Disclaimer: This will be the only time I do this. I do not own Harry Potter.


Chapter O1:
Green Goop and Broken Glasses

Margo Wilder, squinting at the blurry outline of her busted glasses, wondered whether her mother was beginning to worry about the number of glasses she went through every school year. She was running out of excuses and Oculus Reparo could only repair so much damage. And 'so much damage' stopped short of Confringo. Violent explosions tended to leave little left to repair, unfortunately. Margo exhaled sharply, pushing off the ground with the heels of her hands, and reached for her bag. She was going to be late for Potions, judging by the lack of students in the corridors, and briefly contemplated skipping before giving a soft laugh. She was a Hufflepuff, not a Gryffindor, and Hufflepuffs did not skip class. Anyway, she couldn't afford to miss class. This was the year for O.W.L.s and if she wanted to do anything in the wizarding world, she couldn't screw up.

Footsteps hurried, Margo practically ran down the stairs to the dungeons. She knew Professor Slughorn was usually lenient, but she did not want to abuse his obnoxious geniality. As she ran, Margo quickly patched up the holes in her robes from this morning's abuse with a Reparo then stowed her wand in her boot absentmindedly. She idly wished that the Slytherins would limit their harassment to Gryffindors. But she shooed the thought away almost immediately, disappointed that she would even think of such a thing, and stopped her mad dash in front of the Potions classroom. After a quick, calming breath and a nervous hand through hair, Margo braved to enter the room.

"Good of you to finally join us, Miss Wilder," Slughorn said, looking distinctly disappointed in her late arrival. "Please take a seat. Ah, there's is one next to Mr. Lupin."

Margo dimly bobbed her head and hastily looked around for Remus in the back rows, cursing mentally when she realized that the Marauders had decided to sit front-and-center today. Head tucked securely between her shoulders in a mixture of shame and aggravation, Margo scurried over to her partner.

"Hullo," Remus Lupin greeted pleasantly, giving what Margo suspected to be a smile. Although, at this close proximity, he could straight up turn into a toad and she wouldn't be able to tell. Lowering her shoulders a bit, Margo returned the gesture politely before digging through her bag for her Potions textbook and notebook. She wilted when she discovered the course book practically soaked through with water, evidenced by her now unpleasantly wet hand. She had forgotten that she had used it earlier when defending herself against an Aqua Eructo spell. Cursing the Slytherins and letting out an tired sigh, Margo turned to Remus sheepishly.

"Erm...excuse me," Margo attempted to interrupt, but Remus was deep in conversation with Sirius Black and James Potter. Forgoing any further efforts to disrupt their conversation, she squinted across the table at his notes. Luckily, they were far enough away for her to read successfully.

Apparently, they were brewing a Draught of Peace. Margo frowned, aware of how tricky the potion could be, but reaching for the powdered moonstone nonetheless. Surely some effort was better than nothing at all, right?

It took her nearly twice as long to do anything without her glasses and everything was twice as embarrassing. Every time she wanted to see what she was doing, she had to bob her head back and forth, as if she was a camera lens trying to get the right focus. Even then, with the thing in the perfect place, she had to squint her eyes hard to make out the details. The laughing only made it worse. Margo was determined to ignore it though, until Sirius Black, seated at the table in front of hers, decided to comment.

"Having trouble there, Wilder?"

Margo's eyes snapped up to his face, which she was sure was as agonizingly handsome as always, and the frown which had been on her face since the beginning of Potions, deepened. "Not at all, Black. Thanks for asking," Margo replied, voice strained in her endeavor to ignore the slight. Or at least she assumed it was a slight, going by the arrogance in his words. Of course, Sirius Black always seemed to be like that.

"Really? Because you just put in powdered unicorn horn instead of powdered porcupine quills." There was a little concern in his voice now. James and Remus looked worriedly at her cauldron.

"What? Oh Merlin's beard!" Margo exclaimed, color draining from her face and shaky fingers entangling themselves in the roots of her hair roughly. She squinted at the noxiously green color of her potion and wondered why she hadn't noticed before. "Professor Slug-" She was cut off by the explosion of green slime that originated from her cauldron. "-horn." Margo finished, wiping the sticky substance from her lips. "Oh please tell me that the green goop on you three is just my imagination and that I haven't just soiled the most popular people in my year."

The way that they wiped their faces in a disgusted manner made it clear that she had, actually, just done what she'd feared. "Oh Merlin's saggy left bollock. Of course it's not my imagination." She heard several girlish gasps and suspected several raised eyebrows at her foul language. She had even surprised herself.

