AN: I forgot to post this chapter here, guys, I'm so sorry! orz I posted to AO3, but completely forgot FFnet *facepalm* Well, I guess if you're following this story only on this website, you can consider this a double update; chapter 16 is going up right after this one.
Chapter Fifteen: In Which Truth And Bullshit Is Mixed Until, Huh, Harry Thought They Were Talking Out Of Their Ass, But . . . ? Also, Certain Things Are Purposefully Kept Out Of Mind
Harry had initially thought that, beyond gossiping about it amongst themselves, no one was actually going to approach them about the whole seer thing. Which . . . okay, they were actually kind of happy with — it would have made sense if others had come pestering them about it, but it wasn't like Harry actually wanted them to. However, it turned out that it was just that nobody had the balls to be the first one to ask Harry about it. (Was it somehow viewed as personal information?) But once Seamus Finnigan of all people asked what being a seer was like, it was like no one had enough ears to listen with nor mouths to speak with.
"No, I can't control what visions I see," Harry murmured into their parchment in the back of the Defence classroom when Seamus prodded them about it. "They-yy just happen."
"What I see tends to centre around me," Harry said as they were trailed back to the Great Hall for the afternoon break. "Me and the people who have some sort of impact on my life. I guess my power is egotistical like that. Of course, that doesn't mean they're only about me."
"It's actually not always the future," said Harry when an older Slytherin asked them at the table. "I actually see more of the past and present. Not too actively us-sseful in the case of the visions of the past, but I suppose it gives me insight into the people around me." They swept their eyes over the Slytherins seated, their smiling, knowing expression unsettled more than many would like to admit. "For a number of people, I likely know far more than they'd be comfortable with. A few mummies and daddies have been very bad."
"I have visions in my sleep, never wuring daking— during waking hours," said Harry when an older Hufflepuff boy asked if they ever had trouble with being struck by visions during the day. "I actually only recently started regarding them as visions since they don't really fit the standard format. I don't actually remember the images in my dreams very often, so it's like I just wake up and suddenly know about something. More sairclenti— Ugh! More clairsentience than clairvoyance."
"A lot of what I see of the future ends up not happening at all," said Harry as they stood with a cluster of assorted first- and second-year girls in front of the bottom steps of the Grand Staircase. "I tend to get warning visions, so I prevent what I don't want to happen from happening. If I can. I can't stop natural disasters nor other things out of my control, of course, but I do take preventative measures as much as I can so that things don't end up as bad as they could be.
"For instance . . . Lavender. You'll get a pet bunny after our second year if things don't get too skewed." Harry couldn't help but smile when the aforementioned girl gasped and cheered. "Your family will have to be extra careful about where it's allowed to run around, though, because . . . as the path is currently unw-winding, during your first Divination class in third year, Professor Trelawney will tell you, 'that thing you are dreading — it will happen on Friday the sixteenth of October.' And on that day you'll receive a letter saying that your bunny was killed by a fox. Let's try to keep that part from happening."
"You're misunderstanding," said Harry blandly when Millicent Bulstrode tried to get smart with them in the common room. "What I see of the future is not set in stone, but what will happen if the path that the present is unwinding remains the same. There is nothing inevitable about what I see; I don't give prophecies, I'm neither an oracle nor a prophet. I don't need to be either of those, either, to tell you that you better step off before you bite off more than you can chew."
"What do I actually see? It's . . . it's really hard to give a concise answer to that," said Harry when Ken and his friends asked them about it. "The information I get doesn't come in any linear sort of way. Sometimes I'll receive insight on something in a clump, like . . . hmm, let me think of something that won't incidentally put someone's private information out there. . . . Ah, it's not really possible!
"Well, let's say it like this — sometimes I'll get hit with essentially a person's life story, like, all the major bits that define them, all the way from their childhood to when they die. Other times I'll get scattered glimpses over time that I have no idea when they take place. And sometimes it's just miscellaneous imfornatio— miscellaneous information about things in general.
