Chapter Thirty-Nine - Slytherins Can Be Fun

As the bets were still going and Harry was being harassed openly on daily basis about his reasoning at the Slytherin table, different issues had arisen because of it. A quarter of the bets were actually students thinking that Harry had joined the dark side, killed Cedric and needed to collaborate on his murderous plans together with his Slytherin death eaters. Luckily Pansy and Blaise were not amused by it and just acted as if they couldn't hear the bet when they were being placed. Resulting in an amusing sight of Blaise and Pansy drinking tea while a group of people were screaming insults at them. In the mean, the whole of Slytherin would scoot in and build a wall around the two as if placing their own bets.

It did not make Harry happy.

The murder glances were so common that Harry started to feel unsafe walking through the corridors. Hermione and Ron had decided to always wait for him after classes, Ron glancing murderously at anyone trying to come to close, and Hermione just disapprovingly showing her prefect badge. While they tried their best, he had to admit it worked best when Draco and his friends would walk with him. People would actually stop mid corridor and turn around to walk the other way. It was laughable if Harry had not known the reason that they stopped was because those kids thought him, and Draco, were a group of death eaters. It hurt.

On the other side, Harry was able to walk the corridors with Draco now without people being weird about it. And how great it fell. Harry couldn't understand how he had never seen that Draco was the greatest nerd there was, almost topping Hermione. And worse, he and Pansy were horrible gossips, OUTRAGEOUS gossips. It didn't matter if someone was wearing black, blue, or white; whether they cut their hair, grew their hair or coloured it; or perhaps even made a comment about merlin knows what; Draco and Pansy would talk about it.

Harry swears, honest to God, that he had heard Draco giggle once.

Draco denies.

Of course.

But today Harry's nightmare had come true. Hermione and Ron were so absorbed with their discussion and Draco was asked to stay behind for an extra credit for Charms, leaving Harry. A stone had settled in his stomach for he was about to walk the murderous corridors, all alone. Brazing himself, he ducked in the corridor hoping to make it to the library without too many jinxes when he was saved, or better said, harassed by Pansy linking their arms, and Blaise practically throwing himself across him.

"Harry, my dear, you didn't think you would get rid of us that easily now did you." Pansy whispered in his ear while Blaise was trying to regain himself from his fall as he had not expected Harry's reflexes of someone trying to throw themselves at them. Not to crazy one would think, but Blaise seemed quite put off by it.

While Pansy uttered weirdly possessive claims about their group and Harry, Blaise wiped away a fake tear, "Harry, Harryyy, I thought we were friends. Weren't we?" Wiping away another fake tear, "I shared my breakfast with you, I trusted you."

All Harry could do was stop in his tracks, his gaze fixed on them, utterly bewildered. Draco would have scolded him for looking unbecoming, but when had he become friends with the Slytherins? Even Nott was standing there, perhaps two meters away, but he was there. All of them waiting for him, wanting to accompany him, and dare he think it, protect him.

After recovering from this newfound discovery, Harry had the time of his life. Apparently Slytherins definitely knew how to have fun. Looking back on it, he should not have been so surprised. Clearly Pansy was missing her normal gossiping partner and deemed Harry sufficient when Harry nodded to the latest buzz, making Harry slightly regret it as he was now being updated on the latest relationships. Huh, apparently Dean and Seamus were now an item. He had not even known they were gay in any way, which when he said so, made even Theo laugh at him with ridicule.

Blaise on the other hand was like a puppy who had just learnt how to sit for sweets. He was clearly trying keeping his regal nonchalance, but seemed so happy he had a chance to talk to Harry that his nonchalant mask was shattered completely by the ongoing stream of questions. Questions he had apparently read in a magazine over the summer 'questions to get to know your friends on a deeper level'. Harry had no idea how to respond to that knowledge.

Harry had not had any idea where they were going, too occupied with keeping up with all the new streams of conversations when suddenly they were standing before a known wall, Slytherins common room entrance.

Pansy glanced at him slyly, while Blaise was openly smirking at him, and Nott was just acting as if he didn't care. "What the hell am I doing here?!" Harry just didn't understand what was happening to him. "You must know that this will make them only think even more that I went over to the dark side right".

Blaise's eyes had grown considerately as he looked worriedly at Harry. "You shouldn't worry about what others think of you so much. What do you care? Besides, we are just picking up some books for our study session later."

Harry's interest left him after the first part of Blaise's answer sentence, not caring what came after. "What do you know? It's not like you had seen Voldemort rise to power in front of your eyes, killing your friend, having killed your parents and destroy your whole life, then to only hear that not a week later hearing people think you actually joined his side." His anger quickly subsided when he saw the look of pure hurt on the Slytherin's faces.

Nott was first to recover, "Potter, you do know that that is sort of the story of our life. Of the life of most Slytherins? Not one of us chose this side, our parents did."

Had he really been so prejudiced and stupid all this time? Harry felt terrible. He had been complaining constantly while the Slytherins had fun and laughed, keeping up their heads constantly, without any sort of worry. "I'm sorry guys, that was so inconsiderate, I can't believe I...".

He was quickly interrupted by Blaise's woop of victory as he slammed his fist in Harry's shoulder, "I knew we would bond; didn't I tell you Pans."

Which is how suddenly Harry found himself befriended to three new Slytherin's. The sorting hat might have been right, he feels like Slytherin would have suited him quite nicely indeed, he thought as he walked back to the library, his newly found friends close behind him.