Little Bird

Chapter Thirty-Seven

            My stomach dipped at her words, feeling my throat start to close up at her mention of my aunt. When my mouth opened and closed uselessly for half a second, Draco reached under the table to place his hand on my knee. Swallowing hard, I forced a smile and told her as calmly as I could, "Good. She's doing good."

            "Is she? That's good to hear," McGonagall said, and her tone was so genuine that I could tell she didn't have any idea what had happened over the summer. The professor smiled one last time at us and said, "Well, enjoy your classes."

            "Thank you," Draco replied hastily as she turned away to hand out the rest of the schedules, because my voice seemed to have stopped working and I couldn't bring myself to respond. He turned his head to look at me carefully as he whispered, "Are you okay?"

            My mouth felt very dry as I forced myself to nod, telling him in a quiet voice, "Yeah. I'm fine."

            He gripped my hand tightly, saying softly, "Hey, I'm sure your aunt's alright. She's smart, she'll know how to stay hidden."

            "I know," I said, giving him a tiny smile that I knew he could see right through. I pushed his plate towards him again in an effort to distract myself, insisting, "Quick, eat something. We've got class soon."

            When he rolled his eyes and reached for the toast reluctantly, I opened the schedule McGonagall had handed me and saw that I had Charms first. "What do you have first? I've got Charms."

            Draco opened his own schedule and compared it against mine, groaning as he said, "No, I've got Potions first. This is bullshit, we've only got Care of Magical Creatures and Defense Against the Dark Arts together."

            I was suddenly incredibly nervous—I hadn't even considered the fact that Draco might not be in most of the same classes as me. But I forced myself to grin as I pointed to his schedule, saying, "Look, you've got double Herbology last. I'm glad we're not in all the same classes, then."

            "What? That hurts, Eve, that really does," Draco told me, but he was grinning too and trying not to laugh. He took my schedule from me and groaned, "You don't even have a double Herbology? Something must be wrong, I'll tell McGonagall for you—"

            I was laughing and trying to grab my schedule back from him when Flint entered the Great Hall, sitting down opposite us and yawning tiredly with his robes a complete mess.

            "Morning," he said, reaching for the cereal. I noticed Draco's small grin instantly fading as he nodded to Flint, turning much more serious than he had been a few minutes ago. Wondering why Draco couldn't just always act like he did when he was alone with me, I shot him a pointed look to make him finally give back my schedule.

            "You slept in," Draco stated, pushing his empty plate away. "Were you planning on skipping first period?"

            "Maybe," Flint grinned as he quickly poured the milk. "But I don't want to be writing lines on the first day back. Hey, do you think they'd cut me some slack because it's the very first class of the year?"

            "Probably not," I told him honestly, trying not to laugh when he nearly knocked over the pumpkin juice in his hasty attempt to put the milk back.

            The bell rang then and Flint began to eat his cereal as quickly as possible, to which Draco rolled his eyes. He started to get up from the bench, reaching for me and saying, "Come on, let's go. I can't watch this."