Ok, chapter are gonna start taking me longer to post now, cos the interesting stuff is finally gonna start. Sorry to disappoint you, but hopefully this fic will be finished soon! Yay! Anyway, enjoy this chappie.
Lara: Hey Lara. How's life? Lol, anyway, like I said Ron is not pregnant, but you should write a fic about that. lol. You need to write more fics, I love your humour stuff *cries*
Ghetx2o: Yup! I know you hate my cliffies, that's why I like 'em. You're really confusing me. Mind you it's probably my fault, I keep breaking them up and bringing them back together. Harry can be pretty dumb. But this fic would be boring if he wasn't. Anyways. Loved your review as always. And I really, really, really hope you update your fic again soon! *begs*
Miss-Aurelia: Hey, thanks for reviewing, it's a two way thing writing. You like the chapters, I like the reviews, hee, hee. Anyways. I know everyone's being evil at the moment, but hey. It'll all be over soon. There's only gonna be about 32 chapters to this fic. Sorry that my updates are starting to take longer, but the chapters are getting harder to write. *gives you a banana* will you tell me the story about the cucumber, I like laughing. Lol. Anyway, thanks again for a great review and I'll always think you're a great reviewer.
Tylah; No problem, I love your fic! Don't worry about Harry and Cho, I couldn't keep them apart for long. Thanks for reviewing and I hope you updater soon, there's nothing much good to read at the moment.
Dragoon Knight: I know, I never liked that side of her either. But hey, that's how JK created them, I gotta try to stick to it.
Erika: I'm sorry I broke them up. I wasn't going to but, well, Cho's like that, she's annoying sometimes. I didn't create the characters. Don't worry, I could never keep them apart for too long. They love each other too much. I hope I didn't keep you waiting and I hope you like this chappie.
LogicalRaven: Yes he is! He's a guy, blind and stupid. Sorry that's just the way I think he would react, it'll all be ok in the end.
HoshiHikari4ever: Well it is just a Quidditch match, I'm not gonna make anything too drastic happen. I hope I don't disappoint you with this chapter. They will figure it out, Hermione's too smart. Glad you liked the chapter even if I did leave it at a cliffhanger.
Miss-Cho-Potter: Yay! I'll be sending you chapter 27 ASAP, I'm so glad I'll finally have someone to check my fic for me, cos my spelling and grammar is often awful. I didn't have time to send you this one, I had to get it posted. Thanks again for reviewing and for offering to be my beta reader.
Dory1727: That's an interesting theory, you reviewers really are imaginative, but unfortunately no. But there's more to him than you think. Maybe not as interesting as being able to turn into other people though. Sorry. Oh well I hope you like this chapter and keep reviewing, always great to know what you think.
Pippi: Well, I'm trying to keep to her character the way JK created her. I know she's a bit dumb sometimes, but there'll be a happy ending eventually. I hope the Quidditch match doesn't disappoint you, I love writing them!
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"AND THAT'S 50 v 50!" Screamed over the explosion from the Gryffindor end. Harry punched his fist into the air as Kieran scored his second goal of the match. Malfoy was hovering a few feet away with a sneer if disgust on his face, but even that couldn't dampen Harry's happy feeling as Kieran did a small celebration and gave Harry and wide smile from below which Harry returned happily.
So far Harry hadn't had much to do. Neither he nor Malfoy had seen the snitch yet as they flew around the pitch searching. Several minutes passed and Slytherin scored again. Harry groaned and fought back the urge to punch Malfoy's sneer forcefully off his face.
But it wasn't long before Gryffindor were level once again through Angelina's third and quite spectacular goal from 20 yards out. Harry searched desperately for the snitch as the match went on. But still no sign. Slytherin scored one more, but Gryffindor clawed back another through Katie Bell. Before Kieran got another past the Slytherin keeper, putting Gryffindor ahead 80 v 70. And that's when he saw it. Glinting next to the head of one of the Gryffindor goalposts only a couple of feet away from Jamie Renwick. (Gryffindor keeper.)
Harry's heart leapt and he leant forward on his broom and pelted towards it. He could feel Malfoy only a meter behind. He gritted his teeth and spurred his broom on mentally. He focused every cell of his brain and fibre of his body on catching the snitch before Malfoy.
The wind was whistling in his ears and making his eyes water, but he was getting closer. 20 feet, 15 feet 10 feet only 5 feet. Time seemed to slow down as he reached out his arm and closed his closed his fingers around the tiny golden ball.
