Girls by The 1975
Chapter Five: Girls by The 1975
“What was that Percy?” Penelope hissed
She was sitting stock-still on the table gripping his shirt savagely with one hand and the table with the other. It was quiet now. He looked around the dim, dark, and dank dungeon storage room, ears straining for the slightest sound. He thought for a second he had heard the echo of retreating footsteps, but now it was just his heartbeat and the faint scuttling of rats.
The candle on the table flickered slightly casting shadows on the blonde’s stricken face. Eyes wide and skirt and shirt in disarray, robe cast to the side on the dusty stone floor. She still didn’t move, sitting frozen on the table, he didn’t think she dared breath either.
Percy walked to the door, inspecting through the small crack, nothing lay on the other side but the acrid smell of wet and rot. He hated these dungeons.
“It’s nothing.” he replied, feigning nonchalance. And closing the door quietly behind him.
“Then why was the door open?” she asked her voice rising precariously.
Percy walked back to the table, not sure why the door had been open.
He picked up her robe, handing it to her, lost in thought.
He was sure he closed it behind him. He cursed under his breath, he should have used Colloportus on the door. He knew better after his brothers had last interrupted them in an unused classroom on the 3rd floor. He was sure this was a thoroughly unused hallway. He had followed the twins down here before when they were using it to store various pilfered ingredients, objects for pranks and doing whatever stupid antics they got up to. How they found it, they would never say. They had a knack for always finding even the most hidden places in the castle.
“I must have not closed it all the way, but no one uses this corridor anyway, I’m not even sure anyone else knows it exists.”
“You said the twins do, what if they followed us down here?”
She was now fixing her uniform and slipping on her robe she had just snatched from him. She was grimacing slightly, her brows furrowed, a perturbed look that often painted her features nowadays, especially when she was talking to him.
“I told them to stay away or I would tell Mother about their little extracurriculars,” he assured, grabbing her shoulders, “Don’t worry it was nothing I promise.”
She looked up at him, obviously unconvinced, and thoroughly cross.
“Okay well I need to go, Professor Flitwick will need me to report before bed, don’t follow me, andwait a while before leaving.” She said sternly
She moved towards the door fixing her hair, and without a backward glance slipped through the dungeon door.
Percy sighed, to be honest he wasn’t quite sure if someone hadn’t been at the door. It sounded like something had been directly outside; and in the lowlight he couldn’t tell if he had seen something move, a shadow maybe? He was almost sure he heard retreating footsteps echo down the hall; but there was no trace of anyone having been in the hallway when he checked, and he could barely see down the dark twisted corridor anyway.
He didn’t dare get Penelope worked up, She was always jumping down his throat for something nowadays, the most they talked anymore was in these late night meetings, and there wasn’t really much discussion.
Percy sighed, sitting down at the edge of the table. His white shirt untucked and in disarray, unbuttoned slightly. He looked straight ahead, lost in thought. He didn’t want to think about someone finding him like this, down here. That was the last thing he needed. He struggled knowing he needed to tell Penny they couldn’t do this anymore, but he also didn’t want to think about the fit she'd throw if he told her. She wasn’t the same Penelope, she acted as if seeing him was a chore. It was easy, with her though, natural. He sucked air in through his teeth sharply and let out a wry sigh.
He fixed himself slowly, and left the room. lighting his wand and extinguishing the candle he stepped out into the hall. something crushed slightly beneath his foot. Moving his wand down he illuminated something crumpled and bright against the dungeon floors.
His blood went curdled in his veins, it was a quill; a pretty, slightly crumpled and now dirty pheasant quill, silver tipped hardly used.
He picked it up panicking slightly, he was sure that it wasn't there before.
He thought about the footsteps he heard, maybe someone was outside the door, someone who had heard them.
He slipped it into his pocket and moved quietly through the dungeon halls, bristling and agitated. ears and eyes peeled for any sound or movement, sticking to the shadowy walls. He knew from checking the schedule no one was patrolling tonight. Snape usually skipped his patrol shifts to stay in his office. He thought more about the quill and panicked slightly, maybe Penelope had dropped it in her hurry to leave. He tried to reassure himself that was the most plausible answer. He however couldn’t ignore the fact that she hadn’t brought her bag with her.
He reached the ground floor. Thinking more about Penelope, He thought about their triste in the dungeons and the empty classrooms they could find. Then the painful thought that someone might have seen them. If it was his brothers they’d have wasted no time embarrassing him, but if not them, then who? Who would be out of bed and in that corridor at that hour? He tried to brush it off, it was probably a rat or a ghost, he half hoped.
“But a rat wouldn’t have dropped a new quill.”
He shook his head, trying vainly to fight his rising trepidation. He walked mechanically to the Gryffindor common room, still turning over thoughts in his head. He'd finished all his homework so he had no deadlines to worry about, but he wanted to get a jump on his extra credit paper for Ancient Runes. He stopped with a jolt in front of a large bushy haired wizard, snoring loudly in his frame.
Aemilia.
He had agreed to meet with her tomorrow, before muggle studies, to work on their potions assignment.
He groaned under his breath. He had been doing his best to ignore her presence since the night in the Prefect’s bathroom. He couldn’t think of that night without cringing.
