The last day of exams had finally reached its end. A flood of robed teens burst into the 4th floor hall, heralded by shrieks and laughter. A few books went flying into the air, and someone had already begun to sprinkle the floors with flyers for an end-of-term party in the Hufflepuff common room. The party, which had been a joint venture of a few of the students of each house – or at least three houses – had been predicted to be the first massive inter-house gathering since the Yule Ball, and the light at the end of the tunnel for every anxious and work-laden student for the past week. And especially so for Harry Potter, who knew it would be his last hurrah before another seemingly endless summer at the Dursleys.
Once outside of McGonagall's watch, and safely into the hall with about a hundred other students, Ron, Hermione and Harry let out laughter and long sighs of relief. After Ron had finished with a brief jig, he began talks of the following evening.
"Alright, 'Mione, you'll be in charge of snacks, Harry you're going to check with the Gryffindor-attendees that everyone knows the Hufflepuff password – though its always the bloody same... 'Hufflepuff.'... Good people but thick gits, -- and I will be attending to the copious amounts of Firewhisky and muggle-booze –"
"If you honestly think I'm going down to get your snacks off the house elves--" a somewhat less jovial Hermione interrupted.
"Fine, Harry you get the snacks, Hermione, you're on password duty." Everyone seemed content with this. And honestly, Harry couldn't think of a complaint in the world. He had one last Quidditch meeting, in which plans for next year would be discussed, and then he was off for some sleep and seeing to his house elves. He was more relaxed and content than he'd been almost all year. Keeping him particularly elated was the prospect of experiencing his first social gathering since his somewhat disgraceful falling out with Cho. He had spent the last year more cynical about girls than the average sixteen year old boy, but had lately found himself a bit – shall we say – restless for what he had had with his short-lived relationship with Cho. At least the part of it without the public screaming. And by the way Ron had been so insistent on Hermione's attendance at the party – even though she protested that she needed to get a head start on the summer's reading – Harry suspected that Ron felt similarly.
"Harry, meet back in our room at quarter nine?" Ron asked.
"Great." He replied.
"Miss Granger, would you like to meet up for some pre-gaming as well?" asked Ron, doffing a suddenly posh accent and suggestive tone.
"If you're asking me to participate in your binge-drinking, I'll pass," she retorted, then continued with a smile "though I will meet up with you to make sure you look presentable. Harry, do let me try something on this, I promise I won't leave you bald." With a ruffle of Harry's trademark untidy hair, she skipped off to the common room to get an early start on her duties.
The rest of the day went by quite quickly. Once the Quidditch team had gone for a last practice, and changed again, Harry was thoroughly exhausted.
After an hour's nap – mainly filled with ethereal dreams of exams and quills and some of the fitter Hufflepuff girls – he headed down to the kitchen to request about two hundred pastries and chips. On his way back though, he heard one of the few voices that could take him down from his elated mood.
"Scarhead thinks his little box-social will be bloody fantastic--" drolled Draco Malfoy to who Harry could only assume were Crabbe and Goyle.
"So are we going then?" one of the trolls asked.
"Course not, idiot! We've got plans of our own. We're getting drunk and seeing what Pansy and her friends are up to. I don't make parties, like some people, I show up at them." Harry slowed, not having the energy to stop and eavesdrop entirely.
"Yeah Draco, when are you going to hit that?" the other oaf asked, chortling slightly.
"Don't talk like a muggle, and you know I could get Pansy her any time I want."
Harry could head somewhat uncomfortable shifting, possibly on Malfoy's part. He had no interest in the social workings of the Slytherins, and as long as they weren't crashing his party, he had no concerns. He walked straight past the archway in which the three boys were loitering, but not without notice.
"There you are Potter. Preparing for your big night? First boy-girl party is it? Maybe you're going to get to play some spin the bottle or pin the tail on the Mudblood."
In Harry's most painfully sweet voice, he retorted "Why yes Draco, you're entirely welcome to come to the party, we'll be waiting on pins and needles for your arrival." He hoped they'd picked up his sarcasm.
He walked away hearing their sniggers, but obviously they could come up with no better retorts. Arms full of bags of cakes and snackss, he made his way up to the common room. "Sacramentum" opened the portrait hole, and within an hour he was in his room with the four other boys getting ready.
Seamus and Dean were both shirtless, in the process of trying on new muggle clothes they'd received as end-of-term gifts when Hermione and Ginny came in, prompting several cat-calls from Hermione, and sheepish blushing from Ginny. Feigning shock, the two boys covered themselves up with pillows and let out girlish shrieks. Still joking five minutes and three outfits later, Hermione advised that the boys simply give up and attend the party in the nude (Ginny had not succeeded in paling quite yet). Ron – a bit too furtively perhaps – drew attention away from the scantily clad boys and asked Hermione for advice on some clothes Harry had lent him, claiming he needed a girl's opinion. Almost everyone in the room knew it was really only one girl's opinion he needed.
