Alexandra Potter
Chapter Fourteen: Back and Back Again
Scene 1/5
The door to the Potions lab was a good one. It was a deep, dark brown, almost black, and made of a sturdy wood, thick enough to block sound. Only the faintest hints of Professor Snape's voice made it through. A large metal ring hung in the centre, worked into a twist.
Alex sighed, replacing the knocker. She took a few steps back and rummaged through her bag, producing a small mirror. Her hair wasn't right. She focused and braids unravelled, knots undoing themselves. In the blink of an eye her black hair was straight and loose, hanging just past her shoulders. She took out a hair band and put it into a simple ponytail.
That was better.
She knocked three times, the heavy wood absorbing the sound. A moment later the door swung open to reveal the scowling face of Professor Snape. His dark eyes took her in, standing at his doorstep like a beggar. She was dressed, for the first time, in Hogwarts' summer uniform: a short-sleeved summer dress, white and buttoned down the front. It was boring, but at least it was well-fitted. It was obvious she'd grown since last summer - the hem hovered a couple of inches above her bare knee caps, higher than Professor McGonagall would have liked.
Behind Snape, the class craned their necks to look. And then the whispers started. Alex resisted the urge to fiddle with her hair. "Sorry I'm late, Professor," she said, stepping into the room. "I just got here."
Snape took some time to reply, continuing to stare at her. Alex looked away, catching Lily's eyes. She was beaming. "Is that so?" he said at last, stretching out each word. He paused, then spun around and paced back to the front of the room. "Five points from Hufflepuff for your tardiness."
Alex swallowed her reply. "Yes, sir."
"Well, what are you waiting for?" snapped Snape. "Sit down."
Alex looked around for a spare seat. Most everyone immediately moved to appear unavailable, placing bags and parchment on any stool near them. All but one: Lily beckoned with a wave and Alex joined her, the whole class still following her movements. The room was completely silent.
"Hey," Alex whispered, dropping her bag under the bench, "long time no see." She wanted to say more, but not with everyone listening. She hadn't forgotten that Lily alone stepped forward to testify for her.
Lily gave Alex the briefest of hugs -- anything more would have brought Snape swooping down upon them -- before returning to the cauldron on her desk. She gave it two stirs using a twig. The potion turned a cloudy grey.
"So what're we making?" Alex said, looking at the tabletop. Soil, grass, leaves, and some still-wriggling worms… she knew the answer before Lily replied.
"Potable potion," she said, flipping through her book to the ingredients page. "It's pretty rad, actually."
Alex glanced down the page. She'd read it a few times, but it felt like ages ago."It purifies water, right?"
"Yeah, but that's not what makes it special. All the ingredients are the kind of thing you can find anywhere."
"Meaning it's perfect for a stranded, wandless witch," said Alex, impressed. It must have been fiendishly difficult to design with such limited ingredients. "What's next?"
Lily peered into the cauldron and sniffed cautiously. The potion, which was supposed to be turning clear, still looked like it contained a handful of limestone. But then, Lily had never been the best at Potions. "I think we're more or less there," she said. "I just have to --"
Snape loomed overhead. "Miss Potter," he drawled, and Alex jerked back from the potion. "Where is your cauldron?"
Alex's heart sank. It was just like Snape to make a big deal over it. "In my dorm, sir."
"Andwhywould it be there?" he said, smirking. "Clearly the papers have overstated your intelligence, if you cannot even bring the correct equipment to class."
To Alex's horror, giggles came from behind her. She spun around, trying to catch who it was, but everyone was suddenly interested in their desks. Alex clenched her jaw and turned back to Snape. "Like I said, sir, I only just got here. I came by Floo half an hour ago."
"Fortunately for you, the store cupboard has spares," said Snape. "Another five points from Hufflepuff for poor organisation, Potter."
Alex frowned and looked at the clock. It was only five minutes until the next class. There was no way she could make the potion in time. "But sir--"
"Now, Miss Potter. Don't make me repeat myself."
And so, pushing down her annoyance, Alex rushed to start the potion. She lit a burner and arranged a cauldron on top, setting some brackish water to boil and chopping up some worms. All around her the other students were moving to decant their potions and clear up, the clatter of their equipment and the sound of running water at the sinks pushing Alex to cut even faster. She threw in the worms and stirred rapidly, skipping the counter-clockwise motions. It would make an inferior potion, but it was much quicker.
