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19
INTO THE LION'S DEN
MUSICAL MOOD FOR THIS CHAPTER: GREYSON CHANCE - SHUT UP
"You have to earn the magic."
Katie narrowed her blue eyes and pursed her lips, reminding me a little of the tiny freshwater plimpies that lived in the pond behind our house. I could practically feel her thought process as she watched me from her perch on her unmade bed, her legs crossed and her hands gripping her knees; she was itching to contradict me - to tell me that I had imagined James not really wanting to ask me to come to the party and that it was stupid to trust Vala, who had never really cared for me before.
But she didn't. And somehow, this made it worse.
"I'm not going," I said stubbornly, sitting down on my bed with my arms folded in front of my chest.
"I didn't say you should," Katie replied, still acting too calm. Usually, the potential invitation to a Gryffindor common room party should have made her squeal with excitement but, until now, she hadn't even so much as squeaked.
It was weird.
"Good. Because I won't." I was well aware that I sounded a little like a moody toddler, but I couldn't help it; somehow Katie's refusal to challenge my decision had caught me off-guard. Of course, my best friend knew exactly how to push my buttons.
"If avoiding the Potters solves all of my problems, I'd be stupid not to do it." I only just refrained from adding a probing 'right?' at the end and instead swallowed the half-formed word again. It shouldn't even have been up for debate, really: Vala hadn't needed to specify her admonitions for me to understand that the recent surge of dumb rumours about James and me had basically put a target on my back. "Who knows how far the 'fanclub' will go?"
Katie rolled onto her stomach, crushing her discarded WhichStyle magazine underneath her as she smirked up at me. "Can you remember third year, when James was going out with Bea Hargrove for a hot minute and Marie Dollohof wrote a poem about it and then went ahead and published it in the school paper?"
I snorted at the memory. "Or when Trix Bishop read in Witch Weekly that the best way to get a boy to notice you was by putting yourself in their way and she ended up following James for an entire semester?"
"Like a creepy pogrebin." Katie laughed and I felt some of the tension that had been building in my shoulders fizzle out. In the candlelit coziness of the dorm, Vala's performance seemed more ridiculous than sinister, really. After all, while stealing someone's clothes wasn't nice, it also wasn't exactly dangerous.
"This is mental, Kat." I shook my head and let myself fall back onto my bed, staring up at the painted ceiling. "I mean, I have absolutely nothing to do with Albus and I don't even like James."
I could hear Kaite crawling out of her bed, her footsteps shuffling on the floor before she let herself fall down next to me with a low sigh. "Do we even know if Vala is trustworthy? I mean, for all we know it's her who fancies James and wants you to back off."
I frowned at her, remembering Vala's flushed cheeks at the kick-off when she had talked about James and how she had called him 'lush as fuck' during sports. "Well, that's stupid."
"Is it, though?" Katie raised an eyebrow at me and I shook my head laughing.
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm just saying." She turned towards me, putting us close enough for me to smell the ginger drop she had just eaten. "James Potter invited you to his party."
"But it's not like that," I said, because it really wasn't; I even doubted that he would have invited me at all if Freddie hadn't brought it up. "And it's not his party."
"So…" Katie drew out the 'o' as she narrowed her eyes at me, "we're not going, right?"
I sighed, my eyes wandering over her shoulder towards Bernice who had rolled out her exercise mat next to her bed, setting up for her Friday night workout routine. "No?"
I looked back at Katie just as Bernice launched into her first set of biceps curls, grunting every time she lifted her 10-kilogram dumbbells. "Or maybe…"
Katie snapped her head back to me, eyes wide and nose touching mine. "Yeah?"
I bit the inside of my bottom lip just as Bernice issued a particularly loud groan. "We could check it out? For a little bit?"
Katie seemed to be holding her breath, her nose still pressed against mine, but then she simply shrugged, like it was all the same to her. "I mean, if you want to…"
"Kat." I rolled my eyes at her which was all it took for her cool facade to crumble and melt into a brilliant smile.
"I love you." She squealed and then pressed a sloppy kiss against my forehead before practically leaping out of my bed, pulling me along with her. "It's going to be great. I can feel it."
