Livia briefly considered what the Winter Ball might have felt like if she had danced with Bill at last year's event. The "what if" aspect might have tormented someone else, but Livia recognized how happy she was as things stood. No anxiety. No expectations, good or bad. She risked nothing and therefore could really smile and bask in Bill's full attention, even if only for part of an evening. He still had no idea, so he also enjoyed a stress-free night dancing with a girl he had never truly seen until her friends took the time to show how pretty she could look. He already knew her to be kind, modest and hugely talented. He had never thought about how she looked, but he did wonder then if Bill and Livia made a better-looking dancing couple than Bill and Emilia had.
Livia only wondered about how the evening would end. She noted that he saw her somewhat differently than he had before but felt it would not translate into any sort of relationship. He had other plans to find his own way first after he graduated. That would not change, no matter what. She still had to work with him, in any case, so their friendship mattered above anything else. Yet at the end of the night, he walked with her outside briefly and wanted to ask her something as they stood alone on the bridge next to the courtyard, with him loaning her his jacket. For some reason, she could not anticipate what he wanted to ask her.
"Livia, have you ever kissed a boy?" he inquired.
She had trouble accepting that he had caught her off-guard. "Um, no," Livia answered.
"I think it high time someone fixed that," he said. He pulled her towards him and gently, tenderly kissed her. He almost pulled her off her feet, or she sure felt like she was floating.
She could not prevent responding had she wanted to do so and had trouble pulling back. It may not have been the most passionate embrace, but if anyone had seen it, it definitely could not be called chaste or a peck, either. It lasted way too long for either of those two words to apply.
He leveled with her. "I know you will not misunderstand me," he began. "Some people meet future spouses here, but I never planned on doing that. Dating became a social hobby – I guess one I took for granted because I never had problems asking girls for dates. I know that does not describe your time here."
"True, it does not," she admitted.
"I wanted to do what I did, but we have to work together, at least to some degree," he continued. "So I hope I do not insult you if I do not ask you out and we do not start dating."
"I understand," Livia stated. "I basically thought I was the equivalent of your little sister."
"She is a lot younger than you are," he revealed. "Still, I admit that your assessment has a lot of truth to it. I definitely do not want to hurt you, and if we did date, I think I would at some point do precisely that. You do not deserve that, and I doubt I will change soon – certainly I highly doubt anyone could change me. Young women sometimes think they can 'fix' a boyfriend, and they usually set themselves up for a lot of disappointment, instead, like Emilia."
"I agree," Livia said. "I have witnessed fights over this very thing, including your own."
"Some young man who finds himself ready will be most lucky to win you fairly," Bill observed. "Make sure you wait for the right one – no matter how long it takes or how unlikely it seems. I know I am willing to wait for the right time to find the right girl."
They walked back inside and he accompanied her as far as a Gryffindor student could go to the Ravenclaw rooms. He hugged her, and she welcomed and returned his embrace. He took his jacket back and kissed her hand. Then as he let go of her hand, they bid each other goodnight.
Livia discovered that she had been the last one in the room to return from the Winter Ball. Everyone had seen her dancing with Bill Weasley and peppered her with questions like would they start dating, did he kiss her goodnight, what happened to his original date, did she hex his date and even did she make money off what happened to him, which no one had seen coming.
"First, let me thank Shelley, Athena and Selene for helping me look decent tonight," Livia acknowledged. "I never fully imagined it would matter in the slightest."
"Oh you tease!" Shelley squealed. "What happened?"
"Well, as some of you suggested, I did make a wager on him," Livia replied. "I did not see it was him until after I turned around to see that the first person to tell me I had to be wrong was his brother, Percy."
"Oh, he must have been shocked," Athena mused.
"He definitely was, but he and the rest all paid up," Livia responded. "I got more money off that than I think any other prediction I ever made." She lifted up her pillow and showed them all the money she had collected that night. "At least half of that came from that one wager."
"That is quite a haul," Ted observed. "And you did nothing to Bill's date?"
"No," Livia answered. "He told me the story, since I followed him outside the Hall when he walked out. He has no interest in finding a wife here, and his date had other ideas about their future. When he informed her casually of possible plans that did not include her, she got upset and left. We talked for some time when he suggested that, instead of sitting there, we could go back inside and enjoy the Winter Ball together."
