Disclaimer: Joel Pritchard, Clarissa Hawthorne, Jamie Hart, Corrine Colt, Jesse Green, Jolie Taylor,Kristen Hart,Paul, Matt, Ethan, Jon, and Parker are mine.
Author's Note: You are going to be so proud, I actually am starting this chapter only minutes after posting the last one. I know, a part of hell really is going to freeze over!
Sometimes it's wrong to walk away, though you think it's over
Knowing there's so much more to say
Suddenly the moment's gone
And all your dreams are upside down
And you just wanna change the way the world goes round
Tell me, have you ever loved and lost somebody
Wished there was a chance to say I'm sorry
Can't you see, that's the way I feel about you and me, Baby
Have you ever felt your heart was breaking
Lookin down the road you should be taking
I should know, cos I loved and lost the day I let you go
Can't help but think that this is wrong, we should be together
Back in your arms where I belong
Now I've finally realised it was forever that I've found
I'd give it all to change the way the world goes round
I really wanna hear you say that you know just how it feels
To have it all and let it slip away, can't you see
Even though the moment's gone, I'm still holding on somehow
Wishing I could change the way the world goes round
Tell me, have you ever loved and lost somebody
Wished there was a chance to say I'm sorry (I'm sorry)
Can't you see, (ohhh) that's the way I feel about you and me, Baby
Have you ever felt your heart was breaking
Lookin down the road you should be taking
I should know, (I should know) cos I loved and lost the day I let
Yes I loved and lost the day I let
Yes I loved and lost the day I let you go
Have You Ever by S Club 7
Chapter Six
"Sit down and listen." Madam Hooch snapped. Joel took his seat back on the bench.
"That game yesterday was disgraceful. Never in the history of this school have I seen such malicious and vindictive playing. You are very lucky that none of you are permanently injured because it was just sheer dumb luck that some of those injuries, particularly the ones where players were thrown off their brooms, were not deadly. I should suspend all of you." Draco was shocked. They couldn't lose quidditch. Quidditch was one of the only things in this school that he actually liked.
Joel and Harry, the quidditch captains, jumped to their feet. "No!"
"I said I should, now sit down." Madam Hooch said. "But quite frankly, I think a quidditch tournament with only two teams is rather pathetic. So I will allow both teams to continue playing, but you better be on your best behavior out there. One suspicious foul, and the whole team is suspended. Got it?"
She received tweleve "Yes"s and two nods of the head. Ginny Weasley and Blaise had chosen to remain silent. Draco wondered why.
"Good." Madam Hooch said.
"Can we leave?" Dean asked, quite irked.
"One more thing." Madam Hooch said, pausing for dramatic effect and speaking in a whisper. "That was some of best damn quidditch playing I've ever seen." And with a smile and a twinkle in her eye, she walked away, leaving the fourteen of them to sit there and wonder if she really said what they thought she said.
"Did she say...?" Jamie asked, looking very puzzled, an expression that Draco noted was on several of the other's faces.
"I think so..." Seamus Finnigan answered.
"Well, that was not what I was expecting." Ginny replied, finally speaking up.
"What were you expecting, Miss Weasley?" Dumbledore said, appearing in the doorway that Madam Hooch had just left from. None of the fourteen saw him arrive.
"Um, I'm not sure exactly." Ginny confessed, a little startled by Dumbledore's sudden appearance.
"What's going on Professor?" Harry asked although a piece of Draco wondered if Harry already knew, he and the headmaster were close. Everyone could see Harry was his favorite student.
"I wanted to have a chat with you all about yesterday's quidditch game. I must say I was not particularly pleased with what I witnessed." Dumbledore had said that he wanted to chat but every student there, even Clarissa who Draco always thought was a tad slow, seemed to understand that when he said chat, he meant "I want to talk and I want you to listen."
"I have feared this for many a years now and it is now time to take action against before we are left in a trurly irreversible situation." Dumbledore continued, pausing for a moment. No one was following his train of thought. Draco was sure that couldn't have possibly meant that he had been fearing Katie Bell knocking Clarissa off her broom for years.
"The separate houses have their advantages and disadvantages. The houses allow for students of similar ways to be together however they also separate from others of different ways and beliefs and promote competition, a competition which I now see has taken a seriously unhealthy turn. I would like to correct this before it becomes detrimental to the welfare and the future of the school."
Draco was starting to see where this was headed, but he certainly didn't understand how the headmaster planned to weaken the rivalry between the houses, these rivalries were centuries old and generations deep. Nothing was going to change that.
