An American At Hogwarts: Book Three

Chapter Twenty-Nine

A/N: Hey y'all! Sorry this is coming a little later than usual, I just moved back into/started school again and it's been a hectic week. The plan is still for updates to come every four days, but every so often one might come a little later because school is a much busier time than summer for me.

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The next few meetings of Umbridge's class were a lot easier to get through. Now that the DA was running regularly, and WWHRS was going strong, the part of my soul that needed to rebel against stupid, unfair things like Umbridge could finally rest easy, at least for a little while.

The only downside was how much busier I'd become since joining and running so many clubs. Especially with Quidditch starting, it was hard to find room in my schedule for anything other than class, homework, and clubs.

Oh well. At least my clubs were fun, for the most part.

After a successful week and a half of one-on-one WWHRS meetings, Jackson and I reconvened in our regular classroom to compare notes on how everything had gone. We still had a lot of class planning to do for future meetings, and every once in a while we'd forget to share something with more than one person just because it'd gotten lost in our notes, but for the most part we were doing pretty well.

"You know, I'm glad this is working, especially because I hate Umbridge, but it's a lot more work to run a club like this," grumbled Jackson as the two of us continued to work on the hoverboard.

"You're telling me!" I cried. "I've actually been running this club since I got here, and it was already challenging enough without having to do individual lessons for every person involved. And you don't even have to juggle college apps!"

Jackson grinned. "Your mistake, Stark. You could always throw muggle education out the window and commit to being a batshit insane wizard like me."

I shook my head, but couldn't hold back a smile. "Yeah, you have fun with your crazy old man routine starting at age twenty."

"I will."

I just laughed, and the two of us worked in comfortable silence for a little longer. It was getting close to dinner time, but we were also getting close to finishing our hoverboard. I glanced up at Jackson and we came to a wordless agreement: we weren't leaving until this thing was done.

It took some serious self-control not to fling the hoverboard across the room a few times while we were working out the final, tiny details, but we managed it. After a few failed tests where Jackson and I absolutely wiped out trying to use it, our project was done.

"Oh my God, I can't wait to go ripping past Umbridge on this," I cackled. Jackson just grinned back at me.

"Why wait? There's no time like the present."

I looked at him for a few seconds, considering his words. Then, I dropped the hoverboard to the ground and mounted up.

"Game on, Rappuccinni."

Jackson cheered as I carefully maneuvered the hoverboard out of the room. He followed after me, and although I was a little shaky, I couldn't stop a grin from growing on my face with every foot I travelled.

"You recording this?" I called back to Jackson. I couldn't turn all the way around without falling over, so I just had to half-yell it over my shoulder.

"I absolutely am, and just so you know, you look hilarious."

I tried to turn around and flip Jackson the bird, but unfortunately for me, it was enough movement that I almost lost my balance and the aggression I was trying to convey was seriously lost.