THIS IS NOT A TATTOO
Terrence frowned.
Something was wrong.
He would have recognize anywhere the way Albus was flying – he had studied it from a critical and very professional point of view and he was the brain behind the aeronautical impressive figures that made the reputation of the second Potter: since he was so quiet and shy, people tended to think Albus was the sissy version of his father and his brother. Terrence had remedied to this by combining the innate gift of his friend and the freestyle aviation manual of his father who was a stuntman.
Something was definitely off.
Albus was not holding himself up properly and the broom was slightly jerking, as if the control was no longer assured.
- "Potter, there's no snitch in play, no need to fly at that speed", called the teacher, amused.
Albus must have heard him, as he slowed down, but as if he rode a broken machine: the twitching broom zigzagged.
- "Potter? You okay?"
Apparently, Mr. Wood had also picked up on the weird way the boy was flying.
Puzzled, the other players stood still to look up at the Seeker - quite happy to take a break. Wendy cast a glance in the direction of Terrence and shivered seeing his worried face turned to their friend.
- "POTTER WATCH OUT!"
She jumped.
Up there, Albus had clenched a hand on his chest and was wincing as if in pain. He swayed, then suddenly fell off his broom.
- "AL!"
James - who until then seemed to think his brother drew a little too much attention to himself - suddenly dropped the quaffle and rushed towards the falling silhouette, immediately followed by Jeremy Shacklebolt. The boys caught up Albus, one under the arms, the other by the legs, and slowly carried him to the ground. They laid him on the sand and stood aside to let their teacher through.
- "Potter, you okay? What happened? Answer!"
- "Al? What's that?" James asked, kneeling next to his brother and helping him to sit.
The teenager's lips were white, as if all the blood had drained from his face, and his fingers clutched on his sweater.
- "It ... it hurts ..." he gasped.
- "Lemme see. Was that a bludger? You might have a bruised rib" said the professor, somewhat relieved. He lifted the boy's shirt, felt the clammy skin. "No ... weird. Looks like you haven't broken anything. Tell me. No one has a heart problem in your family, isn't it?"
James shook his head, while Albus, wincing, tried to calm his breathing.
Terrence slipped between the Quidditch players that looked at their teammate worriedly.
-" I can take him to the infirmary", he said.
The teacher nodded. He hoisted the injured boy to his feet, looked at him up and down.
- "Can you walk over there, Potter?"
Sweat dripped into the green eyes of Albus and along his nose. His black hair was a mess and he visibly struggled not to cry in front of everyone. He nodded in silence.
- "All right, then" Professor Wood finally said. "You lads get back the Bludgers and do a series of push-ups. Potter, do you want to go with your brother?"
James hesitated then shook his head.
- "Then, on your broom. Philips, you too."
His friend's arm around his shoulders, a hand firmly hooked on Albus' belt, Terrence met the eyes of Wendy and cracked a smile to cheer her up.
- "Can you take our stuff back to the Great Hall?" he asked. "Don't touch what's inside the cauldron, unless you want to say goodbye to your nails."
The girl nodded.
- "Thanks", said Terrence.
Then he turned to his friend and took a deep breath.
- "Let's go, mate."
He pushed aside the purring cats rubbing against their legs and whispered words of encouragement tirelessly until they reached the arcades. There, he removed the arm from his shoulders and let Albus sit between two stone windows. He crouched in front of him and gave him a flick on the knee.
- "You okay? Still alive? Take a break, we're almost there."
The other boy lifted his chin a little, still clutching onto his sweater.
- "S-sorry."
Students were passing by, chatting, books and scrolls in their arms. A group of 3rd year girls, clucking like chickens, cast glances at them before scampering with whispers. A toad escaped from the grip of a first-year kid and jumped heavily to them, his beady yellow eyes staring in worship at Albus.
- "Yeah, right", Terrence sighed, rolling his eyes. He gave back the toad to his owner then came back to his friend. "Be sorry my neck hurts from carrying you this far. I know you didn't want to look lame, but… say, a stretcher or a levitation spell would have made things easier."
- "Wingardium Leviosa", Albus chuckled, reminded of the old story his uncle had told him dozens of times.
He felt a little better, but laughing was not a good idea and he nearly choked when the pain suddenly intensified.
- "Stop with your private jokes", grumbled Terrence wincing as if the pain was his own. "Do you want me to get you something to drink? Or shall we keep going? We're almost there ..."
Albus bit his lips until they bled. He managed to nod and his friend helped him up. They limped to the infirmary and crashed on an empty bed in the big room, exhausted.
- "What's the matter, children?" asked Hannah Abbot, the school nurse, coming toward them from the back of the room where she had administered a calming potion to a seventh year girl obviously hysterical - probably because of the term exams coming soon.
She stopped to check the oozing bandage of a fifth-year boy, on whose head were growing stalks of leeks, then walked toward them.
She was wearing a blond low bun, and her pale skin had a tendency to blush at the top of her chubby cheeks. She was wearing a long gray-blue dress that was stretched on her opulent chest and which brushed on the floor tiles.
