Protection From Nargles

IV - Moonlight

January, 1996.

Harry Potter was slowly moving down the hallway towards the Ravenclaw common room, covered in his Cloak of Invisibility, carrying a book bag. He was wearing a long winter jacket, snow boots, and a matching woolen stocking cap and scarf in alternating gold-and-red stripes. It was nearly 8:00 p.m., and he found himself far more nervous than he expected to be. He was planning on taking Luna Lovegood down to the shores of the Black Lake for a night-time stroll. This was nothing he hadn't done before with her - he had spent quite a few evenings with her over the fall term just walking around and chatting. However, all of those outings had been just them running into one another and deciding to walk together. This one, Harry had planned. He had asked Luna deliberately to do this with him. It was functionally no different than before, and yet it was.

Neville Longbottom grinning at Harry all day hadn't helped. Harry was glad to have Neville's support where his friendship (or whatever this was) with Luna was concerned, something he wasn't certain he would have from Ron or Hermione, but he could do without the pressure. And the "thumbs up" signal Neville gave to him at dinner when he saw Harry and Luna giving a slight wave at one another. Harry was just glad no one else saw Neville's gesture to him.

At some point, he was going to have to talk to Ron and Hermione about this. Harry really did value their opinions, and he wanted to talk to them about what had been happening with Luna. He also wanted them to like her. He was worried, however, as he knew that Hermione found Luna's beliefs irrational and frustrating. Ron might be worse - he'd known Luna a long time, and while he didn't dislike her, he thought she was crazy and frustrating. For all Ron's wonderful qualities as a friend, he lacked the social graces to not make that obvious. If he wanted to be able to hang out with Luna more often, he knew he would have to get his friends' support. And teach Ron some manners.

But at the moment, he had a lovely girl he wanted to spend time with, so he tried to put all of this out of his mind while he negotiated his way down the hallways, trying not to run into any of the other students in the hallways. When he eventually got to the passageway to the Ravenclaw common room, he saw Luna standing there in her robes, smiling vaguely and looking around the hallways.

As he moved towards the blonde girl, he heard her humming the same cheery tune she was humming the day she gave him the anti-Nargle charm. He approached her and was about to say something when Luna whispered roughly in her direction, "Harry, is that you?"

He lifted up the Cloak in front of him to see her, and whispered, "Hi Luna. Join me?"

She got under the Cloak with him, and said to him, "My jacket is under my robes." Harry nodded, glad that Luna was trying to remain inconspicuous before their evening. They walked silently together until they came to the castle entrance. He was once again acutely aware of how close she was to him underneath the Cloak. He tried, only partly successfully, to suppress a smile.

When they got to the castle entrance, Luna led him into a secluded alcove and got out from under the Cloak. She removed her school robes, revealing an explosion of clashing colours - a lime-green and cherry-red winter jacket that went down to her hips, bright royal blue leggings, and mismatched winter boots - the left one bright purple, then right one a dark violet. To top off her outfit, she pulled out a red, yellow, and orange woolen stocking cap with a small rainbow pom-pom on top from her jacket pocket, and placed it on her head. Her wand was tucked behind her left ear as always. None of the items of clothing she wore went with any of the others (Harry thought some didn't even go with themselves), but the whole outfit was just so... Luna, for lack of a better word, that it made him smile.

It occurred to Harry that he had only seen her out of her school robes twice - at the initial D.A. meeting, and when he had initially met Luna on the train at the beginning of the year. Not for the first time, he rued (regretted) the arrival of Dolores Umbridge at Hogwarts, and her requirement that school robes be worn at all times. He liked seeing Luna in bright colours - it suited her far more than the black robes did.