A/N: allo my duckies.

Thanks for the reviews and the love.

Brings me joy.

Plz keep it up lol

(oh and just so u know, a clabbert is real *harry potter* animal. google it)

Now, I had used portkeys a thousand times and would go on to use them a thousand more. You would think someone in my position would be able hold on until the opportune moment and then softly float to the ground.

You would be wrong.

After a few seconds of the discomfort behind my naval that only portkeys and Daphne's cooking can bring me, my hand began to slip. I tried to get a better grip on the vase but the cold china slid from beneath my fingers and felt myself being flung off in some unknown direction.

My panicked, frenzied screams were lost as I felt the air gush past me. If I could go back now and insert some coherent thoughts into my brain such as 'goodbye, cruel albeit beautiful world, tell my mother that I love her and to not bury me next to my uncle Nicholas, he was horrid" I would have done.

As it was however, it went something more like this:

"CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAP CRAAAAAAAAP!"

Suddenly it all stopped; the noise, the wind, the sense of falling. I hit something hard and rather prickly with an almighty thud that knocked the breath out of me so the screaming stopped too.

I lay there with my eyes closed, trying to take shallow breaths and wondering what kind of strange world I had ended up in.

"Whoa, look over there!"

Ahhh, I hear voices. Perhaps a lost city...

"Crap! Do we know her?"

Or a far off desert...?

"Yeah, its Daphne's little sister!"

Well wherever I am they know Daphne. I won't be staying long.

"Er...is she dead?"

Dead? Me? Am I dead? Holy Crap!

My eyelids flew open to check (I know the logic is flawed but odds were, I had a concussion so you'll have to forgive me) and indentified my surroundings as a rosebush.

...Fancy.

I groaned as the feeling in my head started to change from numbness to a dull aching pain.

"Ow..."

I tried to focus my eyesight and saw two figures kneeling beside me and my bush.

"She lives!"

I live? Hoorah!

"Um... Are you alright?"

I just fell out of the freakin' sky Sherlock, what do you think?

"Meh?"

"Uh...Draco, maybe we should go get someone..."

Draco?

That's a funny name...

Hey! I know a Draco!

...Oh no.

I sat bolt upright in some desperate attempt to salvage my dignity. I realised this probably wasn't the best idea when it caused all the blood to rush to my head and I started to fall backwards again, but a hand on my back propped me up.

I blinked back the darkness that clouded my vision and gazed into the confused/worried faces of my would-be rescuers.

Draco Malfoy and Blaise Zambini.

Found me in a bush.

With pearls in my hair.

...couldn't the fall have just killed me?

"Er...Hello."

That's right Tori; cool, calm and collected. Humiliation is just a frame of mind.

"You just fell out of the sky!" Blaise blinked, staring at me with a face that read 'what is wrong with this chick?'

"Yes, I believe I did."

"Um, why?"

"Dunno, I guess I'm just into extreme sports." (A/N: though i realise it sounds like it this WAS NOT meant to be a twilight reference)

I'm rather witty, I am.

I heard a snort to my right, and turned around to see Draco smirking a smirk that clearly questioned my sanity. I quickly checked to make sure my dress wasn't up around my knickers and was greatly relieved to find in entangled with my ankles where I belonged. Right, well that's one less thing to worry about.

"Hey, it's Astoria, isn't it?"

He knows my name! Let the trumpets sound!

"Uh yeah...Tori."

"Right, I'm Draco, this is Blaise. Do you remember us? I think we used to hang out when we were little-"

Yes, and I've sent you anonymous singing Valentine's Day cards ever since, but you really don't need to know that now, do you mate?

"-we're friends of your sister."

"Yeah, I remember."

"Speaking of Daphne, by the way, is she here?" Blaise piped in, earning him a disgusted look from his friend, "What? I was just wondering..."

That's right; I have a near death experience and this tosser is trying to hook up with my sister.

Ah well that's the way the cookie crumbles.

"Um, not to be daft, but as you cleverly noted I did just fall from the sky...where is here?" I glanced around, seeing only grass, flowers and the wall against which my bush was growing.

