It was, as Harry had anticipated

It was, as Harry had anticipated, useless, boring work, punctuated (as Snape had clearly planned) with the regular jolt in the stomach that meant he had just read his

father or Sirius's names, usually coupled together in various petty misdeeds, occasionally accompanied by those of Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew. And while he copied

out all their various offenses and punishments, he wondered what was going on outside, where the match would have just started... Ginny playing Seeker against Cho...

Harry glanced again and again at the large clock ticking on the wall. It seemed to be moving half as fast as a regular clock; perhaps Snape had bewitched it to go extra

slowly? He could not have been here for only half an hour ... an hour ... an hour and a half...

Harry's stomach started rumbling when the clock showed half past twelve. Snape, who had not spoken at all since setting Harry his task, finally looked up at ten past

one.

“I think that will do,” he said coldly. “Mark the place you have reached. You will continue at ten o'clock next Saturday.”

“Yes, sir.”

Harry stuffed a bent card into the box at random and hurried out of the door before Snape could change his mind, racing back up the stone steps, straining his ears to

hear a sound from the pitch, but all was quiet... it was over, then...

He hesitated outside the crowded Great Hall, then ran up the marble staircase; whether Gryffindor had won or lost, the team usually celebrated or commiserated in their

own common room.

“Quid agis?” he said tentatively to the Fat Lady, wondering what he would find inside.

Her expression was unreadable as she replied, “You'll see.”

And she swung forward.

A roar of celebration erupted from the hole behind her. Harry gaped as people began to scream at the sight of him; several hands pulled him into the room.

“We won!” yelled Ron, bounding into sight and brandishing the silver Cup at Harry. “We won! Four hundred and fifty to a hundred and forty! We won!”

Harry looked around; there was Ginny running toward him; she had a hard, blazing look in her face as she threw her arms around him. And without thinking, without

planning it, without worrying about the fact that fifty people were watching, Harry kissed her.

After several long moments—or it might have been half an hour—or possibly several sunlit days—they broke apart. The room had gone very quiet. Then several people

wolf-whistled and there was an outbreak of nervous giggling. Harry looked over the top of Ginny's head to see Dean Thomas holding a shattered glass in his hand, and

Romilda Vane looking as though she might throw something. Hermione was beaming, but Harry's eyes sought Ron. At last he found him, still clutching the Cup and wearing

an expression appropriate to having been clubbed over the head. For a fraction of a second they looked at each other, then Ron gave a tiny jerk of the head that Harry

understood to mean, “Well—if you must.”

The creature in his chest roaring in triumph, he grinned down at Ginny and gestured wordlessly out of the portrait hole. A long walk in the grounds seemed indicated,

during which—if they had time—they might discuss the match.