A/N: Alright kiddies, just throwing this out there. Shockingly, I don't own Harry Potter. If I did, however, I would have made sure to give Daniel Radcliffe some colored contacts so his eyes would be green like they're supposed to! Sorry, pet peeve. I'm not going to say "I don't own Harry Potter blah blah" every chapter, because unless JK decides to sell the rights on e-bay, I'm still just going to be a silly girl writing about my favorite books.
Chapter 1: magic?! and grilled cheese, and all-around badassity
"…Come again?" I couldn't even begin to imagine the look on my face after having that… speech recited to me just five minutes earlier. Actually, let me try to describe it for you lovely ladies and gents; I had to resemble a fifteen year-old girl getting marshmallows stuffed in her mouth, bitch-slapped several times and then being told, "Congrats! You've just given birth to a grilled cheese sandwich." Ah, my imagination impresses even me sometimes.
"We believe you are a witch, Miss Cleveland, and we would love for you to attend Hogwarts. Though we must admit your case is very rare. It has never taken this long for the signs to show. However, your magical, er… tendencies are now apparent and cannot be ignored or neglected. We can have you situated and ready for lessons as early as next week, if it is convenient for you and your mother, of course."
I think it was the use of the words "magical tendencies" in a serious sentence that finally set me off. My brain went fuzzy and my knees felt weak. The last coherent thing I mumbled was, "Ah shit. I was really hoping to give birth to a bologna sandwich on wheat. Can we name him Bartholomew?" And then I was sprawled out on the carpet.
"Allie! Allie honey, wake up."
"But Mum, Pedro is a silly name for a grilled cheese sandwich."
"Heh, ain't magic grand?" the stern-looking woman said sheepishly, now addressing my distraught mother.
The eccentric old man, however, merely stood, flung his long silver beard over his shoulder and said cheerily, "Well, all this talk about food is making me hungry. Would you happen to have any bologna? Preferably some that isn't named Bartholomew."
Mum fell in a neat little pile next to me. Nothing like spending a little mother-daughter unconscious time together on the day a girl finds out she's a witch.
xx
Perhaps I'm going a little too fast. Like… that blasted cup and saucer ride at the amusement park when you've just had a cotton candy eating contest. I mean it's just a couple spins, eh? How hard could it be to hold in a couple bags of that swirly diabetes on a stick? And nobody wants to be the wimp that backs down from a "wee baby ridey widey" cause they've got "tummy twubble". No, it's never a pretty sight getting off those teacups, especially for the poor trash bin. Or when you're riding down the biggest hill in the whole damn neighborhood and then you realize some dickhead (AKA your best friend, who's a little devilish manwhore) thought it would be simply hilarious to remove your brake chain. Stupid Jack… he wore my rusty bike chain like a medal around his neck for a week while I got to wear a lovely full-on leg cast for 3 months. I got my revenge though, no need to fear. All those times I accidentally "lost control of my crutches" were enough to ensure that good old Jackie would never be having babies. And then… oops. Going too fast again. I really need to stop doing that.
Well, before we start off this whole shebang I might as well get on with the awkward subject of explaining my looks to you. I've never been one of those people that like talking about themselves, it's just not really my style. But I don't want you all to think I look like a mutant or anything, so let's do this.
My hair's a medium shade of brown. I think someone called it chestnut one time. Two years ago I decided to hack it off all the way up to my ears. I will never make that mistake again. I act enough like a guy without having to resemble one. Now it's finally at a length that doesn't make me look like I'm starting boot camp; I'd say it comes to the middle of my back, in these curls that are beastly and damn near impossible to tame.
I'm average height, about five and a half feet tall the last time I got measured in gym class. I eat everything in sight, but I've always had an "athletic figure". Someone told me that before too. Trust me, I don't go around calling myself these things.
My eyes are the only thing about me that I don't feel weird talking about. They're turquoise (I know, pretty sweet right?), and they've got these pretty gold speckies in them. Is speckies even a word? Haha, speckies. Speckies. Speckies. Speck… I need to be slapped sometimes.
Alright, that's more than enough uncomfortable describing of myself. Moving on…
I suppose the whole "Holy crap I'm a freaky magic girl!" issue started with Jack. Yep, that kid's a part of just about everything that I do. He's the only person I've ever felt like I would die without. I know that phrase is used so often between stupid girls my age when referring to their best friends that change about four times a month, but you can trust me when I say without Jack Dawson, I am nothing.
We've been more than inseparable for the past ten years. I won't bore you with the "this looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship" story, but I will say that it involved me convincing him that the brown pile in the sandbox was seriously chocolate. "Just go ahead and eat it Jack, only the coolest kid in the sandbox is allowed to eat it."
