The anticipation for the Ravenclaw vs Gryffindor was high for many reasons, for one, whoever wins will face Slytherin for the Quidditch cup.
The second reason was the fact that everyone was excited to see the Firebolt in action as Professor McGongall had returned it a few days ago.
You'd think that with the broom back, Ron and Harry would forgive Hermione, but no, Ron seemed to believe that Crookshanks had eaten Scabbers due to the solid damning evidence: three ginger hairs.
It enraged her how they, particularly Ron, treated Hermione, it was obvious that she had no other friends and watching her enter the Great Hall every day, look at them and see that they didn't save her a seat, then leave without eating, made everybody feel so sorry for her that not even Draco mentioned it.
One of the many other things on her mind was her conversation with Theo. The things he said haunted her as many things tend to do.
You don't know what happened that night....
.......People believe what they want to believe......
.....Do you honestly trust that man?
Still, she was feeling so much better that day, it felt like she had been breathing fumes for the past few weeks and just had her first breath of fresh air.
She freed up some of her time to help Sage with the newspaper again, which turned out to be a lot more fun now that the entire work load wasn't divided between two people.
Luna, once you got past the necklace made out of butterbear bottle caps, was actually very good company, the two would draw pictures for the Newspaper together, Arlene stretching on the window sketching while Luna sat in front of her on a stool painting.
Neville was a hidden gem as well, turns out that's he's a fellow Agatha Christie enthusiast, hated Snape, and had many other things in common with Arlene. She also discovered that the root of all his problems was the fact that he used his father's old wand, which she guessed wasn't okay with taking orders from someone who wasn't its owner. Yet, Neville was appalled when she suggested that he buy a new one, she knew that some people wore their deceased loved one's glasses even if they had perfect vision to feel closer to them, maybe that was what Neville was doing.
If she didn't feel the need to punch Snape for terrorizing him before, she definitely did now.
Lee was.... Lee. There was really no way to describe it, he made jokes, he got them snacks from the kitchen, but he also flirted with Sage nonstop, which Arlene guessed was the reason he decided to help in the first place.
That day in particular, it was just the two of them in the room, Sage wearing her reading glasses as she walked around reading the chicken footprints that she calls notes out loud while the typewriter typed in her words by itself.
"So," Arlene started, she had been redecorating a corner of the room to include the newest edition to the Newspaper, the Politics Page, in which they wrote 'impartial articles about the Wizarding Government' which sound easy when said, but Arlene soon discovered that it was hard reporting about politicians without calling them pigs or dogs, or both "What's up with Lee?"
"We have another date on the next Hogsmead trip." Sage said dismissively, only pausing for a mere second before continuing what she was doing.
Arlene frowned and stepped down from the chair she had been standing on "What about all that nonsense about not having chemistry?"
Sage paused, finally putting her notebook down and taking off her glasses.
"I'm asexual." She finally said.
It was silent for a moment.
"How did you know?" Arlene finally asked, breaking the silence.
Sage took in a large breath "During the date I didn't feel any of these things you read about in books and see in movies so I thought that meant that I just didn't like him enough."
"Oh Sage," Arlene replied softly with an undertone of guilt "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you when all that was going on-"
"It's okay." She interrupted her "my mum was a great help actually, I confided in her and everything I was feeling and she was like 'so..., you're ace?' and like, everything clicked, so."
Any sort of friend points Arlene thinks she made in the past couple of days immediately vanished. So apparently, while she was off sulking about her mum who got her eleven Christmas gifts and backed her cookies, Theo's dad was telling him that murdering people was his birthright, Sage was going through an identity crisis and Pansy was crying her eyes out about something that Arlene didn't even bother asking her about.
At that point, she felt unsure of herself, she was so disgusted by Ron and Harry putting a broom in front of Hermione's emotions that she failed to realize that she was doing the same, being angsty and unloading on her friends without realizing that they were dealing with much bigger problems.
Arlene leaned back in her chair, her eyes filled with guilt "Did you tell Lee?"
It was like she could physically feel Sage's relief "Yeah," she replied, a big smile bloomy on her face "that was when he asked me out actually, I think we're going to be official."
"That's good Sage," Arlene said with a supportive smile "I'm really happy for you."
Sage nodded happily like the stereotypical Hufflepuff she was and went back to work. Arlene envied her ability to move on so quickly as she knew she would be stressing about what a terrible friend she is for the rest of the day.
Good news though, Arlene managed to catch up on her studies, except History of Magic, which she intended to skip out on the match to watch. Hopefully that Snitch would be a good hider and the match would end up being one of the longer ones.
It didn't go according to plan.
Since it was tradition for the none playing team to wear their varsities during matches and friendlies, Arlene went to grab it from the changing room and got more than she bargained for.
Pansy was sitting on one of the benches, clutching a letter in her hand that was getting ruined by the tears dropping from her chin as she cried furiously.
"Pansy...?"
"Go away." She said, not even opening her eyes to see who it was.
Arlene approached her warily, then slowly put her arm around the crying girl's shoulder.
