 SS Featured Artist
DA Poet
Rupert is My Man!
SS100 TriumphantAethonan
Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Lovin m wolf & dingo
Posts: 18,891
Hogwarts RPG Name:
Ottery St. Catchpole
Third Year |  SS has been playing havok with your update, but here it is at last ... sorry still no Paris & Kellybear r luv :Read Otty 's fics:Gone With the Wind:I♥Rupert
Dear Readers: Thank you all for your patience and for reading this story. I have not forgotten it, but Nanowrimo must come first and there are my life's obligations. My apologies for taking so long but here is the next update. I hope you all will enjoy it. Xavier, you'll be missed. Lissy *glomps* & the rest of you all my ♥ and thanks for your patronage, your patience and all the sweet words of praise for this fic. Nano will only keep me busy through November ... I promise more up to date updates after then fo' sho'.  ~ Chapter: The Ball's a Rollin' The ghoulish ghastly night of nights arrived soon enough but not before romantic dalliances were foiled, friendships of convenience were made, alliances of necessity were forged, romantic escapades ensued, rivalries inflamed, exploded and threatened to destroy Hogwarts.
In all, everyone had searched and either found their match, found themselves thwarted, foiled or brokenhearted in the pursuit of love or at the very least someone to take to the ball. More than usual, new complications had arisen from the addition of the Beauxbaton and Durmstrang students to the pool of cute, handsome and eligible people to ask to the ball.
Some old favorites stuck together as the case of Ernie MacMillan and Hannah Abbot, other new romances blossomed as Cedric and Cho Chang decided to give it a go, and well ... some romances were not so romantic as they were of necessity as in the case of Colin and Parvati. There were also the alliances of necessity such as Blaise Zabini and Millicent Bulstrode and there was Draco and Pansy which most people didn’t know what to make of. Pansy swore up and down they were betrothed and Draco was apt to be found crying in the girl’s lavatory.
It was of course the gala event of the season. While the first through third years would be allowed to have their Halloween feast in the great hall, the Grand Dancing Ballroom of Days Past was to be where the Halloween Ball would be held for the fourth through seventh years. Though third years could accompany someone older. Dumbledore being an aged wizard with many and sundry things on his mind could of a time be forgiven for forgetting certain things, in this case, the existence of the Grand Dancing Ballroom of Days Past where he himself attended many a ball in his tenure as a student as Hogwarts and where he had his heart broken too. To make up for it, he had taken to holding dance balls with a zeal this year.
“It’s going to be a lovely evening,” Hermione said giggling nervously in her soft blue dress.
Ginny looked a lot more sedate in her dress of pink being that it was all over the school that Harry was going to take Susan Bones to the ball.
While Ginny was sure Harry’s choice had nothing to do with love, it didn’t help any that his second choice had been someone other than she. The truth of the matter was Ginny had grown tired of the fact that Harry did not know she existed. It seemed that way most days, anyways. Harry hardly ever spoke to her, he’d not even thought about asking her to the ball, even just as a friend. She knew it didn’t help that he made her blush but, to have at least considered her. It hurt Ginny, but at the same time she knew that she would never be anything more to Harry than Ron’s little sister.
“Ginny, are you alright?” asked Parvati Patil. “It’s just, you look pale.” There was something of a scoundrelous nature in her mocking.
“Nothing,” she said absentmindedly and went back to brushing Hermione’s hair. She looked so beautiful, Hermione Granger, with her hair all curls done up bright, she would wear her curls up tonight held up with a gold comb sitting on the dresser.
Ginny looked at herself in the mirror. Long dull red hair cascaded down the sides of her plain face. Of course, Harry wouldn’t be interested in her dull looks. Ginny sighed. It was all over the school too that Harry had been chasing after Cho Chang, anyways. The truth was her heart needed to settle on someone else. But telling her heart what to feel and actually having her heart listen were two different things.
Hermione for her part was going to enjoy the ball come rain or come shine. Viktor Krum had asked her to go, in a most gentlemanly manner. Hermione had been so flattered, surprised, and elated but she had demurred giving him an answer only to find out that Ron had already asked someone else to the ball. She readily accepted then and curses to all her other thoughts, life was short and it should be enjoyed, she thought.
Lavender Brown meanwhile sang happily from the showers. Her off tune, tunes floating through the air. Ginny and Hermione exchanged looks. Hermione sighed, while Ginny made a gagging face and Parvati giggled.
Somehow or other Lavender had wrangled Ron into taking her to the Halloween Ball. Likely it had something to do with both of them trying out for the Quidditch team, there they’d kind of gotten to know one another and as backups on the Gryffindor team they were spending an awful lot of time off the playing field. Even during practice, but that was usually because Lavender kept getting hurt and Ron kept volunteering to stay out of practice to watch over her.
