Everyone clustered around them, shocked to see a boy lying unconscious in the middle of the Great Hall, of all places.
“He has a pulse,” Ivy said, relieved, after a moment. “And he’s breathing. But…”
Jordan shoved his way through the circle of onlookers. “We have to take him to the hospital wing,” he stated authoritatively.
“Em and I are the strongest,” Tyrone put in. “We can probably carry him down so my aunt can take a look at him.”
“Good idea,” Emma said quickly.
Jordan looked at her as though she were a three-year-old who had just eaten a jar of paste. “Bad idea,” he said. “Carry him? How ridiculous can you get? Obviously, someone should fetch Madame Patil and bring her here. Then she can bring Ted back to the hospital wing if that’s necessary. There’s no need to lose your heads.”
“Well…” muttered Tyrone, looking somewhat offended. “I’ll go get my aunt then.”
“I’ll go with him,” Emma added. “Get away from Jordan, at least.” Her cousin really did go into control freak mode whenever there was some sort of crisis on hand. If there was something really wrong with Ted, she doubted Jordan’s mood would improve anytime soon.
Haley raised her hand, standing on her tiptoes so that she was visible through the thick crowd of people. “I’ll get Ted’s dad,” she volunteered. “He should definitely know.”
“Good thinking,” her brother agreed. “I’ll go up to the High Table and explain everything to the professors. Ivy, you stay here with Ted. He’s going to want you there if he wakes up.”
Ivy did not need to be told twice”in fact, even if her brother had instructed that she stay away from Ted at all costs, she probably would have completely ignored him. She didn’t budge from here position on the floor, still resolutely holding Ted’s hand and closely watching his shallow breathing.
As Haley scampered off to find Professor Lupin, Tyrone and Emma took the opposite route down to the hospital wing. They walked in silence, more briskly than was customary for either of them. Emma couldn’t help but think about the way Ted had looked just before he’d flopped onto the ground like a deer hit by the Knight Bus. His skin had had this strange, transparent look, a sort of disconcerting delicacy. She could see his veins standing out and the sharp angles of his bones through it. Granted, Ted had been looking more and more like this ever since fourth year, but it had never been so noticeable before. It was surprising that no one seemed to have spotted how sickly Ted looked until then, she thought.
If anything happened to Ted, the school would definitely not be able to function. Ivy in particular would go completely bonkers, and Emma wasn’t completely sure she wanted to see Ivy gone mad, amusing as the idea sounded. Nearly everyone liked Ted and looked up to him, literally and metaphorically, and if Emma was responsible for his untimely demise just because she didn’t fetch Madame Patil quickly enough, she knew she would never be able to live with herself.
“He’ll be fine,” Tyrone said quietly, his deep voice soft and sure. “He just fainted. People faint all the time. He’s got a pulse and he’s breathing and everything, so he’s alive, and that’s what matters.”
Emma gave him a small smile in return. “What, when Ted can’t do it, do you take over his position as Mr. Sunny-Side-Up?”
“No,” Tyrone told her matter-of-factly. “After I learned that my mum, um, went, I passed out, too. Like I said, people do it all the time. It’s a stress thing. I mean, we all just started NEWTs”I wouldn’t be too surprised if that’s what did it.”
Emma was surprised by his honesty. She knew that if she’d ever fainted”falling into a ditch in the Forbidden Forest and whacking her head on a rock didn’t count”she would never tell Tyrone about it. And he was a boy as well, a boy with a reputation. Wouldn’t he want to defend his masculinity as much as possible?
“I don’t think Ted gets stressed out,” she replied. “Maybe Ivy would pass out from too much homework, but Ted’s never had that kind of problem. Even when he got bitten by the werewolf, he was making jokes about it. I think he’s really sick.”
She ran a hand through her hair distractedly. “Do you remember that day in Potions when Ted got really dizzy and Zabini let him go get a drink of water? That was weird. I bet it’s the same thing that’s happening now. And Ivy said he told her it wasn’t the first time he’d felt like that.”
They had reached the hospital wing by now. Presiding over the patients there was Madame Patil, Tyrone’s aunt, and a highly knowledgeable and compassionate Healer who also happened to be extremely, extremely busy. Unsure of the proper procedure for this type of thing, Tyrone took a cautious step through the door.
“Erm… hey!” he called hesitantly.
