Year 2: Read My Lips
Chapter 14: December 2014
Through the remainder of November, the second year Gryffindor girls remained a little on edge, unsure whether Brooke's new potion would continue to be effective, but by the time December rolled around, tensions were dissipated and it was clear that whatever Brooke was taking was working, at least for the time being.
In the wake of the traumatic events of that fateful night and the subsequent issues involving her sleepwalking, Brooke had thrown herself into Quidditch training. Whenever she wasn't in class or doing homework, she was down at the Quidditch pitch practicing her flying maneuvers or chasing a snitch around the goalposts. Tom and Miles joined her some of the time, but even they couldn't keep up with her pace.
"She's insane!" Tom exclaimed one day to Miles and Dominique. "She's up and out as soon as curfew's lifted in the morning, and she barely makes it back before it at night. I love Quidditch as much as the next guy, but even I think this is a little excessive."
Dominique shrugged. "I guess she really wants to make the team next year," she said, not having much of a conception of how much training is dedication and how much is obsessive.
"Seriously Domi," Miles said. "She needs to slow down or she's going to burn out."
"I'll talk to her," Dominique volunteered.
The next day, Dominique cornered Brooke in the dorm as she was preparing to leave for morning training.
"Brooke," Dominique began. "You need to slow down. Miles and Tom and I have been talking, and we think you need to take a break from all this Quidditch."
"What do you know?" Brooke sneered. "You hate Quidditch. You'd love for me to just give it up and spend all my time hanging around with you, playing gobstones or whatever. Well that's not going to happen. If I'm going to make the team, this is the kind of practice time I have to put in."
Dominique stepped back, as if burned. Brooke couldn't have meant to come off sounding so mean, but her words still hurt. "Well if that's how you feel…" Dominique muttered, turning away and swallowing the lump in her throat.
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"Well that didn't work," Dominique announced to Miles and Tom at breakfast. "She basically attacked me and then left for Quidditch anyway. You guys are going to have to find some say of getting through to her, because she is not going to listen to someone who hates Quidditch."
"But what can we say to convince her to stop?" Tom asked. "If she was going to listen to somebody, it would have been you. You're her best friend."
Dominique shrugged. "Am I though?" she asked, still stung by Brooke's words.
"Of course you are," Miles rolled his eyes. "Obviously Brooke's in a strange place right now, but she still cares about you and your friendship."
"I guess," Dominique shrugged.
"Well if we're going to do this, we should do it together," Tom declared, turning to Miles. "Power in numbers."
"You don't think she'll feel ganged up on?" Miles questioned.
"Well Dominique alone didn't work, so I think this is worth a try," Tom said.
"Alright," Miles agreed. "We'll go after classes this afternoon. The pitch is free, so you know she'll want to use it. We can corner her on the pitch and show her how ridiculous she's being."
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That afternoon after classes, Brooke immediately took off as she always did on afternoons that the pitch was free. Exchanging a look, Miles and Tom followed after her, leaving Dominique alone in the castle with nothing to do.
Since she had a project coming up in Herbology, Dominique decided to head down to the library and browse the Herbology section for books that might be useful for the essay. At least it would save time down the line when she had to write it if she'd already done some research.
When she arrived in the library, she headed to the left, trying to remember which section was the Herbology section and failing to remember if it was in the east or west wing of the library. She did remember that it was towards the back of whichever wing it was in, so she figured she'd try one and then the other if the first failed.
As she got closer to the back, she began to read the plaques on the edges of the aisles indicating the section she was in. There was the Transfiguration section and the Ancient Runes sections… Dominique was pretty sure Herbology wasn't near those. She continued to check aisles just in case, coming across aisles on topics like Music and Cooking that weren't academic but contained information that a student could potentially be interested in.
Finally, at the very back, Dominique came across an aisle labelled 'Fiction'. Curious, she stepped into the aisle and started reading some of the titles. Terrence Tuttle's Adventures in Tobago, Love Brewed in Paris, and The Hidden Doorway were just some of the titles that caught Dominique's attention. Intrigued by this newfound section of the library, Dominique grabbed Love Brewed in Paris off the shelf and turned it over to read the short description on the back.
Camille is just a witch who loves to knit and who brews potions for a living. When she runs into Pierre in Ruelle des Lumières, it's love at first sight – for her. When Pierre doesn't immediately return her affections, Camille takes matters into her own hands – or cauldron. The story of a witch and wizard who fall in love in an unexpected way.