Snape passed by with an evil smile. He looked down at Alex's work and his smile grew. "Almost as incompetent as Longbottom," he said, before moving on to collect the class' finished potions.
Alex ignored him, too busy grinding her grass into a paste. Her arm burned from the motion, like making whipped cream, but she switched to her left hand and carried on. Soon enough she dumped the grass into the cauldron - it was meant to be added slowly, bit by bit - and turned up the heat.
"Your time is up," Snape called from the front of the class. All the others were now back in their seats with their bags packed and surfaces clean, just waiting to be dismissed. "Most of you made a passable attempt," he continued, pointedly looking towards Alex. "Alas, some among us are just less gifted.Evanesco!"
"No!" cried Alex, just as her potion disappeared into the aether. She threw the soil in her hand onto the bench and glared at Snape. "I was almost done!"
Snape drew his robes around him, his eyes boring into Alex's. "Feeling angry, Miss Potter?" he said, softly this time, and the class went silent. "Are you going to attack me, or can you control yourself?"
Heat rushed to Alex's face - embarrassment, anger, frustration all competing for dominance - and she looked down. Without saying a word, she started to clean up her bench.
"Class dismissed," said Snape. The class moved to leave, their stools scraping on the stone floor, chattering in hushed whispers.
"Comeon, Alex," said Lily, hovering next to her, "it's ribs for lunch today."
Alex moved frantically to clean her chopping board, running it under the tap. She still had to pack up the cauldron. "Why don't you go on ahead?" she said, "save me a seat."
"Okay!" Lily said, all but running off, leaving Alex alone with Snape. The room was absolutely silent, every clatter and clang of Alex's equipment jarring. Finally, everything was washed and back in the cupboard, but when Alex turned to leave, Snape finally spoke.
"Stay," he said, looking up from his desk, upon which lay several dozen scrolls. He pointed at the seat immediately in front of his desk. "Sit."
Alex licked her lips and sat down. Snape, however, did not recognise her presence. He turned back to his work, dipping his quill into red ink occasionally as he defaced some student's homework. When he reached the bottom he wrote a large P and circled it several times.
"Sir?" said Alex, "did you want to speak with me?"
Snape unravelled another scroll and started marking. Alex sighed and looked at the clock. Lunch had started five minutes ago. She swung her legs and waited. And waited. Ten minutes passed without any sign that Snape would speak.
Finally, Alex moved to get up.
"I don't recall giving you permission to leave," said Snape, still without looking her way. She sat back down.
It was another ten minutes before he rolled up the final scroll in his pile, set it aside, and looked her way. Alex quickly sat up from her slouch.
"Miss Potter," he said, sitting completely still. His eyes bored into hers, uncomfortably intense. She broke eye contact and resolved to look somewhere between his eyebrows. "Do you recall your first Potions class, here at Hogwarts?"
How could she forget? "Yes, sir."
Snape steepled his fingers. "You will recall, then, that your mother and I attended Hogwarts together?"
"Yes, sir."
"What I have not told you is that we were, in fact, friends." He flicked his wand and summoned an old photo, levitating it over to Alex. She plucked it out of the air and stared. There was her mother, looking about the same age as Alex, her long red hair thick and beautiful. She was smiling out at Alex, waving at her. Next to her stood a tall, thin boy with pale skin and greasy hair. It was unmistakably Professor Snape.
Remus Lupin hadn't said anything about this. And if Snape and Alex's mother had been friends, why was he so mean to her? It made no sense. "Why are you telling me this?" she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.
Snape's lip curled. "It was necessary for you to know," said Snape, snatching the photo back with another flick of his wand, "so that you know I speak the truth when I say that your mother would be disgusted by you."
Alex froze. "What?" she said, blinking rapidly. She wouldn't cry. She'd cried enough. But there was something stuck in her throat, and it wouldn't go away even though she was swallowing. Her lip trembled.
Snape's lips stretched into a smile. "Yes," he said, his eyes glinting, "Lilyhatedthe Dark Arts. Abhorred them. What would she say, if she knew her daughter was a Dark witch?"
