The Irreplaceable Charlie Weasley

Chapter 3 - Care of Magical Disaster

Nova

I was lucky that Penny and Tulip gave up on asking me who my crush was as I wasn't prepared to talk about it to anyone. On the one hand, I was happy that I finally managed to figure out who I fancied but on the other hand, my Quidditch concentration went down the drain.

Being such a big Quidditch enthusiast as Murphy was, he was with us on every practice match and in the tent after every practice. If I thought that I didn't understand what Orion was saying before, I had no idea what he was trying to tell us now as I zoned out the second he started to talk.

We had quite a lot of Friendlies this year, which I, of course, didn't mind. Murphy was our commentator for every match and every time I heard his voice through the microphone I felt my heart melt. I was happy we had to wear so much Quidditch protective gear so that nobody could see me blushing.

I think Skye was on to me, however, as she was raging every time I let the Snitch fly right past me as I was pretending to search for it but was looking at Murphy instead.

I finally understood why Charlie thought crushes were a waste of time and they were quite distracting as well. I was thinking about him ALL THE TIME. I couldn't study, I could barely focus on my homework. I dreamt about him a couple of times when I dozed off in History of Magic and I even caught myself drawing hearts on the edge of my notebook when I was trying to draw a mountain troll.

The feelings I got when I saw him or talked to him were great and I felt as if someone slipped me a love potion but I couldn't wait for it to pass as it was getting rather annoying. I wasn't planning to act on it as Penny did. I didn't want to go on a date and hold hands while strolling the streets in Hogsmeade and talk about how we fancy each other. I wasn't that type of a girl and I wanted to focus on more important things like my Care of Magical Creatures O.W.L. and Advanced Transfiguration which was so demanding this year that I could hardly keep up.

And speaking of Care of Magical Creatures! I couldn't wait to start learning everything about every single animal and beast that ever roamed this Earth. We were going to study some amazing and very interesting creatures this year and just when I thought the classes couldn't get any better professor Kettleburn found a way to change my mind.

I was walking down to the School Grounds where we had our lessons with Charlie, casually wondering what would happen if an abraxan and a normal horse would mate. Charlie said that it would be a flying horse without any magical abilities, I on the other hand thought that little to nothing of a horse would be transferred to the youngling as magic is far too powerful to just disappear.

When we got to class, we couldn't help but feel scared as professor Kettleburn for the first time since he was our teacher didn't look happy.

"Today we are going to be cautious, students! I accidentally forgot to lock the cage in which I had my firecrab and now it's on the loose!" His smile started to return as if this was all very amusing to him. "As we have learned last year, they can be very dangerous as they shoot fire from where, Mr. Weasley?" He looked at Charlie.

"Their behind, professor." Charlie couldn't hide being proud of himself as it was the only class where he could answer the question and get it correct without a second thought.

"10 points to Gryffindor!" Kettleburn swung his claw around.

"As Mr. Weasley said, it shoots fire from its rear end so be careful while you look for it. Try to find it by smelling your surroundings. It has been outside since early this morning, something ought to be on fire by now." If it was any other teacher we would all question his teaching methods with a confused expression on our faces. With Kettleburn, this was just another lesson.