Chapter 10

"Wake up sunshine." Bradley crooned, strongly shaking Aidan's thin shoulder. "It's your . . . mom's first day. You don't want to miss this!" he said cheerfully, struggling with admitting that the pretty, new potions teacher is the women who birthed one of his closest friends.

"God forbid," Aidan replied sarcastically as his school uniform was unceremoniously thrown in his face.

"Oh, don't you want to wish her good luck before class starts?" Bradley asked hopefully. He had been praying Aidan would go to see her and invite him to come along. He had a particularly interesting dream last night where Aidan's mom had been eating cake in her underwear while he watched and got repeatedly slapped in the face by Aidan. He was no divinator but he had a feeling the dream meant that he should stop lustfully admiring his friend's mom. And that he would never look at cake the same way again.

"No," Aidan said, standing up and stretching his lithe body, "She's a big girl. She can handle herself."

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"I am calm. I will do fine." Magdalena told herself as she nervously smoothed out the wrinkles in her dark blue sweater for the third time. Her first class was first year potions, which made her feel a little better. At eleven, children were usually still obedient and listened to authority. It was her second, third and four year classes she would have to be worried about. They would most likely behave like overgrown children, rebellious, argumentative, and coping with a surge of foreign hormones. The remaining classes of older students would probably respond well to her because she intended to treat her students how she treats her son: respectful, adult, and friendly until order is needed.

Outside the door of her office he heard voices, children's voices. Sing-songy children's voices like a choir of baby angels. The boys hadn't even begun to break and the girls still sounded as sweet and innocent as two-year-olds. And I'm afraid of them, Magdalena thought with self-deprecation. "I have nothing to be afraid of. They are just as scared of me as I am of them. Maybe even more. Eventually I will know them and think I was silly for having to do this ritual in the first place." she concluded.

Taking a deep breath she pushed open the door of her office and walked out into the room full of thirty or so first years, perched attentively and nervously on their seats, trying to judge her before she spoke a word. The chatter had stopped once she walked out, a decidedly good sign.

"Good morning, everyone. As I'm sure you have all heard, Slug- Professor Slughorn will be away for a while so I will be your new potions teacher until he returns, which will be some time in January. You may called me Professor Lumairo." Magdalena watched their faces as she spoke. They listened heedfully and she was thankful.

"Now, I was going to take attendance but I don't appear to have a class list." she said, shuffling through some unorganized papers on the large, wooden teacher's desk.

"Everyone's here." said a Gryffindor boy with neat brown hair sitting in the middle.

Magdalena smiled. "Thank you. What is your name?" she asked, figuring that if she made everyone talk at some point today, she would be able to ask them all what their names were and get to work at learning them.

The boy awkwardly smiled back at her. "Remus Lupin."

"Remus." Magdalena repeated, imprinting his face into her mind. "Thank you, Remus. I hope none of you mind the fact that I call you by your first names. Once we get to know each other, you can call me by mine too if you want. I don't mind. Now, according to Sluggy's lesson plan, you have just finished up learning about the various uses of wormwood and will now be moving onto bezoars. Would anyone like to give me an important use of wormwood just to recap?"

It was then that she looked up from the plans and realized that some students were giggling. What did I do, she wondered, glancing down to make sure there wasn't something different about her appearance that had changed in the last thirty seconds. Did I miss something? She let out a little gasp when it occurred to her that she had called Professor Slughorn, Sluggy.

"Er, I'm sorry. That was not very respectful even though I'm sure you kids call him that all the time outside of the classroom. It just happens to be a bit worse when you are considered to be one of his colleagues even though I had him as a potions teacher when I went here." she explained quickly. The students laughed and instantly seemed more at ease, as did Magdalena.

"Anyway, the question still stands. Uses of wormwood?" she said, looking around for a volunteer. "Anyone?" she pleaded. "Come on. I don't bite . . . usually." she joked. The students laughed again as a boy in the front row slowly and timidly raised his hand.

"Yes, you." she said, pointing at him. "What is your name?"