Draco was saved from answering by a deafening screech that sounded a lot like my name. We all looked in the direction of the scream and saw my family, the minister and Cynthia jogging towards us. Well, Mother and Daphne weren't really jogging, more flouncing at a fast pace.

"Astoria! Oh my God! What happened to you?" my mother cried, wrenching me to my feet (not wanting to kneel in the dirt, I guess) and clutched my to her scratchy, sequined chest. When she finally released me it was only to be grabbed by my father then Cynth.

"Merlin, Astoria! You had us worried!"

"Tore! That was epic! And you're alive! That's even better!"

"Er...thank you?"

After the hugging, the Minister clasped my arm in a rather uncle-like way and expressed his relief that I was not spattered on the sidewalk of some distant country. I thanked him for these kind words and turned to Daphne, expecting the very least a pat on the head. What I got was the death stare to end all death stares and an accusatory "What is wrong with you?"

Oh nice, sis.

"Daphne!"

"Come on Father, I know ten year olds who can hold onto a portkey!"

"Daphne, that's enough, go on inside and find Pansy."

Pansy is here? What fresh hell is this?

"Um...guys, seriously, where am I?"

I hadn't really aimed the question at her but it was my dear old sister who rolled her eyes at my stupidity, "We're at the party, you moron, if you'd had held on for another, like, two seconds everything would have been fine!"

"Daphne, I thought I told you to go inside."

You tell her Daddyo!

As I marvelled at my incredible aim, Daphne 'humphed' but didn't move, as she had just noticed the rather awkward looking Draco and Blaise who were trying to discreetly edge away from our odd family dynamics.

My mother had seemingly spotted them too.

"Oh, Draco! Blaise! You saved her!"

"Oh, um...not really, we just kinda saw her fall into the bush."

...

"For someone who can't even walk downstairs, Tori, you have some pretty kick ass aim!" Cynthia laughed and punched me in the arm in what I assumed was meant to be a friendly way.

The awkward silence that followed that statement was one the likes of which I had never seen before. Mother and Father exchanged winces, the poor old Minister became very interested in the dirt under his fingernail, Daphne snickered quietly, Blaise snicked because Daphne snickered, Draco raised his eyebrows at me, it was all I could do not bury my face in my hands and apparate to Siberia and Cynthia didn't seem to get what was wrong.

"What?"

Daphne snickered her last and tossed her chocolaty brown hair over shoulder, "Come on guys, let's go find the others." And off she pranced, Blaise trotting meekly after her with not so much as a look back at me. Draco, however lingered a moment.

"Uh, you sure you're alright?"

"Yeah, thanks for...yeah..."

Smooth Greengrass, smooth

"Right."

I watched as he strolled off across the perfectly kempt lawn of Ministry Grand Ballroom (seriously, that's what it's called), mentally bashing my face against my palm.

"Right well, shall we?" the minister said, gesturing after the Daphne Posse. My parents made general sounds of agreement and we started to make our way around the side of the building into the crowd that surrounded the main entrance. As Cynthia and I fell back behind the adults she whispered excitedly in my ear.

"That went well, I thought!"

"Well? None of this can be classified as anything remotely resembling 'well'! This whole situation watched as 'well' rode off into the sunset, leaving me upside down in a bush only to be found by the guy I've liked since I was seven!'Well' has forsaken me!"

"Did he see your knickers?"

"Thankfully no."

"Then I say it went well; you didn't die, you actually carried out some shreds of a conversation with Draco and Daphne all but got told to bugger off! Now all you have to do is survive the next few hours and you home free."

Hmm, the girl makes a fine point.

"So, this was a good thing?"

"Very nearly."

"Victory to the republic!"

"Do keep it down deary, McGonagall just gave you a rather strange look."

I turned around to see that the headmistress of Hogwarts was indeed looking at me rather questioningly. In no mood to discuss why there were leaves amongst the pearls in my hair with Minerva McGonagall, I dragged Cynthia after my parents through the crowd of sparkly people filing into the hall.

