Through All the Pain // N. Longbottom

Sixth Year // Chapter 4

"Are you coming or are you staying?" Ron said staring intently at me.

"Ron - please you're being foolish!" Hermione said standing in front of me.

"I'm not the one being foolish! All of you are!" Ron shouted.

"Ron, can she just have some time to finish getting ready?" Hermione said moving from the door of our dorm. I was sitting on my bed tying my boots, while Ron was standing anxiously in the doorway. "Besides Quidditch trails don't start for another thirty minutes."

"I want to make sure Lori can still fly and not kill herself while doing so." Ron debuted. "So are you coming?"

"Give me one minute!" I snapped as I tied the last lace, "Honestly if this is how you're going to act if we both get on the team and we have practices ... I may kill you."

"You wouldn't dare,"

"Try me, Ronnie," I said chucking a folded-up handkerchief. However, Ron thought it was something else and sprinted down the stairs. I picked up the handkerchief and tucked it into my pocket. "Works every time."

"Lori?" Hermione asked. "What do you think Ron's chances are? Getting on the team I mean."

"Well, after he just understood he wasn't like everyone else and embraced his own inner Gryffindor lion for the last game of the year ..." I looked out the window and sighed. "I hope that means he still has his confidence and can forget that he isn't the best Weasley at Quidditch. If he does, then I'm sure he'll be okay."

"Good," Hermione said getting on her coat. "Ron enjoys Quidditch and well ... if he doesn't make the team ... I don't even want to think about what will happen."

"He'll be impossible to live with, I'll tell you that," I said grabbing my gloves and heading down the stairs to where Ron was standing with both Harry and Ginny. 

"Finally! Now let's go!" Ron said yanking me by the hand out of the Common Room. I sighed and shrugged at Ginny and Harry who both shared a confused look. As we not walked, but sprinted down to the Pitch. About halfway down Ron started getting all giddy and almost skipped down the rest of the way. 

We did some practice flying, Ginny and I passed the Quaffle back and forth a little bit, Harry brought out the Snitch to try and catch it, and of course, Ron was trying to block imaginary Quaffles (which honestly made him look like a complete idiot).

"Alright, everyone else will be here shortly!" Harry called as he landed after catching the Snitch. "time to quit and wait for trails." So we all landed and just waited for more people to arrive. Suddenly people started coming in droves to the Pitch. Apparently having "The Chosen One" as Quidditch Captain made the sport irresistible. 

"Alright so this afternoon we will ..." Harry tried to say, however his voice could barely be heard over the crowd of students standing around. Not one person, other than us three Weasley's seemed to be paying much attention to Harry. Finally, Ginny took a step forward and shouted.

"SHUT IT!" she bellowed, finally causing all the students to shut up and listen to Harry. 

"Alright, this afternoon I will be putting you all through a few drills to assess your strengths. But know this, just because you made the team last year, doesn't mean that you will this time. Is that clear?" The crowd muttered in agreement as Harry began by asking all applicants for the team to divide into groups of ten and fly once around the pitch. This was a good decision on his part because the first ten was made up of first years and it could not have been plainer that they had hardly ever flown before. Only one boy managed to remain airborne for more than a few seconds, and he was so surprised he promptly crashed into one of the goalposts.