The boy tilted his head up slightly and looked at her through his shaggy and greasy, black hair. "S-Severus Snape." he said, nervously.

Magdalena smiled warmly, recognizing this kid as the outcast. Even though he was a Slytherin, that didn't at all effect the fact that she didn't want him to be fearful or shy just because he was ostracized. "Okay Severus, for the one hundred galleon question tell me an important use of wormwood."

He smiled briefly and answered quite authoritatively, "Wormwood is most commonly used in a potion called Draught of the Living Dead. It's called that because it is such a strong sleeping potion, people who take it appear dead."

"Excellent, Severus." Magdalena said, beaming at him. A furious blush washed over his face and two Gryffindor boys in the back murmured, "Ooo, he fancies a teacher." Magdalena shot a knowing stare in their direction. And I have found the bullies of the bullied, she thought.

"And you two would be?" she asked, pointing to them.

"James Potter." answered a boy with short, black hair and glasses.

"Sirius Black." answered the other, a boy with longer, dark hair and a complacent smile.

"James and Sirius," she said like she was pondering connotations of their names, "So you're the guys I'm going to have to watch, huh?" she said, smirking. She had a feeling that, with time, in spite of the fact that they clearly goofed off everywhere else, they wouldn't goof off with her simply because she had a tendency to create a more free and casual environment.

"Well, if you really want to watch us, we won't stop you." Sirius replied, basking in the laughter of his classmates.

"Very funny." she answered sarcastically as she gave Severus a don't-worry-about-them smile that caused him to blush a bit more. "Now, before we start the actual lesson for today, does anyone already know what a bezoar is?" she asked.

The Gryffindor girl sitting next to Severus raised her hand and Magdalena called on her. She had long, flaming red hair that reminded her of Liam back at the lab and emerald colored eyes. "What is your name?" Magdalena asked.

"Lily Evans." the girl replied. James let out a faint whistle in the back.

"Lily, what is a bezoar?" Magdalena asked, ignoring him.

"A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat that will save you from most poisons." she said, sounding a bit unsure of herself.

"Yes, correct. Good job, Lily." Magdalena said. It's odd that I asked two questions and the answers came from two kids who were sitting next to each other but don't at all look like the kind of people who would be friends, she thought. Oh yeah, Sluggy used to pair up students based on skill level so that the slackers wouldn't rely on the smart kids for everything. A technique of his that I actually agreed with.

"Are you all in lab pairs?" she asked, just to make sure.

Lily nodded.

"Good. That makes my job easier." she said, with a comical sigh of relief. "Now, I don't expect you to take my word, or more accurately, Lily's word, for it. Everyone come up here and get one of each of the supplies." she said, as she motioned to some equipment she had set up on the desk in front prior to the start of class. The students all jumped up enthusiastically as if this was their first experiment and got right to work.

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When class was over, Magdalena sat back and silently listened to the most avid talkers among the students. They were giving her a positive review so she surreptitiously slipped back into her office and shut the door so she could cheer and do a little dance of success. What a professional I am, she thought to herself. Absurdity was much more acceptable in her little lab with Liam where they could play the roles of mad scientists than among students who would tell their other teachers that the new potions professor was having seizures in her office while loudly shouting.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door that caused her to jump. After giving herself a few seconds to calm down, she answered it, surprised to see Severus standing there, looking embarrassed.

"Oh, hello." she said. "What is it?" she asked, smoothing down her hair that had gotten quite messed up when she was jumping around.

"Well, I have a free period now and I don't have any homework so I was wondering if you needed any help organizing the potions closet or, well, you probably don't have any papers to correct but if you need any help with anything else. . ."

Magdalena grinned. She felt bad for him all over again. She couldn't exactly relate to the torturous emotions of liking a teacher but she could certainly imagine.

"Well, when I went into the potions closet everything seemed really out of order. If you could create some sort of system, that would be a big help." she suggested.

He looked happily up at her. "Okay, Professor Lumairo."