"Like . . . the Weasley twins will hit Professor Quirrell in the back of the head with snowballs this Winter break. It was a volcanic eruption that caused the ten plagues of Egypt. Gringotts has a Ukrainian Ironbelly guarding their lower vaults. Ireland and Bulgaria will compete at the 1994 World Cup. The late Madam Hepzibah Smith's house-elf was blamed for her death, but actually she was— Well, maybe I shouldn't get into that bit. . . ."
"I don't actually see it as too useful," said Harry when one of the background Slytherins in their year — Mauricius Pike, a goon of Malfoy's in the films — asked why Harry didn't take advantage of being a seer. "Like, okay, theoretically I could place a winning bet if I see the result of a sporting even or something, but I can't control when I have visions, so it's not like I can just turn it on. And what if what I see is several years down the road? Can't exactly fill my pockets with that if I need money right away, can I? Regular divination that anyone can do is way more reliable."
"I am the last person you should be trying to argue with against Divination," said Harry when Hermione — presently at her most intolerable — confronted them outside the library and launched a tirade at them before they knew what was happening. "Never mind for a moment that Divination is a field of magic that's been verified by magical theoreticians for centuries now — you trying to use logic based on the Muggle paradigm you've been brought up in is the least effective and equally the least sensible way of creating your stance on a magical matter. And even if you did have a sensible basis to postulate from, I'm not someone you can fast-talk and bulldoze over with a slew of assorted information you may or may not have taken out of context from random sources."
"I didn't say Divinition isn't a valid field of magic!" Hermione protested. "I'm saying what you are saying about being a seer goes against all logic and apparently follows none of the rules! Absolutely none of the books I've read in the library mention having visions the way you've described it!"
"Ah, yes, a vocational school for children that puts emphasis on teaching practical magic is really going to have shelves upon shelves of niche information about a skill that's inborn and not learned. Of course. Really aligns with the curriculum," Harry smiled and nodded. "How could I have been so blind?"
When Hermione looked primed to retort, Harry said, "Look here, I'm not going to argue with you — it's utterly pointless. You think you know better than I do because you assume you've read more than I have, so you're obviously not going to believe anything I say; and I believe in my own experiences over uninformed hypotheticals, so I'm obviously not going to just nod along when you tell me that you know more about what I've experienced than I do."
"Scared I'll prove you wrong?" the girl retorted, lifting her chin. "Or perhaps you just don't want to listen when others point out fallacies in your logic?"
And thus Harry was reminded why Hermione Granger had always been their least favourite good-guy character of the series. She was exactly like they had been in their previous childhood but doused in snootiness, bossiness, and presumption — traits Harry couldn't stand.
"Hermione Jean Granger, born on the nineteenth of September 1979 to two dentists," Harry said blandly. "Virgo sun, Virgo moon — Virgo quite a number of signs, actually — and Sagittarius rising. That means nothing to you, though; you subconciously look down on astrology still even though you know now that magic is real.
"Parents originally considered the middle name of 'Jane' but decided against it. Mother has dark hair, father blondish. Scared of heights. Used to wear braces. Wasn't popular in primary school. Family goes skiing regularly enough that you're proficient, but you don't actually care for it. The Sorting Hat wanted to put you in Ravenclaw, but you argued with it for Gryffindor. You idolise Headmaster Dumbledore for his accomplishments and were impressed by Professor McGonagall who delivered your Hogwarts letter, so you wanted to be in the same House as them."
As Harry spoke, Hermione's grew wider and wider and her face turned paler and paler.
Harry felt a little mean seeing how unsettled they were making the girl, but they were very tired of all the questioning in general at this point, and Hermione with her predisposition to ruffle feathers had firmly stepped on the last of their nerves.
"You'll be the first in your classroom to perform the Levitation Charm when we start doing practicals," Harry continued. "Despite being gifted intellectually, you have a crippling fear of academic failure. The form a boggart will take when facing you is a professor telling you that you've failed of your exams. You ignore reality if it doesn't conform to your own self-cultivated beliefs — if someone says they don't want broccoli, you will insist that they do and that they only think they don't because they don't know the benefits of broccoli like you do, that the problem is the other person's ignorance, not your own perception.