Without even turning her back from the potion she was pouring out”it wasn’t exactly difficult to recognize Tyrone Thomas solely from his voice”Madame Patil said, “Oh, Tyrone, now’s really not a good time for a visit. Rupert Daniels has come out in boils and Antonia Carville has a nasty stomach flu, and there’s half the Slytherin Quidditch team in here after they crashed during practice with the--”
“We’re not just here for a visit,” Emma spoke up. “Ted Lupin… he passed out at breakfast today. He’s still down there in the Great Hall. There’s something wrong with him.”
Madame Patil quickly set down her potion bottles with much clattering, wiped her hands on her apron, and rushed over to the friends.
“He has a pulse,” Tyrone added helpfully, not knowing much about medicine but wishing to be of use nonetheless. “That means he’s not dead.”
“Er, yes, I know,” his aunt reminded him. “Well, let’s get going.”
Emma nodded with understanding and chucked Tyrone lightly on the shoulder. “Yeah,” she said. “Come on, we should get out of here before we catch whatever that bloke’s got.” She jerked her head over toward a nearby cot, which held a young boy who moaned as he scratched madly at a rather virulent-looking purple rash.
“I’m not stopping you,” Tyrone replied. “Let’s go.”
Ivy was thinking about Ted. Namely, about how she hadn’t worried nearly enough about him up to this point. After the incident in Zabini’s class and all the other weird little moments Ted had been having lately, she should have put two and two together and realized something was wrong. Did this make her a bad girlfriend? Ted certainly noticed whenever anything was amiss with Ivy. He noticed everything. Maybe if Ivy hadn’t listened to all of his casual, dismissive ‘oh, don’t worry about me, I’m all right’s, this wouldn’t have happened.
She was conscious of all of the eyes watching her watching Ted. She didn’t want to create any sort of melodramatic scene, but she couldn’t just get up and leave his side. The same horrible, morbid thought kept running through her head”what if this next breath was Ted’s last? What if the feeble pulse stopped altogether?
The double doors of the Great Hall burst open with a loud bang, and Ivy looked up, shaken from her paranoid reverie. Trust Tyrone Thomas to make a big entrance.
“It’s okay, guys!” he roared. “Healer’s here! Everyone OUT of the way!”
Everyone complied automatically as Madame Patil made her way forward; even Ivy took a reluctant step backward to watch.
Madame Patil scanned Ted’s body with her wand, listened for his heartbeat, and checked his eyes under his eyelids while his friends stood nearby, their expressions increasingly anxious. At last, Madame Patil looked up. “He’ll be all right,” she announced.
The sort of collective sigh of relief that never actually happens in real life occurred.
“But I’m going to give him a thorough check-up, so he’ll have to come back to the Hospital Wing with me for a bit. I promise Ted will be back to normal before long.” She rolled up her sleeves and conjured a stretcher from thin air, then levitated Ted onto it. It was more than a little eerie watching him float up from the floor to the stretcher, particularly the disconcerting way his arm dangled. Ivy had never seen anyone alive look so much like a corpse.
Ivy followed solemnly as Madame Patil sent the stretcher floating down the hallway to the Hospital Wing. The walk there seemed strangely, agonizingly long, and she never took her eyes off of Ted for a second, hoping that he’d blink his eyes open and give her a big, goofy, reassuring grin.
She looked down at Ted, so lifeless and limp and colourless. With his eyes closed and his face slack, he looked ill and worn-out and strangely frail. Although he always looked tired and drawn to some degree, Ivy normally never noticed because he was always smiling, always vibrant, his light blue eyes always alight with a cheery and energetic spark. Now he was like a chandelier with all the candles blown out”Ted with all of his brightness missing.
Lying flat like this, it was more obvious than ever just how skinny Ted was. He looked as though a single touch would snap him in two, and the effect was more painful than comical-looking.
As they reached the Hospital Wing, Madame Patil held up her hands. “Whoa, Ivy. Where do you think you’re going?”
Ivy was wearing her tight, pinched-looking expression again, the one comprised of equal parts vulnerability and stubbornness. “I’m coming with Ted,” she said in a small, hard voice.
Madame Patil shook her head. “Ivy,” she said patiently, “you can’t be in there during his check-up.”
Ivy didn’t even blink. “I’ll wait outside for him, then.”
