Take a Deeper Look

Chapter Thirteen: Good Life

Abigail's eyes were wide as she stared up at the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall. She felt vulnerable standing up there in front of the entire of school like a first year. Her eyes swept over the tables holding all the students, lifting her chin in a slight greeting to Ewan, who mimicked her just as slyly. Abby turned around a bit to glance at the professors whom she would be bothering that year. She caught the smile of Minerva McGonagall, who was looking older in the ten-year absence of seeing her.

"Dear, come forward please. We'll take care of you first so you don't have to stand up here." Minerva said softly, motioning toward the stool with a withered hand.

Abby turned her head away just as she was about to take in the last few people sitting at the table, a blonde man and a very scruffy man she knew was Hagrid. "Alright, thank you," she sat down on the stool, laughing inwardly as the tiny little man, whom she assumed was Professor Flitwick, had to charm the hat up to her head.

"Ah, yes, I remember you. You moved me with your mind those ten years ago, did you not? Hm . . . well you're an interesting combination, Miss Weasley. Interesting indeed. Well, what shall it be, then, hm? I think you'll do well in GRYFFINDOR!"

Abby smiled brightly as she jumped off the stool, handing the hat back to the small professor and made her way to the Gryffindor table. She sat next to a boy who had scooted down the bench to allow her presence among the other seventh years.

"I'm Greg," he said with a welcoming smile, "these are my mates, Sam and Jamila."

Abby smiled at the girl, noting her black hair and dark skin, "Egyptian, are you?"

Jamila nodded, "how'd you know?"

"I've lived in Cairo my entire life," Abby said proudly, "I'm Abigail, by the way, but you can just call me Abby."

Jamila leaned forward on the table, "you did? Wow! I moved here just before I entered first year, I was so lonely!"

"And missing all the sunshine and warm weather?"

"Terribly!"

The two girls laughed, Abby happy that she had made a fast friend in the Egyptian girl. She turned her words to the boys, "d'you boys play Quidditch?"

"I'm the Keeper," Sam said through a mouthful of food. "Jamila is Chaser."

Abby laughed, "You're just like Uncle Ron, never could resist talking with food in his mouth."

Sam smiled sheepishly, "sorry."

Abby waved her hand in a dismissive manner, used to the manners, or lack thereof, of men. "So who is going to help me cause trouble this year?" Jamila, Sam and Greg all raised their hands swiftly. "Smashing! I'll get a hold of Fred and George straight away!"

"Fred and George Weasley? You know them?" Greg looked at her with wide eyes.

Abby took a strand of her hair into her fingers, "notice the family resemblance? They're my uncles. And they are dying to help me cause havoc in the halls of Hogwarts once again!" she flushed red a bit when her voiced echoed around the hall a bit at the end of her sentence.

"Oi, Gryff! Quiet up over there!"

Abby turned around, spotting Ewan giving her a challenging look. "Quiet up yourself, Ewan!" she threw a piece of treacle at him, clocking him on the forehead. Ewan picked up the treacle, sniffing it cautiously, then plopped it into his mouth mumbling a thanks that sent her into a fit laughter.

Greg pointed between the two, looking confused. "So . . . did we miss something?"

"Ewan is my friend," she saw their disbelieving looks. "He's the nephew of my mums' best friend, and they live next door to our place. He's a great guy; honestly don't know how he got into Slytherin!"

Jamila grinned, "He is a right gent, boys."

Abby lifted an eyebrow in a questioning, and in an I told you so manner. "How d'you know Ewan is a right gent, Jamila?"

Jamila looked as if she had been caught with her hand in the cookie jar and her cheeks, if she had been paler, would have shown traces of red. "He trained me in secret two years ago for Quidditch."

"So that's how you got so good!" Sam said in surprise, and then looked slightly offended. "And here I thought it was my tips!"

"No! They helped too, Sam!" Jamila quickly recovered, then rolled her eyes at Abby with a half-smile. They settled back into friendly chatter before the night finally came to a close and with Abby and Jamila leaning on each other from drowsiness, they made their way up the stairs to the Gryffindor Tower.

