OR DIE TRYING: THE STORY OF CHO CHANG

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG

Spoilers: Everything

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41. Looking to the Future

Cho was of two minds on the Hogwarts Express back to London. She was always of two minds about her mother; she was even of two minds about being of two minds.

She sat at a seat by the window, watching the white landscape speed by and thankful that there were no dementors on the train; bad enough having to pass under the gaze of them-dozens of them-just to get on board. It was a long trip, though, and, while she tried not to talk to anyone about anything, she gave in before the second hour was over and chatted with the others in her compartment-mostly girls from her dormitory. They talked about what presents they were giving for Christmas, and what they hoped to get. They talked about invitations to holiday parties-some of them even thrown by Muggles who had no idea about their guests. They talked about the over-the-holiday schoolwork-murderous with Snape, difficult with McGonagall, just as difficult but more fun with Flitwick, and incomprehensible with Trelawny.

If she kept this up, Cho would never have to say what was really on her mind: that she didn't like the way her mother treated her-as if she had no sense at all. Then she'd dislike herself for disliking her mother. Why do parents put you through that? she wondered as she bit into a pumpkin tart she'd bought off the trolley. I swear I won't make my daughter feel that way about me when I'm . . . Hold on! I'm getting a bit ahead of myself; don't even have a boyfriend yet. Don't know as I'd want one either, just now.

Yet as she closed her eyes, inhaling the cinnamon and spices of the tart, she imagined what it might be like to be "with" someone, to have the whole school know it and not care as the two of you walked through the corridors holding hands . . .

xxx

Red has been the most important colour in China since long before there was a Hogwarts. When she stepped through the barrier into King's Cross, she was greeted by her father holding two carrier-bags full of presents wrapped in vivid red paper.

On Chinese New Year, the custom is to give gifts of money in red envelopes. The Changs adapted the practice for Christmas by wrapping all their gifts in red paper. As a child, Cho loved the contrast, the green tree seeming to float on a sea of fire.

When she woke up Christmas morning, she rushed down the steps from her room to the parlour where the tree was. There it stood, as it had for years, although the sea of fire seemed a bit smaller than she remembered. Chairman Miao was under the tree as well, rubbing his face along the trunk. He was well up in years now, and wasn't the kitten that used to play with the old red wrapping paper and pounce on the ornaments. In fact, he'd caused quite a bit of havoc every Christmas until Cho's parents Charmed the tree to keep him off. Still, they were all of a piece for Cho: the evergreen tree, the sea of fire, and Chairman Miao. Take any one away, and it wasn't really Christmas.

Cho looked at the labels on the presents, and found that her gifts consisted of four red envelopes. Annoyed but curious, she waited until her parents awoke. They had breakfast together, during which James and Lotus asked Cho about the dementors and life at Hogwarts since Black's apparent arrival there. Cho knew only that Black had escaped from Azkaban and was somehow linked to Harry Potter, so breakfast lasted an extra hour as her parents told her the story of the onetime friend of the Potters who'd betrayed them to the Dark Lord, then gone on a murderous rampage, only to be locked in prison twelve years ago.

Cho didn't dare tell them of the visit to the hospital wing and what she'd heard of Harry's nightmare, but now she knew even more of what it was all about, and the price he'd had to pay for defeating the Dark Lord. Without being aware of it, she almost shed a tear for Harry, but she knew her parents would ask a hundred questions she couldn't answer. She checked herself and turned to the presents.

While her parents wore dressing gowns and sat on the parlour sofa, Cho, still in her pajamas, sat cross-legged on the floor next to the tree. If there had been anyone else in the house, or if it had been any day other than Christmas, she surely would have gotten a long, stern lecture along with her presents. Since it was Christmas, they let it pass.

First, Cho's mother opened her earrings, and seemed to be quite taken by them. As she modeled them for her husband, Cho took a bit of gold ribbon and decorated Chairman Miao's collar. Her father admired the astrolabe and took it to his study. Her parents exchanged a couple of small gifts: a new wallet with a high-security anti-theft spell for him, and for her a bottle of her favorite perfume, "Brangaena". Many had tried to copy its formula and sell a cheaper version; all had failed.

Mister Chang motioned for Cho to open her envelopes, which she now saw were numbered. The first contained merely a page from the Dervish and Banges catalogue:

"Rough It In Style with The GRENDEL Our Most Popular Tent Two bedrooms Two bath Full kitchen Functioning fireplace (extra fee for Floo access) Twelve square feet exterior 1,000 square feet interior"

This was odd. The last time the family had anything to do with a Dervish and Banges tent was when Cho was in kindergarten. A group of Chinese wizards had gotten together for a charabanc tour from Cornwall to Dover. Cho's parents had brought the tent for comfort, but Cho decided she's rather sleep on the bus.

Envelope number two was a timetable for a Portkey. Most of the time, one never bothered; Portkeys were Spelled so as to send the person who touches it to one precise location. But more and more Portkeys began sending wizards to the same place and time. After a couple of highly dramatic splinches, the Department of Magical Transportation stepped in to regularize the trips. This schedule was for a Portkey leaving the Leaky Cauldron in Diagon Alley in August; the destination had been blacked out.