- "Al's not feeling too good", said Terrence, getting off the mattress and removing his glasses to wipe them.
The nurse put a hand on Albus' back.
- "Do you have nausea? What did you have for breakfast? I heard there was something wrong with this morning's pudding…"
She frowned as she took in Albus' hand clutching his chest, the sweat shining on his face and his labored breathing.
- "Oh. What exactly happened to him?"
- "We were at the Quidditch pitch and suddenly ..."
- "Oh, I see", growled the woman.
She looked around for the isolation curtain. Terrence pulled it, but remained near the bed
- "Let's see, take off your sweater. There ... thank you. Sorry, my hands are cold."
She shoved the red and yellow tie on the nightstand, between the pitcher and the lamp, and looked for a bruise, a bump under the skin that would explain what was going on. But there was nothing. She ruffled the hair of the exhausted boy.
- "I'll give you something for the pain, okay?" she offered in an encouraging voice. "I'll check on you again later, when you feel a bit better."
Terrence did not like that at all. He followed her to the locked closet where she kept the ingredients for potions and poultices, while Albus put back on his clothes.
- "What's wrong with him?" he asked quietly.
- "Something that has nothing to do with Quidditch..." Hannah Abbot replied grimly, almost for herself, before realizing who she was talking to. "What are you still doing her? How comes you're not studying in the Great Hall with everybody else?"
Terrence took a leap aside to avoid the smack and went back to Albus' bed. He slipped between the curtains and sighed when he saw his friend curled up on the stripped mattress. His shirt was not even buttoned. The gray sweater had fallen on the floor. Terrence picked it up and dusted it.
- "Al. At least get under the blanket, we're not in summer, mate ... You look like you're posing for the cover of Finnigan's magazines."
He swallowed and crouched beside the bed, his chin resting on his folded arms on the mattress, to be at the patient's height.
- "Al-bus-Se-ve-rus-Pot-ter", he mouthed like a robot. "Hello, over there on the Moon, can you hear me? You'll feel better in three minutes, I promise. Lovely Bobbie may not be a mermaid, but she knows her stuff."
He had already made numerous trips to the infirmary: the experiments and tests he attempted from the manuals he pinched from the upper grades were not always turning as planned ...
- "Thanks for the compliment, Swanson, you ape", the nurse gritted behind him, armed with a stove that smoked thick. "Now get out of here so I can take care of your friend."
Terrence waltzed around the bed and placed himself on the other side to monitor the operations.
Hannah Abbot sighed. She rolled her eyes and gave up chasing him from the infirmary.
Terrence Swanson was such a dearie - he was so smart, always asked lots of questions and knew to be very gallant - and the friendship between the two boys was one of the immovable things of Hogwarts.
- "Here, help him prop up against the pillow. There, that's better."
She smiled at the patient who tried to withstand the waves of pain without complaining, an eye closed and the other half open, his face tense.
- "Albus, it'll be a bit hot at first, but you should feel relief afterwards."
She opened up the boy's shirt, chin-signed to Terrence who grabbed the hand whose nails were driven into the skin and who took it away from the pain site.
- "Brace up, mate ..."
The nurse took a handful of the viscous black goo and applied it to the teenager's chest.
Albus made a movement to push her away, at first, then his body relaxed.
- "Thank you ..." he murmured at last.
He was breathing more calmly, but his face was drawn with fatigue like if he had run a marathon.
- "Well done, Bobbie!" Terrence exclaimed happily.
The nurse wiped her hands on her apron, tsk-ing, half angry, half amused.
- "Listen to this child who doesn't know his place", she muttered.
She leaned over Albus and covered the poultice with a large square of cotton.
- "Stay a moment like this, get a wink of sleep, and we'll see how you feel later. You okay with that?"
The boy nodded.
- "Okay."
The woman smiled again.
- "Good."
Then she turned to Terrence and her eyebrows narrowed dangerously.
- "As for you, get out, nipper! I bet everyone's having dinner. You'll make your house lose points!"
The boy dodged the slap effortlessly and ran towards the door.
- "I'll be back, Al!" he shouted.
- "SHUT UP WHEN IN THE INFIRMARY!" roared the nurse behind him before the two doors closed with a bang.
- "She thinks she owns the place", Terrence muttered, heading to the Great Hall.
He slipped behind Bert Hammersmith, the school janitor, and sneaked to his table.
- "How's Al?" Wendy asked before he had time to sit down next to her.
The entire Gryffindor Quidditch team bent over the dishes.
- "Does he feel better?"
- "What was it, then?"
- "Appendicitis?"
- "Eh? What's happen dix it is? A curse?"
- "He got hit by a bludger, isn't it?"
Terrence endured the storm of questions without batting eyelids, piled half a dozen chicken drumsticks on his plate before helping himself to a huge dipper of mushroom soup, and took the time to swallow a spoonful of mashed potatoes before answering.
- "He'ss be''er bu' Bo'pp'ie doe'n't know wha' hap'e' - ha' tha' ho'!"