Harry had finished attempting to tame his hair when he decided he had better hurry everyone along. In ten minutes they were outside the Hufflepuff common room with a group of students far larger than he'd predicted this early. Ron, arms full of every type of magical or muggle alcoholic drink he could find with the help of the Weasley twins, uttered the password and the lot walked in. The Hufflepuff common room was quite brighter than any room Harry had yet seen at Hogwarts, but it was quite large and served well as a venue. Within an hour most every student from Hufflepuff, Gryffindor and Ravenclaw were in attendance, and even a few of the more amiable Slytherins were making the rounds. Ron had already turned quite flushed after doing a few Firewhiskey chasers with Neville (who after ten minutes had seemed to have passed out on a couch) and playing some sort of drinking game involving Exploding Snap with Owen Cauldwell.
The sight of Blaise Zabini indeed reminded Harry of his encounter with Draco Malfoy earlier that day. He began to tell Hermione about it when she donned a particularly guilty look. Harry stopped himself and asked what she was looking funny about. "Well...don't get angry...I invited Pansy Parkinson."
"What?!" Harry bellowed.
"We've actually been getting on quite well since we were made Potions partners last month. She's been somewhat civil – oh don't give me that look – and I didn't want it to seem like we were excluding the Slytherins entirely. So I think she said she might come. And might, well, bring some of her 'friends.' Come on it won't be that bad. And I'm sure, SURE, she won't bring Mal-- " as if staged, Hermione stopped herself, looking in disbelief at the door. Who should be there but Pansy Parkinson, side-by-side with a disgusted looking Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, and about four other less-threatening looking Slytherin girls. Indeed the look on Draco's face was similar to the one on Harry's a mere moment earlier. Though, Hermione was right; Pansy and she did begin chatting, and seemed quite civil. Draco on the other hand had a look on his face like he'd just been dragged by his mother to get a yellow-fever inoculation.
Harry, perhaps because of the one-too-many Hornback Beers he'd had, couldn't help himself. Walking up to the evil pale-faced boy he said "So, couldn't turn down the invitation, Malfoy?"
"It's not my fault my girlfriends got friendly with your girlfriend, sod. Now if I'm going to have to socialise with you people I'm going to need to be shitfaced. Excuse me." And he stormed off to the refreshment table with his cronies at his side.
Harry indeed was feeling quite pleased, despite the circumstances. Draco was having a miserable time, he'd done some flirting with Vicky Frobisher, Parvati Patil and Susan Bones -- each incident garnering a sidelong glance from Cho -- and he was quite enjoying the sight of Hermione, who seemed to have been cajoled into drinking for what would seem like the first time in her sixteen years. She was just finishing up quite an interesting conversation with Lavender Brown about how she couldn't feel her own tongue, when Harry heard words that didn't immediately register with him.
"Who wants to play spin the bottle?!" a female voice echoed. She had to be joking. He reflexively glanced at Draco, who for the first time that night seemed truly celebratory. He gave a look of disbelief at the girl, and proceeded to laugh in Harry's general direction. Harry couldn't help it. He buried his head in his hands, laughing only a little and quite painfully at the irony of it. Fortunately Draco's amusement was drowned out by the enthusiastic response of the party. Somewhat derisively, he began clapping and loudly responding "Right! Let's get on then! Spin the bottle then!" Draco had clearly accomplished his goal of becoming inebriated, because his usually well groomed hair fell into his icy eyes as he began walking to the centre where most people seemed to be locating themselves for the game, and his typically pale skin now flushed ever so slightly. For a moment, Harry wondered why he was noticing this...he merely blamed it on the drinks.
He was planning on politely excusing himself from the room for just long enough to avoid being pulled into the circle, when Draco seemed to read his mind. "Aw, leaving already Potter?" Harry turned back, but Malfoy continued. "Afraid you might have to kiss a girl and make Weasley here jealous? Or afraid we might have to snog? Heaven forbid." Something about the laughter Malfoy was getting from a crowd that was supposed to hate him – or something about that last thing he said suspiciously increasing Harry's pulse a -- made Harry's pride get the better of him. He sat himself down between Ginny and Lee Jordan, hoping to shut Malfoy up.
It took a few minutes for people to situate themselves, and for Cho to down a bottle of butterbeer with which to spin. This earned a few hoots and yells, making Harry that much more uncomfortable with the whole situation. Cho began to spin the emptied bottle, when Draco let himself be heard again. "Wait, wait, don't we want to set up some ground rules?"
"What do you mean?" asked Cho.
"Well, dear, are blokes kissing blokes? Are girls – well yes, I must insist that the girls kiss girls..."
"Yes, I think everyone should have to kiss everyone. And the way my sister used to play it with her friends was, if you land on someone three times it's up to the rest of the group what you have to do. If you don't want to do something you're out," finished Eloise Midgen.
"My hands are like giant paws!," mumbled Hermione, followed by a slight collapse onto Eloise's side.
"That all sounds quite right," said Draco. Harry didn't want to add anything, but honestly the thought of kissing Crabbe or Goyle made him want to pummel himself with his own broomstick. "carry on then."
And so it began.