The story actually sounded really interesting to Dominique, and since she had time before her friends would be back, she figured she might as well get comfortable and read a bit of it. There was a comfortable looking chair at the end of the aisle that was unoccupied, so Dominique sat down and opened the book to the first page, quickly immersing herself in the universe of Camille, the young potioneer living in Paris.
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"Dominique, there you are!" Miles cried, jolting Dominique out of the story and causing her to jump.
"Wha's goin' on?" she cried, disoriented. Five seconds ago, she'd been in Camille's potions lab brewing a batch of Amortentia that they were going to administer to Pierre by slipping it into his drink at the local pub. Now she found that she was actually in Hogwarts, in the back corner of the library, curled up in a chair.
"We've been looking all over for you," Miles said. "You missed dinner."
"I did?" Dominique frowned. Had she really been in the library that long?
"It's after seven," Miles confirmed. "We were worried that you'd gotten lost or stuck somewhere."
"Or that Quinn lured me out into the Forbidden Forest?" Dominique joked.
"Don't joke about that," Miles admonished. "Tom's out checking the perimeter of the Forest right now for footsteps leading into it."
"I'm sorry," Dominique apologized. "I didn't realize how late it was. I just found this book and got really into it."
"Okay, well are you ready to rejoin the real world now?" Miles asked. "Because we've still got a serious problem on our hands."
"What's that?" Dominique asked.
"Brooke," Miles replied. "She was not receptive to Tom's and my suggestion that she take it easy for a while."
"Oh boy," Dominique groaned, getting up and shoving the book back on the shelf. "Let's go find Tom then."
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Later that evening, Dominique and the boys were ready to sit Brooke down and have an intervention as soon as she came in, but when she did, she bypassed them completely, heading straight to the dorm without even saying hello.
"Well that was rude," Dominique commented, feeling slighted.
"She's probably a bit upset with all of us for cornering her all day," Tom commented. "She just has to sleep it off, she'll be in a better mood tomorrow."
"And then we can try again," Miles added.
Dominique thought about this. Were they really going to keep doing this until Brooke complied with their desires? Was Dominique going to have to corner Brooke every morning and be verbally attacked and then ignored all day? Was this the direction their friendship was heading? If it was, Dominique needed to come up with a different plan. Because she wasn't ready to lose Brooke's friendship.
The following morning, Dominique set her wand alarm to wake her up even before Brooke was awake and then headed to the bathroom to take a shower. She knew Brooke was awake when she heard the bathroom room open and a second shower start running, and Dominique knew that she had to take her chance while she had it.
"Up early again?" Dominique asked. "So am I."
"And why is that?" Brooke asked hesitantly. Dominique was sure Brooke was nervous that she was going to try and talk her out of training again. Which she was. Only she wasn't going to say so.
"I'm heading down to the library," Dominique said, expecting a response from that one.
"The library?" Brooke asked, surprised. "What for?"
"Just thought I'd get in a bit of reading," Dominique shrugged, despite the fact that Brooke couldn't see her shrug anyway.
"Reading for what?" Brooke wondered. "What schoolwork could possibly be so interesting that you want to do it at such an ungodly hour of the morning?"
"It's not for school," Dominique informed her.
"So what's it for then?" Brooke asked. "For fun?"
She meant it sarcastically, which made it all the more fun for Dominique when she replied, "that's right."
"Hold on," Brooke exclaimed. "Since when do you read for fun?"
Dominique smirked. "Wow, you really haven't been around much, have you? Reading's my new favorite hobby."
"How did that happen?" Brooke asked, obviously intrigued by this strange tale.
"Well I was looking for the Herbology section of the library and I stumbled across the fiction section instead and I was curious, so I grabbed a book and started reading a bit of it and then I got hooked," Dominique said truthfully, conveniently leaving out the fact that this had all happened yesterday.
"You have to be making this up," Brooke insisted. "The Dominique I know does not read for fun."
"Come with me and I'll prove it to you," Dominique challenged her friend.
"I think I will," Brooke declared. "The pitch was booked this morning anyway so I was just going to jog around the school a few times, but that can wait."
"Oh my god, she sounds like Victoire's crazy roommate," Dominique muttered to herself.
