Chapter 5

That night, Ziad lay in his bed and thought. He'd been at Hogwarts for a few months now, and he'd made a few acquaintances and started an underground resistance movement. But, at the risk of sounding clichéd, Ziad concluded (after a few minutes of thinking and a few strange daydreams) that he wasn't really all that happy.

He had spent a while contemplating this, and concluded that the problem was that he hadn't listened to his favorite music since he left the muggle world and went down the rabbit hole and into the insane world of magic. He was looking forward to the end of the year- and the beginning of summer vacation- for just that reason.

Just kidding. The reason he wasn't happy was because he didn't have any real friends.

Ziad rolled over onto his back and let out a huge sigh.

"Can you keep it down over there? I'm trying to sleep." yawned his roommate (whose name Ziad had yet to figure out).

Ziad rolled back over and attempted to sleep. Sleep failed to come, as is usually the case when you think really hard about how much you want to sleep. Eventually he got out of bed, grabbed a book, and went to the common room and read until he collapsed.

Ziad was awakened way too early by the Hufflepuff quidditch team going off to practice.

"Son of a... Do you really have to practice at like.. " Ziad glanced at his watch and groaned, "5 AM?"

"Gotta keep our skills honed, mate. Plus, the other teams have the pitch booked at any other reasonable time. See ya!"

Ziaz rubbed his eyes, yawned, and knew attempting to go back to sleep would be futile. He grabbed his towel, a change of clothes, and took a long and incredibly hot shower.

Before he brushed his teeth, he stared at his reflection in the mirror. Black hair, brown eyes, olive-skin (or what used to be olive-skin-a couple of months in northern Scotland had paled him out a bit.). Average height, and fairly thin. He resolved to eat more.

He dressed, grabbed his bag, and went for an early breakfast. He immediately gave up on the whole "eating more" thing and grabbed two pieces of toast and a glass of orange juice. Chewing on the first bite, he reached into his bag and selected one of his books and propped it up against the jug of juice.

"'The Great Game: Struggle For Empire in Central Asia.' Sounds interesting, but not exactly what I'd call enjoyable morning literary fare."

Ziad spun around mid-chew and saw Parvati standing behind him, looking somewhat ill-at-ease but, well (and Ziad cursed his hormones for thinking so), quite pretty, in a sort of really-tired-and-just-got-out-of-bed sort of way.

Unbeknown to Ziad, Parvati was thinking more or less the same thing, but didn't use the word "pretty" because that word just doesn't really apply to Ziad. He's not French, after all. Phrases like "ruggedly handsome" don't work either, but they are somewhat more accurate.

"I don't know, it's pretty fascinating, really. Most people don't really appreciate history, which is a shame. Greatest story ever told, if you ask me."

Parvati sat down beside him.

At Ravenclaw table, Padma pumped her arm and whispered, "Yes!" before returning to her breakfast.

What followed could not, in an terms, be called a particularly comfortable conversation. There were lots of "Um..'s," and "Sorry, you go..'s" and even a few awkward pauses. That's not the point. The point is that it ended with Parvati saying something along the lines of, "Doyouwannagotohogsmeadwithmenextweekend..."

Ziad thought about it, sounded it out, and said, "Yeah, definitely!" although he wasn't entirely sure exactly what he was agreeing to do, as the entire phrase had been said in about half a second and sort of petered out towards the end.

"Great!" Parvati jumped up, blushed, and ran back to Gryffindor table, where the few people who were there at this hour of the morning quickly flocked to her like seagulls to a piece of bread. They sounded sort of like it too.

Ziad returned to his book, wondering if perhaps his prayers had been answered.

He finished his toast, stuffed his book back into his bag, and got up from the table. On his way out of the hall, Parvati just "happened" to be leaving at the same time.

"Oh, hello."

"Hi."

They stood there, blushing at each other.

"So, what class do you have now?" Ziad asked.

"Transfiguration."

