Chapter Thirty-Five: Things Get Drank

The second month of summer had started with its' usual flurry. Only a few things were really different. Hermione had gotten a letter informing her that she was, naturally, Head Girl, and Draco Malfoy had managed to become Head Boy, much to some Gryffindors' mock displeasure. Ginny Weasley had broken up with Harry for the third time, this time only requiring three hours and an apology on bended knee to take him back. "After all," she was heard to remark coolly to Blaise, "it would hardly be a serious relationship if I didn't break it off at least once."

Classes were now to be held with some regularity in the Shrieking Shack, whenever Cass had some Muggle media to show her students and whenever the Whomping Willow could be placated with a spray form of asphodel and wormwood Snape had prepared. On one miserable occasion, Cass had accidentally sprayed herself in the foot with it, causing a hilarious limp and more 'foot's asleep' jokes than it was really fair to hear.

John and Cass, with Draco and Hermione's help, had finally perfected the computer-wand machine. Since Voldemort's 'secret weapon' was merely an amplified wand, their invention seemed sure to prove far superior, since, as John haltingly explained, Moldy-Voldy's was drawing its' power from him and theirs was converting electrical current into magical energy.

"So we might put the lights out in London," Cass explained, "but it won't draw anything from us."

"We simply point and shoot?" Professor McGonagall asked. She was, like most, awed and more than a little frightened of what the machine might do.

"A little more tricky, but basically," John smiled.

There was a long pause before the Head of Gryffindor spoke again:

"The Ministry's going to have kittens over this."

"Speaking of!" Draco cried, looking at the closed-circuit camera monitor. "Toadwoman approaching at twelve o'clock!"

"Sweet satan!" Cass quickly shut down the wand-machine's interface and put up an innocent game of solitaire. "I forgot she was coming by! Draco, get the door!"

"Can't Hermione? I don't want her to simper at me again!"

"She hates my guts, and she'd wet herself if Professor McGonagall went –no offense, Professor."

"None taken. I think it's quite a nice compliment."

"Somebody's got to let her in!" Cass cried, just as the doorbell rang. "I've got to change my shirt!"

"Hello, Ms. Umbridge," John greeted, having gotten the door himself. "We've been expecting you."

"Help!" Cass whispered to Hermione, trying desperately to pull her t-shirt off. Since it read 'Bugger Bureaucracy' in large Gothic capitals, Umbridge would likely take the garment too personally. "Something sober!" Hermione grabbed a plain black t-shirt from one of the abundant indoor clotheslines and tossed it to her friend, just as Draco flinched at the sudden sight of a leopard-print bra. A split second after the hem reached the waistband of Cass's jeans, John led the opprobrious lady in. "Ms. Umbridge! So nice to meet you at last!"

Dolores Umbridge's traumatic expulsion from Hogwarts two years ago had not improved her much. She now had a nervous tic in her right eyebrow, a profound fear of anything and everything with hooves, and a rumored addiction to Calming Potions. She also feared what the Ministry feared more than ever before. A simpering smile on her toadly face, she offered a hand to Cass.

"Professor Tyler," she greeted.

"Come, sit down," Cass offered, indicating the mad assortment of armchairs, couches, and other odd furniture. "How was the journey here?"

"Pleasant, for the most part. I was deeply distressed by that tree outside."

"Whacky? Oh, the Whomping Willow really means no harm, and the students love it. Whacky's sort of a class mascot." The fact that Cass had just made this up out of whole cloth was not lost on the Head students. "Besides, it's really quite the school talking point, apart from Inky."

"Inky?" Umbridge asked tensely.

"Inky's our giant squid," Cass explained with a chipper smile.

"How…charming." The pedantic bureaucrat opened her purse and drew out a small clipboard. "Would you mind if I took down a few notes during the interview?"

"'Course not. I'm doing the same myself." Cass smiled and made a limp gesture toward the Slytherin boy. "Draco, m'duck, would you fetch the Dictoquill?"

