By Friday morning no one remembers Freddie's fight. His eye is a gross yellow colour now and Isaiah still has a swollen face and a big bandage on his nose but other than that it was like it never even happened.
Till mum sent a howler of course.
"FRED WEASLEY!" My mum's voice rings throughout the entire hall during breakfast which causes me to nearly spill my orange juice all over the place. I look around the room seeing which of us got the howler. Ophelia is standing on the bench peering out over the sea of students trying to get a better view of the event.
"Someone called?" Uncle Fred says appearing beside me.
Mum's voice stops me from responding, "BEATING UP A BOY YOUNGER THAN YOU!? WHO RAISED YOU WHEN YOUR FATHER AND I WERN'T WATCHING!?"
Rose pulls on Leah's sleeve trying to get her to sit back down but Leah's not having any of it.
"GOOD JOB FREDDIE! BREAK THEIR JAW NEXT TIME TOO!" Dad's voice cuts through the silence of the hall which makes everyone laugh. I swear I see Professor McGonagall press her fingers into her temples, obviously done with the entire situation.
"WE DO NOT CONDONE VIOLENCE FRED! TELL HIM GEORGE!" Mum shouts.
"I'M SO PROUD OF YOU!" Dad says.
"WE WILL PULL YOU OUT OF HOGWARTS I SWEAR TO MERLIN!" Mum's voice screams before dad could say anything more.
"BETTER WATCH YOURSELF MISTER CHAPMAN!" Dad screams.
Then the letter falls to the table in front of Freddie. The entire room breaks out into laughter.
"They fight just like they did when we were in Hogwarts." Uncle Fred says to me once the noise has died down, "Vi's proud of Freddie too, when your mums faking being mad she annunciates each word perfectly."
"Does she really?" I ask him
Uncle Freddie just winks at me and sinks down into the table. Darcy appears out of nowhere and sits across the table from me. "You're parents are the best."
"And they wonder why they can't control Freddie or his emotions. They can't agree on anything." I say back to him.
Darcy throws his head back and laughs. I stare a little too long at him, listening to the way his laugh rises and falls in pitch. "Mum would have just left me at the platform when I came home for Christmas holidays if I did what Freddie did."
"Come on, we've got potions soon." I say to him changing the subject from my idiot brother.
Darcy and I leave the great hall before anyone else. I pull my phone out and unwrap my headphones. "Listen to this, I found it last night." I say to him.
Darcy takes an ear bud from me and puts it in his ear. I put mine in too before I press play. The song 80's by PrettyBoysHav starts to play. Something about this song scratches my brain and makes me insanely happy.
Darcy's arm keeps bumping into mine as we walk because we have to be so close together. I've always had a soft spot for D, ever since we were little kids. It took Scorpius sitting me down and telling me that I fancy Darcy for me to actually figure out that yes, that's exactly what I have been feeling. Something about him just makes my entire body feel warm and happy.
When the song ends I stop my playlist so nothing else plays. Darcy takes the ear bud out but he doesn't move away from me, "I feel like we could write something like that if you wanted to. Like that older style of music."
"Yeah definitely. Course we would need Leah to meet up with us so she could sing it. And she's been busy with I don't even know what recently." We turn into the dungeons slowly. Dominique is leaning against the wall by our common room door, her 'friend' Lucas is standing in front of her, so close that their noses are touching.
"You could always sing it." Darcy says pulling my attention away from my cousin. I'm jealous of her, she's got boys practically begging her to notice them where ever she goes and she flirts so casually, I don't even think she knows what she's doing.
"Me? Sing? You've lost your mind Williams." We walk into Slughorn's classroom together and take our seats at the cluster of desks in the upper right corner of the room.
"You're good at everything you put your mind too Cassie. Besides, it'll just be me and you in the room, no one important would hear."
You're important I almost say but I stop myself and just make a choking sound instead, yeah real smooth Weasley.
I pull out my potions book and some parchment and a muggle pen, "How about you sing it?" I say under my breath.
The classroom door smashes open and Ophelia stands in the middle of the door way for a second with her hands on her hips, "Well fuck me with my own god damn wand, good old Sluggy isn't even here yet." She says loudly.
"Well beat me over the head with a mandrake I think your right Weasley." Her friend Chandler says from behind her. They walk into the room and sit at the farthest desks from the front of the room possible. Other students file into the room and find their seats. Georgette sits with Darcy and I, and two of Darcy's Hufflepuff friends Jakob and Pierce sit with us too.
