Suzy had taken a sip of her butterbeer at the wrong moment. It sprayed out across the table as she snorted. Jake patted her helpfully on the back.
"You hit the interviewer on the butt?" asked Suzy, still snorting with laughter.
Jake spread his hands wide and cocked his head, grinning as he saw his sister lean backwards from laughing. "Accidentally. He might have enjoyed it, you never know-"
Suzy rolled her eyes. "Wow, I wonder why you didn't get hired."
The Three Broomsticks was crowded and noisy, thick with the smell of smoke and butterbeer and the laughter of Hogwarts students on the first Hogsmede visit of the year. Jake and Suzy had arranged to meet up together, and Jake was regaling her with stories about his many failed job interviews, while Suzy complained about Umbridge and OWL year in general.
Jake drained the last of his butterbeer and ran his hand self-consciously through his curly hair as he glanced around the pub. He caught sight of Angela nearby, with two other girls from Suzy's year. He waved exuberantly to her, and winked. She turned bright red and looked away.
"Stop teasing her," said Suzy, also looking over.
"What?" cried Jake. "I'm only being friendly."
Suzy kicked him under the table, and Jake yelped in protest, grabbing his ankle. "It wasn't that hard!" Suzy protested, and Jake looked up at her with the expression of a lost puppy.
"Anyway," Suzy said, as Jake sighed loudly, looking around the pub in an attempt for sympathy and looking triumphantly at Suzy as Madam Rosmerta began to walk over. "Didn't you say you had a job interview today?"
Jake leant forwards, looking horrified. At that moment, Madam Rosmerta arrived at their table. "Can I get you anything?" she asked.
Jake swore loudly, making a group of third years glance over to him.
"I'll take that as a no," said Madam Rosmerta snippily and she strode away.
"I am…oh, Merlin," said Jake distractedly, picking up his tie and glancing at his watch. "I'm late already!" He looked around for his jacket.
Suzy grinned, handing it to him. "You idiot," she said fondly.
Jake shuffled his tie on and pecked her on the cheek. "Bye bye," he said, waving. "I'll see you soon, right?"
"Right," said Suzy, watching him go disappointedly. "See you."
Jake waved again, and had almost crossed the pub before Suzy yelled after him. "Hey! Have you got any Sickles?"
He turned round, speading his arms wide and almost hitting Professor McGonagall, who had just entered. "I'm broke, Suze. I hardly have two Knuts." He swung round the door, yelling "Love you!" before he disapparated with a sharp crack.
He was feeling warm from seeing Suzy again after so long and from the Butterbeer, and it had been a long time since he had felt like that, so he was still smiling when he appeared in London. He threw his jacket over his shoulders and was stuffing his arms through the sleeves when he rounded the corner and saw his mother and father standing by the red telephone box, looking horribly out of place in the Muggle street. Jake slowed down.
"Mum, dad," he said slowly. "What are you doing here?"
"Making sure you go to this job interview," said his father. "And I think it's a good thing we came, don't you?"
Jake rolled his eyes, brushing past his father as he opened the door of the telephone box.
"Where have you been, sweetie?" his mother asked as she and her father followed him in. "We've been waiting." She sounded really disappointed.
"I was with Suzy," Jake muttered. He turned around and began dialling. He had used the Ministry of Magic Visitors Entrance a few times over the years; most recently for a number of job interviews and in the past when he, Suzy and his mother used to come to visit his father at work. It had been exciting then, but now, as the box moved down Jake felt claustrophobic. His mother handed him the badge and he pinned it on.
The Atrium was full of people when they arrived. Jake felt his cheeks burn. How must he look, with his parents shadowing him as if he was about twelve years old? And then he became angrier than ever with his father, because of course it was his father's idea to come with him. And then he became so damn angry all he wanted to do was turn back around, get back in the stupid telephone box and Disapparate back to see Suzy. Or grab a Time Turner and go back about three years.
"Well, you know where to go," said his father, nodding towards the lifts.
"Yeah, yeah, I know, right, thanks," Jake muttered, throwing his hands in his pockets and walking away.
"Good luck!" his mother called after him. Jake didn't respond.
"Jacob!" his father snapped.
