After a bit, when I rested enough and my strength is back, the sight of her body doesn't give me anymore peace but stir something else. My caresses from lazy and light they were, start to be a proper audacious and satisfying groping, and stroking away her hair, I start to savour that wonderful skin she has. She titters but sleepily and doesn't seem too up for it. I look at my watch on the bedside table. It's four o'clock. In an hour everybody will be back. I told all my roommates I was going to be here with her to be sure of not being interrupted. One can arrange that with the others sometime. All, in turn, have done it but it's not easy; you need to ditch classes and be very watchful, especially if the girl in question is from a different house, it is worth but not manageable very often.
Francis hinted in jest he was going to return sooner. The wanker is even too willing to try to get off with Mohini, he has got all this fantasy of a threesome and says I'm a bloody stingy egoist in not sharing. I wonder if she would agree… Probably yes if asked in the right way; she is silly enough to be coaxed in more or less anything, but exactly because of that I'm hesitant. It doesn't seem right to get profit of her dumbness. And anyway, I'm not one hundred percent sure I would like that. Mohini, one of her stupid friends and me, very willingly. Two men and her, I don't know, he is my best mate and everything but it's still a man too many for what it concerns me. However, I'm fairly sure he won't show up but as a safe measure I locked the door.
We still have an hour and that give us plenty of time for a last shag and maybe a shower together. Perhaps we may even combine the two. God only knows when we will have the chance to use the room again instead of uncomfortable bloody broom cupboards or even more uncomfortable and damp Hogwarts ground. I want to make the best of it.
Inspiring ideas start to pop in my head like popcorns and I grow, in every sense, very keen to put them into action.
I'm just wondering if I should casually slip Ophelia in a sentence to give her the boost she lacks when the handle of the door turns down abruptly as somebody tries to get in.
Mohini jumps in alarm pulling frenetically the duvet over her.
'It's locked' I say to reassure her and then to the door I bellow 'Francis, you jerk. Sod off! I told you until five. Come back in an hour!'
'Potter! Open this door immediately!'
Unfortunately, it's not Francis but a very authoritative McGonagall.
For a split second me and Mohini freeze in terror.
'Shit!' I blort out 'One moment!' I bellow and then under my breath 'shit shit shit shit!' as I stand up fumbling between sheets and duvet to find my pants.
Mohini, terrified, turns in a marble statue, pallid as the linen under her staring in supplication at me, tears in her eyes, as though I can conjure some kind of magic that can make her disappear. Luckily for her, I can.
'Potter, if you don't open this door immediately, I'll open it' our headmistress voice doesn't promise anything good.
'I'm coming' I bellow again having localised my pants at the bottom of the bed, wearing them hastily, and pulling roughly Mohini, who, in terror has lost every will of her own, from the bed in a corner.
'At the count of three this door will be open!'
I open my trunk frenetically, fortunately what I'm looking for is at the top of it, ready to be used.
'Three'
I sprint toward Mohini with it.
'Two'
I cover her completely commanding her at the same time in an agitated murmur not to speak or move.
'One'
I scoop all her clothes I can find, and I shoved them in my trunk.
'Alohamora'
In a nick of time, I throw myself on the bed like some sort of flying squirrel just as the door sprang open.
I'm literally swimming in a pool of sweat, my heart endeavouring to jump out from my mouth, I gulp it down trying with all my might (hoping against hope not to have any hickeys anywhere) to have an air of composure, despite in my underwear, in front of a monstrously enraged headmistress who scans the room like a hawk, ready to attack her prey, in this case me, or better, Mohini.
'What were you doing, Potter?!' she hisses, her eyes flashing.
'I was sleeping' I murmur feigning an unconvincing yawn. Albeit while doing it, I spot Mohini's bra at the end of the bed, I give it a slight push with my foot to hide it under the duvet hoping she won't notice.
'By the tone of your voice it seemed everything but that, Potter! I may also advice you a more polite use of the English language when you talk to your friends'
She doesn't seem to notice my sneak, still scanning every corner to spot what she suspects me hiding.
