Rain

Chapter Twenty-Two:

Tutoring Session

The rest of the week past fairly uneventfully. Dorothy began to daze off in class as her tutoring session with Draco in the library drew closer. Finally!! A time when they could be together without anyone questioning them. Once, when she was completely spacing out in the middle of potions, she'd dropped her wand on the floor and as she was going down to pick it up, she knocked over her cauldron. Snape had deducted 25 house points from Gryffindor and Dorothy was totally mortified.

Just as the last lesson of Friday, Transfiguration, was about to end, Professor McGonagall called her up to the front of the room. Dorothy reluctantly obeyed and walked slowly up to McGonagall's desk. The elderly woman scratched something down on a piece of parchment and then looked up at her student with a softened gaze. McGonagall then went back to writing on the parchment which was very unnerving for Dorothy.

"Class is dismissed," said the professor standing up and walking around her desk to speak with Dorothy. When all of the students had left, McGonagall pulled up a chair for Dorothy to sit on and sat on the edge of her desk herself. "Ms. Agel...Professor Snape has informed me that your grade in his class has dropped substantially in a short period of time. He also tells me you find yourself in a daze in the middle of his class and that you sometimes forget to add things to your potions. I know this is not like you. Is there something wrong?"

"No, Professor, I've just been rather tired lately," Dorothy lied, looking at her hands.

"I know you're lying," replied McGonagall. "I know that you have a very extreme divinatory sense, Ms. Agel, but something tells me it's not that either. Are you having any personal problems, maybe? Family issues? Boy troubles?"

"Well...okay," said Dorothy, finally giving in. "This is strictly between us though, okay professor?" McGonagall nodded and the young girl took a deep breath. "I have this boy I really like...and he really likes me. We've been seeing each other behind everyone's backs because I'm a Gryffindor and he's...well...he's a Slytherin."

"Oh my," said the professor, looking surprised. "That's very different. There haven't really been many Slytherin-Gryffindor relationships in all of Hogwarts' time. Well, continue Ms. Agel."

"It's getting a little hard for us to keep ourselves hidden from the rest of the school. I've already made one slip up and one of my friends knows about us but that's it. Now, before me and this boy had any romantic confrontations, I was warned by two people. One warned to be careful who I chose as friends while the other...well, they told me just to plain stay away from this boy. I'm getting a little stressed out, professor, but I really like this boy. I'm worried that if someone finds out, no one will like me anymore...even this boy." Dorothy finished explained and stared at her hands slightly, as an awkward silence drifted between the two.

"Well..." began McGonagall after a long pause. "If this boy really has feelings for you, he wouldn't care what happened if everybody found out and if your friends were really your friends then they would stay by your side no matter what. As for the warnings, the first person was absolutely right. You should be careful who you pick as friends. It could really change the course of history right now if you chose right or wrong. As for the second, you should just ignore them They obviously envy you for what could have and probably is a very good relationship. I hope that solves our problem. Now, I'm sure you're hungry and I hope we've settled this. Please go to dinner and if you need anymore advice, please come see me."

Dorothy left the classroom and was startled to see that Draco was waiting for her outside, looking at his feet curiously. There was a very awkward silence between them and just as Dorothy was about to speak, Draco interrupted her.

"Do you think we should tell everyone?" he asked. It was obvious that he'd over heard her conversation with McGonagall. Dorothy sighed, and grabbed his wrist, pulling him toward the stairs and way from the Transfiguration classroom so they wouldn't be overheard by the professor.

"Draco...I don't care if we tell everybody or not..." she whispered, looking into his grey eyes. "I really don't care. If you want to...we can." Draco closed his eyes and was silent for a moment as he thought the concept over.

"I don't...I don't think we should. Knowing Pansy, she'd get too jealous and overreact. She might hurt you...and so might some other people. If this relationship is stressing you out, we could always break—" but Dorothy stopped him, putting a pale finger to his lips, looking down.

"No..." she whispered. "I don't want to break up, Draco. For once in my life, I'm really happy, stressed or not. I'll try really hard to keep up in school...besides...we have a tutoring lesson tomorrow." She had a note of finality in her voice and turned to walk down the stairs, Draco following after.

