"I guess. I'm heading to the library after this, hopefully I can find some way to get their attention."
"Do you want some help?" Neville offered. "I'm caught up on my homework, and I would probably just end up playing exploding snap in the common room the rest of the night otherwise."
"Thanks Neville, that would be great."
"No problem. I…" Neville stopped what he was saying and looked up. "Harry, Hermione's headed this way." Harry turned around and sure enough, his bushy haired old friend was headed directly towards them. He tried to keep a neutral expression on his face while she sat down at the table next to him. Neville, having watched how the three 'friends' had acted around each other since Harry's name came out of the Goblet of Fire, eyed Hermione with suspicion.
"Hi, Harry." she said quietly.
"Hello Hermione. Is there something I can do for you?" Harry asked, causing Hermione to frown.
"I don't want to fight anymore, Harry. I want things to go back to the way they were."
"We're hardly fighting Hermione. In fact, this is the first time you've talked to me in almost two weeks. So what has changed? Did you finally realize that I have been telling the truth this whole time?" Harry retorted.
"I don't know. I want to believe you, but Harry I saw how excited you got when they announced the tournament and I know how competitive you can be."
"Sure I was excited, but so was the rest of the school!"
"Hermione," Neville spoke up for the first time, "I thought Harry was supposed to be your best friend. I trust him to be honest, why don't you?" Harry and Hermione were both a little shocked by this statement, as neither of them had ever heard Neville speaking so strongly in defense of anyone before. Harry smiled, Neville was a better friend than he had given him credit for.
"Neville, this is between Harry and I. Please let us…"
"No, Hermione." Harry said, cutting her off. "It's a good question."
"It's not that I don't trust you, I just thought that there was more going on here than you've told us. I guess you could be right. Just let me think about it, ok?" Hermione asked. Harry merely shrugged his shoulders.
"Hermione, I think I have already lost Ron's friendship. I hope I don't lose yours, but I haven't done anything wrong here."
"Surely things with Ron can't be that bad." Hermione said, not responding to the rest of Harry's statement. "You two can patch things up, right?"
"I don't think he wants to. I know you have seen how he has treated me the last two weeks. In fact, I had hoped you would say something about it."
"I thought that if I got involved I would make the situation worse. I didn't want to take a side if that meant the three of us wouldn't be friends anymore."
"Things can't just go back to the way they were, Hermione. Everything has changed. I don't want to lose you, but I can't force you to see it my way. Just think about it. I'll see you later." Harry pushed his chair back and with a nod to Neville left the Great Hall leaving Hermione and Neville alone. Hermione sat thinking, obviously on the verge of crying. Neville looked at her, wondering what her reaction would be. He had already chosen his side, and in retrospect it wasn't a hard choice at all. Harry had always treated him as a friend. He had the feeling that Ron, on the other hand, was only nice to him because of Harry.
"Hermione, Harry seems to really care about you and I know you care about him. He probably should be angrier with you than he is. For both of your sakes, I hope you don't drag this on too much longer." Neville quietly gathered his things and got up from the table to follow Harry to the library.
As he left, Hermione finally started to cry. She wished she could find some way to mend all of the broken friendships between herself, Ron, and Harry. Harry didn't seem to think it was possible, and Ron had given no indication he was interested in doing so. 'How did things get so messed up?' she asked herself as she tried leave the Great Hall before anyone could see her crying. She didn't notice, however, that two tables over a certain blond Slytherin had been watching the entire scene since Hermione came in with more interest than anyone would have expected. Daphne sighed, hoping her Gryffindor friend could make it out of this situation without being hurt too badly.
...
"Settle down and get your seats. Weasley! Ten points from Gryffindor for being unprepared." The Gryffindors in the class groaned as Professor Snape docked more points from their house, like he did in every class. Most of them had learned by now not to fight it, losing points was inevitable in this class. Ron Weasley, however, seemed to have missed that memo.
"But that's not fair! Look at Malfoy, he has less of his stuff out than me!" Ron argued. And it was true, Draco wasn't even at his table and all of his potions supplies were still put up. Not that it mattered to Professor Snape.
"Ten more points from Gryffindor for talking back to a teacher. I suggest you be quiet unless you wish to spend tonight in detention." Ron finally seemed to get the hint and sat down, clearly still angry about losing twenty points. Harry and Neville watched from their table at the other side of the room, each happy that Snape had not picked them to pick on today.
"For the next two weeks you will be split into pairs to work on a new assignment. Each pair will be given the ingredients for a type of poison, but not the name of the poison or instructions on how to brew it. You and your partners must not only identify the poison and brew it successfully, but must also determine the antidote and brew that as well. The poisons I have picked for you may be obscure, so I do not expect any of you to be successful." Snape explained. "Ever since the delegations from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons arrived the Headmaster has become obsessed with increasing cooperation amongst young wizards and witches. Therefore, he has requested that any class grops consist of students from different houses. The pairs for this assignment will all have one student from Slytherin, and one from Gryffindor."