Haley and Jordan stumbled into the Common Room, the latter looking embarrassed yet smug, and the former laughing like a loon.
“What’s up?” Ted asked warily.
“Oh, nothing,” Haley giggled. “Jordan’s just GOT HIMSELF A DATE TO THE BALL, THAT’S ALL!”
Emma nearly fell out of her chair. “JORDAN Jordan?”
“Jordan Jordan,” Jordan clarified flatly.
Ivy smiled. This was certainly unexpected. “Who is it?” she wanted to know.
“Antonia Carville!” Haley squealed.
“Antonia Carville?” Emma’s jaw threatened to become friendly with the floor. “Ravenclaw fifth year? Blonde? Squeaky voice? Went out with Tyrone Thomas last year? I threatened her with murder at Kings’ Cross in September?”
“That’d be her,” Jordan affirmed.
“It was really weird!” Haley exclaimed. “So we were in the hall, right? And we see these two fifth years in front of us”Antonia and that friend of hers, the one who’s dating Grant Jorgensen, I think her name is Julie or something. Jolie! That’s it, Jolie. Anyway, so Antonia was, like, ‘You know who’s cute?’ and Jolie was like, ‘Who?’ and Antonia was like, ‘Jordan Potter!’ And Jolie was like, ‘The short kid with the hair?’ And Antonia was all, ‘Yeah, what a beast. Smart, too. And did you see him sing in that play last year?’ And Jolie was like, ‘Oh, yeah, and he’s good at Quidditch,’ and Antonia was like, ‘Good? He’s fantastic!’ And I had to laugh, so Antonia and Jolie turned around and they saw me and Jordan, so Antonia, she was all embarrassed, and then she asked Jordan to the dance right there in the hallway, and he said, ‘yeah, all right,’ so now he’s going to the dance with her!” She took a deep breath, her first in a bit.
“Jordan’s not the only one here who’s ‘a beast’ and ‘fantastic,’” commented Ted with a mock pout, holding up his Care of Magical Creatures textbook. “Look, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Werewolves are on page 41!” The others laughed at this, and Emma pressed on with the subject of Jordan’s date.
“Still-- wow-- I can’t believe Jordan’s the first one of us to get asked to the dance!” she exclaimed.
“Actually, he’s not,” Ted said softly.
“What?” Ivy looked confused.
“Well, Isadora Dalton asked me earlier today,” he explained, and Ivy’s expression became strangely closed. Isadora had been the Hufflepuff girl who had asked Harry the ‘boxers or briefs’ question.
“But I’m not going with her,” he continued. “I had to turn her down, because, well…” He swallowed, causing his newly protuberant Adam’s apple to bob in his throat. “You see… I wanted to go with you, Ivy. That is, supposing the thought of that doesn’t make you too sick?” He didn’t know why he was so nervous. You’d think that after sleeping in someone’s lap in wolf form, it wouldn’t be too difficult to ask her to a dance.
Ivy smiled. “Of course I’d like to go with you,” she told him, and Haley and Emma giggled conspicuously and chorused, ‘awww.’ Haley did a very good job of embarrassing Ivy by drawing heart symbols in the air and making kissy faces behind Ted’s back.
“Yeah, I think I’m going with Jonas-- the boy I peer-counsel,” Haley mentioned after she was done being ridiculous. “He’s cute, and he’s a fifth year Gryffindor prefect. Anyway, the reason why he goes to peer-counseling is because his older brother, Judas, he joined the Overseers, but he got caught and chucked into Azkaban. What about you, Emma?”
Emma looked startled. “What do you mean by ‘what about you, Emma?’ If you’re asking if I have a brother in Azkaban, the answer is no.”
“No, dum-dum. Who are you going to the dance with?” laughed Haley.
Emma rolled her eyes. “You know I never take a date. It takes all of the fun out of life.”
They continued to happily discuss who was going to the dance with whom for the next several minutes. Valentines’ Day was an even bigger event for them than it was for most people because it was also Haley and Jordan’s birthday.
