the girl with all of the choices

s i x

2243 words

november seventeenth- another potions mistake

It had been just under three weeks since Cedric's celebration party. I woke up the morning after not having any idea of anything that happened the night before. Since then, not much had changed. Ainsley and Matt were officially a couple. They snogged all of the time. It was highly annoying when we tried to hang out as a group. Cedric and Cho were also officially a couple, although they were rather secretive about their relationship status. They didn't want anyone or anything to mess it up. I didn't want to jinx it, so I never said it to their faces, but I would have sworn that they were in the early stages of actual love. 

Malfoy and I had begun to spend more time together. It was almost four weeks ago that we both decided to help each other with the classes we were struggling with. There was one spot in the library that we would always use to study. Although, if I'm being honest, we never studied all that much. We were actually friends. We would update each other on our lives and gossip about the people we went to school with. I would always update him on the well-being of my favorite succulent, whom I named Thomas. We had gotten to the point where he would ask about Thomas if I didn't mention him right away. The only thing that held us back was that, similarly to Ced and Cho, our friendship didn't stay with us when we were around other people. It only existed at our spot in the library and in Flitwick's and Snape's classrooms. He never called me a mudblood again, but he and his cronies wouldn't hold back from taunting and teasing my friends. We had promised to not speak a word of what had happened in Snape's classroom 4 weeks ago, and that promise carried over into everything else we did.

I had begun to get better at Potions thanks to Malfoy's help. Today we were supposed to work together to brew Draught of Peace. 

I gathered a majority of the ingredients while Malfoy grabbed our cauldron and turned on the heat. We had fallen into a rhythm when it came to brewing potions. It was if our minds were one. I knew what to grab and we never accidentally did the same thing. Even though we were wizards and regularly used magic, it still felt magical. 

Draught of Peace was even harder to brew than the Calming Draught we so famously screwed up 4 weeks ago. Professor Snape made a point of it to come over to our desk while we were beginning to brew it.

"Miss Corbyn, please be reminded that if your potion is not of acceptable quality, you and Mr Malfoy will be required to come back later this evening to re-brew the Draught of Peace until it reaches the minimum acceptable quality." I nodded and looked to Malfoy sheepishly. 

"Yeah, Corbyn, don't mess it up," he teased under his breath, a smirk playing on his lips. 

"Mr Malfoy, if I were you, I would pay extremely close attention to the potion-brewing habits of your partner. We all know that you have a natural aptitude for potions. I would suggest calling on that aptitude especially for this lesson." With that, Snape walked away to threaten other students. 

The irritating thing about Draught of Peace is that the people brewing it won't know if they messed up until all of the ingredients are added, which takes at least 90 minutes. 

Malfoy and I paid extra close attention to the directions and felt really confident in our creation until Professor Snape came over to inspect it at the end of class. 

"Miss Corbyn and Mr Malfoy, it seems as though you have made one small error. Your potion is emitting dark grey steam instead of a silver vapour, meaning that you made a minuscule mistake. nevertheless, this potion is not of acceptable quality. Detention. Be here promptly at 6 pm."