"We better keep an eye on this one. She's tricky."
-Michael (Mary Poppins)
Being back at school was nowhere near as fun as it usually was. Umbridge was still making new decrees as fast as her pudgy hand could scribble them down. The word around Hogwarts was that six students leaving early for the Christmas holidays had made her furious, but to Scarlett's relief, nobody received a detention for it. She had the feeling that this was Dumbledore's doing and she was grateful.
The D.A. was one of the only things preventing Scarlett from completely losing her mind now that she was back under Umbridge's watchful eyes. The first meeting after the holidays was coming up and Harry had promised they'd be learning how to do Patronus Charms. This was what many members of the D.A. had been looking forward to the most.
"What do you think your Patronus will be?" Justin asked as they walked to the Room of Requirement, hand in hand.
"I have no idea," Scarlett admitted, shrugging. "I'm anxious to find out, but I might not even be able to do one. They're pretty advanced."
"If Harry could learn, I don't see why we can't," Justin pointed out. "Harry's a really great teacher, so I'm sure we'll be able to learn in no time."
"True," Scarlett shrugged. She looked at Erica. "What do you think yours will be?"
Erica shrugged. "Something cool, hopefully."
"Yeah, same," Scarlett agreed. "They reached the Room of Requirement and slipped through the door. They were some of the last to arrive so it wasn't long before Harry began the meeting and got them started on their patronus charms.
"Think of the happiest memory you can," he instructed, walking around to survey their work.
"You try first," Scarlett said, turning to Justin.
Justin nodded and closed his eyes, holding his wand up. He stood like that, motionless, for what seemed like forever.
"Justin?" Scarlett asked, laughing. "Are you going to do anything?"
Justin opened his eyes. "I was concentrating really hard on my memory," he said.
"Or he's constipated," a voice whispered in Scarlett's ear.
Scarlett turned to see Fred and George standing beside her. Fred, clearly the one who had spoken, was smirking at her.
Scarlett rolled her eyes. "Go back to practicing and be sure not to strain yourself too hard thinking of a memory. You might come across as constipated."
Fred smiled. "Good one, Scar. Real original." He patted her on the shoulder and walked away.
Scarlett sighed and turned back to Justin. "Try again," she said, "but maybe you should hurry it along this time. Merlin knows Fred will have more jokes up his sleeve if you don't."
"What'd he say to you just now?" Justin asked.
"Forget it," Scarlett shook her head. "Just try again."
Justin glanced at Fred and George. "Fine." He closed his eyes and concentrated again, but for a considerably less amount of time. "Expecto Patronum!" A thin vapor escaped from his wand.
"Wow, a fog patronus! Fascinating!"
"Piss off, Weasley," Justin scowled, glaring over Scarlett's shoulder at Fred. "What's your problem?"
"Yeah, really," Scarlett added, folding her arms as she looked over at a smirking Fred. She glanced at George. "George, control your brother, please."
"Don't bring George into this," Fred said, his tone teasing.
"Well, then stop being so rude," she demanded. She glanced at Justin, then back at Fred. "I don't exactly know why you two seem to not like each other-,"
"You know why I don't like him," Justin scoffed.
"Fine. Fred, I don't know why you keep teasing Justin, but-,"
"It's fun to see both of you get so defensive," Fred answered.
Scarlett rolled her eyes. "Just go back to practicing," she said, turning back to Justin.
"Bloody hell," Scarlett heard Fred whisper a few minutes later. "This shouldn't be so difficult."
"You've only been at it for five minutes," George said, trying to conjure his own patronus to no avail.
"Still," Fred muttered. "It's frustrating."
Scarlett smirked at the conversation. She wasn't going to let this opportunity to tease Fred pass by. "Ooh, an invisible patronus! Brilliant!"
Fred turned around. He looked amused that Scarlett was teasing him. "Ah, George, look at this. Scarlett thinks she's quite the jokester." He turned back to Scarlett. "You should know it's not funny when you reuse jokes like that, Scar. That's twice in, what, fifteen minutes?"
"It still doesn't change the fact that your patronus is non-existent."
"Invisible," Fred argued, slightly irritated. "Didn't you just say so?"
Scarlett shrugged. "I guess I did," she smirked. She was enjoying herself and Fred knew it.