"You know, maybe we should go," Sam whispered next to me, his eyes still glued to the towering painting of the Fat Lady, who famously guarded the entrance to Gryffindor Tower. He had been sitting in the Ravenclaw common room, watching Hector Chang and Adina Singer snogging ostentatiously for the entire world to see, and the expression on his face had seemed to get gloomier with every second.
We couldn't have left him there, really.
"No," I said, sounding much braver than I really felt. "We're going in." It was the first time I had been invited to the Gryffindor common room and - while I liked to tell myself that it really was no big deal - the prospect of facing what - or rather who - was inside, made my stomach churn.
"OK great," Katie said on my other side. "Could we just maybe try to look a little less scared?"
She was right, of course. I couldn't go in there looking like I was afraid; even if there were a bunch of slightly unhinged fangirls out there who probably wanted to claw my eyes out.
What I needed was composure.
"Right," I sighed and looked up at the Fat Lady, who had started to languidly inspect her nails, pretending she had not been listening to our conversation. "Um, cornua arborea?"
"Is that a question?" She inspected me slowly, her dark eyebrows arched as her gaze wandered from my trainers up to my slightly messy waves. Until now, I hadn't even considered that this could potentially end in yet another wardrobe disaster.
"Um, no?"
The Fat Lady rolled her heavily made-up eyes, but her portrait swung forward nonetheless, releasing a sudden burst of loud music and bubbly voices that spilled into the dark corridor, filling the silent castle with life. A glowing cylinder of light came from the door-shaped hole in the wall that had been revealed by the portrait, opening the view to a dimly lit room that seemed to be bursting with people.
"Oh, don't mind me," the muffled voice of the Fat Lady made me snap out of my daze momentarily. "I'm just hanging around here."
"Right, sorry!" I called and, with Katie and Sam following in my wake, I climbed through the hole, ignoring the voice in my head that told me to run into the other direction.
Considering what I had heard about Gryffindor parties - including thrilling tales of impromptu sword fights - it really didn't seem that bad. At least it was much better than the Halloween party; the common room looked actually cosy and inviting, with fires and candles casting a warm glow over red velvet wingback chairs and haphazardly placed coffee tables. Groups of people were either sprawled over the chairs and sofas or stood huddled together in circles, talking over the moderately loud music that seemed to come from no visible source.
Some had glanced our way when they had noticed the portrait hole opening but hadn't seemed particularly surprised to find a couple of Ravenclaws crashing their party. I supposed it wasn't uncommon for people from other houses to be invited, although I could tell that we were definitely outnumbered.
"So, should we just, uh." Sam scratched the back of his head, looking slightly lost as he scanned the vast room. Like Ravenclaw tower, the Gryffindor common room had apparently adapted to the growing number of students by expanding magically over the years and adding bits and pieces whenever needed, evolving into a quite complex structure.
"Get drinks?" Katie supplied, nodding towards a couple of tables in the corner which were laden with all sorts of alcoholics that were definitely not permitted in the dorms. "Yeah, I think that's a great idea." She led us to the makeshift bar and immediately began to grab various bottles, pouring them into three plastic cups while Sam was watching her with wide eyes, looking fascinated.
"I didn't know you could mix drinks."
"She can't," I said, rolling my eyes. "She's just randomly pouring things together."
I had to admit that the way Katie flourished the bottles as she picked them did look somewhat purposeful but I knew that she was simply going for the ones that looked the flashiest.
"That doesn't mean it's not good," she said in a sing-songy voice before thrusting a cup into each of our hands. Whatever she had put in there was neon green and looked entirely toxic. "Cheers!"
She tipped her drink towards us and Sam and I echoed her toast before, after exchanging a quick look, lifting the cups to our mouths to mimic Katie who seemed to have downed half of her drink already. The moment the liquid touched my lips, however, I felt the strong urge to gag: an overdose of sugary sweetness combined with artificial flavours numbed the inside of my mouth for a second, but I swallowed, forcing the drink down my throat until only a burning sensation was left.
"That was horrible." Sam spluttered in between coughs, shaking his head like a wet dog. While I had taken a sip, he had downed the cup to it's dregs. "Can I get another one?"
"Sure." Katie beamed and took the empty cup out of his hand. "Seth?"
I quickly shook my head, indicating my still half-full plastic cup. The pungent taste in my mouth had faded into a pleasant, buzzing warmth that tingled in my arms and legs and I knew that, after that drink, I wouldn't need much else tonight except for a good headache cure. "I'm good. You two go ahead."
