Professor Snape led me silently down that staircase, then down another one, and then down about fourteen others, or more, or less, but probably more. We went down corridors, we passed through walls, and all the while he walked as briskly as if it weren’t past midnight, with his black robes swooshing behind him impressively. 

At last, we came to another solid wall. 

“Naiad”, said Professor Snape. The wall opened. “Go on,” he said to me impatiently, and I scrambled into the next little stone hallway. It closed behind me, and to my utter dismay, I found myself greeted by a roomful of applause. I had done it. I had ruined all my chances of gaining respect with Slytherin.

“Way to go, first-year!” cheered a fifth-year. My shoulders sunk in embarrassment. Gemma appeared out of the crowd, smiling slightly, with a raised eyebrow.

“Don’t worry about it, there’s one that gets lost just about every year.” Just as I realized that most of the Slytherins were in good humor and not trying to actually hurt my feelings, the applause subsided as it became clear how unhappy it had made me. Thinking quickly, I grinned and bowed deeply to the entire common room, which caused some laughter. Ha HA! Now I was winning. 

The crowd dispersed, and I saw that this room was by far the most beautifully decorated that I had seen so far. There were several black leather sofas and chairs, and  the water outside was completely black except for faint rays of moonlight that broke through the surface. Candles lit the room all over, and black-and-green lanterns burned dimly above. Stone snakes were carved all over the stone walls, and I could tell that whoever had built it had a great liking for stonemasonry, because the carvings did not stop there. The chairs were decorated with realistic wooden carvings of skulls, and the great stone fireplace was host to several magnificent detailed designs featuring leaves, serpents, hands, and men with beards. 

I followed a group of girls down to the left, where the girls dormitory was. There, I was greeted by another happy surprise: there was a skylight. And by skylight, I mean I could see the moon and stars through the surface of the lake, something I could never have hoped for outside of Minnesota. The moon and stars through the water. 

We didn’t have to sleep in bunk beds, which I was grateful for. I thought it might be like camp, but it wasn’t. We each got our own four-poster queen-sized bed, which was bigger than my one at home.

I conked out without putting on pajamas or anything.

The next morning, I woke up at 5:00, because I was so excited, and also Lilly the cat had decided that a good way to sleep would be draped across my neck.

Someone had pulled the curtains shut over my bed, or perhaps I had done it, or more likely, they had done it on their own, and the only light was coming from the water outside. There were weeds swaying gently in the waves, and I was watching spiny sunfish meander aimlessly like lost tourists.

At 5:30, I got up and started to explore around the common room. One reason I really liked mornings was that no one was awake. The stone floor was cold, as was the damp cool air around me, and most of the heat came from the fireplace, which seemed to brighten when it saw me walk by.

I discovered a very helpful message board that listed the current password and the Slytherin schedules, along with notices such as,

“Lost rat: albino, hates music (except R&B), responds to name ‘Ziggy’” and 

“Wizard cards for trade or sale! Missing an Agrippa? Xavier Rastrick vanished (no pun intended)? Contact Titus Mitcham!” and

“The owner of the lost dungbomb found in the boy’s lavatory is invited to come and retrieve it from off the walls and ceiling. Please collect your dungbomb before noon or we’re getting Professor Snape.”

I scanned the list of schedules for my own.

“First years:

1A Herbology (Ravenclaw)

  2A Transfiguration

  12:10-1:30 Lunch

  3A History of Magic (Ravenclaw)

1B Defense Against the Dark Arts (Hufflepuff)

  2B Charms

  12:10-1:30 Lunch

  3B Potions (Gryffindor)”

Maaaaaaan. Only one class with Gryffindor. 

Breakfast was eggs and bacon and toast, which I wasn’t a fan of. Mostly I drank a lot of cranberry juice. I sat silently at the Slytherin table, my nose buried deep in a book I had gotten at Flourish and Blotts called Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which was highly gratifying to read. I glimpsed Mikaela at the Gryffindor table, apparently having a pretty nice chat with Harry Potter.

“Famous Potter.” said Draco bitterly to his only two friends. “Not so special now, is he? Just look at the lot he’s picked as friends, mudbloods like McParlan and scumsuckers like Weasley.”

In the future, I would wish I had said something then. In fact, I would wish I had said something about two hundred other times after that. Instead, I just pretended I wasn’t listening, which seemed to drive Draco mad anyways. 