Haley had always loved having her birthday on Valentines’ Day for the same reason that Jordan loathed it, (namely, it was pink, fluffy, and romantic) and she and Emma were in the middle of putting finishing touches on a valentine. But not just any valentine. It was addressed to Headmistress McGonagall and signed, ‘a secret admirer,’ and it sang a terribly mushy love song of their own composition… in Professor Zabini’s voice.
Just then, Tyrone Thomas climbed through the portrait hole and strode over to where the friends were sitting. “Hey,” he greeted them, though managing not to look at Emma. “What’s up?”
“We’re sending a valentine to McGonagall that sings a love song in Zabini’s voice,” Haley explained cheerfully.
“Cool,” Tyrone complimented her. “Speaking of Valentines’ Day, the ball’s tomorrow. D’you want to go with me, Potter?”
“Um…” Haley began thoughtfully.
Tyrone flashed his white teeth in his customary grin. “No, I meant Blondie Potter. Not like you’re not cool, Haley, but I meant your sister.” He smiled at Ivy. “You’ve looked kind of down lately. I thought you might want to go to the dance with me, have some fun and get your mind off of things.”
Ivy looked up, mildly surprised. She had noticed that Tyrone had been one of the first to take to calling her ‘Potter’ after she was adopted, but she’d never known him very well. “That sounds really nice, Thomas, but I’ve already got a date,” she told him meekly.
Tyrone looked unfazed. “All right, then. Maybe some other time. Who’s the lucky bloke, by the way?”
“Ted,” Ivy replied, gesturing toward him without quite managing to conceal a smile.
“I should’ve guessed.” Tyrone grinned again. “Well, see you there tomorrow night, Blondie Potter, Crazy Potter, Bloke Potter, Lupin.” And with that, he strutted off to find another available girl-- not that he’d have a problem with that. In fact, he had a veritable fan club, a fact of which he was very aware.
“Wow,” noted Ted. “Now all of you girls have been asked to a ball by Tyrone.”
“Except for Jordan,” joked Emma, and her cousin rolled his eyes.
The previous year’s ball had been fun for everyone. Ted and Ivy had danced together for one of the songs, Haley had gone ‘as friends’ with Tyrone, and although Emma had turned down all offers to dance, she and Tyrone had done a tap-dance number together during a slow-dance number (it was a very, very long story… and even Emma wasn’t quite sure what the reason behind this strange exhibition was). Although Jordan hadn’t had a date, he had charmed a punch bowl to explode all over Ophidias Malfoy as he tried to ladle punch from it in revenge for attacking Ted in the corridor earlier in the year.
They all hoped that this year’s ball would be equally full of surprises, and in a way, they were right. But these surprises were not all good ones.
“The attacks have all been in Scotland for awhile now,” Ron noted during a weekend meeting.
Harry frowned. “I noticed that, too,” he mentioned. “And to tell you the truth, I was actually rather surprised that he hasn’t come by Hogwarts yet.” He shifted in his seat. “On a lighter note, Haley and Jordan are having their birthday tomorrow.”
Ron slapped himself upside the head. “That’s right! Oh, I knew I was forgetting something-- I haven’t got a present for either of them! With all of this Malfoy business…”
Harry nodded understandingly. “I know. It’s all that’s on anyone’s mind anymore. When was the last time you went a day without worrying about Malfoy? I remember how upset Ginny was when Jonathan said his first word last month.”
“Malfoy,” the two men said in unison, then sat back in their chairs.
“So,” said Ron, changing the subject. “That ball thing’s tomorrow, right? Should be fun.”
“Yeah, for the kids,” replied Harry. “It was nice of Ted to ask Ivy to dance-- it’s always good to see her happy.”
Ron raised his eyebrows. “You’re not dancing?” he asked. “You can borrow Hermione if you need a partner.”
