Chapter 4: Avoiding the inevitable.
After a few reassurances and many pats on the back by the professors, Nadia and Harry began to walk back up to the Gryffindor common room, silently. Nadia didn't know why they weren't talking maybe they had nothing to say, or they were scared of what was to come, or maybe they were frankly in denial of what being a champion actually meant. Nadia, however did not want to be a champion. It wasn't because she was sacred, gosh no, it was because she did not want the whole 'eternal glory.' She completely and utterly did not want to win. She didn't want the attention.
Eventually after a tense and silent walk, Harry and Nadia made it to the common room, where they were met by a very worried Hermione and a very tired Ron. The minute Hermione caught a glimpse of them she jumped up and grabbed Nadia into a bone-crushing hug, causing Nadia to gasp silently for breath.
"Omg! Nadia, Harry are you ok?" Hermione spoke quickly and Nadia was blessed to know she had a friend that cared. Slowly, Nadia saw Harry nod his head ever so slightly and Nadia repeated the action also. Ron however made no effort to see if either herself of Harry were ok, instead he just sat staring at the fire with a very stony expression, causing Nadia to wonder why.
"Come on Nadia, let's go up, I bet Ginny's waiting up for you." Hermione said quickly and Nadia knew that Ron wanted to speak with Harry alone. So Nadia grabbed Hermione's arm and trudged up the stairs and into the dorm. Suddenly, Nadia was met with a sense of De Ja Vu, because the minute Nadia stepped through the threshold she was grabbed into yet another hug by Ginny.
"Nadia are you ok? How are you feeling?" Ginny quickly asked and Nadia hugged her back tightly, again feeling blessed she had yet, another friend that cared. Ginny eventually let go and the three girls went and sat on their beds. After a short moment of calm silence Nadia whispered rather quietly,
"I didn't put my name in." She quickly glanced up to see the girl's expressions and was relieved to see that they were looking at her with sympathy.
Hermione took Nadia's hand and gave it a comforting squeeze, "Ohh Nadia we know you didn't! You looked so shocked when you name came out that you couldn't possibly have put your name in!" Ginny quickly nodded in agreement and Nadia sighed a sigh of relief.
"Thanks guys I'm so glad I have such good friends as you!" Nadia said quickly and she pulled Ginny and Hermione into a threeway hug. The joy of having such nice and loving good friends got too much for Nadia, and she couldn't stop the tears leaking from her eyes. She pulled back embarrassingly and glanced and the two girls, surprisingly they were crying two.
"Don't worry Nadia we'll help you through this, won't we Herms?" Ginny replied softly and Hermione nodded in response.
"Of course we will! And don't worry Nadia, we've got the Halloween party tomorrow, which means you can let your hair down and forget about everything!" Hermione spoke excitedly and Nadia giggled slightly. She had totally forgotten about the Halloween party! Ohh how she loved to party!
"Ohh gosh I totally forgot. Man I love parties!" Nadia shouted happily and the two girls giggled in response.
"Guys we haven't got that long to get ready!" Nadia shouted, quite frankly she was panicking. The reason was because it was the night of the Halloween party and they had only 1 hour to get ready. Quite frankly not long enough in Nadia's eyes.
"Nadia we've got an hour! Trust me we will be ready!" Hermione responded back, Nadia was still unsure because in all honesty It looked like Hermione was stressing also. She was currently flying around the dorm, presumably trying to find her costume, or part of it.
"Guys calm down; an hour is fine! Right Hermione you do your nails, Nadia you start with your hair because in all honesty it's the unruliest and I'll do my makeup and then we'll swap. Deal?" Ginny shouted and the others quickly nodded and rushed to their stations, partly because Nadia didn't want to get on the wrong side of Ginny. However, Ginny's system seemed to have worked and miraculously the three girls had actually gotten ready in under an hour. Nadia was a maid, Ginny a vampire and Hermione the queen of hearts, which Ginny was looking at rather confusingly
"Who are you meant to be Herms?" Ginny asked sceptically, causing Nadia to giggle softly to herself.