Madame Patil put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry, your friend’s in good hands,” she said. “You’ll be able to see him in just a short while.”
Ivy cast a last glance back at Ted’s unconscious body as Madame Patil levitated him from the stretcher to one of the hospital beds, and readied herself for a long, agonizing wait. She hadn’t worried nearly enough about Ted before he’d passed out, and she planned on making up for it now.
Back in the hospital wing, Madame Patil whispered a spell, and Ted’s eyes snapped open immediately, his brain kicking back into gear and his heart rate returning to normal.
He blinked, taking in the hospital wing around him and spluttered weakly, “I’m guessing this isn’t Kansas anymore?”
Madame Patil smiled. “You passed out in the Great Hall during breakfast, and I brought you here. I promise it’ll just be a quick check-up”a certain someone is very anxious to see you.” She pulled on a pair of rubber gloves. “How do you feel?” she asked.
Ted considered the question. “Dizzy,” he replied honestly. “And kind of sleepy… and I have a splitting headache. Other than that, I’m okay enough. I’m really hungry and thirsty, though.” He rubbed his aching head. He remembered feeling lightheaded just before breakfast, but he had no recollection of fainting. Come to that, he had no recollection of anything since then…
“Well, the headache’s from the fall, no doubt,” said the Healer. “It must have been awful when your head hit the ground. But I definitely want to run a few tests.” She thrust a flimsy, powder-blue garment at Ted. “I need to grab some things from the back room. Put this on, and I’ll be back in a flash.”
Speaking of back in a flash, Ted thought, the hospital robes he’d been given could not exactly be recommended for modesty. In addition to being flimsy and powder-blue, they were a bit more revealing then he felt entirely comfortable with. He glanced warily at the inhabitants of the surrounding cots and closed his bed curtains discreetly.
Haley careened down the corridor, flailing her arms like a windmill in a hurricane and trampling an unsuspecting first year or two in the process. She banged on the door to Professor Lupin’s office eight or nine more times than was necessary, and kicked it twice for good measure. “Professor, open up quick!” she shouted.
The Defence Against the Dark Arts instructor greeted her with a wry smile. “Haley, I didn’t fall for the ‘hurry-Dementors-are-after-me’ trick the last three times. If you want a piece of chocolate, you can always just ask for it.”
“This isn’t about chocolate!” Haley said indignantly, planting her fists on her narrow hips. “Ted passed out in the Great Hall during breakfast.”
Lupin dropped his quill. “What?” he said quietly.
“He just ran in, and we were talking, and then pow! He just collapsed!” Haley explained. “Only you can’t see him yet, because Madame Patil wants to do some tests on him or something to make sure he’s all right. She says he’ll be fine, though.”
“But Ted? Fainting? He’s never had a problem with this before.” The professor’s face was creased with parental concern.
Haley patted Lupin’s shoulder and managed to simultaneously filch a bar of chocolate from his pocket with her dexterous fingers. “He’ll be okay,” she assured him. “I mean, he’s Ted. I bet it’s just one of those twenty-four hour bug things, or someone slipped him a Fainting Fancy.”
Lupin nodded in agreement. “Maybe he’s just feeling a little under the weather,” he said, sounding as though he was trying to convince himself. “After all, there is a full moon coming up.” He paused. “You stole my chocolate bar, didn’t you?”
“No,” Haley said innocently, while taking a blatantly obvious bite of chocolate.
The professor sighed. “Just ask next time,” he told her. “And could you please let me know when I can see my son?”
Haley saluted. “Will do,” she agreed. “Keep you posted, that is. Asking for chocolate takes all the fun out of taking it. I’ll see you!” Lupin shook his head and closed the door as the girl scurried off.
As soon as Lupin was out of earshot, she sighed and her step became noticeably less springy. She really could be a convincing actress when she had to be. She was more worried about Ted than she let on, but she didn’t want to upset Professor Lupin--so many things had happened to his loved ones in the past, and he didn’t deserve any more extra stress.
As she walked down the hall, she saw a gaggle of Slytherin girls strolling by, gossiping and giggling with one another.
“…and so then, that insufferable Potter goes, ‘you’re not well,’ and Lupin just faints right there in the Great Hall!” crowed a pretty blonde girl.
