"What's with you?" He asked, looking at her. Chal immediately blushed at her staring. She glanced up to see his chocolate brown eyes looking back, speckled with a lighter brown…
"Nothing." She muttered, forcing herself to turn away. Darn it. Now everything was awkward.
"Hmm." Was all he said, looking back out to the landscape. "The grounds are beautiful, aren't they?" He muttered. Chal grinned.
"What's that? A Slytherin actually caring about something? The fact disturbs my delicate heart." She gasped, placing her hands over her heart. Kadric just chuckled.
"All right then. I need to go in." With a wave, he descended the stairs.
Great. My life just got 100 times harder to live in. Chal thought, later on climbing down the stairs and into her bed.
"Chalondra-I-I wanted to say-" Chalondra turned around to see Yoyo standing awkwardly behind her the next morning in the Great Hall, looking down at her feet. Chalondra didn't even let her explain. Not after what she had felt last night.
"Don't worry about it, Yoyo. I can't control you."
Yoyo smiled shakily. "Friends again?"
Chal hugged her. "For sure."
"CLASS!" Snape snapped, slamming the back door shut on his way in. He glared at them all, sending shivers down Chal's spine. He stood up at the front, crossing his arms and glaring down at everyone. Chal hated how they had to spend this class with the Slytherin's. Let alone her new realization a few nights ago, but now Yoyo was constantly glancing over at Kadric and sending giddy little notes to Chal with hearts on them.
Chal had to force herself not to rip them up in frustration and anger. Sure, it was okay for Yoyo to like him, but not her! Not Chalondra—that just wasn't what she did.
"Because my day hasn't been going well at all, I will be splitting you into partners..."
He glared down at them all, and Chal didn't think that was so bad. Why should she be bothered he had a hard day if he was pairing them up? She'd go with Kate for sure. Chalondra was a pro in potions, and Kate needed her help as much as possible.
"…with people from the opposite house."
Now she knew why this was so bad for them. She wouldn't be going with a friend. She'd be going with a slimy, lowly, You-Know-Who Supporter.
His lip curled at the horrified looks overtaking everyone's faces. "All right. Ms. Todd, with Mr. Jameson. Mr. Lindsay with Ms. Kiddle here, if she'd please STOP WRITING A NOTE!"
The Ravenclaw stopped and blushed while the Slytherin's laughed ruthlessly. What did they have to laugh about? They were stuck in the same stupid position as the Ravenclaw's.
"And Ms. Guarmagoz will go with Mr. Marsters, and…"
Chalondra was dumbstruck. Of all terrible, horrible, slimy and scaly things in the universe, she just HAD to be stuck with the one guy she was hoping to avoid for the rest of her life? After all, Yoyo liked him, AND he was a Slytherin. A SLYTHERIN. Slytherin's and Ravenclaw's do not mix. It was like, the code of honor at Hogwarts.
Chalondra glumly collected her things and forced her feet to drag across the stone floor to where Kadric sat lazily, his chair propped on its back legs and his legs resting on the table, his hands laced behind his head as he casually watched her with a smirk on his face.
"What?" She snapped, sitting herself down beside him. She could feel his eyes drilling into the back of her head as he continued to sit there lazily while Snape paired people off.
"WHAT?" She asked a bit louder, setting her cauldron down a bit harder than she would have liked. She grabbed some more ingredients out of a bag and set them beside it with a bang as well. She was surprised no one was staring at her. Suddenly, the creaking of Kadric's chair coming back on all fours caused a shiver to run up her spine.
Suddenly, his head was right beside hers. Her body went rigid as he leaned in and whispered into her ear. His breath tickled the skin, and she forced herself to stop shivering.
"So, we can have a perfectly civil conversation alone under the stars, but we can't have the same surrounded by people?"
Chalondra went stiff. Oh god, that stupid boy!
"No." She said sharply, ducking her head down to grab something from her bag, but thankful it took it away from his annoyingly cute mouth whispering into her ear. She heard him chuckle softly and then get his things ready as well. There was silence as Snape yelled at the group some more, ordering them that if they failed this potion their mark would be failing this term.
No problem. Chalondra thought as the ingredients appeared on the board. This is as simple as simple gets.
