"Hey Fred, can you take Hermione with you" I asked, handing my sister, who was still sobbing, over to him "I'm going to look for Harry's broom. Might as well try cheer him up when he wakes up, right?"
Fred smiled at me, and carried on walking back to the castle.
With the rain still torrentially pouring down from the sky, I hurried over in the direction I saw it fall. I muttered a string of curses when I caught sight of it, broken parts scattered throughout the branches of the whomping willow. Trying to figure out how to get them down without damaging them any further, I stared closely at the tree and tried taking a step forward. Not liking the close proximity, the branches lashed out, scraping my cheek.
"Bloody hell!" I yelled, stumbling back from the hitting distance.
I heard a small bark from behind me, and saw Padfoot walking over.
"No no you silly dog! You'll freeze to death out here in this weather!"
The dog barked again, before trotting to the base of the tree, dodging the branches as they tried to smack him. With a nudge of his nose on the trunk, the whole tree froze.
I stared with an open mouth as the dog barked at me again, and ran back off to the forbidden forest.
"Accio broomstick"
The broomstick pieces floated down from the top of the tree, until they laid in front of me. I looked down in shock at the state of the once beautiful nimbus 2000
Unsure of what to do to fix it, I shoved the pieces in my pocket and made my way up to the castle.
"Miss Granger! Where have you been!" McGonagall shouted, waiting in the entrance hall.
"So sorry professor, I went to find Harry's broom" I explained in despair, pointing to my pockets "but the whomping willow found it first"
"Oh no" McGonagall tutted, looking at the pieces through her spectacles "That's beyond fixing"
I nodded sadly.
"I believe you'll be going to see Potter in the infirmary" she questioned, earning a nod from me "very well".
With a flick of her wand, I felt myself dry off, the squelching noises I had been suffering with for the past few hours disappearing.
"Thank you professor!" I beamed, before starting my trek up to the infirmary.
"Is he awake yet?" I asked, walking into the room.
"No, but he's alive. Madam Pomfrey said he's lucky to have avoided a broken spine" Fred replied, turning around to look at me "oh hey, you okay?"
"What?"
"You're bleeding" he said, brushing his thumb over my cheek. The soft touch made me shiver, and as if only realising what he had just done, he jumped back from me, looking awkwardly down at the floor.
"Soooo ... where's the broom?" He asked awkwardly.
I took the pieces out of my pocket in despair, showing the rest of the Gryffindor team what was left of Harry's broom.
"No!" Angelina cried, looking at the destruction "we need that broom! That's what gives Potter the edge over the Ravenclaws - I don't even want to think about going against the Slytherins without it"
Letting the others mourn the broom (Ron was almost crying) I made my way over to Hermione, who was holding Harry's hand, as if to comfort herself.
"You Okay Herman?"
She nodded, her eyes now much drier than earlier. I gave her a side hug, before noticing Beth sat in another bed, Ebony sat on the side, seemingly shouting at her. Furrowing my eyebrows in confusion, I watched as they had a silent argument which resulted in Ebony storming away, leaving a crying Beth behind.
Leaving Hermione with Harry, I rushed over to Beth.
"What the hell was that?" I asked incredulously
This made beth sob harder, motioning me to close the curtains around her bed. I quickly did so and sat on the chair next to her bed. Beth quickly held her wand and cast a silencing charm to the curtains.
"Remember when I said - that - that I had been over a friend's house for the majo- majority of the summer"
"Yes?"
"Well I was over Ebonys!"
"Okay why couldn't you have just said that?"
"Because she didn't want Conor to find out"
"But why?"
"She likes him - thinks they have a chance together" she spat viciously
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Under normal circumstances no, it would not be a bad thing. But Emily something happened over the summer. I don't know what it was - kissing mostly - but I knew I liked her. She said she liked me too! So we carried on, but when we got back to hogwarts everything changed. She started threatening me to stay quiet, that I couldn't mess up her chances with Conor. She said it was all a mistake"
She was back to sobbing now, though I could no longer tell whether it was from anger or sadness, I didn't want to interrupt her so I just started to stroke her hair calmingly.
"I asked her, I said if you knew it was a mistake why did you go through with it. She said experimenting. She's known I was gay since third year! You don't use someone like that! If we were both unsure, then fine, but using me as a test subject without even knowing it? That's not okay!"
I just nodded, silently urging her to go on.
"So I told her that, exactly as I said it to you just now - how it felt to me and how messed up it made me, and then she blames me! Said I got into her head. Made her feel stuff she wasn't actually feeling. That she knew she liked Conor and that I'd never be enough. Then just stormed off!"
I was hugging her now, rocking her back and forth in the way my mother used to when I got upset.
"She made it sound like I started it! She kissed me in the back of her parents car when they went to buy some takeway or whatever it's called, she started it! I was so confused but when she kept flirting I kissed her again. I swear! Look!"
Beth had aimed her wand at the curtains again, and did a little projection charm (charms was her best subject).
"Is this - a memory?"
"Yes. Look - see? She leans in too. She's making it sound like I forced her to kiss me but I didn't!"
"it's all going to be okay" I murmured "We'll sort this out"
Madam Pomfrey started to pull back the curtains, making Beth quickly remove the charms she had placed on the fabric.
"Miss Abbott I'm going to need you to drink this potion, that bruise will be gone in no time"
Beth just nodded, she had made herself to worked up to talk without crying even more.
"Miss Granger! Your cheek!" The witch scolded, "why didn't you come to me as soon as you came in?"
"Sorry ma'am" I apologised weakly, allowing her to magically erase the cut "thank you".
Waving good bye to Beth, I walked back over to Harry's bed, where everyone was peering over his body.
"Harry!" said Fred "How're you feeling?"
"What happened?" Harry asked, sitting up so quickly he almost headbutt Katie Bell.
"You fell off" George answered "Must've been - what - fifty feet?"
"We thought you died" said Alicia, who was trembling. Hermione made a small squeaky noise, her eyes extremely bloodshot.
"But the match" Harry said, almost desperately "What happened? Are we having a replay?"
No one spoke, and Harry's face fell.
"Did we lose the match?"
"Diggory got the snitch, just after you fell. He didn't realise. When he did he requested a rematch but even Wood said he had won fair and square" George said gently.
"Where is Wood?" Harry asked - only just realising he wasn't there.
"Still in the showers" Fred said "we think he's trying to drown himself"
Harry curled up in shame, he put his face to his knees, his hands gripping his hair. I decided I had had enough of this. Moving around to the side of the bed, I grabbed his shoulders and shook him.
"Come on Harry! You've never missed the snitch before! And this technically wasn't even your fault, so your score is still technically still a 100% catch rate"
"You has to miss the snitch at one point" George added
"It's not over yet either" said Fred "We lost by a hundred points right?"
The twins, along with Lee, then started doing calculations to work out how they were going to win the cup that year; after about 10 minutes Madam Pompfrey came back and kicked them all out.
"We'll come to see you later" Fred said
"Don't best yourself up Harry, you're still the best seeker we've ever had" George added.
"I'll go with them too, hope you feel better sport" I said, ruffling his hair and following the team out of the infirmary.