----
Some time ago Harry had refound the Mirror of Desir-- ah,
Erised. The first time Harry had looked in the Mirror of
Erised, he'd become nearly obsessed with the images of his
family he'd seen there. But, thanks to those surprising few
chapters in the previous book, Harry felt a sense of...
completion, joy... and a sincere wish to never see his family
ever, ever again.
To ease the writing of the story, and because his bed hadn't
had a headboard (a stylish touch, the lacking of which Harry
thought to be extremely gauche), Harry had propped the
mirror against the wall behind his bed; well-covered, of
course. There had been very little comment on it, except for
some puzzled glances from Ron, and a poke or two (swiftly
halted) from Neville. Now, though, for the first time in
months, Harry had a reason to look into the mirror.
He waited until the other boys were asleep. He was cutting it
close; he'd only have a few hours to write his assignment for
the next day, and that was only after doing a very poor job on
the rest of his work. That was all right, though -- he'd be able
to finish the rest properly during Divinations, and claim he
was writing out a new version of his will.
It was past midnight, now. Four snores, of varying
symphonic quality, surrounded Harry. He pulled the drape
from the mirror.
Though only half the Mirror of Erised was visible -- the other
half having been wedged into place between his bed and the
wall -- Harry could still see himself completely. Kneeling in
front of it, he could see clearly his almost-too-long black hair
(had Harry any experience with Japanese animation, he
would no doubt be extremely disturbed to discover how
closely his hair style resembled that of an anime character's),
bright green eyes, glasses of a spectacularly ugly design, and
the small lightning bolt scar on his forehead that had so
enchanted Malfoy.
_Malfoy_.
At the thought, the mirror's image wavered. The Mirror of
Erised showed what a person most wanted. And what the
mirror showed Harry was a picture of Malfoy, sitting on his
bed, his long legs stretched out before him and crossed at the
ankle, a pile of papers surrounding him and a quill in hand.
Malfoy muttered something, crumpled up the sheet he'd been
working on, and tossed it aside. The image ran his hand
through his unbound hair, muttered again, and set his quill to
paper. Suddenly, the audio on the mirror picked up.
"Hot sex on field with / famous, too kissable..." Malfoy said.
The mirror-Malfoy pinched the bridge of his nose. "There
has got to be _some_ other thing I can pass in tomorrow.
And lord only knows what the 'open mike' session will
entail."
Malfoy sighed, sneered, grimaced, and settled for looking
faintly troubled. "One thing for it," he said. The image got
off the bed, and left the picture.
The reflection in the mirror wavered, then resettled in a
different location -- the Art and the Artiste classroom.
Malfoy stealthily entered, wand in one hand and paper and
quill in the other. He looked around after he closed the door,
and the mirror-Malfoy's face took on that most naked of
expressions -- surprise.
Ye gods and small fishes, thought Harry, what an awful
description. But the mirror's picture suddenly pulled back,
and Harry forgave the author any and all prose decisions up
to this point because, standing near the opposite wall of the
classroom, staring directly at Malfoy, was Harry himself.
Gosh, thought Harry, this looks like the beginning of a spicy
porn scenario. The author had no comment. A second later
the mirror clouded, and when the picture cleared--
Harry swallowed.
"Right. Erised. _Not_ going to be the answer." He watched,
mesmerized, as the mirror-Malfoy began doing something
rather ingenious to the mirror-Harry's... etcetera. "Then
again, who needs answers..."
The mirror did a tasteful fade to black, but not before
_someone_ had brought out a tube of Bertie Bott's Every
Flavor Lube, a novelty item that Harry had only ever seen out
of the corner of his eye in the 'Unusual Tastes' portion of the
Hogsmeade sweet shop. This tube, if the color was to be
believed, seemed to be cherrywood flavored.
"Oy! Author!" cried out both of the mirror images. "That
was _completely_ unnecessary!"
The mirror-Harry muttered, "Besides, it's clearly orange
sorbet."
And the mirror blacked out.
Harry sat staring. His eyes felt as if someone had double-
glazed them during a moment of inattention. _This_ was
what he desired?
The Mirror of Erised. It couldn't read the future, it couldn't
tell the truth, but _by God_, it gave good show.
With much difficulty, Harry covered the mirror again and
focused on Mary Sue's advice. What should he do?
Well, the mirror-Harry had been in the Art and the Artiste
classroom. The question that begged was, why? Perhaps I
should look in the mirror again, Harry thought, you know,
just to, um, find out, what... how...
