What the Fuck Annabeth

Chapter 12

Ron

(This was a fun chapter to write)

"Thank you for asking me, you look smashing!" Pavarti said quietly as we left the common room and made our way to the feast.

"Thank you for going with me, you look amazing!" I grinned. Although I had asked Hermione first, well, I thought we sort of clicked but I guess I was wrong, I was happy Pavarti agreed to go with me, just as friends. She was very nice and probably the prettiest first year, well, that wasn't cursed by Aphrodite. I really should have asked her first.

Pavarti wasn't waiting for Harry, she was a very nice girl and didn't put on airs like Hermione. Like all the girls she had shown an interest in Harry, well, he was 'the Chosen One,' and famous, but Pavarti didn't seem to be out of her mind like the others were.

"Oh! Neville arranged for corsages, I almost forgot, may I pin it to you?"

"Awww, thats sweet Ron, of course!"

Pavarti had to help me anyway, I didn't want to stick her with the pin. We made our way to the grand hall, chatting and holding hands on the way. She was having difficulty walking in her heels, but we're both only eleven so its not like she had a lot of experience. Her dress,,, robe,,,, uh, traditional Indian formal gown thing, which when I finally broke down and asked was told was a "saree," looked just smashing. And she was fun, plus really good at spell combat, especially blocking spells. We made a good match as I was better at attacks.

"So where is Hermione?" She asked.

"No idea, she said she might not go, or if she did she would just hang out with everyone."

"You're silly, you really haven't heard?"

"Haven't heard what?"

"She is so convinced that Harry is or was going to ask her, she is now convinced he is too shy and too much of a gentleman, so he is going to wait until the last second and ask her at the Feast."

"Oh. Well that might not work out for her."

"Why not? He hasn't asked anyone else. Trust me, the girls have been keeping up with it."

"Uh, he has a date, that's all I know."

"Really? I don't think going with Annabeth and Percy counts as a date." Pavarti giggled.

"No, someone else, I don't even know who really."

'Oh, well that should make for juicy gossip!"

"If you're into that sort of thing," I replied.

"Hmmmm, maybe just a little!" She laughed.

We found Hermione just outside the door of the grand hall, waiting. Neville must have given her a corsage in passing, he and Eloise were together, at least for the evening but really all of us were becoming so close that we were probably just going to be bunched up in a mob all night.

"Why don't you come in and wait with us?" Pavarti asked.

"Well Har"

"Will be along anytime now. He's just being fashionably late I'm sure, Come on, we don't want to miss the beginning." Pavarti said, and finally with a smile Hermione joined us.

We found our group about a third of the way in, about where we usually sat had there been tables. The Feast was more of a party and the tables and chairs had been pushed to the walls, and the room decorated for Halloween. Once the party started music would begin and the tables would be covered with food and drink.
For now though everyone was just milling about chatting and our group, probably thanks to Annabeth, was the place to be. Several upper classmen were trying to mingle in, and most were being ignored.

"Pavarti! Ron! Hermione! Yay!" Annabeth squealed when we arrived. I wasn't sure why but it did cause the others that were trying to weasel into our group to move aside so we could join our friends. "Tonight is going to be such fun!"

Pavarti, Percy and I ended up facing towards the door we had just came in with Annabeth, Hermione and Neville facing us, and everyone else in a circle filling the area between. George and Fred were also there, but somewhat excluded. We mingled and chatted for a few minutes, and then Harry arrived with his date.

The only explanation was Veela. My brother Bill had told me about them, magical women of unearthly beauty and grace, they captivate any room they enter. Harry's date was the single most beautiful girl I, or anyone else in the room, had ever seen, Without fail all eyes that saw her stared. Brunette, a little taller than Harry, beautifully tan with flawless skin, her dress clung to her as she walked, except she didn't really walk, she just sort of floated across the room with a smile that could disarm and... and she just took everyone's breath away. She might have been thirteen. Or nineteen. Or twenty three, however old swim wear models are. On top of all that when she smiled she had a angelic glow about her that just drew in your attention. And she never stopped smiling. Occasionally she looked forward, but mostly she squeezed Harry's arm and smiled at him.

"What the... Fuck! Ron!" Pavarti gasped.

"What the... Fuck Harry!" Hermione sneered when she saw. Her face was red and her eyes watery with tears as she stomped off, but everyone was staring at Harry's date and I don't think anyone else noticed.

"What the fuck Annabeth?" Percy exclaimed with a great smile as he pointed over her shoulder at Harry and his date.

"What the fuck? Selina?" Annabeth practically shouted as she ran to the girl and they embraced, launching many a perverse and profane fantasy for the guys in attendance at the moment.

