Some Badgers like Snakes

Elle

"Are you coming?!" Lavender called.
I took one final look in the mirror, adjusting my flower crown.
"I'm coming, I'm coming!" I assured as she walked into the room.
"You missed Breakfast, I brought you a muffin though." She rolled her eyes and took the blueberry muffin from her hand.
"Where would I be without you?" I joked, biting into the baked good, it was still warm.
"Probably still asleep." Looking over to the mess of sheets I had hurriedly gotten out of moments before.
"Ha ha ha" I retorted lamely, we both knew it was true.
"Classes start in five we better get going, you're lucky potions isn't too far away." She said turning out the door and practically bolting down the hall.
"Damnit!" I mumbled swallowing the last large chunk of breakfast and tossing the wrapper in the wastebasket.
I ran after her, catching up just as she got to the exit of the common room.
"Nice touch by the way." She half giggled, pointing to my hair.
I touched the soft daisy petals of the flower crown resting in my mess of wavy hair.
"Thanks. It really brings the whole thing together, doesn't it?" I laughed.
Besides her comments Lavender was really the sweetest, most loyal friend I had. We'd gotten really close over the past four years at Hogwarts. Her, Abby, and I were practically joined at the hip. Although Abby never bothered to wake me up, she let Lavender handle me for the first week or so whenever school started up again. I chuckled at the thought of Abby sitting in class all alone right now, staring at the clock, and wondering when her idiot friends would show up.
"I hate potions." I mumbled as we got closer to the door.
"Don't we all." She whispered back, giggling.
We may have all hated it, but at least Lavender was good at it. She blossomed in first year and was the favourite of nearly every teacher in the school.
"Yeah always succeeding must be torture." I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes.
She punched me in the arm
"Shut up." She said jokingly, but I saw the smallest smile of pride cross her lips. The bell rang seconds after we got to class. There were two empty seats, side by side. one to the left of Abby and the other to the right of some guy. Lavender settled down beside Abby and started to arrange her quills.
"Excuse me, is this seat taken?" I asked the boy quietly. He looked up at me. My heart stopped.
"Sure, Elle." He said.
Jacob. It's not like I hadn't seen him around school, he played on the Slytherin quidditch team, sat across the dining hall, I'd seen glimpses of him over the past four years. We hadn't spoken since the very first day of school. My fist tightened as I remembered what he'd said. I didn't really have a choice, I sat down next to him.
Professor Slughorn started the class and I tried my best to focus.
How had I not noticed I had this class with Slytherin? Had he known? Had he sat close to Abby so that he could insult me again? Did he know how mad I still was? I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of breaking. I smiled and took notes acting like nothing had ever happened, ignoring him completely.
"Now let's work with your elbow partners on page 203 please." He said finally. I looked up. Abby was on the end, Lavender was her only partner and I was Jacob's. I gritted my teeth and turned to face him. Why him? Why not that smelly kid who never smiled, or the dumb one who lit everything on fire no matter what the spell?!?
"Guess we're partners." He said quietly.
"Guess so." I grumbled, not making eye contact.
I opened my book to page 203, I was terrible at potions but went to work silently.
"You're chopping those roots too thickly." He muttered.
"Excuse me?" I scowled.
"Chop them finer, the skin will slide right off so you won't have to waste time peeling it off later." He said taking the knife and demonstrating.
"I can handle it, thank you." I retorted coldly, snatching my knife back.
"Whatever." He mumbled looking back to the instructions.
I went back to chopping, trying to hide that I was in fact using his methods, they really helped. We brewed our potion in silence, listening to other pairs giggling and chatting.
"I'm sorry." Jacob's voice quietly broke the silence.
I looked up from my work he was facing me, his eyes fixated on the ground.
"What?" I questioned, not sure I'd heard him right.
He looked up at me, sadness lingered behind his ashamed eyes.
"I'm sorry." He repeated a little louder, staring directly into my eyes.
The air stood still.
I couldn't believe that after almost five years, he was apologizing.
"For what?" I asked quietly, breaking his gaze and turning back to my work.
He sighed, "You know." It came out in a whisper.
I whipped my head around
"No, I'm sorry, I don't. Care to refresh my memory?" I snapped.
He looked like he was going to cry, I felt my triumph melt away.
"For what I said." He began looking at the ground again.
"I was stupid, I would say I was young but that's not really an excuse. I should have known better. What I said was cruel and like you said evil." He lingered on the word.
"I shouldn't have pushed you away. I can't tell you how many times I've wished I'd said something else, anything else! You-" he choked
"You were my only friend."
He looked back up at me, his face filled with bottled up emotion.
"I-I don't, well I mean, I" I stammered looking away from him, trying not to cry. I took a deep breath.
"Look you really hurt me." I whispered.
His face fell, "I know. But I-"
"I'm not done." I said looking up at him.
He closed his mouth, ashamed.
"You really hurt me, I can't say you didn't. You broke my heart, I really thought we were becoming friends." I said sadly, remembering all the tears I'd shed over him.
