Meredith Hewitt yawned widely as she climbed through the portrait hole into the dimly lit Gryffindor Common Room. It had been the first day of lessons, and it was late and she was looking forward to her bed. Her prefect patrol had been uneventful; the school was dark and quiet. Pulling her cardigan around herself, she headed for the stairs up to the girls' dormitories.
"Meri!" A voice hissed her name, and she stopped abruptly, gazing round for the source of it.
"Lil?"
"I'm here!" Lily Potter, Meri's best friend, waved at her from the sofa by the low fire.
"Lily, what the hell are you doing?" Meri changed her tracks and crossed the common room to the fire. "It's really late!"
"I know. I was waiting for you. Come and sit down; I need to talk to you."
Lily's voice had taken on a coaxing note, and Meri sighed. However, now that she was closer, she saw that her friend looked thoroughly miserable, which was enough unlike Lily to be concerning. She generally saved being upset for the things that were worth it.
"What's the matter?" Meri asked, sitting down on the other half of the sofa.
Lily pulled her feet up and hugged her knees. She was dressed for bed, in pyjamas, socks and a blanket.
"I broke up with Zeke," she said softly.
"Oh," Meri replied. "Again?"
This was unlike Lily - not the breaking up part, which was fairly unsurprising, but the fact that Lily seemed bothered by it. Meri tried to work out what it meant. Until the previous year, Lily had been completely uninterested in boys as anything other than ordinary friends. It had been obvious, to everyone except Lily, that there were quite a number of boys who would have liked to be more than friends, but she had been cheerfully oblivious to this fact.
That had begun to change about a year ago, and Lily had been out with more than one boy in the intervening months. But even now, she treated dating and relationships with a casual lightness that sometimes amused and sometimes irritated Meri, and she consistently refused to take any of it seriously. She had been out with and broken up with Zeke three times now, and in between, over the summer, had gone on several dates with Sebastian Graves. None of this - either the dates or the ending of the dates - had seemed to faze Lily in the slightest, and yet now here she was sitting up in the dark, empty common room to talk about it.
"I think it's forever this time," Lily said after a pause.
Meri tried very, very hard not to feel pleased at this idea, and mostly succeeded. It wasn't as if being dumped by Lily was going to make Zeke notice Meri. The only differences it made were that she wouldn't have to see them holding hands or kissing, and that she might now be able to go to Hogsmeade with her best friend again.
"What happened?" she asked instead, for something must have happened to make this time different from the other times.
Lily shrugged. "He's… I don't know. He's clingy. He always has been, but it was getting worse."
"You mean he's more into you than you've ever been into him," Meri commented wryly.
"I can't help that, though." Lily fiddled with the edge of her blanket. "He knew I didn't want anything serious; I told him that from the start. Plus we've only ever gone out for a few weeks at a time. I don't know what he expected."
Meri sighed. She loved her best friend, but sometimes Lily was clueless to the point of selfish. Although, in this case, it sounded less like Lily was clueless and more like she was trying to convince herself – and Meri – of something. There had been a time when Meri would have let her get away with that; would have said something soothing about how it wasn't Lily's fault. But not anymore.
"Lil, you know how much he likes you," Meri said bluntly. "I know you've tried to make it into something casual, but you must have known for ages that that's not what he wants. It's obvious."
There was another long pause, while Lily bit her lip and hunched further over her knees.
"I know," Lily whispered at last. "That's why… that's why I told him not to ask me out any more. I wasn't… It wasn't really fair, was it?"
It was the first time Meri had heard anything like this from Lily's lips, and she was startled into silence.
"Mer, am I a horrible person?" Lily said, her voice low and anxious. "I mean, I hurt him, and I didn't mean to, not really. But I knew I was doing it, at least I would have known if I'd let myself. I just wanted to have fun, so I carried on. I'm selfish, aren't I?"
"No," Meri said instantly. "You're not horrible – you're one of the kindest people I know. But Lil…" She took a deep breath. "Sometimes, you know, you just don't think about things enough."
"I know," said Lily sadly. "I try to, but usually it's too late by the time I think of thinking." She gave Meri a very small smile. "Thanks, Mer. I didn't really expect… I mean, I feel bad about breaking up with him, but I'm actually going to really miss him too. He's good fun. But I did the right thing, didn't I?"
Meri wanted to say yes immediately, but that was the selfish part of her that wanted Lily and Zeke not to work out. Instead she shrugged.
"Depends. Probably. Unless you secretly do like him, and you're just denying it to yourself."
Lily laughed slightly. "I do like him. But not enough – not in that way. And he's a seventh-year and I'm only a fifth – so he's too old for me really, isn't he? Anyway," she went on before Meri could reply, "I've done it now. And I'm going to stay single this year. I'm fed up with boyfriends."
