DEAD TO ME → (h. potter)

CHAPTER EIGHT

When Gryffindor came out, Indiana stood up to lean against the rail, her hands gripping the bars and her one heel hooked on the back of her chair. Blaise got up to join her as well, followed by Draco, Theo and Nancy. Indiana shrugged off her jacket due to the heat of the sun and tugged down the long sleeves of her shirt.

Potter walked in front of the rest of his team, but Weasley (Ron, not Ginny) stayed so close that she could tell they were whispering to one another. Indiana always wondered why Potter chose to wear his stupid glasses rather than Seeker's goggles — perhaps he, too, knew the goggles made him look a bit like a bug.

The Captains shook hands; Potter always seemed rather polite in the beginning of the game, but Holmes seemed to be shaking with worry. They weren't too fit to be Hufflepuff Captain, Indiana thought, but she supposed the school chose them for a reason.

Madam Hooch blew her whistle and they were off, flying left and right and up and down. Indiana had learned over the years that Potter had a habit of hovering really high up in the air and then swooping down low when he spotted the Snitch. The Slytherins had dubbed the move of swooping low and then flying as high as one could "The Potter," considering he did it at least once every match.

Hufflepuff's Chasers were alright, but Weasley seemed to be doing a brilliant job at not letting the Quaffle in. The Hufflepuff Beaters were behaving recklessly, whacking the Bludgers at nearby players in such an aggressive manner that Indiana wondered if they had even planned out their plays.

"Should we start singing again?" Draco suggested, watching as Weasley continued to keep the Quaffle out of his general vicinity. "Weasley is our King! Weasley is our —"

"Oh, shut your fat mouth," Indiana grumbled loudly. "You got yourself jumped for that song, remember? George Weasley and Potter beat the shit out of you."

Indiana remembered that day very well. No one had told her of the insulting song Draco had planned for the Slytherins in the stands to sing, and even though she strongly disliked Weasley, even she knew that it was wrong on so many levels. Besides — finding out that it had taken three Quidditch players to hold back Fred Weasley was a bit of information she never wanted to forget.

"So?" Draco shrugged. "It still worked."

"And we still lost the damn game, you twat," Indiana snapped. "So shut it and let me watch without listening to your stupid voice."

Indiana found it hard to not watch Potter during the game. The way he rode his broom was very different from how she did; he kept his feet locked tightly in the stirrups of his broom and his hands very close to the top of the broom, his back so flat that sometimes it looked like he was towering over it. Indiana, on the other hand, kept her feet in the stirrups, sure, but she usually just pressed the balls of her feet on them; her hands stayed towards the middle of the broom, her back upright.

The wind was awful, and it seemed to be hitting Potter right in the face; his hair was being whipped backwards and his uniform was being pulled so greatly that it looked like it might tear in half around his arms. She had gotten so distracted by him that she had almost missed the way the Gryffindor Beaters gathered together before circling about the pitch, closing in.

"The fuck?" Blaise muttered, watching as Ritchie Coote hit the Bludger across the pitch towards Peakes, who hit it back — back to Coote — back to Peakes — and then Coote hit it so aggressively towards the one of the Hufflepuff Chasers that she dropped the Quaffle and cowered.

"What the hell was that?" Theodore shouted as Girl-Weasley swooped low to grab the Quaffle. She hurdled it toward Hufflepuff's goal post and slipped it right past the Keeper. Indiana's face was screwed up and was reminded of Simon's words from before the year started; these games were going to be dirty.