Right about now would be when I gave a beautiful description of the inside of the hall and the stunning decorations and people therein. However I must report that seeing as I had been to more of these things than I'd like to admit to, I didn't really take much notice of it all, in fact my main objective was to find a nice quiet little nook (preferably by the food) in which to hide until it was all over. When you take into account that I had recently had my pitifully short life flash before my eyes, being afraid of a party might seem a bit overdramatic so let me provide some perspective. Some of my achievements past at these things included spilling a bowl of jelly on Lucius Malfoy (his face would have been priceless had I not been running for the high hills), spending the best part of an hour dancing with Greg Goyle, tripping over a house elf, tripping over a dog, tripping over a house elf carrying a dog and knocking over Pansy Parkinson (yeah...she doesn't like me much) and the grand prize goes to setting the curtains on fire while trying remove a stain that I caused by spilling my pumpkin juice on it.

Not what one would call a triumph.

I was just about to put my hiding plan to Cynthia when she grabbed my arm and pointed over a table full of the Hogwarts teaching staff, just as Professor McGonagall was taking her seat.

"Hey! Look!"

"Yes Cynth, we do know them, they taught us for seven years..."

"No, I mean Hagrid's here! Dude, last time he had giant cockroach eggs in his pockets!"

"Um, good for him?"

"So what are we waiting for? Let's go see if he'll sell us some!"

Yes, Mother would lurve that.

"You go, I'm just gonna find a shadowy corner and some chocolate frogs and wait it out."

"Astor-"

"Don't worry about me; just go get your illegal pets. I'll be fine."

She graced me with one of her few serious looks of concern, "you sure?"

"Positive." I grinned, "You know I'm not really a cockroach type of gal."

"Alright then...I'll see you later." And she jogged over to the teachers table, waving an enthusiastic hand.

Once I saw that Cynth was fully engaged in a very animated conversation, I began my way over to one of the many tables laden with food and drink, to gather supplies for my hibernation. I had to change route when I saw Daphne talking to Pansy and her other glittering friends. As always, my effort at being discreet ended up with me turning around and walking straight into someone and falling down on my butt.

Once again; Ow.

The someone turned around and upon seeing me on the ground offered me a hand and said "Oh, sorry about that, are you ok?"

I gazed up praying that it wasn't someone I knew.

It wasn't.

It was worse.

Staring down at me were Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger who was still extending her hand.

Why me? What did I ever do? All I ever wanted was to live in quiet, unnoticed peace!

I took her hand seeing as she'd been holding it out to me for at least a minute by then and once vertical again, bowed my head in shame.

"No no, it was my fault, I should look where I'm going, I'm sorry."

"Hey, don't worry about it, no harm done." Said Harry. As in Potter. As in Harry freakin' Potter! "I'm Harry Potter, this is Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger."

"I know."

Oh dear, that came across a bit stalkerish, but at least they laughed.

"Yeah, I guess we're pretty popular." Ron grinned causing Hermione to elbow him, "What?"

"Do get over yourself."

"Please, baby, I'm a celebrity!"

"Oh Merlin..."

I laughed drawing their attention back to me.

"So, sorry, have we met before?" Hermione asked kindly.

"Not really, I mean we were at Hogwarts together but I'm like two years younger than you" -plus I was in Slytherin- "I'm Astoria Greengrass."

They exchanged surprised glances.

I mentally kicked myself in the head (I'm quite flexible in my mind). Why didn't I just make up surname?

"Oh, are you Daphne Greengrass's little sister?"

Sadly.

"Yeah."

"Yeah, we know her..."

"Sorry about that..."

They all looked taken aback.

"Sorry," I hastened "Do you...not hate her?"

"Well hate is a strong word..."

"Yeah, we hate her."

"Ronald!"

"What?"

"No, no it's ok," I said, holding up my hands, "lots of people do...I'm kinda one of them."

Ron grinned at me, "I didn't think you were one of them." He said, nodding to my sister's group who had just let at a rather annoying and amazingly simultaneous peel of laughter.