She swung her legs round and scooted up next to Meri so they could lean together. Meri laughed.
"Yeah, how long's that going to last? We've got the Yule Ball this term – and I'll eat my best quill if you end up going without a date."
Lily elbowed her gently, then also laughed.
"Depends who asks. But one date doesn't make someone my boyfriend anyway. Who are you planning on going with?"
Meri rolled her eyes. "I'm not planning on going with anyone. I doubt if there's anyone who'd want to go with me. Which I'm fine with." A lie, but hopefully Lily would buy it.
"Well then, we can go together," Lily said sleepily. "Never mind stupid dates. We'll have a girls' night, and get Claire and Freya in on it too." She leaned her head on Meri's shoulder. "Tell you something, though. I'm really glad James isn't at school to stick his nose in anymore. You know, last year he actually had a go at Zeke because we were going out? At least he can't interfere with my life from London."
Lily sounded half asleep, so Meri slipped out from under her head, and stood up, tugging her friend with her.
"Come on. I'm going to bed. We've got Potions first thing in the morning."
Lucy stuck the final poster to the wall of the library, and stood back to admire it. The artwork had been done by Tilly, and it looked good. Lucy had secured permission to use the History of Magic classroom after lessons finished on Thursday; nobody was ever in there, and Professor Binns liked Lucy. She was one of the few students whose names he remembered, because she was also one of the few students who managed to retain an enthusiasm for History of Magic despite the way in which it was taught. Professor Clearwater was unlikely to find out that they were using the classroom, and even if she did, Lucy (somewhat optimistically) couldn't think of any objection she could make.
"What on earth are you doing?" a voice asked behind her, and she turned to find her sister, Molly, standing there, one hand on her hip.
"Putting up a poster," Lucy replied, as if that wasn't obvious.
"Did you get permission?" Molly asked.
"Yes," Lucy said smugly. "Madam Pince said I could, so long as I didn't use a Permanent Sticking Charm, and took them down myself afterwards." In fact, she had simply refused to give up or go away until Madam Pince gave in and agreed, which Lucy had found a useful strategy on many occasions.
Molly looked again at the poster, read it carefully, then looked at her sister.
"A drama club?"
"Yes," Lucy said again, folding her arms over her chest. "And before you ask, yes, I've got permission."
Molly shook her head. "Lucy, you're mad. You'll never get anyone to join. Oh, and by the way, is it true you brought that stupid duck to school?"
Lucy shrugged. "So what if it is? There's no rule against it."
"Well, Mum and Dad are going to kill you, even if the teachers don't." Molly sighed. "Why can't you just be normal for once, Luce?"
For all her optimism to Molly, Lucy was not intending to leave attendance of her club to chance. Her own close friends would be there, of course, but she needed more than that, and had spent some considerably effort recruiting people from her own house. The response from the second and third-years had been a little disappointing, but a few first-years had promised to come along. That might have been because they'd been intimidated by Lucy's overwhelming enthusiasm, but as long as they came it didn't really matter why.
After some more thought, she and Tilly, her main co-conspirator, skipped the last part of Charms (Lucy pretended to be ill, and Tilly volunteered to take her to the Hospital Wing) to lie in wait for the Gryffindor second-years coming out of Defence Against the Dark Arts. They could have left this to Padraig and Artemis, but Lucy didn't trust them to recruit with enough passion, and she had friends among the second-year Gryffindors.
As the crowd of twelve-year-olds spilled out into the corridor, Lucy bounced out in front of a plump, blonde girl wearing glasses, who stopped short with a startled expression.
"Oh! Lucy…"
"Alice! Come on, we want to talk to you about something."
Lucy seized Alice Longbottom by the arm and towed her down a side corridor. As she had expected, Alice's two companions followed them.
"What are you doing?" a small, dark-haired girl protested. "We've got Transfiguration in a minute!"
Lucy gave her a stern look. "This is much more important than Transfiguration, Issie. We need you to join our new club. All of you."
The three second-years looked at each other.
"What sort of club?" the third member of the trio, a boy by the name of Jake Nelson, asked.
"A drama club," Tilly put in. "Just for third-years and below."
"You've got to come," Lucy went on. "It won't work if nobody does, and you're our friends so you're some of the first people we're asking. You can even help run it if you come to the first meeting on Thursday."
"Cool!" Jake said. "We'll come, won't we?" He looked round at his friends, who looked slightly less enthusiastic.
"Since when is there a drama club?" Issie Malfoy asked.
"Since now," Lucy replied firmly. "Oh, come on, you two. It'll be fun!"