Katie and Sam crowded around the surprisingly well-stocked bar again and I took the opportunity to look around a bit, taking in the scene while nibbling half-heartedly on my toxic drink. Since I didn't have any Gryffindor friends I had never been to their tower before and, even though the structure should have been somewhat similar to Ravenclaw, their common room looked nothing like ours. Naturally, there was a lot of red and gold in the form of banners and posters, but there were also less bookshelves crowding the high walls which gave the room an airy feeling. More cozy lounging opportunities were grouped around low-slung tables, now laden with bowls of crisps, sundry wrapping papers, and plastic cups, making the place look more like a trendy coffee shop than a boarding school common room and I wondered if that was also part of the castle's magic; adapting not only to the number of students but also to their specific needs and preferences.
"Is it weird that I'm kind of disappointed you're not wearing pyjamas?" A deep voice suddenly said next to my ear and I jumped, spilling bits of the disgusting drink on my new jumper.
"Jesus Christ!"
"Sorry," James said, obviously trying to keep a straight face, but a smile was tugging at the corners of his mouth as he examined the green drops of liquid that were slowly sinking into the light pink fabric. "I didn't mean to scare you."
"Then maybe you shouldn't jump on people from behind." I wiped my sticky hands on my jeans and was grateful that it gave me something other to do than having to look at James and his stupid dark green sweatshirt that unfortunately brought out the amber colour of his eyes.
"Right." He smirked and took a sip from the plastic cup he was holding. I caught a whiff of something sharp and tangy and it tickled in my nose. "You seem generally jumpy when I'm around."
"Dear Merlin." I rolled my eyes at him, though - strangely - I could feel a smile pull on my lips nonetheless. I wasn't as annoyed by his arrogance as I should have been and the only explanation was that Katie's toxic drink had gone straight to my head. "You're right. My world revolves around you, James Potter."
He merely grinned and lifted his cup to his mouth again, all the while holding my gaze. It shouldn't have bothered me, but I couldn't help shifting my weight uncomfortably as I felt the sort of nervous tingle behind my chest that wasn't unlike the one I got right before a big exam. "So, how was detention?"
He had barely finished his question when the music suddenly surged and a bout of cheers swept across the room like a wave. It was infectious, really, and the crowd leapt at it hungrily, hands thrust into the air and bodies moving.
"Just a couple of second years who set off a slime slushie!" I had to shout over the thick beats that vibrated along the floor, mingling with exuberant out-of-tune singing and wild laughter and James turned his head down to me.
"Where?" He was close enough that I could smell the mixture of alcohol and mint on his breath and I wondered what he'd had to drink - how much he'd had to drink. Around us, the room was getting more crowded by the minute, turning the air hot and sticky as people pushed past, glassy stares sliding over us in passing with vague interest, and I felt a surge of unease: Vala's warning had been looming in the back of my head like an ominous shadow and, despite my previous declaration that I wouldn't let myself be scared by a bunch of hormone-ridden fangirls, my cousin's words felt slightly more sinister outside the safety of my dorm room.
But this - telling James about detention and slime slushies - wasn't anything to be jealous of, right? I had registered the unnatural amount of shoulders that brushed against his in regular intervals, how the crowd seemed to condense around him like magnets that just couldn't help themselves. He must have talked to dozens of people tonight - probably even more than talked. After all, James Potter was never alone.
"Um, third floor, next to the Transfiguration classroom," I said, loud enough for the group of girls that had been circling us for a solid ten minutes already to hear; let them know that I wasn't trying to throw myself at James. "They mostly got it on themselves, though."
James smiled - wide enough for the dimple on his right cheek to appear - but the music and the singing and the chatter warped his words as he answered and I shook my head at him.
"What?"
"I said," he said loudly and then, unexpectedly, took a step towards me, putting us close enough for our bodies to almost touch, "the slime doesn't come off for days." His lips brushed against my ear when he spoke and I almost dropped my drink from shock. I would have stumbled backwards too like an idiot if it hadn't been for the arm that wrapped around my waist, and I turned my head away from James to find Katie standing behind me, her cheeks glowing bright pink.