Halfway through breakfast, the Great Hall was bombarded by a swarm of owls carrying packages. This came as a shock to me, half-asleep, and I screamed in surprise, to the amusement of Draco and Crabbe and Goyle, whose first names I never learned.

By the end of breakfast alone, there were about twenty individual drawings of Draco getting attacked or squashed by different magical creatures in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, many of them being ridden by Mikaela and I. 

I waved once at Mikaela, who waved back. It was going to be a whole year before we figured out that no one was keeping tabs on house tables and we could probably sit wherever we wanted or even leave altogether and run around the school. Unfortunately, we were too stupid.

Classes started right after. First, though, we had Herbology, which was taught by the kindly little Professor Sprout. In Herbology, we learned all about magical plants. It was nice, being in a greenhouse.

After Herbology, we had our first Transfiguration lesson. McGonogall was a nightmare, especially after Sprout. I got tired of listening to her lecture us on how dangerous and complex it all was and started daydreaming, jumping only when all of a sudden her desk transformed into a pig and back. It got boring again after that. At one point I noticed that everyone else was jotting down notes, so to look busy, I started writing a poem. 

Then it turned out that we had to know some of that stuff in order to turn a matchstick into a needle. None of us accomplished anything except Zabini, who was a terrifying sort of person who I had never seen speak and who frequently gave me the evil eye. He got his matchstick to turn silver, but it was still just a matchstick. McGonogall was very displeased with me when I revealed that I didn’t know the incantation. 

Then we had lunch. Lunch came with a 70-minute break before our third class. Mikaela and I used this opportunity to explore the school.

Mikaela and I somehow discovered the courtyard. She related the tragic tale of how she accidentally split her bean down the middle instead of making it bounce, and how a boy named Seamus managed to break his into hundreds of flying shards. That was when the Gryffindor ghost came by with a lady friend. They were both chuckling lightly.

“I say, aren’t you the two first years that Peeves managed to frighten half to death?” He asked, amused. 

“No!” She cried defensively. Mikaela and I were forced to leave when about five more ghosts showed up and all started laughing at us.After that, I daydreamed my way through History of Magic, which was taught by a ghost named Biff or something like that. I stopped paying attention after the first few words.

Mikaela and I decided that we would explore the grounds till it was time to eat and go to bed, but we never got out of the castle. As it turns out, everything in Hogwarts moves all the time, and getting lost was a school hobby. The locked door that we thought led down to the Great Hall turned out to be the door to the Third Floor, which, it seemed, they added after our escapade the night before. In the end, we ended up sitting on a set of moving stairs as they floated all over the place, taking turns drawing Draco and his gang being stampeded by various Fantastic Beasts, until the stairs finally parked themselves outside of a door that  two Ravenclaws told us led to the Great Hall. At this point, dinner was halfway through with.

The next day, I was awoken at 7:00 by one of my roommates, Tracey Davis, who had been kind enough to put her pet toad on my face.

“Breakfast time.” She said plainly as I sat up shrieking, sending the toad flying onto the green comforter. 

Tracey was the only First-year I had met who wore makeup. She favored a load of heavy black eyeliner, which today she had jazzed up with some lime-green liquid eyeshadow. Her hair was jet black and kept interesting by little goth accessories.  I liked her because she didn’t talk much.

I picked up the toad and dusted him off, handing him back to Tracey to show her I had meant him no harm. She said nothing, keeping a blank and placid look on her made-up face as she tucked him into her robe pocket.

Today I had been looking foreword to since yesterday, because it was Potions day. Not only did we get to be with Gryffindor, but Potions was clearly the most interesting subject, judging from the textbooks. 

First, though, I had Defense Against the Dark Arts with Quirrell, who was the unfortunate victim of a bad stutter. He didn’t really seem equipped to be dealing with dark arts of any sort. Second, there was Charms, with the little elf-like man named Professor Flitwick, who I found out later was head of Ravenclaw, which made me wish I was in Ravenclaw all the more. Charms was the most fun, mostly because we got to use our wands for the first time. I squealed in excitement when I made a lima bean bounce once in the air. The lima bean broke as it hit the desk, but I couldn’t have been more pleased. I was one of the few who succeeded, along with, unfortunately, Draco.

That lunch period we decided to study up for Potions, because we had already decided to be the best at it. If I thought Flourish and Blotts was exciting, it was nothing compared to the Hogwarts Library. I would have lived there, if they’d let me. 