Charybdis Nott tossed her long, straight hair over her shoulder. “Serves him right, werewolf scum. I still can’t believe they made him a Prefect. As if the whole part-human thing weren’t enough he’s an empty-headed, clumsy buffoon. How does McGonagall expect anyone to take that seriously?”
“He looks like some sort of awful stick insect or something,” added a tall girl with a thick, black ponytail. “I don’t know what anyone sees in him, he’s just creepy-looking. And have you seen the way he walks? No class at all!”
Charybdis snorted. “Well, what do you expect? Not that the others in his little group are any better. That goody two-shoes blood traitor girlfriend of his, and that Potter, and that absolute Amazon Weasley. But you know who’s the biggest saddo of the bunch?” She pulled a face and announced in a high-pitched baby voice, “Little Miss Harriet-Lily Potter.”
The blonde girl and the ponytailed girl snorted in agreement as Haley’s hands curled into angry fists. She was standing tucked away in an alcove that made her invisible to the Slytherins, but she could still see them perfectly from where she stood.
“She tries sooo hard to be cool,” continued Charybdis, her voice a malicious drawl. “She just doesn’t get it. I swear, I’d think he was twelve if I didn’t know any better. She might be Harry Potter’s daughter, but no matter what she thinks, no one else thinks she’s ‘cool’.” Her fingers made air quotes around the word ‘cool,’ an aggravating gesture made more aggravating by her words.
Just when Haley was almost ready to stomp out and confront Charybdis, the door to a nearby boy’s bathroom swung open and none other than Anatoly Capshaw strode by.
“Give it a rest, will you?” he demanded. “I happen to think that Haley is, in fact quite cool, cooler than you’ll ever be at least.”
Ponytail girl cackled. “Like you’d know anything about cool. Nice shirt, by the way. It really matches your zits.”
“Nice,” Charybdis complimented her minion, doubled over in laughter.
“Like you’d know anything about nice,” retorted Anatoly and he stalked away, the three Slytherin girls exchanging typically unimpressed expressions.
Haley blinked several times. She felt at once gratified and horrible. Her Inter-House Unity partner had fulfilled his part of the bargain, and he remained appropriately loyal when he heard people talking behind her back. And yet she, the Gryffindor, the member of the house known for bravery and loyalty, had not stood up for Anatoly when Emma had insulted him.
In fact, she’d agreed, however vaguely and absentminded. And Anatoly, although he’d heard was still willing to stick up for her? Haley shook her head. She’d have to make it up to him, sometime soon. But for the time being, she had Professor Lupin’s chocolate to consume.
Ted felt uncomfortable and exposed in his hospital robes, and he focused his eyes on his bare, skinny legs, swinging back and forth nervously as they dangled off the side of his cot. Madame Patil had finished her examination of him, and her expression was serious, which could not be a particularly good sign.
“Well, I’m surprised you haven’t passed out before today,” she said, shaking her head. “You must have an especially strong constitution.”
This introduction was far from promising. “What do I have?” asked Ted, looking up from his legs and up at the Healer. There was a hint of pity in her eyes, which was even more ominous than the serious expression.
Madame Patil sat down. “Ted, you were bitten by a werewolf when you were on the cusp of adolescence,” she explained slowly. “And the onset of puberty is a difficult enough time for the human body, with so many changing hormones. Werewolves’ bodies go through intense chemical changes in their DNA every full moon, and in the body of a young man who’s going through puberty, things can get muddled up.”
“Like what?” Ted asked cautiously. This certainly wasn’t sounding too good.
“Well, for one, it’s easy to see that you’ve gotten much taller than either of your parents in the past few years. Hormones are very easily affected by these sorts of things, and that’s probably why you grew so quickly. You’ve probably stopped growing by now, so you’ll probably stay at or around six feet, five and a half inches, and that’s nothing important. The real health concern is your pancreas.”
Ted blinked. “My what?” Practically all he knew about pancreases was that people had them, and he didn’t know what they actually did. He only thought about that kind of thing when dicing erkling pancreases for Potions class.
“Well, your pancreas is supposed to make a hormone called insulin, which keeps the sugar in your blood normal. But over the past couple of years, your pancreas has stopped making as much insulin, and sometime in the last few months, practically stopped altogether. That’s why you passed out”and you could have gone into a coma, so consider yourself lucky. The name for this disease is diabetes.”