He sighed. No. That would be playing entirely too much
into the author's hands. If I were to go to the classroom right
now, he thought, why would I do so?
To touch a flashing Inspiration. To gain some much needed,
well, inspiration. And considering Professor Jimison's
instructions ("Use what Inspiration you had yesterday..."
Harry remembered helpfully), to be a complete and utter
bounder and cheat at my assignment.
Just like the mirror-Malfoy had planned to do.
"Right," said Harry. "Where'd I leave my wand?"
--
The classroom was glowing with the constant burn of the
bottle stickers. Harry had never seen darkness look so bright.
He silently congratulated the author for the apt, though a tad
obvious, metaphor.
He sat at his desk and flattened his Marauder's Map on the
surface. No one was moving. No one had moved around at
night since Voldemort's death in the previous book, and the
surprising involvement of the caretaker, Argus Filch, and his
cat, Mrs. Norris, both of whom were taking a well-deserved
vacation in the Virgin Islands.
"Don't know what I'd do if old Filch hadn't saved my life
during the perilous conclusion to the previous book. He
_was_ flash." Harry sighed. "Who knew pectoral muscles
could be that multipurpose?"
No, Harry wasn't looking for creepers about the school -- he
was looking for Malfoy. And sadly, there were no little
wandering Malfoy shapes to beguile Harry's eye.
Harry put away the map and opened his notebook to a fresh
page. "Right," he said. "Cheating. Can't be hard, can it?"
He felt a twinge of discomfort at the thought, but despite that,
he closed eyes, took a deep breath, and touched one of the
glowing Inspirations.
"Dear God!" he cried out, as his pen began to idly scribble on
the page, "I'm a, I'm a, I'm a _hack_. Can't manage on my
own, can't come up with a gram of, of _originality_,
_creativity_, nothing, I'm nothing, why did they let me sign
the contract? -- I can't write. No talent. That first one was a,
was a _fluke_, and now they expect me to do it again! Damn
the readers anyway, no taste, if they had taste, they wouldn't
have bought my book, and those editors, daft, the lot of them,
_they_ haven't any taste either, bloody publishers and their
bloody sense of, of... _Literary hacks_, that's what they want,
they, they _made_ me become one -- I could have been great,
if they hadn't forced this upon me. O muse! I have no art,"
Harry sobbed into one hand, "and I'm fooling _no one_."
The fizzing noise in his ears receded, and the tears abruptly
stopped. Crikey, thought Harry. Damned if _I'll_ ever
become a writer, even if wizarding goes out of fashion.
He stretched, and looked down at what his pen had written.
Then he looked again. And then he started counting pages.
And finally, he read the thing.
"Bloody hell," whispered Harry, dropping the over-hopeful
PG-13 rating off the Embankment for British readers. "I've
written a mainstream novel."
What's more, defying all logic, it was... it was a _good_
mainstream novel. Love, loss, sex and violence, "a journey
through adolescence", and more first person monologues of a
highly personal and self-exploratory nature than you could
shake a stick at.
And its focus was Harry and Malfoy.
Oh, granted, those weren't the characters' names. And
perhaps the descriptions differed, and the setting somewhere
unlikely. But even so... it was clearly Harry. And Malfoy.
And the previously mentioned sex and violence.
_Lots_ of sex and violence.
Funny, thought Harry. Characters that are clearly based upon
real people, including a character who is, in fact, myself. I
wonder if there's a term for that in the literary field?
"Mary Sue!" Harry said aloud suddenly. "She knew I'd do
this! She knew I'd find the mirror, come here, and write --
_this_! It must be all right then." Harry fondly smoothed the
ink-heavy pages of his notebook. "I'll magic this up into
proper manuscript format, one-inch margins, 12 point mono-
spaced font, double spaced and all its pages numbered. I'll
even put my name, address, email, fax and phone number on
a cover page. I'll make this _perfect_ for tomorrow."
An Inspiration paused its glow for a moment, dimming to
black and then back to blazing glory. The interruption jogged
something in Harry's head. "A title," he murmured. "I need a
title for this."
He worried the end of his quill with his fingers, and then, it
came to him. In triumph, to be followed shortly by a scene
break, he wrote in the upper margin of the first page of text:
THE HORRID PAIN OF THE ARTISTE
"Bloody original, that is," he said triumphantly. "This story'll
be a _smash_ tomorrow. I can't wait."
