Fleur Delacour was sitting at the end of the Ravenclaw Table at breakfast, not wanting to talk to anyone, angry with herself and her imperfect performance against the Welsh Green dragon. She had expected it to be fairly easy as she was indeed a seventh year, female and powerful. However, she had let herself get careless and be set on fire. Though she had calmly extinguished herself, she should have been able to retrieve the egg earlier. She stabbed a sausage furiously, not caring that others at the table were giving her strange looks as well as the usual lovey dovey drooling looks. How it all just pissed her off so much.
'It is so stupid. I was so stupid. Such an easy task,' she grumbled to herself.
She then heard a row going on at the Gryffindor table, Harry Potter and his two friends were arguing, about who knew what. She certainly did not care much, but she knew it was probably the boys' fault, she'd often seen the girl storming off in exasperation in her short visit so far. Fleur glanced over at Harry irritably, having good mind to yell at him to quieten down.
She watched as the bushy, chocolate brown haired vixen got up... 'Hang on!' thought Fleur furiously, 'vixen'? Where on earth did THAT come from?
Well, she was rather good looking, cute rather than attractive just yet. She probably hadn't fully developed into the beautiful young woman like Fleur was now. However, Fleur had always been pretty, which was now accentuated as she was at the sexy age of 17. 'Oh, she's leaving!' thought Fleur, and on complete impulse, she reached out and snatched Hermione's hand, dragging the Gryffindor to sit down beside her.
Hermione was utterly surprised at someone from the Ravenclaw table to touch her, let alone grab her. She was about to angrily tell them to let go when she realised that it was Fleur.
'Why did you do that?' she demanded angrily, though a little less furious.
Fleur shrugged, 'Well, I thought that you'd might like to sit here. Away from those little boys. It's not as noisy and you could finish your breakfast here. There's plenty of room here.'
Hermione was at a loss for words. She smiled a little at Fleur and sat down back down next to Fleur. Fleur nonchalantly pretended to be interested in eating her sausage and mash, annoyed at herself for babbling.
Hermione decided that she was indeed quite hungry and reached for the sausages and mash also. She suddenly felt self concious, 'Um, thanks for er... making me, I mean letting me sit here.I'd probably be really hungry during Potions otherwise.'
'My thoughts exactly, here I'll pour you some pumpkin juice,' replied Fleur, wondering at her behaviour towards the younger girl.
'Thanks,' said Hermione, digging into her breakfast.
'My, what a healthy appetite you have,' commented Fleur good naturedly.
Hermione blushed and slowed down a bit.
'Oh by all means don't stop! I just thought that most girls around here barely ate much anyways, wanting to keep their figures or some other rubbish like that,' said Fleur, amused.
Hermione swallowed, 'I agree! It's ridiculous to expect someone to keep in shape by just not eating!'
Fleur finished her leftover mash and proceeded to watch Hermione finish her own breakfast. Hermione felt Fleur's eyes and nervously gobbled up the last bit of sausage rather speedily, resulting in her choking. Fleur panicked slightly and rushed to aid Hermione to dislodge the offending piece of meat. Hermione coughed violently and drank from the glass Fleur offered to her. She glanced at Fleur, feeling flushed from embarrassing herself.
'Um. Thanks again for this time saving my life,' joked Hermione, getting up.
'Sure, anytime,' replied Fleur, watching the beet red Gryffindor leave the Great Hall quick smart.
Hermione left the Great Hall feeling very odd. Why did Fleur grab her? Really did she mean to help her? Surely not? Someone she hardly knew, someone she had not even met properly.
'Omigosh! I didn't even introduce myself!' gasped Hermione loudly, receiving odd looks form the students around her from the sudden outburst.
Hermione raced back to the Great Hall, but Fleur had all but vanished.
'Bother! Now I'll just have to magically bump into her before the end of the Triwizard tournament!' grumbled Hermione.
She felt rather rude and disappointed as Fleur had not decided to iniate introductions either, but then she wouldn't have needed to. Everyone at Hogwarts knew who Fleur was, knew her pretty face that lit up the room whenever she appeared. Not like Hermione, most scattered, afraid that Hermione would scold them for loitering or being too loud. She liked her peace and quiet. So did Fleur it seemed. She had not been sitting in the midst of crowds of her fans. In fact she had been sitting on the end of the table by herself.
