Chapter Thirteen

A/N: Hi everyone, thanks for all the reviews I got for Chapter 12!!! To those of you who took the time, you're amazing, I keep writing because you keep reviewing! So thanks to: Emzer92, Dare2dream00, TwilightForever93, ELAELAELA, drakeundone, Oh. Its. Her, CheeseFace, Raelliin Cullen Potter deSilva, nbf4eva, TanyaUchiha, James018, wallytops, FrequentlyDazzled93, Sapphire Serina Riddle, amylily123 ChocolateGal16, corinne, Twin of Alice, AshlingDervil and blackfeatherlass ….. If I've forgotten anyone, please tell me!!!

Special thanks on this chapter to wallytops, who gave me the idea and helped a lot, and to Haze-Ox and Emzer92, who actually spoke the words involved in one part of Jake and Rose's argument…

Um, I had a bit of a scare Sunday night, one of the girls who plays Gaelic football on my club's senior team had a pretty serious neck injury and is in a neck brace….. Not to turn this into a sob story, but if anybody who reads this could keep her in your thoughts, I would really appreciate it…..

Love,

Ciara

x x x

Jake's POV:

While everybody else was off in Seventh Year Transfiguration learning to turn into animals (Ha! I was sooo gonna ace that spell when we covered it…) Nessie and I were sitting in the highly-perfumed Divination classroom, listening to a demented-looking woman in oversized glasses and wearing a couple of hundred strings of beads around her scrawny neck droning on about the proper way to read tealeaves. As far as I could see, it was just a pile of soggy brown stuff in the bottom of a china cup. The only message I was getting from the mush was that Divination was a waste of time.

There was one upside to it though. Blondie wasn't in this class. In fact, she wasn't in any of my classes. Wow. It was kinda quiet without her, and a little boring. Weird, but I sort of missed our blazing arguments. They were certainly a better use of my time than sitting here, getting high off the perfumed flames coming from the fire.

"Professor!" called a girl with two fuzzy auburn plaits in a shrill voice. "Professor, what does this symbol mean?"

Professor Trelawney floated over to where the girl sat perched on the edge of her pouf, staring at the contents of the teacup as though she was hoping they could tell her the winning numbers in next week's national lottery. She picked up the cup with a bejewelled hand and examined the contents closely. Eventually, she stared down sadly at the girl.

"My dear," she said in a hushed voice, as though the girl was on her deathbed. "You have the Grim!"

"Oh not again," groaned Ginny Weasley, sitting somewhere behind me. "She told Michael Corner that in Third Year and he's still alive and kicking. What a load of rubbish!"

I was in complete agreement with her.

"What's the Grim again?" asked a boy with dark hair which had bleached-blonde tips. He looked like a gormless hedgehog.

"It's that big, ugly dog thing," his friend replied. "You know, like a werewolf. It's evil, brings death wherever it goes."

A couple of whispered conversations broke out at this, but Ginny Weasley just snorted with laughter, an action I echoed with gusto.

Professor Trelawney turned on us, looking scandalised.

"Mr. Black, is it? My dear, perhaps you ought to take things a bit more seriously." She looked at my pityingly, which annoyed me. "You don't seem to have much of an aptitude for this subject. Perhaps if you paid more attention, you wouldn't be struggling quite so much."

That did it. I couldn't help but lose my temper. Who did this sherry-drinking old witch (that doesn't sound nearly as insulting when it's true…) think she was, telling me I was behind the rest of the class? How could you possibly be behind in a stupid class about fortune-telling and voodoo, with a teacher who couldn't predict the future if you paid her?

"Calm down Jake," Nessie whispered. "Someone will notice."

She had hardly spoken when the frizzy-plaited girl gave a little shriek and leapt out of her seat.

"Professor!" she squealed. "Professor, Jacob's shaking. Maybe he's ill!"

Everyone looked at me, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't control the shivers racking my body as I attempted to stem my anger. Turning into a wolf right here in the middle of Pointlessness 101 might just give the game away…

"I'm fine," I blurted through clenched teeth, though nobody looked at all convinced. Professor Trelawney teetered towards me in a whirl of cardigans and multi-coloured beads, looking like a walking advertisement for Mardi Gras. She swept up the steps and pressed a hand to my forehead.

"My dear, you're burning up!" she exclaimed. "Ms Evans, show him to the hospital wing immediately!"

Of course, it would be the squeaky redhead. Still shaking with suppressed rage, I snatched up my schoolbag and stalked out of the classroom, leaving Professor Trelawney looking like a wide-mouthed tree frog and Nessie biting her lip with worry. The redhead scuttled after me, looking pleased with herself.

"The hospital wing is this way," she trilled, her voice irritatingly high-pitched, as though someone like Blondie had sucked on helium before speaking. "I'm Bianca by the way, I hope you're not mad that I told Professor Trelawney you looked sick, it's just that it's scary when you know someone isn't well and you're worried about them and…"

On and on it went. The girl talked more about her own thoughts on my mysterious illness than Alice did about clothes. Seriously, what did she think she was, some kind of freaky genius girl? As far as I could tell, witches and wizards didn't study normal stuff like science and biology, so how the hell would she know what was wrong with me? God, she actually was like a red-haired version of Rosalie… The thought of two Blondie's was almost enough to make me actually feel sick.