"Hey," she said and I could have kissed her for her genius timing. Obviously, I wasn't at all equipped to deal with a sloshed James Potter and I might as well have left him to his adoring fans already who surely were only waiting in the wings to take my place. "I just wanted to let you know that we'll be over there." She pointed vaguely to where the bathrooms were located. "Sam doesn't feel too good."
"Rot, I feel grand!" He practically shouted into my ear and slung a sweaty arm around my shoulder that almost threw me off balance. "You guys are the best," he slurred and tossed his other arm around Katie, looping her into an unsteady group hug. "Bestest. I love you lot."
"We should probably get him back to Ravenclaw," I said, trying to keep Sam from dragging us both down as he swayed dangerously, but Katie quickly pulled him away from me and gently nudged him into the direction of the bathroom.
"No! I mean, I got this." She glanced at James, who - surprisingly - was still there, and then back at me. "You should stay. Really."
I wanted to protest; partly because I didn't want to leave my best friend to deal with a piss-drunk Sam on her own, but also because I needed an excuse to get away from James. Before I could even open my mouth, though, Katie had turned away, her hands on Sam's shoulders as she steered him through the crowd.
"So, I guess his girlfriend wasn't pregnant after all?" James had leaned his shoulder against the wall, one hand buried in the pocket of his jeans, the other still holding the red plastic cup as he arched a dark eyebrow at me.
"No." I sighed and looked down at my artificially neon drink that had gone lukewarm from cradling it in my hands. Considering how fast Sam had been taken out by Katie's questionable bartending skills I doubted that I would give the thing another try. "She thinks I stole her boyfriend, though."
"What?" James sounded weird and I looked up at him, once again caught off guard by his proximity. Had he leaned in more? "And - um - did you?" His eyes seemed to flicker towards my neck where Sam's arm had been just a few minutes ago and I frowned at him.
"Do you really think that of me, Potter?"
He watched me - a little too intently, which I attributed to his lack of sobriety - and then finally shook his head, mouth curving into a perfectly uneven smile. The song changed and the first chords drowned in a sea of cheers that caught my attention for a second, but when I turned back, he was still looking at me, his heavy-lidded gaze traveling lazily across my face as he let his head drop against the wall.
Needless to say, I was entirely out of my depth - mostly because I had the terrifying feeling that if he stared at me like that just a second longer, I might forget that I actually didn't like him - and so I blurted out the first thing that came to my mind. "How did your potions exam go?"
It seemed to take him a moment to catch on, but after a second he smiled and shrugged. "I think I did OK. Thanks to you." His voice was low, barely more than a rumbling hum that carried over the clamour around us, and my stomach did a funny little twist. Maybe Katie's makeshift cocktail was taking its toll after all. "Tell me, Woodley, why are you so good at that stuff anyway?"
I shrugged, though I felt relieved; James was definitely less intimidating when he wasn't drunkenly staring me down. "Oh, um, I just like it."
"But why?" He was still too close and every time he spoke I could feel his breath tickle on my skin, which was absolutely not something that should ever happen in a somewhat friendly conversation between vaguely acquainted classmates. Unfortunately, James Potter seemed to know none of that.
"It's just - it means more." I could have said anything, really; anything that would have gotten me out of this nerve wrecking thing of a conversation that had me seriously question my decision making skills. But the words had tumbled out before I could stop myself and I watched James's eyebrows draw together into a frown.
"OK, what?"
I felt patches of heat flare up on my neck and quickly shook my head to give myself something to do. For a moment, I had actually forgotten who I was talking to - where I was. It definitely was time to leave. "Just… Forget it. I should -"
I had wanted to say 'go', simultaneously scanning the pulsing crowd for traces of Katie and Sam, but they were nowhere to be seen and, before I could even finish my sentence, James pushed himself off the wall and took another step towards me.
"No, explain it to me. Please."
I considered him for a moment, how he studied me with his eyebrows still furrowed and a mildly confused look on his face, wondering if he knew that he was too close; that I was so phenomenally incapable of coping with whatever he was doing that, for a reckless second, I honestly considered just bolting.
I would have if it hadn't made everything a thousand times more awkward, really.
"Potions are complex," I said, shifting my weight from one foot to the other as I avoided looking at the expression on James's face. "It just - it doesn't come easily. You need to be patient and careful and really think about what you're doing." I looked up at him unwittingly, noticing that his frown had deepened. "You have to earn the magic."
