A Parental Guide
By Miss Willow
A.k.a
XXxFluffy-Pink-Socks
A/N: Thanks to Logan and TranquilSeas (She PMed me) for reviewing my first chapter of this story. Now on with the second chapter!
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I glumly resigned myself to my fate; I was doomed to become a drunken hobo and well, there was nothing I could do to stop it. I hadn't been clever enough to be sorted into Ravenclaw, something Brendan had obviously been delighted with, but instead I had been 'brave' enough to be sorted into Gryffindor. Brave, for Merlin's sake… I could kiss goodbye to any dreams I had of being the future Jane Austen right now. But then, of course, who cares! Because I am brave! Oh the career prospects are endless!
The fire crackled and I broke out of my thoughts. I was curled, cat-like, in the armchair nearest the fireplace and successfully ignoring all of my fellow Gryffindors. I was the only person not chattering away with their friends about their holidays, save another girl, who was sitting across from me and reading a book. She had straight, shoulder-length brown hair and blue eyes and looked promisingly like she could have a similar personality to mine.
"Hi. I'm Rosa." I smiled, leaning forward and offering her my hand. The girl moved her head upwards but didn't manage to tear her gaze away from her book for a few seconds. She smiled uncertainly back at me and put her book back in her schoolbag.
"Mary," the girl replied, and shook my out-stretched hand. "You're new, huh?"
"Yes. I'm in 7th year, what year-"
"7th year also."
"Good good." We fell into an awkward silence, both of us nodding thoughtfully to ourselves, only glancing at each other every so often to smile politely.
"Do you like reading?" I asked and instantly regretted it. Good job, Rosa, way to go on making a first impression: stating the obviously obvious. Mary nodded vigorously at this; maybe not everything was lost after all…
"Are you intelligent?"
She seemed thrown by the nature of my question and hesitated, clearly unsure of how to reply.
"I s'pose," she said slowly. "I'm not as clever as the Ravenclaws or Lily Evans but I get mostly Os."
"Os?"
"Outstandings."
"Right," I lied, faking realisation but I was secretly panicking inside. What the hell were Outstandings?! Was that bad? Well, it sounded good but you never could tell with this school. I wanted As, not Os! As!
The portrait hole suddenly swung open. A tall woman with chalk white skin and black hair, which was pulled back into a tight bun, strolled into the common room. She was dressed in the usual Hogwarts attire, black robes and black pointed hat. Her robes also bore the Gryffindor crest and I realised that this witch was my head of house.
"Potter, hand me that stink bomb now… Black, you too… Oh for heaven's sake, we've only just got back to school and you have already managed to burn a hole through a cushion! Longbottom! Are you listening to me!" the woman shouted angrily, halting in front of a tall boy with a roundish face. He obviously hadn't been listening to her rant and had a glazed look in his eyes.
A pretty girl with strawberry blonde hair was in a fit of giggles beside him. She gave the boy a shove and he seemed to come back to reality. "Erm- where are you? Professor McGonagall! What are you doing here!" the boy said in shock, edging his chair over toward the girl's to hide the burnt cushion from view.
"She's already seen it Frank," another boy called out.
"Oh." Frank's face fell.
"Detention. Tomorrow, my office," McGonagall snapped. "The reason I came here tonight was to give out your timetables. I assume you do remember what those are?"
There were a few mutters of 'yes'. McGonagall called the people out in alphabetical order and handed each of them their own timetables. All of the timetables had been given to their respective owners within only a few minutes of McGonagall's entrance. She surveyed the Gryffindors with a suspicious expression, threw the four boys in the corner a dark look and walked back over to the portrait hole.
"Professor!" I shouted out and was surprised to hear a few voices join mine. We all looked at each other. I sighed and rose out of my seat. "Professor!"
"Yes?" McGonagall fixed her piercing gaze on me. I became very interested in the floor.
"Erm… I haven't got my timetable."