"The Halloween feast is nearing, a mere two weeks away, and I hope that I have given enough time to allow my plan to work. This year the feast and dance will celebrate Halloween and our unity as a school, not four separate houses. I plan to make my announcement at dinner but I feel that since you fourteen felt the need to spark my plans, you could do with hearing of them first. Everyone may attend the celebration on one condition, they must come with a member of a different house. You will come with the fellow Hogwarts student, enjoy the feast with the student, and stay with the other house student the entire celebration. No exceptions." Dumbledore said.
Draco turned to look at his housemates. Joel and Clarissa looked irked, Draco was sure that they had planned on going together, Jamie and Jesse looked both relieved and shocked, at least the drama between them and Corrine would be nonexistant this dance. Then it struck Draco. He couldn't ask Blaise. This thought struck a scary note in his head. Why had he thought of taking her? He did not like her like that. Anyway, he could not go with her. She was a Slytherin. Like him. He caught her eye and she smiled. She actually liked the idea? She wanted to go with someone from another house? No!
"You mean we cannot go with someone from our own house?" Dean inquired, Draco noticed he was clutching tightly to Ginny's hand. Draco suddenly felt a pang of sympathy for her. Surely Dean would not allow her to go with someone else. Oh well, at least he knew now that one other person besides himself would not be there.
"Yes, Mister Thomas, that is exactly what I mean." Dumbledore answered. Draco wondered if he knew that Ginny was dating him.
"Now, I expect that you all had other ideas as to how you wanted to spend your Sunday then talkng with me, so I will leave you."
Dumbledore obviously knew that word of the Halloween dance would spread like wildfire even though he only told fourteen students. Draco was sure that within an hour everyone in the entire school knew about it, even the loners like Luna and Longbottom.
"Hello!" Blaise said, standing behind the sofa Draco was sitting at and talking right next to his left ear. It tickled and he scooted away. He had avoided Blaise most of the morning, since the meeting.
"Hello." Draco replied, talking to her was inevitable. More than ever, she seemed to always be right there. Did she not have any other friends? Why didn't he have any other friends?
"Want to go for a walk on the grounds?" She asked, leaning over so her head was next to his. "The trees are changing colors, it's beautiful."
He didn't want to go but he didn't want to be rude. And he liked spending time with Blaise. Blaise was suddenly one of his closest friends. He wasn't mad at her. He wasn't sure who he was mad at. He didn't understand why the dance thing was upseting him so much. He didn't like Blaise like that. She was a friend. It wasn't like Blaise liked him like that either. The way she teased Jesse, the way she walked with him to the meeting, the way she disapproved of his crush on Corrine, all signs pointed to Jesse. Stupid Jesse.
"Sure." Draco replied, getting up and Blaise smiled.
"You might want to get your cloak." She said. "It's a bit nippy."
"Oh, okay, thanks," Draco muttered and summoned his cloak from his dormitory.
"So who do you think you will go with to this dance?" Blaise asked the inevitable question when they reached a door to the outside. This was the reason, Draco suddenly reasoned, that he did not want to go with her.
"My, it is cold." Draco said, avoiding the question.
"Are you going?" She asked, kicking a pebble on the stone path, Draco watched it roll under a vivid yellow leaf. She was right it was pretty.
"I can't think of any one from another house who I'd like to go with." Draco admitted.
"Well, that's very snobby of you." Blaise retorted bluntly.
"Excuse me?" Draco said, unable to see what she meant by that statement.
"No one you'd like to go with?" She repeated. "You don't have to fancy the person. Just a friend."
"Well, I don't have friends outside of this house. As you may have noticed Slytherins are a bit isolated from the rest of the school." Draco snapped, defending his lack of non-Slytherin friends. "I don't see you with many non-Slytherin friends. In fact, you spend all your time with me and since I never spend time with anyone else, then I guess you don't either."
Blaise looked like he had just smacked her across the cheek. "Well, I'm sorry that I am apparently bothering you so much." She said, looking more hurt than when Hermione yelled at her.
"You know I didn't mean it that way." Draco said, trying to touch her hand. She pulled away sharply, almost causing her to stumble.
"Do I?" She snapped back, folding her arms across her chest. "You know, I could find a date to this thing." She hissed. "I was going to suggest staying back in the common room because quite frankly I couldn't go with the person I really want to go with, but I think I've changed my mind. You don't have to go Draco, I know how your lack of friends would make this a bit of a challenge for you, but I assure you I will be there."