My words ebbed away into the bevy of distant chants that were urging some poor soul to 'chug', a manic peal of laughter spluttered over the general din, someone's outcry of 'fucking Weasley' soared above the music just to be taken under by a wave of cheers and ominous metallic clinking, but James didn't move.
All he did was look at me - frowning, unsmiling - and I swallowed, clutching the cup in my hand a little tighter as my body was pushing backwards, urging me to bring some reasonable distance between us - to make him stop looking at me like this.
"There you are!" Arms flew around James's neck and then Athena Notte's lips were next to his neck, moving relentlessly as they shaped whispered words against the shell of his ear. She was smiling, her white teeth flashing now and then, and James had put an arm around her waist to steady both of them as she leaned into him entirely.
If there had ever been a perfect moment to leave, it was this; but my useless legs felt numb and heavy and James's gaze flickered towards me as Athena continued to press into him, her hand clenching his sweatshirt like she was holding on for dear life, and I just couldn't move.
They swam out of focus, merging into a swaying blob of colours, and I suddenly felt sick. The air in the room was dense and heavy and I knew it was going to smother me any second.
"Woodley?" James's voice seemed to come from somewhere far away and I wondered if I had moved after all. "Hey, what's wrong?"
Everything. Everything was wrong.
I couldn't think straight anymore. Random thoughts were chasing each other in my mind, making it impossible to put them into words and my limbs felt heavy and strange, like they belonged to somebody else.
"Woodley!" James's voice echoed somewhere in my head, but he was too far away. "Hey! Woodley!" I felt something warm and sold wrap around my middle, just as my legs gave out. "Shit!"
James was behind a glass wall.
I was behind a glass wall.
A glass box?
And then I was falling - headfirst into the abyss.
She was blurry at first; a blend of dark brown and white that hovered above me, breathing onto my face. Only after I had blinked a couple of times, her face came into focus and her brown eyes narrowed dangerously.
"What the hell -" I wanted to scream but all that came out was a miserable croak. My throat was bone-dry, like I hadn't swallowed for days, and every syllable that tried to push through my vocal chords hurt.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" Vala hissed, her face still only inches from mine. "I told you to just stay away."
I was completely confused and disoriented, struggling to make sense of the situation. I had no idea how Vala had managed to sneak into Ravenclaw tower in the middle of the night, but she was definitely not supposed to be here.
"What are you doing here?" I still sounded like a bulldozer had run up and down my throat, but at least the fog inside my head was dissolving, allowing me to think a little clearer.
"Do you ever listen to anyone?" She hissed under her breath, completely ignoring my question. She was obviously furious with me but I didn't know why. "That's just like that one time we all got new dresses from Grandmother and you jumped into the Carmichaels' muddy pond to catch a fucking tote."
I did remember the Carmichaels' pond and the tote, which I had named Cinnamon, but I still didn't understand what Vala was trying to tell me. Had she snuck into my dormitory just to remind me that I had ruined an impossibly expensive dress as a toddler?
"How did you even get in here?" I demanded, trying to sit up just to fall back down onto my pillow again as Vala's face started spinning wildly. Something was wrong with my head; it felt too light and too heavy at the same time, like it had collided with a rogue bludger.
"Do you know where you are?" Vala asked, her expression softening just a little bit.
I frowned, feeling like this was quite a strange question, considering the circumstances. "Of course I know where I am. What kind of question is that?" I tried to lift my head once again but gave up eventually; all the dizziness was making me nauseous. "I'm in my dorm."
Despite all the angry tension in her face I thought I could detect a hint of sympathy as Vala watched my futile struggle to force my body into an upright position. "Seth, you're in the hospital wing."
"What?" I asked incredulously but, even as I said it, I knew that she was telling the truth; around me, the clean white-sheeted beds were empty and the faint smell of disinfecting potion lingered in the air. Images came rushing back into my head, filling the empty spaces I hadn't even been aware of just a second ago: I had been at a party - the Gryffindor common room - and then there was James Potter's face, way too close.
"What happened?" I rasped, willing my heavy eyelids to stay open; it felt like I had been running a marathon, only without the endorphin-high.
"I warned you." Vala's lips tightened and her gaze hardened again. "They aren't joking. Not about this. Just - stay away, okay?"
