The Stubborn Old Headmaster

37

Severus cleared his throat. "We'll just let everyone believe the next Hogsmeade visit to be on Valentine's Day, but in fact, we're going to hold it on a different day, which we'll announce at breakfast the morning of the visit on the respective day, this way no one will know on time to make any plans."

On a sunny Saturday morning, exactly one week before Valentine's Day, Tom announced at breakfast that the students from third year onwards were allowed to spend the day in Hogsmeade. With that, the Great Hall erupted in an excited babbling as hundreds of students began to plan their day for the surprise announcement of the Hogsmeade visit a week earlier than expected.

From the corner of his eyes, Harry saw how Severus stepped over to Draco and firmly led the boy out of the hall.

'Dad?' Harry hesitantly thought to his father. 'Where are you taking Draco?'

'Easy, Harry, everything is all right. I'm going to take Draco with me to the Potions classroom. I know that he promised not to betray you, but I decided I won't even give him the opportunity to. Instead I will have him serve a fake detention with me, so his father won't get suspicious of him in case he heard of the Hogsmeade visit date change later on and think Draco purposely did not notify him of the date change,' Severus replied calmly, causing Harry to relax.

'Ok, thank you, Dad,' he thought back, and turned to Ginny, who was sitting opposite of him at the Gryffindor table. 'Ginny, shall we go on our date today?' he queried, hesitantly turning his eyes to the girl. 'She's so pretty,' he mused, smiling as her eager 'Of course' penetrated his mind.

Harry hurriedly ate his breakfast and after a short detour to the head table to inform his mother and brother that he was going into Hogsmeade with Ginny, he returned to his room to get ready. Half an hour later, he headed to the entrance hall to meet with Ginny, feeling very happy but extremely excited to go on a first date completely alone with his beautiful girlfriend.

Just a few metres before he reached the entrance hall, he could hear Dumbledore's voice speaking to him from a shadowy alcove. "Have fun, my boy," the annoying ghost's voice told him.

"Thank you," Harry replied quickly as he hurried away, not eager to further communicate with the ghost.

"Hi Harry," Ginny smiled when he arrived in the entrance hall.

"Hello," Harry replied, suddenly feeling a bit excited. 'It's nothing special. It's only Ginny, my second Co-captain of the Quidditch team,' he mused as he gently pulled her into the line of the students, who were patiently waiting for his mother to check their names off the list of students with permission slips for the Hogsmeade visits.

"Harry, are you not coming with us?" Hermione suddenly queried, already stepping down the steps along with Neville, Mandy, Susan and Teddy.

"No, I'm going with Ginny today," Harry replied, uncomfortably noticing that heat crept into his cheeks, causing the girls to giggle. "Let's meet for lunch at The Three Broomsticks," he shouted after his friends, just when his mother checked their names off the list.

"Be very careful, dear," she said quietly, throwing him a sharp look.

"Of course, Mum. May I bring home some chocolate frogs for Felix?" Harry replied, causing Minerva to nod and smile at her oldest son.

ハリーと頑固な校長先生

Harry and Ginny headed to Zonko's first, although Harry had a hard time hiding his surprise at Ginny's choice.

"You know, my brothers would love to open their own joke shop," Ginny explained in a small voice. "That's why they were helping with Hagrid's circus over the holidays, so they could earn some money, even if Hagrid couldn't pay them much. They've invented enough joke items to sell them, but they don't have enough start-up money to open a shop. At the moment, they're having a huge fight with my parents, because they are wanting to work at the circus until they've enough money for the shop, so they really seem intent on opening one. That's why I'd like to study Zonko's as intensely as possible. Maybe I could help them later on."