Nobody even listened. They kept on chucking food at the people they hated and occasionally missing except for Snape who always missed. Sirius had been a Beater for Quidditch in his school days and he also was a very good shot anyway, so all of his pudding ended up splattering on Snape's face (except for the pudding he ate, of course). Snape finally gave up on trying to throw his pudding after that, though.

The voice shouted again: "QUIET!!!"

It turned out to be Hermione's. She was holding back Kreacher, who was pulling Snape's hair. "Now, let go of Snape's hair, and let him go, Kreacher, it's not nice to pull people's hair, even if—"

"No, let him, Hermione," said Sirius, who was evidently enjoying seeing Snape's hair pulled.

"Sirius—" she began, but she had to laugh when Snape tried to kick Kreacher's foot but missed as the little elf jumped nimbly out of the way. "Well, all right, but just don't hurt him, Kreacher, okay?"'

Kreacher's only response was another smack at Snape.

"Get—off—me—Ouch!" yelled Snape, since Kreacher had just pulled extra-hard on his hair. Finally he managed to kick Kreacher away and walk up to Sirius, who glared. Snape glared right back.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" said Sirius calmly but there was some coolness behind his words as he looked at his enemy. "Maybe if I liked you better I wouldn't tell you how you're so ugly…"

"ARE YOU SAYING I'M UGLY?" shouted Snape.

"Why, yes, I suppose I am…" said Sirius happily, dodging Snape's fist; the Potionsmaster's other fist was balled up in his pocket where his wand probably was. "Well, no, not unless you count my saying you're so ugly, you'd scare Frankenstein right out the window…At least his nose isn't a cucumber-shaped–"

"Shut UP!" said Snape, and this time he had his wand out; pointing it right at Sirius's face, he obviously let loose a trip jinx or something, because Sirius fell backwards then. Meg made an angry noise, went to the place where Sirius and Snape had been fighting, and slapped Snape right on his face.

"Meg—" said Snape, but she just slapped him again and Sirius got up, smiling.

"If your stupid wife-to-be wasn't going to slap me a third time, I could say you're still the stupid, insulting poop-face you always were and always will be and—MEG, IF YOU SLAP ME ONE MORE TIME, I SWEAR I WILL JINX YOU! I'M ONLY TELLING BLACK THE TRUTH!"

"If you jinx her, I'll jinx you till you're reduced to a single-cell life form," Sirius growled at him.

"Don't you dare," said Snape, lighting his wand and holding it up to his face for a dramatic effect. "If you lay so much as a finger on me…" He lowered his voice to a whisper. "I'll tell on you."

"There's nothing to tell about."

"Yes, there is," said Snape sinisterly. "There's nothing to stop me from telling where you're hiding. I can tell the Ministry, and they'll send you back to the dementors and I'll finally be happy again."

"You wouldn't," said Sirius quietly.

"I would," said Snape, smiling evilly and extinguishing his wandlight. "What's to stop me? Nothing, that's what, except you, and you know perfectly well they're never going to listen to you."

"There is something to stop you," said Meg angrily. "Me! Did you just tell him you would be happy if somebody handed him back to the dementors? What sort of creep are you, Snape?" She had her own wand out and pointed it at Snape, who put his hand on her shoulder and pushed her away.

"You get off her!" said Sirius, pushing Snape hard.

"Then why don't YOU get off ME?" Snape yelled. "I'm tired of her calling me a creep, tired of you informing me on how ugly I am, tired of you throwing pudding at me and getting me EVERY SINGLE TIME—"

He said a swearword and Celeste piped up, "Severus, really, I wouldn't have expected it of you!"

"Then you obviously don't know him very well," said Sirius, turning to her. "What, has he been acting nice around you or something? I think you should get to know him a little better, Celeste."

"I do know him!" Celeste shouted in his face. "What sort of horrible person are you, Black? What have you done to Severus to make him hate you so? I know what you did when you were in school, you tripped first years and laughed when they cried, with your stupid friends and everything…"

"Tripping first years?" said Sirius. "I didn't—I never—"

"No, he would never!" Meg nearly screamed at Celeste. "What kinds of lies are you making up about him, anyway? I happened to know those four when I was in school, and they never tripped anybody or did anything bad like that, one of them was a prefect, for goodness sake! Lies, they are!"

