Complications // Severus Snape

• Ch 22 Picture Perfect •

As the weeks passed by, dark circles formed underneath Severus's eyes, and his sallow skin was lackluster. His irritability increased tenfold, and I could hardly get a word in without being snapped at. Any time I tried to express my concern, he only grew grumpier, and I began to wonder if the spaghetti incident had drawn him away.

Aura, Ava, Shay and Sage were more focused on Cecil, who was in a much better condition than Severus—although, her wickedness level seemed to be increasing over time, and it was rare for a class period to go by without at least fifty House points taken away, and two detentions given.

After enduring one particularly bad lesson with Cecil, Avery, Gwynn and I decided to relax by the Lake.

I sat a few feet in front of the two Gryffindors, attempting to form the icy snow around us into a snowman. It was a difficult task, as the snow was quite hard and refused to be molded into anything but a non-spherical lump.

"It's—not—working!" I exclaimed in frustration, squashing a snow in my hands and causing it to break back into powder.

"That's what we've been trying to tell you for the past fifteen minutes." said Gwynn.

"Honestly, Am, just give up. This day's been stressful enough without non-conformal snow." said Avery.

"Give up?" I said, my eyes widening. "Give up? I can't just give up! I've already spent fifteen minutes on this bloody snowman—"

"—so you should give up before you waste even more of your time." said Gwynn. "Are all Ravenclaws this persistent?"

"Oh, this is only the beginning. You should've seen her when we were learning nonverbal spells in Defense. She couldn't get them, so she checked out every book in the library on them and didn't sleep for three night so she could practice." said Avery.

I turned away from my pathetic snowman momentarily to look at Avery and Gwynn. "Well, it paid off, didn't it? I completely owned Shelby in that duel! And the look on Cecil's face was priceless!"

"You're mad." Gwynn declared.

I raised an eyebrow while inspecting the misshapen snowman before me. "It's missing something..." I said, scrutinizing the snowman's face, which was composed of two buttons for eyes and three small stones for a mouth.

"Y'know, one time I went to an art museum, and this snowman reminds me of one of those modern art pieces." said Gwynn.

"Really?" said Avery, tilting her head to inspect the snowman. "I think it looks like Professor Trelawney, with those huge eyes." Professor Trelawney was the new Divination professor that year, and while I didn't have her class, I had still seen the eccentric woman, whose eyes were the size of those of a house-elf.

"Oh! Speaking of—Am, d'you still have that weird Potions book? I think I remember a potion in there that would serve as a good prank—the old bat's been driving me mad." said Avery.

I tore my eyes away from the snowman. I had completely forgotten about the Potions book! "Er—yeah, I'll look for it." I said.

"Brilliant." said Avery.

After a few moments passed without any explanation, Gwynn said, "Is one of you going to explain what you two are talking about, or am I supposed to know?"