"Me neither."
"I haven't!"
"Nor me."
"Ah yes! How could I forget…" McGonagall exclaimed and I could tell that she was trying to keep a smile off her face. "All of the people without timetables please follow me." I followed her out of the portrait hole, closely followed by the other five people, who were also lacking in the timetable department. I hadn't asked why we had to go to the professor's office-- partly because I hadn't wanted to but mostly because I just didn't dare to.
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I slid down in my chair, so that my head was level with McGonagall's desk, and folded my arms across my chest. She had been lecturing us for the past fifteen minutes and I was still yet to discover what it was actually about. She could have been stripping and singing 'I'm too sexy for my shirt' for all the attention I was paying her.
"Marriage is a blessing-"
"W-w-what?" I spluttered. Why throw a glass off water over me when you could say the word that every commitment phobic dreads to wake me up? "M-m-marriage?"
"Nice of you to join us again, Miss Willow," McGonagall greeted coldly, her lips thinning to an alarming size. She opened a drawer in her desk and pulled out half a dozen different coloured files. "Yes, marriage."
"Wait, so what you are saying is that we have to be married to someone for a whole two months?" the boy I recognised as Frank from the common room said in disbelief.
"WE HAVE TO MARRY SOMEONE?!?" I was unable to contain myself; or control my overly large mouth as it now seemed. "I can't marry someone! I'm not even 17 yet! It's illegal in the wizarding world! I don't want commitment! I don't want to get married-" My nervous blabbing was obviously annoying McGonagall to no end (and amusing the other occupants of the room). Eventually she managed to interrupt me.
"Detention Miss Willow. My, my, you aren't getting off to a good start at Hogwarts, are you? Tell me, have you been listening to a word I've been saying?"
"Yes. No. Kind of."
"Yes or No?"
"No professor," I admitted, bowing my head.
"Carrying on… this project will simply give you a taste of what married life will be like if you choose to pursue it in the future. The staff has already decided the person you will 'marry'. All the rules and information that you will need can be found in these folders," McGonagall held up the six folders for everyone to see. "If no-one has any questions, I shall now tell you who your husband or wife shall be."
Everyone waited with baited breath for McGonagall to continue. "James Potter and Lily Evans."
"NOOO!!!" The scream of despair almost gave me a heart attack and ironically the girl behind the scream, who had now fallen to the floor, looked like she was about to have one. Her red hair had fallen into her face, hiding it from view, but you could tell from the wounded howls she was making that she wasn't happy with who she had to marry.
"Alice Murdock and Frank Longbottom." Frank and Alice looked at each other for a few seconds and shrugged.
"Sirius Black and Rosa-Marie Willow."
"Rosa-Marie? What sort of name is that?" my husband-to-be scoffed, clearly irked with having me as a wife.
"Yeah, seriously Sirius, what sort of name is that?" I shot back. He hadn't bothered to look at me up until then and when he did, I gave him the dirtiest look I could muster. He wasn't sore on the eyes, that was for sure, but if he was going to be my… husband (Merlin, just the thought of marriage had me searching desperately for the nearest exit) then he would have to sort out that attitude problem of his and soon.
"I'm-working-with-you-for-this-project-do-you-understand-me?" Sirius asked slowly, spelling out every syllable like I was some alien, smirking at me as he did so. It was unbelievable how much he seemed to fancy himself! Just the way he was leaning back in his seat, so that it balanced on its back two legs, and the way he was running his fingers through his hair like some kind of self-obsessed movie star.
"I-know-I-speak-English," I responded equally as slowly, pointing at myself as I said 'I' and pointing to my mouth as I said 'speak english'. Sirius didn't seem at all impressed with me using his own joke on him.
"You're from Australia," Sirius stated
"Actually, I'm Spanish."
"Where?"
I rolled my eyes. I was fighting a lost cause. "It's a nationality."
"Natalie who?"