It seemed to take an age for Harry to realise that he'd caught it, but in reality only a split second past between Harry catching the snitch and Harry punching his closed fist into the air and speeding around the cheering Quidditch stands. The deafening shrieking and screaming of happiness from the Gryffindor's drowned out the groans and boo's from the Slytherin's.
All Harry could feel was elation as his team closed around him cheering for him, slapping him on the back congratulating him, Angelina threw her arms around him and hugged him joyfully. After several minutes Harry managed to land smoothly on the ground, only to be engulfed by another crowd. Amidst all this Hermione managed to fight her way to the front of the throng and give him his second hug in five minutes. All Harry could do was smile as the snitch in his hand fluttered its wings in a pathetic escape attempt.
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Later that night Harry was sitting in the common room still reminiscing the match that morning, Harry had seen the most hyper active Kieran that day, he hadn't stopped talking since he'd landed after the game. Even now he was talking once again about how he'd watched Harry grab the snitch only inches in front of 'that Malfoy loser'.
Harry had noticed that Kieran was very modest, even when Harry had congratulated him on his amazing goals he'd just shrugged it off and started talking about Harry and the snitch again. Harry could only sit and smile that evening, listening to Kieran and the celebrations going on behind him made him fee like he could fly, he'd won Gryffindor the most important game of the season, they only had Hufflepuff left to play and they were 200 pints head of all the other three teams.
(But, because I'm annoying and love to torture my reviewers, this of course didn't last.) The next day the feeling began to fade, he remembered what situation he was in. Cho still wasn't talking to him, and today he had to talk to her. But it turned out this never happened. Hermione had other ideas. At breakfast on Sunday morning Hermione revealed what she'd been thinking about for a couple of days now.
"Harry, can I talk to Cho, I mean before you do?" Hermione asked simply.
"Um…..yeh, of course if you want to, but why?" Harry asked, slightly confused, why would Hermione want to talk to someone who seemed to hate her at the moment, when Harry could just as easily patch things up…..hopefully.
"Because I want to explain everything to her, I just think if she hears it from me she'll know she has no reason to ever think what she has in the past, so she'll fully know where she stands." Harry considered this for a while.
"Yeh, I guess, I never really thought about that before." He said eventually.
"Ok thanks Harry, I'll catch her after dinner tonight." Hermione said going back to her boiled eggs and letting Kieran and Harry slip into more avid conversation about yesterdays Quidditch match. Honestly she liked Quidditch it was interesting to watch, but once you'd covered every second of the game from a thousand different angles, it did get slightly tedious.
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At dinner that evening Hermione was preparing herself to talk to Cho, she felt slightly nervous in case Cho got really upset or angry and didn't let Hermione explain, but she was determined she was doing the right thing.
So when she saw Cho stand up from the table Hermione walked purposefully after her, along the rows of tables and out of the great hall. She managed to catch her up and call her name on one of the corridors she assumed lead the Ravenclaw common room.
"Cho!" Hermione called. Cho spun around her expression darkening into anger as she saw who had called after her.
"I don't believe this, what the hell do you want?" Cho said sharply.
"Cho I just want to talk to you, I want to explain." Hermione said calmly.
"I have nothing to say to you, you and Harry can't explain yourself out of this one. Just do me a favour, and leave me alone." Cho said turning as if to storm off again.
"No Cho, just hear me out." Hermione said, Cho stopped and turned back around.
"Give me one reason why I should listen to you." Cho said defiantly.
"Because I think you've miss-understood and I want to explain something to you." Hermione said, still keeping her voice calm and collected.
"No Hermione, you've miss-understood, you've miss-understood the words leave me alone!" Cho said, her voice raising in pitch. Hermione started to feel her own anger rising in her stomach. Cho had no right to be like this towards her.
"Cho, you haven't given me a chance to explain if y-"
"No Hermione! I don't want yours or Harry's explanations, I'm not letting you do this to me again!"
"Cho, you're doing this to yourself, if you don't listen you'll never know the truth!" Hermione herself was past talking calmly, she was aggravated by Cho's incapability to listen.
"I KNOW THE TRUTH WITHOUT YOU OR HARRY TRYING TO DIG YOUR WAY OUT OF GUILT! THAT'S ALL YOUR GOOD AT, EXPLAINING YOU'RE WAY OUT OF SITUATIONS YOU DESERVE TO BE IN! NEITHER OF YOU CAN BE TRUSTED!"
"IT'S BECAUSE YOU DON'T TRUST PEOPLE THAT YOU GET INTO PLACES LIKE THIS WHERE YOU THINK EVERYONE'S LYING, YOU DON'T GIVE ANYONE THE CHOICE TO SHOW YOU WHERE YOU'RE GOING WRONG!" Hermione wasn't taking this, she wasn't letting Cho just walk away thinking she could just yell at anyone and make accusations with nothing but her own knowledge to back them up.
