Disclaimer-J.K. Rowlings owns Hogwarts, the characters, and everything in this fic. I only own the people I made up and the plot.



Turmoil at Hogwarts



Chapter 8-The Contest



The next day went by very quickly for Ginny. She spent most of the day with Lavender and Susan just talking. It seemed to Ginny that the girls talked about almost everything that had ever happened in their lives. While sitting in comfortable chairs by a warm fire, the girls talked about their family, friends, and what their lives were like at Hogwarts. Mrs. Gallagher had brought them tea at about 2:00 and she sat down and talked with the three girls for a while. Ginny really liked the Irish witch because Mrs. Gallagher always had time for her. Ginny could come to her with questions, problems, or even just to talk. She was kind of like a temporary mother that all of the students liked. So, when she came and talked with the girls, they were all very happy to share some of their stories with her.

When the girls were finished talking they went down and ate dinner and soon it was time for the christmas decorations contest. The house looked excellent. All of the rooms were decorated and the tall Christmas tree looked beautiful.

At seven o'clock the doorbell rang. When Mrs. Gallagher answered it all, of the students were surprised to see Professor Dumbledore and professor McGonagall standing in the doorway.

"I suppose that you are surprised to see that we are the judges of your contest," Professor Dumbledore said with a big smile on his face.

"We thought it was a muggle contest," Lavender said.

"It's a contest between all of the groups to see which group can decorate their house the best," Professor McGonagall said.

"And the group that had the best decorations wins a prize," Dumbledore said and his blue eyes twinkled.

"What is the prize?" Lee asked.

"A trip," Professor McGonagall replied.

"To where?" Susan asked.

"To wherever the group that wins decided to go," Dumbledore said, "The winners get to go anywhere in the world they want to go, but everyone in the winning group has to agree on the place or else nobody gets to go."

"Professor, let's begin our judging," Professor McGonagall said.

They inspected all of the rooms and marked on a piece of parchment every so often. When they were finished everyone was anxious to see if they had won or not.

"So how does our house look?" Ginny asked.

"Very nice," Professor Dumbledore said.

"Did we win?" Terry asked.

"We haven't been to any of the other houses yet. We will be bac in an hour or two to tell you the results," Professor Mcgonagall said and then the two judges left the house.

"We have to wait two hours?" Lavender said. "I don't think that I can wait that long to find out if we won!"

"I know." Ginny said. "I hope that we won!"

"Where would we go if we did win?" Susan asked.

"Somewhere none of us have ever been before," Seamus said.

"Not anywhere in Europe," Lee said.

"Has anybody been to America?" Draco asked.

All of the students shook their heads no.

"That's a good idea! Let's go to America if we win!" Ginny said. "Do you guys want to go?"

All of the students wanted to go to somewhere in America, but they couldn't decide where they wanted to go.

"Let's go somewhere that's sunny around this time of year." Lavender said.

"How about Florida?" Lee asked.

"No," Susan said.

"California?" Lee asked.

"No," Seamus said, "Hey wait. Let's go to Hawaii!"

"Yes, I've always wanted to learn how to Hula dance. Lavender said.

"I want to go to a luau!" Susan said.

"Does everyone agree?" Terry asked.

All of the students said yes and they were all extremely excited.

"Wait a minute," Draco said. "We haven't won yet. Wait happens if we don't win?"

"Then we stay her and be miserable," Lee said.

The students were quiet for a little bit because they were busy hoping that they had the best decorations and thinking about what they would do in Hawaii if they won. All of the groups had worked hard and worked as a team. The Professor's plan was working perfectly. The students were learning to get along with each other. Ginny was even beginning to tolerate Lee because he hadn't made any rude or obscene comments to her lately.

Ginny soon became tired of just sitting and waiting, so she went up to her room. She had just finished changing into her blue plaid pajama pants and white tank top, when she heard a knock at the door. When she opened the door, she was surprised to find Seamus on the other side.

"Hi, Seamus." Ginny said and gave him a look that said "what the heck are you doing here?"

"Hi," Seamus said. "I just decided to come up to see how you were doing. I told Ron that I'd look out for you, but I haven't been doing a very good job. Are you getting along alright?"

"Yes, I'm doing fine," Ginny replied.

"Has Malfoy been giving you any trouble?" Seamus asked.

"No, not at all. He's actually been nice to me," Ginny said.

"Really?" Seamus asked. "I never knew that Malfoy could be nice to anyone."

"Neither did I. But he has been really nice. The only person that I've had any trouble with is Lee. I never knew that he was such an ass."

"Yes, I know. I talked to him and told him he needed to start treating you with more respected. He got pretty pissed at me. He doesn't think that he is treating you bad." Seamus said.

"Is he different when I'm not around?" Ginny asked.

"Oh, yes. He is completely different. I think that when he acts like a jerk, he's just trying to impress you," Seamus said.

"Well, hasn't he figured out that he's not impressing me?" Ginny said. "You'd think that he was smart enough to figure out that he's pissing me off!"

"I guess not." Seamus said. "Next time just ignore him. After a while he figure it out."

"Thanks, Seamus. You're a really good friend." Ginny said and gave him a big hug.

"Actually, I'm not as great a friend as you think." Seamus said.

"Why?" Ginny asked.

"Because, I came here to ask you something," Seamus said.

"What?" Ginny said.

"Well, I wanted to know if...well, has Lavender said anything about me or asked about me?" Lee asked.