"So here's the hospital wing," Bianca chattered, pulling me through a set of doors onto a longish ward with beds lined up on either side. It was empty of patients as far as I could tell, except for the bed at the end of the ward on the right, but the curtains were pulled around that one.

"Madam Pomfrey," Bianca called, still sounding like the long-lost sister of Alvin and the Chipmunks. "Madam Pomfrey, Jacob has a fever or something!"

"Let me look at you," said a pleasant, female voice. A plump woman with a kind smile whipped out from behind the curtains and bustled down the ward to where I stood. She had caring brown eyes, and her brown hair was flecked with grey. She looked rather tired, but assessed me professionally with shrewd eyes.

"He's running a fever and keeps shaking," Bianca piped up, in what she seemed to think was a helpful manner. Personally, it just made me want to tie her to one of these hospital cots and leave her there. Permanently. But that wouldn't be fair. Then this nice nurse lady would have to put up with her. I didn't want to drive anyone to murder… Unless Blondie was their intended victim. Then I would supply them with the weapon and be their accomplice.

Madam Pomfrey reached up and put a hand to my forehead. She pulled her fingers away as though she'd been burned. Which she probably had. My body temperature was so high that the phrase 'you could fry an egg on his forehead' wasn't a figure of speech anymore.

"My dear, you're running a very high temperature. I think you'd best stay here until we can sort you out. Hop into one of the beds down this end if you don't mind, Mr Malfoy is down the end. He had quite a nasty accident in Potions and I think it's best to keep a safe distance where possible. The smell is rather putrid. Hurry on now."

And despite my protests, I was forced into a set of spare pyjamas and thrust into the nearest bed. She might look tiny, but Madam Pomfrey was deceptively strong.

So I endured a couple of hours of pointless poking and prodding as she attempted to figure out how I was still alive when the temperature I was running indicated that I should be dead. Eventually she decided to give me a dose of some foul-smelling potion. I almost choked trying to swallow the steaming liquid, and spit most of it out into a potted plant on my bedside locker when Madam Pomfrey wasn't looking.

All of this would have been fine, if it hadn't been for the visitor I got when the rest of the school was at dinner.

"You have someone here to see you dear," the nurse said, adjusting my sheets as she left me, presumably, in peace with my visitor. Peace? Yeah, right.

Blondie was standing at the foot of my bed, a bunch of grapes in one hand and wearing a malevolently smug expression. She sniggered at the sight of me sitting hunched over in the bed, feet dangling over the end and kneecaps showing in pyjamas that were at least two sizes too small for my huge frame.

"Poor Jacob," she teased evilly, tossing her hair as she contemplated what to do. "Look at you, an invalid in a hospital bed. It'd be sooo easy to torture you right now….. Sounds fun, don't you think?"

I was about to respond with an x-rated swear word when a better idea struck me. Now I was the one grinning.

"Madam Pomfrey," I called as she changed the sheets on a bed nearby. "Rosalie here is feeling a little ill. Maybe you should check her out." I looked at Blondie with mock concern.

"No, no I'm fine, really," she said hurridly.

"She just doesn't want to worry anyone." I almost laughed at the idea of Blondie taking anybody else's feelings into account.

"You do look rather pale, dear," Madam Pomfrey fretted. She put a hand to Blondie's forehead. "You're freezing! Into bed at once, and I'll whip up some Pepper-Up Potion. No arguments."

And despite Blondie's protests, she was bundled into the bed opposite mine and dressed in some rather unflattering cotton pyjamas. She glared at me wickedly as she gamely swallowed the hot potion the nurse offered her.

Then Madam Pomfrey came over and put a new cold flannel on my forehead. I screamed as the cold water hit my warm brow. Blondie sniggered as soon as the nurse was out of earshot.

"Only your fellow dogs could have heard that, it was so high-pitched."

"Well you're a bitch, so I guess you had no trouble then," I smiled back sweetly as she eventually got the joke. "Blondes," I muttered under my breath.

"How dare you?" Blondie shrieked furiously. We glared across the small space at each other, neither one of us blinking as we attempted to out-stare the other.

"Could you two please be quiet? Mr. Malfoy is trying to sleep, so stop squabbling like children." Madam Pomfrey frowned as she pulled across both sets of curtains, interrupting our battle for the moment. There was a moment of silence, then-

"I know you're still staring at me Blondie."

"What, have you got X-ray vision now, dog?" she spat back.

"I can't help it if you're obsessed with me, I am absurdly good-looking."

"I'd rather stick pins in my eyes."

"Feel free."

"I wouldn't give you the satisfaction. But if you want to, go ahead, be my guest. I'll even supply the pins."

"What, are you going to slice them off the metal pole you've got stuck up your butt?"

Maybe being stuck in the hospital wing wasn't so bad after all. After all, I had Blondie to wind up, and Malfoy was sick as a dog (no pun intended) too. Things were looking up, even if I was stuck in too-small pyjamas in a hospital bed when the only thing that was wrong with me was that I occasionally turned into a giant wolf…..

Every cloud has a silver lining and all that…