"Ron! Hey, Ron! Pass the Quaffle here, you idiot!" Ginny hovered in front of her brother, wondering why on Earth he was aiming the Quaffle at the back of Cho's head. "Ron! What are you doing?" Ginny screeched and flew in front of Cho, seizing the Quaffle before it knocked the Ravenclaw girl backwards off her broom. "Have you gone completely crazy?"
"Ginny, stop yelling at your brother and get back to the game already!" Harry roared, zooming over to see what the feud was about.
"Well you weren't doing it, so I thought someone should!"
"Just do your job, and I'll do mine! It isn't even my job to yell at him, it's Angelina's!"
"Would you two stop yelling at each other and actually focus on the game!" Angelina screamed from the middle of the pitch. Ginny tossed Harry and her brother glances of contempt and zoomed off, the Quaffle tucked under her arm.
"Harry, stop hovering and look for the Snitch!" Fred – or was it George? - roared as he whizzed past, brandishing his bat and aiming a Bludger towards the Ravenclaw Keeper to distract him from that fact that Ginny was rocketing towards the Slytherin goal posts.
"Right, Snitch…" Harry muttered and flew off, eyes attempting to be everywhere at once…
"THREE CHEERS FOR GRYFFINDOR! THREE CHEERS FOR HARRY POTTER, GINNY WEASLEY, RON WEASLEY, ANGELINA JOHNSON, ALICIA SPINNET, KATIE BELL, FRED WEASLEY, AND GEORGE WEASLEY! WHY'RE THERE SO MANY OF THEM?" Lee Jordan bellowed over the general noise of celebration, frowning at the eight-strong Gryffindor Quidditch team.
"NO-ONE KNOWS BUT WE WON!" Harry yelled back and everyone cheered. The twins jumped up onto their improvised stage of two coffee tables stuck together and took over entertaining the crowd.
"Ginny, great match, well played! Dean, how're you? Enjoy the match?" Harry kept up his random greetings and comments as he made his way around the room to where Ron was slouched in an armchair with a bottle of Butterbeer at a dangerous angle in his hand. He was gazing into the fire, a very grumpy expression on his face.
"Ron. What's up mate? We had a brilliant game, why the long face?" Harry threw himself into the seat opposite Ron and looked expectantly at his best friend. Hermione had disappeared long ago with the excuse that she had just remembered she needed to double check the properties of leaping toadstools, though Harry believed she was actually just trying to get away from Fred and George who had taken to stalking her incessantly because she confiscated one of their experiments. Harry doubted this excuse as well, he was pretty sure both twins had a thing for his bushy-haired best friend. Now that would be an interesting… threesome…
"I'm a terrible player, I shouldn't be on the team," Ron mumbled miserably, startling Harry out of his rather disturbing thoughts of Hermione and the twins.
"What are you talking about?" Harry asked in confusion, staring at Ron as if he had gone mad. "You played brilliantly today, you made some fantastic saves! Although I am kind of curious as to why you nearly knocked Cho off her broom… She'd probably be in the hospital wing if it weren't for Ginny. What was that all about?" Harry frowned at him.
"Huh? Oh, I didn't realise it was her. Couldn't see properly," Ron grunted. Harry raised an eyebrow and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees so he could examine Ron closely.
"What's wrong, mate? Usually you'd be the life and soul of the party; especially after we just completely thrashed Ravenclaw! But you're sulking in the corner, and you and Hermione haven't even argued all day! Plus, Ginny and Michael have been fighting, which is good, right? Come on, I'm your best friend, surely you can tell me what's wrong?" Ron stood up without even looking at him.
"I'm going to bed," he mumbled and turned away. "I'm just tired." Harry barely heard Ron over the sudden roar of noise as the twins started demonstrating their latest product: Exploding Umbridges. Harry decided it would not be wise to confront Ron whilst he was clearly in such a mood and instead spent an hour or so chatting to Ginny and a few others about the match.
"I'm going to turn in, guys," Harry said with a yawn as he stood up and stretched. "Sleep well," he murmured and started trekking up to the dormitory. He pushed the door open slowly, expecting to see Ron fast asleep on his bed, perhaps still in his Quidditch gear. Instead, Ron was sitting at the foot of his, Harry's bed, in his pyjama bottoms, twirling his wand thoughtfully between his fingers. He glanced up when Harry shut the door.
"Sorry about earlier," he muttered, looking back down at his wand as if it was the most interesting thing he'd ever seen in his life. "Just had a bit of a mood swing."
"I thought only girls had mood swings?" Harry questioned, rummaging in his trunk for his pyjamas.
