The rest of the week disappeared quickly, although nothing extremely interesting happened, and the time was nearing five o'clock on Friday evening. Which, in other words, meant Professor Umbridge's detention.
"We should probably get going, Harry." I suggested, after we had both quickly downed our dinner. He agreed and reluctantly, we made our way to Professor Umbridge's office on the fourth floor.
Walking down the corridor, there came a loud crashing and clanging noise from around the corner. Assuming it was other students, we ignored it and continued on.
"AHHHHHH!" Harry and I yelped simultaneously, for just as we had turned the corner we had been pelted with quills and ink pellets by none other than Peeves, the Hogwarts poltergeist.
"PEEVES!" Harry roared.
"Peeves, we do not need this right now!" I shouted angrily.
"Poor ickle Eddie and poor ickle Potty! Been naughty have we? Gots a detention?" He cackled, finding himself quite amusing.
"Peeves! Leave this instance!" Professor Umbridge ordered, marching out of her office.
"Hmph!" He said, sticking out his transparent tongue and zooming off in the other direction.
"Ah, Mister Potter. Come in." She greeted, her usual sickening sweet voice returning. I made to follow Harry through the door but Professor Umbridge stopped me.
"Miss Eddie, what do you think you are doing?" She asked, quite confused.
"You gave us both detentions..." I replied, equally confused.
"Oh. No, you may go." She decided. I frowned at Harry but he gestured that it was alright.
Careful to avoid Peeves this time, I journeyed back to the dorms. Everyone was in the Great Hall eating dinner and I thought it would be wise to get my homework; 10 inches on the ingredients, brewing and usages of the Draught of Peace for Potions and 8 inches on the Fanged Geranium for Herbology, out of the way before the weekend began. I stopped by the library on my way, picking up the books Fire, Fangs and Venom: Plants you ought to stay away from, Feisty Plants from A to Z and Peaceful Potions for Peaceful People, to help me because honestly I couldn't remember half the things I was told in class.
The Common Room was deserted and I set myself up by the fire. I remembered that earlier on I had lent Laurie my inkpot so I ran up to his to room to get it. Sitting open on his bed was a short letter and at a glance I recognised his messy handwriting. Something was drawing me to read it, but I was hesitant, I didn't want to invade his privacy. Then again, we told each other everything so I doubted there would be anything in the letter I wouldn't already know, no matter who it was addressed to. Feeling slightly uneasy about it, I sat down on his bed and picked it up.
Katie,
I'm sorry it turned out like this. I really never meant to hurt you. What happened with us in the summer was great and I meant what I said. I hope you know that I still mean it, even though I'm with Sarah. I want to talk to you... alone. Meet me at the entrance to the Bell Towers at one o'clock? We need to sought things out. I think we can make our own arrangement. That is, if you'll be okay with it? I'm sorry I'm not going to be able to completely be with you. I want to be, I really do, but I want to be with Sarah too, and that seemed to happen first. I care about you both and I don't want to have to choose. You don't have to write back with an answer, but I'll be waiting at the Bell Tower for you.
- Laurie.
He must have been meaning to send it the next morning.
At first, I didn't want to believe it so badly that I convinced myself someone must had set him up, but reading over it again and again, I couldn't escape from the fact that it was definitely Laurie's handwriting. I sat there on his bed, speechless and unmoving with tears rolling down my cheeks and splashing onto the note I was still clutching, distorting the unbelievable words, until I heard the unmistakeable stampede of footsteps belonging to students returning to their dormitories. I hastily dried my eyes and stuffed the letter into my pocket before grabbing my inkpot out of his bag and returning to my homework.
I decided I wasn't going to confront him about it, not yet anyway. I needed advice first, but until I spoke to someone about it I wasn't going to pretend everything was fine because it was certainly not fine. 'I think we can make our own arrangement.' The words lingered in my mind. I was going to give him a chance to explain, to prove me wrong, because if I was right, he was telling Lavender he would be willing to cheat on me because he wanted us both. I hoped to Merlin that I was wrong.