Diabetes? Ted had heard of that before. It sounded so serious, so final. Ted rarely got sick, and it was a frightening notion to think about the fact that one of his organs was basically broken and wasn’t about to get any better anytime soon. But it was also rather comforting to give a name to the dizzy spells and hunger pangs he’d been having. It was nice to know that he wasn’t just going crazy.
“What can I do?” he asked, poking himself gingerly in the abdomen in the area where he thought his pancreas might be and missing by a good three or four inches. Madame Patil was sounding like a lot like a textbook, and he’d rather know how this would all affect him.
Madame Patil poured a yellowish potion into a glass. “Well, this is the insulin potion. You’ll have to drink it every morning to keep healthy. Now, you’re actually lucky, because you’re a wizard”some diabetic Muggles have to inject themselves with insulin, and prick their finger every now and then to test their blood sugar. The insulin potion takes care of that, though, so you won’t have to worry about needles. You will have to watch what you eat, though, and you have to eat certain amounts of things at certain times of the day. I have a book for diabetic wizarding teenagers somewhere around here that I can give you. You’ll find it very useful.”
Ted let all of this sink in. He had a disease, a disease that was manageable but incurable… well, that wasn’t so different from being a werewolf, and considerably less dramatically life-changing. True, gone were the days when he could just grab a handful of chocolate frogs and wolf them down”no pun intended”at any given time, but this was a small price to pay for feeling healthy and normal again. If all he had to do was drink a potion and watch what he ate, then it couldn’t be all that bad.
“Diabetes, huh?” he said at last. “So, is this why I went all dizzy and weird in Professor Zabini’s class?”
The Healer looked at him closely. “It does explain why you felt so hungry and thirsty,” she said slowly, “but Professor Zabini reported it to me that afternoon, and from what he said, that didn’t just sound like the usual symptoms. There was something more to that. But I’m sure it was just a one-time thing… some of those fumes in Potions class can be really intoxicating. I’ve never approved of having children mixing some of those dangerous potions. You might’ve been allergic to something you were working with?”
Ted nodded. “Well,” he said, “this is a relief. Now I won’t have to worry about fainting in embarrassing places. Here I was worried I’d pass out on the toilet or giving a report or something, just swooning all over the place like some weird guy version of Scarlett O’ Hara.”
“You really are an optimist, aren’t you?” Madame Patil laughed, shaking her head.
Ted smiled. “Emma calls me ‘Mr. Sunny-Side-Up,” he responded cheerily. “Oh, and while we’re talking about breakfast foods, if it’s not too much trouble, can I have something to eat?” From the sounds of it, someone had tickled a sleeping dragon inside his stomach. He was ravenously hungry.
“Oh, of course! I forgot you hadn’t had any breakfast yet!” cried Madame Patil. “Drink your potion”you’ll feel much better”and I’ll find you something that you can eat. After that, you should rest for an hour or two and get your strength back up, but after that, feel free to do whatever you’d like. Just pop by every morning for your potion.”
Ted settled back onto his pillow and picked up the glass of potion. “Thanks, Madame Patil,” he said. He paused. “Erm… one more question, if that’s all right.”
“I’m sure you have lots of questions. After all, you’ve just been diagnosed with diabetes. Ask away.”
The boy smiled sheepishly. “Erm… actually, I was wondering… is it okay for me to put some pants on now?”
“Diabetes?” squawked Emma. “Isn’t that a disease fat old people get?”
Ted shrugged. “That’s Type 2, but yeah, I have Type 1. I didn’t know kids could get it, either.”
He and his friends were sitting in the Common Room, the others listening to explain what had caused his fainting spell earlier that day.”
Ivy sighed. “Why does everything bad happen to you?” she asked.
“What do you mean?” Ted replied brightly. “I’m usually pretty lucky. It’s you I worry about.”
“Well, you don’t worry enough about yourself,” said Ivy.
“Then it’s a good thing you’re so good at doing it for me,” Ted replied. “Madame Patil told me you were ‘impossible’ after I passed out. Wish I was awake to see it.”
“Sickening cuteness aside, people,” chirped Haley, “It’s basically just a relief that Ted’s okay.” She gave him a light, sisterly hug. “Oh yeah, and can you believe we have Apparition lessons coming up soon, after our next Transfiguration class? I can’t wait to just, you know, go POOF!”
