Thursday 5th
September
I don’t know how I managed to concentrate throughout
today. Everything was just a blur. I’m still a little shaken up from
yesterday’s flying incident, but I’ve made it through okay.
This morning during breakfast, there
was a massive row at the table. Almost everyone was red faced and yelling at
one another, as Jed and I came in. It wasn’t just our year either. Other
Slytherins were joining in too. Professor McGonagall was stood in the centre of
all of the shouting. She glanced around from student to student with a faint
smile on her face. She waved a hand in air and shouted, “That’s enough!”
Everyone closed their mouths, but their fowl expressions still remained. “Now I
don’t want to hear another word out of you,” she barked. “My decision is final.
Any more complaints and House Points will be deducted.” Professor McGonagall
poked her hands out in front of her, to part the crowd, and marched off to the
teacher table.
With everyone sulking off to get some
breakfast, Jed and I slid into a seat beside Malfoy and the girls. Jed swiped a
triangle of toast from the racking and plonked himself down beside Scarlett.
“What was all of that about?” he asked as he ripped the corner off his toast.
“Haven’t you heard?” said Scarlett.
“Potter’s been made seeker on the
Gryffindor Quidditch team,” Malfoy grumbled. Snarling his nose Blondie turned
to face the tables behind him. As he turned back, he slumped his head in the
palm of his hand and prodded the spoon in his bowl. “Everyone knows First-Years
aren’t allowed on the Quidditch team, but it seems McGonagall favours her
little scar-bearing hero. He didn’t even get into trouble for his stupid stunt
either.”
Blondie here’s lucky
that he didn’t get into trouble either, but seriously? Professor McGonagall
praised Potter’s dangerous going-against-Madam-Hooch’s-orders thing? And
rewarded him? I’m not exactly sure what Quidditch is, but by the sounds of all
of the whining and complaining, it sounds like this Potter guy’s been given
some sort of reward.
“Oh well,” I heard
Malfoy mutter. “If they want to play dirty, then we’ll play dirty too,” he said
with a smug grin. “In double Potions class, tomorrow morning, we’ll see who
gets the special treatment.”
After that, all I can say is: let Operation ‘Slytherin
Rules’ commence!
*
Nothing much interesting happened this morning, after
breakfast. On our way to our second Defence Against the Dark Arks class, I
actually managed to escape the illusion stairs. After last time, Jed gave me a
tip of keeping to the right-hand side of the staircase. Well I have to say, it
worked. Most of the illusion steps were either to the left or in the centre of
the step. Seeing Priscilla stumble again, I grabbed her by the elbow and
whispered Jed’s little secret to her. After not falling through another, she
was so thrilled that she sat in class beaming from ear to ear. I was so happy
to have helped her out – especially after how upset she got last time, when she
fell through almost every single fake step.
I felt like the lesson
itself though was a little pointless. It started off fine, Professor Quirrell
was set on teaching us a shielding spell that was supposed to reflect a handful
of dark art spells – which after all of the warnings of dark magic and curses
and hexes that I’ve heard so far, since I’ve been here, seemed like a really
good idea. The only problem was, after about ten minutes in, Blaise asked
Professor Quirrell about his turban and that was it. He was gone. Completely
gone. The professor spent the rest of the lesson muttering on about how they were still after him and that they
would catch him if they could. Whoever ‘they’ are though, I’ll never know.
Professor Snape would make a better Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher than
this cry baby. I’m sure I heard someone mutter on the first day that Professor
Snape had been after the job. Well no offence to the Headmaster, but Professor
Dumbledore must be a fruitcake if he gave the job to quivering Quirrell. He must have lost a bet.
*
In our next class, Professor Binns just droned on and on
in his deadly monotone voice. All he did today was pretty much recite from the
textbook. There wasn’t anything that he said that we couldn’t have figured out
for ourselves. I realise that Professor Binns is probably so old that he can
recite all of his cases, but that doesn’t mean that he has to read the whole
book to us as well. I thought the whole point of teaching us was to tell us
something that we couldn’t find out from the book. I am so glad History of
Magic is only twice a week. I guess I did learn something about Elfric the
Eager’s revolt – I learnt he was a goblin! But even after all that tortuous
rambling, Professor Binns only went and gave us two parchments of homework to
do. Jed told me that the trick is to write really big and leave lots of space
between the lines – I think I might just have to borrow that idea!
*
Next, we had lunch, which was a relief after such a
frustrating morning. On our way to the Great Hall, someone tugged on my elbow.
I gasped, spinning around. It was Josie. I smiled at her. “How was your flying
lesson yesterday?” she asked. “I heard about what happened with Harry and
Draco.”
“It’s probably not as bad as it
sounds,” I told her with a weak smile. “You know how rumours spread.” Well at
least I hoped she did. “Come and sit with us,” I told her. Looking from me to
the Slytherin table Josie shook her head.
