Entry for "Muggle Studies" at "Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (Challenges and Assignments)"
How about... phones? Telephones, cell phones, the first phone invented - everything goes! Make sure it's a main part of your story though. Minimum word count is 900.
Optional Prompt: "I swear, if you've called me up at 2am in the morning to rant about dill pickles I will kill you."
I hope you all like it :D
"Congratulations, Professor Snape, you are the new Defence Against the Dark Arts of Hogwarts!" Dumbledore exclaimed and the whole staff that was gathered in the Great Hall applauded loudly.
"Thank you," Severus said, turning to face his colleagues. "I am very happy to have been chosen by you, Headmaster, and I would like to reveal my revolutionary curriculum..."
Severus Snape turned in his bed with a satisfied smile on his face, snuggling deeper under his blanket and sighed over the wonderful dream he was having.
It was summer and again the job of the DADA teacher was open and Severus was figuring his chances out – he was sure that this time, Dumbledore would realise that his Potions professor was more than qualified to take over the post!
Suddenly, a ringing sound ripped him from his wonderful dreams and Severus sat up on the mattress, his confused gaze wandering through the room, his eyelids still half closed in sleep.
"What? What is that?" He mumbled, nearly falling from his bed as he tried to stand up, grabbing his wand from the nightstand. Upon succeeding, he stumbled out into the hallway, searching for the source of the annoying ringing sound until his gaze fell on the old phone he had left standing on its usual place after moving in after his fathers death – he simply had not bothered and until this day, it had never rung before. Who the hell would call and also in the middle of the night?!
Slowly he approached the phone, hoping that it would be silenced by his murderous glare, but it continued and finally he picked up, holding the earpiece up.
"Hello? Who is there?"
"Wow, you have no idea how much you sound like a psychopath through the phone!" A female voice exclaimed.
"Who is there?" Severus asked again, lifting his eyebrow.
"Rolanda, you fool!" Rolanda slurred, giggling awkwardly and Severus found that she sounded a bit too happy, in fact she spoke so joyfully that it almost seemed faked. "I just was at a party and the drinks were fantastic by the way, but they only had those disgusting dill pickles as snacks, I mean, seriously, why dill..."
"I swear, if you've called me up at 2am in the morning to rant about dill pickles I will kill you," Severus snarled, feeling like his drunk colleague just wanted to make fun of him. "And what I really want to know: Where did you get my number?!"
"Um... telephone book, Snapey-poo! Where muggles get their numbers from. I was just thinking of you, you know? I was wondering if you ever went to such a great party, as you never seem to have any fun at all and if you ever were so sloshed that you could not walk another step?"
"No," Severus answered, grimacing stiffly. He was very close to putting an end to this call – it was night, he wanted to sleep and Rolanda had no better idea than to get on his nerves. As much as he appreciated her, and he did, yes, he actually might be liking her, kind of... – it definitely was not enough friendship to tolerate a drunken late night call.
He was Severus Snape after all.
"Rolanda, seriously, I don't want to waste my time here, I am tired, I want to sleep!" He snarled and for a moment it was quiet on the other end of the line – then there was a loud sob.
"A-Alright... I... I will just hang up and... and try to get home, you know... I... I am s-sorry for wasting your o-oh so p-precious time... Maybe I was just... just hoping to h-hear that at least... at least one person a-appreciates me..."
Severus closed his eyes for a moment, torn between the need to continue being distant, his clumsiness in situations like this and the urge to hear what could shatter Rolanda so much and also to make her stop crying.
"What... what happened," he asked, hoping that he did not sound too reluctant and too disinterested.
"I... this... he dumped me, at the p-party... in... in front of everyone... it was so...so damn embarrassing!"
Severus lips were a thin line as he let her words sink in. She was obviously talking about her boyfriend, or rather ex-boyfriend, Shawn – Severus had only met him once and he had disliked him before Rolanda had even introduced them. He would never admit it, but somewhere deep inside of him, he had sensed a tiny bit of jealousy.
"Oh..." He made, unable to find anything else to say to her while she did burst into a series of loud sobs and Severus felt anger about this... this man rising inside of him as he heard the heartbreaking sounds of despair Rolanda released and he did not know what drove him to his next actions, something he would not do for anybody else.
"Where... where are you?" Severus asked with a sigh, waving his wand to change from his pyjamas into his normal every day attire.
"In... In Dublin, in Temple Bar... the telephone box, I... what..."
"I'll come and get you. Just stay where you are, do you understand me?" Severus said, trying to sound like he always sounded before he hung up and hurried to get out of the house. As he stood outside the boundaries of the Anti-Apparation-Spells he took himself a moment to imagine the right place to apparate to – Rolanda was in muggle Dublin and appearing out of nowhere in the middle of the district that was extremely busy at night time due to its pubs did not seem like a good idea.
After appearing in a dark alleyway it did not take Severus much time to find the phone box Rolanda had been speaking of – the muggles were starting to remove the boxes because of a new invention, a mobile phone, that allowed everyone to make calls from where ever they were.
The young witch was cowering in the small box, wiping over her face with the back of her hand as she saw him approaching, presumably to make herself a bit more presentable, but it only made it worse. Black, glittery make-up was smeared around her golden eyes and her blonde curls were a mess. She was looking up at him, but she did not move, not even as he was standing right in front of her.
"Come on, get up," he ordered with a dry voice, but she did not – all she did was sniff. Severus rolled his eyes and knelt down to get down at her level with a small sigh.
"You did not call me so you could sit around here on the floor, didn't you? Come on, I have no desire to stay here in the middle of a muggle street."
Rolanda nodded slowly and her hands closed around his forearms, using him to pull herself up.
"Where are your shoes?" Severus asked, furrowing his brows. "Wait, I don't care."
His colleague was wavering slightly as he guided her towards the alleyway where he had apparated to and he placed one hand on her hip to support her, something that felt oddly familiar to him.
"Where do you want to go?" Severus asked, both of them seeing Shawn cross the road and Rolanda pressed her face into his shoulder, mumbling:"I don't care... just... just away from here."
Severus watched how the woman on his couch slowly drifted into sleep (after eating half of his ice cream stock at once) and gently pulled a wool blanket over her.
"Thank you... you are a really good friend," he heard Rolanda whisper and he had to admit that it felt better than he had thought. Maybe having a friend doing late night calls was not that bad at all – he might try that out for a bit longer.