Scopophobia | H. POTTER [4]

6 | quidditch tryouts

"Look, Ron beat you fair and square," Harry pointed out, "He gets the spot."

Cormac towered over Harry with a snarl, his hand raised in a fist, "I deserve the spot you ti-"

"Woah, there," Abigail commented, stepping between the two, "Sometimes I think it's like you want to get punched."

"You won-" but before he could finish, she had swung at him and nailed him in the nose.

"Abigail!" Hermione exclaimed as she approached them.

Cormac held his nose which was now gushing blood.

"He deserved it," she shrugged as she shook her hand slightly.

"I don't think you needed to punch him," Harry pointed out from behind her.

She turned around to face him, "He was going to hit you."

"You don't know that."

"And now we don't have to find out," she pointed out before she turned around, wand in hand to Cormac stomping over to her, "Levicorpus."

"Are you done?" she inquired pointedly, "The way I see it, I warned you."

"Liberacorpus," she spoke and waved her wand and the boy fell to the floor with a grunt. "Next time it'll be worse."

She turned away, stuffing her wand away and mumbling, "I'm going to get cleaned up."

"Abigail, wait a minute," Hermione called after her and Abigail turned to see her whisper something to the boys before running after her.

The two started walking and Abigail eyed her cautiously, "Do you need something?"

"I just - Is everything okay?" she asked, playing with her hands nervously. She was clearly worried about how Abigail was going to respond to the question. The girl had been on edge lately and it was clear that even the smallest thing would send her over.

"Everything's fine," she responded simply, pushing the door open to the castle for Hermione to enter as well. "Why wouldn't it be?"

"I mean, I know you haven't really been sleeping lately," she explained, her hands still wound tightly together as they walked through the corridor. "You haven't really been doing your school work and you show up to class on a rare occasion. I know things have been hard for you lately and I want to do whatever I can to help."

She stopped walking and turned to face the girl, Hermione took an instinctive step back and Abigail raised an eyebrow, "Are you scared of me?"

"No, of course not," she shook her head.

"It seems to me like you are scared of me," Abigail countered.

"You've just been so...on edge lately. Like what happened with Cormac."

Abigail scoffed at this, "What happened with Cormac is that he's an entitled douchebag who needed to be put in his place." She looked to the side for a moment before looking back at the girl, "Go find Harry and Ron and rethink your intervention. I can manage the walk back to the common room on my own."

"Abby, I didn't-"

"Go now before I give you an actual reason to be scared of me."

Hermione's lips pressed together in a tight line and she nodded, "I'll see you at dinner."

"Don't count on it," she replied before walking off.

"Hey," Abigail greeted as she entered the Room of Requirement. Harry had sent her a note requesting that she join him there.

"Hey," he replied with a tight smile as she approached him.

"No, Abby, just wait a minute, okay?" Harry suggested, pushing her away carefully. He moved her hands out from under his shirt and pulled it back down.

She looked up at him from where she sat on the bed, "What?"

"Not like this," he shook his head and she stood up straight.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You're upset," he explained, "I don't want it to be like this."

"Last time you didn't argue."

"That was different."

"Was it?" she inquired, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Abby, what's going on?" Harry tried and she shook her head.

"Nothing's wrong, I'm fine."

"You don't seem fine," he argued. "You aren't even acting like yourself."

"Then maybe you don't know me as well as you thought you did."

He frowned at this, "Just talk to me, okay? I want to be here for you but I can't if you keep pushing me away."

"If you can't give me what I want, I'll just go get it elsewhere," she concluded before she made her way to the exit.

"Abigail!" he exclaimed but she had already slammed the door shut behind her.