Jordan raised his eyebrows. “Your ridiculously short attention span never ceases to amaze me,” he stated. “But I am looking forward to that. It’s so much more convenient than floo powder or broomsticks or a Portkey, even if there is the chance that you can leave your legs behind.”
And with that, the conversation veered off toward the subject of magical transportation, and, although Ivy still looked wistful, the topic of Ted’s health was dropped. And since this was the way Ted liked it, he joined in with gusto.
Everyone was looking forward to their first chance at learning to Apparate, and it would have preoccupied them were it not for the necessity of paying attention in their difficult N.E.W.T.s level classes.
Professor Granger-Weasley certain did not let the students off easy with their last class before their Apparition lesson. As if actually practicing self-transfiguration on the colour of their hair was not difficult enough, the second half of the period was to be spent taking a written test on the properties of self-transfiguration”making it easily the most difficult class period so far that year.
Haley studied her face contemplatively in the mirror. “Emma, do you think I look good with pink eyebrows?” she asked dreamily.
“Absolutely stunning,” her friend replied, her voice so earnest that she could only be joking. “But nowhere near as ravishing as me and my lime green eyelashes.” She batted said eyelashes coquettishly, admiring the effect that they had on her appearance, namely clashing hideously with her red-brown hair.
Two desks over, Ivy had put a rather fetching black streak in her hair, which contrasted nicely with the rest of her fair braid, and next to her, Ted was sporting one orange and one purple eyebrow and waggling them in a decidedly strange manner. The overall effect was so weird that Haley didn’t even bother bopping her friend in the head as punishment for raising one eyebrow.
Behind him, Jordan, overachiever that he was had managed to turn the whole of his hair a Giorgi-like shade of candy apple red, and an aerial view of his head showed that gold letters charmed onto his head spelled out, “GRYFFINDOR QUIDDITCH FOR THE CUP!” For this, Professor Granger-Weasley actually awarded fifteen points to Gryffindor, which, as his sister pointed out, marked the first and only time that Jordan received positive recognition for his hair, which she usually considered to be the worst hair in the school.
Emma would have laughed at Haley’s comment, but she was distracted, as most would be, by an incessant jabbing between her shoulder blades. “What?” she demanded, turning around.
In the desk behind her, Tyrone was grinning like a Cheshire cat, and above that grin, the downy hairs on his upper lip were a painfully bright shade of electric blue. “Hey, Em!” he said lazily. “Check out my mustache!”
Emma rolled her eyes. “Tyrone Jonathan Thomas””
“Vincent!”
“Whatever. Tyrone Vincent Thomas, I deny the existence of your mustache!”
Tyrone wiggled his nose, his intention clearly being to make his meager mustache jump around like Ted’s eyebrows. “You can deny the existence of a freight train, but that doesn’t mean it won’t smash you flat if you jump in front of it,” he said sagely.
Emma rolled her eyes yet again, preparing a snappy comeback. “Well”” she paused. “Wait, what? What’s that supposed to mean?”
She didn’t get the chance to reflect on Tyrone’s philosophical meditations, though, because just then, her mother announced that it was time for everyone to return all hair to its original colour and prepare for the test.
Because the room was so noisy and busy with muttered incantations, waving wands, and books being thrown off of desks for the test, only those nearest Jordan saw what happened next. Notorious for bad posture as he was, his frame suddenly went rigid, and his mouth, conversely, became slack.
He began to speak, but when he did, his voice was strangely deep and even flatter and more robotic-sounding than usual. “Number one,” he said quietly. “Name one exception to the rule of self-transfiguration. The best example of an exception to the rule of self-transfiguration is the eyes. Eye colour and shape and eyesight cannot be changed with a spell or even by a metamorphmagus. These can only be altered by””
“Jordan? Jordan!” Ivy shook her brother gently, as she would to wake him up on Christmas morning.
An odd little shiver passed over the boy’s body, and he blinked. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I must have dozed off again. I haven’t been sleeping well,” he apologized.
“That’s all right,” said Ivy, “I know what you mean.” The previous year, when she’d been studying ridiculously hard to become an Animagus, she’d lost a lot of sleep and was always an inch away from falling asleep in class. It had actually happened to her a few times, but luckily, Ted or Haley had always been thoughtful enough to wake her up so she wouldn’t suffer embarrassment. Especially since he apparently talked in his sleep. “I just didn’t want you to sleep through the test.”
