Harry Potter Imagines

[Pumpkin Carving]

It was the weekend before Halloween, and Hogwarts was practically vibrating with excitement.
The castle had been draped in floating candles and cobwebs, ghosts were swooping through the halls singing spooky songs slightly off-key, and the scent of cinnamon and pumpkin drifted from the Great Hall all the way up to the tower.

You'd spent the morning in Hogsmeade with Hermione and Ginny, weaving through the crisp October air with bags of Honeydukes sweets and Zonko's pranks clutched to your chest. Harry and Ron had disappeared into Quality Quidditch Supplies and were nearly an hour late meeting you at The Three Broomsticks — though Harry's sheepish grin when you found him nursing a Butterbeer had made it impossible to stay annoyed for long.

By late afternoon, everyone was back at the castle for what Professor Flitwick had dubbed "a community-building, pumpkin-carving celebration." It sounded suspiciously like detention disguised as fun, but at least there was hot cider involved.

When you and your friends stepped into the Great Hall, it barely looked like the Great Hall at all.
The long house tables had been pushed together into carving stations, each piled high with pumpkins — fat and round, tall and skinny, even a few knobbly ones with strange little warts. Buckets lined the aisles for "pumpkin guts" (or, as Hermione insisted, seeds), and small bowls of cinnamon sugar waited at the ends of each table for roasting later. Floating jack-o'-lanterns flickered above your heads, casting the whole room in a warm orange glow.

McGonagall and Flitwick hovered near the front like proud parents. You heard Flitwick squeak something about "channelling youthful energy into constructive creativity," while McGonagall muttered darkly about Peeves, slime, and "the incident with the moving staircases."

The room buzzed with chatter and laughter as students rolled up their sleeves, sketching designs and arguing over which pumpkin was the best. Someone had already started a mini competition at the Slytherin table, and you were pretty sure Malfoy had bribed Crabbe and Goyle to hollow his out for him.

You were elbow-deep in your pumpkin, scooping out cold, slimy handfuls of stringy pulp and tossing them into the bucket. "Ugh, this is disgusting," you groaned, wrinkling your nose.

Across from you, Hermione didn't even glance up from the elaborate curling vine pattern she was sketching. "They're not disgusting, Y/N. They're seeds. We'll roast them later."

"Seeds," you repeated skeptically, holding up a dripping handful. "Nope. These are guts. 100% guts."

Ron, sitting beside Hermione, was attacking his pumpkin like it had personally offended him. "I vote guts," he declared through a mouthful of actual pumpkin seeds, which he was spitting directly onto the table.

Hermione swatted at his arm with a horrified gasp. "Ronald! That's vile! Stop that!"

You tipped your pumpkin upside down and gave it a hard shake, watching the last of the gooey strands splatter into the bucket. "There," you said cheerfully, wiping your hands on a napkin. "Now I can start on the fun part." You grabbed your pencil and leaned over your pumpkin—

And that's when the chatter around your table faltered.

At first, you thought maybe someone had set another pumpkin on fire. But then you noticed heads turning — whispers, giggles, all directed toward the entrance.

You looked up.

Harry Potter was walking across the Great Hall.

At first glance, he looked completely normal — messy hair, trainers, casual slouch. Typical Harry. But then your eyes dropped to his shirt.

White cotton. Bold red letters stretched across the front, impossible to miss:

I ♥ my girlfriend.

Your stomach dropped. Your jaw followed.