MJs Hogwarts Journal Chapter 45

 

Sunday 23^rd March

I really am beginning to lose the will to write in here. Josie always used to inspire me. I would see her writing in her little book, and it would make me want to write too. The problem is that I haven’t seen her in over two weeks. Alright, so I’ve seen her – she’s there on the far side of the room in Herbology and I see her come and go from the Great Hall, but that’s about it. She avoids me every single time I try to go near her. I tried to catch up with her after Herbology on Wednesday, but she ran off so fast. I tried keeping up with her, but once we got back into the castle, I bumped immediately into Professor Snape. “No running in the corridors, Miss Frost,” snarled Snape. “That is how accidents happen.”

“Sorry, Professor,” I mumbled as I lowered my head. By the time he had moved out of my way, Josie was gone.

*

Jed had another detention. In fact, he, Crabbe, Goyle and Blondie all ended out in detention. Jed and Crabbe were discussing if hexes worked on ghosts – I think they were trying to figure out if they could hex Professor Binns in our next History of Magic lesson, when Goyle and Malfoy jumped up from behind them and used the Stingktum Alosca hex. Jed and Crabbe screamed, before spinning around and disarming them with Everte Statum. We were sat outside at the time, so they appeared to have gotten away with it. That is until Professor McGonagall walked past just as Jed used the Petrificus Totalus spell on Blondie – luckily for the both of them, it didn’t work thanks to Jed’s pronunciation, or lack of.

“Edwards! Malfoy!” Professor McGonagall barked. Any expressions on the boys’ faces dropped as they turned towards her. “You too Mister Crabbe… Goyle.” The four boys stood there facing her. “You know better than to mess around with Dark Arts magic,” she scolded them. “Even if using it in self-defence,” she added quickly, seeing that Jed was about to retaliate. “Detention. All of you.”

“What?” groaned Goyle.

“Not fair,” Crabbe moaned.

“Enough!” she ordered. “Outside my office tonight, eight o’clock sharp.”

“But that’s past curfew,” Blondie pointed out.

“You’ll have more than a late curfew to worry about, Mister Malfoy, if you plan on breaking anymore school rules. Now off to class – the lot of you,” she projected the last part in mine, Priscilla, Pansy and Scarlett’s direction; we had been watching from the side lines.

The boys’ detentions was a wander around the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid and Fang, Jed told me later. Nothing unusual happened though. Hagrid pointed out to them several different species of tree, told them a great deal about spiders and they caught a glimpse of a centaur in the distance – when it saw them though, it ran away. Apparently, there hadn’t been any unicorn killings for a while. Although Hagrid was please, he was also concerned that this was just a lull in the shadowy figures plan, before he pounced back, twice as badly.

- Josie -

MJs Hogwarts Journal Chapter 44

Wednesday 12^th March

I hate flying. Have I ever mentioned that? I made it off the ground today. It was just a little bit. I was definitely two, maybe three feet in the air. I managed to go forwards in a straight line, but then I crashed into Madam Hooch, who spent the next ten minutes lecturing me on my posture and arm movement. It’s not my fault. I was trying to keep myself up off the ground. It was the first time that I’d actually travelled anywhere. She should be praising me that I actually made an improvement. Okay, so maybe bumping into her wasn’t the best thing that I could have done, but she should have at least noticed that I travelled a good eight, maybe ten feet to get to her. That has to count for something, right?

*

I got a letter back from Viki this morning. I don’t think that I have ever been so glad to hear from my sister in all of my life. When Peggy swooped down in front of me this morning and left a letter at my plate, I had to tear it open straight away. She started off with the usual sort of polite pleasantries, telling me that Mom and Dad are proud of me studying and of all the spells I’m learning, that she’s jealous, because Hogwarts seems so cool, that our neighbours goldfish, Silky, passed away last week – the general sort of rubbish really. I skimmed through it as fast as my eyes could allow, desperate to see if she answered my main question. She had.

The paragraph read:

Mel, I’m sorry to hear about your argument with your friends. I hope that you have managed to sort it out by now. If not, then I hope this helps: Do you remember when we went to that street full of magic shops and Mom and Dad bought all your stuff for school? Well when you got your wand, I remember the guy who gave it to you said, “You must be careful where your loyalties lie.” Maybe it’s something to do with you and your wand.