Dinner was over quickly, since Dorothy was practically late for it anyway. She's eaten a little something bur found herself too tired to eat much and simply sat there when she was "full" her mind wandering back to her tutor and his tutoring session the next day. When everyone was getting up to go to their common rooms for the night, Dorothy was the first to leave the Great Hall, her eyes drooping with sleepiness.

When they reached the common room, Dorothy wasted no time in walking weakly up the stairs and into the girls' dormitory. She plopped down on her bed and closed her eyes, falling asleep without even changing her clothes.

The next morning, she opened her eyes groggily and stared at her enchanted clock, forgetting the event of the day. She simply rolled over and thought about the time for a minute and what she was going to do for the day. She shot up very suddenly when she remembered about her tutoring lesson with Draco and it was...7:36!?!She was late!!

She jumped out of bed and changed her clothes. She dropped her robe, removed her wrinkled blouse and skirt and put on, instead, a black sweater and a long grey skirt. She zoomed out of the common room before anyone could ask her anything and was tripping down the stairs in a desperate attempt to get to the second floor. When finally she was in the stairway leading down from the third floor, she saw Draco waiting at the end of it, tapping his foot expectantly. When he saw her she had an apologetic look on her face and was waving. In the rush she tripped over her long skirt and went flying down the last few steps. Draco ran forward and caught her, spinning around little as he did so. She clutched his shirt tightly in her pale hands and her eyes were wide with fear.

"Are you okay?" he asked, turning his head to whisper it in her ear. She gave a nervous laugh and let go of his shirt, backing up a little to look into his grey eyes.

"I-I'm okay," she replied. "Sorry I'm late. I thought I was going to wake myself up but I guess I was so tired. I didn't make you wait long did I?"

"No," he lied and headed toward the library with her at his head. He's actually been waiting since 6:00 figuring that she'd be the one to come early only for her to come late.

"Whew, that's good," she replied, with a sweet smile as she caught up to him. "I was afraid that you would be mad at me."

They found a small table in the back, hidden from the rest of the library. There were several books already stacked there and two chairs sitting right next to each other. Dorothy sat in one and Draco sat in the other. He pulled down a very large book from the top of the stack and opened it to a page he'd book marked. She pulled out a piece of parchment, a quill, and some ink and began to take notes on what he was saying.

"Wolfsbane and monkshood are the same thing so don't trouble yourself on trying to find them both because it's a waste of time. Also, never mix wolfsbane with calabast because it will blow up in your face," he explained, after they'd reached the third book.

"But," began Dorothy, setting her quill down after finishing those notes. She pointed to a picture of wolfsbane and calabast. "They grow near each other how come they react like that when they're mixed and not when they're next to each other."

"It's because the substance inside the two isn't touching so it doesn't create a chemical reaction," he explained.

"Oh."

Draco then noticed something on her left hand as she moved it to start taking more notes. It was his ring, the one he'd given her for Christmas. He took that hand and looked at the precious gems on the gold. She blinked at him as he did so but them smiled warmly, also seeing the golden chain she'd gotten him draping around his neck. He fingered the ring lovingly and then looked up into her pale blue eyes.

"You said...you love it so you wear it on your engagement ring finger. I was surprised, I guess. I was a little shocked when I saw you wearing it. I thought you might not like it," he whispered as he watched her run a pale finger across the chain around his neck.

"Why wouldn't I like it? It's beautiful and perfect," she replied.

He shrugged and quickly brushed his lip lightly against hers. Startled, she jerked back a little. He grinned at her, picked up a big book, and propped it up on the table so no one would see what he was about to do. He leaned in closer and closed the gap between them once more only this time it was rough and full of fire. Dorothy almost fell of the chair but Draco wrapped his arms around her and pulled her very close to him so that she was almost on his lap.

When the broke away, Dorothy took a deep breath and looked around the library to see if anyone had seen them. She was relieved when she found that the coast was clear. She them closed the book and rolled up her notes and put away her supplies.

"That was fun, Draco," she said, trying to sound normal and hide her blush. "Maybe you should tutor me more often."