"Oh — and you're fond of sprouts."
Hermione couldn't come up with anything to say in response. She looked genuinely lost. It was probably their imagination hyping them up, but it looked like her curls were drooped with discouragement as well.
Having vented and gained satisfaction, Harry immediately sought to console the girl. It wasn't like they hated her — she just rubbed them the wrong way.
"Not everything is written in books," they told her. "And not all books have accurate information. Anyone can put words on a page and make it available to others; and sometimes people who do know good information simply keep it to themselves. I don't know if my way of receiving insight has been documented before, but even if it hasn't, that just means it was never documented before — not that it never happened. Assuming you know everything there is to know on a matter when you're literally just an eleven-year-old that's read a few books is . . . well, it's not smart, to say the least."
Huh. That came out less consolingly than they intended. Okay, let them try this again.
"You could have just asked me about it nicely, you know. There was no reason to come over bossing, demanding, and accusing. We've never even spoken before. How rude can you be?"
Gods dammit. Nope. That wasn't consoling either. Guess Harry was feeling more resentful about it that that realised themselves.
"Anyway, chill out," they said lamely, having given up on any consoling. "Even if I was making things up, so what? It's not a crime to claim to be a seer. What would my theoretical slight moral corruption have to do with you? It literally does no one any harm."
That stirred Hermione again.
"Lies are lies!" she cried. "You shouldn't just let people lying go uncontested!"
"Unless it's a salesman, a politician, someone trying to encite violence, or the one being lied to is your friend, mind your own business," said Harry with a shrug. "Someone saying that they're a seer when they aren't is like . . . it's like someone claiming they can whistle when they can't. Like, okay. So what? Is someone being hurt or taken advantage of? It's not like being a seer can make you money — because the ability varies from seer to seer and there's no consistent method of verification, you're legally not allowed to offer it up as a payable service."
Harry would know — they'd gone digging into it amongst the first things they did while staying in the Alleys; they'd been browsing a bookstore, caught sight of a Divination textbook, and wondered why Trelawney decided to be a teacher instead of professional fortune-teller when she clearly was playing up the psychic gimmick — something that really didn't suit structured academics. Some poking around revealed that to charge for 'prophecies' would get you a 4-months sentence to Azkaban. Mercifully, regular divination didn't fall under this umbrella.
"The only thing you can get by lying about it is clout," Tracey interjected from where she had been hanging back and silently backing up Harry with Lily and Sophie. She stepped up with her hands on her hips and gave Hermione a sceptical look. "And do you really think Harry Potter of all people needs more clout? Really? The One Who Lived?"
"She's muggle-raised, Tracey," said Lily, crossing her arms. A twinge of disdain entering her usual nonchalant tone. "She might know from an intellectual standpoint, but she doesn't know know."
Oh, that needled Hermione good, apparently.
"Supremacists," she snapped, girding herself up and wrapping her self-righteousness around herself like armour. "Just because you have only wizards in your ancestry doesn't make you better than me or know more than I do!"
This was obviously something Hermione would often tell herself to console herself after actual supremacists made disparaging remarks before, and she was absolutely correct — she was a brilliant witch and would continue to become even moreso as she grew. However. She was assuming things again, and this provoked Sophie, the slowest to be provoked of the lot.
"We're quite done with your snobbishness and assumptions, Granger," Sophie said quietly but severely, well and truly steamed. "Literally all four of us have some Muggle blood in recent generations. Both of Lily's grandfathers are Muggles, Tracey's family's well-known for marrying partners without considering bloodlines, and my parents come from regular families that don't keep up with pedigree at all. Harry's famous and is held up as a credit to half-bloods, of course, but she technically has the purest ancestry out of all four of us because of her father's line.
"You've got another think coming if you think only blood supremacists have a problem with you acting like only you have a brain in your head and everyone else is too stupid to keep up."
"Ooh, you're scary when you're angry, Ms Roper," Tracey teased, pretending to hide behind Harry.
Harry sighed and checked their timepiece.
"Enough of this. We need to get our books quick and go if we want to make it in time to Professor Flitwick's auditions."
