To Find What is Lost

Chapter 8: Crush

Hellooooo!!! Here's the next chapter as promised on a Sunday, I know I'm being a bit inconsistent with my updates but I'm trying to publish as much as I can while still keeping ahead with my writing, so I'm sorry if the timing feels a little random xD. I'm going on holiday to the Maldives today (woo!!) so I might not publish very much for the next two weeks, but I'll try to fit in at least two or three updates over the period. Please enjoy this chapter and (if you want to) vote/comment, it makes me so happy -Emmi 

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Nico soon learned that being paired with Draco during Potions was a godsend (or probably just luck, he doubted any god cared about him failing at potions).

They had started the year with an awfully fiddly and difficult potion, and everyone in the classroom was struggling, ten minutes in they had already experienced their first explosion, and an hour later pretty much everyone was coughing over heavy smoke, or simply being forced to give up and run for it before the potion did something especially nasty.
All that was, except Draco Malfoy -Nico counted his lucky stars (depressingly only finding two and a half)- and a certain Hermione Granger.

As soon as Nico saw her his brain exploded in memories;

IT'S HER! IT'S HER! IT'S-

"Okay, I got it." thought Nico irritably, "It's her."

He stole a glance over at her, and saw her easily finishing off her and Weasley's potion, while poor Potter was left blinking in shock when his potion turned bright yellow and exploded all over his and Longbottom's faces.
He was about to snicker, when he realized that might well have been him if he hadn't been paired with Draco, and shut his mouth.

"So," he thought curiously. "That's the little genius that's on the brink of discovering the gods."

He decided to approach her after the lesson, no point in delaying the inevitable. Then he remembered his encounter with Potter, and realized that she would be leaving the lesson with him and Weasley. He cursed himself for being so hot-headed, and decided to wait until he could talk to her alone.

That prospect was easier said than done, as the son of Hades soon learned.
He had been at Hogwarts for three weeks now, and still he hadn't even glimpsed an opportunity to speak to the brunette genius alone. She was always accompanied by Potter; and the few times she wasn't she was with Weasley, at which times she seemed too preoccupied to mind a bomb blowing up in her face.

"Why doesn't she ever move alone!" he complained in a loud groan to Blaise one night, when Draco was in the library finishing homework.

His friend grinned, "Who d'you mean?" he asked slyly.

Nico looked at him blankly for a moment, and then realized what was going on in the boy's mind.

"What? No, you've got it all wrong, I'm-" he stopped himself, thinking.
He imagined himself in Blaise's place, and realized that he couldn't just ask Blaise for girl-advice and then say he was gay, it would arouse too much suspicion, and if he just pretended he had a crush on someone, then it would only be natural for him to want to keep it a secret...

"Actually, yes. There's this person I have a crush on-" It wasn't really a lie, after all, he did definitely have a crush on Will for ages.

"And you want girl-advice? From me?"

Nico shrugged, "I guess so." (also not a lie).

Blaise snorted, shrugging. "I'm not the one to ask for girl-talk. Ask Draco, he's good with the ladies." he grinned cheekily.

"Who's good with the ladies?" asked Draco as he entered.

"Oh, Dray. We were just talking about you!" said Blaise with a lolling grin as he lounged on his bed. "Di Angelo's got a crush."

Nico reddened, glaring at the other Italian.

Blaise shrugged, continuing to grin as he looked down at the book in his hand, pretending to read.

He turned to Draco, just in time to see the strange look the blonde was giving him. Suddenly he felt jumpy, as if Draco knew something... or maybe suspected...

But before he could think any deeper into it the look was gone again, replaced by a joking grin. "If you want lady-advice go fish. I'm giving all that up."

Nico raised an eyebrow, but the phrase gave him an idea. There was only one person he knew who got on with everybody. Surely this person could help him.