“Have you had Transfiguration yet?” asked Mikaela, cruelly distracting me from a large, wonderful encyclopedia of magical potions and their effects. I was particularly infatuated with the description of a potion that gave you weeks and weeks worth of vivid, waking nightmares.

“Yep. And Defense against the Dark Arts and Charms.” I described my triumph with the bean.

“We had to try and turn matchsticks into needles. Hermione was the only one who got anywhere close. My matchstick didn’t do a thing.” She said glumly. “Transfiguration is already really hard.”

“And Charms is really easy.” I said. “What else have you had today?”

“Defense against the Dark Arts. Professor Quirrell is... interesting.” 

“Super interesting.” I added. “I feel sort of sorry for him, though. Draco caught on early how easy it is to push him around. He’s like a grown-up nerdy kid.”

“Why do you think he has the turban?” She asked.

“I dunno. Maybe he’s Muslim.” I speculated, though Quirrell struck me as more of a non-practicing Presbyterian.

“I don’t think so. He told us he got it from an African Prince, but I heard from someone that he’s stuffed it with garlic.”

“Or maybe the turban serves a more sinister purpose.” I said, foreshadowingly. We laughed, and then the Librarian, who had been “Ssh!”ing us the whole time, finally made us leave.

We spent the rest of our lunch doing what started out as an attempt to memorize the patterns of the Hogwarts staircases, but turned into a contest to see who could jump the farthest. This caused giggle fits. It was made funnier because older students would walk by and give us looks, which put us into more giggle fits. The contest ended when, in a flamboyant show of prowess, I attempted to jump from one staircase to another while both were moving, and found myself being levitated through the air by Gryffindor prefect Percy Weasley, who was scolding both of us for being stupid and careless, and took away 2 points from Slytherin, and 1 from Gryffindor. 

“That doesn’t seem fair.” I argued as he levitated me back onto the solid ground, still grinning.

“Yeah,” added Mikaela pleasantly. “We were both doing it.”

“Don’t you argue with me, I’m a prefect! Don’t think I won’t take away more points from my own house, because I will.” Said Percy sternly.

“This is racism! I demand equal treatment!” I shouted in a deep vibrato voice. Mikaela cracked up. Percy was clearly outraged at our apparent irreverence toward his authority.

“Fine! Have it your way! Three points from Gryffindor and Slytherin!” He boomed, squaring his shoulders in an apparent attempt to feel taller. 

“Ooh, three.” I giggled. “Let’s just round up to a nice even five.”

“No!” Percy yelled furiously, trying futilely to assert himself.

“WE DEMAND FIVE POINTS BE TAKEN FROM OUR HOUSES!” I shouted in the same voice. 

“I’m not going to take orders from first years-- that’s it, what are your names?” He said as Mikaela and I doubled over in laughter. We had never done anything like this before, but there was something so wonderfully nonthreatening about Percy’s authority that we couldn’t help it. “Hey!” He practically screamed over the laughter. We were now attracting a good deal of attention from onlookers, who were beginning to travel to their next classes. Percy grabbed both of our arms and pulled us up level to him. “Quiet down! You’ve left me no choice but to report you.” At this, we both fell quiet. My grin was fading as I realized how much trouble we would be in again.

“I need names from both of you.” He hissed, taking out a little black notebook and a quill. We were both up against the banister now, feeling short because of how close Percy had made a point to stand, boxing us in so he seemed really tall and intimidating.

The first bell rang. The staircase just above us began to move down, much to the distress of everyone who had been just about to climb it to get to class. Mikaela and I both watched it as it floated just by us, and looked at eachother with the same realization that we would never get to class on time without the staircase.

“NAMES!” Percy near screamed, his freckled face as red as his hair. Mikaela nudged her head toward the direction of the staircase, trying to send me a message.

“Well,” I said, looking down anxiously.“Most people call me Chuck.” I sighed mournfully. “Chuck-Sunny-Bun-Bun. And this is my friend, Professor Pants.” 

In one brilliant move, Mikaela and I leapt up onto the banister and off it, making the heroic leap onto the descending staircase, which we ran down, screaming with laughter, to the applause of the audience we had evidently attracted.

Running as fast as we could down the hallway, we could still hear people clapping, and Percy’s frustration.

“We’re going to get in so much trouble!” Mikaela wheezed.

“We should not have done that!” I wailed, still laughing.

“Oh, gosh! I’m still going to have to see that kid tonight in the Common Room!” She lowered her voice as we approached the entrance to the Dungeons.

