THE WITCHING HOUR ➸ h. potter

7 - flying

I had never believed that I would ever meet a person I hated more than the girls in my school, but that was before I met Draco Malfoy. Still, us first-year Gryffindors only had Potions with the Slytherins, so we didn't have to put up with Malfoy much.

Or at least, we didn't until I spotted a notice pinned up in the Gryffindor common room. Flying lessons would be starting on Thursday - and Gryffindor and Slytherin would be learning together. Exactly what I needed. Amazing.

"Typical," said Harry darkly, when I showed him and Ron. "Just what I always wanted. To make a fool of myself on a broomstick in front of Malfoy."

I sighed, nodding. I had been looking forward to learning to fly more than anything else. And now that oaf would spoil it for me.

"You don't know that you'll make a fool of yourself," said Ron reasonably. "Anyway, I know Malfoy's always going on about how good he is at Quidditch, but I bet that's all talk."

Malfoy certainly did talk about flying a lot. He complained loudly about first years never getting on the house Quidditch teams and told long, boastful stories that always seemed to end with him narrowly escaping Muggles in helicopters. Worst of all - people seemed to believe them.

He wasn't the only one, though. The way Seamus Finnigan told it, he'd spent most of his childhood zooming around the countryside on his broomstick.

Even Ron would tell anyone who'd listen about the time he'd almost hit a hang glider on Charlie's old broom. Everyone from wizarding families talked about Quidditch constantly. Another thing that made me feel very out of place.

Neville had never been on a broomstick in his life, because his grandmother had never let him near one. I felt she'd had good reason, because Neville managed to have an extraordinary number of accidents even with both feet on the ground.

Hermione Granger was almost as nervous about flying as Neville was. This was something you couldn't learn by heart out of a book - not that she hadn't tried.

At breakfast on Thursday she bored us all with flying tips she'd gotten out of a library book called Quidditch Through the Ages.

Neville was hanging on to her every word, desperate for anything that might help him hang on to his broomstick later, but everybody else was very pleased when Hermione's lecture was interrupted by the arrival of the mail. I felt a bit bad for her, but her tips were only making me even more nervous than I already was, so I didn't say anything.

A barn owl brought Neville a small package from his grandmother. He opened it excitedly and showed us a glass ball the size of a large marble, which seemed to be full of white smoke.

"It's a Remembrall!" he explained. "Gran knows I forget things - this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red - oh. . . " His face fell, because the Remembrall had suddenly glowed scarlet, ". . . you've forgotten something. . . "

Neville was still trying to remember what he'd forgotten when Malfoy, who was passing the Gryffindor table, snatched the Remembrall out of his hand.

Harry, Ron and I jumped to our feet. I was half hoping for a reason to fight Malfoy, but Professor McGonagall, who could spot trouble quicker than any teacher in the school, was there in a flash.

"What's going on?"

"Malfoy's got my Remembrall, Professor."

Scowling, Malfoy quickly dropped the Remembrall back on the table.

"Just looking," he said, and he sloped away with Crabbe and Goyle behind him.

At three-thirty that afternoon, Harry, Ron, the other Gryffindors and I hurried down the front steps onto the grounds for our first flying lesson.