“Tests are out!” proclaimed Professor Granger-Weasley. “No talking, please, until all have been turned in. Yes, that means you, too, Gryffindors.”
Jordan took his copy of the test, yawning and rubbing his eyes. But after turning over the test and reading the first question, he had absolutely no trouble waking up. In fact, his stomach jolted like a roller coaster car missing a wheel.
“Number one: Name one exception to the rule of self-transfiguration.”
He was still getting over the shock of such a monumental coincidence later that day, when he and the other sixth years were gathered in the wooden-hoop-strewn Great Hall for their first Apparition lesson. But he was not distracted enough to prevent himself from still being the best at everything.
“All right!” exclaimed the Apparition instructor. “Let’s get started!” She was a skinny, somewhat over-enthusiastic witch with bright yellow hair and too much red lipstick. “I’m your instructor, Belladonna Clump, but please, call me Belladonna! Now, for the next few weeks, we’re all going to learn how to do…this!”
She spun around on the spot, disappeared into thin air, and reappeared in a hoop a few feet in front of her. “Now, don’t worry if nobody in this class can Apparate just yet today. We still have several weeks to learn.”
She strode across the room, her peacock-blue robes flapping behind her. “The steps of Apparition are actually pretty easy. The trouble is remembering to do all three. Just remember the Three D’s”Determination, Destination, and Deliberation. You must focus very hard with no distractions, and then contemplate your destination”the hoop in front of you. Then move with deliberation, turning on the spot and disappearing.”
Belladonna clapped her hands together, which looked quite painful, seeing as her fingernails were long, curved talons painted bright red. “Now, you try.”
And as soon as Belladonna uttered the words, the room was filled with teenagers feeling desperately stupid as they stared at the small, circular patches of dusty floor inside their hoops. The Great Hall was silent except for periodic nervous giggles from Haley, who had twirled around so many unsuccessful times that she was beginning to feel as dizzy as Ted pre-diagnosis.
Meanwhile, her twin brother was staring at his hoop, his face composed and contemplative. Keeping his mind focused on the hoop, he pivoted neatly, disappeared into thin air, and reappeared standing inside the hoop with a ‘pop’.
Emma’s jaw dropped. “I hate you,” she said conversationally.
“The Overachiever Bandit strikes again!” cried Haley, hopping on one foot and flailing her arms madly to attempt to maintain her balance. She had tried to Apparate, but there was no way she could focus on the stupid hoop.
Dozens of entirely unrelated subjects”cows, pink lip gloss, the musical “Cats,” banana splits, goblin rebellions, ligers, Darth Vader, the rather cute boy who sat behind her in Divination, pink crystallized sprinkles”flitted through her brain whenever she tried to concentrate. How could her brother find this so easy, get it right on his first try? Maybe it had something to do with Occlumency. Or boring-ness.
“It didn’t seem particularly difficult to me,” shrugged Jordan. “It seems like common sense. I’ve seen people do it so many times and read so much about it that it was almost as if I’d done it before.”
“Well, I have done it before,” grumbled Haley. “Side-along Apparition with Vladislav Poliakoff, remember? And I’m hopeless. You’re a freak of nature.”
Jordan smirked. “Thank you.” He’d been called the same thing countless times by Giorgi, and he’d gotten used to it. By now, he simply took it as a compliment, even if it wasn’t intended as such.
For the rest of the hour, everyone tried to duplicate Jordan’s success, but nobody came even close to Apparating. The students were beginning to feel disheartened, and a lot less excited about Apparition than they’d been at the beginning of class.
Just as Belladonna Clump was about to dismiss the students, there was an absolutely thunderous CRACK!
All heads whipped around and the Great Hall broke out in applause, cheers, and wolf-whistles. Tyrone Thomas stood triumphantly in the centre of his hope, signature cocky grin spreading across his face.
“Ha! Did it!” he exclaimed. “Hey, Em, I don’t get what you had so much trouble with, this was ea””
He spotted something out of the corner of his eye and stopped in mid-sentence. The boy looked down at the ground. “Dagnabit!” he exclaimed. “I splinched my mustache!”
Emma cackled and pulled his hat down over his eyes. “What mustache?” she asked sweetly, and hightailed it out into the foyer.