The next night, I made my way down to the greenhouses for my detention. Before I had left, James had started a game of Exploding Snap with Albus right in front of my face just to taunt me. I could tell Finn and Cameron were annoyed by it as well. We had gotten caught and the others hadn't. It wasn't exactly the greatest situation, but all the same, I was glad that we hadn't told McGonagall about the others.

When I reached the greenhouse where I was supposed to meet Professor Longbottom, I saw he wasn't there yet. He was probably running late. Wonderful, now I'd be stuck in detention for even longer unless he got here soon.

I began to wander around, examining all of the plants. They were kind of interesting. I didn't want to touch any, though just in case they did something freaky. I had learned to never trust magical plants after a mandrake had nearly bitten my finger off last year.

"Oh, good you're here," said a voice.

I turned around to see Professor Longbottom hurrying through the door, his arms full of watering cans and plant food. I went over and took some of the objects from his hands. "Of course I'm here," I said. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, I thought you might have decided to show up late or not at all."

"No," I said, putting the watering cans down, "if I came late, I'd only be here longer and if I didn't show up at all, McGonagall would find out and give me another detention. Since I don't especially like the idea of either of those things, here I am."

"Makes sense," he said with a nod. He began filling up watering cans one by one as I handed them to him.

"Actually," I continued, "I don't want Finn and Cameron to know I think this, but they told me I had the better detention out of the ones McGonagall gave us and I secretly have to agree with them."

"Why, what are they doing?"

"Cameron's with Madam Pince organizing the bookshelves and Finn's cleaning Professor McGonagall's classroom."

"You're right; you do have the better detention."

"Neville," I laughed.

"That's Professor Longbottom to you," he said, handing me the watering can he had just finished filling.

"Right, sorry," I said. "I just never know what to call you. I mean, you're so close to my parents and aunts and uncles that I've always called you Neville, but then when I got here-,"

"—you had to call me Professor Longbottom just like everyone else," he said with a smile. "I think you've answered your own question. It's not that hard, really."

"I know," I sighed as we continued to fill watering cans. After a few seconds, I spoke again. "My parents, aunts and uncles send you their love. Did I ever tell you that?"

"No," he said, looking as if he were about to laugh.

"Well I was supposed to, but I just got around to it now."

"Why's that?" Neville asked, shutting off the faucet and handing me the watering can he had just filled. He took one for himself and led me to the far side of the greenhouse.

"Because I couldn't very well tell you in class, could I? And Finn and Cameron most likely wouldn't tell you at all so it was obviously up to either me or Aerilyn and I knew she would most likely forget."

"Why couldn't you tell me in class?" Neville asked.

"Even for me, walking into class and giving you my relatives' love would be embarrassing. I don't see the big deal about telling you in class. I mean, I'm telling you now aren't I? Like I said, Finn and Cameron wouldn't have told you at all. Ever. It's harder for boys to express their feelings, I think."

"You seem to be quite the expert," Neville said, pulling some dead leaves off of a plant.

"They wanted me to tell you to say 'hello' to Luna as well," I continued.

"I will," Neville said.

"How is she?" I asked.

"Oh, she's fine," Neville answered. "She just got back from a two week trip with her father to look for, uh, well I can't remember the name of the thing…"

"The Crumple Horned Snorkack?" I asked, remembering what my parents had told me.

"Nah, I actually managed to convince her that they weren't real," Neville laughed. "She took it better than I thought she would."

I smiled and continued to water the plants. "What kind of plants are these anyway?"

"Mandrakes," he answered. "I'm surprised you didn't recognize them, or was that one of the many classes where you weren't paying attention?"

"I pay attention," I said defensively. "I just haven't been too fond of mandrakes since one of them bit me."

"Ah, that's right," Neville said. There was another brief moment of silence. "So," he continued, "what landed you in detention tonight anyway?"

I didn't answer. Instead, I bit my lip and continued to water the mandrakes. Neville had always been really close with my family and I found it easy to talk to him about lots of things, but I wasn't sure if I could tell him what my siblings, cousins and I had been up to recently. He might tell my parents and ruin it before we could even finish what we had started.

"Okay," Neville said slowly, "I'm going to take a wild guess and say it was something you're parents really wouldn't approve of."

"What makes you say that?" I asked, managing to keep my voice even.

"You usually love talking about your pranks. Your father and Uncle George were the same way. Loved getting a laugh out of people, they did. Anyway, now all of a sudden you don't want to talk."

I shrugged. "It's not a big deal."