Professor Slughorn, who had managed to avoid the goop [fortunately, it had a relatively small radius], gave a weak laugh. "Well, Miss Wilder, I have certainly never seen a botched Draught of Peace do that before."

"I'm sorry," Margo managed to say, suddenly feeling uncomfortably warm. "I'm going to go clean myself off now. Is that okay, Professor?" She asked, but was already fleeing the classroom and out the door by the time he managed a shocked 'of course, Miss Wilder'.

Margo arrived at the Hufflepuff Basement with astounding speed and after tapping out "Helga Hufflepuff" onto the second row's middle barrel, was out of her robes and in the showers just as fast. And boy, Margo Wilder was never so glad of hot running water. It didn't take very long to wash the green goop that was her mistake out of her shaggy, cropped strawberry blonde hair, but Margo remained in the shower for awhile longer simply because it helped her relax. It was only when she heard voices drifting in from the Fifth Year dorms did remove herself from the shower. Snatching up a soft yellow-and-black striped towel from the hook outside the shower curtain, Margo slowly dried herself. She was delaying the inevitable. She knew that she should just go out there and face what she had to face but Margo had never been the particularly brave sort. And, hell, it was so much easier to run from your problems than to face them. But she couldn't hide in the bathroom forever, and once she donned the Hufflepuff-themed pajamas, she crept out into the girls dorm room.

And just as Margo had expected, on her bed sat Greta Catchlove, in all her sweet-faced glory. Greta, large baby blue eyes shining with an absurd amount of sympathy, smiled at Margo. "I heard you slimed the Marauders in Potions class today."

"Did I? I can't seem to remember," Margo lied halfheartedly, shuffling over to her bed and collapsing onto it, face down, beside Greta. "Oh Merlin, Greta. I've really made a mess of things, haven't I?" Margo murmured, words muffled by the comforter.

"You did manage to get the rest of today's Potion classes cancelled, with the mess you made. Apparently, your goop is particularly hard to clean once it hardens," Greta chuckled, stroking Margo's head in an attempt to comfort her. "What happened?"

"I added powdered unicorn horn instead of powdered porcupine quill," Margo admitted, rolling onto her back and looking at the ceiling.

"Why? You're usually great at Potions, Marge. You're literally the only reason I passed Potions last year!" Greta said, brow furrowing as she inspected her friend. Margo remained silent, staring stubbornly upward and avoiding Greta's gaze.

"Margo." No reply.

"Margo Wilder, answer me." Margo's jaw had fixed, now, and her hazel eyes remained glued to the ceiling.

"Margaret bloody Wilder, answer me this instant or so help me Merlin, I will never help you in Charms again!" Greta's voice seemed incapable of getting particularly loud, but her words held enough impact that Margo crumbled.

"My glasses broke," Margo explained vaguely, but she continued once spying Greta's raised eyebrow. "Alright, my glasses exploded. It seems Slytherins aren't fond of them. They aren't fond of Mudbloods, either apparently."

"Oh Margo." Greta's puny anger seemed to melt. "They're bastards, you know. Stuck to blood purity like bowtruckles on poxy eggs, I say. If they're bullying you, just hex them back! Go tell Professor Sprout! She won't allow someone to be discriminated against."

"Oi, Greta, s'okay," Margo said, in an effort to soothe her friend, who had a tendency to get overly concerned with other people's problems. "It's not that big of a deal. Merlin, Snape gets bullied by Potter and Black all the time and he's not running to Slughorn, is he? Anyway, I'd rather not get expelled just because some snot-nosed Slytherin runs to his daddy."

Greta huffed, clearly not happy with Margo's reasoning, but knowing not to argue the point further. Greta knew Margo wouldn't change her mind about this. "Do you want to raid the kitchens then?" Great offered, cheeks dimpling as her full lips stretched into a smile.

Margo grinned, a lop-sided, crooked thing, in return. "How else would I comfort myself about today without some hot chocolate and pie, Greta? But first, I need your eyes so I can write a letter to my mum. I really need some new glasses. Can't go destroying the Potions room every day, else someone might start to think I'm doing it on purpose."

"Not to mention you'd get kicked out of Slug Club," Greta chirped, giggling wildly as Margo pulled a face.

"Okay, maybe the glasses can wait," Margo joked, pulling a piece of parchment paper and a quill from her bag. "Let's write my mum, Greta."


Well, that's the first chapter of my first Harry Potter story! Hope you folks enjoyed. Reviews are the best thing in the world to me and very much make my day, so please take the time to review if you enjoyed [or if you didn't.] Next chapter will be up soon, hopefully! Thanks for reading!

See you all soon,

Em