Her Tulip Heart | R.J. Lupin

Chapter 12

September soon faded into October. But before September ended, Ravenclaw held tryouts for their Quidditch team. Although, Alethea was really only looking for a seeker (she has been captain for the past 2 years). A seeker was what she found; Cho Chang, a pretty, quiet girl in her fourth year. The team were confident that they have a shot at winning the House Cup this year. With that hope in mind, Alethea decided to start their training sessions twice a week until their first game drew nearer.

Seeing as it was Autumn and the weather wasn't too humid and sticky, but instead slightly cool and breezy, Alethea, Adelyn and Estella spent a large amount of free time down either at the Black Lake or with Hagrid. Alethea was helping Hagrid find a substitute curriculum for Care of Magical Creatures, because of Buckbeak's incident. Unfortunately she couldn't persuade Hagrid to teach his third year class about anything other than Flobberworms - useless and the upmost boring, slimy creatures Alethea had ever come across.

However she did manage to convince him that because her class is full of "responsible" students, (everyone except Katherine) that they should be trusted to continue with their original plan to study the Cockatrice. (A Cockatrice is a dangerous dragon-like hybrid creature with the head and body of a large rooster and the tail of a lizard). Bloody terrifying those things are if they come charging after you. Estella learned from experience when she approached one in class at the beginning of October. Let's just say Alethea's cheeks and stomach were hurting from laughing so much, from watching Estella running away from a rooster-like creature bocking and sprinting after her.

The only other things that happened in late September/early October was a lot of reading, homework and complaints about Divination from Alethea's third year friends - to which which she encouraged them to swap subjects and Adelyn suggested to bullshit their way through. Alethea then corrected Adelyn, telling them that bullshitting would only get them so far in life. But Adelyn came back in with a rebuttal that Alethea was no longer bothered to argue with.

No one could forget the dreadful day that was October 8th. The day that Professor Lupin was sick, meaning Snape got to take over all Defense classes in his absence. Alethea didn't mind that much, because she knew it was a full moon and would rather have Lupin teaching them when he wasn't barking mad. She also rather liked Snape as a teacher; he was always blunt and to the point, two great attributes to teaching a talkative class. One person who hated the fact they had Snape twice in a day was Estella. Who absolutely loathed Snape and his entire existence.

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It was now the second Wednesday of October and Alethea was awaiting the arrival of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team down on the Quidditch Pitch for their 5 o'clock practice. She felt as if she was standing there, in the slightly cool Autumn air for yonks and that the team was running late. When in fact she was early. 35 minutes early to be exact, according to her worn down, brown leather wristwatch she had received from Minnie in her third year as a birthday gift.

Deciding that she didn't want to stand isolated in the centre of the pitch, she piled her Quidditch equipment into a heap on the grass at her feet and started to job around the perimeter of the pitch. As she was jogging she could smell the freshly cut grass and see the browning leaves of the trees in the Forbidden Forest. Just as Alethea was making her way around a Gryffindor observation tower, an arm reached out at yanked her towards the attached body, pulling her out of sight of anyone who may have been near.

'Oh for fucks sake!' Alethea seethed out frustrated because she let herself get manhandled again.

'You?' she questioned in a surprised tone as soon as she saw the person who grabbed her.

'Me!' Quipped Sirius Black, whom was grinning manically. Alethea noticed just how terrible he looked; sunken cheekbones, ashen skin, rips and dirt covering his prison uniform. It's very hard to not see the lack of meat on his bones and the matted, twig infested, and most likely stinky, hair that fell to his elbows.