My Story: Serena Snape

Chapter 25- Detention

"Shouldn't you be serving your detention with Professor Umbridge." It was more of a statement than a question. So he did know, that awful woman must have told him. 

"She's torturing students! She has this quill that doesn't need ink since it uses the student's blood as ink! And as you write the words on parchment, the quill somehow carves it into your hand!" I was freaking out, still unable to believe what happened even as I spoke the words. Surely I must have sounded crazy.

"Let me see." His face still showed no emotion, neither did his voice, proof of how crazy I must have sounded standing there. I quickly pulled up my left sleeve, just enough to show the back of my hand, but not enough to show my dark mark, in case anyone was walking by. He just sighed. "I don't have time for these games Serena." And with that he closed the door. 

Games? I turned my hand around so that I could see the back of it. Even with some of the pain still present, the carved letters were not. The whole thing had healed, it wasn't even red. But how? Then I remembered her words, "until it sinks in". I shuttered at the thought of going back, of having to carve one more line into my skin, of even having to see her again. And now my father thinks I'm making all this up. I could feel the tears well up in my eyes and my feet quickly carried me back towards Umbridge's office. I knew I wouldn't be able to force myself to write...to carve another line into my hand, but at the same time it was a detention I had to serve. It wasn't until I passed the little hallway that I remembered Gregory. 

I walked down the hallway, fighting my hardest to hold back my tears. As I reached the bench we always sit at, he was nowhere to be seen. I had nowhere else to go now but detention, and the thought of going back there made the tears spring from my eyes. I leaned against a wall and slid to a sitting position, letting tears flood my face. It wasn't just the pain that scared me as I thought more about the detention, but the words were being carve into my left hand, not even a foot away from my dark mark. Surely she'd eventually see it, and then it's a one way trip to Azkaban for me. 

I buried my head into my knees and cried when I heard footsteps. I stopped my tears instantly, but was too scared to look up and see who it was. Suppose it was Professor Umbridge, I'd rather be killed on the spot than have her see me crying. 

"Serena?" I heard the soft clinking of a plate on the ground near me as I looked up. There was Gregory, kneeling down next to me. I had no control over my body as I threw my arms around him and cried into his robes. "That was quick, was it really that bad?" 

I sobbed into him a few more times before composing myself and sitting back up. I wiped away my tears and took some deep breaths. "I left early. She was having me carve words into my hand." I glanced at it, seeing the plain white skin, unmarked. "The words are gone now. My father didn't believe it, and I bet neither do you." I looked down at my hand, just staring at it and wondering how it could betray me by healing so quickly.

"I wouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly Serena." He sat down next to me. "I've seen plenty of students walk out of that office with words carved onto their hands, and I'm sure your father has too. But leaving early is only going to make your future detentions with her worse."

"I'm not going to anymore of her detentions. Not if that's what they're like." I took a look at the plate, filled with food. He noticed where I was looking and smiled.

"I thought you'd be out later, so I went and got you dinner before they stopped serving it. I realized I don't really know what you like, so I grabbed you a little of everything."

I smiled a small smile at the food. With everything that had just happened, I didn't feel like smiling, but this kind act forced me to. "Thank you." I picked up the plate and began to eat, savoring flavors.