Chapter Fifteen: Gryffindor vs Hufflepuff

It was very late when Ginny climbed in through the portrait hole, breathless from her exercise.  She paused,  not expecting to see the fire still burning brightly in the fireplace, nor to find three people huddled together at one of the tables, books open and quills scratching hastily across parchment. 

"Where've you been?" asked her brother.  "It's a bit late out, don't you think?"  Although Harry's back was facing Ginny, she saw him stiffen slightly once he'd realised that it was she who'd entered. 

"Out riding," she replied.  Screwing up her courage, she came towards them, deciding she'd only look like the world's biggest coward if she didn't, and she made a point of standing right next to Harry, although she wasn't able to look over at him just yet.

"You should be studying," Hermione said briskly, "not out on that broom of yours."  She motioned to the broom Ginny was clutching.

"Well, I had to try it out just once before the game." 

"And?"

"It's fine," Ginny smiled for the first time that day.

"Good," yawned Ron as he slammed his book closed.  "I'm dead beat."

"Yes, me too," agreed Hermione.  "I'm on watch early tomorrow, and you—" she shook her quill at Ron, "—you have to go explain to Professor McGonagall why you took fifty points from Slytherin this afternoon."

"What was I supposed to do? Let that little conniving first year get away with selling that dead parrot to those Hufflepuffs?"

"No, but…well, I guess you did have good reason."

"Damned right I did!"

Hermione frowned at Ron's choice of words, but just shook her head.  "Come on, let's go to bed.  'Night Harry," she added.  Ginny noticed Hermione didn't extend the greeting to her as well.  Ron smiled sheepishly at his sister, then followed Hermione up the stairs.

Go on. Say something.

What?  What do I say at this point?   " Sorry for leaving you for dead on the common room floor last night."  Yeah, that'll go down well. 

Was it just last night? Seemed longer than that to me.

Just as Ginny took a breath to say something, a shriek from upstairs made both her and Harry jump.

"But you said  'let's go to bed!'" Ron protested, grinning madly as he was almost shoved downstairs by Hermione.

"That's not what I meant and you know it!"  Hermione hissed back.  "Now go to bed! Your own bed!" she added, when Ron looked as though he was going to turn around and head back up.

Silence crept back into the now empty common room once Ron had retreated up the boys' staircase.  Ginny couldn't help but giggle at the antics of her brother.

"I wish I could be more like him," Harry said quietly, startling her.

"Why?"

"Because," He finally turned to face her, "you always know what he's thinking.  Never makes any attempt to hide his feelings.  I wish I could do that."

"Oh," Ginny said, not knowing what to say really.  She'd never really thought about it much, to be honest, but then she'd been living with Ron for her entire life—minus the year separation during his first year at Hogwarts, and thus didn't pick up on the many nuances of her brother.

"I think that's why he and Hermione make such a good couple," Harry continued on absently, "I know everyone says they fight a lot, but I think that helps the relationship, you know?  If something's bothering them, they tell the other, right then and there.  Clears the air.  They don't let things sit and fester, keeping things bottled up inside until you feel like you're going to explode."

Ginny nodded. They stared at each other for endless moments, each waiting for the other to make the first move.

Come on! He's given you the perfect opening!  SAY IT!

I can't…

"Well, I'm off.  We've got to get up early tomorrow." She watched Harry gather up his books and throw them in his bag.  He paused just as he passed her, still standing there.

SAY IT!

" 'Night," he whispered.

"Good night," she croaked, inwardly cringing at her cowardice.

What a wuss!

****

Harry threw his bag on top of his trunk, ignoring the sleepy protests from Seamus, who snorted, then rolled over and mumbled something about Parvati.

Coward! You had the most perfect opportunity—

I know!  I just couldn't do it!

So now what? You're just going to pretend nothing happened?

I don't know! I just couldn't say what I wanted to say…

So instead you said a bunch of rubbish…

"You still up, Harry?" Ron yawned and pulled back the curtains to his bed.  "We've got a big game tomorrow."

"I'm going, I'm going," Harry murmured, throwing back the curtains to his own bed and sliding beneath the duvet.

"Sure could cut the tension between you and Gin with a machete," Ron observed sleepily. 

"Yeah," agreed Harry.

"Ginny can't stay mad forever.  I think the longest she stayed mad was the time I turned her pet rabbit into a snake because she painted my Puffskein pink.  Ginny's scared to death of snakes," he chuckled.  "Ironic, huh?  Anyway, she didn't speak to me for about three weeks.  So, you don't have long to wait."  Ron grinned, "Besides, you can probably turn on the old charm and get her speaking to you in no time.  I mean, that's what I always do when Hermione gets all riled up, and she's never gone longer than a day without speaking to me," he laughed, running a hand through his red hair.   "Although, I have the famous Weasley grin which manages to turn her into butter with one look."  Ron yawned sleepily and rolled over.  "But I'm sure you probably have something Ginny finds irresistible…just use it."

