Part 1 The Yule Ball is not an event to be taken lightly. I'm only going to get to attend once, so of course that one attendance has to be absolutely perfect. I'm halfway there; I've acquired an arsenal of magical hair products and make-up, and what I will describe modestly as being the most gorgeous dress robes ever touched by the hand of man – even though stuffing my horrible body into them will ruin the effect. Getting the cash for them was like squeezing blood from a stone: dress robes? Why can't you just wear a dress? If you've ever had a moment where you've started tearing your hair out and hissing ‘oh, you bloody Muggle! ' even when the Muggle in question is a parent, then I now know your pain. I digress. I have the look, now I need the date. Oh God. I assumed that girls would have it easier than boys – as a rule, we are smarter and more sophisticated than them. Aren't we? We, for example, have perfected the art of going to the ladies' in groups so as to compare notes while simultaneously bewildering any lads in our company. We don't have to deal with female pack behaviour or excesses of passive aggression – something the average male wouldn't understand even if it punched him in the face. Getting a Yule Ball date should have been simple, especially since I'd long abandoned the idea of being picky – there's a certain blond boy in Slytherin I...appreciate...but he's not going to want a four-eyed Muggleborn on his arm any time soon, let's put it that way. So it should just be a case of me finding someone – anyone – looking half as desperate as I feel and saying hey, you look like you won't have a girlfriend, want to publicly humiliate yourself with me? Merlin, it is not that simple. You go near a boy in the run-up to the Yule Ball and it's like hitting a solid wall of testosterone. They may not realise they're doing it – that would be nice, at least – but they smirk, they give you these up-and-down evaluating looks as if you're a piece of meat and they will occasionally exchange glances with their mates. This, I need to reiterate, is before you've spoken to them. Before you're even in earshot. They see me coming, looking vaguely optimistic, and they know exactly why I'm there. I've attempted to ask four boys. Three of them? I felt so humiliated by the experience that by the time we were close enough to talk, I just gave up and mumbled something inane about borrowing Potions notes. On the upside, I now know more about the properties of crushed opals than I'll ever need, thanks to a surprisingly chivalrous fifth-year Gryffindor. The fourth one, I actually got the words out. Well. It was more like one big word. WillyougototheYuleBallwithmeplease? I'll draw a curtain over exactly what happened next and just say that he said no. I'm doomed. Part 2 I'm doomed. Not because of the season, of course. I love Christmas – the lights, the songs, the decorations, the food, and of course it helps that it's as far on the calendar as possible from my parents' tragic yet mysterious demise. Nobody can stand to see me cry, they're all so sensitive to my bad moods – which is a surprise, because so many other Gryffindors like to wander about yelling that you'd think everyone else would have developed an immunity to it – so it's rather wonderful that such a black mark on the year is so distant from the winter festivities. But what I love most about Christmas is the socialising. The parties. And there simply aren't any parties quite so wonderful or highly esteemed as the Yule Ball. Although I'm a Third Year, I've been told I can attend the Ball with or without a date since my presence has, for some reason, been deemed to be indispensable – Draco says it's because I'm pretty and a good dancer, he's such a flatterer, but really? Being the Headmaster's foster daughter and a distant niece of Professor Snape's is always helpful when securing social engagements at Hogwarts. It would be nice to go by myself, because there must be some sort of notoriety attached to choosing to attend the Yule Ball without a date (and then I could dance with as many boys as I liked without feeling guilty! Especially Cedric, he's going with some Ravenclaw girl but he wouldn't have given her a second look if I hadn't given her some tips on how to wear her hair, and anyway he owes me at least one dance for persuading Harry to tell him about the First Task. I'm friends with Harry because – oh, there I go again, I ramble on don't I?), but then again it would be unkind of me to reject all the boys who have asked me to go with them. So I'm doomed. I don't know how to choose. Whoever I don't go to the Ball with will be offended, and if I say yes to the friend of someone else who's asked me then they might get into a fight. Like Crabbe and Goyle – they both asked me, but maybe that's not the best example because I'd never say yes to either of them. Ron and Harry are much better examples; they came to ask me at the same time (how embarrassing!) and I could hardly choose one and not the other, could I? It was so romantic, though – Ron told me how much he loved my long, flowing locks of flaxen hair, and Harry waxed lyrical about how my eyes seem to change colour with my mood. I think they must have had a fight afterwards, but it's alright – Harry's gone to ask the Ravenclaw girl, and Ron…I'm not sure. Someone French? I must stop, though. I promised I'd tell Hermione how she can subtly flaunt her femininity to Bulgarian boys in libraries.