Muggle | 𝐹𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑊𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑙𝑒𝑦

Chapter 131

By that, Pansy's wand shot out of her hand and we all turned around in shock, only to see Neville standing at the other end of the corridor, his wand still pointed at her fiercely.

The three Slytherin girls looked around at each other before they all sniggered.

"Since when have you become so brave, Longbottom?" said Pansy with an ugly smug face. "You can't even hold a wand without dropping it. And now you think you can take all of us alone?"

Neville looked at her for a few seconds, and I realized that his lips were slightly trembling, yet he was doing everything in his power to keep a strong face.

"He's not alone," I suddenly said and then in a blink of an, I took my wand out of my robe and pointed it at one of the other girls, yelling, "Expelliarmus!"

Neville took the chance and disarmed the other one, leaving all the three Slytherins girls defenseless, staring at the two of us with both fear and shock.

I then slightly lowered my wand and smiled at them, saying in a whisper, "This is the part when you run."

On cue, the other two girls turned on their heels and abruptly ran out of the corridor, leaving Pansy alone as she stared between us with widened eyes.

"Goodbye, Pugface," I said sweetly, and not a second later she too left after her friends quickly, disappearing out of sight.

      Neville and I then burst into laughter when we looked up at each other, putting our wands back in our robes.

"Glad to know all the Dumbledore Army lessons have paid off," I told him with a grin.

"Y-yeah, they really were great," Neville nodded shyly, giving me a goofy smile. "I still don't know why you weren't a part of it, though."

"Oh... er..." I started to think about a good answer quickly without having to say that I had no magical abilities back then. "Well, maybe... er... they didn't trust me enough for it back then. I was new and all, you know."

"Oh," Neville muttered. "Well, I'm pretty sure they do now. I mean, from what I heard from Luna, you did save that Sirius Black last year, didn't you? There's a rumor that he's actually Harry's Godfather." My heart sank guilty at those words.

     Last year when I had tried to save Mr. Weasley from the snake attack, I changed many things, yet I'd still been too late to completely stop him from getting hurt, seeing as I had nearly forgotten about it.

When I told Dumbledore about Mr. Weasley, I only managed to save him from being severely injured. He ended up in hospital anyway, but was released soon after, unlike in the actual book when he was supposed to stay there for weeks.

Harry and the others were supposed to visit him in the hospital and meet Neville's parents there. Apparently that was an important moment for Neville, when he found out that his friends weren't going to make fun of his parents and saw them as the heroes they really were.

But without that push, he didn't find the courage within himself to help Harry break into Umbridge's office that day, and therefore didn't end up in the Ministry with them.

But today, with the way he spoke up to those three Slytherins and how he came to my help, I was glad to know that the little talk we had back in the Herbology class had helped him a bit.

Although there was still things that had to be done. He still had some way to go. And just now, an idea suddenly popped into my head.

      There was a way to fix everything. All I had to do was to wait for the night of Dumbledore's death. That was going to be the right moment...

"Lexi?" said Neville, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"Y-yeah?" I said, slightly confused as I shook my head, trying to remember what he had told me.

"I called you a few times. You seemed to have dozen off for a few seconds there," he said with a chuckle.

"Right — er — sorry," I said, clearing my throat. "So... wanna go back to the common room? Or were you headed somewhere else?"

"No, I was going there myself, but then I heard their voices," he said apprehensively, "so I thought I would... you know... come and help you out."

"Thank you, Neville," I said, smiling at him genuinely. "I couldn't have gotten out of it without you."

"D-don't mention it," he said in a small voice, shaking a hand at me reassuringly.

With that, the two of us walked back toward the Gryffindor common room, not saying much other than small polite talk to break the silence.

When we finally reached the portrait of the Fat Lady and said the password, we got inside.

      I thanked Neville one last time and waved at Harry, who was sitting on the couch, reading his Potions' book with Crookshanks sleeping next to him. He did seem to pay that cat more attention as of lately.

I then left toward our dormitory and with a heavy sigh, I laid back down on my bed, staring up at the ceiling.

I ran my plan about Neville over in my head a few times, but somehow my thoughts were lead to Draco.

I hadn't talked to him ever since the Christmas party. Was he ignoring me? Or did he just not want his friends to know that he was spending time with a Mudblood?

But whatever his reasons were, I wasn't going to take no as an answer. I had to talk to him again.