･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. .**.☽ .*
"Good-morning Miss Davies," Professor Flitwick said, handing Sarah a piece of parchment at the breakfast table from the pile in his hands.
"Morning, Sir," she took it, "what's this?"
"Your grades from last term's end of term exams," he said, before handing a piece of parchment to Xenopholius Lovegood.
"Thank you," the blonde boy murmured, only looking up from the parchment he was scribbling on for a moment.
"Miss Rutherford," Flitwick handed Caroline her results.
"Thank you, Sir," Caroline smiled at him briefly.
He moved on to further on down the table and Caroline, her unopened grades still in her hand, gathered her stuff and walked over to the Hufflepuff table to sit with Tyler and Archie.
"Morning," she said.
"Got your results?" Tyler asked.
"Yes, you?"
"Yeah, all good apart from an A in Charms when I was sure I was gonna get at least an E, but that's
fine, Flitwick doesn't like me anyway," Tyler said.
"What did you get, Carrie?" Archie asked.
"I haven't looked..."
"Well look now! You probably got straight-Os anyway," Tyler snorted.
"I highly doubt that," Caroline laughed, even though there was a part of her that was hoping that could be true, "alright, I'll look."
Caroline Rutherfood -
Sixth Year Pre-Mock NEWTs
Charms - O
Transfiguration - O
Potions - O
Defence Against the Dark Arts - O
Herbology - P
Astronomy - O
History of Magic - E
Arithmancy - O
Study of Ancient Runes - E
She had got a P in Herbology. A Poor. She had failed. How could she have failed? How could she have let this happen? She had failed.
"Well?" Archie asked before downing the rest of his orange juice.
"Excuse me."
"Carrie-"
She quickly packed up her stuff and left the hall, her heart pounding heavily in her chest. How could she have failed? Maybe nine NEWTs was too many. Maybe she just wasn't good enough.
"Hey! Caroline I-"
She glanced up at Sirius in passing and said softly, "morning."
She walked straight past him, her mind still a blur as she tried to process her exam results. She hadn't even realised he had wanted to talk to her.
"Ouch," James said as they carried on walking.
"Shut up, Prongs."
"She looked upset," Remus commented.
"Yeah, she saw Sirius' face I mean, wouldn't you be upset?" James joked, making Remus snort with laughter.
Sirius rolled his eyes and shoved him away.
Later on Sirius and Caroline sat silently beside each other in astronomy, looking out at the midnight sky. Sirius kept glancing at her, debating whether he should talk to her about how upset she had seemed all day. He saw her in Herbology, talking to Professor Sprout after the class, and then leaving with tears in her eyes. What was going on with her?
He cleared his throat, but failed to get her attention as she was focused studying her star chart.
He waited another moment before whispering, "Caroline."
She looked up at him then, "yes?"
He was taken aback for a moment, as he often was when she looked at him, before composing himself and starting to talk, "um well, I saw you a couple times today and...well you looked...um, are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, smiling in a 'fine' way for good measure.
He sighed, shaking his head, "no you're not," he said gently.
"I am, I'm fine."
"You looked upset today..."
"Did I?" She asked, rubbing her eyes tiredly.
"You did...just, what's wrong?"
"Nothing, Sirius."
"What is it? Is it to do with exam results?"
Her eyes, to her own frustration, began to fill with tears. Fuck her emotions. This was pathetic, it was just one test but failing it had made her feel so awful about herself.
She shook her head, looking away from him, trying to hide the tears.
"It's okay," Sirius said softly.
"It's stupid," she whispered.
"It's not stupid."
"It is."
"It's not-" but Sirius was silenced by a stern look from their Astronomy Professor, so he turned back to his work.
"It really is silly," Caroline whispered after their professor had moved away, "I got a bad mark and for some reason...my brain has just decided to go on self-destruct mode."
"Because you have high expectations of yourself," he said.
She glanced at him fleetingly before looking back at her parchment and then up at the stars, "yes."
"It's okay, Caroline-"
She shook her head, furiously wiping away her tears, "sorry, I feel really embarrassed."
"Don't. I get it. When...you work hard and think you deserve something and it still doesn't happen, it's hard not to start to blame yourself," he said, avoiding her eye now.
"Have you felt that way?"
"Not about school."
"Then about what?"
"It's nothing-"
"Come on."
He sighed, and looked at her, "my family. I always wanted to please them and I never could."
She seemed taken aback, "I'm sorry..."
"Nah it's fine, I'm better off out of there anyway. They weren't good people."
They had both turned back to their work. She grabbed her quill with her left hand and began to write again, before stopping herself. She stayed looking at her parchment as she let her right hand drop and gently slid it into Sirius' own hand. He enclosed his fingers over hers and she squeezed back comfortingly.
And they stayed that way for a while.
Sirius didn't think he had ever felt more content in his whole life than when holding her hand.