"Watch it, Callaway," Fred muttered.
"Leave her alone," Justin said.
"It's okay," Scarlett giggled. "Fred knows I'm just teasing him."
"Yeah, stop being so uptight," Fred smirked.
Justin scowled.
"Let's see you cast a Patronus, then, Scarlett," Fred said. "You haven't gotten a chance yet. Maybe we can all have a laugh at your expense, now."
Scarlett sent him a look, but Fred just folded his arms and laughed, waiting for her to cast the charm.
She sighed and held up her wand. "Expecto Patronum!"
To everyone's surprise, silvery mist shot out of Scarlett's wand, forming into the shape of a dog—a bloodhound to be exact. She hadn't been the first of the entire D.A. to successfully cast one, but she obviously wasn't the last, either. Scarlett's eyes widened in excitement as the dog circled her happily. It didn't get very far, though. Scarlett was so surprised that she lost concentration and the dog faded.
"How did you do that?" Fred asked incredulously as everyone returned to their own business.
Scarlett shook her head, feeling somewhat dazed. "I don't know."
"What was your memory?" Justin asked.
"It was one of the days I spent with my dad when I was little. It was just the two of us…." She trailed off and smiled, twirling her wand between her fingers as she thought. "Actually, it was the day I started collecting the fortunes from fortune cookies."
"You collect those?" Justin asked.
Scarlett nodded. "Yeah, sort of."
"She didn't tell you?" Fred asked, raising an eyebrow.
"No, but—wait, you know?"
"From when we were younger," Fred said quickly, glancing at Scarlett.
She narrowed her eyes at him. That was strange. Normally, Fred would have told Justin about the conversation he had had with Scarlett by the lake just to make him angry. He also would have thought it funny that he knew something about Scarlett that Justin didn't and would have loved making a comment about it. It was possible that Fred knew Scarlett didn't want to say anything about the night at the lake and was respecting her wishes, but not at least giving Justin a hard time for not knowing about Scarlett's collection was enough to raise Scarlett's suspicions.
"You should have said something," Justin told Scarlett. "I've thrown away plenty of fortunes over the years. I could have saved some for you."
Scarlett shrugged and tore her eyes away from Fred to look at Justin. "I mainly collected my own. For an experiment between me and my dad. To see if the fortunes would come true. I don't really collect them anymore. Well, I haven't in a while." She glanced at Fred to see him smirking at her again.
"Oh. Well collecting them is fine," Justin said, "but you do know they're a load of rubbish, don't you?"
Scarlett blushed and looked down at her feet. Maybe she did know that deep down, but she still had found it fun to wonder about the words printed up on those little tiny slips of paper.
"Oi," Fred said. He sounded like he was trying not to sound snappish. "If Scarlett likes to do it, then why shouldn't she?" he asked. "It means something to her."
"Of course, by all means she should do it if she likes to, but it's true: they are a load of rubbish."
"So what if they are?" Fred asked, shrugging.
"I-," Justin began, but he never got a chance to finish because Harry was ending the meeting.
As they were gathering their things, Fred walked by Scarlett to grab his bag which was just past hers. "Want to prank Umbridge with me and George?" he whispered in her ear as she picked up her bag.
"When?" she asked, turning to look at him. Justin and Erica were already waiting for her a few feet away.
Fred glanced at his watch. "Oh, in about twenty minutes."
Scarlett paused, thinking about it. Then she glanced at Justin. "Sure, I'll do it, but I'll have to let Justin know."
"Fine, but if he gets paranoid, tell him to shove it and come with us anyway."
Scarlett actually started to laugh, but bit it back at the last second. "I'm not going to tell him to do that, but if he doesn't like it, it's not going to stop me from going if I want to go. And he did say he'd try to be understanding about the fact that I'm friends with you, so maybe he won't even say anything at all."
"Oh, he'll try. How gallant," Fred smirked.
Scarlett narrowed her eyes. "Watch it, or I'll revoke my decision."
"So, you're coming?"
Scarlett took a minute before answering. Finally, she pulled her bag onto her shoulder. "Meet you in the entrance hall in ten minutes."
Fred grinned. "Excellent." It was then that George joined them with his things and Fred turned to grin at him. "She's in."
