While Harry shared his room with Neville and his crew, that didn't make him any part of their clique just as it hadn't when he'd stayed their earlier in the term. That didn't stop Neville from trying to include him in. Harry could only fathom that Neville was trying to get the two of them to be "friends" either to find a way to skim off his notes for homework assignments (like Harry was going to let that happen), or to show they were now chums and that Neville was again top dog of his environment since Harry had decided to become HIS friend.
Harry's refusal to have anything to do with them put a crimp in that plan, but that didn't stop him from trying. As is, the morning of the Quidditch game, Neville and his boys approached Harry during breakfast. Neville even sat down in front of Harry, pushing (not roughly, but using a firm hand) Susan down the bench a bit so he could sit.
"Potter… Harry, look. We got off on the wrong foot. Let's let bygones by bygones and how about you taking my hand in friendship?" He held his right hand out towards Harry.
Harry looked at the hand, then looked at Neville's face. He really wanted it for some reason, but friendship wasn't it. Harry then laughed out loud. "You've got to be kidding me, Longbottom. Why would I want to be friends with a jerk?"
"Look, Potter, don't make the mistake of rejecting my friendship."
"What are you going to do' complain that we're not best buds? You know, I like to tell myself that I don't judge people at first appearance. I try to wait to see how they actually represent themselves. But you… you've acted like a jerk from the moment we met. I don't know what crawled up your bum and died, but I think you can take the pole out and come down to the ground and meet some really nice people. If not, you're the Boy-Who-Lived as you like to tell everyone. I'm sure you can find yourself other friends."
Fuming, Neville got up from the Hufflepuff table and went back to the Gryffindor one.
Once he was out of earshot, Hermione said, "You know, maybe you should accept his friendship offer, Harry. He's certainly persistent about it."
Harry rolled his eyes and answered, "Why would I want to do that? He's a jerk."
"Well, they might make some trouble for you in the future."
"Ah, let them. I'll be ready. Maybe I'll assign some detentions. I hear Filch has some new fiendish tortures involving cleaning solutions, commodes, and sandpaper that he's looking to try out on students."
"Well, we'll watch out during Quidditch anyway, Harry. I just have a bad feeling about it." She looked at Neville who gave her and her friends a glare that said he was far from happy.
"You sure it's not the bacon? Seriously, don't worry about it. Neville is already in trouble from the broom incident. And did you hear what he did to Malfoy last week? They got into a fight in the hallway and used magic. Neville won, but got detention for it. Actually both are in detention for another couple weeks.
Ron shook his head and gave Harry and his friends his patented sneer. It looked like he was constipated, Harry thought.
...
As Harry made his way to the pitch, students he knew wished him well on his first match. This included older students, even Slytherins who he patiently explained concepts to in their Muggle Studies class. Gryffindor as a whole had a lot of students wishing they would crush the Slytherins if only to make their matches against them later on not as tough. But as always seemed to be the case, there were the exceptions to every rule. And that included some students who thought they were better than Harry. Well, to be fair, since he was a first year, most students thought they were better than him, apprentice or not. Those students tended to just snub him.
Harry didn't care about them at all. He was more concerned with the chasers on his team: Angelina, Katie, and Alicia. All older students who really didn't know what to expect from Harry as Wood had been the only one to train with him so far, they were withholding judgment on his performance, but were more than friendly to Harry - after all, he was their teammate, wasn't he?
Besides, he had stopped a potentially bullying session from getting out of control the other day, Angelina thought, when Flint had tried to intimidate the three girls in the halls. Apparently Flint, Adrian Pucey, and Miles Bletchley all thought they could try to out-psych the girls and browbeat them at the same time. There was no psychical altercation between the two groups, but the underlying threat was there.
"Flint, jerkwad-one, jerkwad-two. Why are you trying to make these girls cry?" he had said, stepping between the two groups.
"Stay out of this, Potter. It doesn't involve you," Flint said with a snide attitude.
"You sure? Because it seems to me that you're trying awful hard to get these three ladies all riled up so they won't be as effective in the game tomorrow. And since I'm on their team, I thought I should say something so you'd know we were onto your little ploy. That way we can all save some time and you and your two palsies can go back to your room and do whatever it is you three do there. But don't tell me because I'm on a strict no need to know list. Don't ask, don't tell, that's my motto."
"What are you on about, Potter?" Bletchley said.
"I'm on about you three girls leaving these three ladies alone. So how about it? Hop on back to your rooms now, that's it. Shoo."
Of course, the three Slytherins didn't move at all. Other than to pull their wands out so the Gryffindors and apprentice could see them.
....
Read ahead by more than 60 chapters on my p@treon.
Link: pa*treon.com/GalaxyWonder (Remove the *)
Free members an get up to 2 free chapters.
Have a great day....