Umbridge, it should be remarked, flinched slightly at the realization that there were two students present.

"I'm afraid it's still transcribing your Rolling Stones lyrics upstairs," Draco replied apologetically. "Would the tape-deck do?"

"Perfectly, thank you." As Draco went to get it, Cass gave Umbridge a merry, if slightly over-patrician smile. "That Draco makes such a good assistant."

"You –er, employ students?"

"In a manner of speaking," Cass beckoned Hermione over as Draco started the tape-deck recording. "Would you be so kind as to bring the refreshments in? Thank you so much." Hermione relievedly headed for the kitchen to let out the giggles Cass had sensed. "I find that a detention of helping me is far better discipline than, say, cleaning things or writing lines. The student learns with a professional and I get a little help." Umbridge's lips tightened slightly at this.

"What, exactly, did these students do to get detention?"

"Oh, these two aren't being punished, actually. If I find I need a bit of help, I hire students for twenty housepoints an hour. Quite economical. The little Hufflepuff de-gnoming the garden was late for class three times." Cass smiled, having reduced the late classes by four and neglected to mention the boy's utter fondness for throwing gnomes. Umbridge began to look faintly ill as Hermione set down a tray of nearly all Muggle snacks.

"Tell me, Professor, what is your opinion on corporal punishment?"

"I think it's ridiculously ineffective and anyone who says otherwise was never a teenager."

"Oh, really?" Umbridge replied lamely. "How about the banning of clandestine books?"

Cass let out her best airy Trelawney-laugh.

"There's nothing so tempting as a banned book, now, is there? Rather than banning something, why not try recommending it day in and day out until no student wants to read the thing?"

"But if the book is wildly inappropriate, will that not lure some students?" Umbridge challenged.

"How d'you mean, inappropriate?" Cass asked. "Give me some examples."

"Well… the Alleghenys' bestseller, for instance."

"If a student is old enough to be curious, aren't they old enough to get unbiased facts?"

"Professor, that book contains…sexual material."

"So it does. But it also contains contraceptive methods, facts about the prevention of venereal disease, and strong, logical counseling against promiscuity. They're going to try it anyway, why not help them do so safely?"

"Alright… 'The Outsiders' by S.E Hinton."

"What's wrong with that?"

"Character death, flouting of authority, violence…not to mention it's Muggle-written."

"Precisely why I include it my curriculum. There are few books that better explain the American Muggle at that level, and the thematic elements make it interesting enough for the students to enjoy."

"'To Kill a Mockingbird' by Harper Lee. That novel mentions rape and discusses racism!" Umbridge stated this rather triumphantly. Cass looked at her with the same merry smile.

"So you've actually read that one?" Umbridge blushed.

"I most certainly have not."

"Do, Ms. Umbridge," Cass said calmly. "Do."

There was a long silence.

"So, Professor…where were you born?"

"Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania."

"Where?"

"It's a city in America."

"Ah. How old are you?"

"Twenty-three next month."

"Isn't that rather young?"

"Isn't fifty-two rather old?"

Umbridge, while going a little pale, let that slide.

"What…is your favorite subject, apart from your own?"

"Transfiguration."

"Your favorite class?"

"Right now, I think the third year Slytherins and Gryffindors. They're studying the life and works of Jim Morrison when term starts."

"Your …favorite food?" Umbridge gasped. She was trying to ask neutral questions while remaining calm and struggling miserably.

"Fruitcake or fried chicken, either one."

"Date of birth?"

"October twenty-second."

"Are you married or single?"

"Married, almost three years."

"Your husband's name?"

"John Riordan Tyler."

"Your full name?"

"Cassandra Antigone Alcott Tyler."

"Your parents' names?"

"Drs. James and Antigone Alcott."

"Doctors?"

"Muggle title indicating term of study. My father had his Ph.D in history and my mother's was in foreign languages."

