Chapter 10
The next couple of days everything seemed to have slowed down. I had decided not to bother with Oliver anymore as I found that figuring him out took up too much headspace and I didn't have the energy for it, I mean how can it be this hard to just be friends with someone? So I decided upon avoiding him.
Quidditch practises were nothing out of the ordinary; we were up to speed again, which felt good. The same couldn't be said for schoolwork however and I would often find myself rushing back to the common room after having spent hours in the library, barely making it back before curfew.
I mostly spent time with Graham and my Hufflepuff mates, and more often than not, we would actually hang out all five of us. My friends seemed to enjoy having Graham in our company, and he, likewise, seemed to enjoy theirs as well. Seeing Graham laugh as much as I did in their company took a weight of my chest. Knowing Graham, he could get really stressed out over his matches. He puts this massive pressure on himself that he has to be perfect to the last detail and it's not doing anything good but making him morbid. He wasn't the only one. For Roger Davies and me, this week was like no other. But for the remaining Quidditch captains at Hogwarts who had a match this Saturday to prepare for — this week was hell. It didn't help that the Gryffindor/Slytherin matches had some sort of frenzy surrounding them. I couldn't imagine what pressure that must put on the teams to perform well. I hadn't heard much from Oliver lately. I'd mostly seen him around the Great Hall looking sullen. Once or twice I'd seen him in our shared classes, where he saw it fit to catch up on sleep. He had tried to talk to me once or twice after class, and he'd seemed on the cheerier side. But I still thought it better to not bother with him as he only caused much unwanted confusion in my life.
While walking down the hallway from one of these particular classes came Roger Davies up to me from behind.
"Enjoying watching the other captains succumb to the stress?" He asked sadistically.
Startled I twirled around to look at him only to quickly relax thereafter. We walked together. "Yes, very much. It's times like these we can truly appreciate not being put in the notoriously competitive houses. We never have to put up with all this madness." It was true that the same kind of tension had thickened distinctly in the way that it does every year around this particular game. I had witnessed two duels break out this week, and heard about two more.
"Things have gone a bit crazy. But we're lucky. We're on the outside looking in." He said and gave me a smile, which I returned.
We sauntered on in silence until Roger said, "Tutor me."
"What? Why?" I asked confused.
"I'm falling behind in herbology. Further and further every week. I have decided to seek help… from you." He said it as if he wasn't really all that certain of it himself.
I broke out in laugher and stopped walking. "You want me to help you out in herbology?" He gave me a quizzical look that told me he apparently had no idea of why I was laughing, which is odd given how obvious it felt to me. "First of all: that's a stereotypical view of my house. Even though generally Hufflepuffs might have a knack for herbology, that doesn't make us all into sodding expert gardeners and certainly not into equipped tutors in herbology. Especially not me!" He merely folded his arms, looking amused at my reasoning. "And secondly: you're a Ravenclaw. Shouldn't you be equipped to handle something as fairly simple as herbology?"
He leaned himself against the stone wall casually and gave me a challenging look. "Who's being prejudiced now? Sometimes even Ravenclaws need help you know."
I thought about this for a moment. "Fair enough. You know what? I think I will help you out. I know a thing or two about herbology. And it might be good for my ego." I began walking again.
"So you're saying you need to grow your ego?" He laughed.
"Yes. I do. Here's your first lesson: A group of bowtruckles is called a branch." I proudly shared with him.
"First of all, a bowtruckle is not a plant. Second of all, I don't really see how that could be of use to me in the quest to better my grade." Roger criticised.
I shrugged nonchalantly. "I wasn't the one who choose me as a tutor. You dug your grave, now lie in it."
He stopped by a staircase; this was when he would begin ascending the stairs leading to his common room. "See you soon then I guess." He said and gave a small wave.
"Before you go. Can I just ask you, in all seriousness, why you actually came to me?"
"To be fair, I guess it was mainly because of the stereotype about Hufflepuff house. But you're the friendliest of all the Hufflepuff girls I know."
"Okay. Thank you." I said awkwardly. "Why only girls though?" I asked confused.
Roger looked at me for a second too long before correcting himself, "Doesn't have to be a girl, I only know girls in Hufflepuff house though."
The corridor fell quiet.
"Do you wanna begin tomorrow then?" Roger asked.
Shaking the awkwardness off of me I regained my casual smile, "Sure! Should we say 5 p.m. in my common room?"
"Alright." He said and began ascending the many stairs. I did not envy him as I walked the straight path toward my common room.
I mostly saw it as humorous, the idea of Roger picking me to be his tutor. But I guess it made sense, he knew me on a more personal level than the rest of the Hufflepuffs in our year, seeing as we had been fellow Quidditch players throughout our time at Hogwarts.
I would however subsequently have to face the fact that being a tutor entails actual tutoring, an unfamiliar activity in my repertoire.