"How did you?" Annabeth asked as she took the hand that Harry wasn't holding and led her and Harry to our group.

"Well, Selina is year round this year, and I thought she might want to get out, so I asked the Headmaster, and Chiron and Selina of course and everyone said yes. Eventually. Chiron and Dumbledore were a bit difficult at first."

"How are things at camp?"

"Good. Boring. I am having to take academic classes like Rue has been and my instructor is a real horse's ass, but hardly anyone is there and it is so lonely! When Rue asked I couldn't say no, I just had to come see you guys, but that flue travel thing, that's kind of gross, all that dust! Phew!"

"Well lets introduce you to everyone! Guys, girls, this is Selina Beauregard, she goes to school with us in America and is the prettiest and nicest girl you will ever meet! Come on! Introduce yourselves!"

Everyone did and she was very nice. She was a couple years older than Percy and Annabeth, but once you got past the fact that she oozed lust where ever she went she was really very nice and approachable. Well to us anyway. Every other guy in the room, and most of the girls, were just staring and wouldn't dream of talking to someone like Selina in a million years. I wouldn't of if Harry had not whispered to me that his date was the head of Aphrodite cabin at their camp and was really down to earth. He was right.

"So where is Hermione?" Annabeth asked, "I could of sworn she was here a moment ago."

"Uh, she took off, she may have gone to powder her nose or something," Eloise said.

"Well, you can meet her later Selina. She is difficult at first, I think she was trying to steal Percy" Annabeth whispered this as everyone that heard rolled their eyes, none more than Percy, "But she grows on you. Really smart and starting to get decent with a sword."

"Oh! I thought it was all magic here!"

"Officially it is but we have one really cool instructor that lets us add in swords and archery so we don't get rusty. Oh! We're learning to fence and using an epee is just fascinating." Annabeth replied.

"It must be weird though, walking around unarmed." Selina said.

"Oh, we are not unarmed, we have our wands, and my purse is really my book bag with a spell to make it look like a purse, and it has a charm on it that lets us stuff tons of stuff in it, so I have both my daggers in it."

"That must have been a lot of work, Percy and I just cast invisibility concealment charms on ours." Harry said.

"You're going to have to teach me that" I commented.

"Yes, well, Flitwick is the one to cast the extension charm for you, but yes, everyone is going to need one. Right now though, you should probably just stick to your wand. You guys are coming along great with sword play, but you have a ways to go before you should rely on it. They really do learn fast here Selina, its been a pleasure helping them." Annabeth said.

"So you're teaching here too? Do you ever stop girl?" Selina asked. "You would not know it to look at her but Annabeth has been one of our main instructors for two or three years now."

"I don't mind. I have great friends at both Half Blood and Hogwarts, its my pleasure to help out."

Coming from anyone else that might have sounded arrogant, but Annabeth was completely sincere. I thought I was pretty good with a sword, well of all the first year Gryffindors that were not part god I was the best, but I bowed to Annabeth's wisdom on the subject.

It was about then that the lights dimmed even lower, and a light shown down on Dumbledore on the stage as he welcomed us to the Halloween feast. After a few announcements the food and drinks appeared and the music started. We had little time for refreshments unfortunately as when the music started and all the decorations changed to orange and black, and hundreds of bats began zooming around, Selina dragged Harry to the dance floor, Annabeth followed with Percy, and Pavarti followed them with me. Eloise and Neville were next and Neville turned out to be the best dancer of all the guys. Granted the bar was low as the rest of us were horrible. Selina later explained that before going to their camp she had been something called a "cheer leader" and as a result had taken some dance classes. She was far and away the best dancer there that night and taught the rest of the girls and some of us guys a few steps so we didn't look like complete idiots. We did feel like it though, although admittedly it was fun and we all enjoyed it.

Eloise eventually rescued us by saying she needed a break, which we all agreed with. Well everyone in our group except Selina, who demanded that Neville dance with her. Of course Annabeth then had to keep Percy on the floor, but the rest of us got a break. Harry was asked by a upper class man from Ravenclaw if he wasn't worried about another guy dancing with his date, but he just looked at him stunned and annoyed at the question.

"No."

Eloise and Pavarti excused themselves and asked us to find a seat and get punch, so we did and we waited. And waited.

By the time they came back we had drank all the punch and retrieved more. Then they told us where Hermione was, what she was doing and what a horrible person Harry was.

"Harry! You have to make this right." Pavarti explained. Well it was more like a whine really. "She is in there crying her eyes out because of you!"

"What did I do?"

"You know she thought you would ask her to the feast!" Eloise said.

"What? Why? Why would she think that?"

"She's been practically throwing herself at you for weeks! And you show up with... with... with a goddess like Selina. " Pavarti said.