"OH YEH RIGHT! COME ON THEN WHAT'S YOUR BIG EXCUSE FOR HARRY AND YOU! I'M LISTENING." Cho said very sarcastically, making it extremely obvious Hermione could never change her mind. Hermione gritted her teeth, fighting back the urge to do something physically painful to Cho, just to show her how much anger was coursing through her. She pulled something from her pocket and thrust it at Cho.
"There you go, I got that letter of Ron, Ron Weasley, I came to the library to talk to Harry, to show it to him. I was upset and confused, he was supposed to be our best friend. Harry comforted me, because that's what friends do, they look after each other and help each other out, sort stuff out and get through it all together." Hermione said venomously, tears were starting to build in her eyes. she felt suddenly sad again at the thought of Ron.
"Happy now!?" she said fighting back the tears, then before they spilled over Hermione turned on her heel and ran from the scene. Leaving Cho to read the letter to herself and think about what Hermione had said.
Hermione broke into a run down the corridors trying to force back the tears. She sprinted up to Gryffindor tower, through the portrait hole and up to her dormitory where the sadness finally caught up with her. She lay face down on her four-poster sobbing quietly into her pillow.
Cho's POV:Solitary, silent tears fell from Cho's deep brown eyes. The letter Hermione had given to Cho was crumpled in her hand. But the letter wasn't the source of her sadness. She wept for Harry, and even partially for Hermione. She couldn't believe how selfish she'd been towards them. She'd jumped to conclusions and now she'd lost her boyfriend, would he ever take her back after this.
A fresh wave of grief washed over her and more tears broke the barriers and spilled to the floor. She knew how close Harry, Ron and Hermione had been, she couldn't imagine how this made them feel. All see could do was hope they could forgive her. She knew that tomorrow she'd have to find Harry and apologize for everything she'd done.
This should have been a time when she'd been there to comfort Harry, but instead she'd been so blind and shallow that she'd jumped to conclusions and ruined what they had. Was it too late to repair it?
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The next morning at breakfast Cho just sat in silence, looking blankly at her plate of toast. She couldn't eat with the weight of guilt still upon her.
Eventually she saw Harry stand up from the table with Kieran and Hermione, so she took a deep breath and got up to follow them. Just outside the great hall she called after them.
"Harry, wait." She called, her voice slightly more squeaky and nervous than she would have liked. He turned to look at her. His expression was unreadable, so many emotions seemed to cloud his features. Hermione looked slightly angry but partly expectant. Kieran turned to leave, knowing that Cho wouldn't want him listening too, and after several seconds Hermione did the same, leaving Harry and Cho alone. "Harry….I um…..need to talk to you." Cho said not meeting his piercing gaze.
"Didn't want to not so long ago." Harry said flatly. Cho looked up, biting her lip.
"I know, and I'm…….I'm sorry." Cho said giving Harry a pleading look. "I'm sorry that I jumped to conclusions about you and Hermione without talking to you, I'm sorry I wouldn't listen to you and I'm sorry for everything I've done to ruin things between us recently." Cho said. Harry seemed to think about what she'd said for a while before breaking into a smile and moving towards Cho to embrace her. She gratefully returned the hug a feeling of great happiness and not losing everything.
When they broke apart Harry looked at her very seriously and said:
"You have to understand there will never be anything between me and Hermione or any other girl, I could only ever love you Cho. I hope you never doubt that again." Cho nodded biting back tears once again at Harry's words.
"No, I promise……" Cho replied smiling, she eyes sparkled with tears, but her voice was full of truth and love. Harry closed the gap between them once again and kissed her. The familiar electric feeling shot through his body as he tasted her lips once again, promising himself he would never let anything happen to them again. This time their love was bound, the immature break-ups and fights were over, this was how it was meant to be, and this was how it was going to stay.
When they broke apart Harry saw tears in Cho's eyes, he reached to her face and brushed them away.
"Hey, everything's gonna be fine now." He said, he voice barley more than a whisper. Cho nodded and sniffed.
"Yeh, I know, sorry." She said smiling and brushing the rest of the tears from her eyes.
"Come on we've got lessons to go to. I'll see you tonight, same time same place?" Harry asked as the piercing school bell echoed through the corridors. Cho nodded and then they turned from the scene and walked hand in hand to their lessons, hopefully into a better day than the previous.
Harry sailed through his lessons that day, with a happy feeling in his chest. Hermione seemed more at ease too once he'd told her about what Cho had said. Even Kieran seemed to have a more contented attitude. The trio entered dinner talking happily and sat down continuing their conversation over their food.
