Desperate to forget what Draco decided to share with the world in his diary, Zabini found himself in a bit of a loony-loving situation. I wonder how Longbottom will take the news, and the poor guy always seems to get the short end of the stick.

~xoxo, Gossip Witch

"Zabini!" Neville yelled, storming up to the Slytherin table in the Great Hall. His entire body was shaking as he approached the group of students, whom he would go out of his way to avoid on any other day, but today, he had a bone to pick with one particular individual sitting at that table. The closer he got, the faster his heart began to beat. Taking a deep breath, Neville pushed all of his fear to the back of his mind and crossed his arms over his chest as he squared up to Blaise.

"What do you want, Longbottom?" Blaise hissed, looking the Gryffindor up and down. He fought the urge he felt to roll his eyes at the man standing in front of him. If anything, Blaise deserved to get put in his place by Neville. He had gone behind the man's back and snuck away to the Black Lake with his witch just for the hell of it. There wasn't any rhyme or reason to which witch he brought with him down there, and he just wanted to feel something other than anger.

"Of all the girls at Hogwarts, why did you have to go after Luna?" Neville asked, steadying himself with a deep breath as he waited for Blaise to respond.

There were a few ways that this situation could play out at this point. Blaise could swing at him for confronting him in the middle of the Great Hall - the fact that Neville was becoming increasingly aware of as he felt the eyes of his classmates staring at him. Blaise could apologize, and they could both walk away from the situation, never to speak of it again. Or they could both swing at one another and end up in the infirmary for at least the rest of the night. The middle option of the three was preferred, but ultimately, this confrontation would be inevitable. At least once he had faced his fears by talking to Blaise, maybe he'd have enough adrenaline to face his fears about talking to Luna about everything.

"Nothing happened between Luna and me," Blaise replied, crossing his arms over his chest as he narrowed his gaze at Neville. There was no reason for him to believe what Blaise was saying, but there also wasn't any evidence to the contrary besides Gossip Witch's latest blast.

"Why would I believe what you have to say about the situation?" Neville asked, shifting his weight from one foot to another as he took a few deep breaths.

"Have you talked to Luna about it?" Blaise asked, rolling his eyes as he watched Neville's nerves starting to show. A smirk pulled at the corner of his lips when he noticed the small shake of Neville's head. "Maybe you should go talk to her before you fool yourself talking to me."

Neville glared at him for a moment before shaking his head. "At least my best mate didn't out me for being bad in bd in front of the whole school. Stay away from Luna, Zabini. She deserves someone better than you."

Neville turned on his heel and started to walk away when he heard Blaise calling after him, pausing only for a moment to hear what he had to say before reacting.

"I never turn away a witch in need of comfort when her wizard can't give her what she needs," Blaise replied, a smirk pulling tight at the corners of his mouth with his arms crossed over his chest as he watched Neville turn back to face him. "She came to me, and I offered her exactly what she needed."

"You said nothing happened," Neville hissed, gritting his teeth as he closed the space between himself and Blaise. Before he even realized what he was doing, Neville felt the crack of a bone beneath his knuckles as his fist made contact with Blaise's face.

"Mr. Longbottom," Headmistress McGonagall yelled, approaching quickly from the other side of the room. "My office. Now. Someone go fetch Madam Pomfrey to take care of Mr. Zabini's nose."

~xoxo, Gossip Witch ~

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