Things I Never Knew: Chapter Seven

[jennjenn724]

Chapter 7: A Memorable Quidditch Match
When Harry awoke the next day, he felt the familiar knot in his stomach that he always experienced on the mornings before Quiditch matches. Harry smiled to himself, it was somehow comforting to know that he could still feel this combined nervousness and excitement. That he could still get an emotional response from Quidditch.
Harry went down to find Ron sitting in the Great Hall with an expression on his face that Harry knew must mirror his own. Harry was grateful that his friend no longer felt the paralyzing nervousness that he had experienced last year, and which had seriously hindered Ron’s abilities as Keeper. Instead, Ron now smiled at Harry.

“Going to catch that Snitch today Harry?” he asked loudly, smiling even wider.

Harry grinned at his friend, it was good to know that Ron still had some confidence in him or at least was pretending too in public. “You know it,” Harry said, purposefully cocky. “You just concentrate on blocking those Quaffles!” Ron tore off a small piece bacon and threw it at Harry, his aim was off however and the bacon soared over Harry’s head and hit Hermione, who had walked up behind him, square on her cheek where it stuck. Hermione peeled the offending slab off her face with a look of upmost distaste and glared at Ron.

“Honestly, you two,” she snipped, sitting down beside Harry. “How old are you?”

Harry looked over at Ron to exchange their usual looks of annoyance at Hermione’s mothering, only to find the redhead blushing furiously. “Um, I think we’re just nervous about Quiditch today,” Harry thought of a cover for their behavior fast after glancing at Ron.

“Regressing to childhood?”

“I wouldn’t say that . . . ” Harry said, but a look at Hermione told him that she was teasing, which was a rare thing for her. “Oh. Funny.”

“Anyway, being a little nervous is a good thing, but you shouldn’t let it influence how you act. You’ll just end up. . . . ”

“Oh please, someone make her stop,” Harry thought desperately, Hermione’s lectures were becoming more and more of a bad thing for him.

Just then he caught sight of Caydon and Lydia walking past. “Hello Caydon, hello . . . Lydia,” Harry said, waving desperately at them. Ron gave him an odd look and Caydon arched an eyebrow, but the boy came over.

“Hi, Harry,” he said. “Good luck today.”

“Yeah, everyone is saying that you always win Gryffindor the matches,” added Lydia. “I made Caydon and me these Gryffindor scarves to wear on the days of Quiditch matches.”

Harry actually took a moment to notice what the children were wearing and noted that they were, indeed, wearing truly atrocious knitted red and gold scarves. Harry thought that they must have been Lydia’s first attempt at knitting. At least the girl’s scarf fit her well, Harry strongly suspected that if Caydon’s scarf hadn’t been wrapped rather too many times, it would have trailed the ground. Caydon was half smiling, as if he knew what an amusing picture they made and didn’t care in the least.

“Uh, yeah. They’re nice Lydia,” Harry managed.

“Very lovely,” Hermione commented kindly.

“Thank you!” said Lydia brightly. “We’ll be going now,” and taking an end of Caydon’s scarf as though it were a leash, she pulled him along after her. Harry wondered how long Caydon could go before he tripped over the ragged fringe and fell on his face, the boy could barely manage to walk down the hall without tripping over his robes. Harry smiled and went back to his breakfast.

“Isn’t that Snape’s kid?” Ron asked with an odd look on his face.

“Uh, yeah,” Harry said absently.

“And are we buddies with him now?” Ron said, somewhat sarcastically.

“Ron!” Hermione’s voice was warning.

“Well . . . I mean, come on. It’s not just that he’s Snape’s son . . . that kid is weird!”

“He’s not weird,” Harry said with a bit more venom than he meant. Why should he get so upset on Caydon’s behalf? Ron was his best friend and what he had said wasn’t really that bad - to tell the truth, Caydon was sort of weird. It was like he was both older and younger than other kids his age. But the way Ron had said the word made it sound like a horrible insult.

“Yes he is,” Ron retorted. “He says really creepy things and he’s always staring.”

“Staring?”

“Yes, some people have a staring problem. Where they always look at you really intensely.”

“Ugh.”

“Exactly. And that Snape kid definitely has a staring problem.”

“Well, maybe. But he’s still a cool kid. What’s the matter? Afraid he’ll replace you as my new best friend?” Harry teased.

Ron rolled his eyes. “Oh, yeah. Terrified.”
As Harry flew out onto the Quiditch pitch, he began to wish that he had shown up to practice more. He felt really out of sync with the team and he could swear that even his Firebolt was moving slower. Harry looked at Cho Chang directly across from him, Cho smirked back at him.
“Ouch, I guess that was the ex-girlfriend look,” Harry thought.