"Oh, yeah, I like that class. Thanks for transfiguring that plush-leather chair, by the way. It's really comfortable and fits the atmosphere just perfectly."

Parvati was pretty clearly confused. "Should I even ask?"

"I think that would be an accident waiting to- oh, no."

He waved vaguely towards the kitchens.

"Any theories about that?"

Something golden brown and viscous was oozing out into the corridor from what was just possibly, behind the mounds of stuff, a large painting. As the witch and wizard watched, there was a crash as the painting blasted across the hallway in a deluge of brown bubbles.

"Ooh, that's the entry to the kitchens!" exclaimed Parvati.

"Are you sure? It looks more like a... Ah... I really have no idea."

Ziad stamped forward and scooped up a handful, and sniffed at it.

"Is this some ghastly emanation from Hell?" he said.

"Shouldn't think so. Smells like coffee," said Parvati.

"Coffee?"

"Coffee-flavored froth, anyway. Now, why is it I have this feeling that there's going to be Weasleys in there somewhere?"

A figure lurched out of the foam, dripping brown bubbles. A very small, dirty figure.

"It's a house-elf!" said Parvati.

Parvati waded into the foam. After a moment's hesitation Ziad realized that the honor of young wizardry was at stake, and pushed his way in after her.

Almost immediately he bumped into someone in the fog of bubbles.

"Er, hello?"

"Who's that?"

"It's me, Ziad. I've come to rescue you."

"Good. Which way is out?"

"Er-"

There were some explosions somewhere in the coffee cloud and a popping noise. Ziad blinked. The level of bubbles was sinking.

House-elves soaked in foam began to appear, lying on the ground, clearly stunned.

Professor McGonagall appeared from where Ziad thought the entrance probably was. She stared down at Ziad and Parvati. Coffee dripped from her now-droopy hat, which rather ruined the effect.

"Something bloody stupid's been going on here," she said, "and I'm going to wait quite patiently until you own up."

"I don't see why you should assume it was us," muttered Ziad.

"Oh, so I find you two in the kitchen (which is out of bounds, I might add!), covered in frothy milk, with a number of stunned house-elves lying about, and I'm supposed to look for more evidence? Do I look like a court of law?"

Ziad looked, and decided she looked rather un-courtly. "A fair point," he conceded.

A drift of froth twitched, and a figure slowly crawled forward. It opened what looked like a mouth.

"Dean said the coffee ought to be frothy." said the apparition of a Gryffindorish persuasion, "and he did some simple magic and I rather think we got carried away."

"Oh, bloody hell, not again." said McGonagall.

A second drift of froth twitched.

"I think-" it declared, "That perhaps this is not worth a Cappuccino."

"It was damn fun, though." the first pile said, "It was incredible when that one cup exploded like that! That blast must have been equivalent to a grenade, but instead of pain- it's coffee!"

"Yeah! Oh. Hello, professor McGonagall."

Professor McGonagall pulled out her wand and banished most of the frothy coffee, revealing the two piles to in fact be Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan, who Ziad had met during DA meetings.

"Should I even ask what you were doing?" sighed McGonagall.

Dean stood up and rather futilely attempted to brush off the masses of foam still clinging to his robes. "I thought I'd try to make some Cappuccino. You know, basically it's frothy coffee?"

McGonagall scooped a handful of frothy coffee out of her pocket, "I'm now well aware, Mr. Thomas."

Seamus continued, "Well, we got a bit carried away with the magic," Dean elbowed him, "Actually, um, it was mostly me. But it was an accident, I swear!"

Professor McGonagall sighed, "I suppose you'd better go take a shower and change out of those clothes. Ten points from Gryffindor, and please don't try anything like this again." she turned towards Ziad and Parvati, "And you'd better clean up as well."

Ziad and Parvati left behind Dean and Seamus, who were engaged in a whispered argument about whether or not they should try to make various other culinary masterpieces with magic.

Author's Note:

Whether or not Ziad/Parvati becomes official or not is still up for debate. We'll see how it goes, shall we? Indeed we shall.