The sad emo teacher/the vampire wannabe

Merry stumbled downstairs to the Great Hall where he found pigs in human form. The pupils gobbled their breakfast down since they had not eaten anything for twenty-four hours. Merry ate a bit less than the others since he hated all food which was not homemade by the mean Buttercup. Rolle, who had followed Merry to the dining room like a zombie, fell asleep in the porridge stew.

Professor McDreamagall, who was more dressed than usual in a pink-purple transparent silk dressing gown, pulled out a bunch of schedules which had been crumpled in her bra, and threw them negligently at the pupils. Merry studied his schedule and let his breakfast neighbour read it for him (then Merry drew little pictures in the boxes so that he would understand which lesson he would have). The first lesson was potions. Rolle, who just had awakened, sleepily looked at his schedule, put it in the pocket with some crackers (he had not eaten any breakfast) and followed his class down to the classroom.

Down in the cellar caverns the potions teacher waited. He looked very malicious; he had black shoulder-length hair and emo fringe, eyeliner lines under his eyes and a star next to his left eye. He also had solely black clothes, but his cauldron was for some reason made of sparkling diamonds.

The children sat down, the teacher closed the door and drew the curtains (to be strictly accurate there were no windows but he thought it looked cosy with ugly textiles on the brick walls).

"Hi. I am professor Smirk and I will educate you in potions." He did not sound too enthusiastic. He gazed at the children, bored. "Potions is a bit like housecraft, it means that you will prepare several brews. But I warn you, if you do not want to die young, do not drink any potions that I have not cleared. Any questions?"

Everyone peered at him, no one said anything.

"Okaaay… so then it is OK if we have a little introduction on the basics, we will not make any potions today since it is your first lesson." His gaze swept over the class again, and now it caught Merry. He looked Merry in the eyes a few seconds, thereafter he turned away and began to cry quietly.

Merry peered stupidly for a moment. Then he said with a soft, kind voice: "You… Can I call you Smirky?" The whole class now peeked at the crying teacher. "And why are you weeping, are you a girl or what?" asked Merry then with a tantalizing voice.

"Call me Professor", replied professor Smirk shortly.

The rest of the lesson moved on without any more special events. The other following lessons that day were too boring to be mentioned in this book. Anyway, at dinner Merry to his embarrassment received a mail. It was embarrassing because the owls normally delivered the records at breakfast. But since Merry did not have an owl like normal kids, but a half blind flamingo with the IQ of a celery, he could not count with getting his records intime.

The letter was from HB:

Hi Merry,

Comenow an' stare a bit onmy collect ion,

ye can bring yer little frien nds (if ye have some ;P).

Seee ye!!!

P.S; if ye dont come ill go for ye.

Merry shivered. But since he did not think that he had a choice, he set course on HB:s mini-castle later that evening. He did not want to go alone (understandably) so he lured Rolle with him ("Hi follow me, I'm going to PILLOW COUNTRY!"). Rolle, who was quite off, followed of course without further reflections. The only words he had taken in were in any case one of his favourite words; pillows.

At six o'clock they stood in front of HB:s doorway.

"Do I dare to knock?" Merry whispered frighteningly.

"Pillow?" said Rolle, totally retarded.

Before they attained to knock, the door opened. In the doorway a dreadful view appeared; HB with a big happy smile.

"Ohh it's ye", he said as if he had not invited them, "But oh deer, ye've onley ONE friend, even I who'm so unprepossessin' have more friends." He went in and waved at them to follow him. Rolle had already fallen asleep so Merry had to drag him in.

"I'LL GIVE YE A GUIDED TOUR", HB roared enthusiastically, "Nice house I've here, ye see, we can begin here from belowe", he said while he rubbed his hands.

They came in to the first room. It was a big alighted hall with lots of show glasses. They contained condoms in all the colours of the rainbow.

Merry and Rolle (who had woken up) stopped where they were standing for a moment and burst out in chorus; "Oooooooooooh!"

"Impressin', isn't it? I've supposedly the world's most exlusive collection."

Merry was actually impressed, despite his disappointment over the absence of pumpkins. Rolle on the other hand fell asleep almost instantly by drabness.

According as they went by show glass after show glass HB commented and gave them some interesting facts, for example: "These are some ine nineteenth-century styla, note da inscriptive initials. OOOH, THESE, they're real rarities! It's in thisa case I've the moust precious ones, like these who're decorated witha gold sand and little diamonds, or have belonged to cilebrities…" HB waffled on for hours and hours. When the guided tour finally was over it was about two am, and HB shooed Merry with the sleeping Rolle on his back outside.

"Can I borrow a wheelbarrow or something to drag him home with?"

"Nope", HB said and closed the door.