At that moment, students burst through the portrait hole and the dead silent room was filled with loud chatter in seconds. I spotted Hermione and, abandoning my things, quickly ushered her back out the portrait hole, fighting against the incoming stream of students.
"What?!" She puffed after we had finally found our way back out into the corridor.
She stopped and took in my red, blotchy face, instantly sporting a worried expression. I hurried her under the tapestry that was the entrance to the North Wing and shut us in an unused classroom. I got the letter out and angrily shoved it at her, waiting for her to read it. My bestfriend's eyes skimmed back and forth as her expressions progressed from worried to angry and finally, sympathetic.
"I'm sure he wouldn't... It's not necessarily... It could mean anything." Hermione offered, trying to choose her words carefully.
I smiled feebly at her attempt to comfort me but not being able to hold it in any longer, I burst into tears. She rushed over to me and pulled me into a hug, refusing to let go until my sobs finally quietened.
"What are you going to say to him?"
"I don't know yet, but I'm going to do it after Quidditch tryouts tomorrow." I answered, wiping away a stray tear.
With nothing left to discuss we went back to the Common Room. The first person I saw was Laurie sitting in the far corner with our usual group. (Harry, Ron, Tyler, Parvati, Lavender, Dean, Seamus, Neville, Fred and George, Lee Jordan, Ginny, Liza, Nate and Mackay.) Hermione, noticing the pained look on my face, uncharacteristically snapped.
"That's it! I'm going to hex him so hard he won't remember his own name!" She yelled, beginning to stride towards him. I grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
"I appreciate your enthusiasm, but it'll only make things worse." I heeded somewhat reluctantly.
"You're right." She sighed, backing off.
"I'm going up to our room, don't let him follow. Tell him I'm really tired or something." I instructed.
"Sarah, it's seven o'clock."
"Okay, but I'm sitting with you, not him."
Hermione nodded and, bracing myself, we joined our friends, bar one in my case. Tyler noticed something was wrong from my mere aura, some of our friends said we were the younger versions of Fred and George, we just lacked their comedic genius. I shook my head and told him a silent, "Don't worry." and he relaxed back into his armchair. Laurie moved over, expecting me to sit with him, and made to take my hand but I subtly moved it out of his reach and continued to an empty armchair in which I squashed into with Hermione.
I attempted not to sound too different, occasionally contributing to the current conversation, but whenever Laurie tried to engage me, I'd brush him off, giving him short answers. He needed to know I was cross with him. After two long hours, it was finally nine o'clock and I could use the excuse that I was tired to retire to my room, where until I actually was tired, I finished the homework that I hadn't yet even made a start on.
Rain drops the size of golf balls were pelting down upon the ground and to make matters worse, it was extremely windy. Definitely not the ideal flying weather. Angelina Johnson, the Quidditch captain, however, was unperturbed by this and seemed determined to be just as determined as Oliver Wood had been the previous year.
By nine o'clock just about everyone was down in the Common Room, either eager for the team tryouts or annoyed that their eager friends had woken them. Angelina strode into the room, already dressed in her Quidditch robes with her broom in hand, and cleared her throat loudly, waiting for silence much like a teacher did.
"Okay, Gryffindors!" She began enthusiastically, "I want to see you all down on the pitch in half an hour, prompt and ready to fly, got it? Do not be late!" And with that, she strode back out of the room and the noise level quickly rose again.
I figured I'd go down before everyone else and help out Angelina because I was dead bored of waiting. I'd been up for hours and was dressed and ready to go. Fred and George were over in the corner, trying to stay out of Hermione's view, with a small group of first years gathered around them, undoubtedly trying to sell their latest Weasley's Wizard Wheezes products to their naïve prey.
"Oi! Wizard Wheezes!" I called to them. They instantly whipped around and rushed over to me, trying to shut me up.
"Sarah! If Hermione finds out we're in business again-" George started in an urgent whisper.