"You sure did," Shelley asserted. "I find it hard to believe you are not together now."
"We aren't," Livia admitted. "Bill explained himself quite well and said he was concerned that he would hurt me eventually if we dated because he had no intention of changing his view of his schooling. Then, there is the matter of us working together for the club dance."
"I don't know if I would care about that, if I were you," Athena stated.
"Indeed," Livia said. "Believe-you-me, if I thought there was a chance he would waver on that first point, I might have said something different. But he said it himself, girls make a grave mistake if they think they can change or fix their boyfriends. He needs to do what he needs to do, and I needed to let him go. So I did."
"I don't know how he could walk away from you," Ted wondered.
"Well, he did not do so immediately, or I would have returned before the rest of you did."
"Are we getting to the juicy part, yet?" Don asked. Everyone seemed to be listening.
"What do you consider juicy, Don?" Livia put to him.
"It would start if he actually kissed you – more would be nice, too," he responded. "Those girls worked hard. Tell them they did it for something."
"Okay," Livia conceded. "He did."
"Did what?" Ted asked.
"He kissed me on the bridge beyond the courtyard," Livia revealed.
You would have thought the Quidditch team had clinched the House Cup. Everyone seemed to be uproarious cheering. "Anything else?" Ted asked.
"After he explained himself, he walked me back to the Ravenclaw dorm area and hugged the stuffing out of me and kissed my hand before he left."
"I mean the kiss," Ted specified. "C'mon, spill girl. Everyone here wants to know. We won't tattle on you."
"It was nice," she answered. "It wasn't really a peck or timid, but it wasn't really sloppy or desperate or overly intense, either. I mean, he did not kiss his sister, but I would not call it a make-out session."
"Did it last more than five seconds?" Don inquired.
Livia could not understand how or why they wanted to dissect this. "I think so, but I may have lost track of time. I thought I was floating out of my shoes."
"Now that is what I wanted to hear," Ted asserted. "That is a real kiss. I wouldn't be walking away from a girl who felt like that. Why should you give up, either?"
"He probably gets that all the time," Don suggested. "He has never lacked for attention from girls. He probably charms his head of house enough to wish she were young enough for him."
"And he doesn't even play Quidditch!" Barry added. Everyone laughed.
The end of the term brought Livia back to London, where she could see that, despite the stress of his studies, Tom had made good progress and his firm and the course instructors seemed satisfied with his work. Alice kept him grounded as well as focused, a great feat for a young woman who had completed her own studies. She gave him space when he needed it and knew when he needed a break. She has an innate sensibility about him.
Alice had not neglected herself either. She took up volunteering at the British Museum giving tours and talking about the historical context of various acquisitions. She also offered help to one of her more highly prominent relatives, helping him sort various family papers and arrange to turn them over to an archive attached to Trinity College, Cambridge University. Alice's knowledge of history and growing skills in dealing with archives as well as her own family tree started giving her opportunities to have access to unpublished documents and the ability to judge what to do with them. As a dedicated student of history, the Victorian habit of destroying anything remotely unflattering never occurred to her. Understanding context and exhibiting a desire to handle material properly overruled any temptation to omit anything. Yet because she seemed evenhanded to the point of remaining true to a source, relatives made her a "go to" person within any part of her heritage to handle documents of potential historical value. Some relations urged her to seek a DPhil and become at least one family's historian, though her background ran into several aristocratic families, who all vied for her attention and skills. She vowed never to go too far forward with such ideas until Tom's career path became more stable.
Thanks to her astonishing profits at the last Winter Ball, Livia deposited some funds and exchanged the rest for currency in sterling that she used for various gifts. Tom and Alice found themselves quite surprised that she had managed to buy both of them a set of presents, along with their relocated cat Abby, who Gary finally let them regain. Tom had thought she would need money, so he wondered how she managed to buy clothes, music and some theatre tickets to Cats,* as a celebration of Abby's arrival.
Tom asked her how she bought these things. She confessed that she had done some chores helping faculty, but much it came from making wagers with students, mostly regarding their own personal affairs.
