starstruck || hannah abbott

5 || idiot

As the weeks dragged on, it seemed that Professor Umbridge was gaining more and more control over Hogwarts. She began making a habit of critiquing the other professors as they taught their lessons. She carried around a clipboard, a sharp looking quill, and that ever annoyingly smug smirk on her ghastly face. One professor that Anastasia felt was rather attacked on the spot was Professor Trelawney.

Now, Ana had always found Divination to be the most colossal waste of her time but no one deserved to be put on the spot the way Umbridge treated Trelawney.

"Could you please predict something for me?" Chirped the toad in pink.

Trelawney's bug eyes seemed to widen impossibly more at that notion and she floundered for something to say. This was the reaction Umbridge had been hoping for so she could make her little notes on how inadequate the schooling here was.

Anastasia shifted uncomfortably on her cushion as the Defense Against The Dark Arts Professor scratched something in her notes and began to leave. It was only then that Trelawney burst out with a prophecy of sorts declaring Dolores Jane Umbridge to be in grave danger, but that only deepened the smirk on the chubby professor's face.

"How lovely," she said with a final scratch on her clipboard before departing.

The remainder of the class was awkward at best. Trelawney couldn't focus and none of the students were even paying attention. There were hushed whispers behind tea cups and knowing looks passed between friends in the hazy room. This could only mean trouble for the months to come.

When at long last, the frazzled professor dismissed the fifth years, Anastasia clambered down through the trapdoor after Theo and Blaise. No one spoke until they had descended the spiral stone stairs and were making for the Great Hall.

"Bloody hell, Umbridge is killing us all this year," Theo spat out.

"She was in my Potions class earlier and he was extremely irked at her. She kept flaunting how she had the teaching position he always wanted. After she left, he smacked Weasley on the head for laughing at him," Anastasia said with a smirk.

"It still baffles me those red-headed idiots are purebloods," Blaise snorted.

"No kidding," Ana agreed as they took their seats and started lunch.

"You know what wouldn't surprise me?" Theo asked his two companions.

"A lot of things, I imagine," Blaise fired back.

"Shove off, mate, I was being serious," Theo defended himself.

"What, Theodore?" Anastasia asked over Blaise's laughter.

"If Umbridge ends up somehow taking over Dumbledore's job. She's risen so much higher than any professor before her," the brunette boy explained.

"I'd jump off Ravenclaw Tower," Blaise responded with a chuckle.

"Not the Astronomy Tower?" Anastasia suggested as a joke.

"Well. . ." Blaise paused and pretended to momentarily contemplate it before actually focusing on his lunch at hand: soup.

They shared a quite meal until shouting between two people chorused from a nearby hallway.

"Pardon me, Professor," snapped a furious looking Umbridge, "But what exactly are you insinuating?"

"I'm merely requesting that when it comes to my students, you conform to the prescribed disciplinary practices," a feisty McGonagall bit out at the smaller woman.

"It's so silly of me, but it sounds like you're questioning my authority in my own classroom," Umbridge shot right back as she took an advantageous step up the stairs the two were racing up, "Minerva."

"Not at all," McGonagall snidely replied doing the same as her rival, "Dolores, merely your medieval methods."

By now, Anastasia, her two friends, and a large group of students had gathered at the base of the stairs to gawk at their professors' row.

"I am sorry, my dear," Umbridge continued condescendingly, "But to question my authority is to question the Ministry, and by extension, the Minister himself. I am a tolerant woman, but one thing I won't stand for is disloyalty."

"Disloyalty," McGonagall echoed as she took a defeated step down making her now equal in height to the raging pink toad.

"Things at Hogwarts are far worse than I feared," Umbridge noted as she now turned to face the students below, "Cornelius will want to take immediate action."

"Like sending her to Azkaban," Blaise whispered to Ana and Theo.

The crowd of students dispersed amongst themselves to leave the scene so as not to get detention for watching Umbridge try to demean McGonagall. That pudgy lady had no right to control Hogwarts the way she was attempting to.

Anastasia had gotten caught in the mix of students scrambling to get to their next class that she lost sight of Theodore and Blaise. As she scanned the heads of those around her, she felt herself stumble and looked forward to see Hannah Abbott.

"Hannah!" The Slytherin girl breathed incredulously, as though she hadn't expected to find her here.

"Oh! Anastasia, right? I'm terribly sorry I bumped into you. I was looking for Susan and simply didn't see where I was going," Hannah stated a little shakily.

Anastasia was, yet again, at a loss for words. She didn't want Hannah to fear her solely based on the fact that she was a Slytherin and that Hannah was a Hufflepuff. Anastasia knew that there were friend groups that included many different Houses. There was no rule that forbid the students at Hogwarts from befriending another from one of the other three Houses that wasn't their own.

"I'm really sorry again, but I think I see Susan so I've got to go," the Hufflepuff explained quickly before turning to leave.

"Wait a moment," Anastasia finally found her words and managed to catch Hannah's attention for a bit longer. "I'll see you in Charms tomorrow, yeah?"

"I suppose you will," Hannah replied skeptically and then slipping away from the other girl.

'Idiot!' Anastasia thought to herself as she paced off to her next class, 'Of course you'll see her tomorrow, it's not like she wants to see you as well, right?'