“Wear a mask,” I suggested.

We teetered down the steps leading to the Dungeons, which I had gotten pretty good at finding over the past two nights. We were the first ones to arrive, and Professor Snape eyed us suspiciously as we found our seats.

Soon, the room filled with people. The Gryffindors all seemed to culminate at the opposite side of the room from the Slytherins, and cautious babble filled the air. 

Snape was probably the most intimidating person I’d ever seen. If he and Percy got into a fight, Snape would eat him. He did a roll-call, stopping on Harry’s name.

“Ah, yes. Harry Potter. Our new celebrity.” He said this in almost a disgusted tone. I glanced over at Harry Potter, who was looking rather statuesque, obviously sensing danger.

“You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making,” Snape continued after he had finished with the roll-call. “As there is very little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don’t expect you to fully understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with it’s shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses; I can teach you to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death... if you aren’t as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach.”

I pictured Professor Snape spending hours writing poetry alone in his bedroom and memorizing it for future use.

“Potter,” Snape called, barely glancing in his direction. “What would I get if I added a powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?” He said this very quickly. Harry Potter looked clueless. Hermione Granger, not surprisingly, raised her hand immediately. Snape pretended not to notice.

“I don’t know sir,” said Harry. Snape did a tiny, mean little smile.

“Clearly, fame isn’t everything.”

If I was reading this right, Professor Snape had it in for Harry Potter. I expressed this in note-form to Mikaela. She wrote underneath it,

I think he’s just like that.

I got the feeling she had changed her mind after Snape asked Potter two more impossible questions to humiliate him. Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, who I would bet my life had no idea what any of the answers were either, were in silent stitches of laughter as Potter was forced to admit that he hadn’t had the book memorized.

I actually knew the answer to the last question, but I didn’t dare raise my hand. There was an episode of House where someone got poisoned by Monkshood. 

As unpleasant as Snape’s class was, I was super excited when it found out we got to start making potions that day. The first potion we were instructed to make was a cure for boils. I didn’t know what use it would be, because I had never seen anyone with a boil. 

“Okay,” I said, organizing the little bowls and bottles of nasty ingredients in front of our little pewter cauldron, “what do we do first?” I had left the recipe-reading to Mikaela, because it was boring and I didn’t want to do it.

“Add six measures of snake fangs to the motor.” She read carefully.

“To the what?” I asked cheerfully.

“The... the more-tar? What is that?” She looked around at the multiple strange thingies on the desk.

“I think it means cauldron.” I decided.

“But it says ‘cauldron’ later. I think the mortar is a different thing than the cauldron.”

“Eh.” I said, dumping the snake fangs into the empty cauldron. Mikaela sighed and continued. 

“Crush the snake fangs into a fine powder using your mortar.” She read. We were both silent. “Take them out.” She said just as I went to take the snake fangs back out.

We couldn’t figure out what the mortar was and we didn’t want to ask Professor Snape, so we ended up putting the snake fangs between our two potions books and trying to smash them with force. It worked, except that the result was not a fine powder, so we had to dump the pile of crushed fangs onto our desk and hit it with a spoon.

“If you had been reading your books instead of using them to make a mess in my classroom, you’d have known that the mortar and pestle tend to extract better results, unless of course your intention was to lose house points for insolence.” Snape had casually walked up behind us, startling us both. He motioned toward a bowl containing and a little club that could only be the mortar before he walked away again.

“Thanks!” I called, now knowledgeable on what a mortar was.

“Do not interrupt me.” He said. He had already started to criticize the kids next to us.

After we had finely crushed our snake fangs, we melted them in our cauldron, which sat over a tiny flame. 

“Gently stew four horned slugs in he cauldron until tender and pliant.” read Mikaela. “Eew.” She added, turning up the heat to 400*.

“That’s not gently.” I complained.

“We’re running low on time.” She said, stirring the slugs in quickly. 

“Okay, but with that much heat, we’ll have to cut everything in half. It says to stew for about ten minutes, but I guess five now. And instead of stirring thrice clockwise every minute... we’ll have to stir six times clockwise every thirty seconds.” I calculated. Mikaela was concentrating too hard to realize that this made no sense.

A strange feeling came over me, like I was being stared at. I swung around just in time to see Percy Weasley march through the archway. My shoulders shrunk. I elbowed Mikaela, which she later claimed was what screwed up her stirring and caused the potion to catch fire. At that moment, though, she just stared.

