Chapter Text
"Evans, you sly dog!" I squealed, slapping my best friends arm. The love story of Lily and James was excruciatingly long and annoying. The two were playing the longest game of cat and mouse ever, and after hearing Lily explain her story, it looked like the cat had finally won.
"Ren... You can't tell anyone!" Lily hushed me quickly. I zipped my mouth... for about three seconds until I started squealing again.
"Oh, but this is wonderful! I have to tell someone!"
"No!"
"Not even McGonagowl?" I whined, thinking about my beautiful Snow White owl. God, he was cute.
"Your owls name is Hermes." Lily sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose.
I shook my head profusely.
"No, as I recall, I changed his name after my first transfiguration class with Minnie— you know, when she complimented my hair." I smiled, grabbing a lock of my smooth hair. After that lesson, she became my favourite professor. Don't tell Remus, but she also told me I was her favourite student.
"Off topic!" Lily broke my chain of thoughts with her loud voice. "Please don't tell anybody. I'll be telling Marlene later."
"I wouldn't worry about me telling. It's James you should worry about. He's kissed you for the first time after how many years of pining?" I asked Lily, forgetting what year we were in for a moment.
"...Five."
"Five years! I'll be genuinely shocked if this doesn't reach the Daily Prophet."
Lily chuckled, as I continued to ramble on about how cute her and James were. I must've been talking loudly because Lily quickly put her hand over my mouth as I started to list what I think their kids name should be.
James, Sirius, Remus and Peter walked over to our place at the Gryffindor table. It was morning, and I was surprised that they were all awake and coordinated to come get breakfast.
"Lily." James greeted upon seeing her.
"James." Lily smiled back.
"Florence." I said.
Everybody turned to look at me.
"Well, neither of you were gonna say it." I sighed, resting my head on the table. Fuck, this school was gonna give me some type of obesity. I'm literally scoffing down enough food to feed 17 homeless shelters. Once I start rushing off to class, I already know the stitches are gonna come.
"Hello, DuPont." Sirius said, taking the spare seat on my left. God he was annoying. I used to live next to him when I was younger. After my dad died right before my first year, my mum actually wanted us to move back to her home country of Ireland with my grandma. At Hogwarts, Sirius and I recognised each other from before we even got to the sorting hat. We've been friends ever since.
"Ugh. Not you." I sighed again, closing my eyes. I'm not here. I'm not here. I'm in Italy with my super rich boyfriend.
"You hurt me, Florence." Sirius' voice brought me back. Fuck.
"English, I beg you Padfoot." James said, taking his seat opposite Lily. I hadn't even realised Sirius said that in French. Ugh, this bitch. He thinks he's special because we are the only ones in the group who speak French. Jokes on him, because I speak Italian too. So yeah, I'm better than him.
"Remmy! Come sit next to me!" I begged, pushing Sirius over.
Remus looked at where he was, then looked at me.
"Florence, I'm on the other-side of the table." Remus replied, and I took a moment to evaluate.
Oh shit, he's right. Why did me and Lily have to sit in the middle of the table? It would take Remus a full minute to walk to the end of the table and come around the other side.
"Damn. That is so not practical." God damn Hogwarts and their unnecessarily long tables.
"Crawl under the table." I suggested.
"No, thank you." Remus replied. Luckily for him, I can compromise.
"Alright, no problem." I said, slipping underneath the table.
"Oh Merlin." I heard Peter laugh.
"Not again." Lily sighed.
I come out from under the table, exactly next to Remus. Perfect!
"Hey Remus, my best friend."
"That is false." Sirius interjected, and I swear I almost growled at him.
"Let's ask Remus." I said, holding an invisible microphone over to my werewolf friend. Remus looked between us for a moment, a blank look on his face.
"Go on, tell him i'm your best friend." I encouraged Remus with a smile. He chuckled, looking at me.
"Well, you're definitely a friend." He smiled, although he looked a bit unsure with how I would react. I decided to let him off easy today.
"I'll take it!" I smile happily, reaching over for my plate. As I did so, Sirius took it, holding it out of my reach.
"Give that back, you wet dog." I demanded, leaning over the table and reaching for the plate, but his stupid linguine arms held it so far away. Curse my grandma and her short arms that I inherited.
"When she gives you cute nicknames." Peter commented from the side, causing James to laugh. I growled, kicking Sirius' shin from under the table.
"OW! You motherfu-"
"Watch it, Black." Lily defended, punching his arm.
As the bell went signalling first period, a great loud set of groans could be heard within the Great Hall.
"Oh lovely, we have a new schedule this year. Anybody got Flitwick in charms first?"
Everyone looked around at each other. Fuck.
"Maybe you'll have Marlene." Lily said, trying to cheer me up.
"Maybe I'll die. You know that I get separation anxiety. I can't even walk to class alone!" I started to overthink again. I'm truly so pathetic it was actually laughable.
"I'll walk with you if you want." Remus suggested, giving me a smile.
"I could fucking kiss you, Remmy." I smiled brightly, pulling him up from his seat by the arm.
"Not after last time when you said that same thing and then hugged me so hard that I broke a finger and had to go see Madam Pomfrey." I chuckled at the memory that surfaced.
"It's your fault for not preparing for my hug. You know I like to give strong hugs."
"Well, yeah now I do." Remus said, holding up his middle finger. I gasped.
"You kiss your mother with that finger?" I tsked at him.
"It's the finger you broke, you absolute fool." He retorted as we waved goodbye to the others and headed off to my classroom.
"Thank you for walking with me." I thanked Remus genuinely. He was actually a real one.
