New Colleagues

I had known Filius Flitwick since the beginning of her own school years. He stood out among the other teachers at Hogwarts, just as I did. I was the only woman and the youngest among the staff; Filius was the only goblin-related.

Our shared singularity gave us each a special awareness for the other; both of us sensed it clearly, though neither mentioned it. We worked together very well, but both of us were wary – for good reason – of exposing ourselves, and the tenuous bond between us, much too nebulous to be called friendship, remained unacknowledged until near the end of my first year of teaching.

I had had a very stressful day today with a difficult seventh year class of Slytherins and Gryffindors, who were, as usual, at each other's throats throughout the class. Managing, just barely, to come out of the battle unscratched and successful, I retired to my room. But I was too charged up to really enjoy the quiet. So I changed clothes and went to the teachers' lounge to settle down and have a nice cup of tea and hopefully an enjoyable conversation.

The lounge wasn't empty; thank God. Filius Flitwick sat in one of the rump-sprung stuffed chairs, apparently absorbed in a copy of Charms and More. He looked up as I entered, and nodded briefly to me before returning to his reading.

The lounge was equipped with stacks of magazines – salvaged from the students – and a number of tattered paperbacks, abandoned by retired teachers or leaving students. Seeking distraction, I thumbed past a six-month-old copy of Transfiguration Today, a ragged copy of the London Times, and a neat stack of others. Finally picking up one of the books, I sat down with it.

It had no cover, but the title page read The Impetuous Pirate, "A sensuous, compelling love story, boundless as the Spanish main!" said the line beneath the title. The Spanish Main, eh? If escape was what I wanted, I couldn't do much better, I thought, and opened the book at random. It fell open automatically to page 42.

Tipping up her nose scornfully, Tessa tossed her lush blond tresses back, oblivious to the fact that this caused her voluptuous breasts to become even more prominent in the low-necked dress. Valdez's eyes widened at the sight, but he gave no outward sign of the effect such wanton beauty had on him.

"I thought that we might become better acquainted, Señorita," he suggested, in a low, sultry voice that made little shivers of anticipation run up and down Tessa's back.

"I have no interest in becoming acquainted with a ... a ... filthy, despicable, underhanded pirate!"

Valdez's teeth gleamed as he smiled at her, his hand stroking the handle of the dagger at his belt. He was impressed by her fearlessness; so bold, so impetuous ... and so beautiful.

I raised an eyebrow, but went on reading, fascinated.

With an air of imperious possession, Valdez swooped an arm about Tessa's waist.

"You forget, Señorita," he murmured, the words tickling her sensitive earlobe, "you are a prize of war; and the Captain of a pirate ship has first choice of the booty!"

Tessa struggled in his powerful arms as he bore her to the berth and tossed her lightly onto the jewelled coverlet. She struggled to catch her breath, watching in terror as he undressed, laying aside his azure-blue velvet coat and then the fine ruffled white linen shirt. His chest was magnificent, a smooth expanse of gleaming bronze. Her fingertips ached to touch it, even though her heart pounded deafeningly in her ears as he reached for the waistband of his breeches.

"But no," he said, pausing. "It is unfair of me to neglect you, Señorita. Allow me." With an irresistible smile, he bent and gently cupped Tessa's breasts in the heated palms of his callused hands, enjoying the voluptuous weight of them through the thin silken fabric. With a small scream, Tessa shrank away from his probing touch, pressing back against the lace-embroidered feather pillow.

"You resist? What a pity to spoil such fine clothing, Señorita ..." He took a firm grasp on her jade-silk bodice and yanked, causing Tessa's fine white breasts to leap out of their concealment like a pair of plump partridges taking wing.

I made a sound, causing Professor Flitwick to look sharply over the top of his Charms and More. Hastily rearranging my face into a semblance of dignified absorption, I turned the page.

Valdez's thick black curls swept her chest as he fastened his hot lips on Tessa's rose-pink nipples, making waves of anguished desire wash through her being. Weakened by the unaccustomed feelings that his ardour aroused in her, she was unable to move as his hand stealthily sought the hem of her gown and his blazing touch traced tendrils of sensation up the length of her slender thigh.

"Ah, mi amor," he groaned. "So lovely, so pure. You drive me mad with desire, mi amor. I have wanted you since I first saw you, so proud and cold on the deck of your father's ship. But not so cold now, my dear, eh?"

In fact, Valdez's kisses were wreaking havoc on Tessa's feelings. How, how could she be feeling such things for this man, who had cold-bloodedly sunk her father's ship, and murdered a hundred men with his own hands? She should be recoiling in horror, but instead she found herself gasping for breath, opening her mouth to receive his burning kisses, arching her body in involuntary abandon beneath the demanding pressure of his burgeoning manhood.

"Ah, mi amor," he gasped. "I cannot wait. But ... I do not wish to hurt you. Gently, mi amor, gently."

Tessa gasped as she felt the increasing pressure of his desire making its presence known between her legs.

