Liar, Liar

12: A Disruption

I stared at the floor, scared to look up, afraid of what I'd see.

Suddenly, the doors burst open. My head darted up to see who had caused the intrusion. Snape, who had remained leaning against his desk, stood up quickly.

Draco.

"Mr. Malfoy. What a pleasant surprise," Snape said through gritted teeth.

"Professor," Malfoy said, flashing his teeth.

My stomach plummeted. How much worse could my day get?

Suddenly, his gaze turned to me, and his expression changed immediately.

"Zelle," he said, dragging out my name. I looked to my converse, scuffing them against the stone floor.

"Mr. Malfoy?" Snape asked.

"I was actually just looking for her," Malfoy said, gesturing to me.

"What?" My head snapped up.

"We have some unfinished business," Malfoy said. "We'll be getting out of your classroom now, Sir."

I felt bile rise to my throat. What did he want with me? Especially during class? Malfoy made me sick, and being alone with him for even a second ever again was not something I could endure.

"Miss Agoria is in class right now," Snape seethed, and I watched an indescribable emotion flash across his face.

"Oh?" Malfoy looked confused. "Is everyone else sick or something?" His eyes searched the classroom.

"Miss Agoria is the only student who qualified to take Applicable Potions with me this year, Mr. Malfoy. Get out," he seethed. "You are interrupting my class and I will remove house points."

Malfoy looked taken aback. "Zelle? Applicable Potions?" He scoffed. "Zelle isn't smart enough to transfigure a cricket," Malfoy laughed.

"Enough!" Snape roared, making me jump. "You will leave my classroom and end this disruptive behavior at once. Miss Agoria is my most established student, whom will never compare to you lazy excuse of a man and I will not tolerate this behavior any longer. You are not to speak to her like this ever again, understood?" Snape's voice reached a tone so deep yet so loud that it made my ears rumble.

Malfoy looked grief-stricken, and it took all of me not to laugh, which was an emotion conflicting with my feelings about the manner in which Snape had defended me. I'd never heard of him standing up for a student like this ever before. However, I thought back to what he had said before Malfoy had burst in. It was probably because he thought I had potential. Why else would he have defended me that way?

Malfoy's knees shook as he faced us. Snape, his face contorted in anger, and me, mouth agape, eyes wide.

However, my professor wasn't done just yet. "I will hear about it if this every happens again, do you understand me?" He asked Draco, taking a few steps forward.

Draco nodded his head in desperation and fled the classroom, his footsteps echoing down the hall.

After a few very long seconds, he turned back to me. "What did he want with you?" Snape asked.

"I don't know," I replied honestly, hoping he had forgotten about earlier, so the class could continue without me getting all awkward and ashamed again.

Snape tilted his head.

"Sir?" I asked, confused.

"There we go," he said, his mouth forming into a smirk. "Good girl."

My stomach erupted in fire, my palms bursting into waterfalls of sweat. I bit my lip so hard that it drew blood. Good girl, he had said. Oh, how I wanted him to call me that. There was no way this was real, I must have misheard him.

He noticed.

"Let's get you cleaned up," he said.

I looked at him wide-eyed. "Oh- it's nothing-"

His eyebrow raised.

"Sir, I mean- it's fine, my lips are just a bit chapped-"

"Let's fix that," he commented.

"Sir-" I inhaled sharply, my heart beating up a thunderstorm within my chest.

"Foolish girl," Snape scoffed, summoning a tissue from his desk. "What did I tell you moments before we so rudely got interrupted?"

"I'm- I got confused," I admitted, staring at my converse. I was embarrassed into oblivion by what I had thought he meant.

He shot me a look I couldn't place, and shook his head. "Class dismissed."