“No thanks,” she muttered, before
walking around me to get to her house’s table.
“Wait,” called Jed as he grabbed her
elbow. Josie pulled away from him, but spun around to face us. “Why don’t we go
on a picnic?” Jed suggested. “We could take some food and sit outside in the
sun. Kids do it all the time. What d’ya say, José?” Pinching in her lips, Josie
looked from Jed to me and back again.
“If that’s okay with you two,” she said
with a shrug. I could not stop beaming. This was an excellent idea. And we had Herbology afterwards, so the
three of us could spend even more time together.
We grabbed some
sandwiches and some drinks and headed outside. Jed led the way and took us to a
grassy area on top of a hill. The view looked down onto a little hut, with what
appeared to be a vegetable patch. “That there’s Hagrid’s hut,” Jed told us
pointing to the small building. “Hagrid’s the grounds keeper and he also helps
Professor Kettleburn (who teaches Care of Magical Creatures) to look after all
the animals that are kept on the school grounds.”
“So, does he grow the food for the
animals himself?” asked Josie admiring the vegetable patch.
“I dunno,” said Jed with a shrug. “You
can ask him yerself when I introduce ya on Sunday – if ya wanna tag along that
is.” Josie’s cheeks reddened as she looked down at the grass and shrugged. “But
I do know he’s rumoured to grow the largest pumpkins in Britain,” Jed
exclaimed.
Jed sat to my left
with his feet planted on the ground, his knees bent. He leant his elbows
against his knees as he tore apart his sandwich with his fingers. Josie sat to
my right with her legs curled underneath her. It was nice to just sit and enjoy
the scenery. Looking further away you could see a huge forested area. It
bordered the outside of the castle. Without having to ask, I knew straight away
that this was the Forbidden Forest.
“Melanie…” Josie sang
out. I shook my head realising that I obviously hadn’t been listening – I was
too busy staring at the view. “You never did answer my question: how was your
first flying lesson?”
“Thankfully Potter and Malfoy ended it
before I could leave the ground,” I told her. Josie’s eyes widened as she
stared at me.
“Come on MJ,” said Jed as he nudged me.
“It wasn’t that bad.”
“I know, but-” I began to protest.
“An’ you got your broomstick to come to
you, didn’t you?” he said with a smile.
“Yes but-”
“And you weren’t the last one to do it
either,” he added.
“I know that,” I sighed. “But-”
“But what?” he huffed.
I felt my cheeks
tingle as both my friends stared at me. My insides twisted and twirled, forming
thousands of knots in my stomach. “Well?” Jed asked. I closed my eyes and
inhaled a deep breath.
“She doesn’t have to tell us if she
doesn’t want to,” I heard Josie say. This made me smile – even if it was only
on the inside. However, I could still feel my hands balling into fists.
“We’re not exactly gonna tell anyone though,
are we?” Jed retorted.
The sounds around me
deepened. My mind fuzzed. Pulse rapped in my ears. It rattled through my limbs
and drummed in my chest. Licking my lips, I inhaled deep. “I’m scared of
heights, okay?” I blurted out. As I said this, my shoulders relaxed. My hands
uncoiled. I let out a huge breath that I didn’t even realise I had been
holding. I guess bottling up my fear really made me feel stressed. Now that it
was out in the open, I suddenly felt calmer. My heart stopped racing. My head stopped
pounding. My chest stopped shaking.
“Don’t worry, Mellie,”
said Josie softly. I turned to her and forced the corner of my mouth to smile a
little. “It’s okay to be scared of something.”
“Josie’s right, MJ,” said Jed with a
shrug. “Why didn’t you just tell me? I’d have tried to help you… tried to calm
your nerves.”
“I was scared,” I confessed staring at
the lonesome buttercup that had sprouted amongst the grass. Swallowing a lump
in my throat I confessed, “I just thought everyone would laugh at me.” Jed
rubbed a hand on my side.
“You’ll get it eventually,” he told me.
“Yeah,” Josie agreed. “Practise makes
perfect.”
We went on to talk
about other classes. Josie told us that she has been given a huge stack of
Transfiguration homework (from her class this morning) too. “It sounds like
Professor McGonagall gave you the same work,” I told her, after she had
explained to us how her morning’s lessons had been. “We could always study
together in the library after lessons – what d’you think?”
“Only if that’s okay with you guys,”
Josie said with a nod. I smiled and turned to Jed who shrugged.
“Fine by me,” was his reply.
“Great!” I cheered. “We might even be
able to help each other out if we all get stuck on different parts.” Jed didn’t
seem too impressed – he just guzzled down his drink, but Josie’s smile
brightened as she nodded.
