Don't Let the Bed Bugs Bite PV Alexa Abandoned

Alexa listened patiently to the professor of potions as he explained various sleeping potions. She was a good student, always listening attentively, and generally making good marks in this class and others. At least, when she was allowed to do our own work…

The professor made the instructions for the potion they would be working on this class magically appear on the blackboard. Alexa saw they would be brewing a Sleeping Draught (which came as no surprise, considering the content of the lecture), but she groaned inwardly when she was told they would be partnering with their neighbors.

Alexa glanced sidelong at Scarlett as the other girl yawned and looked unhappy about the latest announcement as well. Alexa had never spoken with the Gryffindor before, but she remembered seeing her at Lindsey's end-of-the-year party, last year. She had red hair, like herself, and Alexa turned toward her more attentively as she introduced herself. Alexa hadn't exactly stood out at the party, hanging around the edges and even chocolate, her greatest weakness, so she wasn't really surprised and the other girl didn't remember her.

Always attentive to subtle expressions, and shy people often are, she noticed that Scarlett's smile seemed a little strained, but chose not to comment. Her own smile was small, but came naturally, and was warm. "I'm Alexa Mackenzie. Nice to meet you. Shall we?" She asked, gesturing at the cauldron between them.

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@Alexa Mackenzie

If Scarlett had to have a partner, at least it was a barely-recognisable redheaded girl. Who knows? She could've gotten paired up with a lazy slob of a guy and left to do all the work herself (though considering that situation, she would've been grateful to do it without the interruptions of her imaginary worst-partner-ever). The girl...hadn't she attended Lindsey's end-of-year party in their first-year? She had hung around in the shadows and didn't talk too much, yet seemed alright, albeit shy. The smile she was giving Scarlett was a tad small - but who was Scarlett to notice, her own smile was basically forced - but warmer than Scarlett's own. Damn. She needed to step up her game.

"I'm Scarlett, second-year, Gryffindor" said Scarlett, with a nod towards the other girl. "Nice to meet you too - and yes. Yes we shall."

With another, but more genuine smile towards Alexa, Scarlett got up from her seat and raced to collect the ingredients before the best quality ones were gone, shouting to Alexa, "Check the instructions, I'll get the ingredients!" over her back as she flew over to the cupboard, shoved under some people (benefits of being small and short) and gathered everything they needed. Lavender, Valerian sprigs, Flobberworm Mucus - disgusting - and ran back to their table, as she dumped the contents of her arm down and glanced back up at the board.

"Add lavender to the mortar..."

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Alexa nodded and smiled at the greeting. Now that the other girl mentioned her name, Scarlett, Alexa remembered hearing it at the party last year. So weird to think so much had changed for her since that party. With her family, with her friends at Hogwarts… But it wasn’t all bad.

Scarlett had at first seemed a little less than pleased when the partners had been announced by the professor, but she smiled more warmly now that Alexa before running for the cupboard of ingredients in the classroom, calling to Alexa as she went, asking Alexa to check the instructions while she got the ingredients.

Alexa looked at the board where the instructions were carefully written, and also opened her book to the correct potion, the Sleeping Draught. It seemed pretty simple to brew, but Alexa knew that these dang potions and instructions could be deceiving. She tried her hardest, as she did in every class, but this wasn’t one she had a knack for, like some of the others.

Scarlett returned with the ingredients, and read off the first instruction. Alexa carefully counted out four sprigs of lavender. Sprigs seemed like such a strange measurement to the Muggle-born, but she was growing new stew it in potions. After placing them in the mortar on the table, she looked at the second instruction. “Add 2 measures…” She trailed off as she read the rest of it. She turned to Scarlett. “Do you want to do that?” She asked, smiling.

@Alexa Mackenzie
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"Right," muttered Scarlett, rolling up her robe sleeves and brushing her hair out of the way. She had a habit of letting her hair go loose instead of tying it up recently, but in Potions, that just wasn't practical. She hadn't brought a hair tie or a scrunchie with her, so settled for a sweep back. Fumes from around the classroom were already drifting to the pair's way, which made Scarlett's attention levels perk up. They couldn't and wouldn't fall behind. "So, let me see. Four sprigs..."

She placed the sprigs in and check the blackboard yet again. Add two measures of the herb thing, crush it into a creamy paste, two blobs of Flobberworm Mucus...ew. She grimaced, smiling at Alexa's way. "You know, there's Flobberworm Mucus in this potion," said Scarlett, nodding towards their substance so far. "Just - just wow, right? I mean Flobberworm Mucus...do Flobberworms even have nostrils? Wait, scratch that, I don't wanna know."

She laughed slightly under her breath at her own sarcastic humour, before reading the next instruction, which was to mash the herb, mortar and lavender into a paste. She was good at mashing, but might let Alexa do it, for courtesy reasons and the like.

"D'you wanna mash the stuff together, or should I?" asked Scarlett, view flickering up to her partner. Alexa was certainly taller than her. "So...how were your holidays?" A pathetic attempt at small talk, but Scarlett tried anyway. Every little helped...right?

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Alexa grimaced as she read the rest of the instructions. Mucus! Always fun to deal with…. Not. Scarlett seemed to be thinking along the same lines, mentioning the Flobberworms and their… Mucus. Scarlet began asking about the anatomy of the Flobberworms, jokingly, and Alexa couldn’t help but laugh slightly in response. This girl was obviously funny!

