A/N: Hey guys! So here is the chapter I promised! This chapter is about Harry's tryout and the next is a short one that has it's importance and then the last one is pretty long , when they go to Hogsmede before Christmas. I have finally decided on Christmas present ideas and when they come up I will thank the people who gave me the ideas.
So on with the chapter...
One and Only
Chapter Fourteen
The next day Harry woke up, feeling both excited and nervous. Ginny stirred next to him and smiled over at him.
"Are you excited?" She asked.
"More nervous than anything." He responded. Ginny smiled at him and took his hand. She gave it a comforting squeeze.
"You are the best seeker there is. Once they see you, they'll be begging to have you on their team." Ginny assured him. Harry smiled back at her.
"I love you." He said.
"And I love you." She responded. "You'll be great."
"Thanks." He said. She leaned over and gave him a kiss.
"Your welcome now let's get Ron and Hermione up." Ginny said. She smiled mischievously.
Harry and Ginny both took pillows and hit Hermione and Ron with them until the got up. This led to a fifteen-minute pillow fight. After they got that sorted out they all head up to Gryffindor tower. Hermione and Ginny started for the girl's dormitory. Hermione stopped Ginny on the stairs.
"How's he doing?" Hermione asked.
"He's a bit nervous but I know he'll do fine." Ginny said. Hermione smiled.
"Yeah, he's been seeker since he was eleven. He knows what he's doing." Hermione said. The girls went up to their own dormitories. Hermione put on a pair of jeans and a light blue shirt. Hermione grabbed her black jacket, pink and white knitted scarf, and a matching hat. She had knitted the hat and scarf herself and they didn't look bad at all. She had gotten quite good over the years. She put on her tan ugg boots on and went down to the common room to meet the others.
They went down to breakfast and Harry picked at his food the whole time. When it was time the three on the Quidditch team stood up. "Good luck!" Hermione exclaimed. She gave Ron a kiss and Harry and Ginny hugs. They left and she made sure that she avoided Parvati at all costs. Parvati had taken to sitting next to her at each match.
With all of the matches and cheering it had taken a good toll on Hermione's voice so she found a spell to help her voice. As Seamus announced the players Hermione looked over at the stands with the teachers were and noticed an extra person sitting there. Hermione figured that it was the manager of the England team.
Hermione heard grunts and complaints from people next to her. When she looked over she saw Hagrid making his way to the seat next to her.
"'Ow is he doin'?" Hagrid asked.
"He's doing fine." Hermione assured him. "He was just nervous but he'll do fine. Did you hear about Ron's job?"
"Yeah, Ron at the Prophet, I woulda never thought." Hagrid said. "Oh look, they're startin'." Hermione and Hagrid turned their attention to the game in progress. Hermione was cheering loudly for Ron, Harry, and Ginny, and she was also sneaking peeks at the England manager. She noticed that he was watching Harry consistently, as if making sure that he wouldn't miss a thing. Hermione didn't know much about Quidditch but she did know that Harry made some pretty cool moves. She also noticed Ron making great saves and looking at her before saving them and she noticed Ginny making awesome goals and half of the ones for Gryffindor.
Hermione clutched onto Hagrid's arm as Harry dove for the snitch toward the end of the game. Harry went speeding for the ground but Malfoy was right beside him. Hermione was biting her lip and watching as Malfoy rammed into Harry. Harry was knocked off his broom and was only hanging on by a hand. Ginny had been watching through the corner of her eye as she played but abandoned the game to watch Harry with fear in her eyes. Harry was still going and tried to kick up but he had kicked Malfoy right on the butt. Malfoy complained in a whine of pain and fell five feet of his broom. Harry had a slight chuckle on his face as he tried once again to kick up. He made it and directed his broom upward toward the snitch. Hermione breathed a sigh of relief and loosened up on Hagrid's arm.
"YES!" She shouted and pumped a fist in the air as Harry made the catch. Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff roared with cheers and Slytherin with boos. Hermione and Hagrid rushed out on the field to greet the team. She gave Ron a kiss and they both went over to Harry to cheer him on. Ginny was hugging Harry as if she never wanted to let him go.
"Wonderful job 'Arry." Hagrid said. "There aint no contest." Harry smiled at Hagrid and hugged Ginny back. The manager of the England team approached Harry through all of the cheering Gryffindors.
"Congratulations Mr. Potter. You've made seeker. I don't think that there's another worthy candidate." He said. "That was an extraordinary catch and I would be stupid not to have to have you on my team. See you at practice on the first day of July." He said. Harry looked in complete shock until the Gryffindors began to cheer louder and Ron slapped him on the back.
"Th – thank you." Harry managed to spit out.
The cheering and partying was brought up to the Gryffindor common room.