In the third envelope was a map of Yorkshire, with a circle drawn in the middle of a stretch of completely barren moors. Were her parents proposing to spend a summer camping in the middle of the wilderness? At least the charabanc took a coast road, and there was something to see. This was nothing; this was . . .

The fourth envelope, then. It had better explain everything.

She opened the fourth red envelope, no different in size from the other three. As she lifted the flap, though, three pieces of parchment floated out of the envelope, grew in size to become bigger than the envelope, hung steady in the air, then settled down in front of each person in the room. Cho read the top line of the parchment-

FINALS OF THE QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP

--and threw herself at the sofa, trying to hug both parents at once.

xxx

New Year's Eve was as awkward for Cho as Christmas Day was joyous. The Ng family arrived at the Chang shoppe just at sunset, when Cho was closing. Her mother had been upstairs cooking most of the day, leaving the shop to Cho. Now, she was stuck behind the counter as the guests walked through the store and upstairs, leaving Cho alone to lock up, sweep up, then make herself presentable for company.

When she'd let the guests in she kept her face averted. She didn't want them to see her cheeks burning with embarrassment, and, although her mother had been saying for days that Cho needed to cut a dash at the party that evening, Cho didn't want their first impression of her to be "the girl in the shop". Even as she was washing up and brushing out her hair and slipping into a black velvet ankle-length cheongsam, she was cursing her mother under her breath for trying to humiliate her.

Maybe she wants to prove I'm a hard worker. If THAT'S all he wants in a wife, why doesn't he marry a house-elf?! I wish I'd brought my Quidditch robes; THAT'S who I am, and they'd all better get used to it!

Cho took a few deep breaths before leaving her room. By the time she had descended to the parlour, her face was a pretty, emotionless mask. She bowed to the guests, sat on the sofa next to her mother, and (she couldn't help it) took the occasional glance at the young man they'd brought for her to meet.

Tan Ng looked every inch the Seventh Year. His hair just long enough to be "modern", his features hard and precise as a starchart, and his body (as far as Cho could tell, under his bright green school robes) thin and taut. I suppose he's a good enough catch, Cho thought, but, as she looked at him and looked at him, she realized the truth: she felt nothing about him. Absolutely nothing. Factor out the dislike of her mother trying to arrange things, and Cho realized that Tan was a stranger; just some guy.

The conversation had moved on to Quidditch; the Ngs and the Changs would be in adjacent tents for the World Cup. Mr. Ng had just turned to his son; "Do you have any thoughts on the Cup?"

"No doubt about it," he said, in a brogue that his voice had picked up after seven years in an Irish wizarding school, "Ireland's going all the way this year."

Inwardly Cho smiled. She had her mother now.

xxx

She was all smiles two days later, as the Hogwarts Express returned the students to school. She was talking about the dinner party to her dorm mates.

"Of course, mother still hates that I'm a Seeker; she never misses a chance to insult me over it. I guess it's all right to be a spectator up in the stands, but Heaven forbid her daughter should ever play. Anyway, I knew what I could do to stop this before it started.

"I turned to him and said, 'What makes you think Puddlemere United won't knock Ireland out?' Well, then he was off. He started to go on about the European teams, and about the players on the Irish side, especially their Seeker, Moran. It was an hour before anyone could talk about anything else!"

Cho leaned back in her seat and took a drink from a bottle of butterbeer. "Once we all saw he was mad for Quidditch, all I had to do was wait. We had a ten-course dinner, which seems like a lot, but the courses are not too large; besides, that's tradition for the New Year. Anyway, between courses, I said, 'Did you know that I'm a Seeker at Hogwarts?'

"The first words out of his mouth were, 'Good for you.' Right there, my mother knew she'd made a mistake; she wasn't about to let me get engaged to him! Of course, she gave me a right twisting all the next day, accusing me of trying to sabotage the whole dinner party. But is it my fault that half the wizarding world is Quidditch-mad?"

"Lucky for you he was in the right half," Libby Foggly said as she drained the last of her butterbeer. "Don't know about all of you but I'm still peckish. Who wants to come with me to hunt down the cart?"

Almost all of them chose to go. Cho stayed in her seat, and was momentarily alone in the compartment-until Roger Davies stepped in and closed the door.

"Hullo, Cho."

"Happy New Year, Roger."

"Well, we're, uh, are you ready for the fifteenth?"

"I'm dying for it, Rog. Slytherin won't know what hit them."

"Yes, of course. Well, that is, Cho, can I ask you something?"

"Rog, this isn't like you. What is it?"

"What?"

"The stammering, the confusion. What's wrong?"

"Wrong? Nothing! It's just, well, next year's my last, and with any luck I'll get on a professional team, and who knows if I'll see you after I leave . . ."

"Well, of course, I could end up in the pros myself, couldn't ? Maybe even on the same team."

"Yeah, well, that would be . . ."

Cho didn't give him a chance to say anything else. "And we could also send owls, but it's much too early to think about keeping in touch, isn't it?"

"Yeah, guess you're right."

Roger suddenly stood up, left the compartment and hurriedly closed the door. Cho inside the compartment had the same thought as Roger in the corridor:

"That did not go well at all."

xxx

to be continued in part 42, wherein Cho writes home about the Quidditch match