"The queen of hearts Ginny! You know from Alice and Wonderland?" Hermione replied and Ginny quickly giggled in response.
"No I don't know actually, who's Alice." Ginny commented and again Nadia couldn't help but laugh.
"Ohh Ginny it's a muggle story! Very good book to be honest." Nadia said and Ginny replied with a small 'Ohh' and the three girls laughed rather loudly.
"Come on let's go." The three girls linked arms and trudged downstairs to meet the boys, once they had entered the common room, Nadia began to observe the boy's costumes. Fred and George rather cleverly were dressed as thing one and thing two, which of course made Nadia chuckle to herself at their clever wit. Surprisingly Ron was dressed as a dementer and Harry was a spider. Nadia couldn't quite fathom why one, the two friends were dressed as each others fear and two why they weren't talking.
"They're not talking to each other because Ron thinks Harry put his name in on purpose." Hermione whispered quietly to Nadia and she quickly nodded in understanding. Nadia quickly thought it was childish of Ron to accuse Harry of such a thing, however Ron was a good friend of Nadia's and she began to worry about who's side she would take. Quite frankly she hated taking sides.
Finally, after a quick drink of fire whiskey, curtesy of Fred and George, they eventually made it to the great hall. The first thing Nadia noticed was that there were no professors, the second was that there were no children under 4th year and lastly there were lots of drink. This realization made Nadia bubble with exciting, she secretly wanted to get drunk, very drunk and to completely forget about the whole fiasco of the Triwizard tournament.
"The professors let us party on our own as long as were sensible, except they have no idea we have alcohol." Fred whispered to her and Nadia giggled quietly to herself. She then hurried towards the drinks table, with Hermione and Ginny in toe and collected a large cup of fire whiskey. Man this was going to be a good night. Maybe not the next day though. Eventually after a few cups of drink, Nadia felt a little light headed and feeling much better than before.
"Hey Nadia come dance with me." She looked up to see a smiling Ron and she quickly grabbed his hand towards the dancefloor. They began to dance to the Chainsmokers 'Closer', Nadia realised that Ron was drunk, very drunk which means that his dancing wasn't doing him any favours. So Nadia, surprisingly spent most of the time laughing at Ron instead of dancing. After dancing to a few more songs Nadia left Ron in the hands of Hermione and left to get another drink. However, she didn't get very far because she was lifted of off her feet, by two identical red heads.
"Here's the Hogwarts's princess, let the champion through!" Shouted George rather loudly, causing Nadia to throw her hands over her ears.
"Yeah let the champion through!" Fred replied in response and surprisingly the crowd departed and Fred and George trudged through. Eventually she stopped and Nadia was lifted onto Fred's shoulders. Nadia glanced over to her left and noticed that Cedric Diggory was in exactly the same position as Nadia, however there was no Harry.
"To our Hogwarts's Princess!" Shouted Fred and the crowd erupted into shouts and cheers, causing Nadia to blush in embarrassment.
"And to out Hogwarts's Prince!" Shouted the boy carrying Cedric and again the crowd exploded into cheers and shouts. Nadia noticed Cedric's smile and realised that he wanted this, badly. Suddenly Nadia felt rather guilty, so she vowed to herself that she would help Cedric win, however she could. Suddenly she realised Harry and she began to feel guilty once again.
"Wait what about Harry!" Nadia shouted and she noticed her words were very slurred. Man she must be more drunk then she thought.
"We don't care about Harry, he's a cheat!" Dean Thomas shouted and the crowd began chanting "He's a cheat" over and over again. Although, Nadia didn't have enough time to feel guilty because she was flung back onto the floor, where she was given more cheers and more cups of drink.
"Wake up sleepy head, you're going to be late for potions!" Hermione's voice washed through her ears, causing Nadia's head to throb in agony. How much did she drink last night? Also why can't she remember anything? She slowly opened her eyes and the onslaught of light made her groan in response to the throb in her brain. She sat up and took the glass of water that Hermione was offering her.