"What was that?" Brooke yelled, not having heard Dominique over the noise of the two showers.
"I just said sounds like a plan," Dominique called back.
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Once they were clean and dressed, Dominique and Brooke headed out to the library. Brooke did wonder whether this was all some ruse to get her to stop training, but even if it was she decided – it wasn't a very good one. She's be back on the pitch by the end of afternoon classes either way.
"So where is this aisle?" Brooke wondered as the two girls entered the library.
"It's in the very back," Dominique said, hoping she was leading Brooke into the correct wing. "All the way against the far wall."
She dragged Brooke all the way there and then pointed triumphantly to the plaque that read Fiction.
"There it is," she said.
"That doesn't prove anything," Brooke sniffed. "Besides that the aisle exists."
"Well here's the book I've been reading," Dominique said, locating Love Brewed in Paris and taking it down off the shelf. "I'm about… this far in," she said, indicating with her fingers how much of the book she'd already read. It was quite significant, as she's spent hours in the library the previous day without realizing it.
"What's it about?" Brooke challenged her, grabbing the book, and turning it over to verify what Dominique said with the description on the back.
"Well there's this witch named Camille, and she meets a wizard named Pierre one day and she supposedly falls in love with him – though I'm not convinced its real love on her part – but he doesn't fall in love with her right away and so she decides to brew a love potion to make him fall in love with her. That's as far as I've gotten though, so I don't know what happens next," Dominique said.
Brooke handed the book back with a mixed look of surprise and admiration. "So you really do read now," she said.
"I guess I do," Dominique nodded. "You should pick a book too and try it out."
"I don't know," Brooke said. "Reading's not really my thing…"
"Would you ever have guessed reading would be my thing?" Dominique asked. "You might as well give it a shot. If you hate it, you don't have to come back."
"Alright," Brooke agreed eventually. "But which one should I pick?"
"Whichever you want," Dominique said, gesturing to the shelves and shelves of books available. "Do you think you'd be interested in a romance, or a mystery, or an adventure?"
"A mystery could be kind of cool," Brooke allowed.
"Alright, let's see…" Dominique scanned the shelves for the mystery section. "Here we go. We've got Murder in Moscow, The Hidden Doorway, Break-In at Gringotts, Ursula Turner and the Missing Jewels…"
"I guess I'll try that one," Brooke stopped her. "The Missing Jewels one. That sounds like it could be kind of interesting."
"Great!" Dominique said, grabbing the book off the shelf and handing it to Brooke. "Enjoy!"
Brooke followed Dominique's lead as the two girls found a couple of comfortable looking reading chairs to settle into to read their books. Dominique noticed Brooke watching her and figured she was waiting for Dominique to cue her, so she curled her feet up in the chair and flipped her book open to the page she'd left off at, hoping that Brooke would do the same. Soon, Dominique was right back in the world of Camille and Pierre, waiting with bated breath to see what would happen when Pierre drank the love potion.
"Girls! What are you doing back here?" Madam Maxwell cried all too soon, pulling Dominique out of the story. "Don't you have classes?"
"What time is it?" Brooke cried, scrambling to locate a clock in the old library.
"First period started twenty minutes ago," Madam Maxwell informed them.
"We completely lost track of time!" Dominique cried, jumping up and running back to the fiction aisle to return her book, Brooke following right behind her.
"Thanks for finding us!" Brooke added.
Thankfully, their first class of the day was History of Magic, and they were able to slip in without Professor Binns noticing anything. If there'd been a fire in the middle of his classroom, Professor Binns still probably would notice anything amiss.
"So what'd you think?" Dominique whispered to Brooke at the back of the room.
"I hate to admit it, but the book was really good," Brooke said. "Do you think we could go back sometime and read some more? I'd really like to finish it."
"Sure," Dominique said with a smile. "How about after classes?"
"Sounds like a plan," Brooke agreed.
Turning to face their teacher and at least pretend to pay attention to the lecture, Dominique couldn't help but grin extra-wide. Her plan had been successful. She'd found something to distract Brooke from all the crazy Quidditch training she'd been doing, and at the same time had found an excuse to continue reading the amazing book that she'd been thinking about since she'd had to put it down yesterday.
As promised, as soon as afternoon classes were over, Dominique and Brooke were back in the library with their respective books, completely lost in the worlds the authors had created.
