Summary: gwen's sad, delwy's stupid and andromeda's a musician


The days had rolled off her back since going shopping with Narcissa, which was five days ago. She'd had to find new partners in all her classes shared with Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. She almost had to partner up with Oz Sherman , but she was able to partner with Delwy Selwyn. Sure, he was a little stupid and talked a little too much, but he wouldn't get in the way of the task at hand.

"Did you have fun shopping?" Bella asked, bored.

"Yes, we did! I found so many outfits for 'Meda! She's going to look even more beautiful than she already is," Narcissa said enthusiastically, "You should come with us next time Bella."

"I'm... busy," Bellatrix said then took a big bite of her food.


"Is she still moping?"

"She is. She cried all night in the dormitory. It was unbearable... but she just found out that one of her life-long friends is a bigot... which is really annoying because I can't just yell at her to stop without my conscience killing me!" Edith shrugged, "'Tis the burden of a Hufflepuff, isn't it,"

Gwen had been feeling terrible the past couple weeks. She'd moped around and was barely able to get through a class. Since Edith and Ted were in Hufflepuff they decided to take turns with who would take care of her.


Andromeda sat down next to Delwy Selwyn, usually in Transfiguration she'd sit next to Inaya and make fun of Oz Sherman . Inaya was sitting with some girl from her dormitory, Florence Lambert.

"Hi, Selwyn,"

"Hey, Black,"

Andromeda took out her stuff, and picked out her best quill, her brown quill, it was the easiest to use. She took notes as usual, and didn't notice how Delwy was trying to talk to her. She just thought that he wasn't smart enough to think of taking notes.

"Selwyn, you should take notes. We have O. at the end of this year." she said, not moving her eyes from Professor Mcgnogall, not letting Selwyn distract her.

"Oh, thanks-sorry," he said, starting to write into his notebook.

Inaya talked to Florence, they'd been amicable acquaintances since first year. Inaya and Florence played hangman. When they left the class, Inaya looked at Andromeda. Her face was emotionless, but Inaya knew her well enough that she knew she was hurting.


"Are you ready to go to lunch?" Ted asked.

"Yes I am," She said.

Ted looked at Gwen, she had a strained smile on her face as they walked to the Hall.

"What are you doing, Gwen?"

"I'm being happy,"

"You can be sad, Gwen," he said, putting his hand on her shoulder. She'd been doing this ever since falling out with Andromeda, trying to be happy even though she wasn't. She'd been trying even harder after the bill she got at the last Hogsmead trip from the Three Broomsticks. They'd agreed to make sure that she felt all her feelings.

"I am sad!" she said, her eyes tearing up. He put his arms around her and held her for a few seconds then turned it into a side hug to bring her over to the Hufflepuff table for lunch.


Potions class with Selwyn was always the worst. He always dropped everything in the pot seemingly at random leaving her to clean up the mess. Ted was extra careful in potions, Gwen got more emotional in Potions, probably because Andromeda used to be her partner. Leaving Edith to pair up with Bertha Jorkins who wouldn't stop gossiping about something or other. He could deal with an emotional Gwen better than Edith, so he always was with her.

Andromeda and Selwyn's potion almost blew up again.

"Oh, I'm terrible at this," he said, sitting down and giving up.

She looked at him.

"Yes, you are," he went red with embarrassment, "But not trying would mean that you could never be better," she said remembering something her uncle had told her.

He smiled and got back up to help her.

He put an ingredient in, which almost fixed the whole potion.

"You fixed it, Selwyn,"

"Thanks," he said.

"I only said what was true,"

He blushed.

Ted did all the work he didn't want to make Gwen any sadder than she already was. He'd occasionally pat her head absent mindedly while stirring the potion. Andromeda remembered when she had wanted to comfort Gwen by patting her head in third year. She hadn't known what to do and Inaya had eventually comforted Gwen instead. Andromeda had never really engaged in physical affection with her friends, Gwen and Inaya had always done it. She missed them so much. How could Ted even do that in public? What would everyone think about his relationship with Gwen? With Edith? He didn't care about what others thought, did he? He was just himself.


It was late and Andromeda was being a hypocrite. She needed to practice the flute, so she went to an empty classroom to practice.

She put the instrument to her lips and played the notes of her sheet music.

The notes were beautiful, and sounded like a metallic bird. They sounded like an almost perfect figure skating routine, cold, perfect, precise, fluid, and spectacular.

There was only one problem with her playing: it lacked emotion. She put her flute away from her lips, and sighed. Would she ever be able to move an audience? Would she ever be able to play in front of an audience?

She had begged and begged and begged her parents to let her play and now she couldn't do the one thing music was supposed to do: let you feel feelings.

She looked at the notes on the page and thought of what they reminded her of: ice skating with Cissy when the time was right. The night sky filled with stars her ancestors were named after, and how that had made her feel important and like she belonged. She belonged to the most ancient house of Black.

She closed her eyes and took a breath before playing the piece again. It sounded like the northern lights looked, a flurry of colors all wrapped together and moving over a black dusted dusted with white dots. The sounds made you feel cold and majestic. They made you feel deeply sad and deeply happy.

When she stopped playing and looked up she saw Ted Tonks standing in the doorway.

"Isn't it a little late to be practicing, Black?" He said in a curious voice.

"I could give you detention for being out past curfew," she said putting her flute in its case.

"Wouldn't that be a little hypocritical,"

She knew that.

"How did you know that I would be here?"

"Inaya said that you usually practiced at this time, I just had to find the sound of a flute,"

She looked at him curiously.

"You are smarter than you look, Tonks. Now I know why my friends kept you a secret from me,"

"I'm sure you kept secrets from Gwen and Inaya,"

He looked her in the eyes, and she looked back at him cautiously. Did he remember something?

"Why did you try to find me?"

"I wanted to tell you that Inaya and Gwen miss you. They want to see you again, to talk to you again! God knows why!" He chuckled and paused,

"They love you, Black,"

He gave her a sincere smile.

"Why would you do that for them?" She asked.

"They're my friends, they didn't need to say anything,"

"How do you do that?"

"What?" he asked, confused.

"How are you just… How do you know what to do to make people feel better, and why do you do it?"

He sighed.

"I do it, because they need comfort and I know what to do. I would want them to comfort me if they could. I care about them,"

There was a pause.

"Thank you, for telling me what Shafiq and Fawley are feeling,"

"You played beautifully, if you hadn't stopped I would have listened forever,"

"Why are you being nice to me?"

"I don't know," he said, "I have every reason not to, but I don't want to. I want to be nice,"

There was another pause.

"It must be the night," she said.

Everything did look beautiful, everything was coated in dark blue.

"Could you answer one question for me?" He asked.

"Depends," she looked at the ground.

"Why did you stop using contractions?" He asked, amused.

"I need to be proper,"

"Your sisters do, and you did when we talked in second year," he said, and her eyes went up to him. They were still lit with humor.

"You remember that?"

"Yes, now could you answer my question,"

She needed to make up an answer that wouldn't give her away.

"I am not in a hurry therefore I have no use for contractions,"

He smiled and shook his head.

"You really did play well," He said then walked away.

She thought about what he had said. They loved her. They missed her.

She missed them too. She loved them too.

She was all alone in that classroom, and before she even realised tears formed in her eyes.

Tears fell down her face and she made no sound or move to stop them. She cried silently for a couple more seconds, before she packed up her things and went to the Slytherin dormitory. There were other things to do