"To the new England seeker!" Dean announced drunkenly, after his 13th or 14th butterbeer. Everyone had lost count with all of the partying. Ron and Harry managed to stay sober because they knew that Hermione and Ginny wouldn't be too happy with them if they drank too much.
This time Ron kept his mouth shut and listened to Harry's tale. He was happy for his best friend and he wanted him to have all of the attention like Ron had yesterday. When Ron saw Hermione in a chair asleep he was going to let Harry know that he was going to take Hermione to the Head common room but he saw Harry holding up a half asleep Ginny. The boys decided to take both girls to the Head common room.
After laying them down on couches the both of them went to chairs because Harry wanted to talk to Ron.
"What's up mate?" Ron asked quietly.
"Well I was thinking of giving Ginny a ring for Christmas and I wanted to know what you thought." Harry said.
"Lik-" Ron started in a loud voice but changed his tone. "Like proposing to her?"
"Kind of." Harry said.
"Kind of?" Ron asked. "How do you kind of propose?"
"I wanted to give her a ring to let her know that we could get married someday when she's out of Hogwarts. Kind of like a pre-proposal ring." Harry said. He looked at Ron, scared of whether Ron's reaction might be bad. Ron considered it for a moment.
"You know Hermione's been saying that Ginny's been worried about what's going to happen when we're out of Hogwarts and she's still stuck here. I think that that would be a really good thing to cheer her up. I say go for it." Ron said. He looked at Harry's awe struck face. "You have my blessing." He said in a mock serious voice. Harry chuckled at this.
"Thanks mate, and if you ever want to give Hermione a ring, then you have my blessing." Harry joked.
"Why would I need your blessing?" Ron asked confused. He didn't seem to notice the joking tone in Harry's voice.
"Because she's one of my best friends." Harry said. "I should have to give you permission if you have to give me permission to ask your sister."
"Alright." Ron laughed finally catching the joke. They laughed for a bit more until Ron asked, "So how does it feel to be the seeker for the England team?" Ron asked Harry. Harry smiled.
"It feels…amazing!" He said in a little louder than a whisper. Ron laughed.
"Congratulations." Ron said. "Now, all three of us are set. We're not Aurors like we planned but that doesn't matter now."
"Yeah, it's all good." Harry said as if he was in a dream state imagining, playing for the England team.
"Did Smith talk to you about it yet?" Ron asked.
"What do you mean?" Harry wondered.
"I assigned him to write the article about you getting the job. He wasn't too happy about it but someone's got to do it." Ron said. Harry smiled as an idea crossed his head.
"Why don't you write it?" Harry asked.
"What?" Ron asked in alarm, a little louder than he meant to.
"You should write the article." Harry explained. "It would mean a lot more coming from my best friend."
"I don't write." Ron said, plainly. "I'm only the editor."
"What about those articles on your desk?" Harry asked. "I saw them."
"Did you read them?" Ron asked, alarmed.
"No." Harry lied, badly.
"When did you read them?" Ron asked, with anger and embarrassment in his voice.
"The other day when they were on your desk and you weren't in your office. I thought that the one on cauldrons and how the type of cauldron affects the potion your making was brilliant." Harry said.
"Well –" Ron started the angry comment he had been prepared to make but then realized what Harry said. "Do you really think so?" Harry nodded. "Alright." Ron said with a bright smile. "I'll write it." Ron grabbed some parchment and began to question Harry about it and add in details. By the time Ron was done it was well past two in the morning but after reading it Harry insisted that it be put in the paper for that day. Ron was hesitant, after looking at Hermione's sleeping figure but wanted to know what people would think of his article if he put it in the Herald.
Quietly Harry and Ron slipped out of the portrait hole in their pajamas. It was a funny sight of two boys, one of which was wearing green pants with gold snitches and a white t-shirt, the other wearing Chudley Cannon pants and a short sleeve orange shirt that said Chudley Cannons across the front and a picture of the keeper.
"Should we risk getting the invisibility cloak?" Harry whispered as they started away from the head common room.
"Too risky." Ron said. "Let's just get there and get back." Harry nodded as they crept through the halls. Just as they were approaching they saw Mrs. Norris crossing. Both boys hid behind a suit of armor. Mrs. Norris passed but not before sniffing around to make sure that no one was out of bed. Luckily she missed Harry and Ron as she slinked away.
When they were sure that Mrs. Norris was gone, they sneaked into the paper office. Harry saw stacks of paper waiting by the office with pictures of Library books. The article was about allowing the younger students to use the restricted section in the library by, Denis Creevy.
"How are we supposed to change all of these?" Harry asked. Ron laughed.
"Don't tell Hermione but I have a book in my office that isn't a Quidditch book." Ron said. Harry laughed.
"Alright." Harry laughed. Ron went into his office and came back out with a book labeled: A Guide To Editing with the words: Useful Tips and Spells underneath, and a picture of Harry.