'And why didn't you come to open the door?' she asks threateningly pacing the room, looking in the bathroom and opening the wardrobe causing an avalanche of clothes to fall on the floor.
I glimpse Mohini's stockings close to the pillow, and I swiftly slid them underneath, managing just a split second before she turns to glare at me. 'I was all tangled in the duvet, headmistress' I chirp innocently.
Then, and only then, she notices my not much dressed state and that seems to redouble her spleen.
'I give you ten minutes to make yourself presentable. I will wait for you in my office. Not a minute more, Potter!' she says stern turning and marching out of the room.
It takes me one of the ten minutes to steady my breath and recover the use of my faculties. That was a very, very close call. I then move my gaze to where Mohini is hidden, no signs of life there.
Lifting the invisibility cloak, I find a pitiful Mohini, all crouched on herself hugging her knees, eyes filled with tears. I roll my eyes in disbelief; she is such a Hufflepuff!
However, as girls' tears never leaves me indifferent, and she manages to be extremely pretty even when she cries, I hug and cuddle her a bit trying to calm her down. The poor thing really got a fright all right. It takes me five more out of my ten minutes to do that. I then manage to entreat her to get dressed which it takes forever, as not all her clothes are in the trunk or in bed. Last item to be found is her tie under Francis's bed. Thankfully, McGonagall hasn't looked under it.
I wear my trousers, a shirt, and I let her slip outside the Fat lady's portrait which as we all know, is always getting tea with her friend, the baroness, at the ground floor between four and five. Sir Cardigan takes her place, and he always turns a blind eye to our "boys' pranks", as he calls them.
That leaves me one square minute to finish up my dressing (I don't even bother to do anything about my hair) and to dart to McGonagall office.
The gargoyles at the entrance as soon as they spot me smirk gleefully 'In trouble again, Potter?' says one.
'At this pace it will be wiser to give him the password so he can go directly in' answers the other with a snigger.
'Would you just shut up and let me pass?' I blort out not very gracefully. I'm out of breath for the run and in no mood whatsoever to mess around.
'Allrighty mister' They answer keeping sniggering like schoolboys and swinging open.
I start to go up the stairs my heart racing, quite excitedly and not very scared. Today I really overdone it and I wonder what is going to happen. From day one I stepped in this school I got more detentions than I can count, some were merely jokes, some very nasty. Threaten of expulsion have been countless but never carried out. And I know they never will be. I'm as safe as in a vault. I'll never be expelled from this bloody school no matter what I do or don't. The reason is simple. And is the same reason that governs all my life. I'm Harry Potter's son. You don't expel Harry Potter's son. It wouldn't look well for the establishment, it would create scandal, it wouldn't reflect nicely on McGonagall. Any fool can see it and McGonagall is no fool.
Of course, there is also another reason, that I gathered from my many fun visits to this office. McGonagall adores my dad, in a different way as everybody adores him, blindly, only because of what he has done, she is really fond of him. Obviously, one needs to be very observant to discover it. She is not a person that overflows with emotions but it's kind of obvious once you get interviews with her any other week. She would never cause him any additional distress. And being first page on the Daily Prophet always disquiet him quite a lot. For all these reasons I'll never be expelled.
What are my thoughts on the matter?
Mmmh… To be perfectly honest, I'm kind of sorry for it. I guess a part of me would like to be really in trouble. That's probably why I push my wrongdoing boundaries so much. I would like my dad to shout angrily at me, maybe even hit me as he has never done but I'm pretty sure could. I could hit him back then. I could disperse this cloud of insignificance that surround my life. Make something happen.
Perhaps a part of me wants to be punished, perhaps a part of me wants to be rid of this school, sometimes I think in the muggle world I would be happier despite it means to live a life of lies.
