Song: Take A Slice by Glass Animals (the song is a vibe...and although the words don't necessarily fit the chapter, the vibe does)

Hannah, Susie, and I chatter away excitedly about our first Dumbledore's Army practice with Ernie, Zacharias, and Justin following us as we head towards our meeting place.

Once we make it to the spot where Hermione and Ron told us to wait, Ernie says, "there's nothing but a wall here?"

Hannah rolls her eyes, "are you that daft, Ernie? We're supposed to knock on the door over there." She points towards a small, closet-like door further down the wall. Ernie's face turns a bright red as he mumbles something incoherent under his breath.

Susie turns to me, "clearly he didn't pay attention to Hermione." I nod along with a smile.

"It wouldn't be the first time," I say, causing her to giggle.

Just then we watch Hannah obnoxiously knock on the door, swinging her arm so wildly that it looks as though she may lose it.

"Hannah! Calm down with the knocking, would ya?! We could get caught!" Zacharias yells at her. She turns around, sticking her tongue out at him with narrowed eyes.

"Oh bugger off, Zach!" Hannah bites back, and before he can say anything more, the door opens to Ron waving us in hastily.

"Hurry, hurry! Come on in!"

We scurry into the spacious room, that is full of flickering torches that look quite similar to the ones in the dungeon. I see Ginny, Neville, Lavender, Pavarti, and Dean have already arrived and are sitting on silk cushions looking around the room in awe.

I can't help but to do the same as the walls are lined with wooden bookcases that are filled with books of all sorts, and shelves full of various instruments. This room is the perfect place, it has everything we'd need!

"Wow!" I mutter under my breath, taking in my surroundings before sitting down on a seat beside Susie and Dean.

Dean looks at me with a smile before saying, "isn't it neat in here?"

"It really is. I'm excited to start, I feel like Harry will do an exceptional job teaching us," I reply, giving him a smile back. I glance around, seeing most of the group from the first meeting is already here.

He gives a nod in agreement. "Yeah. I believe so, too."

Just then, a loud click resounds within the room. I look over towards the door we came in to see Harry standing there giving us all a hesitant smile. I feel myself smiling more as he walks forward towards the group.

"Well," Harry says, with a quiver of nervousness in his voice, "this is the place we've found for practices, and you've—er—obviously found it okay—"

"—it's fantastic!!" Cho randomly exclaims, causing several people to murmur in agreement.

"It's bizarre," said Fred, frowning around at it. "We once hid from Filch in here...remember George? But it was just a broom cupboard then..."

There's some silence before Dean then speaks up. "Hey, Harry! What's this stuff?" He's pointing over towards some strange things like Sneakoscopes and Foe-Glass. I remember reading up on these in a book Nymphi lent me a couple years ago.

"Dark Detectors," Harry says, as he steps between the cushions to reach where Dean is standing. "Basically, they all show when dark wizards or enemies are around, but you shouldn't rely on them too much."

I lean over towards Susie as Harry turns and gazes into the Foe-Glass, whispering to her, "isn't this exciting?"

She glances over with an excited grin. "Definitely!"

"Well, I've been thinking about the sort of stuff we ought to do first and—er—" Harry begins saying, but he must notice Hermione's hand shoot up as he asks, "—what Hermione?"

She clears her throat before saying, "I think we ought to elect a leader."

"Harry's leader," Cho snaps out, her eyes like daggers on Hermione. I don't know Cho very well except for whenever she was around Cedric, so I don't have much of an opinion on her.

"Yes, but I think we ought to vote on it properly," Hermione says unfazed. "It makes it formal, and gives Harry authority. So, who thinks Harry ought to be our leader?"

I glance around to see that everyone puts their hands up, but Zach seems to be grimacing as he does so.

He's such a jerk.

I look back over to Harry, whose cheeks are now as red as the Weasley's hair. "Well...thanks."

I see Hermione out of the corner of my eye raising her hand again, causing Harry to ask with exasperation, "what, Hermione?"