That's not bad advice.

But what do we have that she finds irresistible?

Besides a well-kept Firebolt?

She's got her own now, remember?

Oh yeah.

There's got to be something…there's just got to be.

And with that thought, Harry finally settled down and went to sleep.

****

Ginny stood at the door of the locker room, tapping her foot impatiently.  She'd woke up early that morning and headed straight for the pitch, getting a feel for the day's playing conditions.  The weather was nice and chilly, with just a hint of morning fog which would hopefully burn off before the game.  The ground was nice and hard, ensuring a swift kick off.  By the time she'd got to the locker room, nearly every one was there.  She glanced around the room, her gaze pausing on the dark haired figure in the corner, who gave her a funny sort of wink, or at least it looked like a wink.  Ginny wasn't sure.

"Where's John?" she finally demanded, looking at Paul, who—as John's best friend—would be the one to know his whereabouts..  Paul glanced at Dennis and swallowed nervously.  Ron gave a slight snigger from his spot on the bench, lacing up his shoes.    

"Well?"

"He's in bed," Paul squeaked. "He's not coming down."  He quickly looked down at the floor, as though he was afraid to look at her.


"WHAT?!" Ginny was thunderstruck.  "He's sick?  Why didn't anyone tell me before now?" she fumed, starting to head toward the entrance.

"He's not sick," Dennis said quickly, as though this news would reassure her.  Ginny turned around.  "He's just not coming down."

Ginny goggled at him.  What on earth was wrong?  If John wasn't sick…

"John says he's not getting up from bed until you go apologise to him," Paul finally explained, still fascinated with the scarlet and gold tile floor.  "He said that he's exercising  his rights as a Beater to protest against—"

Ginny, however, didn't wait hear what John was protesting against, as she had already dashed through the door and was running back up to Gryffindor Tower.  Pushing her way through the morning crowd of Gryffindors, who were all sleepy-eyed and confused as to why their Quidditch Captain appeared as though she'd snap the head off the first person who asked her what she was doing, Ginny forced her way into the 2nd year boys room.  It didn't take long to figure out which bed was John's, he was sitting up in it, curtains pulled back, wearing—for some unfathomable reason—a brown paper bag over his head. 

"Come on Johnny, get up!" cried a sandy haired boy.  "They're all waiting for you!"

The brown paper bag shook slightly.  Ginny paused at the foot of the bed, knowing if she didn't take time to count to ten, she was going to end up breaking something—or someone—and knew she could not afford to end up breaking her Beater just before a game.

"John," she said quietly, "We have a game in exactly thirty minutes.  Why don't you come down and change?  It'll hardly do for you to be wearing your pajamas during the match."  She was rather proud of how she didn't raise her voice and managed to insert a joke when she was definitely not in a joking mood.

The bag shook again.  "John," she repeated a bit more forcefully, "I'm going to give you until the count of ten."

"Apologise!" John's voice was muffled by the bag.

"For what?" cried Ginny, losing her temper at last.  "I've not done anything!"

"You hurt my feelings yesterday!" The brown paper bag was nodding furiously.  "You said you didn't care about what Mae—"

Ginny couldn't believe what she was hearing.  What was more important to John, Quidditch or his pathetic girlfriend? "I'm going to hurt more than your feelings if you don't get out of that bed this instant! Of all the insane, ridiculous—"  Ginny snatched the bag from John's head.  He blinked in surprise, blinded by the sudden light.   Before John could blink again, Ginny had grabbed him by his—

"OW!" he hollered, causing the stained glass windows to shudder violently.  "That's my ear!"

"It's going to be worse than that if you don't start getting dressed!" Ginny yelled back just as loudly, opening John's trunk and throwing his Quidditch trousers and jumper at him.  "Now get dressed!"

It was a strange procession back to the Gryffindor locker room with John clutching his ear and hopping occasionally due to a sprained ankle sustained when Ginny had shoved him down the stairs.  The commotion in the 2nd year boys' room attracted the attention of quite a few curious onlookers who followed Ginny and John down, sniggering here and there, and talking excitedly about the upcoming match.

"Help!" cried John.  "Won't someone please, please help me?"

"Shut it, you!"

"You've hurt my foot!" wailed  John.  "I can't play like this!" he protested, hopping on his other foot and clutching his right.

"You'll be in the air, you dolt.  You won't need to use your feet much anyway—you're on a broomstick for heaven's sake!"

"It's about time!" Ron exclaimed excitedly, opening the door to the locker room to let the pair in.  "Madam Hooch just came by to see what the hold-up was."

