Chapter 7: Stoop on Somebody
As soon as breakfast was through, Star and Draco met Silia at the door and headed for their Charms class. Upon arrival, they took a seat toward the front of the room, Silia insisting in sitting in the middle of the three-person desk. As the classroom began to fill, the tiny man Star had seen before climbed atop a pile of text books. So the Ravenclaw head of house was the Charms teacher? Hmm...
"Prof. Flitwick's part goblin," Silia whispered to her.
"Oh." Star remembered the goblins at the wizarding bank and hoped this little guy would be a bit more pleasant. Which proved true.
Flitwick welcomed his class back from summer with enthusiasm and a small hop, which almost sent him tumbling from his pile of books. Star smiled and stifled a giggle; she liked him already. But then Flitwick noticed her reaction and gave her a big grin, waving his arms emphatically at her.
"Class!" He called, calming everyone's giggles and snickers. "Class, this is Wystaer Rayner, she's new here from America." What was with teachers and introducing new student? Now everyone noticed her. Great. Just what she wanted.
"Excuse me, sir!" Silia said, waving her hand in the air.
"Yes, Sicilia?" Flitwick smiled.
"I think she'd rather be called Star, sir."
WTF? Star could have just died. Oh well, too late now. She stared at the desk top and nodded.
"Oh, all right, Star," It seemed as though Flitwick was going to continue, but suddenly a small paper wad hit him in the side of the head, again almost sending him off his tower of books. "Well!" He cried huffily, straightening himself and his books with a wave of his wand. He clapped his hands and rubbed them together with excitement and expectation. "That brings us to today's refresher lesson! Who here remembers the Summoning Spell we learned last year?" Most of the hands in the room shot up and Star felt very alone. "All right, who would like to demonstrate?"
In the desk next to them sat a girl with wild brown hair. She was waving her arm in the air and all but jumping in the air.
"Ms. Granger." Flitwick chose. The girl stood up and Silia stuck her tongue out at her.
"That's Hermione Granger; she's probably the biggest brain the school's ever seen since that Weasley boy, Percy left."
Star's eyes locked onto the quill Flitwick placed on his desk some feet from where Hermione Granger stood. What was a Summoning spell, anyway?
Hermione raised her wand and called out, "ACCIO!" The quill flew across the room and she held out her hand to catch it. Star's mouth fell open. So magic really was real. This wasn't a big joke. Am I actually going to learn how to do that?
"Now everyone!" Flitwick squeaked, "Find a partner and give the spell another go; summer is quite a time to go without any practice."
"Want to give it a try, Star?" Silia asked with a grin.
"Do you think I can really do it?"
"Sure!" Silia placed a quill on the empty desk beside them and Star took up her wand. "All you have to say is 'accio.'"
"But," Draco interjected, "This is a test of faith, Star, if you believe that a summoning spell is impossible, you'll never get that quill without having to walk over and grab it yourself."
Star swallowed hard. Did she really think she could do this? She'd never tried a spell before...she raised her wand and closed her eyes for a moment. If I don't do this, she told herself, Tsu will be really sad.
"Accio!" Star opened her eyes and caught the quill.
Silia squealed and hugged her. "You did it! Yay, Star! You did it you did it you did it!" Star felt like jumping up and down, too. She preformed magic. I'm magic...I'm really magic!
"Keira will be so excited." Star said with a grin.
"Who's Keira?" Draco asked, pulling Silia off of her.
"My niece."
As Star met Luci on her way to Defense Against the Dark Arts she couldn't have felt more elated. She actually preformed a magic spell, and Luci was as happy for her has Silia had been.
As they approached the door to their Defense class Luci started getting rather fidgety.
"What's wrong?" Star asked.
"Didn't you see who the Defense teacher is this year last night?" Luci asked.
"No..." She'd been too busy sulking.
"Well, she's creepy and pink and toad-like."
"Oh." Star was worried enough about the class, now they had a scary teacher? Great...
They opened the door and took a seat at the back. A name was written in perfect cursive on the black board behind the very pink, toad-like woman sitting in front of the class.
Ms. Professor Umbridge.
"The Ms. is a little redundant, isn't it?" Star asked Luci, who smirked.
Umbridge's eyes flitted back to them for a split second and she gave them a dark smile, but said nothing.
When the bell tolled the beginning of class, Umbridge rose from her seat and stood before the class.
Now, for those of you who have experienced a class with Dolores Umbridge, I don't have to go into the horrifically boring details about the class. It sufficed to say that it was an hour spent reading text books with too many words and elementary school statements of, "Good afternoon, Prof. Umbridge" and "Yes, Prof. Umbridge." WTF? It was boring. But in some very morbid way, Star was grateful for it. Despite the utter tedium and eye-bleeding, a class that actually started with the basics calmed Star. She figured she'd get good grades in the class. She'd hate every second of it, but at least she'd understand.
I also won't have to go into much detail about Star's next class, which she spent with Silia and Draco. History of Magic. Star usually liked history classes and figured the class would be beyond fascinating...if only her teacher weren't a monotone, droning ghost named Professor Binns. Excitement and interest are the furthest things from one's mind when attending a class with Binns.
Silia explained to her that Prof. Binns seemed particularly and annoyingly nasal today. She promptly fell asleep on Draco's shoulder. About half way through the class Star realized she must have been the only person paying even a smidgeon on attention to what he was saying. When something whizzed past her ear Draco said with a smirk that that the only thing that kept people awake in the class were the bits of paper and pebbles and other assortments of airborne projectiles bored students tended to let loose for Binns.
A group of Gryffindors seated behind her were making bets with a group of Slytherins—whoever got a paper wad through Binns' stomach got 9 sickles, through his head it was a galleon...and so on.
Star pressed through the hour of history taking a few notes now and again, spacing out for minutes at a time, and even taking a turn at "Hole in Binns". She managed to get five parchment wads right between his eyes. So all in all, the class wasn't a total waste. Maybe Star didn't think she could pass next week's quiz on goblin and troll tribal wars, but she DID had five shiny new gold galleons jingling in her pocket as she made her way to the Great Hall for lunch.