“Oh no.” She said. Percy had interrupted Professor Snape’s criticism and was pointing at our table with determination. Snape furrowed his brow more than usual and glided over to us. Looking up at Snape and Percy at that moment was like staring death in the face.

“These two. These are the ones.” He said sternly.

“McParlan, Johnson, follow me.” Snape was unreadable. Snape led Percy, Mikaela, and I into the hall outside the Potions classroom. “Mr. Weasley, explain.”

“Professor Snape, these two first-years have exhibited rude behavior that is an insult to both this school and to the authority of all Prefects. I’m sure you would by highly disappointed to learn of what your students have been up to.” Percy said haughtily. 

“I’m sure.” said Snape dryly.

Percy recounted the entire tale with a whole bunch of adjectives that didn’t need to be there like “ignorant” and “extremely dangerous” and “unbelievably objectionable”. When he finished, Snape’s bored, dry expression had not changed.

“What, exactly, do you expect me to do about it, Mr. Weasley?” he asked. Percy looked slightly taken aback, but was unfettered.

“I think it’s fair to take ten points from both houses, Professor.” Percy dictated.

“No where is it written that jumping from stair to stair is forbidden. I don’t disagree that such frivolity is both dangerous and stupid, but, if I’m not mistaken, Mr. Weasley, there is no rule against stupidity. Quite unfortunately.” Snape said. “And don’t go complaining about your wounded, overinflated ego. I’m surprised, in fact, that it’s taken this long for someone to remind you of your place at this school.”

“But Professor!” Percy cried.

“Get out of my sight, Mr. Weasley.” Snape said coldly.

“Professor, I hardly think that-”

“Five points from Gryffindor for needlessly interrupting my class.” Snape said even more coldly. Percy, all flustered, strutted out of the corridor like a pissed red bird.

We were led back into the Potions room. Neither Mikaela or I said anything. What had just happened was clearly some sort of miracle.

For about ten more minutes, we did stuff to the potion that most likely should not have been done while Snape went around like a bucket of cheer and rainbows, harshly judging everyone in his path.

As we had just avoided losing ten points each, we were both immensely relieved when it was Neville and a Gryffindor named Seamus Finnigan who exploded their potion first, and not us. The slight fire that was blazing atop our pot of vile grey sludge was almost covert compared to the green gush of acid that spilled out over the floor from Neville’s cauldron, eating people’s shoes and causing mass panic. Before I was able to catch up, Neville was covered in warts and Snape was yelling at him like a large vulture yelling at a canary. Somehow Snape found a way to take a point from Potter for this.

Did the houses have any points to start with? Because Gryffindor seemed to be bleeding out pretty quickly, and so far I hadn’t seen anyone gain any. 

Over the weeks that followed, Potions proved to be probably the second funnest class after Charms. The next Friday proved to be a triumphant occasion when the fumes from our expertly-made Sleeping Draught successfully knocked out Crabbe, who was trying to copy us after Snape told us we weren’t doing as awful a job as the rest. I was stirring it with my wand when all of a sudden, Crabbe’s massive head (which had evidently drifted into the cloud of purple smoke from our potion as he tried to get a better look) plunged straight into the cauldron and knocked everything all over the place. Snape was furious, and I think that if Mikaela had been stirring instead of me, he would have taken more points from Gryffindor. Instead he just yelled at Crabbe after he had been revived. The good news is Mikaela and I were given high marks for our super amazing skill and mastery of the art of potion-making.

Except for Snape, who everyone hated, there wasn’t a single teacher at Hogwarts who had any real liking for the Slytherin house. In fact, the other students seemed to hate us in general. At eleven, I was not the most observant person in the world. However, I eventually caught on to the way things worked at Hogwarts. The Gryffindors generally had the run of the place. Even though my only friends, Mikaela and Neville, were in Gryffindor, I could definitely see what Gemma was talking about, what with the pompousness and holier-than-thou demeanor. Even when a Gryffindor was doing something against the rules, they had to be in the right. It wore on you after awhile. Whereas, it seemed, even when the Slytherins were following the rules, we were doing something wrong.

One time, while running down the hall, I accidentally knocked over a second-year Hufflepuff boy and scattered his books all over the place. Pansy, a pixie-faced bubblehead I had to share a dorm with, started laughing hard at this, and almost everyone started glaring at me, because I was obviously in on it. This prejudice and injustice pissed me off so much that I just glared back.

