Chloe Patil at Hogwarts: Chapter 23
Chloe entered the Slytherin common room cautiously, gazing around warily in and around the crowds. The room was filled with people returning from the Holidays, discussing gifts and such and greeting eachother. She snuck past a particularily large group before crashing into Draco.
"Hey Chloe." Draco said, nodding his head. Chloe smiled in response. "I have to talk to you later, alright?" He said seriously.
"Sure." Chloe answered carefully, watching him walk away. She shook her head and continued to head towards her dorm, hoping that her room mates would be too busy finding others coming back to bother staying in their dorm.
No such luck.
When Chloe opened the door to find all five of the girls sitting around, she winced, bracing herself to be yelled at, completely ignored, cursed to oblivion...
"Chloe! You're Back!" Roz called cheerfully, a big smile on her face. Maybe a little too big, Chloe thought.
"Uh, yeah. How was your Christmas?" Chloe asked, surprised, but not letting her guard down.
"Good, good. Thanks for the present by the way! It's awesome!" Roz exclaimed, then, looking quite embarrassed, added, "Um, sorry for what I sent you. I thought you might, uh, need some ink? Here, take these..." She trailed off, dumping a load of chocolate frogs into Chloe's arms. "It's the least I can do." She explained.
"Gee, thanks a lot." Chloe answered, dumping the load of candy onto her bed. She noticed the other girls remained silent throughout the whole awkward scene.
"What about you guys?" Chloe asked, looking each one in the eyes. "How was your Christmas?"
Roz shot them a look that Chloe didn't see. Suddenly they were all speaking at the same time.
"Great! Oh, did you get..."
"....The Feast....beautiful..."
"Turkey!"
"...and a tiara in the Crackers!..."
"Sounds like fun." Chloe said. "I guess I'd better unpack my things then..." She said, trailing off. The other girls nodded and busied themselves with other things. As she unpacked, Chloe thought of what had just happened. It was the complete opposite of the reaction she'd anticipated. They didn't seem mad, in fact, they were almost being even more friendly then before. Still, Chloe got the feeling that something was up, they hadn't even mentioned the pre-Christmas events.
Oh well, if they won't mention them, then I won't either. Chloe thought to herself. If they could forgive, and she could forget, then they'd do just fine.
"Bye Chloe!" One of the girls called.
"Wha- Alright, where are you guys going?" Chloe asked.
"Oh, you know, to find people..." Jessika trailed off.
Chloe nodded, "Sure, yeah, I'll catch up to you guys later?"
"Yeah, sure." Roz answered.
After they left the room, being sure to close the door tightly, Roz hissed at them,
"You guys! What was that? Come on, remember what Jack said, we DON'T hate her anymore! You were glaring, staring and then all talking at the same time there. Just try to act like before, alright? Act NATURAL!"
The girls nodded their heads and rolled their eyes. Then the group of them began to prance down the stairs towards the common room.
"Yeah, but did you see the look on her face?" Jessika squealed. "She was SO confused when you gave her those chocolates, Roz! This is going to be great. I wonder when Jack's going to humiliate her?" She asked out loud.
"Who knows?" Roz replied, "but I sure hope we're there to see it!"
~*~
After a couple minutes Chloe finally finished packing and decided to go and find Roz and the rest of them. Really, there wasn't anything else to do, and she was still curious as to what was going on. She could hear the chatter of many people as she descended the stairs and upon opening the door she was suddenly overwhelmed by the population of the common room. She entered cautiously, wandering around trying to find someone she knew and receiving mixed reactions from the crowds around her. Apparently her story had spread throughout the holidays.
"Chloe!" Someone yelled over the crowds upon tapping her shoulder.
"Oh! Hi Jack." She said with obvious confusion after she'd turned around.
"Hey, do you want to get out of here for a bit? I want to talk to you." He asked, gesturing towards the door.
"Umm," Chloe stalled, looking around. "Sure, I guess."
He broke into a big grin, "Great," he replied upon grabbing her hand. "Let's go."
They made their way through the crowds, or rather Jack did, dragging Chloe along behind him. They exited the room and were engulfed by the silence of the dungeons. After a minute or so, Chloe spoke up.
"Jack? Whereabouts are we going?" She asked timidly.
"Oh, I figured we could go outside." He answered cheerfully.
"I don't want to go out there, it's cold and I didn't bring my cloak." She disagreed.
This brought them to the front doors, much to Chloe's surprise. She hadn't even noticed where they'd been walking. Jack turned to her.
"You can wear mine." He said simply, pulling off the garment and handing it to her. She accepted it gratefully, but before putting in on, asked warily,
"No itching powder?"
He rolled his eyes, "Of course not, I was just wearing it."
"Right." Chloe concluded, pulling it over her shoulders. They stepped out into the biting cold, the wind whipping around their bodies, making them very unbalanced.
"JACK!" Chloe bellowed over the wind. "MAYBE WE SHOULD GO BACK INSIDE!" Despite her efforts, Jack could only barely hear her. He shouted something back, but it was carried off with the wind. She gestured to him that she couldn't hear what he was saying, so he grabbed her wrist firmly and led her towards the Forbidden Forest. As they approached the vast area full of trees, Chloe noticed the wind was relenting. They entered the darkness of the Forest with only a strong breeze every once in a while.
"So," said Jack, sitting down on the cold, hard ground, "How was your break?"
"Alright..." Chloe trailed off, sitting beside him cautiously.
"Chloe, what's going on? You're so, formal and careful. Are you mad at me?" Jack asked, a quizical look on his face.
"Well, no." She said uncomfortably, "but I kind of thought you were at me."
"No, not at all." Jack lied. "I just want things to be the way they used to be. So how was your vacation really?"
