Chapter 28: Valentine's Day

On February fourteenth, as Chris entered the Great Hall with Ron and Hermione, she got a huge shock. The walls were all covered with large, lurid pink flowers. Worse still, heart-shaped confetti was falling from the pale blue ceiling.

"Bloody Hell!" Ron looked sick, as he said. "What's this?"

"Oh My..." Hermione giggled, looking at the staff table.

Lockhart, wearing lurid pink robes to match the decorations, was waving for silence. The teachers on either side of him were looking stony-faced. Chris could see a muscle going in Professor McGonagall's cheek. Snape looked as though someone had just fed him a large beaker of a disgusting potion.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Hermione asked happily as they sat on the Gryffindor table.

"Er... Hermione, I don't like Pink that much. So.." Chris replied but then stopped as Luna and Ginny came to them.

"It's a little bit stupid, isn't it?" Luna asked looking at the decorations.

"I think it's charming." Hermione snapped.

Luna ignored her and turned to Chris.

"I asked Ginny to join us. I wanted my two friends back together." Luna said.

Chris and Ginny caught each other's eye but Ginny looked away quickly.

"What's going on?" Harry asked them, sitting down and wiping confetti off his bacon.

"Happy Valentine's Day!" Lockhart shouted. "And may I thank the forty-six people who have so far sent me cards! Yes, I have taken the liberty of arranging this little surprise for you all — and it doesn't end here!"

Lockhart clapped his hands and through the doors to the entrance hall marched a dozen surly-looking dwarfs. Not just any dwarfs, however. Lockhart had them all wearing golden wings and carrying harps.

"My friendly, card-carrying cupids!" beamed Lockhart. "They will be roving around the school today delivering your valentines! And the fun doesn't stop here! I'm sure my colleagues will want to enter into the spirit of the occasion! Why not ask Professor Snape to show you how to whip up a Love Potion! And while you're at it, Professor Flitwick knows more about Entrancing Enchantments than any wizard I've ever met, the sly old dog!"

Professor Flitwick buried his face in his hands. Snape was looking as though the first person to ask him for a Love Potion would be force-fed poison.

Chris and Harry burst out laughing.

"That was something..." Harry said.

"... something hilarious." Chris completed.

They started laughing again.

All day long, the dwarfs kept barging into their classes to deliver valentines, to the annoyance of the teachers, and late that afternoon as the Gryffindors were walking upstairs after class, one of the dwarfs caught up with Harry.

"Oi, you! 'Arry Potter!" shouted a particularly grim-looking dwarf, elbowing people out of the way to get to Harry.

All the first year girls including Ginny, had sent Harry Valentine (of course, except Chris).

Harry tried to escape but the dwarf caught up with him.

Chris saw all the first year girls were looking red, specially Ginny.

"I've got a musical message to deliver to 'Arry Potter in person," the dwarf said, twanging his harp in a threatening sort of way.

"Not here," Harry hissed, trying to escape.

"Stay still!" grunted the dwarf, grabbing hold of Harry.

Harry tried to break free but Chris hold him back.

"Oh let's get over with it.. how bad possibly it could be?" she said.

"Right," the dwarf said, sitting on Harry's ankles. "Here is your singing valentine:

His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad,

His hair is as dark as a blackboard.

I wish he was mine, he's really divine,

The hero who conquered the Dark Lord."

"I..." Chris choked as she started to laugh. "I take.. that back... This is..."

Harry shrugged.

"What's going on here?" came the cold, drawling voice of Draco Malfoy.

"What's all this commotion?" said another familiar voice as Percy Weasley arrived.

But then another dwarf emerged from the crowd.

"Ei... Christina Norton... We've eight singing Valentines for you." he said.

Chris abruptly stopped laughing as her eyes went wide.

"Oh I think you've a mistake." She said hurriedly, while trying to walk out of the crowd.

"Of course not.. Here's the names..."

And the dwarf started to recite the names of six first year boys and two second year boys, who decided to write valentines for Chris.

Chris tried to evaporate on the spot.

"I'm not that Christina." Chris protested.

Ginny ran into class angrily without waiting any farther and the dwarf started to sing:

"Her smile makes everything bright;

Her eyes are like the ocean in daylight.

She's funny, She's cu...."

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"I've class." Chris ran towards the class before the dwarf can finish the song.

She heard Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle howling with laughter as the dwarf continued the song and Percy yelling.

"Off you go, off you go, the bell rang five minutes ago, off to class, now," he said, shooing the students away.

___________________________________________

Chris tried to forgot that entire Valentine's day but couldn't as Fred and George kept singing the songs for Harry and Chris to remind it. 

So far Chris haven't got a clue about the Diary, she used many advanced spells, anything she could find. Chris even tried Hermione's Revealer, which she brought from Diagon Alley. But nothing helped. The Diary was still blank.

It was now nearly four months since Justin and Nearly Headless Nick had been Petrified, and nearly everybody seemed to think that the attacker, whoever it was, had retired for good.

In March several of the Mandrakes threw a loud and raucous party in greenhouse three. This made Professor Sprout very happy.

"The moment they start trying to move into each other's pots, we'll know they're fully mature," Hermione told Chris. "Then we'll be able to revive those poor people in the hospital wing."

This made Ginny really happy. Everyone thought that's because Colin was her friend, but Chris knew something was wrong. Something was going on in Ginny's head, what the other's couldn't see.