"What auditions?!" Hermione asked right away, seeming to be unable to not ask. She must have been flustered by Sophie taking her to task and was now just upset in general.
"Would it actually kill you to not be nosy for five minutes?" Tracey snapped.
Harry cut off that avenue of potential bickering with a sharp wave of their hand.
"Enough already! Books! Sources!" They gestured at the library. "Lily, you hit the Transfiguration shelves; Sophie, Charms; Tracey, Defence; I'll grab the stuff for Herbology. Rendezvous in ten minutes. Granger . . ." Harry said as the their three girls went as instructed. They brushed hair out of their eyes with a sigh and turned to leave as well. They spoke quickly, "I suggest you don't take Divination in third year. You and Professor Trelawney will not see eye to eye, to say the least. You'll end up calling her a fraud to her face, she'll say you're hopeless and have a mundane mind, and then you'll storm out of the classroom in the middle of the lesson, have a mental breakdown due to accumlated stress, and drop the class entirely. Save yourself the trouble, just go with Arithmancy — it'll be your favourite elective.
"Also — you're not a bad sort. Just learn to calm down with . . . learn to calm with all that. After you do that, feel free to come hang out and do homework with us sometimes. Cheers."
They tossed the girl a peace sign and got on with their business.
Harry honestly didn't expect to see Hermione seek them out again so soon, especially not after the battering to her paradigm that she took while she was in the middle of being up on her high horse. However, she did seek them out again, and only half a week later, after staring heavily at Harry across the room any time they were in the same general vicinity. Hermione found Harry and Sophie after classes on Wednesday as the two were headed to the Great Hall for choir practice.
Harry and Sophie were walking down the Grand Staircase from the fourth floor, chatting about the song they were learning — Mantyjarvi's Double, Double, Toil and Trouble — when Hermione happened upon them, coming from the second floor. Harry nodded cordially, Sophie canted her head to the side in acknowledgement stiffly (she'd admitted that she was embarrassed by her 'outburst' that day after they'd return to the dorms), and the two would have gone on their way if Hermione hadn't called out to them.
"Are auditions closed now?" she asked, stepping hurriedly over before stopping and standing rigidly.
Harry and Sophie paused two steps down from the second floor landing.
"What was that?" asked Harry, blinking a few times.
Hermione's lips pursed and she shifted as if she was half of a mind to run away.
"The . . . the choir auditions," she said, holding her books securely against her chest. "You mentioned them last week. Are they over now? Not accepting anyone else?"
Harry and Sophie exchanged quick glances.
"The choir's always open to new members," Harry said slowly. "It's basically a club — anyone can join at any time. The auditions are, like. . . . You can think of them more as placement tests. You audition and Professor Flitwick judges which voice-type you have and which subgroup your skills are suited for. It's officially held at the beginning of the year so the most amount of people can have the most amount of time to learn the material, but people aren't barred from joining later if they want to. Of course, if you don't sing, there's also the orchestra if you play an instrument; same rules as for the choir."
"You . . . you already know all about it after a few days?" Hermione asked.
"Oh, my friend Ken — you might know him; he's a Gryffindor — he's a third-year and he's been part of the music department since his first year," Harry explained. "And the other older members are really nice, too — they were happy to answer questions and such. You . . ." They tilted their head and gave Hermione a once-over. "You want to join?"
". . . . Is that alright?"
"I don't see why it wouldn't be alright. Do you, Sophie?"
Harry looked to the girl next to them and handed her the reigns. As much as Harry would be happy to befriend and temper Hermione, they weren't about force her company on their other friends. Especially not Sophie who was skittish and thin-skinned and tended to just go along with things even if she'd rather not; they weren't about to knowingly make her compromise on their behalf.
Sophie blinked owlishly at Harry. Then she looked in askance at Hermione.
". . . . There's no problem," said Sophie eventually, relaxing her shoulders. She feigned nonchalance and shrugged her shoulders, ending up looking positively adorable. "It's supposed to be something fun for anyone who wants to join in. If you're no good, you can just be an alto."