"What's the picture for?" Harry asked.
"Would you rather I take it when your wearing that?" Ron asked. "There has to be a picture for the front page article." Harry looked down at his pajamas and laughed.
"Yeah, alright that one works." He said. Ron laughed and opened the book up to somewhere in the middle of the book. With only a two words, and a wave of the wand toward the picture and article every copy of the Hogwarts Herald now had Harry's face on the front with the article right by it. Harry smiled. "Nice work mate." He said.
"Thanks." Ron said. They both picked up a copy of the Hogwarts Herald and flipped through it. It was the same except every article got pushed back a page. Ron figured that he would let Denis have the front-page the next Sunday and he would assign Zacharis Smith a new article to write. He smiled when he looked back at the front page and saw his name underneath the article. Ron knew that Hermione would be proud of him.
"We better get going if we're going to avoid Filtch." Harry said.
"Yeah," Ron nodded. He went back into his office to put the things he took back and then followed Harry out the door. They were on their way when they heard the sneering voice of heir potions professor and felt the collars of their shirts being held from the back of their necks.
"Potter and Weasley." He said. "Surprise, surprise. Weasley, I thought that Granger would have knocked some sense into you but I guess I was wrong." Ron and Harry scowled at him. "I think we ought to pay a visit to your head of house. I'm sure Professor McGonagall would like to know what you were doing out this late."
"Severus?" A familiar voice asked. Everyone turned to look at the former DADA teacher/ werewolf. "What's going on? It's practically 2:30 in the morning." Lupin asked.
"Well Potter and Weasley were sneaking out." Snape said. "You know a lot about sneaking out. Or wait that was Potter and Sirius thinking they were too smart to get in trouble when really they were thick headed idiots."
"Shut up!" Harry exclaimed. Both Lupin and Snape ignored him. They were glaring at each other and seemed to be lost in a memory. Ron felt the collar of his shirt digging into his neck and he tried to get it to loosen so he could breath. Snape held tighter but Lupin seemed to realize what was going on.
"Severus, let the boys go." Lupin said. Snape looked down at the two struggling boys. He released his grip.
"Potter, Weasley, Detention in my office tomorrow night at six." Snape said. "And if I catch you sneaking out again, I'll let McGonagall deal with you."
"Come on Harry, Ron." Lupin said with one last glare at Snape. Ron and Harry walked in front of Lupin so that they could go back to the Head common room. When they were almost there Harry turned to Lupin.
"What was that about?" Harry asked. "It seemed like that happened before with my dad and Sirius." Lupin looked unsure of whether to tell them or not but decided to.
"Well James and Sirius decided one night in sixth year that they wanted to go and find the Room of Requirement." Lupin started.
"But you didn't know about it right? It wasn't on the Marauders Map." Ron said.
"We didn't know about it until Wormtail mentioned finding a door on the seventh floor when there was never a door. James and Sirius wanted to check it out. And Snape was doing his own patrolling because he had heard us talking in Transfiguration that morning. I followed them because they were my friends but Wormtail chickened out. And Snape caught us around the same place." Lupin explained.
"Why didn't you have the invisibility cloak?" Harry asked.
"We did but Sirius tripped over when we were trying to get away from Snape and then he saw us." Lupin said. Harry smiled, thinking of Sirius tripping over the cloak, trying to get away from Snape but felt a pang of sadness. "Listen you two get back to your dorm and go to detention tomorrow. No more of this sneaking out stuff or I'm writing your mother Ron. And Harry I don't think that she would want to hear about you getting detention either." Lupin said.
"Yes." They both mumbled. When Lupin was gone they started in the direction of the Head common room. Ron looked over at Harry who seemed a bit sad.
"Are you ok?" Ron asked Harry. Harry smiled.
"Yeah. I was just thinking about how Sirius and my dad got in trouble like we do." Harry said. He laughed. "I wonder if he would have yelled at me if I got in trouble for something like this or if he would have laughed." Ron smiled too.
"I'm sure he would have laughed. He hated Snape." Ron said. "Just like we do." Ron said rubbing his neck.
"Yeah." Harry said. He knew that his dad was a good person all around like Ginny said. Harry hated Snape too and although he wouldn't hang him by his foot in front of the whole school he could understand the hatred. "Listen, I don't think we should tell the girls about the detention."
"What are we supposed to tell them?" Ron asked with a worried look. "I'm not good at lying to Hermione."
"We'll just say that we have to…meet with McGonagall about our careers." Harry said.
"The both of us?" Ron asked, skeptically. Harry thought.
"Just let me do the talking." Harry said. "I'll figure something out."
"Don't worry I won't say a word." Ron said. Harry laughed as they entered the head common room. Both boys went to opposite couches and were asleep immediately.
A/n: So what did you think? Please review and go on to the next chapter!
Luv ya!
Kylie