Abby yawned widely as she made her way to the common room the next morning, glad to know it was a Saturday and she would have time to just sit around and get to know her new friends better.

"Abs, this just came for you," Jamila dropped the parchment into her lap, and then flopped gracefully as she could into the cushy armchair across from the redhead. "What's it say?"

Abby turned the parchment over, materializing a quill under the coffee table as if it had been there the whole time. "Ewan wants to know if we, I can only assume he means the four of us, want to hang out with him and his mates today."

"His mates?" Jamila didn't sound so sure of herself as she had last night.

"Don't worry, they're harmless. Besides, they all know I'll set Ewan on them if they do anything wrong."

"You're setting a Slytherin on whom now?" Sam asked, Greg not far from him.

Abby rolled her eyes, sighing dramatically, and then looked at them all mischievously. "Grab your brooms all, we're going to have some fun." The girls walked up their stairs, hearing Greg's next comment.

"Y'know, I'm starting to wonder if we should be afraid when she looks at us like that."

Abigail crept up behind Ewan, signaling for his friends to be quite as she clapped her hand on his shoulder, putting on her best impression of the Headmistress' voice. "Just what do you think you're doing, Mr. Smith?"

Ewan jumped, turning round with eyes wide in fear – until he saw the girl laughing hard in silence behind him. "Abby!"

She burst out laughing right in his face. "You should have seen your face! It was priceless, Ewan!"

"I'll get you back!"

"Bullocks!" Abby pulled Jamila forward, the boys coming up behind them. "This is Jamila, though I hear you two have already met?" Ewan half-glared at the insinuation in her voice, "and these two gents are Greg and Sam."

"Pleasure," Ewan extended his hand to the two boys, each looking at it in surprise before clasping it in their own. "That's Frank, Stefan and Paul," each boy nodded when their name was called.

Abby winked at the boys she had known from the summer, smiling with glee. "Do I get to beat you once more in a game of Quidditch, boys?"

"We let you win!" Stefan called out, looking put out because of the lie.

Nodding as if she agreed with them, she laughed again. "Shall we mix up the teams a bit?"

Ewan shook his head, "nah. We're going to show you who's the better House, Weasley! Trees down there are your goal; trees up the way are ours."

Abby scoffed, watching all the players get onto their brooms. "I'll let the balls out."

"Well, if you were that urgent, Weasley . . ." Frank implied with a smirk. Abby threw a just released Bludger into his stomach. "You do that every damn time," he sounded as if he were talking more to himself than to her as he flew out of her arm range.

"Let's get this game on!" Abby let loose the Snitch and shot up into the air quickly to hover just above her friends. She darted her eyes round, watching for even the faintest glimmer of gold, and watching Paul's movements as he went around looking as well.

Jamila took the Quaffle from Franks' hands as he stared in shock as shoved it through a small space between Stefans' body and the tree on his left, whooping as she made the goal.

"Nice one, Jamila!" Abby called from her soaring perch. From the sounds of the game twenty minutes later, it seemed like the goal Jamila had scored was one of three the Gryffindor "team" had made as apposed to the two Slytherin had scored. She was looking down at Gregs' head when she saw it, flittering just near his right foot, and she dove at it quickly, Paul letting out a noise as he dove after her. Abby stretched out her slender hand as she neared Greg, watching him quickly move as she came towards him.

"I'm getting it this time, Abby!" Paul yelled as he stretched his long arm further than her.

Determined, Abby took the chance to slide up her broom, now stretching both hands in front of her and sitting on the very edge of the broom and she felt the winged ball struggling in her enclosed hands just as she fell off. "Woo!" she cheered as she fell the twenty feet to the ground, and then grunting as she landed on her side.

"Abby!" the players from each team flew down to her, worry on the Gryffindors' faces. She lay on the ground for a moment, smiling when she felt the pain recede away.

Ewan laughed, "You could have spared them the gray hairs if you had just –"

"What is going on here?" The students looked behind them to see the slightly angered face of Draco Malfoy. "Well?"

Abby glanced up at Ewan, who scowled but spoke up. "We were just playing a round of Quidditch, Sir."

