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"I could spin and stomp away anyway," she points out.
"Okay, how about this, I get down on my knees and beg for a smile, and you get to spin and stomp. You get to tell your classmates that I begged you to be my date for the Yule Ball and you said no."
She freezes for a moment. "Yule Ball?"
"Oops, did I let that slip?" I grin. "It will be announced sometime after the First Task. I can't go, and this way I can use your heartbreaking refusal as my excuse."
Her eyes widen with understanding. "That's what the dress robes were for! How did you find out?"
My face hurts from doing it, but I grin again.
She scoffs. "Yeah, yeah, well-informed, I remember."
"Would you have gone with me if I really asked?"
She raises an eyebrow at me.
"As friends, of course," I add.
She maintains the look a moment longer, then looks like she's trying to hide a smile. "I couldn't say, since you aren't really asking."
My mouth drops open in shock. "Ms. Greengrass, are you being coy with me?"
"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about." She flashes a brilliant, genuine smile at that, and I can't help but return it.
I fall to my knees and clasp my hands together. "Daphne, had I known you were going to give me such a good one, I would have let you slap me. I'm afraid you got the raw end of the deal."
"You may make it up to me, then." Her face suddenly drops into a stormy mask, then she spins on her heels and stomps angrily back to Tracey and Blaise.
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"Did you get it at the right angle?"
"I got it, I guess. Are you sure you want to keep that?"
"You didn't miss the beginning, did you?"
"No no, I got that, but the end—"
"Then it's perfect. So what can I do for you in exchange?"
"Well...with the First Task coming up..."
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"Oh no, Harry!" Hermione cries as she sees the four dragons being shown off to the crowd.
They are far scarier in person than they are in the movies, let alone the books. I can feel the heat from their breath all the way up here in the stands. It's actually a somewhat pleasant warmth up here on this cold day.
"Do you know what kind they are, William?" she asks.
"Mm, I can't remember all of them. The Welsh Green is obvious, I believe she's the tamest one. The rough one with all the extra handlers is the Hungarian Horntail. That will be the fiercest one. The other two I can't remember. Maybe a Swedish Short-Snout and a Chinese Fireball or something similar. I'm sure they'll announce them."
Hermione cringes even though I'm fairly certain she doesn't know much about the dragons. "Which one do you think Harry will get?"
I snort. "Well, duh, he's Harry. You know he'll get the meanest damned dragon on the planet, but it won't matter because he'll kick its ass."
"You seem rather calm about this," she says, looking at me askance.
"Actually I'm terrified," I correct her calmly. "Otherwise I would have given you at least three embarrassing compliments by now."
"You know, that actually makes a perverse kind of sense," she says in surprise. "Oh I wish I could go speak to Harry one more time!"
"Between the two of us we could probably sneak you in there, but I think we did everything we could. You don't want to psych him out by showing him how worried you are, do you?" She sighs and shakes her head, and I pull her into my side and rub her arm comfortingly. "He'll pull through; he always does."
"I wish I had your confidence," she laments, "I'm going to tear my hair out here."
"Can I have a lock of it if you do?"
"William! I thought you were terrified!"
"I am, I was just trying to reassure you by acting normal."
Hermione, of course, is not reassured. She in fact tears her hair out no matter what contestant is competing. First, she screamed and buried her face in my shoulder when Cedric got burned by his Swedish Short-Snout.
She even yelled out to warn Fleur to watch out for the stream of fire her Common Welsh Green let out when it snored. Then she cried for Krum's Chinese Fireball to stop thrashing and watch out for her eggs, and raged at the dragon handlers, saying that those had better not be real eggs. Then it was Harry's turn, and she got worse.
"Oh. Oh. I can't watch it. Oh, Harry!"
"Hermione, they still haven't even announced his name yet."
"Shut up! Oh William, of course he got the worst one! What are we gonna do?"
"Nothing's changed. Did you watch the rest of the contestants? Fleur did something we didn't think of, but Harry's going to show up to both Cedric and Krum."
"Oh, William! You saw what Krum's dragon did. What if the Horntail crushes her eggs? We have to warn him!"
I frown. I had forgotten about that. Maybe Harry was better off with just the Firebolt? "It's too late now. Maybe Harry will decide he doesn't need the Conjunctivitis Curse. Actually, he's got a powerful Summoning Charm. I wonder if he could just Summon the golden egg?"
"I doubt it; I asked Professor Flitwick about that, back when we were learning it," she says. "He said objects can be charmed against that, and I imagine they would have thought of that."
"Yeah, probably. Anyway, thank you for not moaning my name this time."
She gasps and swats my shoulder as she blushes. "William! Be serious!"
"I'm sorry, but I'm trying to distract you and this is the best way I know how," I say just before thinking that's probably not true. "Do you want me to put you in a full body bind for this and hold you up so you can watch without tearing more of your hair out? I mean, you even cried for Fleur and you don't even like her."
She still grimaces with worry. "But what if Harry needs me?"
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Hey guys if u like the fanfic and want to read ahead by 27+ chapters or just want to support take a visit on my patreon.
(P).(A).(T).(R).(E).(O).(N)
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