Venus

71- Looser's Lurgy

"Mali you're being weird." Venus pointed out at the breakfast table one morning. It was true, Mali had been quieter around Venus and Ginny since returning from the Christmas holidays.

"No I'm not."

"You so are." Ginny shook her head.

"Lay off guys." Mali dug into her single piece of toast.

"Gin, she's only eating toast, there's definitely something up." Venus teased. Then in a more serious note she said, "Has something happened Mali? You can tell us."

Mali didn't say anything, but continued to munch on her toast.

"M, please, what happened?" Ginny pressed.

"My mum." Mali said quietly, "she's dying."

"Oh Mali." Venus pulled her friend into a side hug as they were still sitting on the benches.

"She's got terminal cancer." Mali sniffed, "dad said that there's not much the doctors can do."

Ginny and Venus exchanged a glance. They didn't know Mali's parents well, they had short conversations with them when they dropped Mali off at the Burrow or at Platform 9 3/4, and they both liked her mother. She seemed like a lovely person. But even in the magical world, there was very little that could be done to treat terminal illnesses.

"Mali I'm so sorry." Ginny said.

"Yeah." Mali chewed on her toast.

With everything happening at that moment. All of the strange deaths and disappearances in the magical world, it was easy to forget that the muggle world was still out their, getting on with their lives.

********

The Hogsmead visit at the beginning of March was cancelled. But it didn't come as a shock to anyone. Mainly because Katie Bell still hadn't returned from St Mungos.

Venus woke up late on the day in question (which also happened to be Ron's birthday), to the news that Ron had been poisoned.

She, Ginny, Harry and Hermione spent most of the day waiting outside the hospital wing for news and weren't allowed inside until 8.30. Their parents had been to see Ron and were speaking to Dumbledore in his office when the twins arrived.

They sat around his bed discussing who might've wanted to poisoned Ron. Eventually they were shooed from the hospital wing and back to their dorms.

Ron was okay, but he wasn't able to play in the Quidditch match the next week, which left the team stuck with Cormac McClaggen standing in.

As they made their way out onto the pitch Cormac was trying to give them instructions, "tricky conditions, Coote, Peakes, you'll want to fly out of the sun-"

"McClaggen I'm captain not you, get over to the goalposts." Harry told him. McClaggen trudged off.

Harry shook hands with the Hufflepuff captain and the game began.

"And that's Smith of Hufflepuff with the Quaffle." The dreamy voice of Luna Lovegood said over the sound system, "Ginny Weasley punched him after the last match, he was saying some quite rude things about Gyffindor- oh look, he's lost the Quaffle, Venus took it from him. I do like her, she's very nice."

McGonagall was sat next to Luna, looking uncomfortable as if she was having second thoughts about letting Luna do the commentary.

"...now that big Hufflepuff player has got the Quaffle from her, I can't remember his name, it's something like Bibble- no, Buggins-"

"It's Cadwallader!" McGonagall said loudly from beside Luna.

The next moment Cadwallader scored, McClaggen had been too busy shouting criticism at Venus for letting the Quaffle out of her possession.

"And now Harry Potter is having an argument with his Keeper," said Luna, "I don't think he'll catch the snitch like that, but perhaps it's a clever ruse..."

The match drew on and soon both Venus and Ginny had scored a goal each and then Cadwallader scored another making the score even.

Luna seemed completely uninterested in the score and kept drawing the crowd's attention to things like interestingly shaped clouds and the possibility that Zacharias Smith, who so far had failed to keep the Quaffle in his possession for more than a few moments, might be suffering from something called 'Loser's Lurgy'.

"SEVENTY-FOURTY TO GRYFFINDOR!" McGonagall barked into the microphone.

"Is it already?" Luna asked, "Oh look, the Gryffindor Keeper has got hold of one of the Beater's bats."

"WILL YOU GIVE HIM HIS BAT BACK AND GET BACK TO THE GOALPOSTS!" Harry roared at McClaggen who had taken Peake's bat and was demonstrating how to hit a Bludger. Harry soared towards them just as McClaggen took a ferocious swipe and mis-hit the Bludger, making it smash Harry in the head.

There were screams from the crowd and a great deal of noise as Harry fell off his broom and was caught by the two Gryffindor beaters. A great deal of noise and commotion followed what had happened and Venus took her hands off of her broom and covered her ears.

She flew down to the ground slowly and curled up into a ball on the grass.

********

As soon as the noise broke out Neville's eyes found Venus, he saw her cover her ears and soon was on his feet, charging through the stands to get to her. Before he knew it he was at her side and pulled her hands into his.

"Everything is okay." He told her, "you're okay."

But this didn't seem to comfort her, in fact she didn't seem to hear him at all.

"Is she alright?" Professor McGonagall had hurried over. Across the pitch Neville could see an unconscious Harry being taken from the pitch.

"Professor I've not seen her this bad in a while." Neville confessed.

"You'd better take her back to the common room." McGonagall said, "it's quiet there."

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~Em xx