"But-" I wanted to protest - to tell her that I wasn't even interested in James; that I wasn't scared of some loony fangirls - but my words blended to a mere slur and I gave up. I was tired and exhausted and my surroundings seemed to be slipping away like they were nothing more but a strange dream.
"You need rest." Vala decided. "Don't tell anyone I was here."
Pale light flooded the airy room when I woke up again. I didn't know for how long I had been sleeping; it could have been a couple of hours or a couple of days. My body felt tired and weak but the lightheadedness seemed to have gotten better and I managed to sit up without collapsing immediately again.
"Finally," Katie said softly, dropping the glossy magazine she had been reading onto her lap. "I thought you'd never wake up." She made it sound like she was joking but I could hear something more weighty underneath her chipper pretence.
"How long have I been out?" I groaned, not sure if I even wanted to know. "I feel like I've been in this bed forever."
"Two and a half days," Katie said, obviously trying to sound as casual as possible. "It's not like you've missed anything. Hogwarts is as boring as ever."
I managed a weak laugh but my throat was still parched and rough, making laughing rather painful. "So, it's what - Tuesday?" I turned towards the window next to my bed where snow was slowly building up on the ledge; judging by the weak light it must have been late afternoon.
Katie nodded, fumbling with the thin pages of her magazine. "Sam has just left for the Prefect meeting and, um, Bernice brought you these." She indicated a large box filled with chocolate frogs. "I might have eaten a couple of them."
I laughed, but stopped immediately when a sharp jolt of pain shot through my body. "What happened? I mean, I can only remember feeling dizzy and then -"
Katie nodded. "Yeah, James told us."
"James?" I felt a sudden surge of panic; the thought of having done something stupid under the influence of some intoxicating party potion made my stomach clench, but Katie, who seemed to realise what I was thinking, quickly shook her head and put a soothing hand onto my arm.
"You didn't do anything embarrassing. It wasn't like when I drank that Crapula potion. You just passed out."
I let the information sink in for a moment, but it wasn't exactly reassuring. "So, it wasn't Crapula?" I asked, watching in horror as Katie's face paled. I hadn't even considered any other explanation until now.
"No," she said quietly, fumbling with her magazine. "It took them a while to figure it out but apparently someone slipped you some badly brewed Pustula potion."
"What?" I jolted up, ignoring the stinging pain in my head; images of faces covered in hives and scarred features that I had seen in some of my potions books pushed to the surface, making my blood run cold. Immediately, I pressed my palms to my face, feeling for grooves or bumps that were not supposed to be there, but it felt just as it always did.
"It didn't do anything to your skin," Katie said quickly, "like I said, it was poorly done."
My heart was still racing but I forced myself to slow down my breathing as I leaned back against the bedrest. Vala was right, whoever had done this wasn't joking; As funny as it might have sounded, slipping Pustula potion into someone's drink wasn't a mere schoolgirl prank. The effects it caused, if brewed correctly, were awful and sometimes even irreversible.
"Are you okay?" Katie asked softly, squeezing my arm.
"Yeah," I sighed, though fear was still coursing through my body, making me want to hide underneath my blanket. "I think so."
It grew silent for a moment and I watched Katie shifting in her seat uncomfortably; she was chewing on her lips, which usually meant she was silently debating whether or not to tell me something. It was so familiar and normal that it instantly made me feel better.
"What is it, Kat?"
She looked up, her front teeth biting down on her bottom lip as though she was attempting to eat it. "Um, James carried you up here. Like, in his arms."
"Oh god." I groaned, pulling my blanket up to my nose. This wasn't good; it was terrible, actually. If Vala was right and I was being targeted because of the rumours surrounding James and me, this was only going to make things worse. I really wasn't keen to learn what else people who didn't shy away from using amateur black market potions were capable of doing.
"How bad are the rumours?"
"Not bad, really," Katie said weirdly, her hands clutching the well-used Witch Weekly in her lap. "Actually, the rumours about you and James they're -well - old news."
If she hadn't looked so serious, I would have thought she was lying to make me feel better. After weeks of spinning all kinds of lurid tales about my nonexistent relationship with James Potter, it seemed impossible that people would just let this go.
"He's - um -" Katie gave me a long look, her eyes darting back and forth between mine. "He asked a Slytherin girl from his class to come to Slughorn's Christmas party with him."
