Beware the Broom, Enjoy the Slug

Twenty eight of us first years are lined up in two lines facing each other and there's an old school broomstick lying next to each person. The slightly cool September breeze tugs on the hems of people's robes. "Alright, when I blow my whistle, mount your brooms, kick off, and come back down!" Madam Hooch commands loudly, her voice carrying over the grounds. She blows her whistle.

I throw my leg over my broom and kick off. I fly up about fifteen feet and look around. Almost everyone is in the air at various heights, except for a couple of students who are still stuck on the ground. This isn't so hard, I think, and then fly back down, landing fairly gracefully.

Madam Hooch looks surprised that nothing has gone dramatically wrong yet. We do this a couple of more times, until everyone can at least hover sufficiently. "Good job!" says Madam Hooch. "Now, I want the first seven students on my right to get up in the air as we practiced and then fly in a circle above this class; and try not to fly directly over anyone so as to prevent any accidents."

I'm the last one in this group. We all kick off perfectly and start our loop. This is pretty easy, I'm sure I can speed up. And I do, passing them all with the wind whipping through my hair and robes. I lean slightly to the left, ready to make a smooth turn.

But I don't. As well as turning, my broom starts to spin like a drill, me holding on for dear life. "AAAAGGHHHH!!!" I screech at the top of my lungs. I try my best to stop, to land, to anything as long as it gets me off of this broom! I can hear sounds below me on the ground, but my mind doesn't register any of them.

After what seems like hours, I somehow manage to get the broom closer to the ground before falling off onto the thankfully cushioning grass. Seconds later I hear a small, distant crash which I think was my broomstick. Whatever.

Amazingly nothing really hurts as of yet and I manage to stagger to my feet. Everybody runs towards me, Fiona and Madam Hooch in the lead. Some look worried while others just look amused. "I'm OK," I gasp when they reach me, starting to feel a bit queasy. I take a couple of very unsteady steps to prove this. My legs give out, I knock into Fiona, and everything goes black.

I slowly crack open my eyes to see an expanse of blue with occasional fluffs of white floating by. I groan. There's a dull ache in my head and I can still feel twinges of queasiness in my stomach. My lovely view of the sky is interrupted when three heads suddenly appear in my line of vision. They belong to Dom, Fiona, and Madam Hooch.

"How long was I out?" I mumble.

"Only a few minutes," says Madam Hooch briskly. "Considering your quick revival, I suspect that your passing out was due to just severe dizziness and not actual injury."

Oh goodie, I think.

"Not cool, mate," winces Dom. "You screamed like a little girl."

I slowly sit up, hoping that it will make me seem slightly less pathetic. The motion sends a new wave of dizziness through me, but I force myself not to keel over again.

"Perhaps you should drop by the hospital wing," advises Hooch.

"No thanks, I'm OK." I stagger up and sway a little before properly steadying myself. For the rest of the lesson I stand off to the side, glad that my part in it is over. At least I gave the school a reason to get at least one new broom.

Dom, Fiona, Hyacinth, and I are sitting around a big table in the common room, working on homework. I have discovered that it really is a bad idea to put it off for too long. As we're all scratching away with our quills, Fiona suddenly looks up with a wide eyed look of realization.

"It's Ivy's birthday," she says, still staring at the opposite window where a fine drizzle can be seen falling outside. It's 23 September, and therefore Ivy's fourteenth birthday. Ivy's Fiona's sister and a third year.

"Damn it, I forgot. Too late for birthday presents now, isn't it?"

"Yeah, we should at least wait up and wish her a happy birthday. I think she's at Quidditch practice right now."

About fifteen minutes later, the birthday girl slouches in through the portrait hole, slightly damp and carrying her broomstick.

"Happy birthday!" we shout, rushing up to hug her.

"How was Quidditch practice?" I ask looking up at Ivy. At 5'7 she's a full head taller than me.

"Shit," Ivy replies casually, collapsing onto the sofa. She's got a cockney accent that she probably picked up from her local friends. (I mean local at home, not here) "If it weren't for me, Linda, n' Tyrell the team could resign from all the games now."

"Whatever, they can't be worse than Erik," Fiona tells her cheerily. I choose to ignore this comment as I sit down beside Ivy. As well as being really tall, Ivy's got long red hair that she always wears in a ponytail, brown eyes, a long nose, and freckles.

"So, am I gettin' any presents?" Ivy asks hopefully.

"Eh, sorry, I'm afraid not." says Fiona.

"But we could do your homework for you tonight," I offer.

"Er, no thanks. I'd don't really fancy gettin' at T on every essay."

"You usually get Ds, anyway. What's the difference?"

"Shut up, Erik."

Fiona looks at the portrait hole, gets up, and strides over to it. She'd noticed Bea coming in carrying a couple of cups filled with something steaming. Fiona says something that I can't hear from here, smiles widely, and takes one of the cups, which she brings back and gives to Ivy. It's filled with hot chocolate and a few marshmallows.