"She'll have our heads!" Fred finished.
"Come on, we have to get down to the pitch." I laughed.
"Angelina said not for another half hour!" George whined.
"Now!" I said bossily.
"Fine." They both grumbled, reluctantly following me out of the castle and down onto the pitch.
Everyone else who was trying out arrived shortly after, making sure they wouldn't have to face the wrath of our new captain.
"Firstly we'll be covering flying." Angelina announced, "Everyone line up along here... Okay, five laps of the pitch when I blow the whistle. Oh, and Fred and George will be pelting bludgers at you, so watch out for those. Everyone ready?" And the whistle screeched.
I kicked hard off the ground, simultaneously with about twenty other contenders. Harry and I were in the lead, being the only students who owned Firebolts gave us a huge advantage in this area. I dodged a bludger to the head by barrel rolling, Harry laughed and did the same,. At top speed, although highly dangerous, it was brilliantly fun. By the time we'd completed three laps we were miles ahead of everyone and we decided to hang back a bit. Within minutes the rest had caught up and Laurie soon shot past me.
"Hurry up slow poke!" He called as he went.
Anger washed over me and acting on impulse as opposed to logical action, I ducked into the middle where Fred and George were concentrating on trying to knock people of their brooms. I snatched the bat from Fred and swung it as hard as I could; it connected with the bludger and caused it to speed off in Laurie's direction. It narrowly missed him but before I could get a better shot, Fred had snatched the bat back.
"What are you doing?!" He yelled. "That's your boyfriend you're trying to maim!"
I glared at him and rejoined the race. I quickly advanced to the front where Harry was still holding the lead, we, of course, finished first.
"Now for the second and last part, this will take much longer. We'll be covering keeping and shooting." Angelina began instructing, "All those trying out for keeper, over there... And all those for chasers, here..."
"What about beaters?" A boy named Xavier Denholm asked.
"Get out." George ordered, quite serious. Angelina glowered at him but didn't argue.
"Now get into groups of four, three chasers, one keeper. We'll be rotating between groups and I'll asses each of your skills."
I stuck with Harry, who even though was a seeker, was playing a chaser to help Ron. He was looking positively sick about having to get up in front of the goal posts, the poor boy. Laurie joined us and I did my best to make him feel unwelcome. He, however, seemed to have no idea that I was about to hex his face off, which made me all the more angry.
Over and over we sped up and down the pitch, throwing the quaffle to each other and finally at the goalposts, where if he was lucky Ron would catch it. There was definitely better keepers that tried out than Ron, but Harry and I managed to convince Angelina to give him the position, promising that we'd practice with him all the time.
During our last go, I was so overridden with anger towards Laurie that I snapped again. Harry had just thrown me the quaffle and I pelted as hard as I possibly could at Laurie. It caught him in the stomach and knocked him off his broom. He was only a metre or two from the ground but he still landed with an audible 'thud'.
"Just a bit too hard, hun." He laughed, getting up and dusting himself off.
I quickly touched down and dismounted my broom. I pulled my wand out of my boot and advanced towards him, throwing hexes at him as I went, but with tears streaming down my face none of them actually hit him.
"Sarah! What are you doing? What's wr-" He started, but seemed to be suddenly hit with realisation, "You found the letter..." I nodded viciously.
"Sarah... I never... I didn't mean..." He tried desperately, starting towards me.
I instinctively backed away and for the first time, realised that everyone was gathered around us, even all the people who had been in the stands watching. With nothing else to say, I turned to leave, but he kept going.
"Wait-"
"No, Laurie." I said firmly, continuing to walk away, but he ran and caught my arm.
"Stupefy!" I shouted in anger, not thinking my actions through.
He flew backwards and for a second time landed on the hard ground with a loud 'thud'. I picked up my broom and ran back up to the castle, not stopping until I reached my room and collapsed on my bed in a mess of tears.
Aw, what a jerk. And I liked him too, oh well. Hope you're enjoying, please remember to review! :)