Warning!: arm injuries/scars

Thankfully, the wait time for her dad's response wasn't so bad since Ari was so busy with school these days. Most of her classes were fine and fun, except for Potions, of course. It turned out that Snape had permanently demoted Ari to the naughty table, aka the table in front of the teacher's desk. At least it was easier to read the board now, but she would have much rather sat in the back and have trouble reading the board than to sit in her new seat and have Snape glare at her and boss her around every two seconds. His annoying voice was like a mosquito buzzing around her ear, an incessant sound enough to drive her crazy.

"Pare off the rind more thinly," Snape ordered crabbily from his desk one day during class as Ari peeled a wrinkly orange-looking fruit for her potion. "Don't leave so much flesh on the peel."

She wrinkled her nose and angled her knife so it was to make her slices a bit more precise. But even then, that greedy toad wasn't satisfied. "Cut with the lower portion of the blade," Snape snapped two seconds later.

Ari sighed and adjusted the knife so that the bottom part was cutting through the fruit. But in her concentration to cut the peel more thinly and use the bottom part of her knife, she wasn't paying attention to her fingers and accidentally sliced right through her thumb.

"Ow!" she screamed, dropping the fruit. She had sliced through a big portion of her nail, and blood was gushing out everywhere. Tears of pain welled up in her eyes. "I cut my thumb!"

"I told you, dunderhead, to look where you placed your butter fingers!" Snape hissed furiously. "And yet you wouldn't listen to me, and proceeded to chop off your thumb like the careless oaf you are. Just what do you have to say for yourself?"

He glared at her and she glared back at him through her watery eyes. "You—" she began.

"Five points from Gryffindor!" he interjected. He rapped his wand against his desk. "Now show me your hand."

She raised her injured hand, which was already swathed in bandages from Prince's attack. Snape flicked his wand and her sliced thumb mended back up. Another flick and the blood on her hand disappeared.

He stood up and waved his wand again so the blood was cleaned off her desk. "Keep working," he instructed before going off to do his rounds around the classroom.

Ari sighed and picked up the half-peeled fruit again. This time, she made sure to slice her fruit more slowly and carefully, and to look where she put her fingers.

A minute later, she finally finished peeling the cursed fruit, and exhaled with relief. She set down her knife and looked around expectantly. But Snape hadn't returned to his desk, and when she looked over her shoulder she saw him busy insulting another group of Gryffindors.

So she turned to the board to figure out what to do with the fruit next. But as she searched Snape's messy handwriting, she couldn't find anything written about a fruit. In fact, the more she tried to read the complicated instructions, the more confused she got, and the more her head hurt. Before long, she gave up trying to read it altogether. She looked at the peeled fruit in her hand, shrugged, then tossed it into her cauldron like a basketball player making a slam dunk.

At once, her previously blue, bubbly potion turned a deep yellow color. It gave off some weird smelling green fumes, and she wrinkled her nose. She stirred the potion experimentally, but the more she stirred, the thicker it became, until her potion resembled something like jelly. Her stirrer even got stuck in the jelly concoction, and she couldn't get it out no matter how hard she pulled. Uh-oh.

"Idiot child!" Snape suddenly barked behind her, and she jumped. "Don't tell me you added the entire Shrivelfig to your cauldron!"

What the heck was a Shrivelfig? Was that the name of the fruit? "Uh…" She met his fuming gaze and scratched her collar. "Maybe?"

"For Merlin's sake!" he snarled. "The instructions clearly said to squeeze the juice into the cauldron, not add the entire fruit! How can you be so hopeless you can't even follow the most basic directions?"

"I'm—"

"Five points from Gryffindor!" he spat before she could finish her sentence. "And detention!"

Ari slumped down in her chair and he waved his wand over her cauldron. The jelly potion disappeared, leaving only the cauldron and stirrer behind. "I want a twelve-inch essay on the composition of this potion," Snape ordered, "and an explanation on why you're so incompetent I can't leave you alone for five seconds without you turning your potion into an unusable mess. Is that clear?"

She could hear the Slytherins snickering behind her, and she scowled. "Yes."

"Yes what?"

She glared into Snape's heartless black eyes with all the force her heart could muster. "Yes, sir." Sir Pimple Face.

He glared back at her, his eyes burning. "Then begin!"

Snape stood behind her and watched as she got out her parchment and quills. Only when she started writing out the first line of the essay did he sweep away again.

For the rest of class she slogged away at her essay in a bleary haze, her eyes sliding in and out of focus. Every now and then Snape would come over and tap his wand against her head, and she'd jump back into alertness.

Slowly, torturously, she managed to copy down the potion instructions off the board. Then she added her own commentary to the essay, and said how the instructions on the board were too confusing and she couldn't bother to read them, hence why she had messed up her potion.

She was still working on her essay when the bell rang, and had to stay behind to finish it. When she finally managed to complete all twelve inches, she got up and turned her essay into Snape. He read over her essay, and she half-expected him to crumple it up and make her start over again.

But instead, he just flipped it to the side and looked up at her. "You will serve your detention in my room tomorrow evening," he said coldly. "Five o'clock sharp. Do not be late."

"Okay," she grunted. What a pain. "Can I go now?"

Instead of responding, he continued staring at her with those creepy, blank eyes. "Show me your hands first."

Ari blinked. "Huh?"

"You heard me," he said, sharpness edging his voice. "Show me your hands."

Puzzled, and slightly suspicious, she stuck out her bandaged hands. Was he going to make a comment about her ugly makeshift bandages?

She jumped when Snape tapped his wand against her bandages and they all unraveled as easily as cooked spaghetti. In moments, her bare hands were exposed, revealing all the ugly cuts and scratches Prince had inflicted.