“I feel like this is some kind of alternate reality sometimes,” Ginny exclaimed.
Meanwhile in the boy’s dormitory things were shaping up in an entirely different tact.
“I’m not giving it back,” Seamus replied.
Dean, taller than the sandy haired boy stood in front of him looking as menacing as he could but still Seamus stood there arms crossed and not budging.
“Seamus,” Dean said roughly. “Please,” he asked softly pleadingly.
“I hate bow ties, Dean. You can’t wear a bow tie. Get a tie tie like real people wear, not this silly little thing. Does Jimmy Olsen know you borrowed it?” Seamus asked swinging it around.
“I thought you liked me in bow ties,” Dean teased.
Seamus sighed. “Fine.” He threw it at Dean who caught it.
“You know I love you, right?” said Dean playfully.
“Oh, shut up, Dean,” Harry said walking in and throwing a towel at Dean’s face. “Stop picking on the kid already.” Harry in his bathrobe and slippers plopped onto his bed. These stupid dances were killing him. There had been The Start of Term ball, the OMG It’s September Ball, the It’s beginning to look a lot like Halloween Ball and soon there would be the Day of the Dead ball. Dumbledore seemed to have set his sites on impressing the new arrivals by having a ball every day of the week almost. For his part, Harry was tired of them but being a Triwizard champion he didn‘t really have a choice except to attend.
Ron walked out of the showers whistling, drying his hair and smiling at everyone. The boys turned to look at him. Of course, he was in love. It was sick watching him with Lavender sometimes, making cutesy eyes and being all kinds of lovey. They sent each other notes in the common room even though they could have walked over to one another and handed them to each other. It was all rather sick really.
Teddy sat on his bed working on something, likely explosives. He had not said anything about the ball, had not talked about it, and threatened anyone who had brought the subject up to him. The popular consensus then was that Teddy would not be attending. The brown haired boy didn’t raise his head to look up, but Ottery blushed on seeing Ron walk into the room.
“Ron, I think you forgot your bathrobe,” Ottery said then fainted.
“The ball is going to be insane,” Dean said happily.
“It’s just another dance, Dean,” Seamus remarked sitting at the foot of his bed arms still crossed and pouting. He had wanted to spend the evening doing something more fun than dressing up like a monkey and dancing around a room with a bunch of people watching him. “At least I hope the foods, good.”
“You’re not getting out of dancing that easily,” Dean said laughing.
Ron whistled as he air dried. The door suddenly burst open behind it Colin came in panting. It took a few minutes before he could catch his breath. By then Ron was in his skivvies and Teddy had slapped Ottery awake.
“I love chocolate mousse, mommy,” Ottery said.
“He’s as awake as he’s going to get,” Teddy replied dropping the dark haired boy back onto his own bed and going back to whatever spells or clockwork he was working on.
“I need help! I don’t know how to fix a tie,” Colin said. “Nigel offered to do it, said he had a spell, but I told him he had to try it on himself first and his face is all black now and his hair is white and it doesn’t seem to want to wash off.”
“You should have let me do it,” peeked in another red haired boy. “Hey, what’s wrong with Otts?” Freddie asked.
“Ron,” Teddy replied.
“What did I do?” Ron asked the brown haired boy.
“As if you didn’t know?” Teddy shot back.
“I’ll fix it,” Ottery said getting out of bed. “I’m a tie tying expert.”
In spite of all the hectic chaos in the Gryffindor Tower, when the clock struck dinner time everyone was ready to attend that evening’s ball. Outside of the Grand Dancing Ballroom of Days Past, the students began to congregate finding their partners, slapping their rivals, threatening to steal one’s true love from another person, etc. Professor McGonagall presided over the students like a hawk, her keen eyes observing everything allowing nothing.
Professor Dumbledore was the last one up the stairs. He stopped outside of the Ballroom remembering an earlier day, a different ball, his old friends and Grindelwald. Time had passed so quickly but some things still remained the same.
“We’re ready to start, headmaster,” Professor Flitwick standing next to him remarked.
“Then let the festivities, begin,” Professor Dumbledore exclaimed and with a wave of his wand the great tall glass doors opened onto a lavish ballroom with a white marble floor, black tables all along the round center dancing floor. From the ceiling spider webs hung down, and skeletons. Ghosts danced on the floor or walked hand in hand, an orchestra sat next to a large smoky glassed window that showed a view of the lake stories down from where the ballroom was.
“I can’t help feeling someone is going to come crashing in through that window,” Ottery said to his date. On his arm none other than Luna Lovegood. Next: Sheperd's Pie or Halloween Ball Double Oh Seven style
__________________  |