Harry laughed, imagining the look that would have appeared on feminist Hermione’s face had she heard Ron offering to let Harry ‘borrow’ her. “No, thanks,” he answered. “You’d think after knowing me for nearly thirty years, you’d have realized that I can’t dance to save my life! Remember that ball we had to go to in our fourth year, when I went with Parvati and you had those horrible lacy robes?” Just saying the name ‘Parvati’ forced him to swallow hard. He’d forgotten for a moment that she’d been murdered.
Ron, however, hadn’t seemed to notice. “Yeah, how could I forget? Hermione went with Krum, and I was mad at her,” he recalled. “’Course, Hermione only went with Krum because he asked her first, I suppose, the git.”
“The git? I thought that you’d got over your grudge since he died,” Harry remarked.
Ron shrugged. “Not particularly. Remember I kept sniggering during the funeral?” He had a rather unsettling habit of making light of death that had always bothered Harry slightly.
“You weren’t sniggering, you were trying not to cry,” Harry reminded him.
“No, I was sniggering!” protested Ron. “I should know; I was the one doing it!”
“You were trying not to cry,” argued Harry.
Hermione stuck her head into the room. “Ron, you know perfectly well that you were trying not to cry,” she informed her husband. He rolled his eyes.
“Fine,” he admitted.
“Beauty is 50% natural and 50% painful,” Emma informed Haley, whose scalp was aching from the multiple of pins already holding her hairdo together she was wearing. It was the next day, and the girls were preparing themselves for the ball, which would start in fifteen minutes.
Emma inserted one last bobby pin into her hair. “Right,” she announced. “I say we’re ready to go. Shall we look in the mirror?” The two other girls got up from where they were sitting and stood next to their friends, examining their reflections in the mirror.
“We’re a good-looking bunch,” commented Haley, and indeed, they all looked lovely in their ball finery.
Emma had on robes of chocolate brown velvet with long flowing sleeves, gold trim, and a gold belt; and Haley looked older than usual in her sleekly cut robes of pale pink silk, which were edged with sparkly silver.
But Ivy in particular looked noticeably different from usual. She normally wore simple and conservative clothing, but today, she had allowed herself to dress up in satiny silver dress robes. But the real change was her hair. Not even Haley or Emma had ever seen her without her white-blonde hair in a tight braid gathered at the nape of her neck, but today, her hair was down. It flowed past her waist, held back with a silver ribbon.
“Should we go see if the boys are ready yet?” asked Ivy, straightening her robes.
Haley laughed. “Are you kidding? They were probably ready over an hour ago. After all, they’re not the ones who have to mess around with hair and makeup. Well, most of them, I’m not vouching for Tyrone Thomas.” She linked arms with her sister and her cousin. “Let’s go, then.”
Sure enough, when they reached the Common Room, Ted and Jordan were already sitting in armchairs, looking bored. Ted straightened up first. “Hi,” he greeted the girls. “Well, at least I can see why it took you such a long time to get ready. You look nice.”
Ivy blushed, proving the point she had made earlier to Haley that the application makeup was pointless, as she was just going to blush as soon as she saw Ted anyway. “Thanks, you too,” she replied.
Ted did look rather good in his light blue robes, as did Jordan; his robes were dark green and he had combed gel into his hair that he appeared to have borrowed from Tyrone. It still looked as though he had been through a tornado recently, but the gel made it look like it was that way on purpose.
“I love the hair, Jordy,” noted Emma. “You look like a boy band member.”
“Er, thank you?” muttered Jordan. He wasn’t sure whether or not this was a compliment. He checked his watch. “Well… let’s go, then…” He looked slightly green, matching his robes nicely. Haley nudged Emma and pointed this fact out, trying not to dissolve into giggles.
The five of them set off down the stairs and over to the Great Hall. Haley found her date, Jonas, at once and split off from the group with a cheery wave, heading toward the long banquet table at which they would eat a feast before the ball. The Great Hall was lavishly decorated for Valentines’ Day, full of fairy lights and floating heart-shaped sparks, and a band called Toilet Dragons was setting up on stage.
“Jordan, I see Antonia,” whispered Ivy, pointing her brother toward his date.