It probably didn’t help that Draco and his cronies practically paraded the fact that they were total buttholes all the time. The crap that they pulled made all of us look worse. 

It seemed everyone loved the Gryffindors except us. Hufflepuff, which turned out to be the most average group of background characters I had ever seen, generally didn’t have any real qualms against anyone, but they didn’t seem to trust us at all. Ravenclaw was almost as high-and-mighty as Gryffindor, and in the case of grades, even more so. But they also seemed to have the most cool people who I would want to be friends with in their ranks. The problem was that they didn’t seem to trust us either. I had the feeling that a lot of Slytherins wouldn’t act as rude if the rest of the school was more polite to them. But for that to happen, Slytherin would have to start being nicer first, which it was far to proud to do.

Transfiguration was usually tied for my least favorite class with History of Magic, which was brutally boring. Some days, History of Magic was preferable to Transfiguration, and other days they were equal. The point is, Professor McGonogall haunted my dreams. Transfiguration was easy in theory. It was the art of changing something into something else. I think I probably could have managed it if she didn’t insist on making us memorize all those charts and theorems. Her class was like algebra except it made no sense and I couldn’t remember any of it. Mikaela didn’t mind it nearly as much as I did. Her worst class was, hands-down, Defense Against the Dark Arts. She claims that there was something innately annoying about Professor Quirrell. 

“He stutters a lot.” I said.

“That’s not it, though. There’s just something annoying about him. I just get so bothered.” Mikaela tried hard to communicate.

“His head seems giant in comparison to his body,” I posed.

“No.” Mikaela said, thinking.

“He smells weird, he has a high voice, he seems scared of his own students, he’s effeminate, he looks like an male version of one of the mean girls from Congdon, he doesn’t have enough hair on his face, you can see his Adams apple, he walks like this-” I imitated Quirrel’s jerky gait “-and he never makes eye contact.” I said. Unlike Snape, who made too much eye contact. “There’s loads of weird things about him.”

“There’s weird things about all the teachers here, though.” Mikaela said. “Quirrell seems like he should be the most normal and agreeable.”

“That’s it, then. You don’t like normal teachers.” I said. Case closed. I won.

“It’s the eye contact thing.” Mikaela decided.

We were heading off to our first flying lesson, which I was looking forward to immensely. I mean, who didn’t constantly dream of flying? All the Slytherins, at least, were obsessed with Quidditch. I was the only Muggle-born Slytherin in first year, so I was literally the only person in my house who hadn’t the faintest idea what Quidditch was. When I let this slip one morning during breakfast to Tracey Davis, from half a table away Marcus Flint let out an enraged “WHAT?!” and stormed over to me, eager to explain everything. As it turned out, Flint was the Slytherin Captain, which meant that he  possessed a level of aggressive fervor for the sport that I had not yet seen in anyone. From what I could decipher through Flint’s numerous tales of his own victory and manliness and unfair defeat at the hands of biased referees, Quidditch was like every other sport, except there was a lot more cheating, and people seemed to get injured a lot.

Today, Mikaela and I cut through the Courtyard and made our way down to the

grounds. We had become experts at finding the front door of Hogwarts. At least, Mikaela had become an expert. I was still learning. Generally I thanked my luck that at she had a better sense of direction than me. 

As usual, we were the last to arrive. The practice area was very close to the Forbidden Forest, which I had never gotten very close to. Broomsticks lay in neat rows in the soft green grass. The Gryffindors and Slytherins were, as usual, standing in groups on opposite sides of eachother. 

A spiky grey-haired woman, Madame Hooch, showed up and started commanding us all.

“Well, what are you all waiting for? Everyone, stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up.” She was the wizarding equivalent of a gym teacher. We rushed to do as she said. I got stuck with a really shifty looking broom with almost no twigs in it’s tail, and duct tape on the handle. “Stick out your right hand over the broom,” she commanded, “and say ‘UP’.”

“UP!” shouted everyone at different times. The brooms started moving around, but none of them actually went up except Harry Potter’s. My shabby grey broomstick sort of quavered slowly into the air like a shaky old thing with very little life in it. It had been through a lot. It was a veteran of Hogwarts Flying Practices past. Madame Hooch had us mount our brooms. This took about twenty whole minutes, because apparently there was some technique or something that I didn’t understand or whatever.