"As you know, Tom, I can often predict things well," Livia began. "Every year when new students come, I find at least some not warned about wagering against me on anything. I had a particularly good term, though one of my prognostications involved someone I like very much and did not know it concerned him because I could not see his features well until after I made my pronouncement. His brother said my prediction was impossible, so the money poured in, as if I planted him to say that."
"I presume this was the older boy you told us about," Tom suggested.
"It was. I did. I forced myself to get over it, regardless of how much I still like him."
"Was he mad that you made money off his misfortune?" Tom asked.
"No, actually," Livia answered. "He did not even want me to return his brother's wager. He seemed relieved since this girl thought they had a future together, and he inadvertently let her know he had been thinking about a future after graduation that did not include her."
"But you rushed to his side to cheer him up," Tom stated.
"I did."
"Then what happened?" Tom inquired.
"He danced the rest of the night with me," Livia replied.
"Really? Are you two now an item?" Alice asked.
"No," she responded. "He made it clear that he would only hurt me if that happened because he was not interested in a lasting relationship. I let go, rather than try to change his mind."
"Sad but probably wise," Tom observed. "He's what – 17?"
"I think so."
"Yeah, I can't say a 17-year-old would be automatically reliable," Tom mused. Hit and miss. Very self-aware and kind of him not to toy with you. He must actually respect you a lot to not try to take advantage of you."
"Now you know why I like him," Livia offered.
"He may not be mature, but it takes character for him to pull back when he probably could have done something else," Alice asserted.
Christmas went very well. Livia actually received her own large CD player, too, though she internally felt uncertain about how to power it without electricity. She did find an old turntable at a market that felt more certain about using. Seeing Cats also offered a nice break for everyone. Whilst she did manage to speak to both her father and Cathy on the telephone, she remained ambivalent if they wanted to come for a visit, and worse when it seemed they could only do so as a family trip. Livia knew that would include her supposed mother and sister Lydia, and she had resolved not to see either. Instead, she opted to make an excuse to return to school on 7 January, 1988, deciding that scheming to pester Professor Snape totally beat having to deal with her sister. At least he had some respect for Livia and could show her an iota of consideration, though her stunt might change that. She wanted to figure out how to bother him before his birthday, since he especially seemed very put out by her disturbing him on his birthday. She shrunk everything carefully so she could carry it without difficulty and bid Tom, Alice and Abby goodbye. "Nothing personal, but I am not ready to deal with Lydia or your mother, Tom. My condolences to Alice and Abby. Silently, she warned Abby to hide from the sister Tom called Lydia because she had shown a propensity to being abusive to cats and, though Alice, Tom and Tom's sister Cathy could try to stop her, they might intervene too late. Should anything happen to you, Tom's rift with his family would become huge or something worse might happen. Abby said she understood.
Livia, not old enough to use anything else but use a broom, got back to school early on the evening of Thursday, 7 January. She had brought her own food but the staff wanted to ensure they tended to her well. When asked why she came back so soon, she gave them an honest answer: "my adopted brother's family wanted to visit him, and I am not ready to see all of them again, especially a so-called sister who mistreated me for years. I would rather take inventory for Professor Snape than see her." Given that they presumed that doing anything for him had to be a most thankless task, they accepted that Livia wanted to avoid her sister. She would later enlist Hagrid – after visiting her Barn Owl friends – to help her acquire any materials she would need for the new term.
The next day, though, revolved around finding her way into the faculty housing area of the castle and paying a visit to Professor Snape. Livia could not believe she had kept her mimicry of him under wraps for so long. She just had to try it out – though anything beat being in London and being forced to interact with Lydia Woodcock that weekend. She found that she did not need to do much different to get past the security set up to keep students out. Did Professor Snape not tell the building manager, Mr. Filch, to change everything to stop her? Did he forget?
Once again, she confidently but not harshly knocked on his door. Of course, she had no idea for certain if he had returned. The staff response to her statement suggested to her – if she had understood them correctly – that he had. "Albus, I have no time for you today. I actually have several potions to make before the term starts."
In her best mimicry of Professor Snape, she answered in his voice, "If you do not open the door, I will tell Minerva of my secret crush on her this instant."
