"WE CAN do this!" Astoria said, clutching her broom tightly.

"We can do this." Noor repeated.

"We have to do this!"

"We have to do this."

"We'll smash the competition!"

"Yeah, we'll smash them!"

"Look at those chumps." Astoria scoffed, pointing at the other hopeful Slytherins sitting on the stands. "We can totally beat them."

It was a few days after school had started again, and the Slytherin quidditch team was holding tryouts. The team's Keeper, and two of their Chasers had graduated last year. And they needed to fill those roles.

Both Noor and Astoria were trying out as Chasers.

See, the Slytherin Quidditch team has a severe lack of female players. Apparently in all of Hogwarts's long years of Quidditch, the Slytherin team had only ever had five female players in total.

Which wasn't that surprising when you considered that Slytherin was a house filled with kids whose families were quite ... traditional, and would never agree to letting their daughters playing the sport.

Nevertheless, when Astoria had heard this fact, she had decided to try out with Noor - who was planning on trying out for the team anyways - in order to 'show those backwards gits that women could kick ass at Quidditch too.'

Astoria came from a relatively progressive family, a rare breed in the Slytherin house, and they were apparently quite happy when they found out their daughter was trying out.

Noor, however, didn't come from a progressive family at all. She knew if her mother were to find out about her daughter trying out for the team, she would flip. Noor hoped her mother wouldn't find out, although with the fight Noor had had with Blaise a few weeks ago, who knew if he'd tell their mother or not.

He hadn't told their mother anything yet, about Noor trying out for the team, or her letters to Ron and Zara, but she feared it was only a matter of time.

"Oh, I'm nervous." Astoria said suddenly, bending over a little, looking slightly green.

"Hey, deep breaths." Noor said, echoing what Ron had told when she had gone to see her sister for the first time. "In, and out."

"Chasers!" Marcus Flint, the Slytherin's quidditch captain, called out. "Line up on the field if you want to try out to be a Chaser!"

"Come on, that's us." Noor said, pulling Astoria up.

As she and Astoria lined up next to the five other Slytherins apparently trying out for the role of Chaser ( all of them boys ), Noor caught Marcus Flint's eye, and gave him a nervous smile. Marcus and Blaise were good friends, and so Marcus would often visit the Zabini's during the summer, therefore she and Marcus were on friendly terms.

Noor hoped that this fact, that Noor was the little sister of one of Marcus' friends, would earn her some brownie points, but she doubted it. Marcus wasn't the type of person to let favouritism get in the way of winning. He wasn't the type of person to let anything get in the way of winning, which was a thing that Noor greatly admired about him.

He shot her a small smile back, before turning to look at everyone in the line.

"The Chasers hold an especially important role, it's your job to score the goals, which can make or break a game of Quidditch." He said, striding up and down in front of them, sizing up the people in front of him.

"The three Chasers in a team need to work well together. I already have a spot on the team as a Chaser, as I am the Captain. So for your tryouts I'll be seeing if you can work well with each other, and if you can work well with me." He said, picking up his broom. An action that made Noor gulp nervously, and Astoria clutch Noor's arm tightly.

"I'll be flying with two of you at a time. And we'll work together, and try to score as many goals as possible. Do you all understand?" He said sharply, earning a chourus of yeses.

"Good. We'll start with ..." he scanned the group, "you." He said pointing at a fifth year. "And ... you." He said, turning his finger straight at Noor.

In that moment m, Noor was grateful you couldn't apparate on Hogwarts grounds, because she knew that if it were possible, Noor would have immediately teleported to the other side of the school.

With a reassuring thumbs up from Astoria, Noor mounted her broom, her knees shaking; and slowly rose up into the sky.

Noor looked down at the ground, and immediately regretted that action. The ground was so very far away, the people standing there looked like ants. A fall from this height could be very painful.

"Now is not a good time to discover a fear of heights," she mumbled to herself. 'You've flown before, haven't you? What's different about this time?" She reasoned with herself, trying to quell the pit of butterflies in her stomach.

"You two ready?" Marcus asked, floating in the air next to Noor.

How did he look so calm? How did he make it look so easy?

"Yes." She managed to squeak out, although everything in her heart was screaming no.

Noor looked towards the stands, and for a second she thought she saw a flash of red hair. Weasley red hair.

The nerves in Noor vanished, as she thought about what Ron would say if he were here, probably something along the lines of "Don't think. Just bloody do it."

"Okay, let go!" Marcus said, flying towards the goal.

And Noor followed, without a thought.

——

     ABOUT AN hour later, Marcus  touched down on the ground, after having flown with many different combinations of people.

He narrowed his eyes, and was silent for a moment. "Okay! I've made my decision." He said. "The new Chasers on the Slytheirn quidditch team is Astoria Greengrass and Noor Zabini."