And with that she whipped around and walked away. Draco was sure she would find a date. No guy would hesitate in asking her out. She was pretty, her long dark straight hair, her bright Slytherin green eyes. And lately, up until this very conversation, she was much happier and relaxed, clearly the pressure from her parents to do the Death Eaters bidding had subsided for the time being and her new happy persona had only made her that much prettier. The only reason Draco could think of that would explain why she did not have a date would be intimidation. Guys were surely intimidated of her, because of her hauntingly beautiful looks and her violent quidditch skills.
Damn. Now he would have to find a date.
Who on earth could he ask? He thought, sitting on his bed, well, the bed he claimed in the seventh year dormitory, the dorm he preferred to live in. He hadn't even stepped in the sixth year dormitory yet this year. Who could he ask to help him find someone to ask?
Blaise. Before today, Blaise would have been the person he would have been brainstorming this list of potential choices with. Of course, if it wasn't for Blaise, he wouldn't have to be brainstorming anything. Darn this vicious circle.
He couldn't brainstorm on his own. He needed someone to bounce ideas off of.
"Is Jesse here?" Draco asked, poking his head in the fifth year dormitories.
"Hello." Jamie called back from somewhere invisible to Draco. "Who's there?"
"Jamie?" Draco called back. "Where are you?"
"Draco?"
"Yes, Jamie! Where are you?" He repeated his question. Jamie emerged from the bathroom, holding a tube of toothpaste.
"Brushing my teeth." He answered, holding up the tube.
"Is Jesse here?"
"Nope," Jamie replied, casually tossing his tooth brush and toothpaste on his dresser, making Draco cringe at the mess he was making, and then plopped himself down on his bed. "Want to hear something funny?"
Draco looked at him and then sat on one of the other four beds in the room. He was pretty sure the one he sat on was Jesse's but it could have been Paul's or Matt's, he really wasn't too sure. "This isn't the joke about the Hufflepuff, the hippogriff and the one eyed witch in the muggle shoe store again, is it?"
Jamie had a blank look for a second and then laughed, clearly he was remembering the joke. "No. It involves several of our fellow Slytherins. Almost as funny, but this more moronic and ironic than slapstick."
"Okay, so you know that I am over Corrine, right?" Jamie asked him. Draco nodded even though last time he saw them (which was that morning) he was under the impression that Jamie was still very much into Corrine. "Well, right, this afternoon, Clarissa came barreling in here, scaring the daylights out of Paul because he was still getting ready, Paul likes to sleep late on the weekends-" Draco liked Jamie as a person, he was always ready with a laugh or a crazy scheme that was bound to get at least four detentions, but Jamie tended to take awhile to get to the point whereas Jamie's best friend, Jesse, pardon the Corrine case, would just blurt out what he's wanting to say, going straight to the point. "-so anyway, Paul is startled and then Clarissa wants Jesse because she knows I'm over Corrine and I hadn't even told Clarissa yet, she is just that intuitive. So it turns out, this is the ironic funny part, that Corrine likes Joel, which is just plain crazy if you ask me, because Joel is two years older than Corrine and Corrine and Clarissa have always been pretty close. So Clarissa schemes that if Jesse asks Corrine out then Corrine will leave Joel alone, thus preventing Joel from leaving Clarissa. Now I know for a fact that Joel won't leave Clarissa for Corrine, I mean c'mon, Clarissa is supermodel material and Clarissa is like the only person Joel has hung out with for the past six plus years but she doesn't see that. You know how girls are."
"Well, that's kinda why I'm here..." Draco started to say but was cut off by an irrational Jamie.
"YOU LIKE CLARISSA?" Jamie gasped, standing up and pacing. "I can't handle this! No more relationship drama! Why does everyone come to Jamie with the relationship drama? I can't handle any more!"
"WHOA!" Draco said, placing his hands on Jamie's shoulder and stopping him. "I do not like Clarissa."
"Oh, thank Merlin, cause that would have made the other plan we schemed earlier, you know the one I told you about, so much more difficult it's not even ironic, moronic funny." Jamie breathed a sigh of relief.
"Who are you planning on going with to the Halloween dance feast thingy?" Draco asked, his vocabulary diminishing as his stress level increased.
"Why, did you want to go?" Jamie asked.
"Not with you!" Draco snapped, horrified that Jamie had thought that's what he was asking. "I meant who are you taking to the dance!"
Jamie looked like he was thinking. "I dunno." he answered. "I want to ask Jolie Taylor but I don't think I can."
"Who is Jolie Taylor?" Draco asked.
"C'mon," Jamie said, leading him out of the dormitories after glancing at his watch. "I'll show you."
"Hey, hey," Jamie said, grabbing a first or second year Ravenclaw by the arm. "Can ya get Kristen for me?"
