The last task of the Triwizard Tournament was swiftly approaching, and the excitement level in the school was through the roof. The points of Cedric Diggory (Lauren had a crush on him once) and little fourth year Harry Potter were tied, if my math was right, which was pretty cool. We all thought he'd be dead by the end of the first task, because dragons are no walk in the park. (Not that I know from personal experience or anything. It's just kind of obvious.)

In saying that, the common room was a tidal wave of noise as soon as you came down the dormitory stairs. All the Gryffindors supported him now, and since the third task was in two days, they were trying to make him feel as big as possible. It didn't seem to be working though, because Potter looked as down and angry as ever about the task. Then again, Potter always seemed angry or sad or depressed about something. For good reason, sure, but wasn't that kid ever happy?

"He's kinda cute," Lauren whispered, looking at the black—haired scarboy as we left the common room to go to class.

"Ew, he's fourteen," I countered, and she rolled her eyes, muttering that age was just a number. Yeah, just a number that defined who you should probably not hit on. "Fourteen" was one of such numbers. So was anything over twenty, for that matter. At least for a girl of seventeen years old.

"You're just jealous," Lauren said happily. I wasn't sure what I was apparently jealous of, but I didn't ask. It was nearly nine and if we didn't hurry we'd be late for Transfiguration, and Professor McGonagall didn't take too happily to tardy students. I vaguely wondered why there were so many people in the common room instead of heading to class as I took my seat, but it wasn't really my business. It wouldn't hurt me any if a bunch of fourth years were late for their lessons. Unless it was Potions they were late for, because I had Snape next, and he'd be in a right state if his first class of the day was half full of late Gryffindors. He hated us all enough already.

As it was so close to NEWT examinations (even though the Triwizard Tournament was going on, and general end-of-year exams had been omitted, OWL and NEWT exams were still happening) we were mostly just doing review, so Lauren and I didn't have to pay much attention. In the noise that was our seventh year class turning desks into warthogs, we could have a very private conversation right in the middle of the classroom where we sat. We only transfigured our desks once, and luckily McGonagall hadn't noticed that Lauren's warthog's tail was a desk leg.

"So I heard a whisper," Lauren started in a teasing voice, to which I replied with, "stop eavesdropping." Lauren was always hearing things, rumours mostly, and I didn't like to be on the receiving end of whatever she found out. It was all usually untrue anyway, and what wasn't, was stuff that really should have been kept private. Like last year, when Marcus Flint (a Slytherin who'd failed his seventh year and repeated it last year) had managed to shag a Ravenclaw girl. Amazing, yes – miraculous even – but I really didn't need to know that.

Lauren smiled and smacked me lightly on the arm. "I heard a whisper that Percy Weasley has a thing for you."

I cocked a very disbelieving eyebrow at my best friend. "He's not even in school anymore. And that's gross."

"He's here as a stand-in for Crouch," Lauren reminded me, and I made a silent "oooh" with my lips. She continued: "Apparently he was totally checking you out at the Yule ball, and was going to ask you to dance but then you started dancing with that Beauxbatons guy."

"He was a dunce," I informed, but Lauren obviously didn't care.

"Percy's cute, you should talk to him." She winked. I wrinkled my nose.

"Never going to happen; Percy's a huge dork. His greatest aspiration, as he told anyone who would listen last year, is to become Minister of Magic. What a bore."

"What, do you want a bad boy?" Lauren teased, smacking my arm again. She really needed to break that habit – for, as soft as she did hit me, I was starting to bruise. "Someone like, hmm… Sirius Black?"

"Oh, yes," I said in a very sarcastic voice of longing. "I love my men old, with long, greasy, matted hair from being in Azkaban for murdering a bunch of muggles." I rolled my eyes. "That might be your type, but it's so not mine."

"You're no fun Lena," Lauren sighed, and I refrained from reminding her all the very unboring things I'd done that year. For trying to be more like Lauren, I wasn't doing a very good job of it. Not the slut part of course, I could do without that, but I wanted to be outgoing like her. People flocked her because they knew she was fun. The only time I got flocked was when Lauren had pants me in the Charms corridor (and they mostly only flocked to laugh).

*

It appeared that someone had, indeed, been late for Potions. I'm not sure if it was the fourth years, or just any non-Slytherins in general, but when Lauren, Christine Taylor, and I walked into Potions before class began, but as Snape began to talk, we got the harshest yelling-at I'd ever known him to give. Then we got detention, and were split up through the class so we couldn't sit together and "disrupt his class further". In my opinion, Professor Snape is an old, jealous git, but he makes the rules and we must comply. I'd be jealous too if I were greasy, lonely, and in my thirties.

"This is ridiculous," Lauren grumbled, heading over to sit with a not-so-cute Slytherin boy. Lauren looked disgusted and almost oppressed; the Slytherin looked like it was his birthday and Lauren had just jumped out of his cake. Gross. Christine got sat by another Gryffindor girl; I was placed beside a Slytherin girl with curly hair. She glared at me when I sat down, and I scooted my chair as far over on the table as I could manage. We were mixing an Everlasting Elixir today, something more advanced than I could ever have imagined. Good thing I don't want to be an Auror, I thought, because there's no way I'm going to pass Potions. We had studied Everlasting Elixirs last year, but obviously none of us had ever imagined we'd have to brew one. Almost every face in the dungeon classroom was shocked, confused, or angry.

We made it anyway. It was meant to look shiny silver in colour, and be very watery in texture. Mine looked like cement mix, and the curly-haired Slytherin's didn't seem any more complete. Hers was a shady orange; at least mine was grey, which made me feel better. Snape very openly writing a very large "three" on his paper when he looked at my vialed potion got rid of any elated feeling very, very rapidly, however. The Slytherin girl sneered at me. I stuck out my tongue and told her to stop shagging the teacher for good marks when Lauren and I exited the classroom. She pulled out her wand to hex me, but by the time she pulled it out of the pocket of her robe I was long gone, lost in the heavy crowd streaming towards the Great Hall for lunch.

I was headed in that direction too, before Lauren began tugging me away. And by tugging, I mean she grabbed my wrist and dragged me towards the Gryffindor tower. "I'm hungry," I said bluntly, but she ignored me and kept pulling me out of the crowds. We never made it as far as the tower, but we were alone anyway, and Lauren looked frantic.

"What did you mean about that girl shagging Professor Snape?" she asked urgently, not releasing her iron grip on my wrist. I had to tug my arm away for her to realise she was even still holding it; she dropped my wrist like she'd been burnt.

"Nothing," I defended, readjusting my book bag on my shoulder. I had not only A Guide to Transfiguration and Advanced Potion Making inside, which were both very heavy, but Home Life and Social Habits of British Muggles and Achievements in Charming as well. Lauren had the exact same books (if you switched the Muggle Studies book to an Arithmancy book, because Lauren was a Muggle-born anyway) but they didn't seem to be bothering her at all. All she was bothered about was what I'd teased the Slytherin about earlier.

"So you don't actually think she's with him?" Lauren asked, and I said, "no" with finality and the whole ordeal was over. Yes, I was itching to ask Lauren what in the bloody hell had possessed her to do that, or why she cared about in who Snape put his privates, but she was in too calm a mood for me to dare ask. Well, calm compared to what she'd been just a moment ago. As we speed walked down to the Great Hall to eat before classes started up again, she ranted and raved about the disgusting boy she'd had to sit by. We made a pact to come to Potions five minutes early for the next three weeks. No way would Lauren and I suffer through another ordeal like that. You had to admire Professor Snape for his deftness in Potions… but that was the only thing one could find to admire about the slimy toad.