Harry laughed.
"Sophie! Oh, my gods, that's so wrong of you! Ah, but she's not really wrong wrong either." As they spoke, they waved Hermione over, hooking their arm with hers when she got in reach. "I sing alto, too, if it's needed, and while there's nothing wrong being someone with an alto range, obviously, they really don't give the difficult, leading parts to the altos. In theory, as long as you're not tone-deaf, even if your singing isn't that great, you'll still do fine as an alto in choir since you're mainly there to be support. As long as you don't get positioned in a quartet, you're Gucci.
"Maybe you'll want to try orchestra, too? Sophie's a violin and I'm a viola, and let me tell you — there's actually a distressing lack of string-players presently! Never mind symphonic, we barely qualify as a chamber orchestra at the moment! Apparently, a lot of the members graduated last term. . . ."
As the three of them walked down to the Great Hall together, there was a soft, fragile emotion visible in Hermione's eyes. Harry didn't do anything to acknowledge it, they simply bumped shoulders with the girl and chattered on.
They knew what it was like being that too-smart kid that just doesn't understand how to interact with other kids, being praised for being different while simultaneously being disliked for it. They knew that tentative feeling of barely daring to believe that someone actually wanted to be their friend. They didn't know if they could be the friend that Hermione Granger needed, but they knew that knowing there was at least one person willing to hold out their hand meant more than it should have.
The days leading up to their first flying lesson had been filled with boasts from so-o-o-o many people. Helicopters this, hang-gliders that, delinquency and petty theft those — did they really expect others to believe their tripe? If they had actually nearly broke the Statute of Secrecy, the Ministry would be on their parents' ass so fast, they wouldn't even know what was happening before they got their hides tanned for making so much trouble. And if they were so damned experienced, why were they even going to attend the lessons?
Was Harry thinking pettily? Yes. But after day after day of listening to Malfoy and Zabini extol their own virtues (and Harry was severely disappointed that Zabini who was so suave and lowkey in fanon proved himself to be a braggart comparable to Malfoy), Harry thought it was good enough they hadn't just straight up told the little brats to shut their noisy mouths lest Harry stitched them shut by hand.
At three-thirty, ten minutes after the Slytherins had already arrived and lazily loitered in the meantime, the Gryffindors finally hurried down the front steps onto the grounds. It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled underfoot across the sloping lawns. Two dozen-ish broomsticks lying in neat lines on the ground on the smooth, flat lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the Forbidden Forest. Said forest's trees were swaying darkly in the distance.
Madam Hooch then arrived. Harry didn't know where she'd been in the meantime, or how she managed to arrive precisely after the Gryffindors did, but there she was, striding down from a side door. Her hawk-like yellow eyes were even more badass in person; Harry wondered if there was any weight in the theory that she was an Animagus.
"Well, what are you all waiting for?" she barked, arriving at the head of the two lines of brooms. "Everyone stand by a broomstick! Come on, hurry up!"
The students did as they were told, stepping up to whatever broom closest to them that was available. Harry snagged a decent one that happened to be right next to Goyle. Though it decent compared to the rest, the broom was still old with some of the twigs stuck out at odd angles. Harry recalled reading somewhere that the twigs that acted as the bristles of the brooms were for aiding in aerodynamics; this thing did not look like it would be very aero or dynamic.
"Stick out your dominant hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch, demonstrating, "and say 'Up!'"
That went down as well as expected. Harry's broom jumped into their hand immediately, of course — their protagonist halo had its power switched duct-taped down in the on positon — but they were amongst the minority. Malfoy, Ron, Zabini, Seamus, Tracey, and Parvati managed good results, but the rest. . . . Well, suffice to say the lot of them were standing around for a while before everyone got the right response.
Harry antsily waited, not holding back their impatience from showing on their face. They'd never been a fan of heights, but flying was something they were more than ready to try out. When they would eventually achieve their animagus form (because they were going to achieve it), they hoped their form was something with wings.
Broomsticks properly in hand, Madam Hooch then instructed them on how to properly mount so that they wouldn't go sliding off.