He spun around. "What?" he yelled, straining a little to see his father over the heads of the Ministry workers passing by.
"Your tie."
"What…?" Jake muttered, confused. He looked down, and saw that his tie was off centre.
Jake pulled the tie slowly back into place, and pressed his lips together, trying to avoid the sudden burning behind his eyes. He quickly turned, and joined the large throng into the lift.
It was stupid to feel so panicked, but Jake suddenly felt claustrophobic again. There were so many people in the lift, all pushing and pressing into him and he was nervous enough and suddenly he felt as if he couldn't breathe. He pressed his head against the wall of the lift and wondered Cedric coped with it last year, when he was the Hogwarts Champion and could hardly move five steps without being surrounded by a huge crowd of people.
The lift doors opened and Jake stepped out, quickly making his way along to the Floo Regulation Authority.
"Hi," he said as the door opened. "Madam Edgecoombe, I am so sorry I'm late – my name's Jake Reynolds, and I have an-"
"Yes, I know," Madam Edgecoombe said. She smiled, but it didn't quite meet her eyes. "Come in."
She obviously hadn't forgiven him from missing his interview last week, and Jake seriously doubted whether he would be able to make that good an impression on her. He shrugged as he followed her in.
"I don't trust you, Hermione."
Suzy grinned as she saw Hermione roll her eyes. "And why not?" she replied snippishly.
"I think you will want to make badges for this," Suzy continued as Parvati finished signing her name and handed the quill to her. "Just like SPEW. You wait, we'll all have badges on telling people to-"
"Do you really think I'd be so stupid to make badges for a secret group?" said Hermione, pushing the parchment with the list of names on it towards Suzy.
"Hermione, Snape gave you an O on your last Potions essay," said Suzy, shaking her head as she bent down to scrawl her name on the list. "How can I think you're stupid? I was just teasing you, okay?"
Hermione handed the quill to Neville, who was behind Suzy in the list.
They were in the Hog's Head, just after Hermione and Harry had given their speeches about the Defence Against the Dark Arts / Anti-Umbridge group they were hoping to form. Suzy and Angela had turned up not expecting many others to come, but the small pub was crowded with students, all of whom were queuing up to sign up for the group, or else talking excitedly about it. It was nice, Suzy decided, waving at Terry Boot who was grinning at her. She wasn't even sure she knew a lot of the people in here, but if Umbridge had done anything at Hogwarts, she had at least brought a large number together, united in hatred of her. There was a friendly feeling.
She was going to pick up her Butterbeer, deciding she might as well risk the dust that had accumulated on the bottle, when she caught sight of Ron and Harry, who were sitting a little way away from Hermione, who were still busily gathering names. Her smile slipped off her face.
What Harry had said, up there, about last year, had been horrible. "One second away from being murdered…or watching a friend die before your eyes."
No one spoke about Cedric. Nobody. It was one huge subject that nobody could speak of, because if you spoke about his death, then you were breaking the illusion that everything was okay, and that couldn't happen. You couldn't admit it wasn't okay, because then everything would just break.
And Harry had broken that. He'd said about Cedric, and he'd said that Cedric was dead.
Suzy hadn't even known Cedric. She knew him from the Quidditch team, and obviously as the Hogwarts champion, but had never said one word to him. But his death had shaken her up. She remembered sitting with Jake by the lake after the Third Task, after Harry had come back clutching Cedric's corpse, both of them shaking and shocked, both of them crying.
And looking at Harry, she couldn't help but wonder what it had been like for him; especially with all the stuff in the news recently. And what did it mean to him, to see all these people. Signing that sheet to join in the group somehow wasn't just a way to enter a new club. It was a paper that said 'I believe Harry'.
Suzy went over and sat down next to Ron. "It's going well," she said, gesturing around at the pub at large. She caught sight of Angela talking to Neville, and smirked when she caught her eye.
"I didn't think this many people would turn up," said Harry, running his finger around the rim of his bottle.
"Nervous?" sang Suzy, leaning around Ron to grin at him.
Harry shrugged.
"What?" Ron cried, suddenly, his eyes on Hermione. "Bloody hell, that jerk Smith just signed up!"
"Who?" Suzy asked, craning her neck to see.