Okay, so she wasn’t much help, but that thing she said about Mr. Ollivander was interesting. I had completely forgotten about that. He said that my wand showed strength and loyalty, but I had to be weary of whose side I choose. Whilst pondering over that, I also remembered something that Blondie had told us on the train ride here, that you and your wand are entwined in some sort of destiny. I guess this can only mean that I’m destined to have to face these sorts of decisions throughout my life – great, thanks wand. I guess I’m going to have to learn to get used to this. But whose side is the right one?

- Josie -

MJs Hogwarts Journal Chapter 43

Sunday 9^th March

I never thought this week was going to end. It’s been agonising on so many levels, it’s unbelievable. Jed and Josie still aren’t talking. Josie won’t even speak to me either. I haven’t seen her at breakfast all week, she’s only appeared at the Ravenclaw table during lunch on Wednesday and at dinner she sits on her own with her back towards us. She hasn’t even been sitting with Fabian or his friends. She won’t sit with us anymore in Herbology either; she’s moved to sit with Sherri and Lawrence – two Ravenclaws.

Jed doesn’t seem bothered by their argument at all. He just carries on as though nothing happened. He hasn’t made a single attempt to mention her, or even glance in her direction. But otherwise, he’s the same, old Jed. We laughed our way through Thursday morning’s Defence Against the Dark Arts and made fun of each other’s star charts in Astronomy. We teamed up with Seamus and Dean in Potions on Friday morning and the four of us almost managed to make Wideye Potion. Okay, so it didn’t turn the deep green that it was supposed to. We got a kind of navy colour, which was close. Professor Snape didn’t tell us off, anyway.

I’ve been struggling with my homework though. As we get closer and closer to our end-of-year tests our teachers have been piling more and more homework on us. It’s not fair. I don’t think it’s even all humanly possible to complete in time either. This weekend alone I’ve have a five parchment-long formula report to write for Professor McGonagall; three and a half parchments on the uprisings of Elfric the Eager (which I know nothing about and don’t understand the textbook in the slightest) for Professor Binns; two parchments on the importance of repotting Mandrake Sproutlings correctly and the dire consequences if you do not, for Professor Sprout; a four parchment essay on the dangers of not following textbook and classroom instructions when mixed potions, for Professor Snape; a two parchment essay on the difference between gnomes, doxies, imps and gytrashes and which defence spells are the best to use on them and why, that’s for Professor Quirrell and finally two and half parchments on the importance of the locking and unlocking charm verses the traditional lock and key method, which is more useful and why, for Professor Flitwick. How is one person supposed to be able to write all that in one weekend? And I have to keep my star chart up to date, as well as learn the names of all of the star constellation names for Professor Sinistra.

There was a Quidditch match yesterday too. With all of the homework we have you’d think that they wouldn’t have another game so soon. This one was Gryffindor versus Hufflepuff. We were routing for Hufflepuff, solely because we don’t want Gryffindor to have the chance at beating us. Sadly though, Hufflepuff just aren’t a great team. The match was kind of sad to watch. Hufflepuff got creamed, to put it politely. Gryffindor won one-hundred-and-eighty to twenty – Hufflepuff only got two points, because they got two penalty shots, because the Weasley twins beat the Bludgers into one of the Hufflepuff Chasers. The match was over after barely five minutes, when Potter grabbed the Snitch. I guess it was just as well that it ended so quickly, what with how poor Hufflepuff were and with the amount of homework we all have. I guess Potter did us all a favour.

*

I wrote to Viki today. I pretty much told her everything that I’ve just written down in here. I guess I just felt like I needed someone to talk to. Someone to tell me if I’ve done the right thing or not. Not speaking to Josie feels awful, but I couldn’t go without speaking to Jed either – the latter would be much worse, because Jed’s in all of my classes and breakfast, lunch, dinner and we share the same Common Room. And it was his birthday when they fought, after all. I have every right to take Jed’s side, right? Oh, I don’t know. I’m fooling myself here. I just don’t know what to do anymore. I just hope Viki gets my letter and replies fast, so that she can talk some sense into me.

- Josie -