"We're all here now," said Ginny crossly, slipping on her leather gloves and reaching in her locker for her Firebolt, stopping to check and make sure it was ok.  The polish on it was so shiny, she could see the image of Harry furiously shining his own Firebolt in the corner.  Their gazes met in the reflection on her handle and he winked.  Ginny blinked in puzzlement.

"Are we ready?" she asked, turning around.

"YES!" came the resounding cry.

"Let's go!"

****

"You know the rules," called Madam Hooch.  "I want a good clean fight.  Captains," she pointed to Ginny and Justin Finch-Fletchley, "shake hands."  The whistle blew, and the game began.

"And it's Hoopsis with the Quaffle," said Nigel Roache.  "Amy Hoopsis of Hufflepuff, that is—we have a lot of Amys here at Hogwarts.  Pitiful name, if you ask me."  Jeers and Boos followed this comment, most likely from the many Amys present at the game.

Ginny darted after the Hufflepuff Chaser, but paused in mid-air, realizing something wasn't quite right with the game.

"What is she doing?" Sue giggled as she skidded beside Ginny.  Ginny noticed that all the players, including the Hufflepuff Keeper, were in total shock.  Even Madam Hooch paused from her referee duties, her whistle hanging limply from her bottom lip.

"AMY!" cried another Hufflepuff Chaser in a desperate attempt to stop her, but it was too late.

"Well, this is something you don't see every day," chortled Nigel in his magical megaphone.  "Seems like Amy got a bit confused, or lost…" He paused to snigger, while the entire stands were erupting in fits of giggles, "Chaser Hoopsis just scored the first ten points of the game….for GRYFFINDOR!" 

"The expressions on the Hufflepuffs' faces are priceless," Nigel said, clutching a stitch in his side.  "I guess there are some things money can't buy."

Ginny's new Firebolt, once she got a chance to put it in action, was simply brilliant.  She weaved through the other players, swooping in and out with ease. 

"And Captain Weasley seems to be putting her new Firebolt to good use, although one does wonder how she came into possession of a new Firebolt.  The Weasley family isn't exactly known for their wealth, if the state of their robes is any indication, so maybe Weasley had to turn a few tricks," Nigel said glibly, dodging thrown objects from the Gryffindors in the stands.  "Can't expect Potter contributed anything, word has it she's responsible for that pretty black eye of his."

"Now, now Roache," said Snape silkily.  "You're here to comment on Quidditch, not give us the latest gossip."

"Right you are, Professor.  Just giving a bit of bedroom…I mean, background information."

Ginny barely heard the comments, she was too busy dodging a Bludger aimed at her by one of the Hufflepuff Beaters.  "Sorry to do this to you," said Richard, one of the Beaters as he aimed another Bludger at her, forcing Ginny to roll over in mid-air and nearly crash into Dennis, "but it's only a game, you know."

"And Beater Richard Starkey aims two nicely hit Bludgers at Weasley, a spectacular feat when considering the weight from those rings he wears.  Quaffle taken by Maxwell,  passes off to Weasley, tosses over the shoulder to Creevey, and he scores!  Twenty points for Gryffindor—although I don't think the first ten should count."

Ginny cheered as Sue circled the goal posts.  Harry wasn't far from her, cheering Sue on as well, and once again, he met her gaze and winked.  Ginny frowned.

"Time out!" she motioned to Madam Hooch, who blew her whistle.

"What's up?" Ron asked as he landed next to her.  "We're twenty points up, and barely did a thing!" 

 "Harry, are you ok?"  Ginny asked, completely ignoring her brother.

"Fine," he said, puzzled.  "Why?"

"Is something wrong with your eye?"  Ron let out a surprised snigger.  "Not that one!  The other one!"

"Nothing's wrong with my eye!  Why?"

"You keep on winking!  Like there's something lodged in it or something. Are you ok?" 

"I noticed that too," Paul piped in.  "You have been doing an abnormal amount of winking."

Harry blushed.  "Oh, no…I'm…I'm…erm…nothing's wrong with my eye.  I'm fine," he said quickly. 

Ginny had the feeling he was lying.  "Are you sure?"

"Yes!" Harry gritted out.  "I'm fine!  Can we get back to the game, now?"

The second half of the game got increasingly nastier, especially when Gryffindor gained a 50 point lead.  Apparently, Justin and the rest of the Hufflepuffs had used their time out to make a new strategy.  Either that or they'd taken a few leaves from the Slytherins' book, although they were being a bit nice about it all.  Every time one of the Gryffindors got hit with a Bludger, it was, "Sorry! Didn't mean to hit it that hard!" from the Hufflepuff Beaters, who grinned apologetically. 

