May 1997

Harry hated destiny. It wasn't fair. He didn't want to know about horocruxes and evil people (and death and life and war). All he wanted was freedom and that's why he loved quidditch. During a quidditch match he was just the seeker and all he had to do was catch the snitch.

They were facing Ravenclaw. And Harry thought they were likely to win. He'd heard Luna Lovegood was their seeker. He'd seen her in the halls. She was weird and dreamy and she always seemed far away. He didn't think she'd even notice the snitch until he won the game.

She was so strange. She was an outcast and it almost didn't make sense that she was even on the quidditch team. But it did because Hermione had told him that all the Ravenclaws were scared of her and Draco Malfoy who wasn't the boy he'd met at Diagon Alley all those years ago, but Harry knew why; Everyone did. He remembered how the Slytherins tortured him and the Ravenclaws had shunned him. How he'd always been alone. (How he had looked like he never slept.)

Malfoy was a beater on the team (and Harry heard he was vicious and scary and that his eyes burned silver). But Harry wasn't afraid of a mean boy with a bat. (Voldemort was much scarier.)

Gryffindor had score 60 points (to Ravenclaw's 30) when he spotted the snitch. He circled his way towards it immediately because they wouldn't need any more points to win the Quidditch Cup. And just when he was close enough to grab it, it shot downward. And so did he.

He was surprised to feel Lovegood just behind him. Apparently she was moderately attentive. But that wouldn't matter because he would get there first.

But then she shot past him somehow. He didn't understand at first, but then he realized she wasn't on her broom. She'd catapulted herself off her broom to give herself more momentum and enough speed to pass him.

He watch stunned as she grabbed the snitch and spun around, so her back was falling towards the ground, her hair streaming all around her. She smiled up at him and waved with her free hand (and she was bloody insane). Bravery wasn't the absence of fear, it was overcoming that fear, but she wasn't afraid, not even a little, her silver eyes (weren't they supposed to be blue?!) gleamed at him. Didn't she know she was falling too fast for him to save her? (Didn't she know she was going to die?)

But he tried to reach her anyway. It was like watching Cedric die all over again (only she wasn't scared.) She wasn't scared and the ground was reaching for her. And-

Malfoy came out of nowhere and caught her and she laughed like she'd known it all along. (Her eyes were so silver and so were his and) Harry looked away from them and shuddered. There was something terribly not right about them. They were all wrong. (Didn't Malfoy used to have grey eyes?)

He slowly descended to the ground below and he couldn't stop shaking Not even when his feet touched the ground and he fell to his knees. Not even when Ron joined him. Malfoy was mean and vicious and scary (and his eyes did burn silver), but that wasn't why he was a beater.

Harry stared at his best friend and tried to ease the pit of unease in his stomach.

He remembered how she had smiled as she fell, and threw up.