Alexa put the lavender and the herb in the mortar, and Scarlett asked if she would like to pound it, though she was looking at the mortar and pestle almost wistfully as she asked. Alexa smiled. “No, you go ahead and do that. I’ll get started on the cauldron.” While Scarlett began to work on “crushing the ingredients into a creamy paste,” Alexa went over to their shared cauldron. Next was two blobs of Flobberworm mucus into the cauldron. Cringing slightly, she scooped up what seemed like an appropriately sized blob with two fingers, and added it, and another, to the cauldron.

Next was to add two measures of the standard herb, so she measured out that at the table while Scarlett asked about her holidays. Alexa didn’t feel she knew Scarlett well enough to burden her with her own holiday story from hell… So she just went with the simple, “Oh, it was fine, thank you. How was yours? Do anything special?” She felt like an idiot at small talk, and hope Scarlett didn’t notice her blush, as usual, with embarrassment.

@Alexa Mackenzie
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Scarlett scanned over the rest of the ingredients and instructions - apparently, it was always good to read ahead and know what you were doing, especially in Potions. It wasn't really her style of work, but they had to do what they had to do to get a good mark and not fall behind. She looked over the next three instructions. Gently heat it for 30 seconds, add 3 measures of the crushed mixture they had made and wave your wand. Right. Okay. She registered Alexa saying that she could do the honours of crushing the ingredients into paste and Scarlett grinned, seizing her opportunity as Alexa added the mucus and herbs. Scarlett pounded it quickly enough - must've been the extra Beater training - and dusted her hands off, leaving it on the heat.

She counted to thirty before scraping her paste into the cauldron and waving her wand, taking a glance at the board. Leave to brew for twenty minutes? Normally, it would've been seventy minutes, but their cauldron seemed to be in good shape, so the professor had written only twenty minutes. Besides, the lesson time was running out. Scarlett waved her wand, glancing at Alexa sheepishly before tucking it back into her pocket. "Sorry," said Scarlett, cheeks reddening. "You can do the next, um, thing, if you like."

Alexa blushed at the mention of the holiday. When she asked Scarlett, the Gryffindor barely managed to contain her grimace as her own mind wandered towards what had happened. Surprise visit from long-lost parents. Check. Attending a fancy ball hosted by her worst enemy. Check. Getting caught on a Hogwarts Express trainwreck as they returned to school. Check. But that was all a bit heavy for a light-hearted Potions lesson with a cool Hufflepuff girl, so Scarlett just smiled and said, "Oh, that's great! Mine was pretty good - caught up with my family and went out a little, y'know? Apparently we have to wait for a while now so..."

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Sorry for the delay!

After adding the ingredients, gross as one of them was, she knelt down and carefully poked at the kindling below the cauldron with her wand, muttering the spell and lighting a small fire to warm the cauldron.

Scarlett added her ingredients, having crushed them vigorously and quickly, Alexa noticed with a smile. As they settled down to wait the revised 20 minutes, she turned to the Gryffindor girl. "You are on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, right? I've seen you play; you're really good!" Alexa said this enthusiastically, though she really did not know much about Quidditch. She had, however, been to all of the matches this year and last, to support her team. She just wished she could fly well at all… But that definitely wasn't in the cards.

As they continue to wait, Alexa awkwardly asked another question. "So, er, what kinds of things do you like to do for fun?" I'm so lame, Alexa thought in mild annoyance with herself. Conversations were still something that made her feel awkward until she knew the person really well.

She reached unobtrusively into her robe pocket, where her pet rat, Rascal, was currently curled up, fast asleep. She stroked him with two fingers, he raised his head and gently nibbled on one of her fingertips in a loving way. She was so lucky to have him as a companion. He never made her feel awkward. Not that Scarlett had meant to, or anything. It was simply just conversing with someone she didn't know that made Alexa feel awkward.

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apologies for the short and late reply!

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@Alexa Mackenzie

[font=times new roman]S[/font]carlett tapped her foot on the floor to the beat. She did random little things when she was bored, or wanted to move around a bit. Fiddling with her fingers, she watched as Alexa heated up the cauldron. Now, they had to leave it to boil for twenty minutes, which - to Scarlett - was a very long period of time. Annoyingly long, if you could call it that. Still, at least they didn't have to wait seventy minutes; that would've been torture.

In the meantime though, there was always the option to chat and get to know Alexa better. The Hufflepuff started the conversation. "Oh, yeah, I do actually!" said Scarlett, mirroring Alexa's enthusiasm as she replied. Quidditch was a topic she could talk about for days. She knew everything about it, from its seven hundred fouls to exactly who created the Cleansweep 7 (the Nimbus brand was so much better though - Scarlett had a Nimbus broom herself, so she was probably a bit biased). "And, um, thanks. Aren't you a duellist? If you are, I bet you'd be great at it."

Alexa looked a bit nervous and awkward, so Scarlett launched into the conversation eagerly, trying to make sure to show to Alexa that this was perfectly fun and that she wasn't bored or anything. "Ooh, well, apart from Quidditch-" said Scarlett in response to Alexa's question. "I do like pranking, and acting, and climbing and exploring and all that jazz. Not a lot of interesting things though. How about you?"

After Alexa had told Scarlett her response, she would nod and respond with a 'cool! before asking another question to propel the conversation. "So do you have any pets?" Scarlett asked. "Or, like, a favourite animal?"

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