Malfoy fake swooned in his nearing double digit rendition of the oh-so-hilarious supposed Potter fainting joke which had been overdone even before he'd started doing it. Atlas's eyes roll as he thinks of the faint look upon Malfoy's own face when he'd spotted the Dementors in the corridors, the way he'd refused to look even near the thing when it had peered its head into their compartment.
Atlas sips at his pumpkin juice and glances back down at the Defense Against the Dark Arts book that was assigned for the year, flipping through the pages trying to get a sense on whether Professor Lupin, a man who unlike last year was relatively unheard of, would be as foul at the job as the previous two.
Not that Quirrell had been terrible, just far too skittish and shaking to be taken seriously.
Mina drops into the seat beside him and smiles far too brightly for the early morning. "Ready for the first Divination class of the year?" She asks as she reaches across him for a bit of toast.
And speaking of things not to be taken seriously.
"I still don't know what potion you slipped me to get me to agree to that sham of a class." He remarks while looking over a section on Boggarts near the front of the book.
"You're very smart Atlas, if I slipped you something I'm sure you'll figure it out." She cheerily bites into her bread before starting into conversation with Daphne Greengrass and Theodore Nott who sat across from them.
Atlas flips further through the book, despite the distractions of Malfoy's jeering and his little gang of friends feeding him on.
"—swooned, like a baby." Malfoy laughs loudly, "over just a little…"
"Dementor," Atlas glances up, "yes, we were all there. We all saw them." He pauses, tilting his head and smiling bitingly. "Well, mostly. You looked away though, didn't you Malfoy?" the other boys face falls into something nearing a glare, "stared out the window like if you looked it'd get you?"
"What are you suggesting?" Draco snaps.
"Nothing," Atlas shifted his book upon the table, flipped the page nonchalantly. "Just wishing to state something." He looks to the two previously loud laughing boys on either side of Malfoy. "And you two, Potter may have fainted but at least he didn't lose his lunch over it."
Mina giggles beside him, Theodore across from Atlas smirking while Goyle and Crabbe both turn the shade of red one sees on tomatoes.
Atlas looks away from Malfoy, figuring that was enough of putting the other boy down for the day. As his eyes move he sees the notorious Potter with his friends walking to their tables, the boy's spectacled eyes looking his way with a furrow to his brow.
Atlas disregards it, the boy can be curious all he wants.
All Atlas wants is for Malfoy to find some new content for his over-exaggerated storytelling.
Divination was proving to be as much of a sham as was expected.
First the classroom itself had been difficult to find. Then of course the Professor was proving to be fairly empty-headed and loopy. Oh and the room was full of the hazy smoke of incense that made Atlas want to either throw open a window or throw out a fist.
But the tea was good.
"I think you're supposed to drink it quicker." Mina remarks, leaning over to him. Her own cup already empty as she searches through the leaves.
"That would be a waste of perfectly good tea," he sips, "I'd rather savor it than pretend to see my future in it."
She shakes her head, "I'd smack you if I thought it wouldn't hurt you too much."
"Yes because you're so strong." He shakes his head, though quietly grateful that his friend was smart enough to keep her hands to herself. "Well," he takes another little sip, "what do you see, oh prophetic Mina?"
She rolls her eyes, but does look closer into the cup. "Looks like…" She gets so close Atlas wonders if she'll come back up with leaves on her nose. "A feather? Or maybe a knife?"
"I feel like those could have two very different meanings." Atlas remarks, taking his last sip of tea and setting the cup back down.
"No… no," Professor Trelawney whirls down from behind him, a hand grabbing his cup and putting it back into his hands a bit roughly. He grits his teeth and takes it, not even trying to refrain from glaring at a teacher. "You want to read them right away," she motions, "go."
He sighs, going through the process she'd instructed them on at the start and eventually looking down at the leftovers of his drink and studying the random patterns of leaves.
"Well… what do you see?" Mina inquires, her own cup now resting in her lap as she leans over towards him to look into his cup.
He rolls his eyes, twists the cup a bit and remarks, "a cross? Or plus sign, the crossing is a little low."
Trelawney ducks low beside him, and he moves his head away from hers, a scowl upon his face well and truly formed as she adjusts her glasses and looks herself. "Oh, yes a cross." She nods, "and a skull." She shakes her head, a dark look over her face, "you have some hard times ahead of you Mr. Black." She shakes her head further and stands fully, she pats him awkwardly upon the shoulder and he scowls further as he shifts away from it.
Hard times ahead. He glances at the leaves as she moves away towards some other kids to torment. He didn't need leaves to tell him life was hard.
"Well look on the bright side," Mina remarks, taking his cup from his hands and setting it upon the table. "You could have gotten the Grim like Potter."
