With A Slip Of The Foot
Every girl he passed made a face at him, practically snarling, and he was pretty sure he knew why; they, along with everyone else at his own bloody school, not to mention the others, thought he'd entered his name in the Goblet of Fire, by means of Dark Magic or some other malevolent method.Really, it was the stupidest thing he'd ever heard, but he could convince no one of his innocence, no matter how many times he retold the story of his wrongful conviction.
Nobody except Hermione…she always believed in him, and even if he was wrong at times, she never stopped smiling when he entered the room or approached her in any sort of way. She never judged him, and always had the deepest concern and understanding for him, as well as a protective hold that even he, the infamous Harry Potter, couldn't explain, nor escape from. Something about her just…mesmerized and amazed him.
"Harry! Harry!" He turned, as did the rest of the three schools' occupants that were in the courtyard at the time, as he heard a familiar voice call his name, and he was pleasantly surprised to see Hermione running toward him, a blinding beam on her face. "Harry, you-!" She stopped abruptly as her feet were wiped out from under her as an unseen piece of ice played a nasty trick on her feet that were going at such a rapid speed, and she fell to the freezing winter stone.
Some of the students around her snickered and whispered to themselves ("The smartest girl in school sure doesn't know get out much, eh?"; "Looks like Grange is more of a Mudblood than we thought, eh, Malfoy?"), but Harry paid them no heed as he strode over to her and held out his hand, trying and utterly failing to hold in his giggles while he played her expression as she fell over in his head.
"And just what are you laughing at, Harry James Potter?" Hermione asked teasingly as she grabbed his hand and grinned while trying to hold back her own signs of amusement.
"Who do you think, Hermione Jane Granger?" As he pulled her to her feet, their shoulders shook with the restrained laughter, and they finally let it out, chuckling like they had last year when he'd driven Malfoy away after calling Hermione that murderous name.
As they laughed, the students began whispering again, but quieter this time, as they watched the boy and girl interact with such patent feeling. Harry himself noticed something as he watched her laugh: with a slip of the foot, anyone, even a lonely boy who'd never known the beauty of the outside world until he was eleven-years-old, could be enchanted.
With a slip of the foot, anyone, even an isolated boy who was in the midst of fighting for his life in the most dangerous tournament in the Wizarding world for someone of his age, could be amazed.
And with a slip of the foot, anyone, even an unrightfully shunned fourteen-year-old who had only one person that believed in everything he did and was, could be in love.
A/N: (Yes, it IS short, but I wasn't planning on it being long anyway, and I personally like how it turned out! And YES, I KNOW Hermione's middle name is 'Jean', but 'Goblet of Fire' was out long before she changed it, so ha! lol. PLEASE review!!) (If you're wondering why this isn't bold like I usually write Author's Notes, Fanfiction wasa cting really weird with me the night I posted this, the way it erased all of my bold and italics, so...there's your explanation. lol. Again, please tell me what you thought!!)