"Oh - um - OK..." I stammered, sitting up a little straighter; my heart was suddenly beating unnaturally hard against my chest, which must have been the after-effects of the poison, and I felt slightly lightheaded. "I mean, that's good."
"Seth…"
"What?" I tried to laugh, but my throat was still sore and it came out as a choppy, mangled thing. I meant it, though. This was good; no more ridiculous rumours, no more loony fangirls, and, most importantly, no more James Potter.
"It just - it seemed like-" Katie began but I quickly shook my head, cutting her off mid-sentence; because I knew what she was thinking - what she wanted to think - and I just couldn't go there.
"It wasn't, though."
Katie's mouth opened and closed again, but she didn't say anything and I was grateful for it. After all, it was ridiculous to think that there could have ever been more than a couple of tutoring lessons and occasional semi-serious accusations of stalking; James Potter simply wasn't that boy and I - well, I had never been that girl.
"OK, I need to show you something," Katie finally said and picked up the magazine in her lap, practically shoving it into my face. "What do you think about this?"
I blinked, trying to focus on the colourful page that was overflowing with gaudy pictures. "What, the article on dirty talk?"
"No." She rolled her eyes as though it should have been obvious what she was talking about. "The dress. I want to get one like this for Sluggy's party. Do you think I'll find one in Hogsmeade?"
Suddenly there was a soft click, indicating that someone had entered the hospital wing, and both Katie and I immediately turned our heads towards the door: looking a little lost with a bunch of squashed flowers clenched in his hands was Tarquin Digby, staring back at us like a deer caught in the headlights.
"Oh, um, I'm sorry," he stammered, pushing the black-framed glasses up the bridge of his slender nose. "I didn't know - um - I thought you'd be alone and I wanted to -" He indicated the flowers, of which some were already hanging their heads.
"That's so sweet of you." I fully ignored Katie's death glare and waved him over. "Come on, sit down. There must be a vase somewhere."
Tarquin seemed reluctant to follow my invitation at first but, after a short moment of hesitation, he finally came over and put the flowers in the empty vase on my nightstand. Only now that I saw them from up close, I realised that they weren't actually flowers but quite well-scented herbs that reminded me of summers in Greece.
"They're Nepemi," he explained awkwardly, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jeans. "I nicked them from Greenhouse five; their scent keeps away nightmares."
"Thank you Quin, that's really nice," I said, smiling. "Isn't it, Kat?"
Katie, who had resorted to staring out the window, merely shrugged, not even deigning to acknowledge Tarquin's presence. He seemed to imitate her behaviour, stubbornly staring at his shoes, his lips pressed together as though he was holding something in. They could barely look at each other and I hated it; most of all, because it could have been so easy, if they just stopped acting like idiots.
"Well, I should - um - go, I guess," he stammered after an awkward period of silence, sneaking a covert glance at Katie who was still pretending to watch the snowstorm outside. "I still have to - uh - do things."
"Um, sure," I said weirdly, feeling a little bad for him. "Thanks for stopping by, though."
He gave me a weak smile before he turned and left the hospital wing again. Only when the door had snapped close behind him, Katie let out an exasperated groan.
"Can you believe him?"
"I can't believe both of you, actually."
"Whatever." Katie grumbled, pulling her legs up on her chair and wrapping her arms around them. "He's going to Slughorn's party. With Cecily Winterberg."
I had no idea who Cecily Winterberg was, but I decided that it wasn't the right time for further inquiries. With Katie and Tarquin avoiding each other, Sam and Hector denying each other and, well, James and his latest conquest, this Christmas party was practically destined to suck.
Big time.
Winters at Hogwarts were magical. Of course, everything at Hogwarts was magical, but there was something about the crackling fires and the scent of conifers filling the corridors that put you into the mood for Christmas like nothing else. A thick blanket of snow covered the castle and Professor Hagrid's cabin looked like a life-sized gingerbread hut, nestled against the edge of the Forbidden Forest, whose snow-covered trees glittered in the pale winter sunlight.
It could have been so peaceful, really.
If it hadn't been for the throng of overly-excited girls, pushing through the narrow doors of WitchWear, a small Hogsmeade shop that clearly wasn't built to cater to so many people at once. Even from the other side of the street it was possible to tell that there was a fair amount of shoving and scratching going on as even more girls tried to fight their way through the mob.