Needless to say I went home to Mum that day with a bloody lip courtesy of good old Jackie, but I couldn't stop talking about my new best friend. He spent nearly the whole rest of the afternoon spitting "chocolate" out of his mouth and… oh Lord, I ended up telling you the whole story anyway. Ah well, can't say I didn't try to spare you.
Jack was never an unattractive kid. His hair was sandy blonde and… flippy? I guess flippy's a good word for it. When we were thirteen he went through his "skater-phase" and it was constantly in his eyes. One day I got so annoyed I bought him this bright turquoise silky headband with kissing swans on it. The kid wore it everyday for a month. I think that was the beginning of my habit of calling him Jackie. But after almost five years of being called Al, it was only fair.
Thirteen was also the beginning of Jack's phase that I liked to call "the age of skanks". That year was quite suckish for me. Don't get me wrong, I could NEVER feel that way about Jack, but it pissed me off to see girls in miniskirts and shitty band T-shirts following him around making goo-goo eyes.
I mean get real, you're thirteen. Go trade Pokemon cards or something. That was my philosophy, at least. Unfortunately, I was the object of some unwanted attention myself; guys just couldn't understand that I didn't want to go make out behind the basketball courts. One kid got so bad I actually had to resort to a rather brutal knee in the crotch. Luckily, both mine and Jackie's love interests eventually dwindled down to only a few random preteen sluts and high-voiced boys.
xx
Back in April, Jackie and I received the prestigious honor of being crowned "the badass-iest kids in town". Pretty sweet deal when you're only 14. Yes, I know what all of you are thinking now- "Yes! Story time! It must be my lucky day!" Oh, you people really do know how to make a girl blush. Well, if you really want to know what went down…
Once upon a time, there was a girl, no… queen (oh yeah now THAT'S badass) with curly brown hair and eyes liketh the morning sky. She and her most loyal, trusted companion, no… court jester, Jack, more famously knowneth as Princess Jackie, were trapped in a dungeon with brick walls and overly perky adults. If thou wanted to be all technical about it, I suppose it could be called school.
In this particular educational torture chamber, there dwelled a cantankerous, hunch-backed, saggy faced, red gooey lipstick and wig-wearing hag, who tooketh pleasure in her prisoner's pain. She especially enjoyed watching me and my court jester squirm.
"Who is the current president of the United States of America, Miss Cleveland?" Being the busy queen that I am, I had no time to spend on current affairs such as these.
I shrugged. "Why don't we ask someone in this room that lives in America? Oh wait… it seems we all live on this continent." Sniggers were quickly stifled as the hag, Mrs. Hollahan, walked up to my desk as quickly as she could for her extreme old age.
"Perhaps you would like to try keeping your mouth in check, Allie. You and your partner in crime," she gestured to Jack who was sitting in the back of the classroom attempting to balance wads of paper on the tip of his nose, "can stay after school and do your usual punishment."
Jackie shot up out of his seat, crumpled paper flying all over. "What did I do, Mrs. Hollohan?!"
The nasty hag turned her evil grin (in which several teeth were missing) to him and said in what she obviously thought was a sweet voice, "It's just a precaution, Mr. Dawson."
"That rhymed," I muttered, with a smirk. Then I shouted across the room, "Yeah Jackie, I'd hate to sit there polishing Sally all by my lonesome."
Sally was what me and Jackie not-so-affectionately named Mrs. Hollohan's globe. It was a beast; about five feet tall and massively fat, and took up a majority of the front corner of the room. It would be about the thirtieth afternoon that year that would be spent polishing that monster.
Although, I don't think Mrs. Hag really understood how much fun polishing Sally could be. One time I actually got a boost on top of it (I climbed on Jackie's shoulders and he flung me up there) and I got to spin around on it. Unfortunately, Mrs. Hollohan walked back in just in time to see me fly off of it into the chalkboard. Detention is much less enjoyable than polishing Sally.
After my kind, loving teacher walked away grumbling about how kids these days were loopy, naming inanimate objects, I propped my head on my elbow and tried to look like I was awake. Eventually I gave up, and my head fell on the desk. I was out like a light in no time. Some minutes later, I felt a tug on my hair. I shot up in my seat and glanced to my right. Mrs. Hollohan was standing next to me. "Principal's office, if you don't mind Miss Cleveland."
I groaned, but stood and slowly made my way to the front of the room, past her massive globe, and through the doorframe. And that, my friends, is when brilliance struck. I backtracked a few paces and stopped in front of Sally, then looked to the door; I did this several times. Sally. Door. Sally. Door. Sally. Door. Sally… alright, you've got the point. I looked out among my pupils. They looked bewildered, but I ignored them and finally found who I was looking for. Jack was wearing an identical grin to mine, and I could tell he knew exactly what I was thinking. So I turned and gave Mrs. Hollohan, who was looking just as puzzled as my other classmates, a salute and a wink before skipping out of the room singing happily.