Professor Snape's eyes widened. Could the headmaster impersonate him? He had to stop this, and if opening the door would do so, he better do it immediately. Then he saw her: a grinning, 15-year-old Livia Woodcock, who added in his voice "Will you let me in, wish you a Happy Birthday and explain why I am here, or do I have to talk to Minerva?"
"You win, get inside before you get us both into a heap of trouble," he responded, rather stone-faced and put out. "Start talking – in your own voice – and first tell me how you managed to start doing mine."
"I have practiced, sir," Livia replied. "I thought if you decided to go after myself or Shelley again, I would use it. The detention would have been so worth it. Helena Ravenclaw helped me get it right. No one else really knows about it right now but you."
"Why did you start this?" he asked.
"On the off-chance, you either tried to use what you found out last summer against me – or that a Ravenclaw student let my personal button to annoy me become known and you tried it."
"You have a button? I have tried for several years to upset you and a student did it. Tell me how, or I will make you sorry for this."
"This second-year boy asked me to read his paper, under the misguided assumption that I would fawn over it and tell him how great he was, rather than tell him how to improve it," Livia stated. "When I made suggestions, he started telling me I could not possibly know what I was talking about because I was just a silly girl."
"Ohhhh, that old misogyny thing," he stated, nodding. "So what happened?"
"I told my roommates about it," she responded. "They likely recall that I have helped them or other members in my house. The three Ravenclaw Quidditch players there decided they wanted to 'have my back,' and they told the whole team, including the female players, how to straighten him out, after conning him to try out for the team. Consequently, he kept his mouth shut and has never bothered me again."
"So no one told Professor Flitwick?" Professor Snape asked.
"I did not and no one else did, to my knowledge," Livia answered.
"I think you know what my button is," he observed.
"You have not told me, but…" Livia paused for a few seconds, pondering, then gave an answer. "You hate if anyone calls you a coward. Who would do that?"
"Correct," he said. "It does not happen often but it has, and it will happen again."
"I don't see it, sir," Livia said, confused. "The fact that you live with so heavy a burden on you makes me think that highly implausible."
"So in addition to amusing yourself with my voice and wishing me a Happy Birthday, why are you here?"
"I didn't get to the birthday part, yet," Livia stated. She sang Happy Birthday in his own voice as well as hers, which struck him as incredibly bizarre. "So why am I here? Two words – Lydia Woodcock."
"I don't understand," he admitted. "Isn't she that horrible alleged sister of yours?"
"She is," Livia admitted. "Tom's family wanted to make a trip to London around now, meaning her, also. I did not want to see her or the mother who thinks she is so great. I could not leave fast enough to avoid that possible fiasco for Tom. I just made sure to warn Alice's cat to steer clear of Lydia, since she attempted to harm Sairy years ago."
"I actually understand this," he said. "I often avoided my father. The two of them might be related. Well, since you insisted on being here, I may as well put you to work. I have a few things to do – all potion-making, not inventory. I have dealt with any minor issues involving that already. Usually, I have little to do during the winter, but it's been unusually cold. Anyway, call this your gift to me."
"You got a deal," she agreed. "As long as I am not in London right now, I am happy."
"Why didn't you try to visit Bill Weasley instead?" Professor Snape asked. "His family would have been only too happy to meet you."
"What?" Livia put to him.
"You dancing with him, after his girlfriend stormed out, was the story of the Winter Ball," he said. "Did you not know that? Some believed you hexed his girlfriend, in fact, though that does not strike me as something you would do, despite what I already know."
"I am not dating Bill Weasley, sir," Livia revealed. "In fact, he told me he was relieved she had left, which is why he went after her in such a slow, deliberate fashion. I think I enjoyed that time with him more because I had ceased to be fixated on the outcome versus the moment."
"I find your status with him very hard to believe, Miss Woodcock," he observed. "Still, choosing to pester me over visiting him suggests that you are not lying."
"To be perfectly frank, he told me he has plans after graduation that do not involve marrying someone he meets at school. He told me that, if he did start dating me, he would just hurt me, eventually, because he did not see ever changing his mind. He felt that, all too often, girls mistakenly think they can change a boyfriend when they cannot."
"Nice of him to level with you," he asserted. "But why did you just accept that? Almost every rule has an exception. Besides, spending over a year with him might be pleasant by itself, too. Did it ever occur to you that you gave up too soon or too easily?"