The result was immediate, Pansy threw herself at Arlene, sobbing loudly into her shoulder.
Arlene didn't say anything, it was clear Pany simply needed a shoulder to cry on rather than someone to talk to, so she remained silent and let Pansy let it all out of her system.
Her mother had told her horror stories about her childhood at the Burke mansion. Arlene had seen for herself how her grandmother and Uncles had looked at her whenever they passed.
She didn't understand it for the life of her. Paloma had been disowned for having a child out of wedlock and Andromeda for marrying a muggleborn. Arlene knew that the loss of a child was hard, for them to do it so frequently meant that from the moment the child was born they were ready to disown it if it stepped outside the line.
And what a miserable life that must be, never being able to love someone fully because you always have to be ready to cut them out.
They sat like that for a while, Arlene whispering comforting words to Pansy while tears streamed down the other girl's face.
After ten minute or so, someone walked by the doors, whom Arlene recognized by his infamous platinum hair.
Upon noticing Pansy's smudged mascara and black tears, he turned to the other two and nodded to them to go ahead without him and that he would catch up later.
Draco sat down next to his friend "Pans," he started "what's up."
He spoke so gently like Pansy was a breakable object that he needed to be careful with, which in that moment she kind of was.
She handed him the letter but didn't say anything, her sobs wrecking her body too strongly to allow her to speak.
Draco quickly skim and scanned the paper, realization dawning upon him.
"Oh, Pans." He whispered, as she untangled herself from Arlene and threw herself at him, sobbing even harder "It's okay."
Arlene had never seen Draco that nice, he was bringing shame to the entire Slytherin House.
Pansy remained speechless, but Draco's presence clearly seemed to help as she started to calm down a little.
Arlene didn't know the reason behind Pansy's meltdown, and she probably never would, but even if she wasn't that close to Pansy, she was happy to help.
Silently, Arlene left the room to give them privacy, but Draco was so concerned with his friend that he didn't notice her leave.
She looked at them one last time and smiled, maybe she wasn't that much of a horrid friend.
Apparently, whatever had upset Pansy was serious, since it clearly made Draco forget about his buddies.
The match was won by Gryffindor, which meant that the finale would be between them and Sytherin.
It was also won despite the 'dementors' that appeared, which turned out to be Crabbe and Goyle hidden under black clothing.
Arlene couldn't express how happy she was that Draco had been preoccupied with Pansy. They were becoming kind-of sorta friends, and she didn't want him to embarrass himself in front of the entire school.
In other news -all that writing she had done for the paper was making her use linkers when she was thinking- she still hadn't finished the essay on Protective Runes and apparently, neither did Hermione, since the two were currently sitting in the Gryffindor common room as the party exploded around them.
It was definitely exciting to see how other houses celebrated. The Slytherins usually mess up the order of the furniture and get drunk from various drinking games. Most Hufflepuffs got high and have eating contests, which is very fun to watch if you're sober. Gryffindors, however, seemed to prefer stealing food, making out, and triple dog daring people to ask Dumbledore out.
If that sounded too specific, that's because it was.
Three times.
Hermione sighed and rubbed her temple, Arlene guessed she would've gone to the library if it wasn't past curfew.
"Did you even come to the match?" Harry suddenly appeared, wrinkling his nose at the large book in Hermione's hands.
"Of course I did," said Hermione in a strangely high-pitched voice, not looking up. "And I'm very glad we won, and I think you did really well, but I need to read this by Monday."
"Come on, Hermione, come and have some food," Harry said, looking over at Ron.
"I can't, Harry. I've still got four hundred and twenty-two pages to read!" said Hermione, now sounding slightly hysterical. "Anyway," she glanced over at Ron too. "He doesn't want me to join in."
There was no arguing with this, as Ron chose that moment to say loudly, "If Scabbers hadn't just been eaten, he could have had some of those Fudge Flies, he used to really like them-"
Hermione burst into tears, before Harry or Arlene could say or do anything, she tucked the enormous book under her arm, and, still sobbing, ran toward the staircase to the girls' dormitories and out of sight.
Harry sighed and turned to Ron "Can't you give her a break?" he asked him quietly.
"No," said Ron flatly "If she just acted like she was sorry, but she'll never admit she's wrong. She's still acting like Scabbers has gone on vacation or something."
Arlene slammed her book shut and started to pack her things into her bag.
"What?" Ron questioned, correctly guessing that the gesture was directed at him.
"Oh nothing," Arlene said coolly, becoming a master of passive aggressiveness at that point "I just never thought you'd put a broom or a rat before your friendship, that's all."
She didn't wait for an answer as she turned around and went after her friend.
"Hermione?" Arlene called out as soon she entered the dorm.
"I'm here." A voice called out from one of the beds.
Hermione sat on her bed hidden away by curtains, half her face buried in a tissue as she blew her nose.
It broke Arlene's heart.
"That's it," she announced "You're coming with me."
Hermione sniffed "Where to?"
Arlene's eyes glimmered with mischief,
"Trouble."