"I also think we ought to have a name," she says with a bright smile. Her eyes lock in over by me briefly, and I find myself nodding with an equally bright smile back. "It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity. Don't you think?"

"What about the Anti-Umbridge League?" I hear someone say sitting behind me.

"Or the Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group?" Fred suggests, causing many of us to laugh, including myself.

Hermione frowns at Fred before saying, "I was thinking more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside of our meetings."

"The Defense Association?" Cho says, causing many people to nod along. "We could call it the D.A. for short, so nobody knows what we're talking about." I find myself liking the sound of that.

"Yeah! The D.A. is good, but let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army because that's the Ministry's worst fear, isn't it?" Ginny suggests. Everyone, including myself, nods along excitedly and there are many murmurs about the room.

Hermione seems pleased with Ginny's suggestion as she says, "All in favor of the D.A.?"

At this most everyone has their hand raised, yet Hermione still counts all of them. "That's a majority! Motion passed." I see her place the sheet with our names on a wall, writing Dumbledore's Army at the top.

"Right," Harry begins as Hermione sits back down, "Shall we get practicing then? I think we should start with something basic...like Expelliarmus—the disarming charm."

"Oh, please," I hear Zach sneer out while rolling his eyes, "You don't think Expelliarmus is going to help us fight against You-Know-Who, do you?" I find myself glaring at him. He takes notice and glares right back at me before bringing his attention to a serious-faced Harry.

"I've used it against him," Harry says with quiet seriousness. "It saved my life last June."

I watch as Zach's mouth opens dumbfoundedly at hearing this.

"But, if you think it's beneath you, Zach, you can most certainly leave. You know where the door is," Harry says right back, with sass. I find myself smirking as I look over at Zach to see him not moving a centimeter.

There's some silence before Harry clears his throat and says, "Okay, I reckon we should all divide into pairs and practice!"

We all stand up and begin pairing up. Susie and I immediately partner up, and I watch as Neville is the only one left partnerless. Harry, being the kind soul he is, pairs up with him, causing a huge smile to form on Neville's face.

We begin practicing, the words "Expelliarmus" being thrown all around the room. I manage to do it successfully by the second time, but it takes Susie quite a few tries to get it down.

In one of the corners of the room, Fred and George are taking turns using Expelliarmus on Zach, causing him to be flustered and outright confused. His wand keeps flying out of his hand before he can even get the chance to do the charm. I snicker at this as Zach is now fuming, yelling at Justin. Justin gets angry at Zach, and then they start to fight. Ron and Harry quickly run over to break them up.

Zach mutters a "whatever" as he switches partners and ends up with Padma, while Justin is paired up with Anthony.

"They're such hotheads, I swear," Hannah says beside me, crossing her arms and shaking her head at the sight. Luna steps closer to us, a look of wonderment on her face.

"It must be the Nargles," she says whimsically. Hannah just raises her eyebrows at that.

Looking at Luna, I say, "Perhaps."

She gives me a small smile before averting her attention to Neville and Harry. Neville, after several tries, successfully disarms Harry causing a jolt of excitement from both him and Neville.

We clap along, Hannah clapping the hardest. I see a couple girls walk over towards Neville, but Hannah walks over and shoves them out of the way before looking up at Neville. I watch as she twirls her hair around her finger as she talks to him while a blush slowly creeps onto his cheeks.

She's hilariously head over heels for him, and he's still so clueless.

"Alright everyone. I think this was a great first lesson! Our next meeting will be next Wednesday around the same time." I hear Harry say with a smile. "Thank you all."

Waving to him and the remaining others, I walk out of the Room of Requirement with Susie and Hannah, completely satisfied and excited for our next meeting.

...

I'm sitting down for dinner, picking at the green beans on my plate. For some reason, I'm not hungry. It's probably because I have to see Draco for our tutoring session later, and I haven't talked to him since after our Quidditch game.

Thinking about it all still gives me mixed emotions.