A moment later, the Snitch was released and Harry watched it buzz around his head for a bit before it took off and disappeared. Harry thought it was frustrating, the way the snitch would often fly around the seekers before a game, as though teasing them and then quickly disappear from sight.

The game started and Harry felt that familiar rush that always accompanied playing in front of the whole school. Soon, however, it was replaced by a single-minded focus on the game around him and on catching that little golden ball. Even the new announcer’s voice (a girl from Hufflepuff whom Harry didn’t know) faded into the background.

The game was going splendidly, Ravenclaw couldn’t score a point and Gryffindor soon had thirty. Harry flew lazily about, searching for the snitch. Ron made a particularly nice save and Harry gave his friend a thumbs up. Just then he saw it - the snitch, buzzing about just under Ron’s feet. Harry made a dive for it, but Cho saw him and happened to be much closer. Harry cursed himself for not noticing her earlier. He leaned in further on his broom, reached out his hand, grasping and closed his fingers around - thin air. Cho had caught the snitch.

Harry was in a slight daze as he landed. He had never really lost before. Sure, there were times when he lost because something strange happened to him - like in third year with the dementors - but he had never just lost. He watched the Ravenclaw crowd erupt into cheering, but couldn’t stand it for long and headed straight to the locker room.

Harry slammed open the door, threw his broom across the room and kicked over one of the benches in frustration.

“Easy there, champ,” came a voice from behind him, “I would think anyone would have more respect for a Firebolt.”

“Why don’t you just shut the hell up, Ron?” Harry shouted.

“We really could have won, too,” Katie Bell walked in talking to Ginny. They spotted Harry and stopped talking abruptly. “Oh, hi Harry,” Katie said guiltily, “didn’t see you there.”

“Gee, you mess up one time and all your friends turn against you,” Harry said loudly.

Katie flushed. “Sorry Harry.”

“Do not apologize to him,” Ron fumed. “You were right. We should have won. If The-Boy-Who-Lived here weren’t too good to come to practices we would have won!”

Harry felt like punching Ron. He even envisioned it - his fist connecting with Ron’s freckled nose. Instead he took a deep breath.

“Next time I’ll come to practice, okay? But no Seeker, no matter how good is going to catch the Snitch every time. There is a certain amount of luck involved, you know,” Harry knew in his gut that he could have played better if he had been at practice, but he wasn’t about to admit that now.

Ron just smirked at him. “Oh no, this couldn’t be your fault, could it?”

“Stop talking like that!”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m some kind of bigheaded moron!”

“Then stop acting like one.”

Harry gave his friend a scathing look. “I seem to remember you screwing up a couple of games last year.”

Ron’s face turned bright red. “You know, we would have done better with Ginny as Seeker today.”

Harry turned to glare at Ginny. “Hey, I didn’t say it!” she objected quickly.

“Well you can just ‘do better’ with her from now on, because I quit!” He stomped off toward the door, oblivious to the wails of his teammates behind him.

“You can’t just quit,” Ron followed him, “the team needs you!”

“Funny, I thought I just heard you say that you would be better off without me.”

“You are such a selfish git!” Ron called after him.

Harry went back up to the castle, ducked into the first abandoned classroom that he could find and had some fun slicing himself up with a piece of broken glass taken from a bowl that he found and smashed up. After a few minutes however, he decided that he had better go and tell McGonagall that he had quit the Quiditch team - a daunting task - before she found out from someone else. He mumbled an excellent cleaning charm that he had taught himself for such occasions. Seeing that the bleeding had mostly stopped, he did a quick Reparo on the bowl and headed out.

Harry walked up to Professor McGonagall’s office and knocked boldly on her door. He didn’t think that she was all that likely to be in her office right after a Quiditch match, but it was worth a try. He nearly fell over backwards when Snape opened the door.

Snape made a noise in his throat that sounded suspiciously like an “eww”. “It’s Potter,” he announced distastefully, opening the door to allow Harry in.

Harry stepped in to find McGonagall sitting at her desk and looking at him rather coldly. He reminded himself that he did just mess up the Quiditch match for Gryffindor. Snape sat down in one of the chairs in front the desk.

“Can I help you, Mr. Potter?” Professor McGonagall asked.

“Um, yeah,” Harry stuttered, “I sort of need to talk to you.”

“Go on then.”

“I sort of need to talk to you . . . alone.”