"It's fine. I know that if you're left alone for too long you either get lost or end up accidentally setting something on fire." He reminded me. Pfft, yeah like I needed reminding.
"It was one time! So I mixed up ascendio and incendio, it was an honest mistake!"
"You're an honest mistake." Wow! I unlink arms with Remus.
"I think I can get to class on my own thanks." I took off before he could say a word. I made it about three steps before turning back to Remus.
"Where's classroom 2E again?" I forgot. Hah silly me.
It's a wonder that I'm actually topping most of my classes. Although, I guess common sense doesn't come with intellectual sense.
"An actual loser." Remus sighed, coming up beside me and taking my wrist. He led me to the room which actually wasn't that far.
"Thanks Remmy! Ciao ciao!" I waved goodbye at him before coming into the room. Ok, I guess I was one of the first here.
"Hello, Florence!" Flitwick greeted as I entered.
"Hi, Sir!" I responded with the same enthusiasm. Flitwick was alright, he definitely wasn't anyones favourite, but he did have a cool side that I occasionally got to see.
"Sir, do you mind if I see the class list? I'm not sure if I have any friends in this class." Surprisingly, he didn't mind, and handed me the scroll of names. I took a quick look.
No Marlene. No Dorcas. God fucking damn it.
My eyes looked up and down the list over and over again. Oh wait. Oh no.
Literally all the names I didn't want to see.
Evan Rosier.
Barty Crouch Jr.
Icarus Nott.
Caius Avery.
Regulus Black.
As I read the last name, I heard the door open. Fuck off. Here comes the blood supremacy squad. Protect your brain cells ladies and gentlemen, because these guys are absolute wankers. They'll spew some bullshit about purebloods being superior, like yeah ok, at least my parents don't want me to marry my sister, Evan.
Keeping families pureblood is equivalent to keeping it in the family. They're all related, I swear to God. And the select few that aren't are typically the ones with intelligence. I see a pattern emerging.
"Bonjour, DuPont." Evan said mockingly to me as he walked past. This bitch.
I turned around.
"Your mother is a bitch." I curse at him in French. Judging by the look on his face he was completely clueless on what I said.
I look over to his friends and Regulus has a small smirk on his face. That French bitch. I forget both him and Sirius learnt it. In fact, I forget they're brothers.
I never really talked to Regulus. Actually no, I've never talked to him. When I lived next to the Black's, he was too young and brooding to even acknowledge my existence. His mum always kept him and Sirius away from us. She didn't want them associated with me and my muggleborn mother. Sirius never obeyed and snuck out all the time to see me. That's how we became friends.
But with Regulus, there's always been a bit of an unspoken rivalry between us. He's been topping potions for years, however, last year I finally got him beat.
The same day I found that out? Icarus Nott tripped me up in the halls and called me a half-breed.
I sense a tiny dick.
However, Regulus himself had never actually talked to me. Strange. I don't even think I know what his voice sounds like.
Was it annoying like Sirius? Or suave like... uh, I don't know. Someone suave.
I take a seat at the front of the class in the U shaped seating area. Maybe being friendless in this class was a blessing in disguise. We had OWLs this year, and I could use this distraction free environment to my advantage.
Unfortunately, my class had other plans. Seems like every son of a bitch in this room had at least one friend. And so, the class was unnecessarily loud.
Hello? Doesn't anyone care about their education here?
The noise grew, unlike Flitwick did when he was young.
But eventually, he got annoyed by the noise level and started shouting at the class telling us he was gonna put us in a seating plan.
Not alphabetical.
Please not alphabetical.
"I'm astonished that I have to even put you lot into an alphabetical seating plan."
"Fuck." I vocalised, and everyone went silent. C'mon. How did they all hear that?
"Indeed, Miss DuPont." Flitwick agreed with my response rather than getting mad. Ha, I guess he wasn't that bad.
Cut to a minute later where I was placed right after Barty Crouch.
I was wrong. Flitwick should burn in hell.
It was fucking remarkable that the seating arrangement had Caius, Regulus and Barty all next to each other. Flitwick seemed to have noticed this too because he made me swap around with Barty. Like that would stop them from talking.
You could put Barty Crouch across the room and he would just shout.
Merlin, this seating plan is actually rubbish.
As I predicted, Barty began to try talk to Caius, but weirdly enough Regulus stayed silent.
Barty was annoyingly loud in my ear I couldn't get a word of what Flitwick was saying.
"Can you shut up?" I said, looking to Barty. He looked blankly at me for a moment before talking to Caius once again.
Am I fucking invisible? The fuck?
I slam my head down on my desk, fed up with their chattering.
"OW." I hissed, bringing my head back up. That shit hurt. I placed my head back down, not ready for the embarrassment.
"And you're the girl beating me?" Regulus spoke softly from beside me. I was shocked he spoke— in French nonetheless.
"Yeah, I am." I responded, keeping my head down on the desk.
"I don't know if I should feel humbled or confused." He said. I could feel his gaze on the back of my head. Thank God for my good hair day today, otherwise I would've been so embarrassed.
"Maybe you're just not as smart as you thought." I said, lifting my head and turning to look at him. Wow. The whole Black family must have some type of drug in their water that makes them all attractive.
He chuckled dryly, going silent for a moment.
"I'm Professor Slughorn's favourite. So we'll see who comes out on top this year." He said in English. I rolled my eyes at him before noticing how Caius and Barty went quiet.
I can't fucking believe I'm stuck in between dumb and dumber for the rest of the year. Please Godric Gryffindor, my distant ancestor, offer me your wisdom and strength.
Literally a second after I thought that, Barty threw a paper at my head.
Fuck you, Godric.