Like, I'm grateful he helped me back onto my broom, but he was also the one to shove me off of it in the first place, so I'm also pissed at him. I am still a bit upset with how he talked to my teammates and I afterwards too.

He really is a bloody prick.

"Libby!" Susie whispers at me, her eyes glancing behind me, full of surprise.

"What is it?" I ask, giving her a questioning look.

Before she can respond, the whole table gets quiet, with all their eyes in my direction, and I hear someone clear their throat behind me.

Turning around in my seat, I'm met with Draco standing there with his hands casually in his trouser pockets. I raise my eyebrows at him, as if saying, "what?"

"I need to talk to you—" his eyes glance around at my housemates who are silently watching, eating up every word he's saying, before he continues, "—in private."

"Oh—um—alright," I say in confusion before beginning to follow him out of the Great Hall.

I turn around briefly to see Hannah crossing her arms while quirking an eyebrow. She mouths, "tell me later," before I turn back around.

I feel eyes on both Draco and I as we make our way out of the Great Hall. My cheeks are burning at the attention, while Draco seems completely unbothered. In fact, he seems to actually like it.

After turning down a couple corridors, Draco stops and finally turns to me. He's smirking as he says, "your friends are going to think there's something between us, aren't they?"

"Well, I mean you did say you had to talk with me in private. That does sound a little suspicious," I remark crossing my arms as I say this.

Draco rolls his eyes. "Bloody Hufflepuffs and their desire to be something—" I open my mouth, about to snap back, but he continues, "—anyways I can't tutor you tonight. I have something else I need to attend."

I narrow my gaze slightly at him. "Like what?"

"Like I'd ever tell you," he sneers back with his typical face of annoyance.

"Alright, well, I guess I won't tell you what I heard Harry say about you the other day then. See you later, Draco," I turn around and begin to walk back to the Great Hall with a smirk plastered on my face.

I only get two steps in before Draco's hand grabs my shoulder tightly, making me stop in my tracks. I feel heat rise into my cheeks at the sudden contact.

He turns me around roughly with a stormy face. "What did Potter say about me?" His hand is still on my shoulder as he speaks.

"I'll tell you if you tell me what else you need to attend besides our tutoring session," he takes his hand off of my shoulder looking frustrated. I can see he's debating whether or not to tell me: the curiosity of what Harry has to say about him is eating at him.

"Fine. I'm going home because father needs me for something important, much more important than a tutoring session with you. Now tell me what Potter said," he demands.

I'm not going to lie and say his words didn't cause a pang of hurt in me.

"Why does your father need you home so urgently?" My question seems to irritate him as he rolls his eyes and lets out a huff.

"Bloody hell, Tonks! I've already told you enough...now tell me what the hell Potter said about me!" He raises his voice, balling his fists up.

I think he thinks he looks rather intimidating when he does this, but in reality, he looks like a toddler throwing a tantrum. It's almost laughable.

"Oh, he didn't say anything. I made that up," I give him a cheeky smile, earning a deathly glare from him. It's quite amusing to tease him, I must say.

He stalks closer to my form, towering over me with a dark expression. He bends down so his mouth is closer to my ear.

"Do that again, and you'll regret it." His voice is low as he speaks, no hint of amusement within his statement.

For some reason, his comment doesn't intimidate me. Rather, it causes a rush of heat to course inside me. I have to clench my fists in order to stop my whole body from reacting to his dark words.

Why do I feel like this?

"Was that supposed to scare me?" I say, raising an eyebrow. He looks slightly taken aback at my response; he's clearly not used to others, besides Harry, Hermione, or Ron, talking back to him.

We're close in proximity, so close that I can feel his warm breath hitting my face. His eyes seem to dart around my face, he looks rather conflicted, as if struggling to find the right words to say.

After several seconds of antagonizing silence and awkwardness, he finally must have figured out what he wants to respond with.

"Whatever Tonks, I have to go." He then rushes off without another glance back at me.

I don't think those were the words he truly wanted to end with.

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