"The only thing that she said is that she thought you were an asshole. Why is that anyway? What did you do?" Ginny asked.

"You know how we went to the Yule Ball together?" Lee said.

"Yes," Ginny answered.

"Well, we started dating right after that. We had been seeing each other for about a month when she heard a rumor that I was cheating on her," Seamus said.

"Were you really cheating on her?" Ginny asked.

"No, but Parvati heard that I was cheating on her," Seamus said.

"With who?" Ginny asked.

"Hannah Abott from Hufflepuff," Lee said.

"Oh, I get it." Ginny said. "She didn't believe you."

"That's right, and she broke up with me. We haven't talked since then." Seamus said.

"I'll try to talk to her about it, okay?" Ginny said.

"Really?" Seamus asked.

"Sure," Ginny said. "Now come on, we should go downstairs. We should be finding out who won the contest any minute now."

They walked downstairs and waited with the others for Professor McGonagall and professor Dumbledore to arrive.

The students were each doing different things to pass the time. Susan was curled up in a big comfy light blue chair near the fire and was reading a book. Lavender was sitting on the floor painting her toenails with a kind of paint that muggles call nail polish. She had found it in a drawer in their room the day before and wanted to try it out. Terry was sitting in a chair that was exactly like Susan's and he was writing in a muggle notebook. Lee was looking at a book about quidditch and Seamus sat down next to him and began reading over Lee's shoulder. Draco was writing on a piece of parchment at a small round table and was sitting in a wooden chair which was lined in blue velvet. Ginny thought that he looked very handsome and like royalty sitting in that chair but she didn't want to admit to herself that she felt that way.

Ginny decided to grab a book from the bookshelf at the back of the room. She chose a romance novel about a young witch whose family had died and she was sent to live with her uncle in a far off place. She laid on the carpeted floor near the large white fireplace and began to read her book. Ginny was almost finished with the first chapter of her book when Professor McGonagall and Professor Dumbledore arrived.

Mrs. Gallagher had answered the door and led the professors into the room that the students were in.

Professor Dumbledore asked, "Are you ready to find out who the winner is?"



A/N-Oooohh! Cliffhanger. I don't write many of these but I guess I just felt like writing on now. Sorry it took a long time to post this. School started again on January 2nd and I've been busy with homework and stuff. I'm sure you know how that feels. I decided that I'd stay home from a shopping trip today so that I could finish this chapter. You should consider yourselves special, it's not often when I miss out on shopping! Well, I'll try to update the next chapter a little bit sooner but don't count on it. Sorry this chapter is so short! Talk to you next chapter!



Thanks to all of my reviewer!



Mione, I feel a little bit sorry for Ginny too. But, I can't have everything in her life go perfect can I? And as for your other question, only time will tell!



Satan's Little Princess, I think that Lee should still be the bad character. I haven't been writing about him much in this fic lately. Do you think I should write more about him?



Bunny, I was hoping that everybody would like this better. I tried to make it more realistic, so I guess I did okay at it since you noticed.



Jilly-anne, do you think that would be very realistic? I thought about doing something like that, but I wanted to make my story seem real. I would love to do stuff like that but I don't know how many other people would like it. You know what I mean? You should read my story Only You. It's more mushy, you might like it. Oh, I hope don't think I'm being mean. I love your reviews and I try and use some of your ideas in my story. You're a HUGE help to me.



Katie, I'm glad that you're happy about this chapter. The characters are going through a non-communicating spell, because if they talked then they would work everything out, and they can't work everything out yet, because then I would have to end this story. Thanks for your constructive critisism, I'll make them communicate more in the chapters to come, okay?



Cthottie482, hmmm, do you think that Draco and Ginny will get back together? I did have a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year, thanks for thinking about me! I hope that my next chapters a good too. Do you have any ideas or things you want to happen in the chapters to come?



Cyn James, be patient. It's not time for them to be together. I don't really know when it will be time for them to be together, but maybe eventually it will be time. Did that make any sense to you cause I'm not sure that I even knew what I was talking about.

Lucia, I don't think that you get the chapters the same time everyone else does. Do you know that? Do you think that there's some way to fix that? Hmm, anyway. I know that chapter 7 was confusing, chapters 8 and 9 are lots better about not being confusing, at least I think they are, anyway. I'm glad that you liked some of the things about that chapter, I'm not really very proud of chapter 7, but you give me a little bit of comfort in your 4 star rating. Thanks.



Oonagh, I'm glad that I surprised you. I don't surprise people very often. So, what do you think about this chapter?



Jewel, yes they are in denial. Do you think that they shouldn't be in denial any more or do you think they should stay that way for a while.



Mereshino, thanks! Yes, that probably would have been funny if I did that but I didn't want it to be like the movies, I'm trying to make it seem sort of real. I don't really think I'm succeeding but at least I'm trying!



Dorthey Star, I know what you mean about staying signed in. I hate signing in all of the time. I felt like I had to make them break up so that I could make the story work right, I hope that doesn't make you too mad at me. Please don't be mad! I didn't take three months to update this story. I'm trying to update it pretty frequently but I don't know how good of a job I'm doing.



Sizarie, I'm glad you like my fic so far. I wrote more so what do you think?



LilyAyl, no, I love your questions! I was just kidding about the last review I just couldn't answer very many of your questions. I'm sorry I made you think that I didn't like them. Now I feel bad. You can ask me as many questions as you want and I promise I won't complain, okay?