"Hey, Ron," said Harry, "I don't like you anymore."

"Oh," said Ron, "That sucks. Why?"

"Because," started Harry, "You aren't cool. Lavender Brown, cruel queen of the Hogwarts school (Who I coincidentally happen to have an enormous crush on) said so."

"Wow," said Ron. "Well fine Harry. I guess you can go hang out with your new better-looking friends. I guess you can't sit at my loser lunch table anymore."

"All right then," said Harry, "I'm sitting with the clique at the cool kid table."

"I'll have to hang out with Hermione then."

Hermione came bounding into the room. "HEY GUYS! HEY HARRY! HEY RON! HEY...oh. Lavender Brown."

Lavender looked down her obnoxiously clean nose at Hermione...and Ron. "You know, Harry," she began, "If you're going to be part of the clique, you can't have friends who have any sort of distinguishing features."

Hermione stood up offended. "I DO NOT HAVE DISTINGUISHING FEATURES!" she screamed. "Come, Ron. Let's go talk about how much better we are than them." She paused for effect. "And maybe we'll CLASH OUR CLOTHING and paint our nails black. Anti-conformism wins."

Lavender fainted.

Harry looked at the fainted Lavender, then at Ron and Hermione, then at the fireplace as he waited for a random head to pop into it and scare the living daylights out of a first-year. Since nothing happened, he whipped out a cell phone and speed-dialed Cedric.

"Hello?" picked up Cedric.

"Cedric, dahling, I'm throwing the pahty of the century (again.) Gryffindor common room, same as last time...sleepover."

"Will those... outcrowders Ronald and Hermione be there?" asked Cedric after a pause.

"Ahhh...of course not," said Harry, then resumed his fake accent. "Got to go dahling. Call waiting and such."

"Ciao," said Cedric as he snapped his phone shut.

Ron and Hermione stood there with awkwardly colored nails. "Are WE invited?" they asked.

"Yes, yes of COURSE," cooed Harry. "Ciao children. Things to see, places to do."

Ron looked at Hermione. "He's not really going to invite us," he said bluntly.

"Oh I know," cried Hermione. "Ever since he sold his copyright rights to Lavender Brown's publicist mother, he's never been the same."

Ron looked at her strangely as background music began to play and a karaoke machine appeared.

"I want to be..." Hermione began, and the lights of the Gryffindor common room flashed pretty colors.

"I WANNA BE FAMOUS. I WANNA BE POPULAR!! I HANG OUT WITH SEAMUS, AND HOUSE-ELVES THAT ARE MOP...ular...

"Hermione," said Ron, "That's not a word."

"IT IS NOW!!!" cried Hermione in rage as she kicked over a chair that wasn't there in the beginning of the scene. "IT'S NOT FAIR THAT LAVENDER BROWN CAN MAKE UP WORDS AND I CAN'T!"

"Sorry," said Ron. "Continue your song."

"NOBODY LOVES ME! EVERYBODY IGNORES ME! EVERYONE SNUBS ME! NO ONE ADORES ME! AND IIIII WANT TO BEEEEEEEEEEEEE...FAMOUS!"
"Badumbadumbadumbadum" started Ron.
"NOBODY CARES FOR ME!"

"Nooneee at all," echoed Ron.

"Life's a catastrophe."

"MY HAIR ISN'T GLAM ENOUGH."

"No, no" chimed in Ron, bouncing up and down.

"MY EYES AREN'T BIG ENOUGH."

"No, no."

"I'M JUST TOO SMARRRTT FOR THEMMM!!"

"No, no...wait...what?!"

Hermione smacked him across the face.

A few days later, at the sleepover, Harry was speaking.

"HARRY DAHLING!" cried Lavender Brown, "MUMSIE, THIS IS THE BOY WHO LIVED!"

"Dahling Lavender," said Mrs. Brown, "I already bought him for you."

"Oh yea," said Lavender. "Can I have another one?"

"No dahling, it'll spoil your figure."

"Oh my stars!" exclaimed Lavender. "Better skip a few meals."

Harry looked confused.

Meanwhile, Ron and Hermione decided to crash the party.

Unfortunately for them, the clique had a sharp eye for fashion mishaps.

A sickly sweet voice cut in their lack of dancing. "Your shoes, and your dress do not match, Ronald." said the voice of Cho.

"It's a sleepover. I'm wearing pajamas. Not a dress."