We were approaching mid-November. The air had turned cheek bitingly cold but, disappointingly, there had been no snow as of yet. Instead we got heaps of rain. I swayed on my broom looking down at the pitch far beneath me; it had a dark greyish sort of green to it, instead of its usual forest green. An effect created by the gloomy sky in combination with the hazy rain. I looked down at the grass below me; the rain that hit me trickled down my face and fell to join it. In this particular instant, I wasn't all that happy to be out here. Usually Quidditch was fun no matter the circumstances of the weather, but in this moment, and looking down at the usually forest green grass, I simply couldn't remember the last time we had had a sunny practise. There is only so much rain one can take before one starts to long for being in the common room with a couple of friends playing exploding snap by the fireplace.
So that's what we did when the session was over. PJ, Wright and I silently made our way up to the castle with hair dripping all over. We stopped by the Slytherins to pick up Graham and made our way to our common room where we could finally warm up.
"How's the tutoring going, Willow?" Graham asked. He also, seemed amused by the concept of me being a tutor. "Come to think of it, I've been having trouble with arthimancy lately, think you could help out a fellow friend?" He joked. We sat down in the seating area around the seemingly ever-burning fireplace to wait for Bianca's return from what we assumed was the library so that we could all inaugurate a friendly game of exploding snap.
I decided to ignore his joke and answer genuinely. "You know what? As it turns out, tutoring Roger isn't all that demanding. I mostly just helped him out with his essay. We were basically just hanging out while getting some homework done along the way. And I could take care of my own work when he didn't need as much help. I guess he mostly just wants someone to give him a nudge along the way; he's pretty self-going. And we can also have a laugh as we go which is nice."
Graham kept scanning the room while I spoke, so clearly disinterested in my ramblings that were evidently me contemplating out loud for my own benefit rather than for anyone else's.
"Okay." He said absentmindedly. "By the way, how come I never see you hanging out with the Hufflepuff boys in your year?" He turned to look at us all collectively as if he'd just uncovered a scandal we'd been trying to cover up.
"They're all gay so there's really no reason for us to." Wright said casually while she magically made the deck of cards do a levitating shuffle.
Graham stared perplexedly at Wright whereas PJ and I simply watched the scene unfold in amusement. "So you're saying that the sole reason you people ever hang out with boys is... to groom them or something? Is that what this is?" he gesticulated between us all.
"I'll let you deduce that." Wright said smugly, the point upon which we all couldn't take it anymore and broke into a fit of laughter discounting Graham who up until then hadn't understood that she was joking. He did as he commonly did in our presence: looked on with utter confusion.
"You can't have seriously thought any of that would be true?" PJ asked. In Graham's defence, I had to say that Wright had an aptitude to make anything sound believable, even the most ridiculous of things.
"Well… I never see you together with them, for all I know, that could be the truth to it."
PJ shrugged. "I honestly don't know where this is coming from. Fine, we don't hang out with them regularly, but we like them. They're alright."
"Griffith!" I exclaimed loudly. "Griffith is a right craic. I love him." Griffith was our chaser, and a good one at that.
"He's a bit too much of a craic sometimes don't you think?" Wright and PJ shared a look. They both found that Peter Griffith and I would mock about a little too much on the field at times.
"Too much of a craic is always the right amount of craic for me." I declared proudly with a smile, earning a roll or two of their eyes.
"Here comes Bianca finally!" PJ announced and everyone directed their attention toward the entrance where Bianca emerged with all her badger grace.
She skipped up to us with energy of which I envied greatly. "Heeey!" She cheered, while dragging the E. "My favourite Quidditch team! All gathered around the campfire to greet me! Also Graham. Hey Graham." Graham waved quietly from his chair. She sat down. "So I met Oliver in the library. Said he'd heard you were tutoring Roger Davies. Good job on all that by the way." She clapped my shoulder. "He wondered if I could tell you that he's much interested in signing up for these renowned lessons in herbology."
I have to say, I was speechless. She'd barely entered the room a minute ago and she already had everyone quiet with their attention in her hands.
"I don't understand this!" I finally burst. I would laugh had this situation not been so befuddling. "I'm not even good at herbology! I only got an A on my O.W.L's.! This is codswallop!" I flung my hands in the air like crazy.
"Well… You always finish your assignments in herbology on time. And you always pass them." Graham tried.
I paused to look at him. "If that is the modern idea of what constitutes an adept herbology tutor, then I believe most of Hogwarts should have that in their syllabus." I spat at him before realizing that I should probably calm down. I was acting as if something terrible had happened when in reality it wasn't terrible but bizarre. "How did he find out, though?" I asked Bianca and she pouted her lip in deliberation.
"He probably spoke to Davies I'm guessing." She said.
I paused for an unnatural amount of time. "Are they friends or something?" I asked.
"From one thing to another." Wright muttered.
Bianca looked at everyone else in the room as if to see if they could signal in some way why I was asking. "They're on quite good terms as I understand it." She clarified hesitantly. "He's Ravenclaws Quidditch captain." She added as if that would make the occurrence of them being friends any more plausible to me.
"Exactly. He's Ravenclaws Quidditch captain. So why on earth would Oliver be friends with him given how he declared me his enemy within the first week of my captaincy! What's wrong with him?" I was getting quite riled up by now.
"Did he really 'declare you his enemy' though, Will? Don't you think that you simply misunderstood each other?" Wright argued.