Antonia had on kelly green robes that complemented his dark green ones perfectly, and her curly blonde hair was secured atop her head with a beaded pearl comb. The two of them looked like a pair of Slytherins in their green finery, but Ivy didn’t point this out. Jordan’s mouth did something very odd-- it was as though he wanted to smile but his lips wanted to grimace-- and he and Antonia found a seat.
“I may not like Antonia much, but she beats his date from last year,” Emma whispered to Ivy in a low voice. “A book!”
Just then, Tyrone Thomas breezed by, arm in arm with Isadora Dalton. Tyrone looked like someone out of a catalogue advertising the creamy ivory robes that he was wearing, and Isadora looked as though she had been ordered out of the same catalogue as a cute accessory. This was the norm with Tyrone and his dates. “Lupin! Potter! Nice to see you!” He greeted them. “I’d sit with you, but, you know, extenuating circumstances.” He looked straight at Emma as he pronounced the last two words, then sauntered off toward the far end of the table.
“Well, at least there’s still one jerk less than usual here,” Emma noted lightly. “Ophidias isn’t here, far as I can tell.” It was true-- the tall, blond Slytherin prefect was nowhere to be seen.
“That’s odd,” remarked Ivy. “You’d think he’d be here with that girlfriend of his, Charybdis Nott, causing as much trouble as possible.”
“Jordan will be crushed,” added Emma. “He won’t have anyone to dump a punch bowl on this year. I mean, there’s Thomas, but I mustn’t get my hopes up.”
They found seats at the banquet table. The meal passed by pleasantly enough, though Ted and Ivy were perhaps a tiny bit shyer around each other than usual. When the food was cleared up, it was time for the opening dance.
Haley and Jonas were among the first couples on the dance floor, dancing like maniacs. Tyrone and Isadora were nearby, and it had to be admitted that Tyrone’s gracefulness was not limited to steering a broom”he moved very smoothly. Jordan and Antonia joined in a little while later, though the former appeared extremely nervous and almost as awkward.
Ted looked expectantly at Ivy. “Well, er, would you like to dance, then?” he asked, wishing that his voice hadn’t cracked so horribly on the word ‘dance.’
“Erm, all right,” Ivy replied, wishing that she wasn’t blushing such a deep crimson. Neither of them was a particularly good dancer, but it didn’t matter-- they were just happy about being able to be there, carefree, dancing with each other.
Ted placed his hand on Ivy’s waist and she rested hers on his shoulder. Ted had grown so much over the summer and the course of the school year that he now towered about half a foot over his dance partner, though they’d been roughly the same height the previous year.
They faced each other and began to dance, the werewolf and the murderer’s daughter on the dance floor together, not dwelling on their problems, but reveling in their joys.
Emma was not happy. A second year vomited on her shoe halfway through the ball, and during one of her favorite songs, too. To make matters worse, most of the teachers at the staff table were without their wands, and therefore unequipped to clean up the mess left by the vomiting second year.
Headmistress McGonagall, surveying the students over her square spectacles, stated, “Weasley, Thomas, could you please go get Mr. Gauge to clean this up?” (Andreas Gauge was the school’s rather reclusive caretaker. He was rarely seen, preferring to do his work in the night after students were in bed, and nobody complained about this.)
Emma looked desperately around her, hoping that by ‘Weasley,’ McGonagall was referring to one of her many cousins, hopefully Edwin, a sixth year boy currently doing a flamboyant dance that greatly resembled an ostrich having spasmodic seizures; she was worried more students would vomit if he kept dancing.
But no, McGonagall’s steely eyes were fixed directly upon her. She sighed theatrically and slunk out of the room, an equally reluctant-looking Tyrone in tow.
They walked in silence through the empty echoing hallways for what seemed like much more than just a few minutes-- Emma was extremely aware of the loud clacking of her high heeled sandals and of the SQUEAK of the rubber soles of Tyrone’s shiny brown shoes. As they turned the hallway toward Gauge’s office, they passed a giant plate-glass window that seemed to be overlording as much of the wall space as possible. Emma glanced briefly into the darkened glass to inspect her hair on the reflective surface, and did a double take.