"One of my roommates pretty much asked the same thing," Livia stated. "I am still more a sister to him and his weakness happens to be blondes. I am obviously not blonde, sir."
"So, is your personal weakness tall, red-haired boys?"
"Actually, no," she admitted. "I never realized how attractive he was or how much I liked him until I spoke to him."
"Doesn't that tell you something?" he asked. "Sometimes other factors can change how one thinks about 'taste' – though there is no accounting for that, anyway."
"I see what you mean, but I will not torture myself over what has already come and gone."
"Given the fact that you should not be here, I think we should get to the room another way. I usually cannot do this here, though. Take my arm sleeve." Part of this was a test to see if apparating to the potion room would make her sick – potentially a punishment – whilst it could be said to benefit her also, since no one would know that she bypassed security keeping students from the faculty quarters during their down time. Livia did not seem sick at all, just shocked to be in a room she knew so well.
"What just happened?" she asked. "I feel like that was some kind of gymnastics."
"It is a skill called apparition," he explained. "I could only transport you if we had a physical connection. Most times, a young person first transported this way gets sick from it. I see you have not. A witch or wizard has to know his or her exact destination to do this – though faculty do not often show students this or do it on campus, so I would appreciate it if you do not mention it. During the term, I cannot really do it. Only the headmaster potentially can. To do this legally, you have to pass an exam and receive a license. You cannot get a license until you are at least 17 years old."
"I see," Livia said. "So what can I do now?"
Professor Snape already had begun to set aside ingredients they would need. "Carry these to where we can use them for potion making." She made several trips to collect everything he put down and she rearranged them in alphabetical order as she placed them on the table in front of the room. When he had joined her, he found her arrangement useful. He pulled out a card from a drawer and placed it before her. "You can make this whilst I work on something else. But mind the tools this time."
Livia read through everything and assembled the ingredients in front of her cauldron, in the order listed on the card. This time, both worked seamlessly without crossing either's use of anything. Every so often, he would look over at her working and, if expressionless, held some sort of admiration for how she worked so diligently yet effortlessly, so technically sound but also with sensitivity and subtlety. He thought about how his own Potions Master would have taken great pride in her, though he said far more to her on paper than he verbally showed anything close to approval. She must have read his comments rather carefully, though, based on what he saw.
With a final few stirs, she had completed her task. Livia asked if he could show her how he preserved potions that took time to mature. He led her step-by-step through the process, storing first his, then hers. "We have two more to do," he revealed. "Next time, show me that you learned how to store these properly." He laid out a card for her next task as he began his own.
If she felt any pressure from what he would ask of her later, she did not show it in the least. The second task went as well as the first, but because Professor Snape had a more challenging potion to make, he did not watch her as carefully. He had to test her potion when she finished. She looked at him quizzically. "I watched more of your work the first time, so I wanted to make sure the second came out as well," he stated. "I know it seems unnecessary, but best I am sure now. Anyway, time to see if you paid attention to storing these. Both require the exact same procedure."
Livia's skills at observation and listening came to the forefront. She very cautiously tended to each to ensure she did not lose anything nor made any missteps. He said nothing as she did one then the second until she finished. "You may have acted a little gingery, because you wanted to get everything right, but eventually you will handle this task more quickly as you feel more comfortable with it."
"Does speed matter a lot?" she asked.
"Not greatly," he answered. "For a few it would matter, but not for the two we just did, which is why I felt comfortable letting you try it."
"Thank you, sir," Livia responded. "I hope you find something to smile about tomorrow – hard though I know it is. I will not attempt to compare my misadventures with yours but will wish you a good day." Livia bowed slightly and retreated to her room, where she would try getting her CD player to work. Feeling a bit stymied, she thought she would ask the headmaster.
Livia found him in his office, and he seemed quite surprised to see her. She explained why she had left London – she wanted to avoid seeing her adopted sister. He wondered why a boggart had not become her. Livia explained her dread did not exactly constitute fear. If she feared anything, it would be that she would feel compelled to hex Lydia or do something underage witches cannot legally do. She knew the girl could not really harm her, but she also knew full well that the girl only grew more petty and spoiled by the day. Livia might relish a little too much doing something that neither he nor the school would like, much less those who had made such laws.