"Brilliant," George said, breaking into an identical grin.
"You two are much too devious for your own good," Scarlett muttered, walking away to catch up with Justin and Erica.
"How'd you ever work that one out?" Fred called after her, laughing.
"Beats me," she called over her shoulder, resulting in more laughter from Fred.
Scarlett dumped her things onto her bed and immediately headed for the door. "I'm leaving," she announced to Erica. She was trying at all costs to avoid questions so that she could meet the twins. Although, she really should have known questions were inevitable.
"Leaving? Leaving to go where?" Erica asked, bewildered, following Scarlett into the common room where Justin was waiting.
"I'm going to help Fred and George prank Umbridge," Scarlett said, looking at the two of them.
"You can't be serious." Erica laughed in disbelief.
"I am," Scarlett answered. "That woman needs a taste of her own medicine. She's been terrible to everyone in the school and especially terrible towards me. It'll feel good to get revenge."
"Do you know what she'll do if you get caught?" Concern was clearly evident in Justin's tone and Scarlett bit her lip. She almost felt compelled to change her mind and stay here with him and Erica, but only almost. "She might actually cut your hand clean off this time," Justin continued.
Scarlett giggled. "She won't."
"It's not funny," Justin said, glancing down at the half-healed cuts on Scarlett's hand.
"Fred and George will make sure we won't get caught. They are experts after all."
"But Fred got you in trouble last time—oops!" Erica clapped a hand over her mouth as Scarlett mentally cursed.
"Fred landed you in your last detention? You told me you were alone!" Justin cried.
"I didn't want you to get angry. I know you don't like Fred and he was the one delivering the murtlap to me that night. I didn't want to start a fight."
"So hiding it from me was better?" he asked. Justin wasn't one to get angry, which made the way his eyes flashed that much worse.
"No," Scarlett answered.
"If it's really nothing, then why did you hide it from me? And why were you out that night long enough for it to be after hours? Shouldn't it have taken about five seconds to get the murtlap?"
"He wanted to show me some of the secret passageways that he knows so that if I ever went out after hours again, I wouldn't get caught."
"But you did get caught." Justin's voice was tense and it was rising with every word. "Fred and George are reckless, Scar. They're not the kind of people you should hang out with."
"They aren't? Well, I don't think you're the kind of person who has the authority to tell me who I can and can't hang out with. If this is a jealousy thing, then I can assure you that Fred and I simply hang out when we're together. You're my boyfriend, not him, and I'm sorry, but you're mental if you think I'm a cheater. You've known me since you were twelve and I was fourteen. I wouldn't do that to you."
"Yeah? Well maybe I don't know who you are anymore. I didn't think you were a liar and look who just got proved wrong. Me!"
Scarlett just glared at him. "I didn't lie."
"I'm going to get murtlap from Hermione," Justin mimicked.
"Don't you mimic me!" Scarlett cried.
"Hey!" Erica yelled. "Calm down, the both of you! You both need some space and some time to cool down."
Scarlett sent one last angry glare Justin's way before turning and marching out the door. She tried to regain her composure by the time she reached the entrance hall where the twins were already waiting, but they saw right though her. It figured.
"What's wrong?" Fred asked, looking genuinely concerned.
"Nothing," Scarlett answered.
"Ah, the dreaded girl code." George nodded in understanding.
"It's a tricky language," Fred agreed.
"But we think we've got it down," George finished.
"What are you two going on about?"
"When a girl says 'nothing', she really means 'something'." Fred clarified. "In addition, when they say they'll be ready in five minutes, they really mean twenty minutes."
"At least," George added.
"Ah, like when guys say they'll do what you tell them in five minutes and they really mean another twenty. At least," Scarlett smirked.
"Fair enough," Fred muttered. "Better watch out for this one, George. She's tricky."
George smirked before turning back to Scarlett. "Really, what's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong," Scarlett insisted.
"Fine, fine." The twins held up their hands in defeat.
"What's the plan?" Scarlett asked, eager to get the subject off of her and her mind off of her fight with Justin.
Fred reached into his pocket and pulled out four colorful candies. "Newest invention," he explained. "Skiving Snackboxes. They're sweets that make you ill so that you can get out of class. One end makes you sick and the other makes you well again so that you have an entire class period to do as you please."