"You all know very well that there are to be no unsupervised Quidditch games – And the fall this girl took is exactly why!" Draco reprimanded with a scowl well practiced as Jamila was helping Abby up.

Abby laughed, "Professor, I'm fine. See?" she did a crazy little dance while turning about. "Nothing is broken, fractured, bruised or bleeding." Draco stared at the girl as if she had two heads. "You needn't worry about me, Professor; I can heal myself up right quick just as I did a moment after I landed."

"Pardon?"

"It's a little trick of mine. Now if you don't mind, as I'm sure you just might, we really would like to get into the Great Hall for some food."

Draco scowled, "ten points from Gryffindor, and detention tonight with me."

"Sir, yes, sir! Looking forward to a grand evening with you, Sir!" she mock saluted him and smiled widely before walking around him, her friends staring in surprise, and Draco wondering where he had heard that before.

Abby was already eating when the seven students came into the Great Hall, all of them making their way over to her and sitting at the Gryffindor table. "D'you have any idea who you were talking to?"

"Draco Malfoy, I believe," she replied calmly.

Ewan nodded emphatically, "exactly! You don't talk like that to Professor Malfoy! He gives Gryffs detention just for looking at him the wrong way sometimes. You don't mess with that man."

"Well it looks like I just did, doesn't it?" Abby countered daringly. "If he can't handle a little friendly game of Quidditch, then he really should pull that stick from his bum."

Greg pointed a fork at her, "how'd you not break something back there, anyhow?"

She smiled slyly, "like I said: it's a little trick of mine."

"Wait." Jamila looked at her curiously. "You didn't happen to grow up at the Sites, did you?"

Now she smiled like she had gotten caught, "let me guess, you're parents were part of the Program?"

Slapping her hand on the table, causing a few dishes to rattle and a few people to stare. "I knew it! Your Ginny Weasleys' kid, aren't you?"

"The one and only," Abby nodded, laughing in irony. "I'm guessing that you know, then?"

Jamila nodded her head, "oh yeah. I know."

Everyone minus Ewan looked confused. Frank finally spoke up, his voice laced with annoyance. "Well the rest of us don't. So d'you mind letting us in?"

Abby shook her head with a secretive smile, "ask nicely."

"That was nice, Gryff," Frank responded with a challenging look.

She looked to Jamila who nodded slightly, and then to Ewan who shrugged his shoulders as if he didn't really care. "Well then, let us be off. I don't think some students could handle the shock." Abby led them out of the Great Hall, many of them wondering what shock couldn't be handled, as walked to the dim hallway off the main staircase.

"Well?"

"Patience, my good Stefan," Abby reprimanded as she stood in front of them. "You see, I have these – little gifts, you could call them – that allow me to do things without a wand. Like so," she held out her hand, calling for the muffin sitting in Sam's hand. "This," she Flashed out from in front of them and appeared behind them to their still sustained shock. "And the handy dandy one," she muttered something with her wand, causing a wound to open up and bleed freely on her arm, but just as quickly, she focused her thoughts and the wound was gone.

Jamila laughed at their shocked faces. "You've grown into your abilities since I left, Abby."

"Why do I have the feeling," a voice behind the group sneered, "that you eight are going to be very troubling this year."

Abby grinned as she turned about. "Wow, my second day here and I'm already getting a reputation! The boys will be so proud of me!"

Ewans' eyes widened and he quickly slapped his hand over Abby's mouth from behind her. "Don't mind her Professor Malfoy; she's a bit off in the head. Says things without thinking – Tourettes Syndrome, y'know."

Abby yanked his hand off her mouth. "I do not you great bloody prat! Don't make me take you to the Yukon again!"

"Pardon?" Draco lifted a fine eyebrow in question. The Yukon?

"Uh, nothing Professor. She's just joking about – nothing. We'll be off now, see you in Potions!" Ewan dragged Abby away by her arm with the six other students following closely behind. "Dammit, Abby! You have to watch what you're saying with Professor Malfoy, all right? You can't just be shooting off your mouth with him like you do everyone else."