"Ah. Then you are of Muggle parentage?"

"Yes," Cass answered confidently.

"Ah," Umbridge stalled, trying to think of something neutral. "What is your favorite book?"

"I have two. 'Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood' by Rebecca Wells and 'To Kill a Mockingbird' by Harper Lee."

In the next room, Professor McGonagall and Hermione both stifled snorts. Umbridge finally snapped.

"Professor Tyler, isn't it true that you're an American Auror, here to bring down the Ministry?"

"What utter rot," Cass replied calmly. "Care for a martini?" Umbridge gaped, which the werewolf took to be a 'yes.' "Draco, would you do up two martinis?"

Obediently, Draco emerged from the kitchen pushing a teacart, on which stood a pitcher, glasses, and many bottles. With great dexterity and show, he poured gin into the pitcher of cracked ice and stirred it.

"Stir, never shake," he quoted. Next, he splashed vermouth into two martini glasses and spun them, so that only the thinnest coating remained. Finally, he poured the chilled gin into the glasses and carried them to the adults. "Care for an olive?" he asked Umbridge. "I was taught that it takes up too much room in such a little glass."

"And who taught this young man to make a-"

"Ms. Umbridge, knowledge is power," Cass said neatly. "Thank you, Draco."

As Draco ducked back into the kitchen, Professor McGonagall smiled at him.

"Exactly who did teach you to make a martini?"

"My mother, naturally. I kept bar before I could read."

In the meantime, the interview was steadily declining. When Umbridge asked to see her curriculum, Cass stood up and went to fetch a copy of 'American History' from her shelf, at which point Umbridge let out a gasp. "What is it?" Cass inquired innocently.

"Professor Tyler, I find that you are a hopelessly reckless and wild …libertine!" Umbridge cried.

"And damn proud of it," Cass replied coolly.

"You're no more fit to teach a child than a mad hippogriff!"

"Perhaps not, madam," Cass said in a maddeningly calm voice. "But the students of Hogwarts are not children. They are young adults, and they no more deserve to be talked down to, simpered at and restricted than you deserve power in the Ministry."

Umbridge gaped at the American, looking rather purple and giving the impression that she might at any moment catch a fly.

"Who gave you the right to speak to me this way?"

"A great lot of men in breeches and white wigs, madam. You forget that I am an American, and thus granted complete and total freedom of speech." Cass held up the heavy book. "Never read this either, eh?"

"You insubordinate little-"

"Madam, I am at the present moment neither insubordinate nor, considering the fact that I am two feet your better in height, little. As a full officer of the American Aurory and an international ambassador, I outrank you."

"Then you are an Auror here to bring down the Ministry!"

"I am an Auror," Cass said slowly and deliberately, "here to protect the children you find me so unfit to teach. There you are. My only qualification to teach American Muggle Studies is the fact that I once was one. You can tell Cornelius Fudge that the crazy Yank's simply an armed guard at Hogwarts –basically your old job without the bull."

"And that scruffy cap said she was a Slytherin," Professor McGonagall marveled in the other room.

"Professor Tyler, I am leaving," Umbridge announced.

"A prospect to which I have no objections," Cass replied coldly.

There were a few moments of silence during which the unseen audience listened. Finally they heard the front door slam, and a few seconds later a can cracked open. Professor McGonagall led the students back into the armchair-filled room. Cass had quite rapidly finished the martinis and started on a soda.

"Well…how'd it go?" Draco asked.

"Gods, I hate that woman," Cass observed. "Tell me Rita Skeeter's an improvement."

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For his seventeenth birthday, Harry had his first party. He had been sent back temporarily to the Dursleys after his month between Ron's and Snape's, only to be rescued in a somewhat spectacular manner one morning.

It had seemed rather like an ordinary day for Dudley. He had breakfast, a snack, another snack, played a game of Mega-Mutilation 3-D, and gone out to meet some friends.