"What are you going to do there?" said Alice.
"We're going to put on a play. Maybe before Christmas, if we're ready."
"So there'll be lots to do," Tilly interjected again. "Even if you don't want to act. Lucy's going to be director and I'm going to be producer, so I'll need people to help with costumes and sets and all the rest of it."
"So will you come?" Lucy asked.
"Yeah, okay. We will, right?" Jake looked round at the two girls again.
Alice and Issie looked at each other, and Issie shrugged.
"Okay. But I don't want to be in the play."
"Me neither," Alice agreed.
"That's fine." Lucy beamed at them, and thrust a small version of the poster into Jake's hand. "Thursday, after lessons finish, in the History of Magic room. See you there!"
After the three younger students had gone, Tilly turned to Lucy.
"We're going to need more people if we want to put a play on. So far, you, Artemis, and maybe Jake are the only ones who actually want to be in it. Apart from those first-years."
Lucy smiled. "We will. We'll get enough."
On Thursday, it seemed that her optimism had paid off. It was not a huge group, but for a first meeting, Lucy thought as she looked around, it wasn't too bad. All her own friends were there, of course – including Padraig, who had remained reluctant, but had been dragged along by Artemis. The little gaggle of first-year Hufflepuffs had all come, and even a couple of second-years. Tilly had convinced a few of her fellow third-year Ravenclaws, and Issie, Alice and Jake were there, as Lucy had expected. Those three might be a year younger, but they had counted as an extension of Lucy's close crowd ever since a certain rule-breaking incident the previous year, and Lucy had been instrumental in managing to get an out-of-season Christmas Tree delivered to the Hospital Wing after Issie had been knocked off her broom during a Quidditch match.
"Okay!" Lucy jumped up onto a chair and called over the general chatter, which began to die down at her voice. "Right, everyone! Let's start! Thanks for coming. And welcome to the very first meeting of Hogwarts Inter-House Drama Club!" she announced, flinging her arms out to the sides and almost overbalancing. "Most of you know me, I think – I'm Lucy Weasley, and I'm the club chairperson, and also the director. This is Tilly, and she's the vice-chairperson and the producer. And these are Max, Artemis and Padraig, who are the rest of the committee – we need to fix on proper job titles for you lot, by the way," she added, ignoring the fact that Padraig, who had had to be forcibly co-opted onto the committee, was rolling his eyes.
"What is a committee?" A Hufflepuff first-year whispered to the person beside them, but Lucy heard.
"A committee just means we're the people in charge of making the decisions," she explained. "Because it's our club. Now, today we just want to take down everyone's names, and maybe an idea of what you might want to do – you know, whether you want to act, or help backstage or what. And then, if anyone's got any ideas about what play we could do, tell me or Tilly."
Tilly herself produced a piece of parchment and a quill, and began to pass it round the room as Lucy went on talking.
"By the way, I ought to tell you. Professor Clearwater said we could only have this club on two conditions. One, we have to not let it affect our schoolwork. So you'd better all work hard and make sure it doesn't." She stared sternly round the group. "And second, it has to include all four houses equally, and help house unity, so there's going to be no fighting between houses at all. Or else Clearwater'll close us down. Okay?"
There was an assenting murmur, then Issie Malfoy looked up from the parchment she had just finished writing her name on, and glanced round the room.
"Well, that's a bit of a problem," she remarked. "There are no Slytherins here, so how can we include them equally?"
Lucy also looked round, disconcerted for a moment. "Oh. So there aren't. Well." Her brown eyes took on the determined expression all her friends were familiar with. "There will be by next time. In fact, we need more people in general. Get recruiting, all of you."
"How's Lucy's drama group going?" Albus asked Farah as they patrolled the corridor together one night. "I saw she'd put posters up everywhere."
Farah laughed. "She's your cousin. Ask her."
"You're the one who promised to help her with it," Al retorted. "I don't want to get involved with Lucy's mad schemes, thanks."
"Well, when I asked her, she said they'd had the first meeting and quite a few people came along. So it looks like it's happening, anyway. And there've been no more fights," she added hopefully. "So maybe things are going to settle down after all."
Albus sighed. It was true that there had been no more trouble, at least none that they had found out about. But only the day before, they had been informed that their input would indeed be wanted on planning the Yule Ball, something Al was extremely uninterested in. Then this morning he had ended up accidentally sitting opposite Sapphie at breakfast, and had discovered that things between them were still very awkward after all. And there was the stupid letter he had received that morning and which was still in his pocket, with its even stupider demands. He had no intention of complying with the demands, but refusing them would probably be difficult, given who they came from.
"That would be nice," he agreed. "But I'm not holding my breath."