I was happy before going to Hogwarts. I knew, of course, that we were different and that it had to remain a secret, but it was exciting to have a secret. I had my muggles friends, and we played soccer and rugby, sometimes I would go to their place, and we'd play videogames on their pc. It was fun. I still see them sometime, but not much. It's difficult to talk to them when I'm forbidden to mention about Hogwarts. It gets tiring to concentrate on not to let anything slip. At school, teachers treated me like everybody else and if I misbehaved, I was reprimanded. Like normal. As it should be. Mum didn't like much that school. I know mum and dad had a few arguments about it. I didn't understand why at the time but when at Hogwarts I understood. Magical people don't go to muggles school. They have their own, mum wanted me to attend one of those and dad didn't want to. The reason is obvious when you see what happened once at Hogwarts. I think he was right, and sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't have been better to keep attending muggles school. Perhaps I would have been happier. Difficult to say.
When I was a child, I loved my dad in a rapturous way and in my eyes, he was a hero. Uncle Ron told us of their adventures, and this was how I received them, adventures. Where my dad was the incontestable protagonist. Perhaps I didn't even fully believe in it or anyway the border between fantasy and reality is very feeble when you are a child. But I've always seen him as strong and mysterious and I craved to be loved by him, to be noticed. However, he always seemed in a world of his own where there wasn't any place for me.
When I went to Hogwarts everything changed. It had been a shock. People were recognising me and courting me, everybody wanted to talk to me and be my friend. They were looking up to me. It was lit! I discovered my dad was proper famous! Only at Hogwarts I really understood what it all meant. I was gobsmacked, people said he killed this super-duper dangerous wizard, that he fought dragons, dementors, he had been Hogwarts champion, all the adventures uncle told us were real. I just couldn't fit everything into him. He had always seemed a normal person to me. He was my hero obviously but just as any parent is for a child. How was it possible that he never told me anything about it? Was I so insignificant as not to deserve to be told?
People were gobsmacked I didn't know anything about my father's past. It had been proper embarrassing. So then, after a while, I begun to pretend knowing what I didn't.
When I was back at Christmas, I couldn't look at him with the same eyes as before. It was like a barrier had been erected between us. He wasn't the person I always thought he was. He was a hero, but not my hero, everybody's hero. Separated from me by an unsaleable gap. My being just ordinary.
I asked him about all of it many times, I wanted to understand his point of view, if there was any truth in the whole of it, but he never answered me, dodging me, getting in an impenetrable silence, leaving the room as soon as a question escaped my lips.
He wouldn't talk to me. He would ask about my friends, lessons and trivialities alright, but I wasn't allowed to know anything about him.
And it took me sometimes at Hogwarts to understand that all this popularity wasn't awesome but only a curse. I wasn't popular because of myself but because of him. Without him I was nothing.
Resentment started to grow.
McGonagall realises it. She is not dumb. And by now we see each other so often that I almost feel entitled in calling her by name.
'Sit down, Potter' she says as soon as she spots me. She is proper simmering.
I obey trying to assume my most repentant air. It doesn't wash with her anyway.
As soon as my bottom touch the chair she sprints up, looking at me severe and starting to pace the room. All the portraits watch me stern (minus Dumbledore, he smiles serenely and nods slightly at me, I nod back with a small smile I hope McGonagall won't catch).
'Potter….' she says after a while ominously, but then she stops abruptly, glare at me for a couple of seconds and slops on the chair wearily 'I don't even know where to start' she says shaking her head. 'Was it you that caused the mayhem with the armour this morning?' she blorts out pulling herself together.
'Yes'
She raises an eyebrow 'Yes?'
'Yes'
She straightens up on the chair 'There shouldn't be some pretence here, Potter? You deny the evidence, me insist on the obvious, you come out with absurd excuses?'
I shrug 'Why lose time? I did it and you know I did.'
She doesn't speak for a while and stares hard at me, that makes me falter 'Shall I lie?' I ask uneasy.
'No, I guess not' she says eventually, and I clearly hear Dumbledore chuckle, McGonagall too but she ignores it.
'Why didn't you attend lesson today?'
'In the morning or in the afternoon?'
She sighs taking her head in her hands and massaging her temples. I feel almost sorry, she seems tired. I much prefer when she scolds me.