"You don't have to tell me," Neville answered. "I get it. As long as it's not dangerous." He gave me a long stare until I finally cracked just a little bit.

"Well, we didn't think it would be but it turned out to be more dangerous than we thought."

"Is everyone okay?" Neville asked.

"Yeah, we're all fine," I answered, turning back to the plants. It wasn't exactly a lie. We were all fine now. We were lucky that Albus had simply been knocked out and nothing worse and that Aerilyn and James hadn't been hurt by Fluffy.

"You'll find our more about it eventually," I continued after awhile, "but for now we want to keep it a secret."

"Fine," Neville shrugged, "but you know you can tell me anything. You kids are like part of my family."

"I know," I answered, "and you will find out eventually, but just not now."

"Promise you'll be careful with whatever it is," he sighed.

"Don't worry, we will be," I assured him with a smile. That was the truth. We were going to have to be a lot more careful after the experiences we had through the trapdoor.

"I think my hands are permanently cramped," Finn complained, collapsing into the seat next to me at breakfast the next morning.

"Well my eyesight might be worse than before," Cameron said, sitting down on my other side. "I have never strained my eyes so much before. Honestly, Pince couldn't even give me a decent lantern to use."

"What about you, Lissie?" Finn asked. "Any complaints about your detention? Any body parts worse off than they were before?"

"Well, my hands do still smell like dirt and plant food," I said. "No matter how many times I scrubbed them last night, the smell wouldn't go away."

"Seriously?" Finn looked as if he didn't believe me.

"It's true. Want to smell?" I held my hand under his nose.

"No, I'm all set," he muttered, pushing my hand away.

"You know," Cameron said, looking up at the staff table, "I'm surprised McGonagall didn't write to our parents about what we did."

"I think she will if she catches us next time. She probably just figured it was a onetime thing and we won't do anything that drastic again," I shrugged. "That is why we have to be super careful next time. We have nearly a month to plan out the Chamber of Secrets adventure and we have to make sure we do it right. This time, I think Aerilyn, Rose, Raina, and Albus should stay behind."

"They won't like that. They already know the whole plan." Cameron shook his head miserably. "We're stuck with them."

I snorted. "They're two years younger than we are. We have authority."

"Not really," Finn said. "They'll tell mum and dad if we don't let them come. Those manipulative…" he trailed off, searching for a word.

"Hooligans?" Cameron suggested, using Grandma Weasley's favorite word.

"Yes," Finn said. "Those manipulative hooligans switched things around on us."

"We can get out of it," I said. "We just don't bring it up around them ever again and then we sneak away one night, get it over with and sneak back. They'll never know a thing and by the time they bring it up, we'll already have gone."

"And they'll be angry and they'll go to mum and dad," Finn said.

"Still a problem," Cameron agreed.

I sighed. "Fine, then you come up with a plan if you're so smart. I hate being the brains of everything."

"Far from it, sissy dear," Cameron teased. I punched him in the arm.

I paid a visit to the boy's dorm that night, barging in without notice, causing Finn and Cameron's roommates to jump in surprise.

"I need you two to write a little paragraph in here," I ordered, thrusting our scrapbook at Finn. It was opened to the trapdoor page. Everyone else had already written in it, even the younger cousins only because they had hounded me about it until I gave in.

"What's that, a diary?" a boy named Thomas asked.

"No," I answered as Finn began scribbling in the empty space left on the page.

I wanted to hurry up and get out of the room. It was probably infested with mold and boy germs. Except when it came to Brendan, one of my brothers' close friends. He definitely didn't have any germs. In fact, over the summer he seemed to have been cured of all icky boy germs. It was the first thing I noticed when I saw him in class on the first day. Anyway, now he was also part of the reason why I wanted to leave. I was uncomfortable and shy talking to him. Pathetic, I know, but it's the truth and I'm only human.

"So," Brendan said. I looked up. He was looking at me, meaning his 'so' had been directed at me. I think my lungs malfunctioned in that moment.

"Yeah?" I squeaked. Finn and Cameron looked up at me. My face turned even redder. Great, now they were going to find out about my little crush on their friend. Actually, I'm surprised they didn't find out sooner.

"That was some potion you made today in class," he smiled. He looked as if he didn't know what to say to me.

"Yeah," I nodded, "I just followed the directions." Well, obviously I thought to myself. I was such an idiot.

Finn and Cameron were still squinting at me so I gestured for them to keep writing.

"Finny, you need to save me room," Cameron complained. "You're writing a whole book in there."

"I have a lot to say," Finn said. "Just like Lissie will have a lot to say when we see her at breakfast tomorrow morning. Right, Lissie?"

