Jinx Not-So-Malfoy and the Triwizard Tournament

Chapter 16

I'm bored and I feel like writing and I don't want to study so I'm writing. 

Yay. 

Oh, and the Yule Ball chapter is will be Chapter 20. 

Just so you know. ;D

~ERMAGERDICAN'TFREAKENWAITTOWRITETHAT~

So Sirius sent Harry an owl back saying something about a fire and midnight and a fortnight or something.

I don't know. 

Fred flipped his hair attractively and winked at me as Harry was saying stuff so basically in that moment I didn't know what air was. 

Life became even worse for Harry within the confines of the castle, for Rita Skeeter had published her piece about the Triwizard Tournament, and it had turned out to be not so much a report on the tournament as a highly colored life story of Harry. Much of the front page had been given over to a picture of Harry; the article (continuing on pages two, six, and seven) had been all about Harry, the names of the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang champions (misspelled) had been squashed into the last line of the article, and Cedric hadn't been mentioned at all. 

The article had appeared ten days ago. Rita Skeeter had reported him saying an awful lot of things that he couldn't remember ever saying in his life, let alone in that broom cupboard. 

I suppose I get my strength from my parents. I know they'd be very proud of me if they could see me now.... Yes, sometimes at night I still cry about them, I'm not ashamed to admit it.... I know nothing will hurt me during the tournament, because they're watching over me... 

But Rita Skeeter had gone even further than transforming his "er's" into long, sickly sentences: She had interviewed other people about him too. 

Harry has at last found love at Hogwarts. His close friend, Colin Creevey, says that Harry is rarely seen out of the company of one Hermione Granger, a stunningly pretty Muggle-born girl who, like Harry, is one of the top students in the school. 

I was only happy about that because they called Hermione stunningly pretty. 

From the moment the article had appeared, Harry had had to endure people -Slytherins, mainly - quoting it at him as he passed and making sneering comments. 

"Want a hanky, Potter, in case you start crying in Transfiguration?" 

"Since when have you been one of the top students in the school, Potter? Or is this a school you and Longbottom have set up together?" 

"Hey - Harry!" 

"Yeah, that's right!" Harry found himself shouting as he wheeled around in the corridor, having had just about enough. "I've just been crying my eyes out over my dead mum, and I'm just off to do a bit more..." 

"No - it was just - you dropped your quill." 

It was Cho. Harry blushed. 

Wait.

Does he --

He does. 

HARRY LIKES CHO.

"Oh - right - sorry," he muttered, taking the quill back. 

"Er... good luck on Tuesday," she said. "I really hope you do well." 

Which left Harry feeling extremely stupid. 

Hermione had come in for her fair share of unpleasantness too, but she hadn't yet started yelling at innocent bystanders; in fact, Harry was full of admiration for the way she was handling the situation.