"Well toss me into the black lake and call me giant squid feed but it seems like I've forgotten my books." Ophelia says loudly. People all around the room laugh at her, she loves being the center of attention. "Not me Avada Kadava-ing myself." She says spinning her wand in between her fingers like a drumstick.
Slughorn walks into the room moments later and the class goes silent. He goes behind his desk and stands there for a moment, "Well gather around then! You're in third year now I highly doubt that I have to tell you to do everything!" He says crossing his arms over his chest.
The class moves and we stand in front of Professor Slughorns desk. He pulls out a small vial of liquid and places it carefully at the edge of his desk. "Can anyone tell me what this is?"
"Confusing Concoction." Leah says from the back of the group, "Come on Sluggy, give us a hard one!"
Slughorn laughs. It blows my mind but even after all the things that Ophelia pulls in her classes, she's still every ones favourite student. "Ten points to Slytherin for being a know-it-all. Miss Weasley, care to double it by telling me what the main ingredients to a confusing concoction are?" Professor Slughorn says.
"Scurvy grass, lovage, sneezewort, water, and Allspice." I say before Leah can.
Professor Slughorn looks from me, to Leah, back to me, back to Leah. "Very good Miss... Miss Weasley, another ten points to Slytherin."
I turn around and look at Leah who's got a very over exaggerated frown on her face. I smile to myself and turn back around to face Slughorn.
"You will all be brewing this potion today. Take your time, read the instructions in your texts very carefully. What do we say hmm? If you need help today send... purple sparks from your wand and I'll be over in a split second. Sounds good with you all?" Professor Slughorn puts his hands on his hips and waits for us to respond. A collective sigh of 'yes sirs' seems to do the trick because he sends us back to our seats to get started. Each class we have, Slughorn assigns a colour of spark to questions that we may have instead of the standard raising of hands. I overheard Neville tell mum and dad at Christmas last year that he's starting to lose his mind in his old age.
Nevertheless, Darcy and I head over to the ingredients cupboard and wait in line to get our things.
"I knew that answer you know." Ophelia says coming over to me.
"Course you knew it. But I knew it faster." I say back to her.
She scoffs and looks away like she's looking for a hidden camera to stare into. She watched the entire muggle show 'The Office' over the summer with Rose and Albus and she pretends like she's on television whenever she's given the chance. "Yeah but Slughorn was asking me. You know that no matter how many of my questions you answer he won't put you into his club." She says it like she's trying to hurt me but it doesn't work.
"Unlike you Ophelia, I don't need a teacher to tell me I'm smart every thirty seconds. I have this thing called confidence." I say it so matter of factly even though all of us know that I just lied right through my teeth.
"At least I don't go crying to our brother every time someone looks in my direction. If it wasn't for you, he wouldn't get in so many fights. None of us would." Now that one hurt. I hate fighting with Leah, she knows exactly what to say to get a reaction out of me.
"That was a low blow Ophelia." Darcy says standing up for me.
I think she just realized what she said because she shrinks down into herself for a second. "Sorry Cass, I didn't mean it like that."
"You did though." I say back to her, "But it's alright."
The line moves up and Leah pushes into the room to get out of the awkwardness that we've created.
Darcy goes to say something but I put my hand up to stop him, "I'm fine." I say. I look into Darcy's eyes and he looks at me for a good long while before shrugging his shoulders and walking into the ingredients cupboard.
"Here." A voice says from behind me. A hand reaches up from behind me and grabs the jar of allspice off a shelf that I couldn't have reached otherwise. I turn around and the boy from the owlery, Todd, is standing very close to me.
"Thank you." I say quietly. I take the jar from him and move to the desk that is set up in the cupboard. Todd follows me and stands beside me watching as I measure out four tablespoons of the powder into my little ingredients bowl.
"Have you heard anything about your grandmother?" I ask him. Instantly his posture changes and I get nervous, "Sorry I didn't mean to press, it's none of my business."
Todd shakes his head, "Oh no it's fine. Just surprised you remembered is all." My cheeks get warm. I can see Darcy out of the corner of my eye watching me interact with Todd. "My mum says she's still alive, so that's a good thing. Not much else though." There's a pause, "What about you? Your estranged grandmother still dead?"
I laugh and I swear I see Darcy's shoulders tense, "She's still dead yeah."