That night he’d seen someone he didn’t recognize slip into the Prefect’s bathroom from the end of the hall. He incorrectly assumed he would catch his brothers breaking in again, flooding it with endless streams of bubbles and suds. He was a little shocked to see a girl he barely recognized. He had of course accosted her for being out past curfew. He realized slowly she was the Slytherin Prefect who had run into him earlier. He had a vague inclination of seeing her before that in meetings, and in passing; but she didn’t talk much. She spent most of her time on that stupid muggle machine, headphones on, head down.
“Are you going to stand there all night, put that damn light out!”
Percy jolted, he had been standing in place and didn't see one of the paintings in the dark hall had awoken. He continued on, The painting scoffed and mumbled a few curses under his breath. Percy made his way to the next floor; Unable to stop thinking about that night. She shouldn’t have been out past curfew, and technically she was slinking from her patrol duty, So technically he, as Head Boy, had an obligation to say something,
“Ironic coming from you.”
He tensed his jaw against the bitter thoughts. He couldn't deny part of the reason he had been so short with her was the row he had just had with Penelope. Or how earlier that day he had caught his brothers gifting Peeves rotten fruit and garbage from the kitchen. His classes, his parents, Head Boy duties, what he was going to do after Hogwarts, or how rude she had been to him earlier. A mountain of frustrations and she was simply an easy target to vent on.
He thought about that night a lot. He walked in already angry, expecting his brothers and saw her, singing softly, face painted in perfect bliss. The shock and surprise on her features when he finally spoke. He thought she played the part of the siren well, down to her anger as stormed after him when her songs fell on deaf ears. Her slender naked body barely covered by a thin layer and hair and bubbles before he had quickly glanced away.
The intoxicatingly sweet scent, the steam rising from her skin. The curve of her waist. Her loose robe sliding off her slight shoulders, her collarbone, and long neck. Her face etched in anger and defiance. He thought of pictures of Circe, emerging from the waters to accost a wandering interloper. The water dripping from her long dark hair, framing her pale face, steam rising from her porcelain skin. How her green eyes blazed angrily glinting like hard jewels under her furrowed brow and dripping lashes. He thought of how her lips moved as she debased him. She’d looked like a picture of an angry harpy or siren you’d see in some old manuscript waiting to drag men to the depths of hades. intimidating and alluring, he'd rarely seen her face, always looking down, but he couldn’t help thinking how pretty she was.
He banished that thought, shaking his head. He was not proud of how often he had replayed that meeting, Her biting sarcastic words, painting him a fool and hypocrite. A poor excuse for a Head Boy who could barely contain his own brothers. He gritted his teeth, his knuckles cracked as he gripped his wand tighter. He hated to think she was right. He stooped short as nearly running into the sleeping portrait of a large woman snoring on a chaise lounge.
“Fortuna Major.”
Without awakening, the door swung open revealing the entrance of the Gryffindor common room. His tired feet carried him to his dorm, where he undressed quietly, jaw still clenched tightly and face impassive. He threw on his now threadbare monogrammed pajamas his mother had made him when he was first made Prefect.
He still thought about Aemilia. He had started to notice her more in his classes. He was sure he had caught her eye more than once. Humoring himself that she was anxiously watching and waiting for him to keep his word about telling her Head of House.
It satisfied him to think of her anxious and worried, that he had the power to strip her of her privileges, he could if he wanted to. He hadn’t, and wouldn’t, though. It would have been pointless, more trouble than it was worth.
He was bluffing, he'd just ignore her. Resentment and frustrations surrounded his thoughts of her mostly.
She, so rude, proud, and thoughtless. Her cruel mean remarks. Thoughts and doubts he’d secretly harbored himself. She wouldn’t get to him though, what did she know?
He however caught her face in a crowd now, still watched her curiously in Potions when he could steal a glance. Head down, long dark hair falling in front of her face. Delicate hands fiddling with her pheasant quill. How she sat, How she bounced her leg absentmindedly, her skirt riding up slightly. Her long fingers fiddling with her hem. Her soft thighs.
He shook himself, but he couldn’t keep away the image of her angry face, inches from his own. The sickly sweet smell of bubblegum. Her robe on sliding softly down, her chest rising and falling with her ragged breaths. Body still dripping from the bath. He shook himself again, Head hitting the pillow hard.
The wind rattled the single glazed windows slightly next to his bed. And the fire crackled lightly in the bronze burner. He had done his best to betray no emotion in potions, to be as impartial as possible. He tried to look as little as possible in her direction.
He watched her tongue run over her lips, she licked them often. The defined cupid's bow. How she sometimes mouthed the words as her eyes darted across her potion notes. They were green, dark, with flecks of brown. He saw the way her hands looked wrapped around the pestle as she ground the moonstone. Long rounded nails on her thin fingers, gripping the stone tool. The tendons pushing and moving against her fair skin. She often pushed her hair behind her ears, just for it to fall back down again.
Her potion skills were impressive, she hadn’t been sliding by on Snape's obvious favoritism. She seemed...intelligent, exacting. He knew they had brewed it perfectly, He could have done it easily on his own, she could too he supposed. They both could write the paper just as easily, it was nothing really. He knew the real reason he asked her when she was free wasn’t from Snape's urging.
No longer able to banish some of the images that floated lazily through his head, he finally drifted asleep.