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booksmarts and broomsticks
act iii , turning tables
chapter forty-three , to hell with men

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➖JACKIE O'HARE ➖
november 1993

"ARE YOU PLANNING ON going to practice at any point?"

The question had been aimed at Jackie who was stretched across the sofa, playing with the - now faintly purple - ends of her hair.

"I don't need to practise, I'm naturally gifted." She shrugged with a small smirk at which Penny - who had raised the question - merely tutted.

Dria cracked a very small smile at Jackie's words. Her head was firmly planted in Tess' lap, her shoes in a pile in front of the other sofa upon which she lay, as she curled up beside her friend.

If she had to guess, she would say that maybe an hour had passed since she'd stormed into the common room in her Oliver-Wood-fuelled rage, and she had been the only one to enter since.

"Haven't you guys got a new Seeker?" Tess mused, as she absentmindedly braided a section of Dria's hair.

"Cedric Diggory, isn't it?" The blonde chuckled, her voice cracking having not spoken in a good while. "Maisie's obsessed with him."

"Can't blame her really, can you?" Jackie responded at the mention of the new Hufflepuff Seeker, in the year below them.

"No, you cannot." Dria agreed, her chuckle still shaking through her as her friends responded with similar laughs.

However, whatever light hearted atmosphere they'd managed to create for themselves very quickly disappeared at the sound of the gut wrenching scream.

Dria shot up from her position on Tess' lap, her blue eyes narrowing in the direction of the Portrait Hole from where the sound had derived, as it was followed by growling noise and the sound of something paper-like being slashed.

"What in the fuck was that?"

Dria whipped around to see Jackie and Penny on their feet with wide eyes aimed at the Portrait Hole, while Tess remained seated, seemingly unfazed as she continued braiding the last ends of her blonde hair.

"That's the Fat Lady." The Robbins girl shrugged, nonchalantly. "She sings sometimes, you get used to it."

"Tess, that didn't sound like singing." Dria assured her friend, stealing her hair back and out of her reach, earning a scoff in response.

"That's what I've been trying to tell her!"

Penny, being the responsible person that she was, had risen from her seat by the fire and had elected to investigate the problem close-up. Jackie following close behind her, with her eyebrows knitted tightly together.

"It's jammed." The Ravenclaw spoke up after a moment.

"What?" Dria quirked an eyebrow at her words.

"The Portrait Hole won't open." Penny reiterated, as Jackie grunted as she made a meagre attempt to open the Portrait.

"You mean she's left her post?" Tess asked, rising to her feet and moving towards the entrance.

"Does that mean we're stuck in here?" Penny looked to Dria as she walked back towards the sofa.

"Oh my God, this is fantastic." The blonde let out a gleeful laugh. "I never have to face my problems again, maybe fate is on my side after all."

"Be serious." Penny shoved her, as Dria merely groaned and curled back up on the sofa.

"Oh, come on, you've barely even tried!" Tess cried upon examining the door. "You've got to put your back into it."

Dria raised her head from the arm of the sofa to spectate Jackie and Tess' bickering at the Portrait Hole.

"Oh, be my guest!" Jackie exclaimed, stepping back with folded arms as Tess rammed herself into the doorway.

"We're royally fucked."

"Yep." Penny agreed as she slumped down on the sofa beside the blonde. "And we're going to miss dinner."

"Oh, for shit's sake!"

***

AFTER MANY AN attempt at getting the Portrait Hole to open, Jackie and Tess eventually conceded that their efforts weren't going to them anywhere. However they only came to this conclusion because Penny threatened to hex them if they didn't stop trying and subsequently injuring themselves in the process.

The ruckus that they had created in their attempt brought the issue with the common room entrance to everyone's attention. Aside from the small group of second years that had been huddled around a Wizard Chess a set, a few first years had emerged from their dormitories with worried looks as well as Alita Byrnes, who had been studying up in her dorm.

Dria adopted her initial reaction to the closure of the Portrait Hole for a good while, deciding to believe the universe was acting in her favour by confining them all away from the rest of the school. However, her temperament began to change when she noticed a rumbling in her stomach and Penny brought to her attention just how much time had passed.

Jackie had decided that an optimum use of this time would be to apply another round of purple dye to the ends of her hair, and had soon adopted her signature plastic hair wrap once more. Meanwhile, Tess had been pacing around the room, throwing out a million questions as to their safety in the room.

"Is it getting hot in here or is that just me?"

"It's the fire, Tess."

"Do you reckon they've checked the walls for asbestos?"

"What in the fuck is that?"

However, she eventually calmed down when Penny cracked open a window and Alita proposed a games of cards.