Right as he reached the driveway, a limousine pulled up in front of his house.

"Dad!"

Vernon Dursley dropped what he was doing and headed for the door, as did Petunia. They were awed and astonished by the sight, more so as several people in black suits and sunglasses emerged from the front of the spectacular car. They had earphones and one seemed to be carrying a gun in a shoulder harness, just like bodyguards did in films. The neighbors were starting to emerge from their houses to watch, and Vernon tapped Dudley on the back.

"Stand up straight, son. Our moment's come at last."

Two other, less remarkable cars appeared and a veritable slew of reporters, dressed in trenchcoats despite the heat, came swarming out and started to photograph. A van followed, and a cameraman started to film a strikingly pretty blonde as she commented on a mike:

"We are here live, at Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey…"

Vernon seemed quite about to burst with pride. At length, the bodyguards made a formation and one opened up the back door of the limousine. Dudley's jaw dropped as an exceedingly beautiful redhead and brunette emerged. They were dressed in what looked like Victoria Martin Beckham's leftovers, and glamour fairly dripped off in the camera flashes. Two of the bodyguards unfurled a red carpet, which neatly covered the cement walkway, and, flanked by drooling, camera-flashing reporters, the two temptresses approached the Dursleys' door.

"Well?" the redhead asked expectantly, looking at Dudley over her sunglasses.

"Erm…good morning."

"No, where is he?" the brunette inquired.

"Where is…whom?" Vernon asked haltingly. "I'm Vernon Dursley, this is my wife, and my son-"

"Oh, not you," the redhead waved them off. "Where is Harry?"

Vernon went visibly pale.

"H-h-harry?"

"Harry Potter, you great twit," one of the bodyguards observed. "We do have the right address?" It wasn't a question.

"Your nephew," another added.

"Ah, yes. Right." Vernon looked quite frightened. "You aren't by any chance…magic?"

"Magic?" The brunette looked at the man as if he were quite mad. "Have you gone batty? Harry Potter's one of the best-known rock and roll stars in America."

"Er…are you sure you have the right Harry?" Petunia stammered. "Our nephew doesn't even…he isn't…"

"Aunt Petunia, what's-?" Harry had just appeared. "Ginny, love!" He reached over and hugged his girlfriend, giving her a faintly scandalous kiss. The reporters went wild.

"Mr. Potter, is it true that you plan to tour?"

"How long have you been together with Miss Weasley?"

"Is it true that your bass player's marrying Carmen Electra in a month?"

Harry, looking a bit gobsmacked, put up a hand for silence. The brunette spoke up:

"Harry's going with us to finish our new album, due out in three weeks!"

Applause was heard, and a little slew of screaming thirteen-year-olds had appeared. Dudley gaped in horror as his cousin signed pictures and CDs and even the arm of one enthusiastic little teenybopper. The flashbulbs were starting to make him sick, on top of the irony that this whole situation caused. Quickly, Vernon stepped forward.

"Er- Harry?" he smiled, trying his best to seem like a loving uncle and not a depraved walrus. "When can we expect you home?"

"Never!" the redhead cried. "His new mansion's in Beverly Hills!"

"Feel free to visit, Uncle," Harry invited wryly, having realized what was going on. "I'm off!"

As the limousine and reporters and teenyboppers began to filter away, Dudley and Vernon vainly tried to catch a bit of publicity for themselves.

"Would you like to see his bedroom?"

"We have the inside story-"

"I think he left a few of his socks down the laundry…"

"Wait a tick!"

It was really kind of pathetic, Petunia thought. She, being just a bit brighter, had caught on to the fact that nearly all of the 'bodyguards' had vibrant red hair.

***********************************************************

"How on earth did you manage it?" Harry gasped.

"Back Auror pay and a good idea," Cass explained from behind the wheel. Turning Dingo into a limo hadn't been very hard. Hermione smiled despite her scandalous Spice Girl dress.

"Do you think they bought it?" she asked.

