Silver Eyes
By: FreakyHotGeek
Note: Not bad on the review front with the last few chapters! Yay! As such, I'm trying to crank this baby out super quick! ((Didn't happen… sorry dears!))
Disclaimer: -brandishes autograph pen for a few seconds before face falls- No, I am sorry, but I cannot lie to you… I do not own Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling does.
Chapter 9
Trying To Understand
I sort of drift through most of my classes. Between the headache, which still throbs at my temple, and the note from Blaise, I find it very difficult to think. By the time Divination comes around, I've resolved to ask Trelawney about the headache. I am not a liar by nature. And besides, there's really very little she can do to punish me. My life… is wanting anyway, so a little detention is not going to hurt.
Once again, there is a crowd waiting at the trap door of Trelawney's classroom. I'm starting to understand her; she likes to hold her students' attention. We won't be let in until every last student is waiting at the foot of the ladder.
"Pretty quick thinking in Snape's class," Blaise says suddenly from behind me. It's all I can do not to jump a foot in the air. I manage about an inch.
"Well it's… a bit rare I get any notes," I admit carefully.
"I figured as much. The look on your face was priceless! And just so you know, not many Gryffindors can get away with that kinda stuff."
I arch an eyebrow. "So why did you risk it?"
"You're in the back row. I figured that gave you an about fifty-fifty chance of getting away with it."
I smile softly, not sure if he's teasing me or telling the truth. "I think Snape was a bit preoccupied with making Harry Potter's life a living nightmare to worry about me."
Blaise's eyes went a bit dark. I resisted the strong urge to try and figure out what he was thinking.
"Harry Potter," he said very slowly. "Has had everything in his life handed to him. I think that one person not making it so easy is more or less justified."
I look at the floor. "Well… it's not really right to try to make someone miserable," I begin. "But, it's going to happen anyway, at some point in their life."
"Welcome, welcome!" Professor Trelawney says from above us. I'm glad because where this conversation was heading sounded a bit too much like an argument.
We shuffle up through the trapdoor and into our respective poufs, Trelawney standing at the front of the class, eyes huge from the spectacles that I suspect may only be a prop she uses to add quirk to her appearance.
"Now that you know the basics of meditation," she says mystically. "You must perfect the art. Today, that is what you will be doing. Empty your minds, travel deep within yourselves… I will awaken you when it is time to return to the world you know as school."
I exchange a glance with Blaise. He's smiling as well at the way she phrases things. And he must be at least somewhat used to it, if he's been in her class three years. I feel almost relaxed.
"Remember… open your mind… drift freely into the inner reaches of yourself… I will sound this gong when it is time for you to awaken."
Smiling still, I assume the proper position with only minor difficulties, and close my eyes, trying to breathe steady, but it's a bit hard to forget I'm in a room of other students. Curiosity to know what they're doing is overwhelming. I peek. They've all got their eyes closed like good students, meditating or at least pretending to. I sigh and give it another go.
The next thing I'm aware of is the ringing of Trelawney's gong, and then the ferocious growl of my stomach. I'm glad it's nearly time for dinner.
"Skip lunch, Shi?" Blaise asks , sliding his bag over his shoulder.
"No," I tell him. "Just hungry again."
And it's true. I'm not the kind of girl who skips meals. Much. Only when I'm feeling too lonely to face the Great Hall, or too left out. Today is certainly not one of those days.
"Then you should come with me out to the lake again," he said with a sly smile. "Draco has Prefect duties again, and I shall be lonely."
I want to smack him in the face for only inviting me to lunches and dinners when Draco Malfoy isn't around, but it's not like I want to be in that sort of company anyway. "All right," I say, and then I realize something. "Why… I'd have thought you too would be a Prefect."
Blaise grinned a huge, wicked grin. "It was offered… but I turned it down. Wouldn't want to risk losing my mischievous air, now would I?"
I sigh and shake my head a bit, but I know he's just joking around… I think.
He smiles at me, and takes my bag. "I shouldn't let you hold these with a man in your presence," he says, with this look in his eyes like, "I dare you to question a thing I say." Obviously, I don't. I'm a bit too stunned to say anything. I'm sort of learning that's the best way to handle him sometimes.
We walk a bit in a sort of comfortable silence. I'm so used to the quiet, it doesn't bother me to be dealing with it now. At least there is someone there with me now, holding my things. It comes to me to wonder at how my life has changed so much, and ask why, now, it's doing so. But then I'm afraid if I question it, it'll all fall apart.
"What're you thinking about, being so quiet?" Blaise says, looking at me in a very odd way indeed. Like he's trying to see into MY soul. I resist as best I can the urge to look him blank in the eye and see what he's made of. I know I'm afraid to find out it's nothing to do with me. Or worse. It DOES have something to do with me. Which of course couldn't be true, but if it were… that would be too much change to handle. Too big an impact on a lonely life that I've grown used to.
"I don't really know…" I say, knowing it's a lie and knowing he knows.
"Well if you didn't want to tell me," he says, smirking, "Then just say so next time."
I feel my face get hot, and I look at the floor. I've never, ever spoken with someone at Hogwarts enough to be caught in a lie like that before.
"I'm sorry," I say truthfully. "My people skills… are a bit lacking."
Blaise shakes his head. "Now don't say that," he says, that teasing glint coming into his eyes. "You're never supposed to admit that! That's bad people skills!"
I give him a light tap of a punch on the arm, which somehow feels right, though I've never done anything of the sort before. I hope he won't take it badly, but he doesn't seem to. "Don't tease me," I say, but I'm laughing.
"Oh, come on," he says, grabbing my arm and dragging me into the Great Hall.
I'd like to say that people turned, stared, were amazed to see me enter the room with the handsome Blaise Zabini, but it would be a lie, and I don't see the point in lying about such a thing. We came into the room, gathered our food, and went out, without any notice, save a few of Blaise's friends offering out snide remarks or high fives or other inner-Slytherin-social-working things that I can't quite say I much care about.
"Why don't your little Gryffindor groupies ever say anything to you when I'm around?" Blaise asks suddenly. I jump a bit, startled by the question, but avoid a major klutz attack, and keep my balance.
"I…" it's hard for me to say, but I don't want to lie again. "I don't really have… many close friends… in Gryffindor," I say, putting it into the words that feel the least painful to me.
He looks at me for a long minute. "That's stupid," he says. "Why?"
Having him put it so bluntly, to ask "why?" makes me step back and wonder.
"I… I really don't know," I say after a long moment. And I realize, I really don't. There's not a good reason for it, the reason for my sadness and bitterness for so long. "I've not… not done anything…" I mumble, more to myself than Blaise.
"Well don't worry about it," he says, grinning broadly. "Now you've got me, and I'm sure I'll occupy a lot of your time."
I blink at him, wondering what that's supposed to mean, exactly. The problem is… it's hard to tell when Blaise's being serious, and what he means by half the things he says.
This boy's going to drive me mad, I realize. But he also may have saved me from insanity.
End note: AH! Sorry it took so long! I love you all, please please review! I'll be better next time… I hope!