- "Not a word was clear", Wendy said, pinching her friend's nose to throw a glass of water down his mouth and make him swallow faster.
- "If the geek's no more panicked than this, in any case, it means Al's not dead!" James said.
The others laughed and Terrence took the opportunity to sprinkle soup on the chicken drumstick he had quickly pushed in his mouth.
His eyes met Wendy's disapproving look and he grinned, his chin drooling with sauce, his mouth full. She hesitated, then smiled back.
"Al's fine, don't worry."
"OK. Thank you for staying with him."
After dinner, Terrence, who had retrieved his school bag, discreetly put back the potions book in Jeremy Shacklebolt's bag before going back to the infirmary with Wendy. James and Lily caught up with them on the way.
Hannah Abbot frowned as they entered.
- "Five minutes, no more", she warned before pulling the curtain. "And I don't want to hear a sound."
They gathered around the bed on tiptoe. Albus was asleep, one hand on his chest and the other over the edge of the bed. He was breathing better. With his black mop of hair on the pillow and his mouth ajar, he looked like a quiet child.
- "Pff", James said, with a relieved smile, despite himself.
- "He really looks like Daddy", Lily said.
"True", thought Hannah Abbot.
Wendy had no opinion on this issue, she was busy thinking of a way to grab onto the hand that was hanging on the edge of the mattress – but without anyone seeing her. Terrence did notice it, though, and walked around the bed to strategically place himself in between the brothers and the girl.
- "He only looks like him from the outside", James corrected after a while, in a weird voice.
Albus coughed in his sleep. He stirred, his hand went to his face, he blinked and opened his eyes.
- "Ah ..."
- "Hi, bro", James said. "Back to the Living?"
Albus nodded, still half asleep.
- "Well, that's good. I'll get out of here, then. Lily, if you write the parents that Al passed out during a Quidditch workout, you're dead meat, got it? I don't want Mum to rush here at once."
He underlined his threat with a significant gesture of the thumb under his chin. His sister rolled her eyes and brushed back her red hair with disdain.
- "All right, all right, I'm not four anymore ..."
James snorted and left the room.
- "Well, that's it, that's enough for today", the nurse intervened. "I'll look at what happened with the poultice, Albus. The others, out."
- "See you tomorrow, Al ..." Wendy whispered awkwardly.
Albus smiled and held out his hand. She high-fived it gently, then went out after a last look.
- "Oh My Gosh Isn't This Subtle", Lily sighed.
- "Get off, Miss "I have no sense at all", Terrence said, pushing her towards the door. "Give them some space."
Lily stuck her heels in between two tiles and sank against him, her eyelashes fluttering.
- "Whaaat, what have I doooone?"
Terrence blew out a deep breath and massaged the bridge of his nose under his glasses. He grabbed her by the shoulders and smirked.
- "Lily. I know your mother married her brother's best friend, but you know what? It will never happen between us. Never ever. And you know why?"
He leapt towards the nurse and affectionately put his arm around the waist of the chubby woman.
- "Because my whole heart belongs to Hannah "Bobbie" Abbot, the best among female creatures in this world", he proclaimed solemnly, crossing a hand on his chest.
- "It's disgusting", protested Lily.
- "Out, now", the nurse snarled, grabbing the two of them by the neck and throwing them outside.
She closed the door when they were down the corridor and returned to Albus. She pulled the blanket and removed the gauze.
The patch was dry and now greyish.
- "How do you feel?" the woman asked, breaking pieces of clay.
The teenager smiled.
- "Much better. Can I go back? I mean, I feel fine, now..."
Mrs Abbot shook her head, while collecting the bits of poultice in her apron.
- "Uh-uh. First, I want to see how it looks. And I'd rather you sleep here for the night, just in case."
She sprayed some liquid from a vial on a cloth and cleaned the boy's chest. Albus gave her a pleading pout.
- "Please ... I'll make sure Terrence apologizes to you, but ..."
- "Hey, I apologize if I want", interrupted his best friend popping in next to the nurse. "So how ..."
His mouth o-shaped, he suddenly stopped talking. The woman had also fallen silent. She frowned.
- "What?" Albus asked, a little worried, trying to see what they were staring at.
Mrs Abbot looked up.
- "Albus. What is this, exactly?
The boy shared a panicked glance with his best friend, hoping for some help. He had no idea what she was talking about.
- "Whaaah", finally said Terrence. "I didn't know you got such a tattoo…It's huge - but beautiful, actually. Maybe I should get one too."
The nurse gave him a slap on the arm.
- "Shut up, Swanson. Potter, this mark has nothing to do with ink. This is not a tattoo. It's magic, and, even more, very complicated magic, very old. Where did you get that scar?"
- "Scar?" Terrence repeated, stunned, staring at the swollen mark that looked like a snow flower on the chest of the teenager.
Albus shook his head.
- "I don't know ..." he said in a shaky voice. "I don't know, I've never seen it before ..."
Somehow, he felt like he was lying – but he had no idea why.
TO BE CONTINUED