"So desperate." Katie rolled her eyes, although I could tell that she was slightly disappointed; just like most girls, we had ventured into Hogsmeade, braving the icy streets and cold wind to buy an outfit for Slughorn's Christmas party.
"Do we have to go in there?" Sam asked feebly, his eyes wide with shock as he watched a petite blonde whack the girl in front of her with her tiny handbag.
It really wasn't pretty.
"No." Katie sighed somewhat wistfully. "Let's move on."
There weren't many alternatives when it came to shopping in Hogsmeade; Most stores only sold stationery supplies or groceries and, of course, traditional wizard's robes, which made WitchWear really the only clothing store in town that actually catered to a younger clientele. It was therefore no surprise that, when we entered the small charity shop at the end of the street, it was almost completely empty.
"Hey guys!" A young witch behind a wooden counter called out lazily without looking up from her magazine. "Feel free to browse. Everything on the right side is 20 % off." She gestured half-heartedly towards a colourful assortment of clothes and then popped her chewing gum as though for emphasis.
"What a service," Katie mumbled and, only grudgingly, followed me towards the section labeled 'dresses'.
The crowd in front of WitchWear seemed to have grown even bigger as we walked back down the street, swinging our Hogsfam shopping bags and sipping on paper cups filled with Madam Puddifoot's scolding hot Christmas punch. It was slowly getting darker and the fairy lights that were draped across trees and building entrances lit up, dipping the whole town into a festive light. It had started snowing again and I took a deep breath, inhaling the clean, cold air.
"I'm in love with my dress," Katie announced, padding her shopping bag affectionately. "And everything else I bought."
Considering that she had been rather reluctant at first, she had quite enjoyed herself and ended up cleaning out half of the shop. Once we had sorted through the voluminous Victorian frocks, Hogsfam had turned out to have an admirable selection of nice clothes.
"You should be." I laughed. "You spent your entire pocket money on those clothes."
Katie shrugged. "Yeah well - it's for a good cause, isn't it?"
"You're such a selfless person." I lifted my steaming cup to my mouth to take another careful sip, when - suddenly - something slammed into my shoulder hard.
"Oh James!" A voice shouted next to me, just as I tried to swerve, but it was too late already; the impact had knocked the paper cup out of my hand, causing the searing hot punch to spill all over my jacket and my jeans, burning even through the fabric.
I winced at the sudden surge of pain, still too perplexed to realise what had hit me, when a girl's voice piped up next to me. "Can't you, like, watch where you're going?"
I blinked at the petite blonde who had narrowed her pale green eyes at me; of course, her name had been floating around the castle for the past few days: everybody knew that Fern Sterling was James Potter's chosen girl of the hour and that he was taking her to Slughorn's party. Her new-found popularity had gone to her head quite fast as well: even though I was more than a head taller than her, she seemed to have no trouble looking down on me. Much worse, however, was the look on James Potter's face, who stood next to her, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans.
"Sorry. I didn't see you," he said and his brow furrowed as he stared at me for a moment, how I was standing there, dripping spiced punch like an idiot, with - was it pity? Indifference? I really wished my stomach wouldn't have twisted itself into this unshapely knot that sat uncomfortably behind my navel but there it was and I couldn't do anything about it.
"Are you OK?" He asked like he would about the weather, ignoring the blonde's impatient tugging on his arm as she tried to get him to move on. Like this, towering over me with some girl dangling from his arm, he was entirely the boy who had run me over in the hallway, who had accused me of stalking him in front of the entire Gryffindor team, and I felt inexplicably stupid all of a sudden.
"Yeah. Sure," I said, trying to mimic his casual tone and, even though my heart was beating in my ears, I looked straight at him, summoning all the nonchalance I could muster. "I'm good."
"James, come on. Let's go," Fern urged, still pulling on his sleeve until he finally yielded. I didn't watch them walk away but instead bent down to pick up the now empty paper cup that bore Madam Puddifoot's cheerful logo. Apparently, I had been right all along; James Potter was an arrogant prick.
It took me forever. I know. And all I can say is, I'm sorry. I'm having quite a stressful couple of weeks but after next week, the semester will be over and I'll have time to write full-time again :). I still hope you enjoy this chapter and I would love to hear your thoughts, wishes and, of course, theories :). Again, I want to thank all of the wonderful people who favour and review and give this story so much love… you people are simply awesome. It can't be said enough.