"Never mind," I sighed, shaking my head in disbelief at his utter lack of general knowledge. I also didn't like how he was looking me up and down and making no attempt what so ever to hide it. I decided it was best to just ignore him and instead concentrate on the more important fact that I would have to be 'married' for the next two months to someone that I already could not stand.
I opened my plastic folder. A plack card fell into my lap. Mrs. Black. Oh my god, the Quibbler hadn't been joking, the teachers at this school really were a bunch of nutcases. All the same, if I was going to be married then I would do it properly and to do that would mean to get an A. I mean, an O. To get an O, I would have to play the act of Sirius' wife well.
The plack card was around my neck in a matter of seconds, the thought of the Outstanding I would get at the end of this project lingering determinedly in my mind. Sirius looked up from his folder and smirked. Again. Merlin, that was annoying. "You have to wear that?" He didn't even try to keep the laughter from his voice.
"Yes," I said through gritted teeth. I snatched his folder from him and leafed through it until I found what I'd been looking for. "And you have to wear this!" I held up the plack card that read Mr. Willow and smirked back at him. He glared at me. I smiled innocently.
"What are the rules to this thing anyway?" Sirius asked, while he tied the placard around his neck on a piece of brown string.
"Oh my god… no way… I refuse to…" I muttered to myself, my eyes wide with horror. There was no way I was doing that… no way…
"What?" Sirius interrupted impatiently. I didn't answer and in the end, he took the rules from his folder and, for some unknown reason, began to read them allowed.
"Rule 1: You must sit with your partner in all of classes-"
"HA! We can't!" I announced triumphantly. "We're probably in different lessons!"
"Actually, no, we were paired because we have signed up for the same NEWTs…" Sirius replied, frowning down at the rules.
"Oh shite."
"DON'T interrupt!"
"Fine!"
"Right. Rule 2: You cannot spend over half an hour with a person of the opposite sex, that isn't your partner, outside of classes- WHAT!" Sirius shouted. He was now staring at the rules in absolute fury and I quickly grabbed them from him, not trusting him not to throw them into the fire or do something else reckless.
"Rule 3: You must signify your marriage by the wearing of these two rings." I turned the folder upside down and out fell two white-gold rings. "Woah. These don't look cheap."
"Rule 4: You must say I love you at least once a day to keep the passion alive in your relationship." Sirius read out. I laughed at this. Ooh yes, an 'I love you' a day would certainly keep the non-existent passion in our illegal marriage alive!
"Rule 5: Public displays of affection are a must. To a limit please. Just kisses on the cheeks, hugs, waves, nicknames will do… nicknames?" Sirius raised his eyebrow at this and looked over at me. "Any particular name you would like me to call you?"
"'Oh wife who I am not worthy to serve let alone be married to'."
"OK. Mine's 'oh sex god who I want to shag like every other member of the female population'."
"… let's just settle on 'dear'."
"Aww but I was just getting into it!"
"Rule 6," I began loudly, drowning out Sirius, "Each week you will be given a task that is optional for you and your partner to carry out. You must do this task."
"Wait. How can the task be optional and we have to do them?"
"The teachers say they're optional, I say you have no choice and that we are doing them."
"Why?"
"Extra credit! Rule 7: You must wear an item of your partner's clothing… at all times?!" I practically shrieked out the last part of the rule.
"I bagsy your underwear!"
"No you don't. You can wear my school scarf and I'll wear your…"
"Underwear?"
"No-one's wearing anyone's underwear!"
"OK. You can wear my black hat. I bought it from Hogsmeade last year."
"Sorted."
"My turn: Rule 8: You cannot share the same bed. You may be sharing dormitories-"
"DORMITORIES? WE'RE SHARING DORMITORIES!"
…Needless to say, this was not my best day.
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Please R&R! Thanks to Sarah, my official ideas person. Also thanks to my amazing beta, Alicia, who also helped with a few ideas. Love you both –x-.