr Diggory isn't here, go find another good looking boy to pester!" said Pomfrey in a curt and disapproving voice, shoving Christine out of the Hospital Wing, much to her refusal and determination to know what happened to Cedric. " I MENDED HIS NOSE NOW GET OUT!" Pomfrey bellowed before slamming the doors shut.
Christine turned around, shocked and offended. She walked back to the dormitory in defeat, washed up and fell asleep.