"Smith, Zacharias Smith!" snapped Ron, pointing out a boy with yellow hair who was signing his name on the parchment. "What's Hermione doing, letting him sign up? We don't want that idiot in the group."
Suzy began to grin as Zacharias Smith looked over to where they were sitting, and Ron stuck his middle finger up at him.
"Bet he won't even turn up to the first meeting," said Ron, sitting back down and folding his arms.
"You mean you hope not," said Suzy. She laughed at the sight of Ron's face. He looked round at her, and his frown deepened.
"What are you laughing at?"
"Nothing," said Suzy, quickly. Ron was still looking at her, though, and she realised that his eyes were a light shade of bright blue. She had never noticed before.
"Nothing," she said again, quickly, turning away from Ron and scanning the pub again, taking a drink to ease her confusion. She realised with a sinking feeling that her cheeks were turning red – she blushed easily, and her whole face could turn bright scarlet.
Suzy said goodbye quickly, realising with a wave of relief that Angela was waiting for her at the door, along with Neville and Terry Boot. She joined them, quickly, brushing her curly hair forwards in an attempt to hide her burning cheeks.
"We're just going to go back to school," explained Angela, as she opened the door and stepped out into the snow. Neville walked with her, their footsteps falling into line with the others. Suzy shook her head as she and Terry trailed behind them.
"Are they together?" asked Terry curiously, nodding towards Angela and Neville.
Suzy wound her scarf round her neck tightly. The wind was even stronger now. "No," she said. "But I think she likes him." She didn't mention that she thought Angela could do a lot better than Neville if she wanted a boyfriend. Angela was tall and thin, with short blonde hair and, although quiet, was, like Suzy, fairly popular, while Neville seemed to spend a lot of his lunchtimes alone and had never quite escaped from the chubby, nervous little boy he had been in their very first year at Hogwarts. "They spent a lot of time together at the Yule Ball last year," explained Suzy.
Terry grimaced. "So I guess our setting up Michael and Angela wasn't exactly a success," he said.
"Depends. I think Ginny and Michael are going out now, so at least they're happy."
Suzy's date for the Yule Ball last year had been Terry Boot. They had been friends since they were about five years old, as their parents knew each other and Jake had been close friends with Sophie, Terry's older sister. Suzy's only real clear memory about her first day at Hogwarts was sitting in the train carriage with a lot of Jake's friends, hunched up nervously in the corner with Terry as they discussed what houses they would be in. She had thought she would we sorted into Ravenclaw, not expecting Gryffindor, so she had been disappointed when she and Terry had not been placed in the same house. Nevertheless, they had continued their friendship undisturbed, until the Yule Ball.
Terry had asked Suzy out, and the whole thing suddenly became very awkward as they had become trapped on the dance floor for one of the slow dances. Terry had tried to hold her, and all Suzy could think of was how big and awkward she felt, especially as Parvati, tall, slim and elegant, had whirled effortlessly past her with a Beauxbatons boy in tow. Suzy had dragged Terry off the dance floor, and they had spent the rest of the night with Antony Goldstein and Mandy Brocklehurst, not wanting to look at each other. She had tended to avoid Terry after that.
There was a silence as both of them remembered the Ball. They were turning back into the pathway that led to Hogwarts when Suzy decided that it had gone on long enough.
"So what do you think about this defence group?" she asked.
Terry shrugged. "Don't know. On one hand I think it's just another one of Hermione's crazy ideas, but on the other I think it's actually pretty good. I mean, Harry can't be a worse teacher than Umbridge, can he?"
"Definitely not," Suzy laughed. She didn't mention how she felt when Harry was talking about what it was like facing You-Know-Who, and Terry didn't either. It had disturbed her, seeing the look in his eyes when remembering Cedric's death, and it seemed like something that shouldn't be gossiped about behind his back. So she steered the conversation towards Umbridge, which kept them laughing back to the castle and throughout dinner, and was the longest conversation she had had with Terry for a long time.
But when she went to bed that night, she wasn't thinking about Terry, or wondering how Jake's job interview had gone, or even thinking about 'one second away from being murdered.' She was thinking of Ron, and wondering whether he thought she had been laughing at him or not, and hoping desperately that he hadn't.