“Professor Snape and I were in the middle of discussing important school business,” she said, shooting a slightly irritated glance in Snape’s direction. Harry wondered what if the “school business” was actually Order business. He knew that Snape and McGonagall got along as well as could humanly be expected, but the fact that Gryffindor just lost a Quiditch match had to make things tense between them. They were incredibly competitive about House points and especially about Quiditch, although Harry had no idea why - he didn’t think that either of them actually enjoyed the game that much and he had the distinct impression that Snape despised it. “If you can’t talk about whatever it is in front of him, then you’ll just have to come back later,” his professor went on.

“Fine,” Harry snapped, suddenly angry with her. “I just wanted to tell you that I’m quitting the Quiditch team, Professor.”

“Get out Severus,” she said, but Snape didn’t budge an inch.

“He might as well stay, now,” Harry said.

But she seemed to have forgotten about Snape anyway. “You are not quitting the team, Potter,” she said. “We don’t have a chance of winning without you.”

“I didn’t do that good today,” he pointed out, “and Ginny is a really good Seeker.”

“But not as good as you. No, you’re not quitting.”

“Yes, I am. You can’t make me stay.”

“Don’t take that tone with me, Potter,” she warned. “I’ve done a lot of favors for you.”

“What, and now you’re calling them in? What is this? The mafia?”

McGonagall raised her eyebrows at this and Harry was sure that she didn’t know what the “mafia” meant, in fact, when he thought of it, he didn’t even know what exactly the “mafia” was.

Then Snape spoke for the first time since Harry entered the room. “Well, I never knew that Gryffindor was so. . . . coercive, in its team selection methods,” he said smoothly with the slightest emphasis on the word ‘coercive’.

“I thought I asked you to leave, Severus,” she said through gritted teeth.

“You didn’t ask, Minerva, you told. You were perfectly willing to discuss a student’s private concerns in front of me, but not a threat to your treasured team. But I’ll go wait outside like a first year until you and Potter conclude this all important discussion,” and with that he swept out of the room.

“Listen, Potter, I know that you feel bad right now about the game. But you’re emotional and will most likely change your mind. I must insist that you stay on the team until the next match - the one with Slytherin - and mull it over. It would at least give your teammates some time to get used to the idea also.”

Harry frowned, Professor McGonagall normally did not seem nearly this concerned about people’s feelings and he suspected that every bit of what she had just said was a ploy to get Harry to play against Slytherin and maybe keep him on the team. On the other hand, she really had done a lot for him over the years, he could do this one thing for her and for his teammates.

“Fine but I’m not going to change my mind. And I want to resign from the captaincy right now because I am a really horrible captain.”

“Of course,” she replied in a tone of voice that made Harry wonder if she hadn’t been planning on removing him from this position all along, “I will select a new captain within the next week.”

“Thanks,” Harry said awkwardly. “I really am sorry about this, Professor. I did decide it in a moment of frustration . . . but I also think that it may be what’s best for me right now.” He wanted to go on, but how to explain to stoic Professor McGonagall that what had once been a fun game had become a drain on his life, a role that he must live up to at all costs or risk his reputation, his emotional well-being, and even his friendships? When she didn’t say anything else, Harry left the room quickly.

He almost ran into Snape outside the door. “Did you resign?” the man asked him smugly.

Harry was a little surprised at being asked. “Er, I have to play one more game,” he said.

“Oh, poor little Harry,” he sneered. Harry regretted ever asking the man to call him by his first name, he only used it when he wanted to be cruel or else tacked it onto the end of a statement sarcastically. The rest of the time, it was still “Potter” or “Mr. Potter” if Snape were in full teacher mode. “He might actually have to play one more game for his adoring fans after coming to the stunning realization that he can actually lose at something,” Snape finished his insult.

“I’ve lost a lot of things, sir.” Harry snapped. “And why are you harassing me?”

“Excuse me?”

“I mean, why did you start this whole confrontational conversation with me? If you hate me so much why go out of your way to say anything to me at all?”

“Is ‘confrontational’ the vocabulary word of the day, Potter?”

“Whatever. You can’t even get out two words without throwing an insult at me.”

“I certainly don’t have to justify my actions to you. Ten points from Gryffindor for your insolence.”

Harry rolled his eyes. Snape’s actions were increasingly just rolling off him these days, but every now and then he still said something that got to Harry. “Disappointed that I’ll be playing in the game against Slytherin, I guess? Maybe you could talk Professor McGonagall into letting me quit before then? I certainly don’t want to do it.”

