James

I've just added the bean juice to my Draught of Living Death when Lily stands up to turn in her potions. As she cleans and returns her equipment, I try to catch her eye, to smile at her in congratulations. She's not paying attention, though - she leaves as soon as she's cleared her desk.

Oh well. I turn back to my potion. It's hardly lightened at all. I'm frustrated, but not surprised - the same thing happened last year when we brewed this in class. I'd thought at first that Wormtail must have chopped the sophorous bean wrong, but it soon became clear that everyone had run into the same trouble. Even Lily's potion remained a stubborn deep purple. Everyone except Snape, that is - Slughorn went on for ages about how light his had become. But no surprises there - Snape's always been unnaturally good at potions, the git.

So yeah, I knew I'd have trouble with this potion. That's why I made the Dreamless Sleep Potion first. I can brew that one pretty reliably; I wanted to make sure I wouldn't run out of time without finishing it.

I guess I'll just pretend it's turned lilac - I'm not sure what else to do. So I start stirring.

I quickly become skeptical - is the stirring making any difference whatsoever? If my potion is any lighter, it's barely perceptible.

I glance up at the board in panic. An hour remaining. Should I keep stirring? Hope that it'll eventually have an effect? Or should I turn it in now? The longer I take, the worse my grade, after all, so if no amount of stirring will make it any lighter…

If only we'd learned about the Draught of Living Death this year. If only I'd been dating Lily at the time. I bet Marlene knows exactly what to do - she's partnered with Lily in Potions for the last two years, ever since Lily and Snape fell out.

I need to calm down, think about this reasonably. Maybe I can give it another few minutes, see if we get anywhere? Not many people have finished - just Snape and Lily so far - so I'm still ahead on time.

- and there goes Padfoot now as well, bringing his potions up to the front to turn in. But most people are still working.

My hand is tired already, but I'm trying not to pay attention to that.

Five minutes later, my hand is aching, but I think my potion has turned a shade lighter? I'm not certain - the change happens so slowly that you lose track of what color it was originally.

Oh! I could siphon some out into a beaker. That bit won't get stirred, so I can check for color change against that.

After another few minutes' work, I'm certain: the potion is getting lighter. Agonizingly slowly, but still.

Finally, with eighteen minutes to go, I declare myself finished. For a while, my potion changed color faster and faster as I stirred, but then it abruptly stopped. I'm pretty sure the color hasn't changed at all in the last ten minutes.

I've finally run out of patience. It's still not a light purple, not by any stretch of the imagination. But it's far from the dark shade it once was, at least. I turn it in, glad to be done. My hand is exhausted.

I could really use a break. What's Padfoot up to, I wonder? Looking around, I see Moony still chopping and stirring. Excellent - if Moony's not around to corral him into it, there's no way Padfoot's revising.