Living Dangerously

Chapter 2: The Golden Boy

The next day passed thankfully quick for Harry. It was a Thursday, which meant no lesson, but it also meant it was considerably more difficult to avoid his friends. He wasn't up for facing them, not yet, anyway. He knew he'd have to eventually, just...

He'd tried to act casual about it, but that wasn't easy with Hermione's eagle eyes. When he'd arrived back at common room last night he'd been in a state, and Hermione was the first one to jump on him. She'd instantly known something was up, but he'd been able to play it off as though Snape putting him through a rough time. If she, or anyone, knew the truth about what had gone on... It'd be a while before he'd be able to look Ron or Hermione in the eye again, never-mind Ginny.

They were in the last few days of autumn, which meant he would have been able to get away with spending the day on the Quidditch Pitch, if Umbridge had not closed the pitch indefinitely.

Despite his attempts, it was useless. He still couldn't wrap his head around what had happened. It had all been so alien to him that he couldn't a point of reference to begin working his problem out. He tried raking his brains for possibilities as to what had come over him. There had been no opportunities to slip him a love potion or cast a spell on him -and given Greengrass's horrified reaction at Snape catching them- he doubted she was behind it. When he finally ran out of weird and wonderful solutions, he finally accepted what had happened.

Daphne Greengrass had... done things to him. Not, actually done things, christ no. But the way she'd made him feel... He needed to admit that to himself. Fooling himself didn't work, he knew exactly what was going to happen if last night had played out uninterrupted. It had felt so right at the time... In the dark recesses of his mind, though he didn't like to admit it, he knew he was playing devils advocate. If it was any other time and he was any other lad, living any other life, he'd probably pat himself on the back for getting so close to her. A lifetime of living under-stairs makes you appreciate whatever small showers of affection you get- but this?

Maybe the Sorting Hat was right all along, he'd really embraced the spirit of Slytherin; he was now a genuine snake in the grass.

The more Harry thought about what happened, the more potent the feeling became. He wanted to tell somebody about it. Only problem was that would involve telling somebody, which he wasn't going to risk. Talking about how attractive you find a girl, typically isn't something you do when you already have a girlfriend - Ginny Weasley.

He began to think of Greengrass, and what she was doing at this moment. He could only pray that she had stayed as secretive as he had done about everything. She wasn't known to be very well-liked, she wasn't the type to start bragging about him making moves on her, was she? To be fair, he'd only ever seen her around Hogwarts with the same small group of friends, maybe people in Slytherin outright avoided her? Or was he just wholey assuming the worst in her?

The only people that knew about it were himself, Snape and Greengrass... and he would prefer it to stay like that. If all went according to plan, he and her would get these detentions over with and then never speak to each other again. It wasn't an ideal solution; as he'd still know forever have that image of her in his head, but it was a compromise.

As of yet he hadn't technically done anything wrong, because there would be no coming back from that. His stomach churned at the idea of describing himself as a cheat.

As the clock struck four, he was brought out of his thoughts and began prepping for detention.

A ten minutes or so later, Harry and Snape stood outside the potions classroom, waiting patiently for Greengrass to arrive. Harry wished she'd get a move on, as he could fully feel Snape's death glare burning deep into the back of his skull.