Something that was a strange pale pinkish was floating in midair not far from the edge of the grounds. The pale pinkish thing rummaged around in the air for a moment, then appeared to pull back what looked like an invisible curtain, revealing a dark figure. Someone was on the grounds, someone who had just taken off an invisibility cloak.
“That’s weird,” muttered Emma, staring at the figure.
Tyrone actually skidded to a halt, though he managed to make it look smooth and graceful as always. “What, Weasley?” he asked in a short, abrupt voice that was totally different from his usual flowing tones.
“Someone just took off an invisibility cloak over there,” Emma replied, eyes still fixated on the lone figure on the grounds. She pointed her finger toward the person so that Tyrone could see.
He leaned over, inadvertently resting his elbow on her shoulder. It was lucky, Emma thought, that he didn’t have painfully pointy elbows like the Potter twins did. Tyrone seemed to have forgotten all about pretending that Emma didn’t exist-- particularly after what happened next.
Because the moon moved out from behind a cloud, illuminating the figure from behind. Long white-blond hair spilled down the man’s back, and he carried a long and ornately carved wand. Emma’s mouth grew dry and her eyes widened to the size of pie tins; she knew this man.
“Malfoy,” she breathed, sounding not unlike Ted did when his voice cracked. “Malfoy! Outside the school! I don’t believe this, how did he ever get in?”
Tyrone gaped and grabbed Emma’s wrist, attempting to pull her down the corridor with him. “Come on, let’s run and get your uncle! Hurry!”
Emma kept her feet firmly planted on the ground. “No,” she refused, and Tyrone gaped even wider.
“What, you think we should just wait here, let Malfoy get into the school, murder people? Not that you’d care, but I think that might upset some people!” he yelped, sounding slightly hysterical. Again, it was disconcerting not to see him cool and collected, though Tyrone’s behavioural habits were the last thing on Emma’s mind.
Emma didn’t know what he meant by ‘not that you’d care,’ but she brushed it out of her mind for the time being. Malfoy was on the grounds! “No, you prat!” she snapped. “We don’t have time to run all the way back to the Great Hall and get a teacher! Obviously, we should send a Patronus to let them know!”
“Yeah? Terrific plan, Weasley! Only I don’t know how to conjure a Pa-bloody-tronus, that’s all!” Tyrone yelled, sounding near tears. “I mean, that’s N.E.W.T. standard!”
Emma rolled her eyes, then focused on a good memory-- she was in her third year, pranking Zabini’s potion room with Haley and Ivy, so that anyone who entered would leave considerably stickier, pricklier, gloopier, featherier, and angrier than they had been upon entering. “Expecto Patronum!” she intoned, drawing her wand. A giant silver tiger erupted from the end of her wand, racing silently down the hallway faster than any broomstick.
Tyrone’s face was an ominous greenish-lilac and he was now gaping so wide, Emma wouldn’t have been surprised if his lower jaw fell right off. “What?” she smirked. “You don’t think I could be the niece of the head of the Order of the Phoenix and not be able to cast a Patronus? Anyway, the teachers will be here in a minute, so we can relax.”
Tyrone took one quick look out the window, then addressed the portrait of a thin, morose-looking witch. “Hey, you, scream as loud as you can until Malfoy leaves the grounds, and get as many other portraits as you can to yell, too,” he instructed.
“Let’s just stay here until the adults come,” Emma suggested over the screaming that was now echoing down the hall.
“Yeah,” Tyrone replied in a would-be-calm manner. But Emma noticed that his voice was rather higher than usual. She was frightened, too, but she didn’t dare betray any signs of fear. Everyone knew that Emma Weasley was practically fearless.
Ivy and Ted had been having a great time at the dance when suddenly, most of the people near the door gasped and stopped dancing.
“I wonder what…” Ted began, when suddenly, a giant silver tiger came streaking into the room. Many of the students, who were apparently under the impression that it was part of the enchanted decorative scheme, laughed and continued to dance, but Ivy stopped abruptly, crashing into Ted’s shoulder.