"Um, not bad, Padma, Parvati and I all got in a fight, so it was kind of rocky at first, but it got a bit better." Chloe answered. "How about you?" She asked, anxious to keep the conversation off of her.
"My mom was really sick. I'm really worried about her." Jack said, using the lie his father had created. "Dad had to bring me here early so that he could take care of her."
"That's too bad, Jack. I hope she gets better." Chloe said sympathetically.
"I don't know, I just have this feeling, you know? Like she won't." Jack answered, figuring he may as well take it to the limit.
"I'm sure she will. It'll probably be hard, but...I'll be here if you need to talk." Chloe said, overwhelmed by Jack's momentary lapse of sincerity. His expressions really told her how much this was bugging him.
Little did she know that Jack was an excellent thespian, and his intentions were anything but sincere.
He jumped up from this. "That's exactly what I needed to hear. Come on, let's go back, supper's probably ready." He held out his hand to help her up.
She accepted it and looked warily out into the cold wind, not excited to have to trudge her way back towards the castle through it. But, he was right, supper probably was ready, and her stomach overruled her mind.
*~*
Draco just noticed Chloe leave with Jack out of the corner of his eye. When he realized it was them, his heart skipped a beat. The crowds of people interfered with his getting to them right away, and he found himself being caught for a good five minutes before he could actually get away from the common room.
He raced through the dungeons, wondering where they could possibly have gone. He considered calling out but decided against it. If he found them, he wanted it to be as natural and casual as possible, so Lawson wouldn't think anything was up. He heard voices up ahead, in the Hall, heard the heavy oak doors thud shut, sending reverberations of sound throughout the castle. Draco sped up, trying to catch them.
The icy current of wind hit him as the thrust open the massive doors. However, in the flurries of snow, there was no one to be seen. This time he did try calling out, but his words were lost in the wind.
"I sure hope she knows what she's doing." He muttered to himself as he reentered the castle, shutting the doors being him. He decided to search through the rest of the castle with hopes that it hadn't been them going outside for a blustery stroll.
Later on, after having been stopped twice by teachers, Draco sat in the Great Hall among a few others, waiting for supper to begin. He heard someone walk in and looked up. Sure enough, there were Chloe and Jack, laughing over something unknown, covered head to toe with snow. As he glared, Draco renewed his vow to keep a closer eye on Chloe.
*~*
A month had passed since the students of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry had returned from Christmas Vacation. Everything seemed to be going well around the school, and as Chloe strolled into the library in search of a Potion's Book, she found herself thinking that her life was finally back to normal. There had been some awkward spots here and there, but at least her friends were on her side again.
As she pondered over these lovely thoughts, her "friends" discussed some of a more hostile nature.
"She's such a twit!" Ashley complained loudly. "So naive, she actually thinks we suddenly had a sort of revelation and like her now?"
Roz giggled. "Well put. It's pretty amusing actually, although I don't see her hanging around Potter and his gang as often..."
"Yeah, I noticed that too." Jessika put in. "I wonder why?" she asked with a quizzical look on her face.
"That's exactly what I want you girls to find out for me." Jack announced, stepping up behind them. "Listen guys, I kind of need Potter for the plan and-"
"Plan, plan, plan..." Autumn complained in her tiring voice. "Why don't you ever tell us what it's about, Jack? What's the big plan?"
He shot her a look of distaste. "Can I continue? Thanks." He answered sarcastically without waiting for an answer. "As I was saying, I need Potter for the plan, but it's kind of hard to use him without Chloe being friends with him anymore. Find this out for me as soon as possible, alright?"
The girls, too nosy for their own good, agreed straightaway. Which is why, later on that night, Chloe found herself in the most awkward situation yet.
As they were getting ready for bed, Jessika began, in a blunt voice, "So, Chloe, why don't you and Harry talk anymore? Not such a big Gryffindor lover anymore, are we?"
Chloe's face burnt red. "No, that's not it."
"Well then what HAPPENED out there? You guys, what, made out in the courtyard at the Ball, and now you never talk to eachother anymore. If it's not that you don't like him, although I don't see why you did in the first place, what is it?" Autumn questioned in her nasal voice.
Chloe looked at the girl with exasperation. "I don't see how it's any of your business."
"Listen Chloe." Roz interrupted before a fight broke out between the two. The placid atmosphere was suddenly becoming very tense. "What Autumn MEANS is," she began while shooting Autumn a Look, "Is that we're your friends, and we're just curious as to what's going on with you."
"Well," Chloe began, conceding in giving them an explanation. After all, they were her friends... "It's just that, Padma went to the Ball with Harry, and as it turns out, she really kind of liked him. So, when she heard about, er, us that night, she was kind of mad. SO, the only way I could get her to talk to me and forgive me was to agree to not talk to Harry anymore. It was really quite a simple thing to agree to," she lied, "after all, she IS my sister."
"Ha!" Jessika began after Chloe had finished. "I would've told her where to stick that solution!"
"There must've been another way." Roz added. They both forgot for the moment how against Harry they were.
"Nope." Chloe answered simply, shrugging her shoulders. "So, now you guys know, but could you keep it to yourselves? I don't know, it may seem weird, but I don't want this story running around the whole school. Harry knows, and he's the only one that really needs to."
"Sure we can keep it to ourselves." Jessika said sweetly, lying through her teeth.
"Of course," Roz added, "we won't tell a soul..."
*(A/N)* Well, it took a long time, but it's here! Um, Harry and any other characters you recognize belong to JKR and Warner Bros. The original characters technically belong to me, but as if I control them!
I finally did a Disclaimer! It's been a while.
Thanks for reading! *Later Alligators*