"Got any sevens?" The Byrnes asked Tess, who shook her head.

"Go fish." She replied, before turning to Dria. "Got any twos?"

"Fuck's sake." The blonde groaned, handing over her cards. "I hate playing card games with you."

Tess let out a gleeful laugh as her hand of cards increased in size. However, before she could launch into a lecture about her unnatural gift for card games, a loud rumbling sound of stone crunching caught their attention.

Their heads whipped around in unison in time to see the Portrait Hole shift, before eventually being cast wide open to reveal Professor McGonagall looking white as a sheet.

"Finally!" Tess cried, taking a deep inhale before getting to her feet and launching herself in the direction of the open archway.

"You took your time!" Jackie followed Tess' manner, as she too got to her feet at lightning speed and marched over to the Head of Gryffindor.

"Jackie!" Penny scolded, as the rest of the student began to congregate around the professor.

"My apologies to you all, but we could not unseal the portrait hole until a guardian was reinstated."

"What happened?" The blonde found herself asking with knitted brows. "Why did it get jammed?"

"The Fat Lady's portrait was attacked earlier this evening, causing her to desert her post." McGonagall explained matter-o-factly, as her eyes scanned all the pupils, taking a headcount mentally.

"By who?"

"We have reason to believe that an intruder broke into the castle and wished to gain entry to Gryffindor Tower, the Fat Lady refused such entry." The professor explained slowly, her voice heavy as she let out a sigh.

"An intruder? You don't mean-?" Alita spoke up, her brown eyes widening in slight alarm.

"Sirius Black."

"Wicked."

"Jackie!"

"What?" The O'Hare girl rubbed her arm where Dria had smacked it in distaste. "This year was shaping up to be quite the dull one."

"Is he still in the castle?" Penny asked, straightening up a little, her Head Girl badge becoming a little clearer.

"A thorough search will be carried out this evening by the staff, in the meantime, I will be escorting you all to the Great Hall where you will be spending the night."

Dria could feel her eyes widen as a wave of disgruntled murmuring broke out amomg the group of students as Jackie voiced their thoughts aloud.

"Oh, brilliant."

"Jack!"

"What? You try and have a good night's sleep on concrete!"

Despite being in full agreement with her Hufflepuff friend, Dria followed Penny's suit in telling her to shush before looking back at the professor.

"Is the Fat Lady back?" The blonde asked, nodding her head in the direction of the Portrait.

"No, I'm afraid not." McGonagall tutted, with an almost pained look. "She is still rather shaken by the incident."

"Then, who let you in?" Tess arched a brow

"What villains are these that trespass upon my private lands?!"

The blonde could feel herself tense at the sound of the voice of a certain portrait's subject she remembered from the treks she used to take up to the Divination tower. Her eyes snapped back to McGonagall.

"Oh no."

"Oh yes." The professor stepped back, clearing the way for the students. "To the Great Hall, if you don't mind."

***

"THIS IS SHAPING UP to be the worst day of my life."

While Dria's foul mood had dissipated during her time in the common room, it had resurfaced on the walk down to the common room and was not aided by the grumbling of her stomach once they reached the Great Hall.

"Amen." Jackie grumbled in agreement, as she, Dria and Tess grabbed themselves sleeping bags from a pile conjured by Dumbledore moments previously.

"I really don't want to sleep down here." The blonde whined, as she hooked her arm through Tess' and three of them made their way over to a corner of the Hall. "I was really counting on crying myself to sleep tonight."

"Ah, well. Best laid plans." Jackie tutted, arranging her sleeping bag on the floor.

"I'll let you spoon me if you want." Tess nudged the blonde.

"You're a good friend."

After a few moments, the three of them were happily situated in their sleeping bags with the gazes fixed on Penny who had been roped into her Head Girl duties in supervising the students in the Hall while the staff conducted a search for Sirius Black.

"How do you reckon he did it then?" Jackie muttered once Penny moved out of their view.

"Who? Black?" The blonde asked, curling up against the wall.

"Heard some of the third years muttering about him Apparating in." Tess offered at which Dria gave a firm shake of her head.

"Impossible, you can't Apparate onto the grounds."

"The Floo Network?"

"Pretty sure it's closed circuit within the castle." Dria dismissed the girl's guess once more.

"Flying?" Jackie queried, laying on her back.

"The Dementors would have got him surely?"

"I mean they're pretty shit at their job." The Hufflepuff shrugged, earnings slap from Tess.

"Don't slag off the Dementors."

"I'm getting seasonal depression as is!" The O'Hare girl exclaimed. "The last thing I need is them to bring up more."

"They're just doing their jobs." The blonde shrugged, causing Jackie to sit up promptly.