We were about to take of when Neville, who had been visibly frightened the entire lesson, rocketed into the air like a firework, yelling all the way up. This sent Draco, Crabbe, Goyle, Pansy, and Millicent (so pretty much my whole grade) into violent stitches of laughter. Okay, it was funny, but not that funny. Then, suddenly, Neville was coming back down again. WHAM. He hit the grass. All fell silent.

“Is he dead?” asked one of the Gryffindors. 

The broomstick seemed to have escaped into the Forbidden Forest.

Madame Hooch gingerly held Neville’s wrist. He was face-down in the grass, sobbing.

“Broken wrist,” she muttered. “Come on, boy. It’s all right, up you get.” She turned to the rest of the class. “None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing. You leave those brooms where they are, or you’ll be out of Hogwarts before you can say Quidditch.” She turned back to Neville. “Come on, dear.” She escorted Neville, who looked more like a sad little gopher than ever, up to the castle.

As soon as they were far enough away so that he wouldn’t get in trouble, Malfoy started laughing again.

“Did you see his face, the great lump!” Crabbe, Goyle, Pansy, and Millicent joined in. Zabini never laughed or smiled. Tracey Davis was sitting in the grass, far away, coloring her nails with a marker.

“Shut up, Malfoy!” Snarled a Gryffindor named Parvati Patil. All the Gryffindors had the exact same stance. In most video games, it was called Battle Stance. 

“Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?” Pansy giggled in her bubbleheaded way. “Never thought you’d like fat little crybabies, Parvati.” 

“Look!” called Draco, grabbing a clear little ball that had evidently fallen out of Neville’s pocket when he smashed into the ground. “It’s that stupid thing Longbottom’s Gran sent him!”

“Oh, lord.” I muttered, cursing my luck for ending up in the same house as this bunch of nitwits. 

“Give that here, Malfoy.” said Harry Potter very dangerously. If all went well, they’d beat eachother up, make up, and just be friends so the rest of us could get on with our lives.

“I think I’ll leave it for somewhere for Longbottom to find.” said Draco, who was feeding off Potter’s anger. “How about... up a tree?”

“Give it here!” Yelled Potter.

As I suspected, the two of them got into a fight, but unfortunately there were no fists. They just flew around on brooms for awhile. Mikaela was busy watching the aerial battle so I braided some dandelions together while everyone was captivated by Potter and Draco and their soon-to-be-bromance.

In the end, Potter succeeded in getting back Neville’s clear little ball, but got caught by McGonogall while he was flying. Draco watched smugly as Potter got escorted by a stern-looking McGonogall back into the castle.

Draco, who had been looking rather crestfallen when Potter caught the ball, was now snickering with triumph as he watched Potter being brought up for judgement.

“You little jerk!” Shouted Mikaela angrily. She and Ron Weasley were charging toward Draco and his gang with determination.

“I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.” said Hermione warningly. “That’s exactly what he wants from you.” Mikaela and Ron both stopped, feet from Draco, whose supersized minions were getting ready to rumble with these tiny freckled foes.

“Ooh, scared, Granger?” sneered Draco. “Afraid your boyfriend might get hurt?”  

“Boyfriend! She wishes!” giggled Pansy. “The teeth on that frumpy hag would even scare off beavers!” This caused Millicent to laugh loudly. 

“Watch it, Parkinson, or the second you leave the ground, I swear I’ll knock you off your broom!” threatened Parvati Patil.

“Really! Think of what Madame Hooch will do when she comes back and sees you all brawling, you’re going to get all of us into trouble!” Hermione scolded, her arms crossed. I had pretty much had it with everyone at that moment, so I snapped.

“Hermione, you’re not everyone’s mom. If they want to be idiots, just let them, okay?!” Tracey, who was several feet away with her back turned, laughed in agreement. Several Gryffindors shot me dirty looks. Mikaela looked at me in surprise. I panicked, realizing I had just taken the wrong side. “Well, I don’t mean that it’s a bad thing, but-”

“First years!” Called Madame Hooch as she power-walked down from the castle. Everyone returned sheepishly to their lines across the field, still eyeing the opposite house bitterly. Madame hooch got down to where we all stood. She raised her whistle. “Let’s have another try at it. This time, everyone keep your feet flat on the ground until I blow my whistle.” She sounded irritated. “Mount your brooms.”

We did so. Madame Hooch blew the whistle. At once, several people rose up shakily into the air. Some kids looked more freaked-out than others, and one Gryffindor boy looked like he was going to wet his pants when his broom actually floated.

I jumped. I didn’t rise at all, but my broom floated meekly downward, slightly delaying my fall time. 