"We just perfected them before the holidays," George added, "but we haven't tested them on anyone besides ourselves and a few first years."
"In other words," Fred said, "we haven't tested them on our enemies yet."
"You have enemies?" Scarlett asked.
"A few here and there," George shrugged. "It comes with the business."
"Business?"
"The pranking business," George said, waving his hand dismissively. "It doesn't matter, though. The enemies we do have are a bunch of gits that we wouldn't want to be friends with anyway."
"We're thinking of slipping these into Umbridge's tea," Fred said. He pointed to each candy as he explained it. "Nosebleed Nougats make you have a raging nosebleed, Fainting Fancies make you faint, Fever Fudge gives you a fever, and Puking Pastils make you vomit. Pretty self-explanatory, really."
"You know," Scarlett said, picking up all four snackboxes and turning them around in her palm, "I've got a better idea than sneaking them into her tea."
"Yeah?" The twins perked up. "Let's hear it."
"Hold on." Scarlett sat down on the steps and, one by one, transfigured each candy so that it was frilly and fancy looking. Then she picked up a stray piece of paper off the floor and tore a tiny strip off of the side. She transfigured the paper to look fancy and the long, thin piece into a pink ribbon. Lastly, she tied the transfigured snackboxes into the fancy wrapping paper. "Have either of you got a spare piece of paper and a quill?" she asked. "I dropped my stuff off in my dorm already."
"Here…." George handed her what she asked for, looking confused.
"Dear Dolores," Fred read over Scarlett's shoulder as she wrote, "I hope you are doing well. From what you've told me about things at Hogwarts being far worse than you feared, I couldn't help but feel sorry for all of the trouble you must be going through. Therefore, I took it upon myself to send you these sweets to express my deepest thanks for taking this difficult job upon yourself. Sincerely, Cornelius Fudge, Minister of Magic."
"Scar, you're brilliant!" George laughed, taking the bag of candies, note now attached, that Scarlett handed him.
"Now, how do we give it to her?" Fred asked. "I suppose you've got that all figured out, too?"
Scarlett smirked as she stood up. Fred actually looked a little miffed that Scarlett was taking charge in his area of expertise, but he also looked somewhat impressed. "We go to the owlery and pick the nicest looking school owl. But we'll have to sneak down to the broom shed and steal some brooms first."
"Why?" George asked.
"Well, her office door will most likely be closed and you want to see what happens, don't you?" Scarlett asked. "Or are you not interested in seeing the old toad become the sickest she's ever been?"
"George and I always use the-,"
"Keyhole?" Scarlett asked. She smirked. "Last time I checked, the keyhole was only big enough for one person to look through."
"We'd alternate," Fred explained. "If we executed a prank in a room where the door was closed, we'd alternate who got to look through the keyhole. Or we'd hide around the corner and just listen. A lot of times, the person we pranked would run out of the room and we'd get a glimpse of how well our prank was executed."
Scarlett smiled. "If we fly up to the window, we'll be able to have a much better view without having one of us peer through the keyhole or all three of us hiding around the corner. I don't know about you but I want to see this whole thing play out from beginning to end and we can do that by spying through the window."
Fred and George blinked at her a few times in amazement. "Marry me," George said, widening his eyes. "Oh, wait…." He smirked at Fred as Scarlett blushed.
Fred smacked George upside the head before turning to Scarlett and smiling slightly. "You really haven't changed, Scar."
Scarlett smiled back. "You two really never thought of using the windows to watch your pranks in action?"
"No," they blushed. "We always thought we'd never have enough time," George added.
"Although now that I think about it," Fred said, "if we'd brought our own brooms we would have, or even if we snuck down to the broom shed before executing the prank, like Scarlett suggested."
"I think it's safe to say I'm thoroughly embarrassed," George groaned. "We were just outsmarted by a girl."
Scarlett swatted him. "Come on," she smiled, "let's get this prank started." She led the way out the front doors and towards the broom shed.
"I told you she's tricky," Fred muttered to George from behind her. Scarlett couldn't help but grin wider.
A/N: Thanks for all of the reviews so far and thanks to anyone who has added this story to their favorites or their alerts! I hope everyone likes this chapter and don't forget to leave a review to let me know what you think!