"Ooo, thanks," says Ivy, taking a sip. I have a feeling that the hot chocolate never reached its intended receiver. She proceeds to gulp it down once it's a bit cooler. We all hang around for another hour before going to bed.

We've had three Astronomy lessons so far and I've discovered that I'm not bad at it. I'm absolute crap. No offense to Professor Sinistra, but to me the night sky just looks like a jumble of stars with a big, fat moon in the middle and I don't take any enjoyment in trying to sort out the whole mess.

So here I am sitting in the Astronomy Tower as Professor Sinistra rattles on about the constellations that are visible at this time of year. We're supposed to be taking notes. Whatever.

My mind drifts to what I had for dinner; which was a nasty looking, but good tasting, mush with eggplant. Eggplants look funny, kind of like slugs. Uncle Ron once told me about a spell that makes you puke slugs. I wonder where those slugs come from. Are they transported from somewhere, or are they just conjured? Where do they go after someone pukes them? Do they just live wherever they end up? Sudsy would be a good name for a slug. Alliteration, you know…

I pick up my quill and write The Life and Adventures of Sudsy the Slug at the top of my Astronomy notes, which up till now were blank. Skipping a line, I begin to write.

Sudsy was a small, ordinary slug. He was about 2 in. long, the greenish, yellowish, grayish color of congested boogies, and rather slimy. Overall not bad, for a slug.

One day, Sudsy was crawling along, minding his own business and looking for a nice snack of leaves (or whatever the crap slugs eat), when, suddenly…

I write a couple of paragraphs about Sudsy before we're dismissed from class. It details what I think it would be like to be transported into somebody's throat and then thrown up. As I follow the rest of my class down the spiral staircase it occurs to me that I didn't take in a word of the lesson. Oh well, better hope that we don't have a surprise quiz during next week's lesson.

"Hagrid's invited us for tea," says Fiona the next morning at breakfast. A fluffy brown owl has just delivered her a note.

"When?" I ask, shoving a tangerine slice into my mouth.

"Tomorrow at four [that would be Saturday. Now come on, Transfiguration's in fifteen minutes." I throw my bag over my shoulder and follow her out the Great Hall, not looking forward to spending an hour and a half in Professor Ashcroft's presence. She's the Transfiguration teacher and her great dislike for Beatrice has to some degree passed down to me too, even though I haven't done much to earn it yet. I've heard a rumor that the only person in this school that Ashcroft likes even less than Bea is Professor Ayala. I'm not sure why, but I do have a couple of ideas.

The next day, Fiona and I walk down to Hagrid's cabin by the forest and knock on the heavy front door. We're wrapped up in our warm hoodies, as it's starting to get chilly and distinctly fall-ish. "Oh, hullo ye two," Hagrid says brightly, letting us in. As soon as we enter, a cubby, golden puppy with a stubby little tail runs up to us, panting and bouncing around in excitement. "This is Lyre, he's me new Crup."

Fiona bends down to pet Lyre. "Awww, aren't you a cute wittle puppy," she baby-talks at him as Hagrid goes about making tea.

"So how've ye been?" asks Hagrid once we're all sitting around the scrubbed wooden table with cups of tea the size of small buckets. Lyre has firmly planted himself on Fiona's foot. "I hear ye've had yer firs' flyin' lesson last week. How'd it go?"

"I really wish that I could tell you how great it went," I say. "But I can't."

"Why?"

"In a nutshell, I lost control of my broom, screamed like a little girl, fell off, and fainted."

Hagrid cringes sympathetically. "Ah well, ye can't be a natural at everythin' from the beginnin'. But don' worry! With a mum an' dad like yours, I'm sure ye'll learn t' fly righ' quickly!"

Fiona and I exchange a skeptical look. I haven't forgotten that, despite not being very much into sports, she didn't make an idiot of herself.

"I'll tell ye what," says Hagrid. "Why don' ye ask yer mum fer some pointers on flyin'? She's not the Senior Quidditch correspondent at the Daily Prophet fer nothin'! I'm sure she'd have plenty o' good advice fer ye."

"Mmmm, OK." Over the next half hour, Fiona tells Hagrid about how our classes are going and about her new friend Hyacinth. Hyacinth's pretty cool. She seems to be a bit too sensible to be popular, but I like her dry and witty humor. I'm not surprised that she and Fiona get along.

While Hagrid and Fiona are talking, my mind goes back to what Hagrid had said earlier about my flying. I really hope that I'll get better with practice. Imagine what everyone will think if I turn out to be as bad at Quidditch as I am at Astronomy.

I feel a soft pawing at my leg. Looking down, I see Lyre looking at me pitifully, obviously begging for a snack. Unable, and not trying, to resist the cuteness, I give him a slice of sausage which he munches on happily.

A.N.: Urgh, I know this took ages to update. As both me and my beta are quite busy with school right now, updating regularly will be a bit difficult, but I'll try my best. For all you people who can write a cockney accent have a skill that I do not, so just use your imagination with Ivy. Anyone who R&Rs gets to cuddle Lyre!