She leaned into Sirius, who stroked her hair and glared at the pair of Snape and Celeste. "She's absolutely right, Celeste, you're lying. We might have been a bit annoying, but—but that's like Slytherins! You must have got us confused with—with Snape! You told her those lies, didn't you, Snape?"

Snape seemed to be caught then, because it had been him indeed who had told Celeste how Sirius and his three best friends had gone around school "tripping first years and sniggering". He scowled. "Well, I might have told Celeste those things, but I'm sure you've told Meg some bad stuff about me?" He looked at the pair of them angrily. "Or do you guys not talk, is it all snogging like I've seen—"

"I sure do tell her bad stuff about you," said Sirius viciously. "Never lies, though!"

"Severus, you were lying?" Celeste whispered. "I can't believe it…I just can't believe it…I know you two don't get along well, but I didn't think you would make up lies. It's below you."

"No, it's not," said Sirius angrily.

"You shut up," said Celeste…and clapped her hands over her mouth. "Sorry…I just…well, this dinner party or lunch party or whatever it's supposed to be, it's—it's not fun. It ought to have been fun. Everybody's fighting and yelling and Severus and Sirius Black are fighting and throwing stuff and—"

"Hey," said Lockhart, wandering out of the kitchen and smiling at everybody. "I heard a big old noise in this kitchen and I thought, I should be in the kitchen! Because there is chocolate here, in the kitchen, for me, and I want the chocolate in the kitchen and the chocolate in the kitchen is delicious and JUST GET ME SOME CHOCOLATE WILL YOU?" Lockhart laughed. "That was my impression of Severus."

"I don't like chocolate," said Snape meanly.

"Well you yell a lot so that makes up for you hating chocolate," said Lockhart sadly. "And you should like chocolate, anyway, because it's good for your heart. Vegetables make you fat you know."

"You idiot, they don't!" said Snape. "Actually, chocolate is supposed to make you fat. Vegetables are the stuff you have to eat…too bad you can't use them in potion-making or something…"

"This isn't what we were arguing about in the first place, anyway," said Sirius loudly. "It's not about what makes you fat or what doesn't" ("Phew," sighed Meg, who had been alarmed when Lockhart said the vegetables make you fat) "it's about the fact that Snape said bad lies about me with no reason."

"Not no reason!" said Snape. "I'm just cleverer than you are. If you'd thought of lying about me, I know you would've done it first. Nope…you were just too stupid to make up lies."

"Why?" asked Sirius, mock-sweetly. "Why in the world would I lie about you?"

"Obviously, so your wife-to-be" ("That's right," said Meg) "wouldn't go after me," said Snape, with an air of self-satisfaction. "Yup. You obviously thought she was getting a bit detached from you" ("I would never!" said Meg) "and then you told her lies about me so she'd like you better."

"First of all," said Sirius angrily, "I never told her lies about you at all, and secondly—"

"Right!" shouted Snape, just as furiously. "She's so smitten with you, she can't even get her mind off you long enough to register that I would obviously be a better husband than you, Black."

"I don't care!" shouted Meg. "I know you can't be a better husband than he is! I don't even know how you treat your women, considering I was under a Romance Charm all the time I let you be romantic with me, so I don't really remember anything. You know how I know you couldn't be better?"

"How?" Snape said, looking angry.

"Because nobody could be better than my Sirikins," said Meg rather romantically, going to Sirius and attaching to him like she did. "Compared to him, Snape, you're just a stupid, dumb–"

"SEE?" roared Snape. "HE'S TURNED YOU AGAINST ME!"

"What does it even matter to you, Severus?" said Celeste, coming. She could hardly see for the tears now clouding up her brown eyes. She was also having difficulty speaking. She was as obsessed with Snape nearly as much as Meg was with Sirius (and that was really saying something). "I thought you were over her. I thought you loved me now. I thought—I thought you wouldn't mind Black…"

"It doesn't matter to me at all, sweetheart," said Snape, seeing Celeste crying.

"Really?" said Celeste, hugging him sweetly. "You're so good to me Severus…as for you, Black, I just don't see how someone wonderful as Severus…could be bad." And they kissed right there.