"SLYTHERIN!"
O-O-O
The word echoes around the Great Hall as it falls into utter silence. Five-hundred and eighty four other students stare at me in horror. James, Fred and Albus Averill; Lucy, Angie Jordan and Hannah Hawthorne; Dom and Molly and Addie Turner all crammed together at the Gryffindor table. Professor Carsons trying to get them to shift back to their own houses. Hagrid and Neville, seated at the head table. Rose and Roxy waiting behind me to still be Sorted.
All staring at me.
I feel Professor Dientina lifting the Sorting Hat off my head and gently nudging me off the three-legged stool. I hear her calling out the next name on the list. "Rivers, Lauren." But it can't be real?
It can't be. It has to be a joke. Any second now, James and Fred are going to jump up laughing and pointing, singing 'Gotcha!' It has to be a joke. Please say it's a joke.
We'll all go up to the Gryffindor common room afterwards together - me and Rose and Roxanne, and James and Fred and Molly - with James boasting all the way about how he bribed the Sorting Hat; how he begged it; how he blackmailed it.
It has to be a joke.
And tomorrow morning, Lucy and Dan McDiarmid will come over from the Ravenclaw table, and Cormac Finch-Fletchley, and his sister Chas from the Hufflepuff table, and they'll congratulate me for following the family.
Then we'll get the owl-mail, Mum and Dad (and Lils) who'll already know because he's so famous, from Uncle Ron and Hermione and Dad (and Hugo) who'll already know because Hermione's so well connected, and from Aunt Audrey and Uncle Percy who'll already know because he's the zarking Minister of Magic. And they'll be saying 'how proud' they are, and 'how happy' I must be.
And it'll be fine. It'll all be fine.
'Cos it's all a joke. Isn't it?
Isn't it?
O-O-O
Author's Note
- I have read far too many Next Gen fics to count - some brilliant; others depressingly bad. But nearly all of them that do sort Albus Severus into Slytherin, fail to appreciate how he would feel. I'm just trying to make a realistic version of what must have gone through his head at that time. :-)
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