'Both, I guess…'
'In the morning, I was sleeping. I didn't sleep well during night-time, and I was tired. In the afternoon…' and here I pause. I mean, I have no problem in saying the truth as far as it concerns me, but I don't want Mohini to get into trouble.
'I was doing stuff in my room'
'What stuff?'
'Stuff'
She looks at me searchingly 'Professor Rabbity told me miss Dara didn't attend lesson either'
I depict a blank expression on my face.
She depicts an inquisitive one on her own.
It starts a silent and hard felt battle of will based on stares, but I haven't got enough experience nor strength to win it. I succumb first.
'Come on, McGonagall!'
'Headmistress!' she interrupts me enraged.
'I'm sorry. Headmistress.' I correct myself quickly 'She is as dumb as a post, and you know it. It's my fault, leave her alone'
She observes me viciously 'I don't like your tone, Potter. And I want to remind you the severe rules of this school that strictly forbid students from different houses to mingle in the common rooms, let alone bedrooms.'
'I think it suck…. It's unfair' I correct myself just in time seeing her eyebrows darting to the ceiling.
'It is not your place to decide what it is fair or not'
'That means I can take a Gryffindor girl in my room but not a Ravenclaw?'
'Neither of the two, Potter! The dormitories are divided for a reason!'
I roll my eyes, it's unbelievable the hypocrisy of this school. Everybody does it, it's quite normal, but it is hushed up as if we must all be bloody kind of saints or something.
'I'll get back to the broom cupboard to cultivate good relations with different houses then…' I say under my voice quite audible for her to hear but with a tone that implies that it shouldn't.
She decides not to hear it.
'So, Potter. To recap the events of the day' she says putting her hands together 'This morning I find you coming out of a broom cupboard with miss Dara, doing something unclear inside…'
'We were just chatting, headmistress' I interject.
She arches an eyebrow 'Potter?!'
'Ok, she was giving me a bloody…' 'POTTER!' she shouts before I can finish my sentence.
'We were just chatting, headmistress' I finish lamely at which she nods.
'In that case I wasn't doing anything wrong' I add however making her nod freeze.
'Broom cupboards are there to keep brooms as the name clearly tells, not to… chat' she finishes archly, rifling between some papers and putting them aside.
'An hour later, a student informs me that you kicked one of the armours…'
'Which student?' I interrupt her.
She looks up to me 'That's not relevant'
It bloody hell is! Davis Maguire, I'll have you at the first chance I get, bloody sneak.
'Anyway, it took the caretaker a whole hour to bring the situation to order. Then you don't attend to any of your morning lessons, nor the afternoon ones. And by your own admission, you let miss Dara (a girl from a different house) in your room'
'I didn't admit anything of the kind!' I interrupt 'I only said that miss Dara is as dumb as a post, that is not an admission!'
She only stares at me for a few seconds.
'Alright, alright! I let a nameless girl of a different house in my room, but it wasn't Miss Dara. And I won't say who she was.'
Then feeling very mischievous I can't resist in continuing 'We actually had the best…'
'Potter!' she snaps threateningly.
I sigh dismayed 'Chess game ever?' I supply wearily at which she nods.
'A bloody good fun actually!' I continue gleefully 'Especially when my knight went down on her queen and with some skilful moves I…' 'POTTER!'
'…. Checkmate…' I conclude very pleased of myself.
'…Potter…' she admonishes me sternly at which I interrupt hastily 'I know, I shouldn't have….' I sighed melodramatically 'but I assure you she enjoyed the checkmate as much as me, actually by far more' I grin smug and seeing her about to open her mouth outraged, I add as the flash of light 'I owed her one after this morning in the cupboard'
She is so red and outraged she is staggering to get breath, but she manages very well because she yells my surname so loud, I almost clasp my ears close.
'What?!' I exclaim feigning bewilderment and innocence 'We were only playing chess…'
I hear some scandalized mutterings coming from the portraits but also a snigger. I'm sure it's Dumbledore.