"Oh!" she said. "Oh, please! You can't! I don't want you to!" [Fine time to start making protests, I thought.]

"Don't worry, mi amor. Trust me."

Gradually, little be little, she relaxed under the touch of his hypnotic caresses, feeling the warmth in her stomach grow and spread. His lips brushed her breast, and his hot breath, murmuring reassurances, took away all her resistance. As she relaxed, her thighs opened without her willing it. Moving with infinite slowness, his engorged shaft teased aside the membrane of her innocence ...

I let out a whoop and lost my grasp on the book, which slid off my lap and fell on the floor with a plop near Professor Flitwick's feet.

"Excuse me," I murmured, and bent to retrieve it, my face flaming. As I came up with The Impetuous Pirate in my sweaty grasp, though, I saw that far from preserving his usual austere mien, Professor Flitwick was grinning widely.

"Let me guess," he said. "Valdez just teased aside the membrane of her innocence?"

"Yes," I said, breaking out into helpless giggling again. "How did you know?"

"Well, you weren't too far into it," he said, taking the book from my hand. His short, blunt fingers flicked the pages expertly. "It had to be that one, or maybe the one on page 73, where he laves her pink mounds with his hungry tongue."

"He what?"

"See for yourself." He thrust the book back into my hands, pointing to a spot halfway down the page.

Sure enough, "... lifting aside the coverlet, he bent his coal-black head and laved her pink mounds with his hungry tongue. Tessa moaned and ..." I gave an unhinged shriek.

"You've actually read this?" I demanded, tearing my eyes away from Tessa and Valdez.

"Oh, yeah," he said, the grin widening. He had a gold tooth, far back on the right side. "Two or three times. It's not the best one, but it isn't bad."

"The best one? There are more like this?"

"Sure. Let's see ..." He rose and began digging through the pile of tattered paperbacks on the table. "You want to look for the ones with no covers," he explained. "Those are the best."

"And here I thought you never read anything but Charms and More and the Journal of the British Board of Education," I said.

"What, I spend every day with rowdy teenagers, and I want to come up here and read 'New methods of teaching'? Hell, no – I'd rather sail the Spanish Main with Valdez." He eyed me with some interest, the grin still not quite gone. "I didn't think you read anything but Transfiguration Today, either, Scottish Wildcat," he said. "Appearances are deceiving, huh?"

"Must be," I said dryly. "What's this 'Scottish Wildcat'?"

"Oh, Dumbledore started that one," he said, leaning back with his fingers linked around one knee. "It's the voice, that accent that sounds like you just fought with the Jacobites, and as a General no less. That's what you've got, keeps the guys from being worse than they are. See, you sound like ... what's that muggle prime minister's name? ... ah, yes, Winston Churchill – If Winston Churchill was a lady, that is – and that scares them a little. You've got something else, though" – he viewed me thoughtfully, rocking back in his chair. "You have a way of talking like you expect to get your way, and if you don't, you'll know the reason why. Where'd you learn that?"

"At home," I said, smiling at the description.

His eyebrows went up. "Home?"

"Yes, I am the oldest of five. I saw my mother who could turn my rather ... rowdy brothers to jelly with a glance." And later, I had had a good deal of practice, where that air of inviolate authority – assumed though it might be – had stood me in good stead against people with a great deal more power than my brothers and now students of Hogwarts.

Filius nodded, absorbed in my explanation. "Yes, that makes sense. I used Walter Cronkite, myself."

"Walter Cronkite?" I goggled at him.

He grinned again, showing his gold tooth. "You can think of somebody better? Besides, I got to hear him for free on the radio every night. I used to entertain my mum – she wanted me to be a money-pinching banker." He smiled, half-ruefully. "If I talked like Walter Cronkite where we lived in those days, I wouldn't have lived to go to college."

I was liking Filius Flitwick more by the second. "I hope your mother wasn't disappointed that you became a teacher instead of a banker."

"Tell you the truth, I'm not sure," he said, still grinning. "When I told her, she stared at me for a minute, then heaved a big sigh and said, 'Well, at least you can teach your nieces and nephews.'"

I laughed wryly. "I didn't get that much enthusiasm when I told my husband I was going to be a teacher. He stared at me, and finally said if I was bored, why didn't I start on the business of getting our own and raising them."

Filius' eyes were a soft golden brown, like toffee drops. There was a glint of humour in them as they fixed on me.

"Yes, people still think it's fine to say to your face that you can't be doing what you're doing. 'Why are you here, little lady, and not home minding your man and child?'" he mimicked.

He grinned wryly, and patted my hand. "Don't worry, they'll give it up sooner or later. They mostly don't ask me to my face anymore why I'm not dressed in a furry costume and playing teddy bear with the children, like God made me to."

Then the other teachers had come into the lounge we had stopped talking, and Filius Flitwick had become one of my best friends; possibly the only person close to me who truly understood what I did, and why.