Hermione found it quite odd, but dismissed the thought as Harry and Ron caught up with her, apologising as they made their way to Potions.
Hermione was just finishing copying the last paragraph from the textbook about wand holds in Charms in the afternoon.
'Why did they have to cancel Quidditch? Honestly! I reckon I'd not feel so weird with the Triwizard Tournament if I had Quidditch to distract me!' complained Harry.
Ron agreed whole heartedly, Hermione turned away and tuned out. She didn't want to hear anymore about their qualms of the sport. She had no interest in it at all. Looking around she spotted shiny golden hair flourishing in the wind, just outside the classroom. It was Fleur! She was about to get up when she remembered where she was. She couldn't go greet Fleur, not in the middle of class. She racked her brains.
'Ah, Professor, may I please go to the bathroom?' she inquired.
'Miss Granger, can't you wait another 15 minutes?' asked Professor Flitwick, though not as annoyed as she thought he would be.
'No, sorry sir. I have finished writing about wand holds,' pressed Hermione.
'Oh, alright then, but try to be quick about it,' replied Flitwick, waving her to go.
She raced out, though not undignified. She did however turn the corner quite abruptly and ran smack bang into Fleur, who exclaimed angrily in French.
'Sacre bleu! Watch where you're going! Oh, it's you Hermione. Shouldn't you be in class?' asked Fleur, surprised.
'Oh Fleur! I'm sorry. Um, how did you know my name? I'm sorry, I didn't introduce myself earlier,' gasped Hermione.
'It's ok. I had forgotten too, but I know your name because I heard 'Arry yelling at you this morning,' replied Fleur, trying to hide her oncoming grin.
Hermione calmed herself down, 'Oh. How embarrassing,' she muttered.
Fleur turned Hermione's cheek towards her, 'I thought it was cute, plus I learned your name.'
Hermione blushed and smiled at Fleur, who returned one to her gently. Fleur found her chance to pounce.
Fleur cleared her throat, 'Well, you'd better return to class, your Professor might give you detention. And we wouldn't want that now would we, if you are to join me for dinner tonight.'
Hermione did a double take, 'You want to eat dinner with ME!'
'Is that so odd? You are very interesting, I'd like to get to know you better,' replied Fleur airily.
'Um, ok. Not that I want to be with the boys anyway. Sometimes I wish I had more girlfriends. I... I I mean friends who are girls!' blustered Hermione, mentally slapping herself.
' I know what you mean, ma chere,' Fleur stopped immediately, not meaning to let the last bit slip.
Fortunately for her, Hermione didn't actually know French. Except maybe 'oui'.
'What does 'ma chere' mean?' inquired Hermione curiously.
'Ah, just means 'my friend',' replied Fleur.
'Ok, well, yes. So... I'll see you tonight then. Um.. your table or mine?' asked Hermione.
'How my table, since you wish to be away from the boys,' suggested Fleur.
Hermione glanced at her watch, 'Yes. Ok, sorry Fleur. I'll see you later. Omigosh!'
Fleur watched her run off, feeling elated at their soon to be dinner 'date'.
Hermione was ecstatic, dinner WITHOUT the unintelligible babble of Harry and Ron, as much as she loved them. Sometimes she felt that they were truly stupid, though Harry a little more understanding than Ron. She was delighted to have a friend who was a girl and seemingly very knowledgeable, after all, Fleur was 7th year AND TriWizard Champion for Beauxbatons.
She didn't think that Ginny was quite what she thought of as a best friend. Ginny was still too young. Fleur was bound to be an extremely interesting person. Hermione felt regret in insulting Fleur behind her back previously. She grinned sillily, which Ginny spotted in the common room.
'What's up with you? Get your marks back early?' Ginny laughed.
'No! I don't ALWAYS think of my grades. I'm not that bad,' replied Hermione, mock scowling.
'What then, is making you so giggly happy?' asked Ginny earnestly.
'It's a secret,' whispered Hermione as she headed for the Great Hall.
'Hopeless, that one,' said Ginny to Lavender.
Lavender rolled her eyes in agreement.