“Emma’s Patronus,” she breathed as the tiger lollopped across the stage over to Professor Potter.
The Potter twins and their respective partners had stopped dancing now, too, and were watching wide-eyed as their father’s face paled considerably and he whispered something to Hermione and Professor Longbottom. He was over to the nearest window in several long strides, and he quickly fired a Patronus outside-- all of this done nicely inconspicuously, with the sort of stealth picked up from Auror training.
What wasn’t was Professor McGonagall’s tight-lipped announcement: “Prefects, please lead younger students to their Common Rooms. The ball is over. Do not leave your respective Common Room unless you wish to be expelled from Hogwarts.”
“Right-o then, everybody follow me!” called out Edwin Weasley, a sixth year Gryffindor prefect-- he seemed to be forgetting that there were other, older prefects. “No need to be afraid, come with me, everyone! Gryffindors, over here, Ravenclaws, come over this way…”
“I believe I’m Head Boy,” a tall, weedy seventh year informed him stiffly.
“Yeah, but I have more charisma!” replied Edwin breezily, and he led the procession upward, twirling his wand like a majorette’s baton.
Only Ivy, Ted, Haley, and Jordan seemed to realize how serious the situation was, and they sat clustered around the fire, curled up on squashy ottomans. “Emma’s still not back,” Haley noted nervously. “Maybe Gauge went psycho and tried to do her in.” She paused thoughtfully. “Thomas was with her. Maybe Gauge did him in.”
“Or maybe Tyrone tried to do her in,” Jordan supplied.
“What a cheerful conversation this is,” Ted remarked lightly, though he looked very nervous himself.
Ivy straightened her hair ribbon, which was askew. “I don’t think the problem is Gauge or Thomas,” she said in a low voice. Everyone stared at her, and she continued. “Think about it. What else would make us all have to go to Gryffindor Tower? Malfoy’s here, he got onto the grounds. I know it.” She looked extremely glum, and the tight, pinched expression that all too frequently found its way onto her face had returned.
At that moment, the door to the Common Room opened, and Emma and Tyrone stumbled in. Emma was very white and her freckles showed up more than usual, but her jaw was set and her eyes looked steady and confident. Tyrone’s face was tinged with an odd greenish-lilac, and his mouth was tightly clamped shut, apparently to keep it from trembling.
Emma collapsed heavily into an armchair next to Haley’s ottoman and announced, without preamble, “Malfoy got onto the school grounds.” These words had impact. Ivy’s face grew even tighter and her eyes were suddenly shining with tears, Jordan paled and swallowed a cold and bitter lump in his throat not unlike mustard-flavored ice cream, Ted gasped, and Haley gave a frightened squeak and toppled right off the back of her ottoman.
“Did they catch him?” Ted wanted to know, his voice cracking horribly. He sometimes envied Jordan, whose voice had changed seemingly overnight halfway through their second year, but right now, he had more important things on his mind than vocal malfunctions.
Emma shrugged. “No clue,” she replied. “My dad-- he’s here, most of the Aurors are-- sent me off as soon as he got there. He didn’t even thank me for sending out an alert.”
“So Malfoy could still get into the castle?” Jordan asked, grim-faced. Emma hesitated for a moment, then nodded.
At that exact second, the door opened yet again, and Emma’s father, Haley’s father, and Emma’s mother entered the room. “Everybody, please be quiet!” commanded Hermione, but there was no need. Just the presence of these three together had silenced the room. “This is Ronald Weasley, acting Head Auror for the Ministry,” she presented her husband. “He has something very important to tell you, so I advise you all to listen closely.”
The room was silent-- you could have heard a pin drop into a haystack and be able to locate it solely by following the sound-- and not even the two random girls who often screamed ‘Ronald Weasley!’ at the sound of his name made a single noise.
