Thought I'd update Monday evening rather than morning!
"The only thing that will make you happy is being happy with who you are, and not who people think you are." Henry David Thoreau
Even though mocks had now finished, the teachers were still piling on the work, the threat of the real exams in June drawing ever closer. However, there was also a festive feel to the castle, as the snow began to settle in and everyone's thoughts turned to Christmas. It was one night, when I was walking back from a party planning session in the Ravenclaw common room, that I passed the sixth floor girls' bathroom. Suddenly feeling the urge to pee, I directed my course into the bathroom. As soon as I entered, I heard the tell-tale sound of someone retching over the loo. Concerned, I called out:
"Um... are you alright in there?"
There was silence from the bathroom stall. I edged closer and tried again.
"Excuse me – I just heard you being sick. Are you alright?"
There was a shuffling, and the door was flung back. A girl, who looked to be in around fourth or fifth year, appeared.
"I wasn't!" she exclaimed.
I was confused.
"Wasn't being sick. That was just the sound of... of... of the... toilet flushing!"
"Well, either there's something drastically wrong with my hearing, or that toilet is having an awful day. Honestly, there's nothing to be embarrassed about. I'll escort you to the Hospital Wing if you want." I smiled kindly.
"N...no." She backed away.
Her reaction was confusing. "There's nothing wrong with being ill. It happens to everyone. I'm sure you won't get into trouble for that!"
Her eyes gazed at me, the pupils dilating.
I took in her haggard appearance, how her robes looked slightly baggy around her waist, how her skin sagged around her eyes. A suspicion dawned upon me. I checked my watch. Dinner had just ended. I voiced my thoughts.
"Unless you were making yourself sick."
She started at my words, and this gave me the evidence to confirm my suspicions.
"No... – No. I wasn't! – It was... It was the toilet – I told you!"
I shook my head.
"I'm sorry, but I don't buy it."
She began to look frantic.
"Please don't tell anyone – I only did it the once. I just – felt a bit full after dinner. Please don't..."
I felt guilty, but I knew I had to tell someone. As a prefect, and being two or three years her senior, it was my responsibility to prevent this girl self-harming, however much she begged me not to tell.
"I'm sorry – I don't have a choice. I have to."
Her mouth hardened.
"I hate you." She stated.
I recoiled slightly, startled by her vehemence, and this was all it took for her to raise her already-grabbed wand and hex me.
"Petrificus Totalus!" she shouted.
My body snapped and became rigid, as I fell to the floor. It took me only a few seconds to perform the wordless spell, but by then she had fled the room, and even as I tried to chase after her, I had no idea where she had gone, or even who she was. I closed my eyes in frustration, but after five minutes of fretting, decided to head back to the Heads' Common Room, and try to come up with a solution overnight.
I entered the Heads' Common Room to find my friends clustered around in various activities, such as work (the girls) and seeing which objects to hand were the most flammable (the boys). Lily glanced up as I stepped through the portrait hole, and an expression that looked like hurt flashed across her face. It came and went so quickly, however, that I was left unsure as to whether I had imagined it.
"Been in the Ravenclaw Common Room again?" she asked.
"Yeah – just chatting to Mia and Iz."
"With all the time you spend there, I'm beginning to think that you prefer the colour blue to red" interjected Sirius.
"No. But don't worry; I'll still cheer for Gryffindor in Quidditch matches."
"Cheer for me, you mean."
I rolled my eyes.
"I shall cheer for you in so much as you belong to the Gryffindor team. And I won't hesitate to boo you should you allow the Bludger to hit any of your team mates."
"Then that is incentive enough for me to prevent the Bludger from hitting any of my team mates, my lady."
"I should hope it should." I stuck my nose in the air, walking primly past him, but making sure to catch his eye. He winked at me, and I obliged by winking back.
I reached a solution to the problem of the girl whom I had met earlier that day, as I lay in bed that night. I would go to Dumbledore. Although it felt like I was going behind her back, I had to put her well-being before my own feelings of guilt by betraying her to a teacher. Besides, she had already said that she hated me, so it wasn't as if I had anything to lose.
I woke up early, before anyone else was awake, making sure to grab my school bag as I left the dorm as I thought I might not have time to pick it up before lessons. Grabbing a stack of toast from the Great Hall, I trekked up to the statue outside Dumbledore's office. Being friends with the Head Students had its perks: one such being that the passwords to all the teachers' rooms and common rooms were pinned up in the Heads' Common Room, and so I gave the password (mint humbug) and so gained entry to the flight of stairs that led to Dumbledore's office.
Reached the top of the stairs, I rubbed my hands nervously against my robes, to rid them of the clamminess that had formed there at the thought of speaking to the Headmaster. As kind as he was, he struck a rather imposing figure. I drew a deep breath, but before I had time to knock, the familiar voice of the Headmaster called out: "Enter", and the door swung open.
I blinked in confusion, then stepped quickly through, not wanting to keep him waiting. He sat at his desk, his silhouette framed by the picture window and the sun-rise behind it. He continued to write, and I stood nervously in the centre of the room, not bold enough to disturb him, or to take the chair across from him.
He finished his sentence with a flourish, as I gripped my hands, and then looked up with a smile.
"Ah – Miss Logan. What can I do for you this fine morning?"
I took another deep breath.
"Well – that is to say..."
Unfortunately, shyness being one of my besetting vices, every word had fled from my mind, and my tongue was as dry as rock on the moon.
"Would you like a seat?" Dumbledore gestured to the chair across from him, and I took it gratefully.
"And a drink, perhaps?"
I nodded emphatically.