“Come on, stupid broom! UP!” I whispered at it. Mikaela was floating four feet in the air, looking excited, even though the broom had barely risen.

I was the last one on the ground. Madame Hooch came over to me to try and help, but it was wasted on me. I jumped again and again, each time suffering the same slow fall.

“No, no, kick straight up, hard, like this, see?” She tried to show me how to jump. 

“I know how to jump!” I complained. “It’s one of my greatest talents!” This was true. I had perfected this talent on the moving stairs, as well as the public playgrounds, in addition to my imaginary punching skills.

I jumped again. All of a sudden, my broom launched itself twelve feet into the air, shaking like the limb of an elderly muppet.

“AAH!” I shrieked, to the laughter of several Gryffindors. Screw them, I thought as my broom steadied itself and began to spin around in the air, helicoptering back down slowly as I held on for life.

“Very good, very good.” Said Hooch dismissively. “Now we’re going to try that again, but this time, you will follow me as we fly around the field very carefully. We will do one lap before returning to the ground, unless you feel inclined to touch down earlier.”

Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil both threw glances at me and giggled.

“On my whistle, one, two, three.” Hooch blew her whistle and we were up again. This time, I didn’t struggle quite so much with the takeoff. My broom jumped in large intervals until it was almost at the same level as everyone else’s. 

“Come on, Mr. Tapey, we can do this!” I encouraged the broom. “Whoa!” The broom that I had named jumped an additional ten feet. Now I was higher than everyone. The Flying class began to follow Madame Hooch slowly around the field. “Wait!” I called. They did not wait, except for Mikaela, and Ron Weasley momentarily, who couldn’t figure out quite what to do with himself without his friend Potter around. He took off after the rest of them after an awkward second. I was trying to will my broom downward, but it didn’t seem to want to go. Instead it floated sideways, trying to spin again.

The Flying class was already halfway done with their lap. Mikaela was looking up at me struggling with my broom, then over at the group, which frustrated me further.

“Just go! I’ll catch up!” I called down.

“Are you sure?” She asked.

I fought with my broom, red-faced and angry, for another moment.

“UGH!” I growled in reply, and decided to just try and follow the class anyways. 

“Okay, then, I guess.” Mikaela muttered. She flew in front of me uncertainly, looking back up every few minutes as I struggled to fly in a neat ring around the field. 

Madame Hooch was back on the ground, and the rest of the class were slowly touching down one-by-one. 

“Almost there!” Called Mikaela encouragingly. 

A sharp wind blew from off the lake in what could have only been an act of pure malevolence towards me. All of a sudden, my rickety broom was floating north at an alarming speed.

“Hey! Stop that!” I chided it. I tried to force it down again but it wouldn’t listen. Mr. Tapey had become despondent. “HELP!” I cried as the wind picked up force. “This broom is... it’s hungover, or something!” 

Tapey swung lifelessly upside down and practically tipped me off. I was hanging on as hard as I could. I shrieked. This elderly broomstick had clearly just gone into a seizure-induced coma. I had no control as the broom floated higher, higher, and farther with the wind. Madame Hooch was approaching me on her own broomstick much more slowly than my situation required.

“HURRY!” I screamed, now floating over the towers of Hogwarts. 

“Hold on!” Called Madame Hooch. Like I had been planning to let go. I desperately wanted to close my eyes, but couldn’t. I could feel my muscles slipping. All of a sudden, Madame Hooch grabbed the tail of my broom. I grabbed her hand and she helped me right-side-up again. I heaved a heavy sigh. “Hold onto the tail of my broom, there you go.” She instructed. I gripped the twigs of her broomstick tightly, my legs cramping with the strain of not falling off my own broom but not daring to relax. We steadily floated downward, back toward the class. Draco was smirking like a stupid blonde weasel. So were a few Gryffindors, but it was Draco who I thought most deserved the evil eye.

Just as we passed the north tower, my broom buzzed violently back to life like a sudden scream and, in what could only have been it’s death throes, bucked me off the back of it so quickly that I had no time to process what was happening. In an instant, I was flying like a rocket through the air and crashing through Professor Binns’ window, shattering the glass, and then I was laying on my back in a classroom full of surprised Ravenclaw third years. Binns had evidently not noticed the disruption and was continuing amidst the yelps of panic from his students and my one moan of pain. 

Between the force of Binns’ lecture on giant hunts and the massive head trauma I had just suffered, I blacked out.