"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," said Madam Hooch when everyone was ready. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle — three — two —"
Hang on a minute — now that Harry was thinking about it, wasn't this the occasion that Neville—?
Before Harry could finish their thought, before the whistle had touched Madam Hooch's lips, Neville, nervous and jumpy and frightened of being left on the ground, pushed off hard.
Harry squeaked, startled. Good gods! Actually seeing it happen put it into perspective how fast everything happened!
"Come back, boy!" Madam Hooch shouted, but Neville was rising straight up like a cork shot out of a bottle — twelve feet — twenty feet. His scared white face look down at the ground falling away, saw him gasp, slip sideways off the broom and —
Screams abounded.
WHAM — a thud and a nasty crack and Neville lay face-down on the grass in a heap, drawing pained gasps and choked exclamations from his witnesses. His broomstick was still rising higher and higher, and started to drift lazily toward the forbidden forest and out of sight.
Madam Hooch was bending over Neville, her face as white as his.
"Broken wrist," Harry heard her mutter, blood pounding in their ears. "Come on, boy — it's alright, up you get."
She turned to the rest of the class.
"None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'quidditch.' Come on, dear."
Saying so, she put her arm around Neville and hurried him off as fast as he could hobble.
No sooner were they out of earshot than Malfoy burst into laughter.
"Did you see his face, the great lump?"
His goons and Parkinson's ilk joined in.
"Shut up, Malfoy!" snapped Parvati, her fists clenched, face paled.
"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?" Parkinson jeered. "Never thought you'd like fat little crybabies, Parvati."
"You shut up, too, Pansy!"
Harry took the opportunity the distraction provided them to snatch up Neville's Remembrall from the grass before Malfoy could spot it and be a tit about it.
"Is this Longbottom's?" Harry asked Hermione when she and Harry's other girls drifted over to see what Harry had picked up. Harry held up the Remembrall for Hermione to see.
"Hey, it's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him!" said Malfoy, pointing. He laughed even more derisively. "Maybe if the fat lump had given that thing a squeeze, he'd have remembered to fall on his fat arse."
"Can you not?" Harry asked, nose wrinkling in displeasure as they handed the bauble to Hermione. "This is so tasteless. He could have died! If he had landed wrong, that could have been his neck! Even if you don't care about him, have some manners!"
"Come off it, Potter," Malfoy scoffed, rolling his eyes as he strutted over to them with his hands in his pockets (like the budding douchebag he was). "Don't tell me you pity the idiot. We're just having a laugh."
"Have the decency to do so in private if you have to do it at all," said Harry, flinty-eyed, crossing their arms. "What do you even have against him? Longbottom is really nice. It's cruel to pick on him."
"You fancy the weepy blob, too, then, Potter?" Parkinson sneered. "What a match made in heaven!"
"Did you guys hear something?" asked Harry, pouting in feigned confusion towards their clique. "There was this whining sound like a mosquito in my ear just now, but I can't place it at all."
"You stupid little—!"
"You want to try this again, Parkinson?" Zabini cut in, ridicule evident on his face. "You really want to try it again here?"
What Zabini meant was self-explanatory to those in the know. Since that first night where Harry and Parkinson nearly physically threw down, Parkinson had shot them poisonous looks constantly and bad-mouthed them to Malfoy, but she hadn't approached them to try to start another altercation. Maybe the threat of being taken to court and publicly shamed actually scared her more than she let on? In any case, the long and short of it was that she'd tucked her tail and stayed away.
"Don't waste your breath, Zabini; she doesn't matter," Harry said before Parkinson could say anything else, drawing surprised bursts of laughter from the Gryffindors. "As I was saying — very uncool."
Harry didn't know if it was because the two of them didn't meet until after the Sorting, or because Harry was Sorted into Slytherin, or because Harry wasn't a boy, but Malfoy had been downright pleasant towards them outside of his innate obnoxiousness. No doubt it had to do in part with how his father had told him to scope Harry out to see if Harry was a budding Dark Lord that the Malfoys could throw their lots in with, but Draco was a still just a stupid kid — there was only so much pretending he could manage if he genuinely didn't want to get along with Harry himself. As such, he'd yet to make things difficult for Harry.
