In the Melancholy Moonlight

Chapter VII: Us, A Distraction?

LUCY:

The twins never stopped talking the whole walk to the castle.

"Harry and Ron told us you stood up to Professor Snape in your very first lesson-"

"And that he told you that you don't belong in Gryffindor-"

"Which is obviously the biggest load of dragon dung we had ever heard-"

"If Neville is in Gryffindor, bless his fragile and easily frightened soul-"

"Then you definitely belong here too!"

"And then we heard from Percy that you had sleepwalked into the Forbidden Forest-"

"And honestly, we were surprised at first-"

"I mean, your brother is so perfect-"

"Never gets in trouble, never does anything unexpected-"

"Honestly, we feel guilty ever pranking him because he's just such a good chap-"

"We almost couldn't believe it was actually you, a Diggory, who wandered into the Forbidden Forest-"

"But then, we remembered! Lucy Diggory, the one who stood up to Snape!"

"We kept trying to visit you in the Hospital Wing, but only Percy and Cedric were allowed in."

"Then we heard you were in your dormitory-"

"And tried to get Hermione to convince you to come down so we could congratulate you on not dying and all that-"

"But she said you were busy studying and told us we would be a distraction! The nerve! Us, a distraction?"

"We had about given up hope of ever getting to talk to the elusive Lucy Diggory, Sleepwalker Extraordinaire-"

"Then all of a sudden, there you were, watching our practice!"

"And then there you were, shooting up into the sky!"

"Oliver didn't strap one of the Bludgers properly, so when it realized someone was still on a broom-"

"Off it went! Chasing you!"

"The two of us jumped on our brooms and started chasing it-"

"But we were so surprised we almost didn't catch it!"

"But then we did, and we looked up, and there you were-"

"Doing a Wronski Feint in reverse!" they finished in perfect unison.

I laughed. "Now that you mention it, that was pretty similar to a reversed Wronski. I've always been too afraid to attempt a real one. Have you tried yet, Harry?"

"What's a Wronski Feint?" he asked, looking equal parts baffled and amused by the rapid-fire conversation.

"It's one of the boldest Quidditch plays there is," I explained, gesturing with my hands to illustrate my point. "If you remind me, I'll show you the edition of Seeker Weekly where they did a whole feature on it. Basically, the Seeker of one team pretends to see the Snitch waaaaay down here, then he or she dives straight downward, hoping the other Seeker follows them. Then, right before they would hit the ground, the Seeker shoots back up into the air... at least hypothetically. If you're not fast enough, you faceplant into the ground."

He winced. "Has anyone ever died doing that?"

"Probably!"

At that point, we had reached the Great Hall. Harry and I exchanged a look when we saw that Ron was sitting by himself, glaring daggers at Hermione, who was sitting between Lavender and Parvati, who were glaring daggers at Ron.