"You know you can check the fiction books out the same as with textbooks?" Madam Maxwell asked them as she came across them again on her rounds.
"Really?" Dominique asked, this thought never having crossed her mind.
"Of course," Madam Maxwell said. "Would you girls like to check those two books out?"
"Yes please," Brooke nodded.
The girls followed Madam Maxwell to the front desk of the library, where she stamped their books and wrote something down on a little card.
"Alright, these are due in two weeks," Madam Maxwell informed them.
"But that's during the Christmas holidays," Dominique frowned.
"Well then it's due before you leave on holiday," Madam Maxwell amended.
Taking their books, Dominique and Brooke eagerly headed up to the common room where they intended to read some more. When they arrived though, they were met by a very confused Miles and Tom.
"Are those books?" Tom asked in surprise.
"Yes," Dominique confirmed, unsure what the big commotion was about.
"For reading?" Tom asked for clarification.
"No, for balancing on our heads," Brooke rolled her eyes. "Of course they're for reading."
"For reading for fun?" Tom asked.
"Yes Tom, now get over it," Dominique insisted, shoving past a shocked Tom and a silent Miles to a pair of armchairs that wasn't occupied. "And if you wouldn't mind, we're going to get a little bit of reading done."
The girls sat down in their chairs and it wasn't until their stomachs started rumbling that they closed their books and headed down for dinner.
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It only took a couple of days for Dominique and Brooke to finish their books. When they went to return them, Madam Maxwell asked if they'd like to take out another book each. Since they'd enjoyed the first books so much, Dominique and Brooke agreed, heading back to the fiction section to choose new books. Brooke chose another book in the same series called Ursula Turner and the Mysterious Noise and Dominique chose a book entitled The River of Time, which was a story about a lonely witch who lets life pass her by and only realizes in her old age all the things she'd missed out on.
Though Brooke still spent time training at the pitch, it was a much more reasonable amount of training she was doing, and her friends were glad to see that she was taking a step back. She would often go down to the pitch with Tom and Miles when they were training, which was why Dominique found herself cycling through twice as many books as Brooke. By the time they were heading home for the holidays, Dominique was already on her fourth book, while Brooke was still working on The Mysterious Noise.
Madam Maxwell had even allowed them to take their books out over the Christmas holiday, which meant that come Saturday morning on the Hogwarts Express, Dominique and Brooke were both ready to settle in for a nice day of reading.
"Seriously?" Tom asked when they pulled out their books. "You're going to read instead of talk to us?"
"It's a really good book," Dominique shrugged.
"It can't be that good," Tom disagreed. "Come on, you can read that when you're stuck at home with your boring families. This is our last time together for two weeks."
"I guess you're right," Dominique agreed, putting the bookmark Madam Maxwell had given her back in the book and closing it. "I do have the whole of the Christmas holidays and only one book. That probably wasn't the best idea."
"It's probably better that way," Tom said. "You don't want to spend your entire Christmas holiday holed up in your room reading."
"Why not?" Dominique frowned. "It's not like I'd have anything better to do."
"Oh come on," Tom cried. "Please don't tell me you want to be one of those people who just lies in bed all day reading without getting up for anything."
"What would be so wrong with that?" Dominique asked, not that this was exactly the vision she had for herself.
"Because people like that don't have lives of their own," Tom said. "That's why they have to read. Because nothing in their lives is exciting, so they have to live through someone else's story. It's pathetic."
Dominique gaped. Did Tom really mean that? Was he saying that because she enjoyed reading, she didn't have a life? Dominique felt offended at this, but decided just to let it go. It would be worse to get into a whole argument with Tom about it.
"So how's Quidditch training going?" Dominique asked, changing the subject. It was a subject she hated, but one her friends all loved, so Dominique knew that Tom would have a lot to say about it. Which he did.
By the time the train pulled into King's Cross, Tom and the others had long since forgotten about their earlier conversation about reading. Sadly, Dominique tucked her novel back into her trunk before wheeling it out onto the platform. She would keep reading, but maybe she'd read in her dorm more often. If Tom was going to make her feel bad about it, she didn't want to give him anymore ammunition.
"Dominique!" her parents greeted her when she found them on the platform. "How nice to see you!"
"Nice to see you too," Dominique greeted them, giving them each a hug. "Merry Christmas."
"Merry Christmas to you too," the replied.