My Deal with a 7th Year

Part Seventeen

The next saturday was honestly pretty great. I had slept in until right around 10ish and had a few hours to catch up on school work before meeting up with Mattheo at 3. I was supposed to help him with transfiguration near the quidditch grounds, but I had a feeling the time was set when it was because of quidditch practice which started at 2. I grabbed my books regardless and headed out of the the common room.

I tucked my wand in my taller boots I had on since I didn't have a lot of hand space and ran down the spiral staircase. Once getting to the bottom of the stairs I continued through the castle, down more stairs, through extra hallways, all that, and ended up in the courtyard. Once I got there, I found Mattheo waiting by the fountain, kicking a rock with the tips of his shoes.

"Sup stranger" I said, wrinkling his hair.

"Hey, you were only 25 minutes early this time. What happened?" He turned around and crossed his arms.

It had been a while since we stood this close to each other while looking eye to eye. I kinda forgot about the fact he was taller than me. I mean, of course he was taller than me, but I hadn't really thought about it recently. I quickly brushed the thought away and slowly turned towards the opening to the castle grounds. He swung around me and ended up on my right, walking out towards the gate.

"Oh you know, I just got caught up fighting some dragons on the way down. The hallways towards the prefects bathroom really is a jackpot for 'em," I joked.

"yeah yeah" he rolled his eyes.

We got about halfway to the quidditch pitch when he turned to me, "yknow, we could just... skip our tutoring session and jump straight in to lesson number 3?"

"You're funny. We just snuck out to hogsmeade like two days ago. I think we deserve a break. plus, now we can enjoy our well earned break with transfiguration!"

"Ugh y/n you're such a buzz kill"

"It's what I strive for"

"Come on it'll be fun!" He gave me that stupid smile he does when he tries to convince me which i just laughed at.

"Okay fine fine, we can go onto lesson number 3 as long as it's not too against the rules and it's not dangerous."

"Deal!" he almost yelled, his eyes lighting up with a world of possibilities.

"I hope you know i'm only doing this because you actually look kinda cute when you're trying to convince me of something."

He paused in his victory dance, "whoa there y/l/n, that sounded like a compliment."

I set my books down on a nearby table and set your scarf on top of them, "don't let it go to your head"

He saluted me with a stiff nod.

"now where are you taking me next?"

He just pointed to the watchtowers for quidditch, "we're just gonna go watch practice. not too daring, right?"

"One question, who's playing?"

"uh... hufflepuff"

"oh okay. honestly as long as it's not gryffindoor im good."

Mattheo was already turned away, walking towards the towers, "uh... right. yeah, totally."

We climbed up the towers from the bottom (which wasn't too safe, but hey it's Mattheo, what can I expect) and eventually with the help of some magic we made it to the top.

He climbed out first, continuing to help me up and led me to one of the front seats. I rubbed my arms as the wind blew against them. i probably should have brought a jacket, but i wasn't expecting to be this high up.

"ta-da!!" he put the goofy smile on his face and did small jazz hands.

I looked out at the field, hoping to find cedric somewhere when i realized the uniforms weren't yellow. It dawned on me that it wasn't infact hufflepuff playing.

I turned to Mattheo who was brushing off the seats behind me, "Mattheo..?"

"what's up?" he still apparently hadn't noticed.

"you lied to me weirdo that's what's up"

He looked up, "oh"

I looked back at the field again and saw George pointing me out to Fred.

"Mattheo can we go?"

"no come on it won't be too bad! you don't even have to talk to them."

Yup. he jinxed it.

Fred said something to Oliver and flew straight up to where we were. It took him a few seconds so i was trying to figure out a way down when i heard his voice behind me, "sup y/n!"

I let out my breath, but i didn't have to say anything yet since Mattheo spoke first, "oh i got this, i got this... Geo-rge?" he sounded it out as he wasn't sure.

I turned around, "it's fred." i said biting my cheek.

Fred was already on the stand, taking his helmet off and i could see his smile grow as i said his name. his expression quickly darkened when i didn't match it, "hey are you mad at me? you've sorta been avoiding me whenever i try to talk to you."

I sorta snapped right then and there. Mattheo hadn't told me what i was getting myself into and all the memories from that night and what he said about me "not being the type" to hang out with him and his friends, "Oh so now you want a ravenclaw?"

Fred's eyes widen and he looked extremely puzzled, "y/n what are you talking about?"

I still didn't know why i cared so much about this. It's not like they said they didn't want me to be friends with them, they made that very clear, but it still hurt for some reason. maybe it was because i actually did enjoy it? i don't know, but it was kinda too late to stop caring now.

I took a breath and looked down reminding myself to cam down, "i was there. at your little party?"

Fred looked like he was searching for anything in his memory that could've offended me, but after a second he seemed to have found it, "oh..."

i didn't say anything, unsure if he was gonna finish a thought he seemed to be having.

he continued, "if you're talking about that guy george and i were talking to, we really weren't meaning it in a-" he stopped and tried to rephrase it, "it's not like-"

he took a breath and i took over, "i appreciate it but i just don't know how to feel about it. i thought you would've at least asked me about it instead of just deciding what i would want or not want to do. you know how much i hate that."

"i do, i know. i really am sorry." he paused, "you can come to the next one! and we can set something up for a bunch of them if you want to! we could-"

i cut him off, "i need some space just to think it over."

he looked down at me and blinked, "oh"

I turned around and signaled to mattheo, "come on, i kinda wanna go back to my dorm"

He leaped down from the risers where he was standing and saluted fred, "see ya man"

I shot him a look as soon as we got far enough down that fred couldn't see us.

he threw one of his hands up in defense, "what! i'm sorry."

"whatever just climb"

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