----
(cont. in 5/7)
Some time ago Harry had refound the Mirror of Desir-- ah,
Erised. The first time Harry had looked in the Mirror of
Erised, he'd become nearly obsessed with the images of his
family he'd seen there. But, thanks to those surprising few
chapters in the previous book, Harry felt a sense of...
completion, joy... and a sincere wish to never see his family
ever, ever again.
To ease the writing of the story, and because his bed hadn't
had a headboard (a stylish touch, the lacking of which Harry
thought to be extremely gauche), Harry had propped the
mirror against the wall behind his bed; well-covered, of
course. There had been very little comment on it, except for
some puzzled glances from Ron, and a poke or two (swiftly
halted) from Neville. Now, though, for the first time in
months, Harry had a reason to look into the mirror.
He waited until the other boys were asleep. He was cutting it
close; he'd only have a few hours to write his assignment for
the next day, and that was only after doing a very poor job on
the rest of his work. That was all right, though -- he'd be able
to finish the rest properly during Divinations, and claim he
was writing out a new version of his will.
It was past midnight, now. Four snores, of varying
symphonic quality, surrounded Harry. He pulled the drape
from the mirror.
Though only half the Mirror of Erised was visible -- the other
half having been wedged into place between his bed and the
wall -- Harry could still see himself completely. Kneeling in
front of it, he could see clearly his almost-too-long black hair
(had Harry any experience with Japanese animation, he
would no doubt be extremely disturbed to discover how
closely his hair style resembled that of an anime character's),
bright green eyes, glasses of a spectacularly ugly design, and
the small lightning bolt scar on his forehead that had so
enchanted Malfoy.
_Malfoy_.
At the thought, the mirror's image wavered. The Mirror of
Erised showed what a person most wanted. And what the
mirror showed Harry was a picture of Malfoy, sitting on his
bed, his long legs stretched out before him and crossed at the
ankle, a pile of papers surrounding him and a quill in hand.
Malfoy muttered something, crumpled up the sheet he'd been
working on, and tossed it aside. The image ran his hand
through his unbound hair, muttered again, and set his quill to
paper. Suddenly, the audio on the mirror picked up.
"Hot sex on field with / famous, too kissable..." Malfoy said.
The mirror-Malfoy pinched the bridge of his nose. "There
has got to be _some_ other thing I can pass in tomorrow.
And lord only knows what the 'open mike' session will
entail."
Malfoy sighed, sneered, grimaced, and settled for looking
faintly troubled. "One thing for it," he said. The image got
off the bed, and left the picture.
The reflection in the mirror wavered, then resettled in a
different location -- the Art and the Artiste classroom.
Malfoy stealthily entered, wand in one hand and paper and
quill in the other. He looked around after he closed the door,
and the mirror-Malfoy's face took on that most naked of
expressions -- surprise.
Ye gods and small fishes, thought Harry, what an awful
description. But the mirror's picture suddenly pulled back,
and Harry forgave the author any and all prose decisions up
to this point because, standing near the opposite wall of the
classroom, staring directly at Malfoy, was Harry himself.
Gosh, thought Harry, this looks like the beginning of a spicy
porn scenario. The author had no comment. A second later
the mirror clouded, and when the picture cleared--
Harry swallowed.
"Right. Erised. _Not_ going to be the answer." He watched,
mesmerized, as the mirror-Malfoy began doing something
rather ingenious to the mirror-Harry's... etcetera. "Then
again, who needs answers..."
The mirror did a tasteful fade to black, but not before
_someone_ had brought out a tube of Bertie Bott's Every
Flavor Lube, a novelty item that Harry had only ever seen out
of the corner of his eye in the 'Unusual Tastes' portion of the
Hogsmeade sweet shop. This tube, if the color was to be
believed, seemed to be cherrywood flavored.
"Oy! Author!" cried out both of the mirror images. "That
was _completely_ unnecessary!"
The mirror-Harry muttered, "Besides, it's clearly orange
sorbet."
And the mirror blacked out.
Harry sat staring. His eyes felt as if someone had double-
glazed them during a moment of inattention. _This_ was
what he desired?
The Mirror of Erised. It couldn't read the future, it couldn't
tell the truth, but _by God_, it gave good show.
With much difficulty, Harry covered the mirror again and
focused on Mary Sue's advice. What should he do?
Well, the mirror-Harry had been in the Art and the Artiste
classroom. The question that begged was, why? Perhaps I
should look in the mirror again, Harry thought, you know,
just to, um, find out, what... how...