Atlas glances over to where the boy was sat with the Weasley and the muggleborn girl. Weasley was talking with a grim look upon his face, clearly believing of the superstition that Potter had been saddled with in this class, while the muggleborn girl, Granger he believed, had her arms crossed and her head of wild curls shaking fervently before she leaned forward and said something that looked sharp.
Clearly she thought the class was as ridiculous as him.
"Have you decided?" Atlas finally asks to get away from the thought of Grims, stretching his legs out, crossing his arms tight over himself as he lolls his head towards Mina.
"On what?" She asks.
"Is it a feather or a knife?"
She glances. "The feather seems nicer. So I'll go with that."
He smirks, shaking his head, "a whole load of bullshit." She laughs, reaching forward and setting her cup down before pulling out the book to find the meanings of feathers and knifes.
"I don't know why Slytherin even bothers with the try-outs lately," Atlas remarks, watching flecks of green whip across the sky as they throw the quaffle and run drills. "Most of the spots are bought in with either blackmail or money."
He glances towards where Malfoy sits lazily upon his broom, secure in his spot on the team and thus not even having to run drills. No one else had even come out to try for the Seeker position.
"If you want in Atlas I'm sure you could find some blackmail or use some of your money," Mina remarks, "or perhaps just give a good old try for the impression route. Be so good they can't not have you."
He hums, but ultimately shakes his head.
"Black here has never struck me as the team spirit type," Theodore remarks, leaning back on the stands so his head comes between Atlas and Mina's legs. "More the solitary loner."
"I've heard that makes men more attractive." Daphne states, turning on the bench and bringing her legs up to sit cross-legged upon it.
"It's certainly worked for him." Theodore remarks, glancing Atlas's way with a smirk before shrugging and adding, "if Pansy Parkinson is to be the basis of judgement."
"She's not the only one," Daphne says, leaning forward and smiling. "This morning while you were reading in the common room a bunch of the second years were giggling like mad hyenas, all while looking your way."
"Oh yes," Atlas rolls his eyes, "exactly who I want to be snogging, a bunch of second years."
"They're only a year younger," Mina laughs.
"Would you want to snog twelve-year-old you?" Theodore asks.
Mina scrunches her nose and starts shaking her head with a smirk, "noted."
"Oh ouch," Daphne remarks head turned back to the try-outs, Atlas glances over just in time to see one of the second years brave enough to try out hunched over after being slammed by a particularly hard hit bludger. He can hear Crabbe and Goyle's cackling laughter over the pitch and sighs.
"I enjoy quidditch fine enough," Atlas remarks, watching the actually skilled plays of the upperclassmen still on the team running through drills. "But I don't particularly care for the team aspect as Nott has pointed out," he watches the second year land and walk slowly and carefully from the pitch. "And even if that wasn't a factor, I don't feel like putting in the effort it would take to join." Outbidding Malfoy for the position, and dealing with the fallout the overdramatic git would make was not something he aspired to have on his plate.
"Fair," Theodore remarks, leaning further back, his arm resting on the bench that Mina and Atlas are sat upon, pressing lightly against Atlas. "And perhaps its for the best, hate to see what you'd do to those second years if they saw you all dressed up in the quidditch uniform." He tilts his head back towards Atlas and winks.
"Don't want them swooning off the stands," Daphne jokes. "Leave the excessive injuries in quidditch to the Gryffindor house."
Theo smiles, "have bets been made for what'll happen to Potter this first game yet?"
"Meaning do you think he'll fall, again?" Atlas asks.
"Technically he didn't fall first year," Mina points out, "his broom just malfunctioned."
"Worst thing that," Theodore jests bawdily. Mina reaches down and smacks his arm which only gets him laughing more.
"I'll put ten galleons on it," Atlas bets.
"That he falls?" Theodore inquires. "Or that his, ahem, broom malfunctions." He has a cheeky grin that gets Mina and Daphne both smacking him.
"That he falls," Atlas shrugs, "seems a smart enough bet to take on my part."
Theodore shrugs and reaches his hand up towards Atlas, "I'll take it."
The two boys shake, and Theodore squeezes Atlas's hand before releasing it and glancing back at the pitch. "How many bludgers do you think Goyle will hit towards the Gryffindor stands though?"
Daphne smiles, "now that's a real bet. Requires actual thought to figure out."
"At least double digits," Mina remarks.
"Can he count that high?" Atlas asks. Watching the to-be-beater loom about the pitch on his broom with his bat in his hand.
"I don't think he's keeping track," Theodore says, glancing himself towards the boy over the pitch. "It seems like just base instinct for him to do it."
Atlas shrugs, "six."