He smiled once more, and suddenly a glass of pumpkin juice was hovering in the air next to my right hand. I took a sip.
"So how is Seventh Year treating you?" he asked.
"Not too badly – at the moment. Though I'm glad it will be the end of term soon – I think everyone would welcome a respite from work at this point."
He nodded.
"And you are well after your recent illness?"
"Yes, thank you. Fully recovered, I hope. But sir, what I really wanted to speak to you about today was something else. You see, I'm very sorry to trouble you, but I think a student might be... in a bit of trouble. But I don't know her name or even her house."
He frowned slightly, regarding me over the top of his half-moon glasses.
"What would the nature of this trouble be?"
"Bulimia, sir. I found... well heard, a girl – I'm sure you can guess - in the sixth floor girls' bathroom near the Gryffindor Tower last night."
I related the rest to him, with a few interruptions for questions.
"Thank you. I shall certainly look into this."
I smiled, and got up, placing my empty goblet on the edge of his desk, and picking up my bag. Just as I was about to go through the door, his voice called me back.
"You did very well, Miss Logan. You did the right thing."
Suddenly, I felt all of my anxiety over the issue fade, the affirmation breaking over me like sunshine. I grinned at my Headmaster, and then left the room. Checking my watch, I saw that there was still time to grab a proper breakfast before lessons, and so directed my feet towards the Great Hall. Lily and the others were all chatting over breakfast, the boys included, but it was not until I was only ten feet away that I saw that Titia was there as well. Feeling my heart sink, I edged up to the table, not wanting to be noticed by her.
As my luck would have it, she saw me straight away.
"Rose! Where have you been all this time? With the Donahue twins?" she asked, deceptively brightly.
Not wanting to give away the girl with bulimia, but also not wanting to lie to my friends, I answered in the negative. Undaunted, Titia ploughed on.
"You seem to be spending so much time with them now that it's a wonder that your old friends don't feel rejected." She added. "Do you feel rejected, Lily?"
"Um... no." Replied Lily, but she didn't sound very convinced. I understood the look of hurt that I had seen on her face the night before: Lily thought that having found my new friends whilst having a fall-out with my old ones, I preferred to spend time with my old friends. Whilst I wanted to disabuse her of this notion, I couldn't let her know about the surprise party, the reason why I was spending so much tome with Iz and Mia, and so I hastily bit back a retort, and merely smiled at Titia, sitting down as I did so.
"I'm sure all my friends know that I'm not rejecting them, Titia."
She smiled thinly at me, but seeing that her ploy had failed, she turned back to her main object for sitting at the Gryffindor table: Sirius.
"So dahling, do tell me that story again about how you came to charm your motorbike to fly. I did so love riding on it with you."
I clenched my fist, feeling a stab of jealousy. This was the first I had heard of Sirius's flying motorbike. And she got to ride on it. I could imagine every detail in my head: how her arms clutched about the toned muscles of his waist, how she inhaled his scent as her head rested against his leather jacket...
A sharp kick interrupted my thoughts. I glanced up to meet Katie's gaze. She raised her eyebrows at me: meaning – Are you alright?"- and I nodded back.
Besides, I was scared of heights, so it wasn't like I would have enjoyed it had I been the one sitting behind Sirius on that motorbike. But still... I hastily pushed all treacherous thoughts from my head, and settled down to tuck into a hearty breakfast, trying to ignore the conversation.
Unfortunately, the only place available had been next to Sirius, so the conversation was close at hand, jabbing into my ears.
"I think that was probably one of the best nights of my life," mused Titia. "The stars were so clear, and then when we landed on the Astronomy Tower (I knew what that meant – the Astronomy Tower was the illicit rendezvous point at Hogwarts).
Sirius cleared his throat next to me, as if embarrassed. Not that you would think such a libertine as Sirius Black would be embarrassed by having his dates aired to the world; it must have been something else.
"That charm you cast – what was it called again..." Titia's voice trilled on.
A draught blew up from behind me, and I shivered. In my haste to get to Dumbledore's office, and remember my school bag, I had grabbed my thin summer robes from the cupboard instead of my thick woollen winter ones.
Feeling my shiver, Sirius interrupted Titia's reminisces by turning to me and asking:
"Are you cold?"
"Just a bit- I grabbed the wrong robes this morning." I replied.
"Well we can't have that, can we. Especially not so soon after your pneumonia."
To my chagrin, and my embarrassment, and discomfiture, and pleasure, and delight (a mix of all five emotions), he then proceeded to throw his arm around me and to pull me close to his side. A warmth that had nothing to do with the physical heat radiating from his body filled me. Not even Titia's narrowing eyes glaring at me for the rest of the meal could dampen the glowing happiness that had erupted within me.
I have some bad news. As proud as I am of myself for updating once a week all through this term, I am utterly and completely exhausted. Mentally, physically and spiritually. That's what your final year of school and the International Baccalaureate does to you.
Anyway, I have decided that I am not going to update this story over the Christmas period, but instead work on piecing my brain back together. If I manage to do that, I hope I may be able to pre-write some chapters for next term. I'm so sorry about this - I will be returning in the second week of January, but I need a complete four week rest after the term I've just had.
I also have a request, which may be a bit of a tall order, and especially cheeky after I told you that I'm not updating for 4 weeks! But I'd love to reach 500 reviews by the end of 2010 - I will be sending a short snippet of the next chapter (the 300 words that I have written) to everyone who reviews, to keep you going over Christmas. If you aren't a registered member of ff, put your email addy in your review and I'll send it to you that way.
Thanks so much, and Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thanks for reading this! Lol EllieBaby xxx