"They were gobsmacked! It was brilliant!" Harry had a sudden thought. "But the reporters, the bodyguards…who were those little girls?"

"The reporters, for the most part, come from the ancient and unroyal house of Creevey. Dennis and Colin have quite a few Muggle cousins with cameras," Hermione explained.

"The bodyguards were my brothers, Draco, and Blaise in drag," Ginny added.

"And the teenyboppers come courtesy of Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff, last term's first and second-years." Cass grinned under her rented chauffeur's hat. "As for the newscaster, you remember Fleur Delacour?"

"Who was the cameraman?"

"Me," a voice from the back replied. Harry looked at the stubble-whiskered, pot-bellied man in shock, until quite suddenly 'he' turned back into Tonks. "That was really fun, wasn't it?"

"And we have another surprise," Draco announced, slipping a tape into the car's stereo. After a short silence, Cass' interview with Umbridge began to play. By the time the crack about the Alleghenys' book was heard, Harry was laughing harder than he had in quite awhile.

"Happy birthday, pal," Cass said, shaking her student's hand.

************************************************************

Hermione found herself using the bottle-top Portkey quite often now. John was nearly always out on some spy's errand, and if Cass wasn't with him, she was either working on the computers or getting impossibly drunk, sometimes simultaneously. Privately, Hermione suspected that her professor was taking Maria's situation a little too hard, since that was usually why she picked up the bourbon –or vodka, or gin, or Firewhiskey… She had lost more than a little weight lately, adding to the haggardness of her appearance, and her friend's condition in the mornings had actually made Hermione vomit twice. Cass still got enough work done to keep anyone from commenting on the fact that she went through almost as much booze as the Three Broomsticks, but John and Severus were getting worried.

Before she left for Severus' estate one night in late August, Hermione noticed that Cass was already passed out. Quickly, she drew some of the blood needed for the Veritas Sanguinus before touching the bottletop. Cass was too far-gone to even flinch.

"What's wrong?" Severus inquired the moment his love appeared. She was clearly struggling to fight back tears.

"Cass!"

"Drunk again?"

"As always! I don't see what the hell her problem is! She's quit soda in favor of Scotch and tea in favor of straight vodka! She's a drunk!"

"Dear, she's deeply depressed."

"So she's soaking herself in depressants? Brilliant move!"

"I didn't say I agreed with her. How have you been?" Hermione sighed and tried to catch her breath, but only succeeded in bursting into tears. "Alright, bad question."

"No, dear, I'm fine, it's just…everything's going so terribly…"

"No, it isn't," Severus consoled. "John arrested four Death Eaters last night, and Voldemort doesn't make a move we don't know about."

"But Cass is a wreck and I'm…" Hermione sighed again. "I just keep crying at everything, or blowing up at my friends."

"Not to seem like the stupid male, but…is it possibly PMS?" Hermione laughed.

"Quite probably. I don't really keep track."

"You've been using that potion to stop…"

"Doesn't everyone?" She considered this a second. "Well, all the females? It certainly saves a lot of bother and inconvenience."

"True," Severus agreed. "Though it does remove one important indicator of health or…erm, condition."

"Dear, we've used a spell every time, except for that night in the dungeons. And that kind of thing can't happen at Hogwarts."

"Exactly," Severus began to think. "What have you been eating lately?"

"Mostly fast-food, why?"

"Why would you eat that?"

"Given the choice between my cooking, Cass's or cat droppings, I'd happily chow down on something from Crookshanks' box."

"How revolting. It's likely that, then, what with all the preservatives and hormones and gods-know-what Muggles put into food."

"That, or I've got the flu."

"Very possible." Severus put his arms around her. "Or you might just need to be cuddled for a bit."

"I have a blood sample from Cass, though. We could do the potion-"

"What the fuck?"

A very drunk, very angry Cass Tyler had just been thrown unceremoniously onto the floor, a water bottle in her hand.

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