The three of us had
quite a bit of fun in Herbology. Professor Sprout picked the three of us to go
into the next greenhouse to harvest some purple and red sproutlings, for a
demonstration at the end of the lesson. We got to wander up and down all of the
– I don’t know what you call them, planters? We got to see loads of different
plants that the school grows and without a teacher’s supervision either –
again, how cool is it that these teachers actually trust us!
“MJ, José,” Jed
called. “Over here, look!” We clambered through the creepy ivy and spindly
limbed branches to make our way over to him. He had his face pressed against
one of the greenhouse’s windowpanes.
“What are you doing?” I laughed as Jed
squished his nose right up against the glass.
“I don’t think that Professor Sprout’s
sproutlings are glued to the window,” Josie said with a smile.
“Har, har,” Jed replied flatly, folding
his arms and cocking his head in Josie’s direction. “I didn’t find the
sproutlings,” he said rather matter-of-factly. “D’you girls remember earlier
when you asked if the school makes its own food?” Actually, it was Josie who
asked, and it wasn’t about the school’s food, but if Hagrid grew food for the
school’s creatures, but I wasn’t about to spoil his fun. “Well I think I answered
your question,” he said as he jerked his thumb towards the window.
Grabbing my sleeve, I
scrubbed the window’s surface. A thick murky-green smear blurred in front of
me. I kept rubbing. Soon, I could see past the blur and into the next room. Jed
was right. It was full of food. Huge strawberries clung to towering stems.
Rosy, red apples hung from trees. Jed had crouched down towards one of the
lower greenhouse panels and had cleared that for us to look through. From there
we could see huge carrots, parsnips, swede and potatoes. The food looked so big
and tasty. I really wanted to go inside and see it. We wandered up and down
several times whilst looking for the sproutlings, but not once did I find a
door or passageway that led to the fruit and vegetables.
There were lots of
huge multi-coloured flowers. It was so hard not to pick one. I felt like
Aladdin in the Cave of Wonders. Just one couldn’t hurt, could it? The only
problem was here, it probably could. We raced past massive Venus flytrap-type
plants as they snapped their mouths at us. Jed tripped over a really thick vine
that swished across the ground as our footsteps vibrated. Josie got tangled up
in a beanstalk-like plant. Jed though it would be funny if we ran away and left
her, so we did. But I felt bad came back to save her. Jed did too… eventually.
Let’s just say Josie wasn’t too happy.
We managed to find
Professor Sprout’s sproutlings eventually. They were small little shoots with a
sort of mauve and deep-red coloured leaves. Upon seeing us return to class
red-faced having run so much, Professor Sprout chuckled to herself. “Just
another day in the garden, dears,” she said with a fat smile. Well if that’s
what she calls just a regular day, I’d hate to see what the greenhouse looks
like on a bad day.
*
Charms was okay, I guess. Professor Flitwick went over the
correct way to swish your wand when performing different kinds of charms, which
was quite interesting. But he did tell us, at the end of the class, that we
would be getting homework tomorrow. I’m kind of looking forward to some of the
homework. I mean, it’s going to teach me how to do spells properly. If I
practise hard enough, I might even be better than Pansy. Okay, I have nothing
against Pansy – she’s nice, but she’s such a show-off. I’d love to be able to
do a spell before her. Just one. Then I’ll be happy… well maybe not entirely
happy, but I’d be at least content with that.
*
After class thoughts of Astronomy at midnight got me
really excited. The room was even further away from our common room that our
Defence Against the Dark Arts class, but at least we didn’t have to mount any
staircases with tricky steps. Well we might have done, but since Jed told me to
keep to the right, I have done so on all of the staircases that we’ve gone up
(and I’ve kept to the left going down) and I’ve been okay since.
Having a class in the
middle of the night felt strange. I forgot to ask Josie what her Astronomy
class was like. I do recall hearing someone say, though, that when you study
Astronomy in your First-Year, you always get your next morning’s lesson with
your Head-of-House, as they are more likely to be sympathetic towards you,
having not had a lot of sleep. That seems like a good idea. We have Potions
with Professor Snape in the morning, so I hope that works out okay.
For Astronomy, our
teacher was a short lady, who wore a deep, shimmering metallic blue robe and
her deep brown hair was clipped back in a bun on her head. Her name is
Professor Sinistra. She didn’t actually seem as sinister as her name suggests.
We weren’t really there that long. I guess forty-five minutes was enough
though, as I started to get a little sleepy. Professor Sinistra had us draw out
a chart of the night sky using our telescopes. It kind of just looked like a
bunch of dots to me. She told us that we would be doing this for a few weeks in
order to learn how Earth travels through space. If you ask me, that sounds a
lot like Physics back home. It was really cool to experience it all first-hand
though. We never would have done this in a Muggle school. Hogwarts is amazing.
- Josie -