Snape seemed to consider this and for once, Harry thought he knew what the man was thinking. If he agreed to help Harry, it would be like he was doing Harry a favor, on the other hand, he really wanted Slytherin to win at Quiditch. At any rate, he managed to think of the most infuriating reply that was possible. “Maybe I will talk to her Potter, then again, maybe I won’t. It certainly won’t matter much either way as Professor McGonagall would die before she would take advice from me about her Quiditch team.”

“Right,” said Harry, somewhat sarcastically, “I’ll just be going now, Professor.” Without waiting for an answer, Harry walked swiftly down the hall, smiling slightly to himself. He had the feeling that he had almost got the better of Snape in that argument, but then he just had to show vulnerability and ask a favor.

Harry wasn’t ready to face the Gryffindor common room yet, so he decided that he would go up to the Defense classroom and look around to see if he could get any ideas for the next D.A. meeting. As he walked up to the tower, however, he heard Adele’s voice coming from inside the classroom which seemed considering that the woman was never in either her classroom or her office if she could help it. Harry had turned around and started back down the stairs (he definitely did not want to see Adele) when he heard the voice of the person she was talking to and realized that it was Draco Malfoy of all people.

This was certainly interesting. Harry moved back up to the door, it was ajar and he managed to nudge it open enough to look inside. He saw the two of them standing quite close together and whispering urgently, he couldn’t make out most of what they were saying, but he caught Malfoy mutter “someone’s going to find out about you”. At that moment, Adele turned her head and Harry could have sworn that she locked eyes with him. She suddenly grabbed Malfoy roughly by the hair and kissed him full on the lips. Malfoy quickly pushed her away, his face bright red. “What are you . . . ”

Adele’s eyes flicked in Harry’s direction. Malfoy turned his head and spotted him. Harry snapped his mouth closed, not having realized that he was standing there with it hanging open before.

“Potter!” Malfoy exclaimed. Adele giggled and Malfoy looked at her irritably.

“Um, sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt anything,” Harry said a bit maliciously. He slammed the door closed and ran back down the stairs laughing to himself. The idea of Malfoy and Adele together just seemed so absurd and funny to him. Although it was odd the way that Adele hadn’t kissed Malfoy until after she had seen Harry. Harry was truly baffled by that one.

Harry was in a good enough mood now to go back up the Gryffindor common room. He found it nearly empty, but Hermione was sitting in the corner with an open book in her lap. Harry went and sat down beside her.

“Have you seen Ron?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied, closing Arithmancy: Magical Mathematics.

“And did he say anything about me?”

“He had a few choice words.”

“Oh.” Harry was silent for a long while. “I really am going to quit the team,” he said after a while.

“Do you think that’s for the best?”

“Yes, I do actually. I like Quidditch, it’s a great game, but playing for Gryffindor has just become too much for me, in a lot of ways.”

“I see. You’ll have trouble getting a lot of people to understand that.”

Harry knew that by “a lot of people”, she really meant Ron. “I don’t know if things can ever be the same between me and Ron again,” he admitted. “I mean, I want to be friends with him - that is if he still wants to be friends - and I think that we can be friends, but I don’t think that I’m the same person that I was when I was a kid. It’ll never be like it was then, it’s like we’re not on the same wavelength anymore or something.”

“Harry,” Hermione said, “there’s nothing wrong with changing and growing - even growing apart a little. You just need to understand that Ron and I are always going to be there for you. I know that Ron is mad at you now, but . . . ”

“I’m not growing. I’m falling. Further and further and I can never come back.”

“I know, Hermione, I get it. Hey, guess what I just saw?” he attempted to change the subject.

“What?”

“Malfoy snogging Adele up in the Defense classroom!”

Hermione’s brow creased. “Really?” she asked. “Well that certainly strikes me as odd. I got the impression that Malfoy wasn’t really that fond of Adele.”

“What gave you that idea?”

“The looks he gets in her class sometimes, and the fact that he never speaks or does anything during her class.”

“Well that could also mean that he fancied her, right?”

Hermione frowned. “Well, maybe, but I sort of thought that he found her a bit much. Like you do.”

“Whatever, they were kissing. Malfoy won’t be able to bother us anymore, now that I have this to hold over his head - whatever the reason was.”

Hermione looked thoughtful.

Harry rolled his eyes. “I’m going up to my room, Hermione. Thanks for the talk. Did you stay down here just to talk to me?”

“No,” Hermione answered glumly, “Parvati and Lavender are up in my room having an infantile argument and I came down here to get away.”

“What is it this time?”

“Apparently Parvati disappeared during the Quidditch match, leaving Lavender to search for her for two hours. Have I mentioned how much I despise sharing a room with those two?”

“Several times, yes. Bye, Hermione.”