Everyone always assumes the gym mistress is gay. It's something of a given. Short hair, interested in sports, encouraging brisk voice and you are labelled the dyke of the staffroom.

No one ever stops to consider that short hair is sometimes short because it's practical, that sporting activity when practised regularly can be enormously pleasurable, and that the only way to talk to someone who is struggling at sports is both briskly and encouragingly because any other way of talking to them ends with them either in tears or refusing to move one step further. No, everyone just assumes you wear flat shoes to a disco and have a very close circle of friends.

It's worse at Cackles, in a way. Three other women staff members, dressed in thick black clothes from head to toe. Okay, okay, I accept that in Constance Hardbroom's case that particular thick black clothing outlines everything, but the fact remains that anyone looking at those women immediately assumes they are virginal spinsters and I... have a very close circle of friends.

What's really terrible about that is that I know the truth of the matter, and it is basically nothing like those assumptions.

There was a brief - very brief - period in which I developed witch powers, thanks to a potion some of the girls brewed up. I didn't handle it as best I could have; I was intoxicated by the amazing things I thought I could suddenly do. Broomstick flying was magnificent, but something else I loved to do during those few days was disappear into thin air and reappear somewhere completely different. It's a feeling like falling off a mountain, or like bungee jumping but with the added knowledge that there isn't a rope tied to your feet limiting how you fall.

The first night I discovered I could do it, I jumped around everywhere. Possessed by I can't explain what impulse, I finally appeared in Miss Hardbroom's private rooms.

Fine. I admit it. I was curious.

The rooms - weren't what I expected at all, really. I envisaged something on the gothic grandeur side of things, lots of wrought iron, black velvet and cobwebs. Instead it was actually charming and very comfortable. There was a large wooden bookcase built into the far wall of the living area; it seemed to have more books in it than the school library. An oh-so-comfortable dark green leather chesterfield was placed just at that point before the fire that you could fall asleep on it and not wake up cold and cramped when the flames started to die down. The floor was still the same cold stones as the rest of the castle, but much of it was carpeted in thick wool rugs, richly patterned in what I thought were Turkish designs. There were even a couple of pot plants. It was pretty bare, and there wasn't anything I would describe as bibelots - no photos, no ornaments, no framed prints saying cant phrases; but it was personal and a side of Constance I hadn't ever thought of.

And then I went into the bedroom, and there was definitely a side of Constance I had never thought of on display.

It was messy! Constance Hardbroom's bedroom was a mess that she would have had any girl - even the Hallow girl - in detention for. The bed was unmade, there were clothes on the floor, there was a towel slung over the end of the bed - it was delightful. I loved it. I don't know how long I stood there in her bedroom, eyes passing over the piles of books and lumps of clothing, with a silly grin plastered over my face. I longed for Constance to turn up so I could raise my eyebrow at her and watch her embarrassment.

Then I heard the door open.

I didn't even think. I was under that bed so fast I was surprised there wasn't a small thunderclap. I curled myself as far back as I could behind a large mound of possibly dirty clothing - it was all black, working out clean from dirty must have Constance puzzled every morning - and tried not to breathe.

Why it didn't occur to me to just disappear out, I can't imagine. No, that's not true. I wasn't a born witch and I wasn't used to thinking of myself as one. Using my powers just didn't occur to me until after the door had closed and they'd started talking. Once they started talking, I don't think anything occurred to me because I was too preoccupied keeping my jaw from hitting the stones of the floor.

"You slept with Davina Bat." That was Constance's voice, and she sounded furious. Cold, tense, loud, and furious.

"You. Slept. With. Davina. Bat." Just in case the unknown party hadn't got the cold, tense, loud and furious message in the first statement, Constance said it again, biting off each word.

"Constance, I - " I lost control of my jaw at that point and it genuinely did hit the stone floor. I knew that voice. Amelia Cackle. And she'd slept with-

"Davina Bat. Our ex-Chanting mistress. Dreamcatchers, Inner Mongolia, yak's milk. And your lover."

"Constance. It was centuries ago."

Jaw, floor again. I knew witches lived longer than normal people, but I hadn't known just how long. Maybe they'd thought it better I not know. But there was a casualness in Miss Cackle's voice which meant no exaggeration. As I would say "a decade", so she said "centuries". How long did witches live?

"How could you?"

"We were girls, Constance. Long before you were even born! Davina and I went to school here together. It was just a schoolgirl thing."

Alright. If I thought of Miss Cackle and Davina as teenage girls, just discovering love and infatuation and sexuality, then it stopped being an image to inspire nightmare and instead changed to something really rather sweet.

Judging by the magnificent snort Constance gave, she didn't feel the same way at all. "Just a schoolgirl thing? So why was she hugging you when I walked into the staff room just now?"

I peeked out. I was in a room I had no business being, with two very experienced witches having a very emotional discussion, and I stuck my head right outside the bed frame and into clear view of either of them, all because I knew I would never be able to handle not knowing exactly how Amelia Cackle looked at that moment.

She was biting her lip, looking down at the floor and looking distinctly nervous. Worried, even.

"I..." Amelia breathed in very deeply. "I may have told her about us, Constance."

What... on Earth... I couldn't have moved any muscle then even if they'd both swung right around and stared at me. In fact, I don't think I was even breathing. I just stared at these two like they were aliens who had just dropped out of the sky - and were fighting with lightsabers. One sword blue, one sword red.

Red sword looked almost as shocked as I did. "You told her about us? Miss Cackle! How could you be so, so foolish?" Then Constance almost wailed, "She'll tell everyone!" and I knew it was actually true, that Constance Hardbroom and Amelia Cackle were really lovers.

"I didn't mention names," Miss Cackle quickly added. "All I told her was that I had found someone whom I was very much in love with. She was delighted for me, Constance. That was why she was hugging me." She was looking at Constance with an imploring face, and I realised that 'very much in love with' was, if anything, an understatement. Just the way she held out her hand to Constance, the way her body yearned toward Constance - I could feel all of that, with a shock of recognition so great it was physical. It was a naked need, a total adoration.

Constance looked almost mollified. "Very much in love with?"

Amelia's eyes were very soft and very vulnerable. "I told Davina I was happier than I had ever been in my life."

"Oh," said Constance. "Well. Well, I suppose that was alright, then."

Amelia's mouth twitched slightly. Then Constance took her hand and drew her close. The tall figure bent her head down and kissed her lover, gently and sweetly, and her free hand placed itself with a loving familiarity on the small of the other's back.

I finally remembered I could disappear out, and the next second I was in my room, with the image of the two of them holding each other still persistent in my head. My heart ached.

You see, everyone always assumes the gym mistress is gay. And they are almost always wrong.

Almost.