"Well... all of you have been throwing yourselves. That's why I decided that if I went with any of you, the rest would get angry. Better to go with a friend like Selina. And she's not a goddess, well not completely anyway, but, well I didn't want to hurt any of you!"

"Oh not much ego there Mister Potter!" Pavarti sneered. She's got a really mean face when she is irrationally mad it turns out.

"So fencing! That sounds like such an elegant way to fight" Selina was saying as she came over to join us with Annabeth, Percy and Neville finally getting to sit down for a moment. Fortunately for Harry their arrival killed that conversation. It wasn't fair to Harry, and it was a bit insulting to me, that Hermione would act that way.

"It is! I wish you could come to SPEW with us tomorrow!" Annabeth replied.

"Ewwww, sounds gross! Spew, why do you spew, what do you spew?" Selina smiled.

"Thats just what we call it, we practice three days a week and half of each Saturday and Sunday. It stands for Special Paramilitary Education Workshop, but most folks here think it stands for the Society for the Promotion of Elven Welfare. Hermione made that up, where is Hermione anyway?" Annabeth asked.

"She's moping in the girls room." Pavarti said. "Because Harry is an insensitive jerk who isn't in touch with his or anyone else's feelings and has absolutely no sense of empathy apparently."

"What?" Annabeth, Selina and Percy all asked simultaneously.

"Selina, I'm sorry but, well Harry is very special here and most of us wanted to go to the feast with him. Well, Hermione in particular has been openly hinting to Harry since it was announced that she wanted to go with him. Apparently Harry is too dense or superior to notice such things. It was to the point that every night we talked and compared notes to see who he had asked, and, well we all thought he was going with Annabeth and Percy as a group thing, since they are always together. Hermione even turned down another guy who asked because she assumed Harry was just being shy." Pavarti said as she stared at me in anger.

I was so busted. Geez what a bunch of... I'm not sure what they are. Gossips? Thanks Hermione, way to run that bus over me! So what if I asked Hermione first? Pavarti apparently knew that when she said yes. Was I her desperation choice when she figured Harry would never ask? Probably so. Was Hermione of the opinion that she could only be seen with Harry? Apparently so. Let her cry.

"Uh, okay, just a couple questions. First, who is Harry?" Selina asked sweetly.

"Oh! That's Rue" Annabeth said "Turns out his real name is Harry. Harry Potter."

"Oh! He is special! All the girls in my cabin just love Rue! But, they think we're on a date? Like a 'date' date?" She asked Harry.

"Well, its a friend thing, I mean you and I dating would be just weird. I mean, geez, that would be like"

"Dating your aunt?"

"Yes, that's about, no, more like my sister or, step sister or... Pavarti, Eloise, the cabin Selina is the head counselor of raised me from when I was a baby until a couple of years ago. I adore Selina, but.. 'date' date? Uh. No. Geez what the fuck is wrong with you?"

"Don't get me wrong, I adore Rue, I just love him to death, he's the best... little brother a girl could have!" Selina added as she reached her arm across to his far shoulder and squeezed him tight.

Lucky bastard.

"And I love Selina to the moon and back, but not like that. I mean, well we could date I guess" Harry said.

"Really? I mean yes we could, but,,, that would be..."Selina said as her eyes twinkled.

"Weird?" Harry smiled softly.

"Yes! Very weird! And can you imagine the gossip at camp?" She grinned.

"Drew's head would explode!" Harry said and they both laughed.

"We should totally start that rumor! Oh! There is the other problem. I don't really want a boyfriend, but Rue is the exact sort I would want if I did." Selina grinned at Harry as he smiled back. I swear he was blushing a bit. "See Annabeth? This is exactly what I was talking about last summer. This is what happens when people play romance games like Drew is always suggesting."

"I know! Right?" Annabeth replied. "I hate to say it, but it looks like your one night with us is going to blow. We really need to defuse this."

"Oh! I'm here for the weekend. Its part of a trial exchange that your headmaster and our horse's ass have worked out. So this SPEW thing? I'm down for it. Are you sure you want my help defusing? I mean if its me she's mad about"

"I do wisdom, you do love remember? And the whole weekend? Yes!" Annabeth said, pumping her fist in the air. "You can stay in first year Gryffindor, take my room, I will stay with Percy."

"Uh, your headmaster said you might say that and I'm supposed to tell you no. Apparently the other Gryffindors have been complaining that you girls live in a mansion and have plenty of spare rooms."

"Maybe I should talk to her" Harry said.

"Shut up Rue, this is the sort of thing I was born for" Selina giggled, and I swear her eyes were literally twinkling every time she looked at Harry.

Lucky bastard.