"You made me feel terrible, worthless, lesser. But the thing that hurt most wasn't that you hurt me, you talked about others. You generalized all muggles and muggleborns, all Hufflepuffs. These people, they were under the same roof as you, in the same hallway even. Who knows who else heard it? Who else felt like I did? Who else you hurt?" I choked on my words trying to keep my voice steady and quiet so no one else would hear.
He swallowed, his eyes glistening with tears.
"For some reason despite all this, despite my better judgement. I'm willing... I'm willing to give you a second chance." I finished giving him a tiny smile.
Hope filled his face.
"I forgive you." I whispered ducking my head.
He was silent.
I turned back to my work thinking how oddly anti climatic the whole thing had been.
He hugged me.
He squeezed me into the tightest embrace of my life, and I'm almost certain I felt a single tear rub on the side of my neck.
"Don't go getting all emotional now, we have to brew this potion before we waste any more time." I tried to chuckle nonchalantly, I felt kind of awkward.
"Yeah of course." He said straightening back up and turning to his book.
"Squeeze the extra juice out of that root, and toss in half a sour cherry. It should rebalance the bubbles so we can finish in half the time." He mused.
"Um oh ok." I said my hands shaking hastily as I followed his weird instructions.
"Yeah, wave your wand in a clockwise rotation about three times, the brew should turn a silvery colour." He said chopping some kind of herb at a ridiculous speed.
I did what he said.
He tossed the herbs into the bubbling potion and it immediately turned as silvery and sparkly as crushed diamonds. I gaped awestruck and noticed him smiling in the corner of my eyes.
"How'd you know to do that?" I asked, hypnotized by the swirling potion.
"Potions are kind of my thing." He shrugged humbly.
"No duh." I laughed.
"What?" He looked at me confused.
"Never mind." I mumbled, his language was going to take some getting used to. Look at me, I thought ashamed, first you just forgive him then you assume you're going to be friends again.
He just apologized, it's not like he wants to hang out with you.
I looked up to see him reviewing the instructions in his book.
I suddenly remembered the comment Lavender made our first night at Hogwarts. I blushed, I guess I hadn't thought about it at eleven, but he was kind of cute.
The timer sounded, and Slughorn started walking around the classroom to look at the complete potions.
"Very good Jacob," he patted Jacob on the back smiling down at our cauldron.
"Thank you, sir. Elle really helped too, she's the one who got the texture just right." Jacob told Slughorn, smiling at me with a covert glance.
"Of course, my apologies Elle." He teetered off to the next group.
"Thanks." I said happily, looking up into Jacob's eyes, his big... green...adorable eye- stop it!
"Anytime." He smirked.
We chatted amongst ourselves for the rest of class, we got along as nothing had ever happened between us.
The bell rang and the students started to clear out.
"I have transfiguration." I whispered cocking my head towards the door.
"History of Magic." He frowned.
"Well uh...see you later." I stuttered awkwardly.
"Yeah, see you soon." He smiled and give me what I could only describe as a small...bow?
I giggled at the cute and formal gesture.
I'm pretty sure I saw him suppress a smirk on the way up.
"Coming?" Abby called from the door. Her hands were on her hip and Lavender was standing behind her casting me a teasing look. I rolled my eyes, and tried to keep my blush from becoming too visible.
"Yeah I'm coming, I'm coming." I mumbled heading off towards them.
I threw Jake one last look from over my shoulder as I joined my friends.
He blushed, I turned my head back around and smiled.
Abby rolled her eyes and walked ahead of us towards Transfiguration.
"So uh...wasn't that the Slytherin kid from first year?" Lavender asked awkwardly.
"Yep." I responded cheerfully.
"The uh...same kid you swore you'd never speak to again?" She stuttered in confusion.
"Yep."
"And he's the one you were just...er talking to?" She asked dumbfounded.
"Yep." I sighed wistfully.
"Just double checking." She rolled her eyes, giving up.
I clutched my books to my chest, beaming.
I couldn't help but daydream throughout the rest of the day. I doodled in my notebook at lunch, barely listening to Abby's story about...well something.
"You know you shouldn't have that." Abby said pointing at my notebook.
Muggle things weren't not allowed but no one really brought them.
"Oh who cares." I rolled my eyes.
"It's that kind of attitude that'll keep you from becoming a prefect next year." She huffed.
All Abby cared about lately was becoming a prefect, that and quidditch.
While me and Lavender couldn't care less about the sport, Abby had devoted two hours a day in our first year to practice for tryouts. Her dedication had payed off, she made the team and was a pretty good chaser now a days.
"How will I survive?" I asked dramatically.
She huffed and turned to Lavender, leaving me to draw in peace.
It was a long day, the first one always was.
We headed back to our rooms before dinner.
"I'll help you study in one sec, I just need to put these away." I told Lavender as I went into our room to finally put away the pile of books I'd been lugging around.
I threw them onto my bed with a sigh of sweet relief. It was then that I noticed the base on my bedside table. Someone had sent me flowers. My heart leaped with curiosity and excitement. They were gorgeous, a beautiful bunch of perfect white daisies held together by a bright yellow bow. I noticed a small card and read it silently.

I know these are beyond late but I'm hoping they'll serve their purpose now.

I pressed the note to my chest and felt my heart sigh. It was too adorable to fathom! There was no name but I knew exactly who they were from; Jacob had good taste.