"How much did I drink last night?" Nadia croaked out and Hermione laughed quietly in response, causing Nadia's belly to twist with nerves. What did she do?
"Well let's just say you drunk a lot! And you tried to kiss Malfoy!" Hermione laughed and Nadia's eyes bulged in shock.
"What! What did he do?" Nadia asked in worry, what if he rejected her? She would be mortified!
"Well he kind of just pushed you away said something to you and you just smiled back. So I guess whatever he said must have been good, anyway Malfoy? Out of anyone you tried to kiss Malfoy!" Hermione gave her a judgemental look and Nadia shrunk away self-consciously. Quite frankly she wouldn't mind kissing Draco, even if he is just a friend.
"Well I was drunk so it doesn't count, anyway how's Harry?" Nadia asks sadly, quite honestly she wanted to change the subject fast and also she did really want to know.
"Well he's a but upset but he's trying to avoid us, especially me, like what have I done you know?" Hermione said sadly and Nadia grabbed her hand and squeezed it.
"I'm sure he doesn't mean it, he's just angry and maybe a little scared, I think we should just leave him be for a while." Hermione slowly nodded and Nadia finally decided to get up and change, even though her head was very much protesting.
Eventually, Nadia and Hermione had made it to potions and they quickly sat down next to Ron, who was currently sitting with his head in his arms and groaning quietly to himself.
"Do you feel as bad as I do buddy?" Nadia said softly and Ron slowly glanced up at Nadia and glared at her somewhat playfully.
"Worse and you're not helping matters." Ron threatened, but instead of scaring Nadia she simply laughed in response. Suddenly the door to class banged open and Professor Snape stormed in towards the front, the sudden noise made Nadia's head throb again and she groaned in unison with Ron.
"I'll be dividing you up into pairs, which will be your pairs for the rest of the year, so get along. However, before you get excited I'll be pairing you up with someone who's not in your house." Snape shouted and Nadia moaned in response partly because her head hurt and because she would be paired up with a slytherin. Nadia wished secretly that her pair wasn't Draco. She didn't want that embarrassment this early in the morning. Snape then pointed his wand at the chalkboard and numerous names suddenly appeared. Nadia assumed that these were the pairs. Hermione unfortunately was paired with Pansy Parkinson, Nadia gave her a look of sympathy, which Hermione returned with a shrug, which probably meant "I don't mind." She continued to read down the line of names and she spotted that Ron was paired with Blaise Zabini, which was a shame because he seemed like one of the nicer slytherins. Nadia again continued to read down the line and her heart stopped when she read the last pair of names.
"Draco Malfoy and Nadia Bowmen."
Nadia groaned in annoyance and she trudged reluctantly towards Draco's desk. He looked up her with a smirk and Nadia's stomach knotted with nerves. Man this lesson is going to be fun.
"Morning Nadia, haha man you don't look too good." Draco smirked again and Nadia gave him a playful death stare. They began with their potion, (which Draco decided would be a confusing concoction) the potion surprisingly was quite easy to make and Nadia found that she was struggling at all. She glanced over at Draco and realised that he was staring at her, how long Nadia did not know.
"What?" Nadia asked quietly and she smiled embarrassingly. Draco smirked back warmly.
"How are you so good at this and hungover as well, impressive!" Nadia laughed at Draco's commented and again Nadia's head throbbed painfully causing her to wince.
"I don't know actually, maybe it's all the alcohol." Nadia joked softly and surprisingly Draco laughed. Although, once again the two succumbed to silence and they began to concentrate on their potion. Eventually, the two had finished and they sat down and waited for the potion to brew.
"So do you remember anything from last night?" Draco asked mysteriously and Nadia glanced up to see Draco smirking at her, again. Immediately Nadia knew he was talking about the kiss, well near kiss.
"No, not really I only remember being put down by Fred and some stuff that Hermione told me, but anything else no." Nadia said timidly and she hoped Draco didn't ask her about the attempt kiss. However, she was left disappointed,
"How about when you tried to kiss me? Remember that?" Draco smirked again and Nadia felt her cheeks warm into a blush.
