"Do you know who you're going with yet?"

"No, nobody's asked yet," Parvati sighed. "Not that there's anybody good."

"Not even Harry?" Padma asked, raising an eyebrow and smirking.

Parvati rolled her eyes. "Do you know how many of the girls want him to ask them? Romilda Vane, some second year, keeps asking around to find someone who can brew a love potion for her to give him. There's no way he's asking me."

-o-o-o-

A week later, only a week and a half before the ball, Parvati came rushing up to the table where Padma and Anthony were working on some homework for Ancient Runes.

"Padma! Padma! Guess what!"

"Shhhhhh!" hissed Madam Pince from her desk.

"Sorry!" Parvati said in a quieter voice, looking sheepish. "Anyway, Padma, guess what!"

"What, Parvati?" Padma asked, still looking at her textbook. It was probably just some new gossip her sister had heard from Lavender.

"Harry asked me to the Yule Ball!"

"What?"

Padma had been joking about Harry Potter asking her sister to the Yule Ball - surely the Boy-with-the-lightning-scar had plenty of girls hanging off of him.

"No joke!" Parvati confirmed, excitedly nodding her head. "And he asked if you wanted to go with Ron."

"Ron Weasley?" Padma asked, wrinkling her nose a bit. Ron was definitely not her type.

"The one and only. But did you have a date already? Or can I tell him you're able to go with Ron?"

Padma thought about it. She did want to go to the ball, and with only a week and a few days before Christmas there was almost no time for another boy to ask. And Ronald Weasley was, at least, not the worst there was. He was much better attitude-wise than Zacharias Smith from Hufflepuff and at least he didn't trip over his own feet like Neville Longbottom, or set things on fire constantly, like Seamus Finnagan.

"Alright, tell him I said yes then," she said with a small smile.

"Okay!" Parvati squealed, earning herself another disapproving look from the librarian. "See you Padma!"

Shaking her head at her sister's hyper attitude, the Ravenclaw turned back to her book. How her own twin could be so crazy sometimes was unbelievable.

-o-o-o-

This was not turning out as I had hoped.

Granted, Padma still thought that Ron wasn't the worst of those who could've asked her to the ball, but it would've been nice to dance for a bit longer... with someone who didn't step on her toes every few seconds.

Harry and Parvati sat down next to them, Parvati looking like she wanted to keep dancing as well. Almost immediately, a very handsome boy from Beauxbatons came over and asked the Gryffindor girl to dance.

Come on! Padma screamed in her head, resisting the urge to yell in frustration. Not only had she been hooked up with someone who had a horrendous fashion sense and seemed to be wearing a terribly old and frayed dress, but said boy wouldn't even dance with her. Instead, he spent most of his time staring at Hermione Granger, who did look much prettier with her hair tamed and a beautiful periwinkle dress on, or glaring at Victor Krum, who was Hermione's date. Padma felt a stab of loathing for the Gryffindor girl as she sat down at their table, a bright smile on her face. She had ended up with a handsome Bulgarian who was not just a good dancer (based on what Padma had seen), but was handsome and polite as well.

"Victor's just gone to get us drinks."

Ron responded bitingly and Padma rolled her eyes. Why did they have to fight, especially right in the middle of the ball?

They argued back and forth, until Hermione seemed utterly fed up and stormed away with a loud "Don't call him Vicky!"

Padma watched her go, looked from Ron's angry face back to Hermione's retreating figure, and made up her mind. If Ron wasn't going to treat her with the proper respect, then she didn't care. She could find someone to dance with her, and her sister would love the opportunity to play matchmaker.

"Are you going to ask me to dance or not?"

"No," Ron said sulkily.

"Fine," she said, adding in her head: Good. Find someone else's evening to ruin. You haven't succeeded in ruining mine.


I got the character prompt Padma Patil, and this was the first thing I thought of. Honestly I like Ron fine, but he was just so angry at everyone during GoF, when it was his own attitude that condemned him.

Written for: Fanfiction, School of Imagination and Creativity; Transfiguration Assessment 2: Prompts - character: Padma Patil