Love is All; Love is New

Four: Waiting.

After September finally ended, October arrives and sends everyone into a frenzy as the Triwizard Tournament is getting closer and closer. The school is getting cleaned from top to bottom, making sure everything is spotless for our guests. The teachers are even being stricter. They try to make us create a habit of being perfect. We must be excelling in all of our studies, we must look our best. They've even gone so far as to give us a lesson in proper manners.

October 2nd arrives quickly, and much to everyone's jealousy, I turn 17. Father sends me brand new Quidditch gear and Mother sends me a beautiful new dress that I'll never have a use for.

My friends give me an assortment of things. Skye gives me a charm bracelet, much similar to hers. Fallon buys me this beautiful hair piece that I was ogling at in Hogsmeade. And, even Oliver gets me a gift! He bought me a nice Bulgarian sweater. When I gave him a grateful hug, his cheeks and ears turned bright red. All my hard work is beginning to pay off.

"Nice dive," Oliver claps from his seat on his broom. I fly up beside him and present him with the mock snitch we use. The Quidditch field is full of people who miss the sport and come here to play with friends. Nearly everyday I've been out here with Oliver.

I smile and hand the snitch to him, wiping my bangs out of my face.

"You guys up for a friendly game?" We hear behind us.

We turn to see two Hufflepuffs smiling at us. The one who spoke up, I easily recognize from the Hufflepuff team, from last year. And, the other boy looks familiar, but I can't quite put a finger on who he is.

"You sure, Bradley?" Oliver raises his eyebrows with a smile, "Wouldn't want to make a fool of yourself, you know." He taunts.

A smile forms on my lips as well.

"Oh, shut it and let's play," Bradley frowns and crosses his arms.

"Alright, it's up to you. But, watch out Diggory, or Florence here might wreck that pretty little face of yours," Oliver says, before flying over to our side of the arena.

That's it! Cedric Diggory. How could I forget him? His perfectly chiseled face is not easily forgotten. I send him a playful, mischievous grin, before joining Oliver on our side.

As Oliver and I wait for them to get ready, I can't help but to overhear their conversation,

"Go easy on 'Princess' over there. She looks easily broken," Cedric snickers, glancing over his shoulder at me.

Oliver, obviously hearing what I'm hearing, just laughs and tightens his gloves.

"Oh, boy," He shakes his head as I grip my broom tightly.

There's nothing that bothers me more, than when someone tries to go easy on me on the Quidditch field, because of my small frame. I'm a whopping 5 ft tall, with a stringy frame. But, their quick judgements just get my adrenaline pumping even more.

"Ready? Set, GO!" Bradley says and we're off!

~five minutes later~

"You know, I really am sorry about the whole broken nose thing," I say to Cedric as we all exit the arena.

Oliver fixed his nose, but his shirt was still stained red with dried blood, as evidence. I bite the inside of my cheek to refrain from laughing.

Cedric just merely grunts and tries to quicken his pace. His nose didn't hurt anymore, just his pride. I have to nearly jog to keep up with his long legs.

"It's just that you called me 'Princess' and I really didn't appreciate that and I got a little worked up and-" I begin to ramble, something I tend to do when I'm feeling guilty.