I'd heard that evaluation of myself plenty of times before. Only this was the first time it was meant as a compliment.

"Yeah, I'm kinda meant to be, I'm just not very good at it." I shrugged, earning me another round of smiles.

"I wouldn't worry about that," Harry winced as another giggle fit erupted, "I don't think they're really going places."

Finally! Someone (besides Cynthia) sees the truth of it!

"Tell me about it." I muttered.

"So, Astoria," Hermione began, "You must have just finished Hogwarts, right?"

"That's right."

"Do you know what you want to do? Like career-wise?"

Every other time I told someone my ambitions they just looked at me like I'd suggested that we all go skinny dipping with the giant squid.

But then again I wasn't talking to the usual suspects this time...

"Well my mother kind of expects me to just do the whole socialite thing; you know lie around all day wearing feathers and attending the occasional gala such as this, everyday getting more and more batty," (Harry and Ron snorted) "But I dunno, I kinda thought it might be cool to be an auror"

Hold for laughter.

"Hey, that's great!"

Hmmm?

"It is?"

"Sure, why wouldn't it be?"

"Well I know it's great for most people, but don't you think it's a bit...ironic for me?"

"Well no offence kid, but we don't really know you that well."

Ahh, I see they need it put in perspective.

"Ok sorry, well my parents weren't Death Eaters as such but let's just say my Mother...sympathised. I grew up with some of the most wanted bad guys as foster parents and my best friend is the daughter of a convicted Death Eater."

And I'm in love with Draco Malfoy.

But he's reformed now so I guess that doesn't count.

"Ahh..." My audience of famous people were looking at me with expressions that ranged from wariness to pity.

Why did you tell them that, you moron? They were actually starting to like you!

I sighed a small "Well I guess I'll be seeing you..." and started to turn around when I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"So, we're aurors" Harry smiled, gesturing to himself and Ron, "Would you be interested in doing some work experience? I bet we could get you in."

Wait...what? Seriously?

"Only if you want, that is."

My brain started to do a victory march but I managed to control it enough to squeak, "Yes please."

"Cool, well I'll ask and send you an owl."

O to the M to the G!

"Thank you, so much!"

"Don't worry about it-" He was interrupted by a loud greeting coming from the staff table. We look over to see Hagrid waving vigorously. Cynthia was nowhere in sight, "Well, that's our cue; I guess we'll see you around."

"Yeah, definitely."

"It was lovely meeting you, Astoria." Hermione smiled as Ron draped his arm around her shoulders and they walked off in the direction of the gamekeeper.

"Yeah, bye kiddo." Ron called over his shoulder.

I managed my little "You too, bye!" before they were enveloped in the crowd.

I staggered over to a corner hidden by a pot plant and sank down, my head reeling.

Did that actually just happen?

No way, it was way too awesome.

And successful...I've never had such a coherent conversation with strangers before in my life!

I had to find Cynthia!

I stood up and walked straight into Narcissa Malfoy.

I must have a depth perception problem.

"Oh, I'm so sorry Mrs Malfoy!"

"Astoria Greengrass? Is that you? My it's been a while hasn't it?"

It had been about a month.

"Yes Mrs Malfoy."

"Are you alright dear?" She was looking at me rather sceptically, "Draco told me you had a bit of an accident earlier."

He did?

Aww that means everyone knows!

"Er...yes, but it all turned out alright."

"I should think you have leaned from the experience?"

Oh shut up woman.

"Yes, Mrs Malfoy."

"Good, it's not very becoming to fall from the sky, you know."

Yes, yes, let's ignore the fact that I could have died; we must focus on the fact that I wasn't being ladylike.

"Yes Mrs Malfoy...you're quite right."

She nodded briskly and strolled off with her head held high.

When she was gone I heard a great cackle from behind me. I spun around, only to see Cynthia emerging from behind the pot plant, doubled over with laughter.

"Whoa! How long have you been there?"