"I saw what your brother did to Chapman. Safe to say that he was the reason you were writing home?" Todd says as he takes the spice jar from me and puts it back up on the shelf.
"That obvious hmm?" Together we pick up our ingredient bowls and walk out of the cupboard.
"He's sort of terrifying, your brother. I mean he's in my house and he's a really funny bloke but when he and James are having a row the entire tower can hear it." I walk Todd over to where he's got his station set up.
"Freddie means well. And he and James have been fighting like that ever since they could speak."
Darcy comes out of nowhere and stands beside me, "Come on Cass, we've got potions to brew." But he's not talking to me when he says it. He's staring right at Todd.
I instantly get uncomfortable, "Let me know if there is anything I can do to help with your grandmother Todd. I'll see you around."
Todd doesn't even get the chance to respond before Darcy takes a hold of my arm and drags me back over to our desk.
"Can I not talk to my friends now?" I say to him scrunching up my eyebrows in confusion.
"Course you can talk... that guys your friend? I've never seen you talk to him before."
I separate my ingredients and start chopping up the scurvy grass, "I'm allowed to know people that you don't know D. What's it to you who I'm friends with anyways."
"Its... nevermind, pass me that knife would you?" He says sticking his hand out towards me. He opens and closes his fingers in a grabbing motion a few times which makes me smile and I place the knife in his hand carefully.
Purple sparks fly from the other side of the room and Slughorn jumps from his desk and scurries off.
"Looks like your friend needs some help." Darcy says it in a very sarcastic tone and I roll my eyes.
"This doesn't look good on you Darcy."
He stops what he's doing and looks at me. "What doesn't look good on me?"
I scrape the scurvy grass off of my cutting board and into my cauldron and add half a pint of water in with it. I touch the end of my wand into the cauldron and the handle shifts into a wooden spoon that I can stir with, something that my mum taught me to do when I was little. "Jealousy. Or whatever the it is that your feeling. It's not a good look."
Darcy scoffs but doesn't say anything more. I slice the lovage stems in half and roughly chop them just like my text says to do before adding it into the cauldron as well. I turn up the heat on the burner and stir for eight minutes. Jakob and Georgette are talking amongst themselves but that's the only noise coming from our table. I sneak looks at Darcy but he's pouring over his textbook and cauldron doing anything but looking at me.
More purple sparks fill the air and Slughorn runs from one side of the room to the other. "Darcy can you pass me the measuring spoons please?" I say it softly
No response. Pierce looks between me and Darcy but doesn't do anything.
"Darcy? Can you please pass me the measuring spoons?" I say it again, a little louder than I said it the first time.
Still nothing. Pierce reaches across the table and gets them for me. I smile and nod at him and he looks between Darcy and me and sort of smiles and rolls his eyes at the same time.
At the end of class Slughorn awards each student with a perfect potion ten points along with a three foot composition on the potion we just got finished brewing.
"Darcy!" I call after him in the halls. He walks faster. "Darcy Williams!"
He slows his pace a bit but he doesn't stop walking. I start walking faster trying to catch up with him.
"Cassiopeia!" Todd comes up beside me right as Darcy turns the corner. I slow down and smile at Todd.
"Nice one today, only needed to call Professor Slughorn over, what? Three times?" I joke.
Todd laughs, "Not all of us can be good at everything we do. Anyways, you've got your Hogsmeade letter signed?"
Wasn't expecting that one honestly, "Oh um yeah, yeah. Uncle Ron runs the Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes location in Hogsmeade now and Dad always has Freddie pop in to make sure that everything is running smoothly. But now that Leah and I are in third year he has more of us to check the shop."
"After you've done whatever you've got to do for your dad, you want to get a butterbeer or something?"
My eyes go wide involuntarily and I try my best to regain my composure, "When's the first Hogsmeade trip again?" My voice is squeaky and quiet.
Todd laughs, "Next weekend. First weekend of October."
"Uhh, yeah?"
He looks at me with one of his eyebrows raised, "Was that a question?"
I can't help but smile, "No. I mean. Yes. I'll get a butterbeer with you."
"Sick, alright. I'll see you around then." He turns down a different hallway, leaving me alone.
Now I'm confused. Why did I say yes? I've been crushing on Darcy for so long and as soon as someone else asks me to get a butterbeer I say yes? I shake it off and clutch my potions book close to my chest and take a breath before walking down the grand staircase and out towards the greenhouses for Herbology class.