"Hermione'd kill you if she heard you saying that," Ron pointed out reasonably as Harry extracted his green pyjamas and began to pull his robes off. "Hey, Hogsmeade this weekend?"
"Sorry, I can't, I promised I'd meet Cho there – we're going together for Valentine's Day. I thought Angelina wanted to run a few drills with you, anyway?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah…" Ron sighed and got up as Harry threw himself down onto his bed and pulled back the covers. Harry watched in confusion as Ron stood there, staring at him with unfocused eyes for quite a while before he lurched forwards and grabbed a new bottle of Butterbeer from his bedside table. He tipped it back and gulped heavily as Harry surveyed the vast amount of empty bottles surrounding his and Ron's beds. In small amounts, Butterbeer had next to no effect on a wizard - unless they were very bad at dealing with alcohol (Hermione) – but only if drunk in small quantities. Ron had finished off at least a dozen bottles, and Harry was pretty sure he'd seen him sneak a drink from Fred and George's small supply of Firewhiskey too.
"Ron, I think you should probably stop with the Butterbeer now… Maybe you should just sleep it off…?" Ron dropped his half empty bottle and bounded over, launching himself to sit on Harry's bed. He was about a centimetre away from sitting on Harry's lap and Harry leaned backwards slightly, alarmed.
"Harry," he whispered with a slight giggle, shocking Harry with his sudden mood change. "I think I've had too much to drink," he confided, then laughed uproariously. Harry wrinkled his nose slightly at the smell as Ron laughed in his face.
"I think so too," Harry replied hesitantly. Ron threw his arms around his neck and hugged him close, making Harry jump slightly.
"Harry, I love you," Ron mumbled into his shoulder as Harry slowly moved to pat him cautiously on the back, feeling rather weirded out.
"That's great, Ron. I love you too, mate." Ron sat up suddenly and stared at him with wide eyes, looking rather comical. Harry hastily stifled his laughter.
"No!" He exclaimed, gaping at Harry as if he were completely stupid. "I don't mean I love you in the friend way, that'd be weird to say something like that if it were only in the friendly way. I'm in love with yooooooou, Harry Potter!" Ron prodded Harry's chest to emphasise his declaration. "That's why I was aiming the Quaffle at Cho's head, because I'm jealous, silly! You're cute when you're silly." Ron beamed at him, as if he were expecting to be praised for such coherency whilst under the influence of too much Butterbeer. Harry simply gaped at him.
"You're… you're what?"
"I'm in love with you and jealous of Cho," Ron said proudly. Harry barely managed to refrain from hitting himself in the forehead. He wondered what Hermione would say if she could hear this… Or Ginny… God forbid that Fred and George ever found out about this…
"Right. You've definitely had far too much to drink. Come on, let's get you into bed." Harry immediately screwed his face up against the images that flowed into his head at that sentence. He felt marginally sick. He got out of his bed, carefully so Ron didn't fall on top of him, then turned and seized Ron by the waist and dumped him unceremoniously in his own bed. Once he was snuggled up under his blankets, Ron turned an innocent face up to Harry.
"Can I have a goodnight kiss?" He asked sincerely and Harry had to once again refrain from hitting himself.
"No," he groaned, then climbed into his own bed, shut the hangings, and attempted to clear his mind of the disturbing images before falling asleep.
"Harry? Harry? Are you alright?" Harry recoiled from Ron's voice, shuddering as he opened his eyes and saw that the redhead's face was about two inches away from his own. He threw his arms over his head protectively.
"No! I won't give you a goodnight kiss! Let me sleep!" He yelled, and heard suppressed laughter from Ron's bed. He peeked out from behind his shield of limbs to see Ginny and Hermione rolling about mirthfully on Ron's bed.
"What? Oh, never mind," Ron mumbled, looking appropriately embarrassed and confused. "Are you alright? You were groaning in your sleep. And you said my name… It was kind of disturbing…"
"It doesn't matter, I'm fine. It was just a dream," Harry replied with relief, sitting up and discovering he'd fallen asleep with his glasses on. Everything was normal – there were no Butterbeer bottles scattering the floor of their dorm, Ron was wearing his pyjama top, and no one was asking him for a goodnight kiss. It all made sense now; he had been vaguely wondering why there were eight players on their Quidditch team, and why he, Fred and George had even been allowed to play after their life-time ban. Ginny snorted from the bed.
"Were you having an inappropriate dream about my brother, Harry?" She asked and Hermione, who had just managed to stop laughing, started rolling around in hysterics again. Harry glared at them, pulled his glasses off, and yanked his hangings shut so he could attempt to have a dreamless sleep.