Her heart lurched and she reflexively tried to pull her hands away, but Snape's hand closed around her wrist, lightning-fast. His fingers pressed down right on her fresh cuts, and she let out a squeal of pain. "Ouch!"

Snape loosened his grip slightly. "Hold still," he growled, and he pushed his hand up her arm to roll up her sleeve.

Her forearm was criss-crossed with more scratches. Some of them were still red and fresh, and looking at them made her wince. And what was more, Snape still wouldn't let go of her arm. She squirmed in his grip. "Let go!"

"Hold still!" he repeated, sharper this time. His accompanying glare made her simmer down a bit.

He took her other arm and rolled up that other sleeve, only to find the same thing as before. He rotated her arm over to inspect the other side, his eyes narrow with concentration. Ari grimaced and shuddered at the sensation of his cold bony fingers against her skin. But at least he didn't touch any of the cuts directly, so it didn't hurt too bad.

Snape suddenly looked up at her, his face still. "How did you get these scratches, Miss Rossi?"

"Huh?" Ari blinked at him, spooked by the use of her surname, and the added honorific. She wasn't used to Snape calling her that. Not after he had addressed her as dunderhead and idiot and all sorts of other degrading names for so long.

"Tell me how you got these scratches," he hissed, his eyes freezing over. "Right now."

"Okay, okay," she said quickly, squirming under his deadly glare. "It's 'cause of my owl. He scratched me."

"Your owl?"

"Yeah," she said, wiggling in Snape's grip. He finally let go of her arm and she quickly folded her hands behind her back. He kept watching her with that unblinking, eerie gaze. "His name's Prince. I was trying to get him to send a letter the other day, but he got all angry and attacked me. He's really violent, you know. Kind of like..." she began, wanting to mention the parallels she had drawn between her owl and Snape — but she thought better of it, and quickly stopped talking.

Meanwhile, Snape continued studying her while drawing a finger over his lips. "You're telling me your owl was responsible for all the scratches on your arms?"

"Yes," Ari said impatiently. She wasn't sure why Snape had to pester her over such a stupid matter. "Like I said, he's violent."

"And is he normally violent?" Snape asked, glaring at her. "Or did you do something to him that caused him to attack you?"

"I didn't do anything!" she whined. "He attacked me first. I just wanted to tie a letter to his leg to send it to my dad, but he wouldn't let me and just scratched me instead."

Snape continued scowling at her, not looking one bit appeased. "Why didn't you get your injuries treated by Madam Pomfrey?"

She scratched her head, shrugged. "I dunno." She remembered how Hermione had reminded her to visit the hospital wing, but it sorta slipped Ari's mind after she left the Owlery. "I guess I forgot."

"You forgot."

"Uh-huh."

"You received fresh wounds on your hands and arms," he said slowly, "which were most likely painful and bleeding, and it never occurred to you once to get them looked at?"

Ridicule oozed from every inch of his voice and Ari scowled. "Yes," she grumbled, shifting on her feet. "Like I said, I forgot."

Snape flashed her a disgusted look. "Could you possibly be any more incompetent, idiot?"

She made a face, but before she could fire out a retort, he suddenly took out his wand and waved it around. There was a creaking sound behind her, and Ari turned around. A cabinet in the back of the room had opened up. She heard some clinking sounds coming from it, and a moment later a bottle whooshed out the cabinet. Ari watched, entranced, as the bottle flew cleanly over the desks, her head, and then it stopped right in front of her face.

"Take it," Snape commanded as Ari stared stupefied at the airborne bottle in front of her. She plucked it out of the air. "Apply one drop of that over each of your wounds, two times a day."

"What is it?" she asked, tilting the bottle around and inspecting the fluid inside.

"Essence of Dittany," he responded. "It will treat most minor scratches and abrasions."

"Oh, okay," she said carelessly, tossing the vial into her pocket.

He glared at her, his eyes sharp as knives. "Handle the bottle with care and do not misplace it. Essence of Dittany is very expensive, and I do not want to waste any more on you than is strictly necessary."

"Okay, okay," she grumbled.

But he wasn't done bossing her around just yet. "You must apply it over your wounds two times a day, dunderhead," he continued crankily. "One drop over each wound — once in the morning and once at night. That is an order. What did I just say?"

"Uh…" she scratched her head. "You told me to apply one drop of the Ditty thing over my wounds."

"How many times must you apply the 'Dittany' over your wounds?"

"Uh…" she said again. She squinched her eyes, trying to remember.

"Two times a day," he said in a slow, exaggerated voice that grated her ears like nails on a chalkboard. "Once in the morning and once at night."

She scowled. "Okay, okay. I know now."

"Then repeat to me," he said. "When are you supposed to apply the Dittany over your wounds?"

"I have to apply the Dittyknee two times a day," she relayed quickly, "one drop over each wound, once in the morning and once in the night."

He inclined his head. "You must do what you just told me, starting today. Do not forget."

"I won't!" she snapped, glaring at him. How annoying! Did he think she was so stupid she couldn't even be trusted to put some water droplets on her arms?

He sneered. "Considering how you were struggling to recall the instructions I told you just two seconds prior, I very much doubt it." She scowled even more deeply, and he nodded at the door. "Go on. You're dismissed."

She hopped out of the chair and hurried out of the classroom, not wanting to spend another moment in Snape's stinky presence. He had been just totally unbearable today. Even more so than usual, that was. It had just been one ordeal after another with him — bossing her around, yelling at her, and making her write another horrible twelve-inch essay. And of course, the way he had just grabbed her arms after class and badgered her about it had been a whole new level of degrading! She'd just about had it with him!