Out of my League

Chapter Ten

I sit on my bed with my legs crisscrossed admiring my dress that is hanging next to Hermione's.

She picked out a pink layered dress that gets darker as it goes down. It has a small v-cut and short flutter sleeves. I can already tell that she'll look amazing in it.

It's sort of fun that both of us got asked to the ball by champions. It's something that every girl wanted. Of course jealousy comes with it, that's why we haven't told anyone other than each other. Well I told Harry the other night, but other than him only Hermione knows.

"I just don't understand why he would do that for me." I admit. "I mean, 45 Galleons is a lot of money. And he just wasted it on me."

Hermione laughs to herself "Kennedy, it's not a big deal to him." She says. It sounds like there's a meaning behind those words that I'm missing.

"Elaborate..." I urge.

"Harry's parents were very, very wealthy and when they died, all of the money went into his vault. In other words he's inherited the amount of money that his entire family would share for a lifetime."  She explains.

"Oh wow."

"Yes, but I don't think he would do that for just anyone." She corrects.

"He hates me, Mione. I think he would." I counterclaim while getting under the covers.

"Don't be too sure about that." She replies while also getting into bed.

I blow out my candle as she does the same but instead of going straight to bed I stay up, thinking. I never thought that Harry would be the one keeping me up at night but here I am.

But when I think about him I get a different feeling lately. My stomach feels weird, like it's weak. It's getting harder to always come up with negative things to say to him, sometimes I want to say something normal or even nice. I'm sort of getting tired of hating him. Of course he can still make me want to hit him with a bludger after one snarky comment. Although he's making less of those these days.

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Moody's on again about how almost nobody did the homework. Of course Hermione had to rub it in our faces that she did it and handed it in early. For the rest of us we got a lecture about our laziness. It's not our fault he's so unclear.

He keeps talking about Harry in a very creepy way. He'll mention random facts about his life, like the other day he told the class about how he is the only known person to survive the killing curse. I didn't even know that and I've been classmates with Harry for four years. I can tell it makes him uncomfortable when Moody talks about his past. Especially because he does it in such a unsympathetic way.

I don't know if I can take much more of this class. All we do is busy work while Moody leaves the classroom to take care of his 'business' for half the class. No wonder why nobody does the work.

I still haven't asked Harry why he paid for my dress but I need more time to ponder in case I come up with a reason myself.

"Do I have something on my face?" He asks touching his nose. I didn't even notice I had been staring at him for the past five minutes.

"No, sorry I was spaced out." I reply while looking away. My heart begins to beat harder as I feel his eyes still on me.

"Hmm. Ok well, I sort of need to ask you a favor." He says touching the back of his neck.

"Go on..."

"I don't know how to ballroom dance. And Oliver said you used to take lessons when you were younger." He admits

That twat sold me out! I did take lessons when I was younger, for five years actually. I was bloody good at it.

"So you want me to teach you?" I ask. He nods. "You could've asked literally anyone else but you chose me, why?" I question, narrowing my eyes.

"Because I know either way you'll make fun of me but if I asked Hermione she would just make me feel bad about myself."

"Awwee poor Harry is insecure about his dancing skills." I tease. He rolls his eyes and turns away from me. Something makes me want to keep talking with him so I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. "Fine, I'll help you but don't think that this will be a recurring thing." I warn.

"Brilliant! When will we start?" He asks.

"More like where. It's not like we can just use the common room." I explain.

"Yes that's true, we'll need somewhere that nobody would just walk in." He begins "I guess I could tell my roommates that I'll need some time alone in our dorm every few days." He suggests.

"Hold on, you want me in your bedroom?" I ask raising an eyebrow.

"It's not a big deal." He huffs.

"Why? Do a lot of girls go in there with you?" I ask.

"No!" He defends.

"Whatever, just tell me when I should come up. Also I don't know which room is yours." I add.

"Oh it's a little hard to explain, I'll just be waiting outside the door." He says. As I look away from him and back up at the front of the room I notice Moody standing over me and Harry. He sucks the life out of us so quickly, it's impressive.

"Go ahead Wood, what was the answer?" He asks. I look to Harry who is just as clueless as me.

"Oh um-"

"You don't know, because you were too busy talking with Potter." He spits.

He picks up my textbook and slams it on the table, then opens it to the page that everyone else's is on. "Point to what section we were just on." He instructs.

Luckily I was listening at the beginning of class so I know that we were talking about a certain protection spell. I point my finger to the middle of the page and lay the rest of my hand flatly while I look to see his reaction to me being correct. He gives me an insulting look then slams the book closed on my hand out of anger causing me to squeal in pain. It's already embarrassing enough so I try to not show how my entire hand is throbbing and that I felt my finger make a cracking sound.

"Hey you can't do that! It's not 1930!" Harry advocates for me as I bite my lip to make sure I don't say anything that will bring me more pain.

"Just be happy I didn't do it to you." Moody snaps.

Harry looks at me with very sorry eyes then back up at Moody while his face goes red and his jawline becomes more defined as he clenches it more and more.

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