One
"Miss McMathewes," he called from the front of the room, his voice bouncing off the stone walls like a trumpet. "Just what do you think you are doing?"
I jumped visibly before looking up from the leather bound notebook, full of scribbles regarding everything and anything but the potions lesson at hand. I slowly met his penetrating gaze, trying my best to infuse my eyes with pure innocence. A very famous muggle had once said that you could influence a weaker person's thoughts by projecting your own. A word of wisdom, if I may: It's rubbish. Ok, two words. But I was naïve and hopeful, which are really one and the same, and so I put all my faith in the Jedi mind trick and thought hard to myself, "I'm taking notes. I'm taking notes."
"Writing notes, I see."
"No, taking notes," I thought. But I said nothing. My mind was screaming at me that silence implies guilt, but as usual I told it to stifle itself and went right on with what I was doing, which was staring at Professor Snape with innocence - infused eyes and confusion scrawled across my face. To the impartial observer I was the picture of virtue, wrongly accused of a heinous act for which there was no proof. I wished Dumbledore were my teacher at the moment.
"Bring them here, then," he instructed disinterestedly. I paled. These notes? To him? This could not be happening. Professor Snape was asking to see my notes, which weren't, in actuality, notes at all, but rather an entire journal virtually overflowing with digressions on my secret admiration of a certain - someone.
Thinking quickly, if not a bit frantically, I slammed the book shut and tossed it behind me, all the while staring ahead of me at my very Byron - looking potions master. I heard the book hit a candelabra, which then hit the floor with a mighty crash. I winced. That was going to make this entire innocence argument quite hard to pull off.
"Bring you..what, Professor," I asked sweetly, twiddling my thumbs and rolling my teal eyes heavenward. The Hufflepuffs giggled politely while the members of my own house, Ravenclaw, simply rolled their eyes in disgust. I wondered, as an aside, how that sorting hat could have been so damnably wrong about me. I didn't belong in Ravenclaw. Oh well. Now was not the time to be considering my placement of house.
My American accent was not going to help my case much either. I got the distinct impression that Mr. Byron up there was not too fond of us yanks. Well, I wasn't entirely fond of my Yankee heritage myself. But that is, as they say, the way the ball drops. Nothing I could do about it now.
Normally Snape would have collected the book and proceeded to read it aloud to the entire class, successfully embarrassing me and building up his self esteem upon the laughter he would doubtlessly receive from the rest of the students. Instead, and much to my surprise, he simply cast me a bemused glance, sighed dejectedly, as if he were weary of my very presence, and went back to marking the first year essays. "Detention. This evening. 8 o'clock." He said it as an afterthought. As if he really could care less whether or not I showed up. Which made me wonder - should I show up? Under normal circumstances I would have conveniently forgotten about it, earning myself a weeks worth of detention and successfully receiving Snape's wrath once again. He knew this just as well as I did. But this odd behavior of his - it perplexed me. I decided I would show up just to throw him off.
I spent the rest of my double potions block copying lines from the text and wondering if I should stop on my way out to retrieve my journal or just leave it where it was, keeping up the ruse that I had no idea what he had been talking about. I decided, in the end, to just leave it. He had probably forgotten about it, I reasoned, and I could simply pick it up when I came back for my detention this evening.
Eventually Snape dismissed us, giving me not so much as a second glance as I walked out the door - alone as usual. This somewhat saddened me and I couldn't quite place why. Did I actually expect him to give a rat's ass about me? I mean, just because I found him to be the most beautiful creature upon the face of the earth, I certainly wasn't entitled to his concern. Was I? This made me feel confounded, and so I snuck off to the edge of the Forbidden Forest to indulge in one of my many vices - a quick smoke before Care of Magical Creatures.
"Miss McMathewes," he called from the front of the room, his voice bouncing off the stone walls like a trumpet. "Just what do you think you are doing?"
I jumped visibly before looking up from the leather bound notebook, full of scribbles regarding everything and anything but the potions lesson at hand. I slowly met his penetrating gaze, trying my best to infuse my eyes with pure innocence. A very famous muggle had once said that you could influence a weaker person's thoughts by projecting your own. A word of wisdom, if I may: It's rubbish. Ok, two words. But I was naïve and hopeful, which are really one and the same, and so I put all my faith in the Jedi mind trick and thought hard to myself, "I'm taking notes. I'm taking notes."
"Writing notes, I see."
"No, taking notes," I thought. But I said nothing. My mind was screaming at me that silence implies guilt, but as usual I told it to stifle itself and went right on with what I was doing, which was staring at Professor Snape with innocence - infused eyes and confusion scrawled across my face. To the impartial observer I was the picture of virtue, wrongly accused of a heinous act for which there was no proof. I wished Dumbledore were my teacher at the moment.
"Bring them here, then," he instructed disinterestedly. I paled. These notes? To him? This could not be happening. Professor Snape was asking to see my notes, which weren't, in actuality, notes at all, but rather an entire journal virtually overflowing with digressions on my secret admiration of a certain - someone.
Thinking quickly, if not a bit frantically, I slammed the book shut and tossed it behind me, all the while staring ahead of me at my very Byron - looking potions master. I heard the book hit a candelabra, which then hit the floor with a mighty crash. I winced. That was going to make this entire innocence argument quite hard to pull off.
"Bring you..what, Professor," I asked sweetly, twiddling my thumbs and rolling my teal eyes heavenward. The Hufflepuffs giggled politely while the members of my own house, Ravenclaw, simply rolled their eyes in disgust. I wondered, as an aside, how that sorting hat could have been so damnably wrong about me. I didn't belong in Ravenclaw. Oh well. Now was not the time to be considering my placement of house.
My American accent was not going to help my case much either. I got the distinct impression that Mr. Byron up there was not too fond of us yanks. Well, I wasn't entirely fond of my Yankee heritage myself. But that is, as they say, the way the ball drops. Nothing I could do about it now.
Normally Snape would have collected the book and proceeded to read it aloud to the entire class, successfully embarrassing me and building up his self esteem upon the laughter he would doubtlessly receive from the rest of the students. Instead, and much to my surprise, he simply cast me a bemused glance, sighed dejectedly, as if he were weary of my very presence, and went back to marking the first year essays. "Detention. This evening. 8 o'clock." He said it as an afterthought. As if he really could care less whether or not I showed up. Which made me wonder - should I show up? Under normal circumstances I would have conveniently forgotten about it, earning myself a weeks worth of detention and successfully receiving Snape's wrath once again. He knew this just as well as I did. But this odd behavior of his - it perplexed me. I decided I would show up just to throw him off.
I spent the rest of my double potions block copying lines from the text and wondering if I should stop on my way out to retrieve my journal or just leave it where it was, keeping up the ruse that I had no idea what he had been talking about. I decided, in the end, to just leave it. He had probably forgotten about it, I reasoned, and I could simply pick it up when I came back for my detention this evening.
Eventually Snape dismissed us, giving me not so much as a second glance as I walked out the door - alone as usual. This somewhat saddened me and I couldn't quite place why. Did I actually expect him to give a rat's ass about me? I mean, just because I found him to be the most beautiful creature upon the face of the earth, I certainly wasn't entitled to his concern. Was I? This made me feel confounded, and so I snuck off to the edge of the Forbidden Forest to indulge in one of my many vices - a quick smoke before Care of Magical Creatures.