"I thought you wanted to ask out Jolie?" Draco said, after the small boy ran into the entrance of the Ravenclaw common room.
"Kristen is my cousin." Jamie replied.
"You are asking out your cousin?" Draco asked in shock.
"NO!" Jamie snapped, looking disgusted. "I can't talk to Jolie without talking to Kristen. They are friends."
"Jamie!" A girl with natural blonde hair pulled into a side pony-tail adorned with a blue ribbon called out, running over to them. Draco looked at her again. She was cute.
"I was wondering who was asking for me by scaring first years." Kristen teased.
"I didn't scare him."
"I'm pretty sure you did."
"Well, it wasn't intentional." Jamie answered.
"So, what's up?" Kristen asked, bobbing her head, her pony-tail swaying. Draco found that look stupid on most people, but on her it was cute.
"Have you heard?" Jamie asked.
"The dance?" Kristen asked, bright blue eyes sparkling. "Yup. I cannot wait!"
"Me either."
"Listen, I was just on my way up to return this book to Professor Trelawney, mind if we walk and talk?" Kristen asked, already starting to walk, not waiting for a response, much like Jamie.
"Oh hey," Kristen said, just noticing him standing behind Jamie. "Great game yesterday."
"Thanks." Draco answered, shocked that someone who wasn't Slytherin supported the Slytherins.
"I've always been partial to Slytherins." Kristen shrugged, as if she read his mind. Kristen was better than Trelawney. "The Sorting Hat took nearly two minutes before it decided between Slytherin and Ravenclaw."
"Tell him why it chose Ravenclaw." Jamie said as they started climbing up stairs towards the North Tower.
Kristen blushed. "Because I asked it to because I had a crush on a boy that had just been sorted into Ravenclaw. Not the brightest thing I ever did, I understand, but I was only eleven. They should re-sort each year, people change you know."
Kristen climbed the ladder first to Trelawney's classroom. Jamie and Draco followed once she was in the classroom.
"Ahh, you come in threes." Trelawney breathed deep. "That is a very powerful number on a day like today."
"Sunday?" Jamie answered, clearly not a fan of divination.
"Well, yes, but it is also the day when a full moon arrives and Neptune comes into view." Trelawney explained. "Did you enjoy the book darling?"
"Why do you have to ask?" Jamie snickered to himself and Draco. "You should already know."
"The Inner Eye does not focus on such trivial matters." Trelawney snapped.
"Of course it can't focus if it doesn't exist." Jamie muttered.
"What?" Trelawney asked, turning away from Kristen and towards the two of them. Draco tried to look serious, but come on, it was Trelawney.
"Never mind, thank you for the book." Kristen said, ushering Jamie and Draco towards the door.
"So, why'd you come?" Kristen asked when all three were off the ladder and on the floor. "To harass an innocent teacher?"
"Jamie wants to ask you a question." Draco replied.
"About Jolie." Jamie hissed at Draco.
"Ah," Kristen said, implying she understood. Draco was sure she did, Jamie was hardly what you could call a complex person.
"Does she have a date?" Jamie asked impatiently.
"Not since the last time I talked to her." Kristen answered much to the delight of Jamie. Silence then ensued. "Would you like to talk to her?" Kristen asked finally.
Jamie nodded. Kristen motioned for them to follow her, she opened a door that Draco had never seen anyone use.
"That's not the way we came," Draco said.
Kristen smiled. "It's a shortcut but you can only use it to leave the North Tower. Follow me."
She walked to the end of another hallway after passing through three more doors and then sat down on the edge of the carpet, and suddenly Draco saw it, a large slide. That's why they couldn't go up that way.
"That was awesome." Jamie said when they reached the bottom, which took them straight to the hallway with the Ravenclaw entrance. "Let's do it again!"
"Jolie?" Draco reminded him.
"Right. Slide later." Jamie said more to himself than anyone else.
"Cover your ears." Kristen teased and then she whispered the Ravenclaw password (Draco thought that it was either "text book", "next cook", or "perplexed brook")
Draco stared in awe at the Ravenclaw common room. It was big, like the Slytherin one, but where the Slytherin one was cold and open, this was warm and cramped. The walls were bookshelves, filled to brim with books, some even overflowing onto the floor. It had several mismatched blue chairs and a few tables where students were doing homework. The fireplace was large and ablaze, lighting up the whole room, casting shadows in the corners.
"Kristen, what are you doing bringing Slytherins in here?" A girl with shoulder length black hair and blonde streaks said, coming over from her spot on the blue sofa. "Nice job." she smirked, eyeing them up. That was making Draco uncomfortable.