He then wanted to know if her sister had something to do with Livia's visit. Livia shook her head and told him about the gift her brother gave her, which ran on electricity. "I do not know how to make it work here. And I want it to work. My battery-powered items usually work."
"Yes," the headmaster said. "Small items powered with a small amount of energy often work. Indeed, you can use existing energy here to keep them running forever. A more sophisticated device has more difficulty owing to various aspects of electromagnetic interference. You have to isolate the device to protect it then harness energy into where it enters the device. Show me what you want to work."
Livia materialized the item and a disc for it. "Fascinating," he observed. "This plays music?" Livia nodded. He manifested some kind of shield to fit around the device, leaving the end of the cord open. He conjured a small, rectangular box for it to plug into. Then the headmaster instructed her on how to gather energy to feed the box, whose composition he showed her. Since the device had its own speakers as part of it, music started coming out. "You do not need electricity. It is everywhere. You need to control it and direct it and protect things sensitive to it."
"Thank you," Livia told him. "I will remember."
"Tell me before you go," he began. "Do you think you are being challenged sufficiently?"
"In many respects, yes," Livia answered. "But at times I get restless. I do not forever want to be quiet and unnoticed. I try to think of that frustration, as well as my awful so-called sister, when I duel Professor Flitwick."
"I noticed that you seemed to enjoy the attention you got at the Winter Ball. It seems Mr. Weasley finally saw you, perhaps for the first time."
"Well, I put that behind me," Livia admitted.
"Why?"
"Because he made it plain that he had no interest in a starting a serious relationship with anyone right now and did not want to hurt me."
"I see," the headmaster said. "He already did that, though, did he not?"
"Yes, you can say that," Livia replied. "In truth, I hurt myself, and I decided to stop doing that and just enjoy what happened without disappointing myself."
"But what if you gave up too soon?" he inquired. "You may see it as self-protection, but if we never try, we only fail ourselves. You can live with that?"
"You are not the first to ask me if I gave up too soon," Livia answered. "I have to live with what seemed like the most rational thing I could do."
"Feeling something towards another person does not involve reason, or we would reject it every time, given any number of issues," he told her gently. "Your heart and your brain seem estranged, even divided, and only you pay the price for that. Even your dueling skills could improve if you reconciled the two better. Love has its own magic that you should never dismiss. Whether you were right or wrong in this instance, I cannot say, however."
"Can I change the subject?" Livia asked, after returning her CD player to her room. "I did something amusing today. I probably should not tell you this, but…"
"That sounds like you should tell me, especially if you tell a good story."
"I pranked Professor Snape again, since I know he has some strange way of marking his birthday. Since few are here, I figured it served as a good diversion for myself, too."
"Just what did you do?" the headmaster asked, impishly hoping he could laugh at whatever Livia had done.
"He may tell you, but I will do so first," Livia responded. "I knocked on his door and after he told me to go away, thinking I was you, I told him that – then she launched into her mimicry of him, slowing down her speech pattern to match his pace – if you do not open the door, I will tell Minerva about my secret crush on her."
The headmaster laughed hysterically. "Oh, that must have been grand. Remarkable work there. How fast did he open the door?"
"Less than three seconds," Livia said in her own voice.
"How did you get to do his voice so well?"
"I practiced with Helena Ravenclaw. Now only you, she and Professor Snape truly know."
"He will probably tell me by Monday," the headmaster suggested. "You have quite a weapon against him now. Did he punish you harshly?"
"Well, he put me to work," Livia answered. "I guess you could call that punishment."
"Somehow, I doubt you saw it that way," he observed. "He could have done much worse. I hope he found it flattering on some level, given all the other voices you can do."
"It was harder for me to speak someone's voice than sing it, so it took me longer. I have not tried many speaking voices, so I cannot imitate your voice presently, for example."
"Might be for the best," he remarked. They bid each other good night and Livia returned to her room and awaited the return of everyone else from their winter break.
* Author's Note
Andrew Lloyd Webber created the musical Cats based on the 1939 work by T.S. Eliot titled Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. Director Trevor Nunn fashioned one Eliot poem into song lyrics for the production, also. The initial London production ran from 1981-2002.