"And why is that?" she bit out with a hint of anger in her voice.

Jamila placed a calming hand on both their arms. "Because he won't hesitate to make sure that you're in detention just about every free moment you have, Abby. And Ewan, she's a big girl; she can take care of herself. If she wants to get in trouble with him, then let her."

"Thank you, Jamila," Abby said smugly, smirking at Ewan. "Now, on to other business . . . PEEVES!"

The poltergeist made a whooshing noise, as he appeared smiling in front of them. "What can I do for you – Hey!" he glared at the book she had thrown through his head.

Abby folded her arms across her stomach. "That's what you get you git. I have it on good authority that you would have taken me to a fifty yard drop, I believe is what they said, when I was seven."

Peeves looked as if he wanted to die again when she spoke, "You're here!" then he floated through the walls, cackling madly.

"Okay, did anyone else think that was odd?" Abby pointed to the wall, her face screwed up in confusion.

Abby knocked on the door before hearing the command to enter. "How's it going, Sir?"

"You are not here for friendly chit-chat; you're here for detention."

Abby smiled broadly, standing in front of his desk. "Aye, aye, Captain."

Draco didn't glance up from the parchment he was writing on. "You're very odd."

"Thanks!"

Startled from his work, he stared at her before catching himself. "Your – Your detention will be to clean out the cauldrons from last year. They are in that back room there, please hand over your wand."

Abby shrugged, "I didn't bring it."

"Excuse me?"

She shrugged lightly once more, "I had a feeling that I wouldn't be using my wand tonight, so I left it up in the dormitory. Sorry to disappoint you?" she finished uncertainly.

Draco scowled, something about this girl struck him as very odd. She was going to be a strange handful this year, he could tell already. "Get to work."

"Yes, sir!" she walked to the storeroom, pausing only to ask where she might find her cleaning tools. She hummed her own little ditties as she worked in the next room, and bobbing her head, she pretended the cleaned cauldrons where her drums as she cleaned the one sitting in front of her out. "They think I think I'm better but they don't know the demons out to get her and she breaks down, she breaks down –"

Draco finally stood up, walking to the closet, "child, would you cease your annoying noise. This is detention, not band practice." He turned back around, preparing to check the supplies in the student cupboard.

"It's Abigail," she said quietly. "My name's Abigail."

He froze his hand halfway towards the jar of Root of Asphodel. "Abigail?"

She walked from the storeroom, wiping her hands on the side of her jeans, "yeah. I'm done with the cauldrons, Sir."

"Abigail Weasley, I presume?"

Abby nodded her head, though he still had his back turned to her. "Yes, sir."

Draco turned around, his eyes briefly looking her over. "You resemble your mother very much."

Abby shrugged, "that's what everyone says. But mum says that I have the attitude of my father more and more everyday."

"Really?" his voice held the tone of nonchalance as he spoke.

She nodded, smiling a small smile of remembrance. "She said that he was very sarcastic when he was my age. And that he knew just how to get into the right amount of trouble at school without getting detentions. Apparently, I haven't mastered that skill as of yet, seeing as I'm in detention."

"So it would seem," he said slowly. "You're free to go, Abigail."

"See you tomorrow in class, Sir," she gave him a small wave goodbye as she left the room, grinning widely as she strolled down the hallways, knowing that she was going to be in trouble when her mother found out what she had just done.

Draco watched the door close behind the girl, the knowledge that Ginevra was back in the same country as him floating in his head that he forgot why he was even looking in the student cupboard.

Delirious – Deeper

Norah Jones – Don't Know Why

Avril Lavigne – Anything But Ordinary

Jimmy Eat World – Sweetness

Switchfoot – Dare You to Move

Avril Lavigne – Falling Down

Evanescence – Taking Over Me

Vitamin C – Graduation

Hoobastank – Too Little Too Late

Boomkats – The Wreckoning

Evanescence – My Immortal

Superchick – One Girl Revolution

Leslie Mills – Good Life

I've been having a bit of writers' block on life lately . . . Sorry folks. I'm just doing some revising and then I'll get the last chapters up.