"No actually I don't remember but Hermione told me. Draco can I ask you a question?" Nadia said quickly, she hoped he would say yes. She kind of wanted to know if he rejected her or not. She hoped he didn't because that would be rather embarrassing.
"Sure" Draco replied smirking. Of course. He always smirks at everything.
"What did you say to me after I tried to... you know... kiss you? Hermione said she saw you say something." Nadia quickly stole a glance up at him and she realised he was blushing and unsurprisingly was smirking. After a short while he spoke again and the answer made me speechless.
"I said, I don't want to take advantage of you when you drunk and also if I did kiss you I would like you to remember it."
It was the next morning and Nadia, Hermione and Ron were making their way to the great hall for breakfast. They took it slow because apparently Hermione had some news for Nadia. This was the first time since potions that Hermione was able to speak to Nadia properly and Nadia was eager to hear what she said.
"So you know I was partnered with Pansy in potions, well apparently she's pretty mad at you, she basically spent the whole lesson telling me that she hated you and that her and Draco liked each other, and you were messing it up for them. I told her numerous times that you were just drunk and you don't actually like Draco, but she wouldn't listen like how dumb can someone be?" Hermione said rather quickly and it took a while for Nadia to absorb all the words Hermione had said. Once she had her stomach dropped in disappointment, which Nadia couldn't fathom why. She didn't like Draco in that why so what was the problem? Although Draco did say he wanted to kiss Nadia and surprisingly she felt rather happy about it. Does that mean she kind of likes him if she was happy that he wanted to kiss her? Yet, he did say if, which means he doesn't a hundred percent want to kiss her. Maybe he was just trying to be nice?
"Hello earth to Nadia? Did you hear what I said?" Hermione said while waving her hand over Nadia's face. Nadia quickly jumped out of her thoughts and returned to the present. Seriously, why was I thinking so hard over a boy!
"Yeah I did sorry spaced out. Anyway I don't really like Pansy, she seems so bitchy, anyway she doesn't need to worry I don't like Draco in that way." Nadia replied, however Nadia couldn't help but think that she wasn't entirely telling the truth.
"Exactly, yet she didn't listen at all, like I said she's stupid!" Hermione shouted comically and Nadia giggled softly to herself.
"Has anyone noticed that Nadia and Blaise look really alike?" Ron said randomly and Nadia again couldn't help but laugh. However, she wasn't given much time to think about what Ron said because Hermione shouted over him and I was reverted out of my thoughts once again.
"Ron that's got nothing to do with what we're talking about! This is more important!" Suddenly Nadia was tapped on the shoulder and she glanced around to see a rather tired Harry. She noticed Ron tense and glare at Harry from beside her and Hermione quickly grabbed his shoulder and pulled him away to the great hall. Nadia stood their awkwardly wondering what Harry was going to say. Nadia liked Harry. However, she much preferred Ron and Hermione's company because they simply came with less fame and attention.
"Erm Sorry to bother you Nadia but It's really important." Harry said timidly and Nadia couldn't help but feel a little guilty.
"It's alright, so what's the matter?" Nadia asked kindly and Harry's face lit up with a smile.
"Well I found out what the first tasks about." Harry's words shocked Nadia and she stared at Harry in disbelief.
"What is it?" She asked quietly, for some reason she didn't want to know. She had been avoiding the inevitable for days. Yet, it looked like she couldn't avoid it any longer.
"Dragons, the first task is dragons" Harry replied and Nadia felt like her world had stopped spinning.
A/N: Hello! Hope you enjoyed this chapter, I'm so sorry It's been a short while since I've updated it's just I've just started college and quite frankly it been quite busy. Anyway I hope to post a chapter every weekend if I'm not busy and if you're lucky on Thursdays because I don't have college that day.
Anyway, back to the story, don't worry there will be more Draco and Nadia moments or Dradia. I've planned all the chapters up until 5th year and trust me there's a lot of Dradia moments. Anyway thanks for favourite, hearting and commenting on my story it means so much that you guys like it.
Anyway see you guys next time.
Amber-Rose x