Huffily Puffily || Golden Trio

Challenge Accepted || xi

* * * * *

She had no idea how but Lucy had wrangled herself an afternoon detention with Madam Hooch— which to be fair was only trimming the broomsticks, but it was still a detention nonetheless. In the first minute of detention, Lucy decided Madam Hooch was her favorite member of staff, McGonagall being a close second. Half of her 'detention' was just Lucy asking the coach questions about Quidditch and while she had never shown an interest in athletics before, somehow Hooch was convincing her to try out for the team next year.

Dinnertime rolled around fairly quickly, but she couldn't help but notice how strange her Hufflepuff friends were acting. Some of their laughs were forced and they were staring at her in an odd sort of way. She couldn't bring herself to worry about it; she had been aching to know what happened at flying lessons, so she ignored the rules about dinnertime and sat between Harry and Seamus at the Gryffindor table.

"Seeker?" Ron was saying, his eyes widened to the size of saucers. "But first years never— you must be the youngest House player in about—"

"—a century," Harry finished as he bit into his dessert. "Wood told me."

"What's this about Harry being a privileged little git?" Lucy interjected. Harry turned to look at her, offended, but upon seeing the teasing grin on her face he merely rolled his eyes. It was so hard to be genuinely offended by Lucy when she wore that smile; it didn't matter what she said. "So when's your first practice?"

"Next week," Harry replied. "Only don't tell anyone; Wood wants to keep it a secret."

She grinned evilly. "I'm telling everyone on the Hufflepuff team—"

Before Lucy could finish her sentence, Fred and George appeared out of nowhere; George clamped his hand over the girl's mouth while Fred shook his head at her in mock-disappointment. "Now, don't go spilling our secrets, Hufflepuff," he chided.

"Yeah, with Harry we'll win the Quidditch Cup for sure this year." At Lucy's quizzical look, Fred explained: "We haven't won since Charlie left, but this year's team is going to be brilliant. You must be good, Harry, Wood was almost skipping when he told us."

Lucy swatted George's hand away. "Seems to me like that's even more reason to tell my team!"

"Oi, no inter-house sabotage or we might reconsider letting you sit here," George warned playfully.

"Stuff it, Weasley— I'll sic Anthony on you!" Lucy warned, knowing full well that they didn't get along.

Fred and George both rolled their eyes at the mention of their top rival for troublemaking. Anthony was a one-man band, and that particular charm seemed to combat the two-man act that the twins had going on. Besides, a lot of Anthony's pranks were pinned on the twins, who never had a proper alibi to prove their innocence.

"Speaking of which, we'd better get going," Fred said, "Lee says he's found a new secret passageway out of the school."

"Bet it's that one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy that we found in our first week," George winked. "See you!"

With that, the twins left as abruptly as they'd arrived. Lucy couldn't help but snicker in amusement but her humor was short-lived; Malfoy had invited himself to the party, flanked by the two gorillas known as Crabbe and Goyle. She'd never been able to tell which was which and she didn't care.

"Having a last meal, Potter?" Malfoy sneered. "When are you getting the train back to the Muggles?"

"You're a lot braver now that you're back on the ground and you've got your little friends with you," said Harry coolly.