“Draco Malfoy got into the school grounds,” Ron stated in a low voice. There were collective gasps and shrieks. Up close, Emma noticed that her father had dark circles under his eyes and looked thinner than usual-- this Malfoy business was obviously stressing him out in the Auror office.
“We chased him away before he got into the school, but he disappeared before we could catch him. We can’t station dementors to guard the school because they’re in league with Malfoy now, but the Headmistress, Professor Potter, and I decided that the Head Boy, Head Girl, and each house’s prefects should be stationed at the entrances into all of the secret passages in and out of the school. And there will always be at least two Aurors on the grounds. You have nothing to worry about, but the Headmistress asks that you always return to your dormitories by 6:30 and only walk across the grounds when accompanied by a teacher and at least three classmates. Now you’re probably all worked up, but please go to bed because according to Professor Granger-Weasley here, you have quite a difficult Transfiguration test ahead of you tomorrow.” And with that, he and Harry left the room, as well as most of the students, who got up to go to their dormitories.
Hermione remained behind, “Emma, Mr. Thomas, could you please come here?” she requested, always businesslike at Hogwarts, even when speaking to her own daughter.
“She’s probably going to yell at us for risking our lives and junk,” Emma muttered darkly to Jordan. “Yeah, Mum, completely unlike you would have done-- I’m sure you were perfectly safe fighting Voldemort!”
She slunched back over to the other side of the room and sat down on her armchair again, and Tyrone found the armchair that he had claimed as ‘his’ in his first year. Hermione settled herself onto a sofa. “Both of you were very brave today,” she told them, “and it took some quick thinking to use the Patronus charm--”
“That was Weasley,” Tyrone interjected, shocking Emma slightly. He normally pretended she didn’t exist these days.
“-- and telling the portraits to call for help,” Hermione continued.
“That was Thomas,” Emma told her, returning the favor.
“Well, I am going to award forty points to Gryffindor for this. And…” Emma’s mother lowered her voice. “Don’t go spreading this around, but, you know, if you hadn’t done that, things could have been worse, much worse. Well, good night.” And with that, she strode briskly from the room.
Emma looked at Tyrone. “Hey, er, not to bother you or anything,” she said stiffly, “but I was just curious, what was that you said back there, about ‘not that you’d care if Malfoy got into the school and murdered your friends?” She tried to keep her voice light and casual.
Tyrone’s handsome face grew cold and distant. “Well, you think the whole Malfoy thing is some kind of a big joke, don’t you? You think it’s funny that he’s been killing off people and doing all sorts of horrible dark magic, just because he hasn’t killed anyone in your family yet. That’s why you’re such a lousy peer counselor. Haley was mad to sign you up.”
Now it was Emma’s turn to gape like a deranged codfish. “What? Are you crazy? Because of Malfoy, Ivy’s depressed all the time. Because of Malfoy, Ted’s a werewolf! Malfoy blew up St. Mungo’s because he wanted to kill my dad, Thomas! You think I don’t care? I just don’t want to be a wimp like some people! I am in Gryffindor after all!” she shouted.
“Well, that sure isn’t what it seemed like to me!” yelled Tyrone. “You’re always, like, ‘Oh, ha ha, Tyrone’s mum got blown up, is that lovely or what?’ Well, it’s NOT!”
There was a terrible silence. Emma blinked slowly. “Oh, Tyrone,” she breathed. “Tyrone, I’m sorry.” She had never seen things this way before, never thought her one little comment would upset the unfazable Tyrone Thomas so. She’d never used his first name before--it had always been ‘Thomas,’ but she associated that name with his strutting and preening public persona, not the boy who now sat before her.
“About time you apologized,” Tyrone replied miserably, and Emma felt dreadfully sorry all of a sudden. He looked so diminished, so different from the bold, vibrant person that he normally seemed to be. Slumped over in his armchair like this, he seemed vulnerable and pathetic.
Emma gave him a quick, light hug, then walked off toward the girls’ dormitory. “G’night, Tyrone,” she called over her shoulder. She wasn’t sure if it was her imagination, or if Tyrone’s expression had just brightened slightly.