Astonishing Amour

Snuggles & Stunts

(A/n: I KNOW. I KNOW. IM SORRY. I SAID I WOULD UPDATE IN THE SECOND WEEK OF JULY, BUT I GOT SO UNMOTIVATED. If you forgive me, I made this chapter really long. Also, in the comments tell me one fun thing you did this summer. )

∞ ϟ 9¾ ♔ ⚯ ➵ ♆

A dull March blurred into a squally April. The Quibbler interview had long since evaporated. O.W.L.s. were drawing closer each day. Hermione was full-on panic mode and I heard Hannah Abbott became the first to receive a Calming Draught from Madam Pomfrey after she burst into tears during Herbology and sobbed that she was too stupid to take exams and wanted to leave school now. It was like every fifth year became mentally insane. As for me, the exams weren't the only thing weaving through my mind. Harry. I couldn't tell what we were. After everything that had happened with Theodore and Cho, we were close friends. Closer than it had ever been, but it was like that wasn't good enough. There was like a small hole in my heart that needed to be filled. The more talking we did the more it reminded me he cared for me and didn't hate me. Some days he would be my friend then flirt with me. He was a book that I couldn't read. Every page seemed like a foreign language that Hermione could read, but wouldn't tell me what it was translated. An invisible string hung between us, connecting us together, but it was invisible and I couldn't understand it. My head would overflow with thoughts of where we stood. What was our relationship?

Thankfully the D.A. meetings were still intact. It was a breath of fresh air from Hogwarts, but also a time to study for the exams. Everyone wondered how Umbridge was going to react when all the members of the D.A. received "Outstanding" in their Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L.s.

We had finally started work on Patronuses, which everybody had been very keen to practice, and my begging on him finally worked. Although Harry kept reminding us, producing a Patronus in the middle of a brightly lit classroom when we were not under threat was very different to producing it when confronted by something like a dementor.

"Oh, don't be such a killjoy," said Cho brightly, watching her silvery swan-shaped Patronus soar around the Room of Requirement during their last lesson before Easter. "They're so pretty!"

"They're not supposed to be pretty, they're supposed to protect you," said Harry in an uncomfortable manner. Something told me Harry wasn't even sure how to talk to Cho after their fiasco date. "What we really need is a boggart or something; that's how I learned, I had to conjure a Patronus while the boggart was pretending to be a dementor —"

"But that would be really scary!" said Lavender, who was shooting puffs of silver vapor out of the end of her wand. "And I still — can't — do it!" she added angrily. Lavender joined our group after the Quibbler interview just as Seamus.

Neville was having trouble too. His face was screwed up in concentration, but only feeble wisps of silver smoke issued from his wand tip. "You've got to think of something happy," Harry reminded him.

"I'm trying," said Neville miserably, who was trying so hard his round face was actually shining with sweat.

"Harry, I think I'm doing it!" yelled Seamus, who had been brought along to his first-ever D.A. meeting by Dean. "Look — ah — it's gone. . . . But it was definitely something hairy, Harry!"

"Great job Seamus!" I said. It was like our friendship had been reunited after being split with our differences. I hung out with Dean and Seamus a lot more now and we had so much to talk about especially the D.A. I hung out a little bit less with Hermione, Ron, and Harry as I was trying to spend more time with my trio. Everything was starting to get better as the day passed on. Harry even seemed relieved.

Hermione's Patronus, a shining silver otter, was gamboling around her.

"They are sort of nice, aren't they?" she said, looking at it fondly. Meanwhile, I was having trouble doing mine.