Empty Gold • d.meadowes

-14-

The library, as always, was peacefully silent, allowing Dorcas to read through the chapters of her Transfiguration book without getting distracted too much. There weren't many people around, but there was the sound of hushed whispers floating through the air that did nothing much to destroy the silence. She thought she could finish her syllabus today, if Juliet didn't take much of her time.

All of a sudden, a slam sounded – not very loud, but amplified due to the closed space and the silence of the library – and reverberated through the air, bouncing off the high shelves, and caused everyone else in the vicinity to jerk their heads up and turn to glare in the direction of Dorcas's desk, for that was where the sound had originated from, right in the place where Juliet had slammed her heavy Potions book down.

Dorcas stared up at the girl with wide eyes, and after she had composed herself, she said in a shocked voice, "Juliet, you don't slam books like that in a library! There –"

"Oh I'm sorry," Juliet interrupted in a harsh and incredibly sarcastic tone, cutting off her words painfully. Dorcas closed her mouth and stared at her, bewildered beyond measure. Part of her waited for the librarian to appear and shoo them away, but a major part didn't care, too taken aback to be able to speak. "I'll just go outside and slam my book on the wall before coming in."

She flopped down on the chair and dropped her head on the desk, just as the librarian appeared and crossed her arms over her chest, glaring at them over her glasses. "What's this –" she began, but was immediately interrupted by Juliet.

"Oh, leave me alone," she spat as she peeked her head up from the table. "I'm not in the mood."

Before she could earn herself a detention, Dorcas hastily stood up and grabbed her hand, pulling her to her feet. With her other hand, she began to pile the books into a stack as she looked at the librarian. "I'm so sorry. She's just having a rough day. She doesn't mean it." She gave another tug to Juliet's arm, and finally she seemed to come to her senses. She helped Dorcas gather their books, and in a matter of a few seconds, they were out of the library.

They walked down a couple of corridors, and Dorcas didn't speak, allowing Juliet to calm herself. She heard her taking deep, heavy breaths, and pressing her lips in worry, she glanced over at her before looking away quickly.

When they were on the second floor, Dorcas shrugged off her bag from her shoulders and sat down at the bottom of a staircase that led to a classroom. Juliet followed her and sat beside her, eyes dull and mouth pressed into a thin, irritated line.

"What's going on?" Dorcas asked.

"Nothing." said Juliet flatly, causing a frown to appear on her face. "I missed the choir meeting today."

Dorcas knew a choir meeting was held in the morning, where the organisers were supposed to meet up and discuss about the graduation ceremony – about the cost, the resources needed and everything else. She wasn't part of the organising team, but Juliet was.

"Why?" she asked.

"McGonagall gave me detention," Juliet answered, pulling at the end of her skirt roughly. "I couldn't turn up her homework yesterday, and she scheduled the detention right when the meeting was supposed to take place." She now shifted her fingers to pull at her hair. Her voice rose by a few octaves when she spoke next. "How does she expect us to do so much homework for each subject, and then also keep up with the clubs? I asked her to change the time of the detention, but do you know what she said? 'I believe you have been giving much too importance to the choir, Ms Dearborn. No, I'm not going to reschedule your detention in the hope that it might teach you to divide your attention to your studies as well.'"

She said this in such a rude mockery of Professor McGonagall's voice, that it left Dorcas speechless for a few minutes. She had seen students disrespecting other teachers, but McGonagall had such a respectable reputation among the Hogwarts students as well as the stuff, that showing her disrespect was something completely out of the question. It was unimaginable – the Transfiguration professor held high position in the school, and she could never imagine anyone speaking ill of her, even by accident. Dorcas was left completely dumbfounded by Juliet's tone.

It seemed like everything Maeve had said was starting to ring true, that she really didn't know Juliet half as much as she believed she did. Her usual phenomenal voice was riddled with so much venom that Dorcas found herself wondering where the real Juliet was.

But then it struck her that this was the real Juliet. This was what made her up as a person, this was how her friends and her family saw her. The impression Dorcas had of the Ravenclaw girl – a talented singer, an ambitious person, someone who had the full potential to shine one day, so beautiful and so perfect in every other way – was nothing but just that – an impression. It was like looking at a tall monument from across a large field, seeing nothing but how beautiful and impressionable the monument is. But the further you walk towards it, the more you begin to perceive the details – the flaws in its structures, the dents and scratches and the thick layer of dirt covering it up, blown from the external environment. The beauty you always thought it had slowly begins to dwindle. And Dorcas somehow felt that this was only the beginning.

Juliet didn't speak further, and neither did Dorcas. Both sat silently on the stairs, hands lying limply on their laps, and lost in their own thoughts that were completely different from the other's.

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so i formed a somewhat workable plan of benjy's book in my head, but i still need to form a proper outline. though, i'm not sure if i am going to publish it anytime soon – i have so many books i need to finish