"Please…" said Alex, and the tears came despite her best efforts. "Please, don't…"
"Don't tell the truth?" Snape said, rising out of his seat. "These are words you need to hear, Miss Potter. Your mother was an extraordinary woman. Not just talented… she was kind, generous, and unfailingly good. You disgrace her memory."
"Iknow!" said Alex, rising to meet Snape, her fists clenched at her sides and streaks of tears running down her face. "Don't you think I know that, with the papers going on about how terrible I am and everyone here whispering about me? Why are you doing this?"
"Isn't it obvious?" said Snape, "I'm teaching." His eyes flickered over her form, evaluating her one last time. "Now get out."
-- Post automerged at 11:27 PM -- Previous post was at 09:54 PM --
Next short scene.
After stopping at the first floor bathroom to clean up, Alex arrived at the Great Hall to find lunch in full swing. It was, as Lily had said, one of the students' favourites: barbecue ribs, with corn-on-the-cob slathered in butter and generous helpings of mashed potato. Alex sat down just as Lily was helping herself to seconds.
"What took you so long?" Lily asked, licking each of her fingers in turn. "You've been ages."
"Snape wanted to talk," Alex replied, and Lily raised her eyebrows in question. "Nothing important. Just my catch-up work."
It wasn't a complete lie: Alexdidhave catch-up work to do. It was just that Professor Sprout had given it to her earlier.
Lily scrunched up her nose. "Urgh, extra work. You'd think they'd let you off, with everything that happened and all."
Alex shrugged and used a slotted spoon to heap some ribs onto her plate. "I don't mind too much. It's only a week or so."
"Knowing you, you'll enjoy it," said Lily, rolling her eyes. She looked at Alex's plate. "Aren't you gonna have more sauce? That's the best part -- you mix it in with the mash, see?"
Alex obediently dumped a ladle of thick barbecue sauce over her potatoes. "So what's everyone been up to? While I was away."
Lily picked up a rib, getting her fingers messy again, and bit into it. "Oh, you know," she said, sauce around her mouth, "not too much. Been hanging out with Helen and Elizabeth, mostly."
"From the other dorm?" asked Alex, frowning as she tried to figure out how to eat ribs with elegance. She decided upon using a single finger to hold each end, before taking a dainty bite from the middle. It didn't work.
Lily shrugged. "Well, Susan and Hannah don't like me much, and I don't like Megan much…"
"Don't be silly," said Alex, giving up on the ribs and going for the potato, "of course Susan and Hannah like you!" Lily raised an eyebrow. "Well, okay, Hannah doesn't like you," Alex said, smirking, "but Susan does!"
"Whatever," said Lily, "I'm just glad you're back. Everything's a lot more fun when you're here!" Alex stiffened and Lily covered her mouth in surprise, screwing up her eyes. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean that, well, the whole thing with Daphne wasfun. I just meant --"
"Don't worry about it," said Alex. "I know what you -- what're the owls doing here?"
A flock of owls swooped into the hall as if it were breakfast, all of them apparently delivering identical post. It wasn't long before a small tawny owl dropped one in Alex's lap: a single sheet of thin paper, rolled up. As Alex undid the tie, excited conversations started all over the hall… and everyone was looking at Dumbledore. When she unrolled the sheet it became clear why.
HOGSMEADE HERALD
SPECIAL EDITION
DUMBLEDORE U-TURN
"FUDGE IS THE FUTURE"
In the greatest political upset of the decade, Cornelius Fudge's re-election campaign received an enormous boost this morning from none other than Albus Dumbledore, all but guaranteeing his victory in the General Election next month. Cornelius Fudge has now been endorsed by prominent figures across the political spectrum, from Lucius Malfoy to Oliver Swann.
Dumbledore's approval will almost certainly carry with it the support of Amos Diggory's Modern Wizardry Party, giving Fudge almost unprecedented power in Hogsmeade Town Council and the Wizengamot. With this unanimous support, Fudge is certainly…
Alex stared at the article, numb. It was so clear now:of courseDumbledore hadn't just convinced Fudge to help her out of the goodness of his heart. There was a price for everything and this was hers. The price of her freedom.
"Alex?" said Lily, trying to see the article. "What is it?"
"Here," said Alex, passing Lily the paper. She looked to the head table and met Dumbledore's eyes. He looked sad, but still, he raised his goblet and toasted her. Alex raised her own glass in return.
She wouldn't let him down again.