'I warn you I won't accept any other insolence from you!' she warns 'In the space of a day you achieved quite a lot already. With any other student it would mean expulsion!' she leaves the sentence suspended but I heard it so many times already that it fails utterly to give me even a tiny glint of fear. Therefore, I don't say anything.
The hush stretches on for some minutes interrupted only by the slight swish of the portraits when they leave their frames.
'Why couldn't you sleep?' she asks in the end.
'I seldom sleep well.' I admit.
She doesn't ask me why thankfully. The reason must be clear even to her. Or at least one of them.
'What should I do with you?' she asks tiringly heaving a big sigh 'Your grades are dropping at an alarming speed'
Thank you for the information. I very well know already.
'It's a shame. They were more than satisfactory before'
There is always this "before" that makes me cringe.
'What would your mother say…'
I snap furiously before I can check myself 'My mother is dead! She doesn't see anything! She does know nothing! Don't speak about her!'
McGonagall flinches 'Potter…' she just says but this umpteen Potter unleashes me, I sprint up in a flash almost overthrowing my chair and I slam a hand on the table 'Just stop calling me Potter, alright?! I have got a name! Everybody forget it, but I have got a name!'
The silence falls immediately dense and so thick it can be cut with a butter knife. Even the portraits stopped any movements, and they are staring stunned.
The first one to broke it is Dumbledore clearing his voice.
McGonagall hasn't averted her eyes from me, and that stare brings me back to senses immediately.
'I'm sorry' I murmur reaching out for my chair and sitting down composedly.
'It is not my habit to call students by their first name' she says with a flat tone after still a few second of awkward (by my side) silence 'but it seems to me necessary to make an exception in your case, James'
Hearing her to pronounce my name really moves something in me. And I realise suddenly I'm quite fond of the old woman.
'We won't speak about your mother if you don't wish to, but we cannot pretend not to see that there is a problem.'
I falter unsure of what I should say. Yes, there is a problem, but I don't want to talk about it, I don't even want to see it. She resumes with a stern voice.
'James, I want to speak to you clearly and honestly for once. Because I consider you not unintelligent'
I smirk. Said from her it's almost as to say I'm a genius.
'If you agree we will drop any pretence, and we will talk, not from headmistress to student but from adult to adult'
I nod, very surprised and interested.
'We both very well know I will never expel you. I cannot and I would not, for your father's sake' I roll my eyes and she, noticing it, continues pointedly 'But also because I think you have some potentials' I look at her suspicious 'but also many internal conflicts'.
I cast my eyes away, she indeed hit more than one soft spot in this sentence.
'Totally understandable of course considering the traumatic events of the last years but I consider you adult enough to understand what is going on inside you and to take proper measures'
'Especially considering what your father is going through, you should be considerate of your behaviour not to cause him any additional distress'
The mere pronunciation of my father soar something vicious 'It's his fault if we are in this situation' I let slip spitefully 'I don't give a damn about his "distress"' I utter the last sentence putting inside all my contempt.
McGonagall observes me again sternly in that way she has but this time she doesn't subdue me.
'You know very well what you said is unfair and overall wrong'
I'm only able to sulk. She doesn't know anything about what I'm going through. She cannot know what it means to be his son, to lose a mother only because he has been amazing enough to beat the darkest wizard of all times but not enough to protect her. Killed only because she married him.
The silence stretches again as I'm totally unwilling to speak of any of those topics she wants to talk about.
'So, what detention do I get?' I ask in the end defiant, eager now to be out of this place as soon as it may be.
Her face is severe, but I detect a glimmer of disappointment in her features.
'None, Potter'
It doesn't escape me that she returned using my last name.
'It's long past the time in which I could make you repent your wrongdoings by a detention. There is nothing more I can do for you. From now on you are on your own.'
I'm taken aback by her sentence, it's worse than a detention and make me feel quite lonely all of sudden, like if she has given up on me.
'Only one advice from an adult to a boy' I have been degraded very quickly I notice.
'Try to slip in your father's shoes time to time. It would do you well'