WHAT HAVE THEY DONE WITH THE RAIN?
There is Something Happening, But You Don't Know What it Is
After breakfast, the Trio marched down to the quiddich pitch, and Hermione went off to sit with Dean, and Ron and Harry went of to join the rest of the team.
"Boy am I glad we got rid of Angelina Johnson, Alicia Spinnet and Katie Bell," said Ron firmly,
"Why?" asked Harry curiously, "They were like our best players."
"Harry, I'm not going to have that attitude on my quiddich team, ok? We are the best players, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise!"
"Ok," said Harry, "But we really do need better chasers. Ginny and Colin aren't all that-"
"Harry," said Ron dangerously, "You'd better shut up now."
"Ok."
Finally, they were out on the quiddich pitch and ready to go. The two teams stood at either end, glaring daggers at each other. Madam Hooche tried to impress upon them that they had to start in the middle of the pitch, but, after realising that their was no hope of getting Ron and Malfoy to shake hands anyway, she gave up and blew the whistle. Harry zoomed up into the air and began to float aimlessly over the pitch, occasionally glancing down at the crowd below.
"Hey," yelled Malfoy, "Potter, aren't you even going to try this time?" for the first time in his life, he actually looked disappointed at the fact that Gryffindor would be an easy win, "You're really taking the challenge, and the – the fun – out of quiddich, dare I say it." Harry looked at him blankly,
"Oh, right, sorry." He did not even bother to give Malfoy a dirty look, but simply swooped down and tried to be involved in the game. Ever since the death of his poor godfather, Harry had never really been the same. Funnily enough, Ron and Hermione hadn't seemed to notice. Harry had stopped thinking about Sirius, but that just seemed to get that empty feeling out of the pit of his stomach. An empty feeling that just refused to go away, and caused him to think of nothing but the empty feeling in the pit of his stomach. What he really needed, he felt, was a good mystery to solve or another unprovoked attack from Lord Voldemort. It would occupy his mind, perhaps, and maybe even cause at least some of the prophecy to come true. It might also get Ron and Hermione out of the strange moods they seemed to have adopted since the beginning of their sixth year.
"HARRY!" Ron's voice reverberated around the quidditch pitch. "MALFOY'S SEEN THE SNITCH!" Harry lurched out of his thoughts and realised he was simply drifting along the bottom of the pitch, his feet trailing gently across the grass.
Looking up, he saw Malfoy lazily reaching for the fluttering golden snitch, an ugly scowl on his face. Galvanised into action, he lunged towards the Slytherin boy, his arm outstretched.
Unfortunately, The-At-Buggerit chose that exact moment to let out a loud whoop of applause, apparently to cheer on both teams. Malfoy did not bother to look up, but Harry witnessed the full horror of The-At-Buggerit's hair tied with green, silver, red and gold ribbons, and the massive banner he was holding up, which featured a huge, vicious lion's head whose body tapered of into a silvery snake tail. Around it were splodges of the colour you get when you mix red and green.
Harry's eyes widened and he forgot all about the snitch. Giving a hoarse cry of protest, he turned away from the monstrosity to find Malfoy rolling his eyes and holding up the snitch. Harry sighed and shrugged, what was a quidditch game, or house rivalry for that matter, when you were the sixteen year old who had to kill a mass murderer and save the world? He could not even be bothered to glare at the hated Malfoy. Ron was quite unaffected by their loss. Harry felt this extremely out of character, even though the Gryffindor team had spectacularly lost every game they'd played so far.
"Well," said Ron, "We'll do better next time. We weren't on our top form. We were sluggish (he didn't even glare accusingly at Harry, to his credit), and I've a feeling it was that sultana bran this morning. I'm going to talk to Dumbledore about that. I mean, maybe the house elves made a mistake when they made it or something," and with that Ron ran a hand through his hair, smiled into the distance and rushed off towards the castle. The rest of the team sat in silence for a full minute.
"You know," said Ginny, "I think there is something bothering Ron,"
"Hmm," the rest of the team agreed.
About a week after the game, the virtually non existent talk had died down, and Malfoy remembered that The-At-Buggerit was Dumbledore's illegitimate son.
"Hey, Pansy," he said, over a butter beer in the Three Broomsticks, "Did you know that The-At-
Buggerit is-"
"Draco, how many times have I told you, do not wear you're Slytherin-green robes with your purple shirt,"
"Sorry. I was just saying that The-At-buggerit is-"
"And those snake patterns around the sleeves? It's just plain childish, Draco,"
"Yes, but-"
"I'll be back in a second; I can see Griselda Gorrington over there, she has these divine leopard skin boots!" Pansy Parkinson rose and headed towards a tall girl with short blue hair and black lipstick. Malfoy gave up and gazed thoughtfully into his tankard. The time, obviously, was not right.But he could wait. His other thought was that Pansy was getting too big for her boots, so to speak.
Maybe he should break up with her, was his next thought. He wouldn't really care, because he did not particularly like Pansy, for her mind at least.
These thoughts were not pleasing to Malfoy, and they lead him to darker matters, such as when his father was going to break out of Azkaban already.
"Harry," began Hermione while they were quietly doing their potions essays in front of the fire in the Gryffindor common room,
"You know Professor Dunglegit?" she asked.
"Hmm,"
"Well, do you think he has something to do with Voldemort?"
"No."
"Oh."
Harry calmly continued writing. It was true. He did not think that Professor Dunglegit, the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, had anything to do with Voldemort. He was not sure why he felt this, he just did, and he really didn't care either way because he knew that sooner or later, the true evil would reveal itself, with or without his help, and he couldn't do anything about it. Hermione looked to Ron for help,
"Ron, don't you think Dunglegit is really suspicious?"
"Could be, Hermione, could be," said Ron condescendingly. Hermione glared at him,
"Don't take that condescending tone with me, Ronald Weasley!" To Harry's confusion, Ron didn't even get angry at this,
"Why not, Hermione, why not?" he said, smiling happily.
"Argh!" said Harry, showing unusual emotion, "You're smiling like The-At-Buggerit,"
"No I'm not," said Ron, scowling like Malfoy, "I'm scowling like Malfoy!" he giggled suddenly. Harry suddenly broke into a sweat. There was something wrong, he knew it.
"When d'you reckon Dumbledore's going to sort The-At-Buggerit?" said Hermione, randomly changing the subject, all anger gone from her voice. Harry screwed up his face and pinched himself. He could not help feeling that reality was being skewed somehow. Everything seemed very intense somehow. The orange of Ron's hair seemed to be even more vivid than usual, and Harry was having difficulty distinguishing it from the flames behind him. Hermione's eyes seemed over-bright, and she was absently doodling flowers on her potions parchment. Hermione was not a person who normally doodled on anything, and Harry blinked stupidly at her as she smiled at Ron and raised her hand to give him a high-five. Hoping it was his own depressed mood that was giving him the impression that his friends were going mad; Harry shook his head and headed off to bed.
"Are you still going out with Dean, Hermione?" Ron's voice followed him up the dormitory stairs,
"Did you steal him from Ginny?"
"No, Ginny dumped him,"
"Why?"
"He smells funny."