Chapter 39: Another Boarder

                                    

                                          
Pansy kept her eyes wide open and watched fireplace after fireplace flash in front of her as she spun through the floo network. She became increasingly nervous with each spin, as she couldn't remember ever traveling so long via floo. When finally she stopped, she threw out a hand to steady herself against the stone hearth. Once steadied, she looked out into the room and the many faces in it, and felt the instant urge to quickly speak the name of her family home and be swept away again.
                          
"Oh, Pansy dear, thank goodness you're alright," a kindly little woman with graying red hair greeted her. "Come on in. You don't want to just stand in the grate."
                          
Pansy timidly stepped into the kitchen and glanced quickly at each person. She watched as a girl with black hair fled the room, leaving her with naught but red-heads. She instantly recognized Ron and Ginny, then also the twins. There were two other men in the room, one tall with a ponytail and the other shorter and stockier like the twins. The woman who spoke to her, she assumed, was their mother. Beside the woman was a young boy with soft brown hair, who she had overlooked at first. Looking off to the side, she at last recognized one last face that eased her anxiety somewhat.
                          
"Pernie?" she asked in confusion. "W-where am I?"
                          
"Welcome to the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix," Ron said with a small smile.
                          
A chime sounded from behind her and she turned to look at the fireplace, hoping for Draco to step through. Hermione appeared and immediately began brushing the soot from her cloak. It wasn't Draco, but Pansy still felt oddly relieved to see her.
                          
"Draco will be here in a minute," Hermione announced.
                          
"PANSY?" a cry rang from the kitchen staircase. A split second after, the kitchen door was thrown open and Blaise burst into the room. He was followed by the raven-haired girl that Pansy then recognized as a former Gryffindor chaser, the former Beauxbatons champion, Fleur, and two more red-headed Weasleys.
                          
"Pansy, are you alright?" Blaise gripped her arms and stared into her face in a panic. "Were they at the Estate? Your family, are they alright? Your father?"
                          
"Blaise, she's fine," Hermione said firmly, hoping to shake him from his frantic state.
                          
"Blaise?" Pansy looked utterly perplexed, but as realization dawned, her puzzled look turned to one of silent fury. "You're in on this?"
                          
"In on…? You make it sound like a bad thing," Blaise blinked in confusion and frustration.
                          
"A bad thing? I was locked away and don't know why and you knew the whole time! Draco at least told me he couldn't say anything. You listened to me go on about it and let me believe you didn't know a thing about it!" Pansy shouted, her eyes shiny with unshed tears.
                          
"Pansy…" Blaise said consolingly as he took a step toward her.
                          
Pansy took a step back and turned her eyes away from him. She felt betrayed and humiliated, which only added to the discomfort of standing in a place she'd never been with many people she'd never met, and worse, some that she had. In averting her eyes from Blaise, they fell directly upon Hermione's.
                          
Hermione's heart went out to the girl. She and Pansy were not friends. At that point in their life, they were hardly anything at all to one another, but Hermione felt pity for her. The tears in Pansy's red-rimmed eyes were just like those she herself had cried so many times in recent days. The poignant empathy pricked at Hermione's heart and created a conflict within her. She waited anxiously for Draco to return, but her sympathy for Pansy urged her to take her from the crowded room to some place more private. She considered herself lucky when the fireplace charm rang out and saved her from making the decision.