The day of Slughorns dinner party has arrived, and I couldn't be more excited. I'm meeting Blaise in the common room in an hour, and we are going to walk there together. However, I am still to get ready. I planned my outfit a while ago, but no I don't think I want to wear it. So I'm rummaging through the wardrobe to find something else. Eventually, I find a navy blue dress that I think is appropriate for the occasion. I lay it out on my bed, before proceeding to do my hair and makeup. Soon I am completely ready.
I walk into the common room to find Blaise waiting for me in his black suit.
"Ah, Miss Gold. You took your time." Blaise says to me. "You look nice though."
"Thank you, so do you. Now let's go, before we are late." I say.
"Have fun." Draco says, he's sitting on the sofa watching me.
I give him a small smile, and he tries too. Then Blaise and I leave and head for dinner.
We arrive just as everyone is taking their seats.
"Hello!" Slughorns says, happily to us. "Miss Gold, Mr Zabini. Please, take a seat."
Blaise sits down first and I take a seat next to him. There's less people here then I thought there would be, which I guess is a nice thing.
We begin to eat and then conversations about ourselves and our family come to play.
Slughorn is then talking about former members of the Slug Club, he acknowledges Harry's mother, Harry smiles at the thought of her.
The meal lasts a while, I know for a fact that Ginny was suppose to be attending, but there is currently no sign of her, and we are already eating dinner.
Hermione tells the group about her parents being dentists, but I'm guessing nobody understands what she is going on about, because when she says her father needed 10 stitches nobody laughs. I do, just to break the tension, but it seems to get worse.
The door suddenly opens, revealing Ginny. She apologises for being late and walks into the room. As she does I see her eyes, they are red, but dark around the outside, she had been crying. Oh Dean.
My thoughts are interrupted by Harry making a sudden stand, all eyes are on him. Hermione pulls him back down. Ginny sits also, I look over at her, but she refuses to look my way. Oh dear, this fight was bad one. I wonder how Dean is taking it?
Slughorn does his best to carry on the conversations after that, but there is very strong tension in the room.
And by the time it's over, I'm glad to go back to the common room.
"Well that was fun." Blaise says sarcastically.
"Did you see Ginny's eyes though? She must have been crying for ages."
"Dean is your friend; go ask him what he did. But it seemed like a pretty dickish move whatever it was."
We arrive back at the common room, it's late and nobody is in here.
"Better go to bed then. Quidditch tomorrow." Blaise says.
I nod, "Yep, I know. See you in the morning."
The next day, I wake up early, and get ready for the match. I know how brutal Quidditch can be so I need to be well prepared. Ron's the keeper for Gryffindor today, so Slytherin are probably going to win by a lot, or lose by a lot, depending on how much faith Ron has in himself this morning.
It's not a lot, I walk into the great hall and see him immediately, and he looks petrified. I go over there.
"Ready, Ron?" He looks up startled.
"No, I don't want to do it. I've changed my mind, Quidditch isn't for me."
"Oh, Ron, don't worry. I'll tell the boys to go easy on you." I laugh jokingly, "You'll be fine, Ron."
I leave the table and go to my own team; they are working on an attack method.
"You shooting, Jas?" Blaise asks me.
"As best I can." I say, not really caring what's going on. These plans never work, in the end, everyone gets hurt and we either win or lose. That's it.
After a few minutes, I see Harry and Ron stand up, "Guys, let's go." I say to my team.
We watch from the side lines as the seats fill up, I'm excited to play, I think this will go well.
"On your brooms!" Our captain says.
We mount and the gates open, we fly out, despite being the Slytherin team, we get mostly cheers.
"Go for Gold!" Some of the Slytherins call. That's to me personally. I like being liked.
The game begins, I see Ron looking confident, oh god, we've lost already. The Quaffle is thrown to me and fly quickly through everyone, dodging everyone as I go, I make the shot at the lower goal, Ron catches it. Oh shit, we've definitely lost.
Gryffindor are 20 points up, and I have the Quaffle under my arm, I race faster than ever to the other end of the pitch, determined to score. A Gryffindor chaser is flying straight at me and get distracted watching them. I turn is face forward as I see the post Ron is at. His face is scared as I'm heading straight for him, I panic and turn the broom quickly, dropping the Quaffle at the same time. As the broom turns I feel my body slip off of it and soon I'm falling, falling, falling...!
