A/N: Characters are from JK Rowlings imagination and are © Scholastic and Warner Bros. I do not own anything and I just borrowed the characters. I'll give them back...sometime...maybe.

Pansy Parkinson looked sideways through her eyelashes at Blaise Zabini.

"I refuse to even contemplate trying out," Pansy said. "Quidditch just isn't my bag and you should know that by now."

"Should we indeed?" Theo asked. "We've seen you on a broom and you were quite graceful if I do recall."

"Its not my ability with a broom in question," Pansy replied, turning to look at the sandy haired boy.

"Then what is the question?" Blaise asked. "Where does this ridiculous reluctance stem from?"

"Perhaps its none of your business, Zabini!" Pansy snapped.

"Aw, don't be that way Pans," Draco grinned. "Just try out? Once, for the team?" Pansy melted a little when Draco slung his arm around her but straightened up once she heard the word team fall from his cupids bow mouth.

"I will NOT!" She said. "I absolutely refuse to partake in this misguided attempt at... Well I don't exactly know what your aims are but they are ridiculous nonetheless. I will not be party to your madness, now if you will excuse me..." She flipped her black hair and walked off. The boys looked at each other; most of them smirked though Draco only raised an eyebrow before continuing with breakfast.

l l l

A few mornings later a wail that was testament to human suffering could be heard in the Slytherin common room. Pansy was facing the announcement board with a look of abject misery and as such she was the object of many curious and disinterested looks. There on the quidditich try out sheet was her name in her curly script. The boys had obviously forged her name but her name was there and she was obligated to go. Furiously she composed herself and walked to the dormitories, back poker straight.

Lunch passed too quickly for Pansy even though she was busily ignoring the preening boys who were smirking at her and her predicament. After hurriedly eating lunch she retrieved her broom from the dormitories and left for the pitch. Draco was already on the pitch in green and silver quidditch robes with Marcus Flint who was ordering people around the pitch as per usual. Theo and Blaise had taken places in the stands and were watching those on the field with patrician boredom. Grasping her Nimbus 2001 she rose her face to the sky and took a deep breath.

'Morganna preserve me,' she thought to herself. She exhaled heavily and marched onto the pitch ready to try out for the position of chaser. A few minutes of shuffling and the common place insults of Slytherins and soon she was airborne. Executing a perfect barrel roll she circled the pitch as her knuckles turned white. Soon enough she was hit with a bludger to the shin and biting back the pain she pointed her broom to the sky and left the violent ball in midair. The other bludger shot towards her right side. Taking evasive measures she dived down only to be hit in the face with the quaffle. The boys in the stands were looking at her slack jawed, eyes blank and surprised for the first time since first year. She made a desperate grab for the quaffle and was hit in the arm by another bludger. Grasping her broomstick with her bruised hand she flew back up and was hit upside the head by...the snitch. Two seekers were suddenly on her as she spiraled down and tried to cover her head with her hands as she guided the broom with her legs. She was ten feet above the ground when the quaffle hit her midsection and knocked her off her broom and to the ground. The first five minutes of the game and Pansy was on the ground holding the quaffle and trying to regain the breath that had been knocked from her lungs.

"I-hate-quidditch," she gasped out at a perturbed Draco and an amused Flint.

"Pans, what happened?" Draco asked. "You're such a graceful flier I can't believe you're this bad at quidittch." Pansy turned a shade of puce and threw the quaffle at Draco's face, which he easily caught. Growling she stood and grabbed her broomstick, poking the rest of the team who had gathered about her with bristles of her broom she strode back to the castle with her nose in the air.

"Well it looks like the only way Parkinson would be useful on the field is if she fell through the quidditch hoop while holding the quaffle," Flint guffawed and all of the Slytherins snickered.

The Slytherin common room was the subject of Pansy's torture for the next few weeks. She was the butt of many jokes that gave quidditch even more of a central discussion. The only balm to her soul was that she had enough blackmail material to make sure none of the other third years outside of Slytherin ever heard about her mishap on the quidditch pitch. Blaise had ended up chaser to her mortification but soon enough it had all died down and was merely mentioned humorously in passing.