Ignoring her I continued my interrogation. "What name did he use?" I asked and when Bianca only looked defeated back at me I clarified further. "Did he say Willow or Penderghast?"
Bianca threw her head back in what appeared to be some sort of mental anguish. "Not that again Willow. Why does it matter? He obviously wants to be your friend."
It didn't matter what she said; I was intransigent. I gave her a look that said I'm not backing down until you tell me, to which she sighed in response.
Bianca crossed her arms impatiently, but admitted, "He said Penderghast. Obviously."
I leaned back in my chair, mouth in a straight line.
"Will, I know you have this desperate need to be everyone's friend, but you can't be on first name basis with every witch or wizard you meet. You just can't." PJ said delicately. I had to agree, the words hit home. For some reason I had always had this big need to be chummy with everyone. I think it stems from just never wanting to end up in that situation where all of your friends are gone for some reason and you are left alone. Still I ignored her as if she hadn't said anything at all.
I turned to Bianca. "Tell him I don't have time to tutor two students."
She rolled her eyes. "Tell him yourself. He only gave me the message because I met him in the library and you guys were away on practise."
"Why can't you just tutor Wood along with Davies? They will both have the same assignments anyway. It's not like he's done anything to personally offend you." PJ offered.
"Are you sure about that?" I said, piercing her eyes. "Besides, Roger genuinely wants my help, whereas Oliver probably has some ulterior motive. Like spying on me to get my plays." I sunk lower into my chair and sulked a little.
PJ had had enough at this point. "Okay Willow. You are being ridiculous right now; can I just tell you that? Do you honestly think Oliver seems like the kind of person who would do that? Has he really made that bad of an impression on you? Second of all, Roger Davies, no ulterior movies?" She paused to see if I would figure this one out by myself. I looked around to see everyone eyeing me expectantly.
"Willow, he's sort of been flirting with you. Have you not noticed that?" Wright carefully asked.
My first instinctive reaction was to dismiss this right away. But then I had to stop myself to think about this. Had he been flirting? I honestly wasn't sure. It would explain why he had asked me of all people. "Are you sure?" I finally settled on asking.
They all seemed to agree on this. They all nodded their heads and looked between each other, all but Graham who hadn't been there to witness the supposed flirting.
I kept quiet for the remaining time that I spent in the common room. Not purposefully. I had to piece things together in my head and it distracted me from the social situation at hand. My friends kept eyeing me as I sat quiet and watched them play and it bothered me, so I left shortly to go up to my dormitory.
I grabbed a book from a drawer in my nightstand. I would always pack many books before leaving for Hogwarts, but I never ended up reading more than two or three. There always seemed to be something else going on, which was a good thing I guessed. I liked to keep busy. This year I had not had time to finish any book as of yet. So I made myself comfortable in my fourposter and read to keep my mind off things.
I felt saddened by the fact that Oliver, whom I had thought since we talked in the stone bridge tower, up until now, had the potential of becoming a friend of mine. It now seemed like he didn't want to be my friend, seemed like he intentionally indicated that fact.
Furthermore I felt kind of embarrassed at my ignorance. Everyone seemed to labour under the impression that Roger had wanted me to tutor him for the sole purpose of… well, I don't know exactly. However I was sure now that it was not because he believed I could teach him something, like I had thought. Which in itself was the reason for my embarrassment. I realise now that the thought of him, a brilliant student, coming to me for help had made me proud, despite how preposterous I had previously thought it. I couldn't help but think it naïve of me to not have questioned the legitimacy of it, and I worried, as I recalled the look on my friends' faces when they had told me, that they had thought it too.
Some time passed and somewhere along the way I managed to forget about my sad embarrassment in the flow of the pages of my book. That is until I heard footsteps coming up the staircase. I knew that I had been a mopey bore this evening and they would probably be annoyed at me for it. Acting quickly I chucked the book into my nightstand, turned my back toward the door, lay down and closed my eyes. The door opened and I wished that I had drawn the curtains around me. I did nothing but listen as the girls sauntered inside, listened to the lack of speech coming from them. Did they assume I was sleeping? The light was still on. Suddenly I felt very silly laying here pretending to sleep when I apparently wasn't. I felt like a child.
Someone walked up to my bed. I decided to open my eyes. It was PJ and she didn't look annoyed. She squatted down to the same level as me and leaned her hand for support on the frame of my bed and smiled warmly. "You're a bit sad." She said and cocked her head in pity.
I didn't know what to reply with but before I'd thought of something she climbed onto my bed and over me to lie down beside me. I turned and caught sight of the rest of the gang who, as if on cue, all climbed into my bed as well. Like one can imagine, it really didn't fit us all, but we made it work. We didn't really say or do anything but lie there. It was nice though. It did the trick to cheer me up.
"Alright, this isn't comfortable." Wright said after a couple of minutes. She got up and left for her own bed. PJ soon followed but Bianca remained a little longer until all the lights were off in the dorm and even a little after that. She gave me a hug before she left and I fell asleep shortly after that with a smile despite everything.
20 September 2018
A/N: Did you like/dislike anything about this chapter? Please let me know!