"Long enough to discover how unbecoming it is to fall from the sky! Does that woman even hear herself when she speaks or is just a chorus of 'I'm so rich, oh so rich'?"

"Yes, very funny, but you'll never guess what happened to me!"

"Can its forehead glow?"

"Er...no..."

"Then what happened to me is better!"

Oh dear.

"Check this out!" and out of her pocket she whipped a small creature that looked like a cross between a frog and a monkey, "My very own clabbert!"

"Ah."

"I shall call him Arthur."

"That's lovely Cynth, but-"

"Hold him."

"Er...what?"

"Hold Arthur, show him the lurve."

"Lurve is a powerful emotion Cynthia, we just met..."

"Hold the clabbert, woman!"

"Alright, alright." I took the little creature in my hands and he grinned up at me, displaying his rows of razor sharp teeth.

"Hello there Arthur, how do you do?"

Arthur responded by sinking aforementioned teeth into my finger.

"Ahhh!"

"Bad Arthur! Don't bite Tori!"

But Arthur's days (or minutes as it was) of servitude were over. With one last nibble he made an almighty leap to freedom and hopped away under the sea of robes.

"Arthur!" Cynth cried in anguish, "We have to find him! He'll be smooshed!"

"He bit me!"

"I used to bite you, Astoria; you didn't give up on me!"

Well that was true.

"Oh fine."

We proceeded to get down on our hands and knees to search for our lost brother. After five minutes of being wacked with purses and stepped on by heels I decided it was time for a new course of action.

"We've gotta spilt up. You got that way, I'll go this way!"

"Ok, good luck!"

I crawled off in my chosen direction, but I hadn't gotten far when I came the feet of the beast herself. Standing above me, her pug-like face twisted with superiority, was Pansy Parkinson.

Merlin and his legions of hats help me now!

"Astoria? What the hell are you doing on the floor, you little cretin?"

Cretin? I would never call anyone a cretin!

"Er...I dropped my...shoe?"

Good grief woman, couldn't you have picked something that wasn't already on the floor?

The girls all laughed, none more cruelly than Pansy and my sister.

"Get up, would you? Merlin, Astoria, you're such an embarrassment!"

Says the girl who once talked to the Minister for twenty minutes about why her hair was so shiny.

Nevertheless, I picked myself off the floor, my pearls finally coming loose and swinging haphazardly about my person.

"You know, Tori, Dray told us the funniest story about you."

Dray?

Seriously?

I might have to kill her.

"Then Daphne filled in the details for us. Can you really not even hold on to a portkey?"

Yes, I will definitely have to kill her.

"Though you did give us all a good laugh. You really are quite the little ugly duckling, aren't you?"

I could feel my face burning and my eyes prickling.

Don't you dare! Astoria Greengrass, if you cry I swear, I will kill you personally. And suicide doesn't look good on the paperwork.

...

Say something, anything!

"Well at least I don't look like the wrong end of a dog, you horrible little minx!"

Anything but that!

Her gang's mouths collectively fell open and Pansy's eyes looked like they were about to fall out of her head. She recovered quickly, her shock turning to fury in an instant.

"What did you just say to me?" he voice was dangerously low.

Normally when people stand up to their oppressors for the first time they are filled with a sense of power. I was filled with a sense of 'oh crap! Death is coming! Run you fool, run!'

For once, I obeyed my brain and before Pansy could make a lunge for me and was off and running, praying that the crowd would hide me. I had been ducking and dodging for a few minutes before I was sure that they weren't following me.

As luck would have it, just as I stopped to catch my breath, I caught a glimpse of what looked like Arthur's legs disappearing behind the curtain I knew lead out onto the balcony. Knowing it was now or never, I got a running start and dived under the curtain, making a grab for the arboreal villain.

SUCCESS! I felt my hands close around the smooth, slippery surface that was Arthur the Clabbert.

"I've got you now, you slimy bastard!"

"Er..."

Oh no.

I looked up and to my absolute horror saw Draco staring down at me with a face that clearly read 'what kind of illicit substance is this girl on?'

...and the best night ever rolls on.