Jamie liked this girl? Sure, Draco thought, she was decent to look at, but she was so not Jamie. She was bold and blunt, with an apparent wild, dangerous side. Jamie got into dangerous situations but not because of a danger-seeking side but because of his apparent magnet for trouble. She looked tough and pessimistic. Jamie was rather weak looking, very slender and fit but not muscular, and was very optimistic. He was the class clown, she looked like she would punch the class clown.
"Come on, Draco," Kristen said, leading Draco away from Jamie and Jolie, whom Draco was sure by now knew what was going on. Clearly, she already knew Jamie.
"So great job the other day," Kristen repeated, sitting on the window seat. It faced the quidditch pitch. Draco liked the view. When he was with Blaise he saw the lake, when he was here he saw the quidditch pitch. One wasn't necessarily better, they were just different.
"Thanks." He repeated. "Do you play quidditch?"
"I'd like to." Kristen answered, staring at it. "But I've always played seeker when we play as family, and Cho is the seeker here, and you can't exactly challenge the quidditch captain to see if there is someone better for her position, so I have to wait until next year."
"That bites." Draco said.
"Yeah." Kristen said, looking at her hands in her lap. "So are you going to the dance?"
Draco nodded.
Kristen looked slightly hurt. "Oh, so you already have a date."
"No, but hopefully I'll find one." He answered, completely unaware of the attractive blonde girl next to him.
Kristen stared at her hands a little longer. "Would you like to go with me?" She blurted out. She stole a quick glance at Draco and then turned her attention to the quidditch pitch where it looked like Gryffindor was practicing.
Wow, Draco was taken back by this question. It hit him hard and fast, catching him completely off guard. However, she was the answer to his problem with Blaise. He had found an almost Slytherin Ravenclaw to be his date, and a cute one at that. "I'd like that." He said, smiling at her. Kristen beamed back. Maybe this would work out. He didn't like Blaise like that, he reasoned. He thought Kristen was cute and Kristen was pretty cool so far and Kristen seemed to like him back. Kristen was perfect. His date Kristen was perfect. He liked that.
"You want to go to dinner together?" Draco asked and she smiled again, although the first smile never really left her face.
"Where do we sit?" Kristen asked when they reached the Great Hall.
Draco hadn't thought about this until she mentioned it. "Well, the Slytherin table is a little less crowded..."
"I'm not going to be hexed for being in Slytherin territory?" Kristen asked, raising her eyebrows.
"Nah, we only hex Gryffindors." Draco teased and Kristen laughed.
Kristen sat on the bench closest to the Ravenclaw table, Draco sat on the other side.
"This is the Slytherin table." Pansy snapped. Draco hadn't noticed her, she was sitting at the far end of the table.
"We were well aware of that!" Draco shouted back.
Draco quickly learned a lot about Kristen Hart; she liked to talk, which was good because Draco preferred to listen than to talk himself. She was older than Jamie by almost three months, her birthday was May 31st, and they were related through their dads, who were brothers. Kristen had three ex-boyfriends, Ethan, a boy from Beauxbatons she met on holiday, a seventh year Ravenclaw named Parker, and a sixth year Ravenclaw named Jon. Ethan dumped her because they never saw each other, Parker was obsessed and drove her crazy, and Jon moved to Los Angeles and now goes to a school in Salem, which is only a few hours by train from L.A., Kristen was allergic to anything dairy; she had a very sensitive stomach. She absolutely loved the beach, which is where all the cousins and everyone met up during the summer. Her family had a beach house that was called the East Blue something or other in the States.
"Do you ever go to the beach?" Kristen asked Draco. She touched his hand, "You are very pale."
"I don't tan." He answered. "I'm always pale."
"Me too." Kristen said. "Except when I go out, I gain more freckles. We will be the palest people at the dance!"
"Humpf!" A voice behind him huffed and then footsteps leading away followed.
Draco turned around, expecting to see Pansy and Millicent, but instead saw Blaise Zabini, hurrying out of the Great Hall, nearly taking out the very first year Ravenclaw Jamie scared earlier in an attempt to get out of there.
"I take it she's an ex?" Kristen asked, but it was more of a statement than a question.
An ex?
Was that how he and Blaise were acting?
Was it over before it actually begun?
What the hell was he thinking asking himself questions like that?
He didn't like Blaise like that.
He wanted to like Kristen.
He didn't like Blaise like that.
Did he?
Thank you so much for reading! Please, please review! Also, the next chapter may not be up for at least a week because I start college for the first time on Saturday and I will have to get into routine before I have time to update, so I apologize in advance for the delay, but I will try to post as quickly as possible.
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