"Why only six?" Mina inquires.
"Because that's when he'll get called out on it most likely." He remarks.
"And you think that'll stop him."
"That or Potter'll have caught the snitch by then."
"Ye of little faith in our mighty Seeker?" Theodore inquires.
"Malfoy's fine," Atlas shrugs, "but lazy, he bought his way onto the team and doesn't think he has to work to make actual use of it." He glances at the blonde again, "at least if I had the care to do so I'd want to put in the work to win."
"You think he doesn't want to win?"
"I think he believes himself having natural enough talent that he doesn't think he has to work for it," Atlas states. "But when you look at the other teams seekers, Potter, Chang, and Diggory, he's working at a disadvantage. Potter has more natural talent, and both Chang and Diggory have the years of experience over him." He shrugs, "if he wants to give the team a chance he should either work harder, or let someone who will have his preciously bought spot."
"For someone who isn't a team player you think like one." Theodore jests.
"Less team player more someone who's sick of seeing our quidditch team get beat out by damn Gryffindors."
"Secret champion of sportsmanship right here." Theodore laughs.
"If that was the case I'd buy out Malfoy and take his place," Atlas points out, "but I won't, and so he can go and keep our team losing for all I care."
The other three share a glance and laugh, making Atlas glower and fold his arms tighter over himself. "You care." Mina remarks, "you just don't want to lose that brooding image you have."
"And really what would those poor second years do without it?"
"Forget the second years," Theodore say with alarm, a hand on his chest, "think of poor Parkinson."
"The last thing I want to do," Atlas sighs, "is think of poor Parkinson, really I wish she'd just make her return to Malfoy by now."
"Then perhaps you should join the team," Daphne remarks, "Because that brooding appeal is really the draw over Malfoy for her. You're both heirs to notable pureblood houses, but you do it with a smolder."
Atlas rolls his eyes, and glances towards the castle. Mina chimes in, "alright, alright." She smiles, "I think that's enough teasing, do it too much and we'll startle him into solitary."
"Might have already reached that limit." He remarks dryly, but Mina just smiles further and shakes her head.
"Ridiculous," she flips her hair back and leans forward. "Lets focus on the Chasers, that actually might have some change this year."
Atlas leans back on the benches. Watching the drills and quietly listening as the three housemates around him remark on the various potential chasers. All while Flint yelled obscenities up at them all for being 'worthless poor tossers'.
He glances once more towards Malfoy, the blonde boy almost looking bored. Atlas sighs, and tries to think past the fact that he'll be forced to watch his team lose another year.
Atlas wanted to bang his head against the table if he had to listen to Malfoy go on about the damned hippogriff again.
Perhaps this is Atlas's fault. He had wanted Malfoy to get new material for his constant talking. He'd been so sick of the fainting Potter theatrics he hadn't even thought about what might come next.
And this was worse. Quite worse. With the personal pity grabs, and the insults towards the groundskeeper-turned-teacher, and oh Merlin all the damned times Malfoy brings up what his father will do upon hearing of this all. Perhaps the only blessing of it all was that it got Pansy Parkinsons attentions turned back fully on Malfoy.
Atlas now fleetingly regrets not taking Care of Magical Creatures, because though he has no interest in the subject at least then he'd have been able to see the beast attack Malfoy. Then perhaps this would all be worth it.
As it stands it is not. And Atlas only lasts a few sips of pumpkin juice and a single bit of toast before he leaves the Great Hall and finds his way to a small alcove hidden from most that he'd found early on in his first year.
Its a small hexagonal space, with pillars reaching high and small windows outlooking towards the forest. The entrance just the space between two pillars, and not often entered.
He settles into the small space by the window, taking a bite of the toast he'd brought along and arranging himself until comfortable enough. He watches the forest as he eats, the trees tall and looming, the fog clinging to it all heavily this early in the morning. He doesn't see any of the Dementors, but he knows they are somewhere out there. Patrolling the school grounds for any sign of Sirius Black.
The Prophet this morning had him sighted nearby. Some woman spotting him in the closest Muggle village.
He hopes he stays there. And leaves Hogwarts to its business.
But the leaves read "hard times ahead." So he doesn't hope too much.
Atlas sighs, pulling out a book and deciding that while Potions was far from the worst class it certainly wasn't one he found himself drawn to often. Snape was a fine teacher, and often generous enough with house points for those in green and silver, but he also seemed to prefer to degrade the Gryffindors, Longbottom in particular, more so than to teach anything particularly revolutionary that Atlas hasn't read from the textbooks.
Atlas glances out to the forest once more before he dives himself into his book, and he watches as a large black dog makes its way up from the forest along the grounds to the castle.
Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know your thoughts!