My eyes flutter open slowly, oh my god, my head hurts so much! I turn my head to the side slowly to see that I'm in the hospital wing. I look at my body, my arm is bandaged up, but my whole body hurts so much.
Madam Pomfrey spots that I'm awake and is over by my bedside in an instant. "Ah, Jasmine. How lovely for you to join us again."
"What happened?" I ask, attempting to sit up, it hurts but I manage it.
Pomfrey adjusts my pillows to how I am sitting, "You fell off you broom during the Quidditch match yesterday. It was a pretty bad fall, but luckily only your arm was broken and I've mended it well for you. However, you have a lot of bruising, severely on your right hip. But your okay, which is what is important."
I lift the sheets up and see my hip; it's basically black with the bruising. "Have I had any visitors?" I ask but then regret it because I think it's a weird question to ask.
"Oh yes." Madam Pomfrey says, "Plenty, let's see... err, Mr Potter and Mr Weasley were here a few hours ago, Miss Granger came yesterday right after the game, Mr Thomas had a lot of questions and... ah yes Mr Malfoy."
"Draco was here?"
"Yes, the longest of everyone actually, must have sat in here for about 3 hours straight." She says.
I nod, "So when do you think I'll be able to leave?"
"Oh today. I was waiting for you to wake up. I'll need to check you're bruising over but then you'll be free to leave."
I limp out of the hospital wing, Madam Pomfrey has said to take it easy for a while and to sit as much as I can because if I stand for too long my bruising will start to ache. My whole body hurts as I slowly start to walk towards the great hall. I can't believe how fortunate I was with that fall, the height I fell from I could have easily broken my spine or even died, but it was just an arm and some bruising, I'm considering myself lucky. The state my hip is in is really bad though, it gives off shooting pain if something taps it, and it looks like I've got some sort of weird disease.
I arrive outside the great hall doors; I question what table to go to. Considering Hermione came to see me first I head for her, which is also the place where all of my other Gryffindor friends are as well.
"Jasmine!" Ron calls, getting up from his chair and running up to me. He puts his arm around me to help me walk to the table; my limping must be really bad.
"How are you?" Hermione says as I sit opposite her.
"In pain, a lot of it. But alive so that's okay I guess." I say back.
"I'm so glad you're alive!" Dean shouts running up and hugging me from behind.
I laugh at him, "Yes, it is good. But could we all please mind my right hip. It's not great." I lift up the bottom of my t-shirt which reveals the top of the bruise.
"Bloody hell!" Ron exclaims as everyone else just looks shocked. "You did hit the floor pretty hard, it all happened rather quickly." He says.
"The whole of the school went quiet and the game was stopped for while so they could take you to the hospital wing." Harry says from next to me.
"I think everyone thought... they thought you had died." Hermione says seriously. "I mean, I did, for a minute and especially when I went to see you and you were still knocked out."
"Guys, a game of Quidditch is not nearly enough to kill me off. It would have to have been something a lot worse than just falling off my broom." I say.
"Yeah, I second that." Dean says.
"Fine, but next time, just try not to look dead." Hermione smiles. "Oh, by the way. Slughorn asked me to give you this," she hands me a letter, "A formal invite to his Christmas Party."
"Oh cool. Are you going too?" I ask both Hermione and Harry.
They nod.
I'm back in my common room again, on the floor in front of the fire, Dean was kind enough to walk me back. It's suddenly got really cold so that's why I'm in front of the fire.
"Hey." I hear a voice from behind me; they move and sit next to me, it's Draco. "Are you okay?"
"I've been better, but yeah I'm okay."
Her nods, "I came to see you, in the hospital wing."
"I know, about 3 hours straight. Pomfrey told me." I say, and smile shyly at him.
"It didn't feel like 3 hours." He says looking into the fire.
We sit there in silence for a minute, the fire warming both of us up.
"Are you okay?" I ask him.
His head shoot around to look at me, "Of course, why wouldn't I be?"
"I don't know I'm just checking that's all. We haven't really spoken much lately." I say.
He looks into the fire again, "I've been busy."
"With what." I ask.
"It's nothing really, trust me."
I watch is side profile as the look of depression takes over him. I just wish he'd tell me the truth. Even if it's bad. We sit silence once again, but I'm comfortable with it, and he seems to be too. It gets later and later, but we still don't speak a word.