To make things worse, Ginny's Firebolt was acting up a bit.  Nothing that she couldn't handle, or at least she hoped it wasn't, but the Firebolt kept on alternating speed, which wasn't right.  Maybe she could conceal the problem if she could just manage to—

"Looks like the new Firebolt might not be up to scratch, does it?  Weasley seems to have a problem with the speed control.  Maybe that's how she bought the thing in the first place, it must've been on sale from the Firebolt Outlet shop."

Or maybe not.

Ginny was trying to keep the Firebolt under control, but the damned thing seemed to have a mind of its own.  It kept on speeding up, faster and faster, making it nearly impossible for Ginny turn it.  Ginny became frightened, what if she couldn't stop?  Screams erupted from the stands as Ginny swooped down, heading straight for the crowd.  Ginny tried to steer the broom away from the Ravenclaw stands, but no such luck.

SMACK!  Ginny was jarred from the impact, but the speed of the Firebolt was such that her fingers never loosened from their death grip on the handle. 

"And Weasley plows straight into the Ravenclaw stands, nearly killing several people, although it only looks like one person is actually hurt.  Looks like Carrie Grouse—Grousen—oh, what the hell, I can't pronounce it.  Anyway, looks like Carrie's got a broken arm."

"I'm so sorry Carrie!  Are you ok?" Ginny shouted, just managing to duck and avoid getting beheaded by the roof over the Ravenclaw stands. 

Then Ginny felt the Firebolt slowing down, and suddenly she could control it again.  Quickly, she headed back into the pitch.

"ARE YOU CRAZY?!" Harry yelled, pulling up beside her.  "You're going to get killed!" He looked back over at the Ravenclaw stands, still in chaos from Ginny's flight.  "Or kill someone! "

"I'm fine! Go get the Snitch so we can end this game and have done with it!" she shouted back, catching the Quaffle as one of the Hufflepuff Chasers dropped it. 

The game continued on, Ginny's broom now behaving like it should.  During her out of control flight, Hufflepuff had managed to score three more times, making the score seventy to forty. 

"Seeker Finch-Fletchley has spotted the Snitch just beyond the Gryffindor goal posts.  Potter's on his way…both are heading towards it….they could crash….oh, but the Snitch dodges past Keeper Weasley….Finch-Fletchley is so close…"

Ginny whirled around in mid-air, stunned the fact that Justin might actually get to the Snitch before Harry.  The Snitch was just above Ron's head, who saw what was going to happen, and…

"NO WAY!  FOUL!" cried Nigel, making everyone in the stands clutch their ears in pain.  "Weasley Snitchnipped!  Ron Weasley grabbed the Golden Snitch!"

Ginny could have kissed her brother.  He pulled a Snitchnip, so that while the penalty might be for Hufflepuff, it prevented them from out and out winning the game.  

"We all knew Weasley wanted to be just like Potter, but this is a bit much!" Nigel sneered.  "I've not seen anyone attempt a Snitchnip.  What a revolting move by the Gryffindors.  I've not seen such a disgusting move, such a foul and despicable play—"

"Since Slytherin's last match," John said as he flew by Ginny. 

Hufflepuff got the penalty shot, making them only 20 points down.  Ginny kicked her broom into high speed, which probably wasn't a good idea considering what had happened earlier, but it was only shaking a little, nothing to worry about. 

"Weasley's got the Quaffle—mind you that's Ginny Weasley and not her brother, although I sometimes have trouble telling them apart," Nigel said, earning more sniggers from the Slytherin stands.  "She's speeding up on that death stick she's flying….she's in scoring range….wait! She's not stopping!  She's going right through the scoring area…looks like her broom is out of control again…Oh NO!  She just slammed into the Hufflepuff goal post.  That's gotta hurt!  She's unconscious, so maybe she didn't feel much—" Sudden cheering from the Hufflepuff crowd, drew Nigel's attention—" What's this?  Looks like Finch-Fletchley caught the Snitch!  YES!  He did!  The game is over folks! Looks like it's better that Weasley got knocked out, if you ask me!  HUFFLEPUFF WINS!  GRYFFINDOR LOST THE GAME!"

****

A/N: This chapter is dedicated to PW and Liz, creators of that little "poll" on GryffindorTower.net  and everyone else who voted in it.  *Shakes fist at them all  in a Scooby Doo villian-ish way*  "Your pathetic attempts to get me to update have worked! But you'll not be so lucky next time!" *evil laugh*  Note to the two people who voted "never":  AH HA!   And hey, does this mean Book Five is coming out soon? J    This also goes out to Carrie, while Amy and I didn't break her arm, she did get hurt,  and well…we're sorry we broke you Carrie! Hope you're ok, now!  And to Anne for betaing, and for messing up my word count…not that I pay attention to such frivolous things as word count.