Even as Harry sat doing his large amounts of homework, before he went to meet Cho in the room of requirements he couldn't shake the happy feeling away. There was still a slight spring in his step as he headed to the room of requirements and he greeted Cho with a smile when she arrived. The conversation was light and cheery for about half an hour, before they finally turned to the real reason they came here. To talk about Lord Voldemort. Though they had a hard time finding anything to talk about to begin with. No signs had started occurring.
"He's probably just lying low, he must have learnt from his mistakes last year." Harry pondered.
"Yeh, um…..Harry I've been meaning to ask you if you know what Dumbledore and the Order are doing about Voldemort, I mean do they a plan or something?" she asked. Harry thought about it for several seconds.
"I have no idea, I'm not a member of the Order yet, so I don't get to know much, but I guess we could always ask Dumbledore." He suggested.
"Yeh, that's a good idea." Cho replied.
"We could go now, it's not too late." Harry said looking briefly at his watch. Cho shrugged.
"Ok, come on." she said. So the couple left the room of requirement and headed in the direction of Dumbledore's office. Harry muttered the password to the statue, which sprung away leaving the way clear for Harry and Cho to climb on to the moving staircase. Harry knocked on the door and heard Dumbledore's voice call from inside.
"Enter." Harry pushed the door open and they stepped inside. Dumbledore greeted them with a smile a gestured to two chairs, which they took. "Now what can I do for you two?" Dumbledore asked. Peering through his half moon glasses to the two teenagers.
"We were just wondering some stuff about the Order." Harry said.
"Ah, yes, I thought you might have some questions. But first I must inform you before I forget. I have talked to the members of the Order and we have decided that both of you will be allowed to join." Dumbledore said, smiling. Harry face lit up with excitement.
"Really Professor?" Harry said, slightly disbelievingly.
"Yes Harry, not only yourself and miss Chang but also, if she wishes, Miss Granger may also be accepted into the Order." Harry's already good mood, inflated even more.
"Thank you so much Professor." He said, looking to Cho who had a very excited expression on her face.
"Yes, thank you very much Professor Dumbledore, it's a great honour." Cho said, she'd totally forgotten about what Harry had said about the possibility of them joining the Order. And now to actually being accepted made her realise what a special privilege this was. Dumbledore talked them through what joining the Order involved, all the stuff Harry had heard before, about being prepared to risk your life for the Order and be ready to be called upon for assistance at any moment.
It was getting pretty late before they even got around to talking about what they'd really come here to ask Dumbledore about.
"Now that all that is out of the way, what did you two really come to talk to me about?" Dumbledore asked eventually.
"We were just wondering what the Order was doing at the moment." Harry said, hoping that was the right way to put it. "I mean, against Voldemort and stuff." Dumbledore paused for several moments, as if thinking about what Harry had said.
"The situation is very complicated, but we at the order are doing anything and everything possible to be prepared for war. We are always gathering supporter, preparing them for war, we are creating what you might call an army." Dumbledore said. Harry or Cho were speechless for a while as images of armies marching against Voldemort and the deatheaters were conjured in their minds.
"How many supporters does the Order have?" Harry asked eventually.
"Well as you know, it's very hard to spread the word of the Order, we have to make sure no-one who could possibly tell Voldemort finds out about us. Everyone has to take extreme precautions to keep this a secret. But so far, there a about 500 wizards and witches able and prepared to join to fight against Voldemort." Harry's eyes widened as he took in this news. There was a moments silence while Harry remembered what other question he wanted to ask.
"Do you know anything about what Voldemort is up to yet? When he might strike?" Harry said eventually. Dumbledore sighed.
"Unfortunately not, we think he's lying low, so he can gather his deatheaters and prepare for an attack." Dumbledore finished. There wasn't much left to say after that. So Harry and Cho left soon after walking through the corridors hand in hand talking lightly about joining the Order.
Their meeting with Dumbledore had answered their questions, but they still didn't know where to go from here. So when they reached the staircase where they parted ways, Harry said:
"We'll have to talk again soon." Cho nodded in agreement.
"Yeh, I'll owl you or you can owl me whenever." She said.
"Ok." He said, pulling her close to kiss her. He felt the familiar feeling of elation when their lips touched, the feeling that never died, no matter how many times their lips met with a kiss. The feeling that kept him wishing for more, wishing he could be like this with Cho forever. The feeling of love.
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Ok, there ya go! That's it for chapter 26! Hope you liked it, I know it was a bit longer than recent chapters, but hey! I'm sure you don't mind! Now go review!