He sighed. No. That would be playing entirely too much
into the author's hands. If I were to go to the classroom right
now, he thought, why would I do so?
To touch a flashing Inspiration. To gain some much needed,
well, inspiration. And considering Professor Jimison's
instructions ("Use what Inspiration you had yesterday..."
Harry remembered helpfully), to be a complete and utter
bounder and cheat at my assignment.
Just like the mirror-Malfoy had planned to do.
"Right," said Harry. "Where'd I leave my wand?"
--
The classroom was glowing with the constant burn of the
bottle stickers. Harry had never seen darkness look so bright.
He silently congratulated the author for the apt, though a tad
obvious, metaphor.
He sat at his desk and flattened his Marauder's Map on the
surface. No one was moving. No one had moved around at
night since Voldemort's death in the previous book, and the
surprising involvement of the caretaker, Argus Filch, and his
cat, Mrs. Norris, both of whom were taking a well-deserved
vacation in the Virgin Islands.
"Don't know what I'd do if old Filch hadn't saved my life
during the perilous conclusion to the previous book. He
_was_ flash." Harry sighed. "Who knew pectoral muscles
could be that multipurpose?"
No, Harry wasn't looking for creepers about the school -- he
was looking for Malfoy. And sadly, there were no little
wandering Malfoy shapes to beguile Harry's eye.
Harry put away the map and opened his notebook to a fresh
page. "Right," he said. "Cheating. Can't be hard, can it?"
He felt a twinge of discomfort at the thought, but despite that,
he closed eyes, took a deep breath, and touched one of the
glowing Inspirations.
"Dear God!" he cried out, as his pen began to idly scribble on
the page, "I'm a, I'm a, I'm a _hack_. Can't manage on my
own, can't come up with a gram of, of _originality_,
_creativity_, nothing, I'm nothing, why did they let me sign
the contract? -- I can't write. No talent. That first one was a,
was a _fluke_, and now they expect me to do it again! Damn
the readers anyway, no taste, if they had taste, they wouldn't
have bought my book, and those editors, daft, the lot of them,
_they_ haven't any taste either, bloody publishers and their
bloody sense of, of... _Literary hacks_, that's what they want,
they, they _made_ me become one -- I could have been great,
if they hadn't forced this upon me. O muse! I have no art,"
Harry sobbed into one hand, "and I'm fooling _no one_."
The fizzing noise in his ears receded, and the tears abruptly
stopped. Crikey, thought Harry. Damned if _I'll_ ever
become a writer, even if wizarding goes out of fashion.
He stretched, and looked down at what his pen had written.
Then he looked again. And then he started counting pages.
And finally, he read the thing.
"Bloody hell," whispered Harry, dropping the over-hopeful
PG-13 rating off the Embankment for British readers. "I've
written a mainstream novel."
What's more, defying all logic, it was... it was a _good_
mainstream novel. Love, loss, sex and violence, "a journey
through adolescence", and more first person monologues of a
highly personal and self-exploratory nature than you could
shake a stick at.
And its focus was Harry and Malfoy.
Oh, granted, those weren't the characters' names. And
perhaps the descriptions differed, and the setting somewhere
unlikely. But even so... it was clearly Harry. And Malfoy.
And the previously mentioned sex and violence.
_Lots_ of sex and violence.
Funny, thought Harry. Characters that are clearly based upon
real people, including a character who is, in fact, myself. I
wonder if there's a term for that in the literary field?
"Mary Sue!" Harry said aloud suddenly. "She knew I'd do
this! She knew I'd find the mirror, come here, and write --
_this_! It must be all right then." Harry fondly smoothed the
ink-heavy pages of his notebook. "I'll magic this up into
proper manuscript format, one-inch margins, 12 point mono-
spaced font, double spaced and all its pages numbered. I'll
even put my name, address, email, fax and phone number on
a cover page. I'll make this _perfect_ for tomorrow."
An Inspiration paused its glow for a moment, dimming to
black and then back to blazing glory. The interruption jogged
something in Harry's head. "A title," he murmured. "I need a
title for this."
He worried the end of his quill with his fingers, and then, it
came to him. In triumph, to be followed shortly by a scene
break, he wrote in the upper margin of the first page of text:
THE HORRID PAIN OF THE ARTISTE
"Bloody original, that is," he said triumphantly. "This story'll
be a _smash_ tomorrow. I can't wait."
----
(cont. in 5/7)