Harry Potter lowered his head into his hands and groaned loudly. "When will it all end?"
"If you don't stop groaning I would hazard a guess it will end very, very quickly." Responded Ronald and then turned back, flicked his wand and suddenly gaped in silent awe as his pen turned into a ping-pong ball,
"Hey – look at that – and I didn't even begin to say anything…"
"And you don't think either, do you? So it's not silent magic." Continued Harry, still stinging from Ronald's lack of sympathy.
"Maybe – just maybe – I have this talent, right, for… "
"That would be a first."
"…turning stuff into other stuff, right…"
"It's called Transfiguration, and you've been learning it since you were eleven."
"…but it only works when I don't do anything…"
"I can sense this is building up to something."
"…so in my exam..."
"Which is in four months, two days, six hours and twenty minutes."
"…all I have to do is sit there…"
"How does that differ from usual then?"
"…and I'll sail past with full marks…"
"Please, please, just stop talking."
"…so I don't have to do any revision."
There was a pause.
"You don't have to do any revision."
"That's what I said, yes."
"Then prove it."
"Prove what?"
"That it wasn't just a fluke, that you can actually turn your pen into a ping-pong ball every single time."
"Well I can't."
Harry sighed. "Then what were you going on about for the last five minutes?"
"I meant that I can't do it, because I'm thinking about it."
"Right."
"Yes."
"But you won't be thinking about it in the exam?"
"Er… what time is it?"
"Six o'clock."
"Aren't we supposed to be having a D.A. meeting?"
When Harry Potter and Ronald Weasley arrived in the Room of Requirement, they found the members of the D.A. sat around in cushy sofas, waiting for something to happen.
Harry strode manfully to the front. "Good evening, comrades."
"Good evening." Everyone chorused, dutifully.
"First item of the agenda," said Harry, and then glanced suspiciously at his watch, "and hopefully the last, the patrols. Now, who made the list of patrols?"
There was no answer.
Harry frowned. "Did we not decide on somebody? Fine then, who suggested the idea?"
A solitary hand rose from the midst of the crowd.
"Then you're in charge. When you've finished, give me the list and we'll hand it round from there. Second item, has somebody nicked Neville's toad?"
Somebody, somewhere,smiled.