"Wrong," I said, snatching the book from him and tossing it at Cameron.

"Hey!" he yelped.

"I wasn't done," Finn said, trying to snatch the book back. Cameron held it above his head. Finn tackled Cameron and before I knew it, the other boys were all cheering them on and yelling. I stood there in the middle of it with my hands over my eyes. I groaned in frustration and impatience, but no one noticed.

"I'll leave you to sort this out on your own," I announced, edging towards the door. "Just give it to me at breakfast tomorrow. Don't forget."

I wasn't sure if they heard me or not, but I left the room in a hurry all the same.

"Okay," James said the next night, brushing his quill across his chin. "We're going into the Chamber of Secrets on Halloween, do we all agree?"

"Yes," the rest of us chorused. Finn, Cameron, James, Matt, Shannon and I were sitting in the secret passageway that lead to Honeydukes. It was one of our hiding spots where we could actually get a little privacy.

"The first Hogsmeade trip is the day before," James said, "so it won't interfere." He wrinkled his nose.

"Don't be disappointed," I said. "You'll be able to go next year."

"We'll bring you loads of Chocolate Frogs," Matt said, looking as if he could go for a Chocolate Frog at that very moment.

"Thanks," James muttered sadly. Then, he brightened a bit. "Anyway, so Halloween will be a perfect night to go. It'll be great."

"How are we going to manage the Parseltongue again?" I asked.

"Uncle Ron told me how my dad opened the Chamber of Secrets," James said. "He can do a pretty good imitation and we know it's accurate because Uncle Ron went down there too during the battle."

"So you're just going to imitate what Uncle Ron told you and pray it works?" Finn asked.

"Exactly," James nodded. "It's called winging it, a term I know we're all familiar with."

"A little too familiar," I agreed.

"We found something that might help us get there without being caught," Matt said, looking at Shannon. "It's a secret tunnel that goes from the seventh floor all the way to the hallway one over from Myrtle's bathroom."

"I thought there were only seven secret passageways," James said.

"In and out of the castle, yes," I told him, "but there are tons that go all throughout the castle. You know, located behind bookshelves, statues, suits of armor…"

"Okay, I get it," James said. "That'll be perfect," he added, looking at Shannon and Matt. "How'd you find it and where is it?"

"It's right around the corner from the common room," Matt began.

"All you do is turn right at the end of the hallway, and count three candle brackets down from the left side and pull it," Shannon continued.

"A section of the wall opens and there you have it," Matt finished.

"Great," James said excitedly. "That's going to come in handy."

"We still need to figure out how we're going to get back out once we're done," I said.

"Easy." Finn barely looked up from his homework that he was finishing before the next morning. "We use our brooms."

"Of course," I said, "how could I have missed that?"

"It's okay," Cameron patted my shoulder. "We all know you're the dumbest one here."

"Not true," I argued. "Who was it that came up with the scrapbook idea as well as plenty of the pranks we've pulled over the years?"

"You," Cameron mumbled.

"Thank you," I said calmly, leaning back against the wall.

James rubbed his eyes. "Alright, I think we're almost ready for this. Can we do this safely this time?"

"Of course," I answered. "No more danger."

"No more danger," James repeated with a nod. He broke into a smile. "Now the countdown can begin. Three weeks and counting until Operation Chamber of Secrets."

"Three weeks," I sighed. "Basically a lifetime."

"A lifetime and a half," Finn agreed, finishing his homework with a big, over-exaggerated scribble of his quill. I looked at his paper and saw that the very last word of the essay was written in huge letters.

"Why did you write that so big?" I asked.

"Because there was a length requirement on this essay and this word gave me the last few inches I needed," he answered proudly. "It's a nice touch, don't you think?"

"Just lovely," I smiled. "Who's the essay for?"

"Professor Binns," he answered dully.

"Well in that case…" I began. I took his quill and added a smiley face to the bottom left corner. "Maybe that'll cheer him up."

"Doubt it," Cameron chimed in. "He never smiles. He just floats there, inches above the floor, and drones on, and on."

"Poor Professor Binns," I said, shaking my head.

"Poor us," Finn argued. "We have to write essays for his class."

"Think of it as practice," Shannon shrugged. "We're writing our own type of history book aren't we in a way? Our scrapbook? Your essays are just more boring versions of that."

"Good point," Finn agreed. "Maybe Lissie is the smart one. She did come up with the idea for that book after all."

"I knew you'd see sense, Finny," I said. Then, I grabbed his essay and ran back towards the common room, laughing the whole way.