"I can't believe you're defending fucking Dementors." The Hufflepuff shoved Dria's leg, with a groan. "If they could act on their free will, we'd all be as good as dead inside."

"Not much change for you then, Jack?" Tess chuckled, moving to lie on her front, earning a laugh from Dria.

"Nah, not really."

Dria pursed her lips in contemplation, her mind considering other options as to how the intruder got inside the castle.

"What if he had inside help?"

"Yeah, I really think our professors have a hidden agendas of getting us all killed." Tess scoffed at the suggestion, at which Jackie simply smirked.

"Everyone's got a dirty little secret."

Dria's face contorted out of its frown momentarily as she let out a chuckle at Jackie's words. However, her eyebrows furrowed a moment later upon seeing the Hufflepuff withdraw a book from the depths of her sleeping bags.

"What did you bring a book for?" Tess voiced the question before the blonde could find the words.

"Ah, this isn't just any book."

"No?" Dria quirked an eyebrow, squinting her eyes in attempt to read the cover as Jackie passed it into Tess' beckoning hands.

"It's my greatest fascination." Jackie told them with an excited grin.

Dria turned her attention to Tess whose eyes were narrowed as she looked over the pages.

"It's annotated?" The Robbins girl quirked a brow.

"Yep, but it seems to be annotated for someone." Jackie explained, her grin never fading as her two friends responded with confused looks.

"How do you mean?" The blonde asked as Tess passed the book into her hands, as she saw the scribblings for herself.

"It's like a love letter - it's hard to describe." Jackie shrugged.

"Like the one Penny found in Osh's?"

Tess' sudden addition caused Dria to look up from the pages of book which she had now noticed was titled Wuthering Heights.

"The plot thickens." She remarked, her eyes narrowing over the writing once more.

"You alright?" Tess asked her with an arched eyebrow.

"It's familiar." The blonde mused, handing the book back to Jackie before expanding. "The handwriting."

"Reminds me of yours a little bit." The Hufflepuff put forward at which Dria shrugged.

She supposed there were a few similarities between the handwriting in the book and her own.

"Did you get it from the shop?" Tess asked, propping her head up on her hands.

"That's the funny thing, I found it in my dorm." Jackie lowered her voice as a group of prefects patrolled passed them. "Really hidden away, I only found it when I bust the floorboard - no idea how long it was there for."

"So it belonged to a Hufflepuff?" Tess asked, her voice also lowering.

"But did they write the annotations or were they the person the annotations were written for?" Dria queried, all the while Jackie's grin remained on her face

"That is the mystery." She smiled, clutching the book close to her before looking at Tess and Dria resolutely. "I'll solve it, there's got to be something in here that will tell me who this mystery girl is."

"Mystery girl?" Tess repeated. "You reckon it's a girl who's written in it, then?"

"I'm positive."

Dria let out a light chuckle as she pulled her legs up to her chest, before allowing her eyes to wander around the rest of the Hall.

However, her chuckle soon faded as her blue eyes locked with a pair of brown ones across the other side of the room.

If Jackie and Tess had stopped talking about book, Dria was none the wiser as she felt her jaw harden at the sight of Oliver.

She let out a small huff, before she pulled her gaze away from him and felt herself slump down the wall.

"Are you going to talk to him?" Jackie raised an eyebrow, as she and Tess noticed the blonde sudden silence.

"No."

"I saw him sulking about on the way down." Tess muttered, with a slight look of sympathy. "He looked really upset, Dria."

"I don't care." The blonde mumbled as she manoeuvred herself to lie down between her two friends. "He's been a real shit about all of this. I really don't like or care about him right now."

"Did he end things with Isolde?" Jackie asked, the question aimed at Tess as Dria buried herself further in her sleeping bag.

"Haven't heard anything officially, but I'm pretty sure I saw her stamp on his foot in the hallway earlier." Tess whispered back.

"Lucky." Dria murmured in response from inside the sleeping bag.

"Don't worry, Dria, I'm on your side." Jackie told her, tapping the blonde's sleeping bag covered head, while Tess shot her a disapproving look. "What? I've always said it, Wood's an arse."

Dria found the will to re-emerge from the depths of her sleeping bag to spare Jackie an appreciative grin. However, looking up at her, Dria couldn't help but stifle a light chuckle upon realising Jackie had yet to remove her hair wrap from her head.

"Just how exactly are you planning to rinse your hair out, Jack?"

"Oh, fuck!"

𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖓𝖆 𝖘𝖕𝖊𝖆𝖐𝖘!
thanks for 200k my loves,
you will never understand
the amount of appreciation
and love i have for every
single reader that finds
and enjoys this story! <3

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