She glanced over at Kadric to see his forehead had a few more creases then normal, but she didn't take it into consideration.
With a heavy inward sigh, she realized the wartroot was on his side of the table.
"Can you please pass me the wartroot?" She asked coldly, making sure to keep her eyes on the cauldron. Kadric glanced over at her quickly, his eyes a bit wide.
Chalondra watched him carefully. "Wartroot. You know. The plant."
"Oh—oh…right…"
And Chalondra watched him with some confused amusement as his hand hovered over the ingredients near him, as if he were perplexed…unknowing.
But he couldn't! Potions is a Slytherin class, duh…
But she took that thought away when she felt something sticky and warm seep through her outstretched fingers.
"EUGH!" She shrieked, waving her hand frantically in the air. Something started to hiss, and Chalondra realized it was her own hand making that noise. With another yelp, not caring whether the whole class was watching or not, she buried her hand into the cauldron of still water. Instantly her hand cooled, and she let out a relieved sigh.
This bliss only lasted seconds, because soon the pain of burnt skin started to sink in again. And, as the class continued to watch her screaming, waving antics, Chalondra rounded on Kadric.
"WHAT DID YOU PASS TO ME?!" She yelled, eyes wide and flaring. She was a bit disturbed to see Kadric look almost—frightened? Embarrassed? No…couldn't be…
He shrugged. Chalondra fumed.
"WHAT. DID. YOU. PASS. TO. ME?!" She took a step over to him, ripping her hand out of the water and shoving it in his face.
"See that?! See the skin?! Yea. It's burnt. It's red, blistering, and bleeding. WARTROOT DOES NOT DO THAT!"
He was silent, and his eyes were squeezed shut as if he were trying to be somewhere else.
"Hey! Answer me!" She said, prodding him in the chest. She couldn't believe she was fighting with a taller, tougher, Slytherin in front of everyone. But, hey, at least she was showing them something!
"I don't know what I passed to you." He whispered meekly. A guffaw was heard from somewhere in the room. Chalondra didn't know who it was, and didn't care. But Kadric seemed to, for he gave a nervous glance in the direction and had a look of complete sadness on his face. Chalondra had never seen an expression other than cocky attitude-ness, so this was definitely a surprise.
"You don't know?!" She held the vial of bubbling green liquid and shook it in front of his eyes, forcing him to look into the steamy glass. "You poured some of this on my hand. POURED it on my HAND!" Chalondra cried with something like annoyance.
"This—is Venomous Tentacula secretion from in their roots. It's POISONOUS. It's CORROSIVE." Chalondra sighed, slamming the vial back on the counter. It shook, but didn't break. Kadric was now looking at his feet, and Chalondra had no idea why.
"What are you so freaked out about?! I'm the one who's burnt, I'm the one who got stuck with a dumb potions partner!"
At those last words, Kadric's head shot up and he glared daggers at her, even causing Chalondra to take a step back. Now, instead of sadness and embarrassment, there was anger.
"Shut up." He muttered. Chalondra fell silent, turning back to her cauldron. And she didn't know why she had given up so fast. Probably because he was scary now. She wrapped her tie around her hand to keep it from becoming too bulbous, and began to chop up some wartroot she had grabbed herself.
The class soon began to grow back into a chattering, giggling center. Except for Chal and Kadric, who were dead silent and dead angry at each other. Chal had no idea why he was so angry. After all, she was the one in pain!
"All right class, bring up your bottles." Snape had re-entered the classroom, and Chalondra grabbed for a vial before Kadric could.
"I'll get the potion." She hissed at him, eyes narrowed. "You might hand in the wrong thing and it might end up killing him."
"Too bad I couldn't do the same to YOU." He growled in her face. With that he grabbed his bag, swung it over his shoulder forcefully, and swiftly strode out of the classroom with other students. Chalondra was left there, standing alone, holding an empty vial and staring out at the door.
Why was she so hyped up? So what if Kadric was mad? He hated her already, so why was this so different?
Because you actually did something to hurt his feelings. That's different then before.
But what did I do?
Why don't you go ask him?
The last student left the room, and Chalondra was still standing there, thinking, fretting, and worrying—as usual.
And then a cough snapped her back to reality.
"Ms. Guarmagoz—are you actually going to hand in your potion?"