Chapter Seventeen

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As the days turned colder and November made way for December, Harry had to admit there was something slightly off with one of his friends. Well both really but one was making it really obvious. Hermione had gone from a good friend occasionally noticing his moments of going missing to constantly inquiring about him and his location—though to be fair, that one time when he forgot to dry off his hair and Hermione spent an hour trying to figure out what could have caused it was partially his fault.

He had lost track of time in the Room of Requirements talking to Ariel as they tried to figure out a way that he would be able to hold his breath underwater for a full hour and wound up almost being late for Transfiguration, since he had to throw in a few practice strokes before talking to Ariel. Thankfully he slid in just as the bell rang and all he had to show was a stern look from McGonagall. No points removed, just a stern look.

But after that incident, Hermione seemed to notice his absences more and more. It was almost as if she wouldn't rest until she figured out why he was disappearing for so long. Ron, thankfully, was either oblivious or he didn't want to test the waters so soon after regaining Harry's friendship. Harry hoped for the later-despite all his flaws, Ron wasn't an idiot and would be able to figure out Harry's disappearances just as quickly as Hermione. Maybe even quicker since Hermione had a tendency to be wrong when her personal bias reared its head-she still wouldn't hear a positive word about Trelawny even after the woman gave a true prophecy!

However, one faithful day in December, something happened to push even Hermione's strange behavior out of Harry's head. Unfortunately.

"The Yule Ball has been a tradition of the Tri-Wizard Tournament since its inception," McGonagall told them one day as all the Gryffindors year four and higher gathered in the Great Hall. "It is a chance to have a night of well mannered friollity. That being said, the reputation of Gryffindor House has been respected across the Wizarding World for generations and I will not have you in a single night besmirch the reputation by acting like a bumbling band of baboons."

Harry smirked as he heard the twins try to say McGonagall's last line five times fast. Hopefully, they would never change and actually open their jokes shop. Charlie had let Harry know via a co-worker's owl that the twins' less-flashy jokes were a hit around the reserve and that the other Handlers couldn't wait to visit the shop when it opened. Harry was so lost in thought that he almost missed McGonagall state the main purpose of the Yule Ball—it was in fact a dance.

Shoot, I'm dead! Forget the dragon and just skip the second task and whatever they have planned for the third task, how am I supposed to go to this thing and not embarrass myself in front of the school because I CAN'T DANCE!

School dances weren't really something he attended much in primary school-for one thing it would have cut into his already limited time for chores since he also had swimming practice. But it would have just been extremely awkward as well on account of the fact that none of the kids in his primary school actually seemed to like him.

Maybe he could just skip it? Go hide up in the Room of Requirement and spend the day with Ariel? Wait, do mermaids celebrate Christmas? Who was the genius who thought having a ball on Christmas would be fun? Way to make Christmas unnecessarily more stressful than it already was!

"Mr. Potter, could I have a word?" McGonagall asked, dragging Harry out of his inner thoughts before they picked up steam and pulled him off to the side, out of earshot of the other students. "I wanted to let you know Potter that it is tradition that the champions lead the first dance of the ball."

"I don't dance. I can't dance," Harry said, the words spilling out of his mouth like word vomit. McGonagall gave him a rather stern look.

"What do you think I'm teaching here Potter? Fencing?" McGonagall asked. "You and your partner will have to dance the first dance of the Ball. No exceptions."

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