A Shot At Happiness

TESTING THE WATERS

  The rest of the week passed uneventfully. Well, as uneventful as it could be for the students of a magical school. Everyone seemed to love the Defense Against the Dark Arts classes taken by Professor Lupin. Snape’s classes were detested as usual, but there seemed to be a change in him. Nobody could pin point on what exactly but it was noticed that he had stopped outright insulting his students. The dementors stationed outside the grounds continued their vigil. Hagrid still continued to take classes but he had lost his enthusiasm.

    As for Ginny, Neville and Luna, the week had been an exhausting one. It was one thing to sit through the classes all over again but to keep a tight leash on their magic while in classes took an extraordinary effort.

Neville, though, was the one at the receiving end of a lot of skepticism and amazement. Other than being his non-stuttering self, he also suddenly appeared to be really good at potions. Even with Snape breathing down his neck, he remained quite cool when it came to brewing potions. His response to his peers was that he had sat down and read a lot on potions during the holidays when in reality all the credit went to his red haired, potion mistress of a best friend.

In the previous timeline Ginny had tutored him and helped him a lot in understanding the subject and all of it had definitely paid off.

Another interesting thing that happened during the week was during the third years’ first DADA class. Lupin, as they had already known had planned to start the class with Boggarts. But knowing, what happened the previous time and that Neville’s  biggest fear won’t be his gran this time around made the trio go into a frenzy of fear. They finally reached out to Dumbledore who agreed to summon Neville during the DADA class so as not to let him attend that first class.

But Neville and Dumbledore definitely watched the happenings of the class, disillusioned. It all happened exactly like the previous time and Neville was relieved when Harry was once again not allowed to face the Boggart. Having not been completely exposed to a dementor yet, it was hard to guess what other horrifying form his fear would take.

Ginny and Luna continued doing well in their classes, albeit a bit of an effort was needed in order to keep their magic in check. Since Ginny was otherwise occupied in her first year and Luna was, well, Luna, they both were often left alone, which according to Ginny was a good thing as it wouldn’t draw attention to them like it did with Neville.

Finally, the day arrived when they decided to go down to the Chamber of Secrets. The three left their dormitories early in the morning, knowing that everyone would be having a lie in because of the weekend. They met with Dumbledore and Snape in Moaning Myrtle’s Bathroom on the second floor. Ginny shuddered as she entered the place. Though it had been years since it had happened to her in real time, the place still gave her the creeps.

“Good morning Professors,” the three greeted on seeing the awaiting older wizards.

Without much delay they faced the sink which was the entrance to the Chamber.

Ginny closed her eyes and took a deep breath while others stood aside watching. She had never done this without Harry by her side. It was him who was there with her when she first figured out that she could speak to snakes. Ginny had panicked thinking that Tom was possessing her again.

Harry had managed to calm her down before convincing her to talk to Dumbledore about it. He had sat with her and held her hands while Dumbledore performed spells on her to check her for possession. But the result had been that she was not possessed and that the ability to speak parseltongue was just the mark left on her after her possession. One that she didn’t know of until that fateful encounter with the snake.

Eventually she had gotten over her fears. So much so that, she and Harry had used it as their private language. Discreetly, of course. But standing before the Chamber while the others waited on, and with no Harry by her side, she couldn’t help feeling a little lonely. Pushing back the depressing thoughts and taking another deep breath Ginny softly hissed, “Open.”
At once they saw movement in the sink. The sink in fact sank down exposing them to a pipe the size of a man hole.