After I sweet-talked the principle out of detention (I can be such a butt-kisser when I want to), I was walking back to the room of death when the bell rang, meaning it was time to switch classes.
"Ah, shit!" I started pushing through people to get back to Hollohan's room and grab my stuff before I was late to algebra (what a shame to be late for that, right?). But an arm grabbed me and wheeled me around, and began dragging me along with him. Jackie passed me my books and said, "By the way, whatever kind of Sally action you were planning back in Hollohan's, I'm so in." He grinned mischievously and proceeded up the stairwell to his next class.
When the final bell rang, I jumped down the stairs three at a time and walked into Mrs. Hollohan's room panting for breath, but ready to begin Operation Get Sally (er… that sounded a bit cooler in my head). Jack waltzed in about a minute later trying to play it cool; his heavy breathing, however, made it obvious he was just as anxious to get started as I was.
"Do you really think we're strong enough to do this?" Jack asked, warily eyeing the colossal sphere.
"Only one way to find out, yes?" I walked to the other side of Sally and began pushing with all my might. The globe slid easily on the tile floor and everything was golden, up until we hit the door.
"How the hell did she fit this thing through here?!" Jack walked around Sally, observing a way to get her through the door frame that was just barely too small to squeeze her out. "Ok, we have to take Sally out of her frame and then she should be able to roll right through the door." So, with a great deal more difficulty, we lifted Sally off of her metal frame (blasted thing really was quite heavy). I proceeded to roll the monstrous bolder out into the hallway with Jackie following close behind, carrying the metal contraption.
Needless to say, we were very proud of our ingenious plan; that is, until we ran into a group of about twenty or so of our classmates that were still milling about talking. "Bugger. Bugger. Bugger. Bugger. Scuse me, all." I grinned sheepishly at them while rolling Sally by at top speed. Jack, on the other hand, had stopped running, and I heard him chatting amiably with our friends, whose mouths were all hanging open in awe at what we were doing. I ran back to him and grabbed his arm, hissing, "More time for chat later, Mr. Social." He went back into action mode as he remembered what he was holding and quickly said, "This never happened", to the crowd before we took of running down the remainder of the hallway.
Once we reached the stairwell, it was a long and difficult journey up three flights of steps. On more than one occasion we had to run back down and retrieve Sally, who took a liking to rolling far away from us. Finally, we reached the top of the stairs, finished up operation Haha Hollohan (again… cooler in my head), and walked out of the building, grinning with the knowledge of victory.
xx
The next day, it was time for phase two. As we were walking up to the school, a crowd had already formed. I exchanged a glance with Jack and we pushed our way through the herd of people to the front. Mrs. Hollohan was being supported by two teachers, who looked very confused, but also slightly amused, if I wasn't mistaken. They were all looking up to the roof of the building. Jack and I faked fascination and looked up, where we saw Sally perched right where we left her.
"Oh my good gracious, Jack, is that Sally!?" I exclaimed, flabbergasted.
"How in the world did she get up there?!" Jack cried.
"Sally," moaned Mrs. Hollohan in anguish.
"Who's the one naming inanimate objects now?" Jack murmured to me. I snorted.
"Well", snapped Mrs. Hollohan, who was apparently over the initial shock of seeing her baby sitting on the roof, "how exactly do you propose we get it down?" She was obviously unaware of the door on the third floor that led right outside to the roof.
"I think this job calls for an exceptionally large ladder," I said seriously.
"Or perhaps a catapult", Jack offered. I had to turn away and shove my fist in my mouth to hide the outburst of laughter. When I turned back around, Mrs. Hollohan was looking at the pair of us murderously with realization in her eyes. Ah, shit.
Me and Jack walked into Hollohan's classroom early that afternoon, feeling like we should at least be on time to her lesson after all of the emotional damage we caused her. When we entered the room, however, we were astounded to see there were presents on our desks.
"You might want to listen for a ticking noise before you open it," I advised Jackie, "who knows what kind of explosives Hollohan has in her possession."
There was a card on top of my present. I opened it cautiously, ready to stop drop and roll at any second. The message was short.
Allie,
Congratulations at being the most badass girl we have ever met. When we saw you guys yesterday after school we knew you were going to give Hollohan some serious grief. Well done, you represent the eighth grade quite nicely.
Sincerely,
Everyone who was a witness to your crime spree.
I smirked and opened the gift eagerly. Inside was a shiny plastic tiara that had rhinestones glued on it, forming the words "bad 2 da bone". Tracing my fingers over it lovingly, I turned to Jackie, who was already wearing his crown, which said "pretty pretty princess".
"At least now we've got something sassy to wear to detention," he said, beaming.
I sighed happily, and put the tiara on my head. "It sure is good to be the queen."
More to come soon, sorry there's no magic yet.
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