"It's clique talk dearie. Maybe someday you'll learn. In the meantime..." Cho stood up on a chair. "ATTENTION ALL! FASHION EMERGENCY! Oooh, and Cedric, dahling, you look fab."

Lavender Brown fainted at her first comment, then woke up.

"I'm going to hang out with my boyfriend, Ron," said Hermione. "We're cool because we don't care what you think."

"Um, Hermione?" interrupted Ron. "Did you just miss that whole musical number back there?"

Hermione smacked him again.

"AND I HAVE A SPOILER!" she said. The clique gathered around her like vulture scavengers looking for a piece of gossip.

"Cedric...is going to die...within a few years!"

Cedric laughed, twirled a curl, and walked away.

The night ended a bit later after some annoying detail I don't feel like going into.

At breakfast the next morning, Malfoy launched a war on the clique because he hadn't been invited to the party.

"Malfoy, dahling, pish-tosh," said Harry, waving a hand around, "It must have gotten lost in the mail."

"Don't dahling me, Potter," Malfoy replied coldly. "I used that rubbish excuse on you in the first week of school."

"Beg pardon?!" exclaimed Harry.

Lavender fainted.

Nobody paid attention to this anymore.

One week later, Colin Creevey approached Harry with a shell-shocked expression on his face.

"Harry, is it true that your mother..." he trailed off.

"My mother what? Had green eyes? Was muggleborn?" inquired Harry.

Colin leaned in and whispered something inaudible. Harry turned bright red.

"Where did you hear that?" he asked.

"It was written on the stall in the girl's bathroom," Creevy replied rather dubiously.

"What on earth were you doing in the girl's bathroom?" asked Harry.

"I wasn't in there. Pansy Parkinson told me."

"What were you doing listening to Pansy? She's not a reliable source."

"Well...Pansy heard it from...a reliable person...and gosh, Harry, I don't know the details, but if it's true, well, my lips are sealed...if it is true...gosh, look at the time, I really gotta go."

Harry had stopped paying attention at "Pansy" and mouthed a single word. "Malfoy."

"DRACONIUS LUCIUNARCISSUS MALFOY!" Harry exclaimed. He skipped a beat. "Dahling..."

"Yes, Harold James Potter?" drawled a cool voice from the shadows.

"MY MOTHER DID NOT...SHE WASN'T...WHY YOU...ARGHH!!!!...Dahling."

"This is what you get for not inviting me Harold," Draco said.

"Okay, Draconius. If that's the way you want to play, so be it. Let the games begin."

"Aren't you forgetting something?" asked Draco, as Harry turned.

"Dahling?" asked Harry, twirling around.

"I meant your tie that you lent me last week, but all right."

"I WANT THAT TOO DAHLING!" roared Harry.

Draco tossed it at him, and left satisfied.

But of course, he wouldn't stay that way.

Harry...had a plan.

Dinner. Two nights later.

Hannah Abbott let out a screech. Ernie Macmillan ran over to help her, and found her staring at a note. He leapt up onto the uncool table and bellowed the poem out to the cafeteria;

Roses are red

Sumtimz pink or white.

i wud luv u

in any case.

Sincerly,

Draeko Malvoy

The entire school erupted in laughter.

"What an awful poem!" exclaimed Hermione.

Lavender said, "It was not of poor literary competence, dahling, but it was written to Hannah Abbot!" Everyone giggled.

"Darn it all!" said Draeko (Draco). "Now I'll never be able to carry out my plan to kill Dumbledore!"

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "What does that have to do with anything?"

Draco said, "Can't you see that my life is over?"
Dumbledore frowned. "No," he said. "Crabbe and Goyle still like you. They're your real friends. I don't know what went wrong with my favorite pupil - "

"Me?" asked Draco.

"Heavens no, Harry Potter. Anyway, I can't understand why he's so obsessed with being popular. It's really just being well-liked after all, but even when he was popular you didn't like him. That's why fictional settings such as this one are bogus."

"Ha!" exclaimed Hermione. "You see Professor, Ron and I were never into this popularity thing. We have been content to be ourselves."

"That's not true, said Dumbledore. "You two define yourselves by what you're not, obsessing just the way Harry here does."

"Oh," said Hermione. "Now I see that being the opposite of everyone else isn't being yourself, it's just being the opposite of everyone else. Black nails are heinous."

"Indeed they are," said Dumbledore. "Indeed they are."