In Another Life

Cassie grumbled darkly under her breath. It was only the first day! Why did teachers have to give them so much homework on the first day. They did have other things to do that did not revolve around schoolwork and homework. Cassie sighed as she gathered up her books.

Some people in the class protested, but McGonagall quieted them with a sharp look. The bell then rang, dismissing them to go to Charms. As they walked from the room Draco was complaining under his breath. "This is utterly ridiculous," he said. "Do they expect us to have time to do all?"

Charms passed uneventfully, apart from the fact that they were given another essay to do for homework. This put Cassie in a rather sour mood, she did not want to spend every moment out of classes doing homework. She had three essays and she had only had three classes in the year so far.

Lyssa frowned at the thought of having four essays to write already as she made her way to lunch. She could already tell that this year was going to be a kick in the face. Stupid NEWT level classes. Things were so much easier in the earlier years, before all the big exams.

Cassie enjoyed lunch, because they were not given an essay in the hour or so that they had for lunch. If they got an essay in potions she was going to shoot someone. The two girls made their way to potions and when the teacher mentioned partners Cassie knew hat this lesson was destined for failure.

Lyssa frowned as she looked her schedule over during lunch, noting the double potions she had next and then at the double transfig in the morning. She wasn't in a very pleasant mood as lunch ended, thinking of her workload that night. She walked to the potions classroom, sitting next to Blaise, self-assured she wasn't moving from that spot. At least, she was until teh teacher mentioned he was picking partners. There her eyes narrowed and a scowl planted on her face.

The teacher started giving out partners and Cassiescowled darkly when hers was given. "Evans, Malfoy, Melyssa that is." This teacher obviously did not know that partnering them together waslike setting off a bomb and just standing there waiting for it to explode.

Lyssa's mouth dropped open when she heard who her partner was, but refused to allow it to do so. Instead, her scowl deepened and her arms snaked across her chest in silent protest. She looked over at Blaise who'd been paired with a Ravenclaw. Lucky him.

Claudie got partnered with Amara, Malfoy's freind and Cassie watched Claudie walk over say hi and sit down, before gettng out her book and starting to work on the potion. Cassie scowled and glanced away sending a death glare at the teacher who was waiting for her to go and sit next to Malfoy expectently. In the end though Casse moved and sat down wth a huff next to the grl.

Lyssa sat at her chair, turned slightly away from the girl that was meant to be her partner, as the teacher gave instructions. "Today," Slughorn said, "each set of partners will be making a Wit-Sharpening potion. You have the rest of class. Turn to page 23 for instructions and begin."

"Well this sounds like fun," Cassie muttered pulling out her book and dropping it into the table. She flicked through the pages until she got to the one they needed and then glanced through the ingredients before going off to get them, muttering about being partnered with Malfoy.

Lyssa finally looked over as the girl came back with the ingredients. "Just sit there and don't do anything," she said, in a snippy tone. "You'd probably just mess it up if you tried to help, and I actually care about my grades."

Cassie rolled her eyes. "I'm not stupid you know and I'm not going to stuff it up. Amazingly enough I don't want to fail either." Sometimes it surprised her how bloody stupid Malfoy could be. She lit the fire under the caldron watching the flame flicker for a moment.

Lyssa fought not to roll her eyes. "Don't make me laugh," she said. "I highly doubt that you've got any skill with potions. It's practically a Gryffindor quality to be horrid at the subject in fact. There's not a competent Gryffindor potions maker in this room."

"I got an O in my owls," Cassie told her with an eyeroll. "So actually I'm pretty good." She glanced at the book reading the first few lines of instructions before getting out her knife and setting off to work on the first step off the potion.

Lyssa looked at the girl, eyebrow raised. "I doubt it was an honest O," she said. "You're grader was probably some mediocre halfblood trying to play off the act of being a professional, as I also got an O and there's no possible way that you're on my level."

Cassie scowled and clenched her fists tightly, her finger nails digging into her palm. As much as she would have loved to thwack the girl in the face there was a teacher present and she didnt want a Detension on her first day. "You know," Cassie said. "You're rather inept yourself. So what if im a halfblood? Im rather proud of that fact actually."

Lyssa snorted at the girl. "What's there to be proud of?" she questioned. "You have no lineage, no expansive family history, no money from the looks of your robes and books. You have nothing, except some petty magic that you think is impressive."

Cassie snorted. "Like I care about money and family history. There's actually nothing in that to be proud of, because it has nothing to do with you, nothing to do with what you have acheived. You're stealing someone elses fame who you probably never met."

Lyssa looked at the girl indignantly for a moment and opened her mouth to respond. Then she closed it again, not having a proper response. She glared off to the side instead, refusing to admit that this girl had a point.

Cassie smirked as the girl said nothing in reponce to what she had just said. Pushing her hair out of her face the Gryffindor added the first ingredient glancing at the next line to find out what the second ingredient was. "Are yoi going to help?" Cassie asked her. "Or just sit there in a huff that I'm right?"

"Malfoys don't huff," Lyssa said, looking back over. "And you're not right. You just don't understand." Deciding that since she'd gone on about caring for her grades enough to warrant this, Lyssa grabbed the next ingredient and handed it to the girl.

"Sure they don't," Cassie replied taking the ingredient from her hand and setting about adding it to the potion. She quite enjoyed potions as once you got the basics it didn't really change that much. Just some things had to be added in different ways to stop an explosion. "I understand alright, but I still think it's bloody stupid."

Lyssa shrugged at the girl. "If you say so," she said. "Athough, I don't see how you can say you understand when you've obviously never experienced it." She shrugged again, looking around to see how Draco, Blaise, and Amara were doing with their partners.

Cassie shrugged and continued working on the potion, glancing at the intructions between each step to make sure that she was doing it right. Because a) she didn't want to stuff up the potion and get a bad mark and b) she didn't want to stuff up the potion with Malfoy sitting right next to her. She glanced sideways at Claudia once she'd added the ingredientsto see that her freind was getting on relativly well with her partner which made Cassie frown.