Dirty Little Game ♠ Professor Lupin

Twelve: To Make Them Happy

December has come and with it the last trip to Hogsmeade. This time, I didn't need an excuse to spend some time alone. Everyone was buying gifts for the others, so our group couldn't do it together so as not to spoil the surprise. We had to be careful not to run into each other in a store. We didn't meet until afternoon to have a Butterbeer.

"Okay, I don't want to sound ignorant, but I'm sure you went overboard with the gifts." Brook pointed to the spell-reduced bags that lay beside my chair.

I shrugged my shoulders, "Why limit myself."

"Half of them are for me because I'm her favourite person." Winston jumped in with a sneaky smile on his face.

"Do I look like a charity?" I stuck my tongue out at him before I drank my beer.

"You know what gift we would enjoy the most..." Jaylee said looking at me meaningfully.

I couldn't think of anything that would make them all happy at the same time. "What?"

She leaned over to me and whispered, "Lupin fired from work!"

I rolled my eyes. Recently, they were unbearable. They were bothering me that Lupin should have been caught long ago. The more they pressed on me, the less I told them, and that made them angry.

"We're not going to talk about it." I said, giving them warning looks. "Or I'll get out of here."

They muttered something under their breaths, dissatisfied, but said nothing more. I decided to change the subject. "This year, my parents are organizing the Christmas feast with Ryley's family. Feel invited."

Brook raised her eyebrows a bit in surprise. "I see your parents took matters into their own hands."

"I won't be surprised if they'd talk about the wedding this spring." Wilton muttered with a sour face. He was in a similar situation to me. His parents pressed him to finally find a girlfriend. I don't think I need to say what would happen if he told them the truth.

I grimaced and took a sip of my beer as if that would help. "Seventeen and already married. Can you imagine going to school with a wedding ring on your finger?"

"Well..." Started mysteriously Brook, the smile on her face getting bigger and bigger. It was obvious what was going on before she even said it. "Matt is going to propose to me."

I was in shock. It always seemed to me that Brook didn't like commitments, that she preferred to be free and move from boy to boy. During the summer holidays she met a boy, or rather a man, because Matt had already graduated from Hogwarts a few years ago. I didn't think anything serious would come out of it.

"That's great!" It was Jaylee who spoke first, squeezing her forearm, a big smile on her face.

"What a surprise." Wilton seemed as taken aback as me. He looked at me for support. I didn't know what to say.

So I said aloud the first thing that came to mind. "Does he know about your... background?"

All three looked at me. One pair of eyes looked to kill. It was the stupidest thing I could say. Inside, I was really curious about it. Few people consciously enter into a relationship with people associated with the Dark Lord. And I knew Brook. I knew that for her own gain she was able to cover up a lot.

"You're lucky there are people here." She said between clenched teeth.

"I'm sorry, that's not what I meant..." I tried to smooth the situation although it was pointless.

She interrupted me, "Stop trying to reverse what you said. I know what you meant. How could anyone be genuinely interested in someone like me." She dipped her hand in her purse and after a moment she placed a bill on the table. "It's good to know what an upper-class bitch think about me."