"Don't be such a bleeding heart, Potter," Malfoy complained, reaching out to tug on one of their braids. "Longbottom's fine, isn't he? Might toughen him up a bit. Merlin knows the lump is soft as hell. If he's going to be here as useless as he is, he better man up or get used to being kicked around!"
There was a chorus of offended protests to the effect of "Neville is not useless, you jerk!" from Gryffindors, but Harry was just impressed that Malfoy was — in a backhanded way — actually stepping down from his bullying and even attempting to pacify Harry.
"Oh, I'm sure he's grateful for your good intentions," Harry said tartly, giving the boy an amused, scoffing look. "Maybe just let him sort that out himself, though, yeah?"
"Are you sure you weren't meant for Hufflepuff, half-blood?" Parkinson interjected again, glaring for all she was worth. "All this fussing over a stupid squib that does nothing but blubber. Trying to start a charity for good-for-nothing orphans? I suppose you're the perfect spokesperson for it!"
In the midst of the angry abuse being hurled at Parkinson for saying such an awful thing, Harry only frowned in disdain. Who raised these kids? There were really people in this world that had nothing but filth in their hearts? Were they really even human? How could anyone say such a repugnant thing and think they're morally correct?
"I pity you for coming from such a family that allowed and likely encouraged a hateful little beast like you're being to exist in this world," said Harry. "I look at you, and the only thing that comes to mind is 'disgusting.' How vile and low-class can you be?"
"Shut your filthy mouth, half-blood!" The girl was all but spitting in rage. "Who do you think you are?!"
"I'm someone who didn't ask your opinion or invite you to talk to me, so I really don't know why you keeping inserting yourself where you're not wanted." Harry could have gotten really mean about this — could have gotten cruel about this — but that was not a face they wanted to reveal at this level and on this stage. So they kept it at just a little more than lame and barely insulting. "Piss off! Go away! What part of this isn't making sense to you?"
"You're not wanted, Potter!" Bulstrode snarled, backing up Parkinson. "Who asked you to—?!"
"Shut your fat mouth, Bulstrode!" Tracey snapped. "Who was talking to you?!"
The Gryffindors were watching this going down with hilarity and awe. Typically, Slytherins kept their in-fighting concealed in the privacy of their common room, so was likely the first time in a long while that there'd been a scene of Slytherins arguing available for those of outside Houses to see.
Snape would be pissed if this got to his ears, but there was nothing to be done about it now.
There was some more back and forth, but Harry missed the contents of it — they got distracted. The conversation was unpleasant, their brain was playing a Finnish folk song, and the grass was mesmerising. It was doing an interesting dance that reminded them of the lod chong their second elder aunt used to make with extra pandan extract, resulting in deep green noodles that wriggled in the iced coconut syrup.
Gods, they missed Thai sweets. And Thai savouries. Thai anything, actually. Good gods, what they'd do if they were presented with a plate of their fifth elder cousin's papaya salad, a serving of their first younger aunt-in-law's pork larb, a side of their mother's turmeric chicken skewers, and then their second elder aunt's lod chong—
"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?!"
Harry blinked and swallowed their saliva, looking up again to see that they'd apparently been addressed again at some point. Greengrass was pointing in their face and was hopping mad.
". . . . What?" they said. "Sorry — I was thinking about food."
That went over as well as one might expect.
Harry suspected there might have been an actual brawl right then and there if Madam Hooch hadn't returned at that same moment. She cut through the petty argument with a finesse and brusqueness that suggested she didn't give a single damn what they were on about, and Harry was living for it.
Harry didn't end up being recruited onto a quidditch team for their display of innate talent, but that was alright since they didn't do much displaying anyway. They thoroughly won the good opinions of the Gryffindors of their year, though, so they chalked it up as a solid net profit.
AN: Once again, apologies for forgetting to update here last time. If you want a surefire way of knowing about my latest fic updates or even read advanced updates, go to my tumblr — .com — and follow the link in my bio.