Noor stood very still, not believing what she had just heard.

"Well done." Marcus said, thumping Noor on the back, and then walking away.

The other rejected Slytherins walked towards the castle, cursing.

Noor and Astoria followed after them, in silence, and when they both had determined they were a safe distance away, far enough away for no one to overhear them, they both let out squeals of excitement.

"We made the team!"

"Merlin, I was so scared!"

"Ugh me too!"

"We made the team!" Noor repeated, not believing her luck.

"In your face your sexist pigs," Astoria said, pointing at the Slytherins walking away, who Noor doubted were actually sexist. "We beat you!"

"We're making history!" Noor said, eyes wide. "Both of us got on the team! Which moves the five female players ever, up to seven!"

Then Draco Malfoy sauntered up to them, with his goonies, Crabbe and Goyle, behind him.

"Hey Astoria." Draco said. "Hey Natalie." He said to Noor. Then turned his gaze back to Astoria. "I heard you made the team. Well, you know, I'm already on the team as Seeker..."

Noor decided to slip away at that moment, not wanting to listen to any more of Draco's strange courting ritual.

Astoria turned her eyes towards Noor, giving her a panicked look, "Where are you going?" She demanded, cutting Draco off.

"Just need to check something out."

Astoria opened her mouth to protest, but Noor dashed away before she could get a word out.

Noor felt bad about leaving Astoria, but she had to check on something.

While she was up in the air, Noor could have sworn she saw Ron sitting on the stands for a brief second. But now, as she scanned the stands, he was nowhere to be found. She must have imagined it.

She was about to walk away, when she heard a voice say her name.

"Hey! Noor!"

She spun around looking intensely to where she heard the voice. But no one was there.

Noor turned around, she must be imagining things.

"Noor! Hey!" The voice whisper - shouted again.

"Who's there?" She hissed, spinning around.

"It's me!"

"That doesn't narrow it down at all." She said, getting annoyed at the disembodied voice.

"It's me. Ron!"

She looked at where she was hearing the voice, but there was no one standing there.

"Ron?" She asked. "Where are you?"

"Meet me behind the changing room." Ron's voice said, and then Noor heard what sounded like footsteps.

"Ron. Ron!" She shouted in the general direction of the voice, earning some weird looks from the people in the stands, but she got no reply.

Noor, feeling very confused, made her way over behind the changing rooms,

Behind the changing room was a small stretch of land, overlooking the greenhouse, out of sight of the prying eyes of the people on the Quidditch pitch.

When she came there, however, there was no one there.

Feeling very stupid, Noor massaged her head. Now she was hearing things, great!

"Boo!" A voice said behind her, making Noor shriek.

She spun around to see Ron there, laughing, clutching some sort of cloak.

"Ronald! Merlin, you scared me! How did you get there? You weren't there a second ago?" She asked.

Ron shook the simmering cloak he had in his hands, "It's an invisibility cloak." He explained.

"Really? No way." Noor said, touching the material in her hands. "How did you get one of these? They're really..." Noor trailed off, wanting to say expensive, but knowing it was a sore spot for the boy. "Rare."

"It belongs to Harry." He said, not noticing Noor's almost blunder. "I borrowed it from you so I could see you flying. Believe it or not most Slytherins don't take kindly to a Gryffindor watching their tryouts." He said dryly.

Noor paused, feeling very touched. "You went through all that trouble just to watch me?" She asked quietly.

Ron's ears turned bright red at that. "Well you've been talking about nothing but your quidditch tryouts for weeks now, I couldn't miss it!" He said. "And it wasn't that much trouble."

"So did you make the team?" He asked, after a minute of silence.

Noor wanted to prank him back, tell him no. But there was no way she could fight the smile that was making its way onto her face.

"Yeah." She said, beaming.

"Bloody hell! That's awesome!" Ron said, hugging Noor with gusto, almost lifting her off the ground.

Noor looked up, and suddenly realized how close their faces were. If she were to just stand on her tiptoes, and lean forward slightly, their lips would be touching.

This thought made Noor feel very hot all of a sudden. Ron's face reddened too, as if he'd just realized the same thing.

Noor pulled away, clearing her throat.

There was a pause of silence, before Ron spoke up, "So the Gryffindor tryouts are in two weeks." He said, hesitantly. "So I was thinking, you're a Chaser, I'm a Keeper. We should practice together. It's perfect."

"My Ronald." Noir said slyly. "First our weekly chess club meetings. Now this. You really are monopolising all my time."

Noor smirked as she watched Ron splutter.

"No - I - I'm not -"

Taking a deep breath, and summoning all the courage in her, Noor stood up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss on Ron's cheek. "I'd love that." She whispered.