The Pensieve

The Boy Who Wasn't

"Don't all relatives just drop you off a bridge sometimes?" Neville asked in surprise as he studied the newest charm he'd once managed by accident. The incantation to make one bouncy looked immensely complicated for something he'd done purely by accident.

Harry was waving his own wand around at his pencil-case without much hope as he passed him a box of liquorice wands. "I mean my cousin tried once, but like, it wasn't something I'd like repeated," he shrugged without concern, eyes on Hermione who was sparing with Ron over the proper phrasing of it. He and Neville had a running tally and he'd already called her a know-it-all twice, one more time and he'd strike out for the day hopefully. Then she'd either come over here and help or stalk off to the Library while they all followed in her huffy silence about what the answer was.

The bell rang for evening classes to begin cutting them off instead. Neville tucked Trevor carefully into his bag along with his Charms work so his pet wouldn't wind up in that class instead as he miserably swung his bag into place and went down to his lest favorite subject with them. Potions class was as tormenting as ever.

Neville always chose to sit at the table directly in front of Hermione rather than with the trio because this way he couldn't be distracted by Ron and Harry when they chose to be inattentive in class but could still hear her whispering the instructions to herself as he tried to follow along with her rather than his own imbecile hands skipping and forgetting steps. He knew they were supposed to be working on the Shrinking Solution today, because it was written on the board, but he'd already forgotten what steps he'd done while trying to keep up with her fast pace. One rat spleen had his potion almost at the same shade of green, perhaps another would strengthen it. No wait, Snape had said something about those, he was sure of it, so maybe if he added a dash more leach juice would balance that out...

At least Malfoy coming in caused a minor distraction before Snape could get to him and notice quite yet, he was frantically cutting up his roots and trying to make them symmetrical before that wore off. The Slytherin prat was helping nothing, making him jumpy and even more ill at ease as he set himself up next to Harry and Ron today, just begging for trouble as he instigated with them about his own potion getting help as if something were actually wrong with his arm. If he hadn't gotten hurt by being so skittish around those hippogriffs, no way had that scratch of his had any lasting damage.

His potion might cause that on someone though, it was the wrong color now and he knew it, if only he could go back and-

"Orange, Longbottom," Snape appeared quite out of nowhere, ladling some up and allowing it to splash back into the cauldron, so that everyone could see while he flinched back from the drops. One landed on his book making it sizzle and the page grew just slightly out of the binding, as if a reminder for later when he had to do extra homework. "Orange." He cringed into his seat as his bottomless black eyes and mirthless, tormenting smile bared down on him. His shaking grew for how Snape managed to say even the basic colors with menace. "Tell me, boy, does anything penetrate that thick skull of yours? Didn't you hear me say, quite clearly, that only one rat spleen was needed? Didn't I state plainly that a dash of leech juice would suffice? What do I have to do to make you understand, Longbottom?"

Neville was near tears, he could feel the waves of embarrassment crashing down on him. Gran had said if she got one more letter from the school, she'd send him another Howler for his dismal performance. He'd be yanked out any day now and he'd have to tell his parents. He wondered if that would finally be something to get their eyes to focus on him...

"Please, sir," said Hermione, "please, I could help Neville put it right -"

"I don't remember asking you to show off, Miss Granger," said Snape coldly, and Hermione went as pink as Neville.

The Potions master had already turned away from her dismissively, back to him to likely dismiss him from the castle. "Longbottom, at the end of this lesson we will feed a few drops of this potion to your toad and see what happens. Perhaps that will encourage you to do it properly." He moved away, leaving Neville breathless with fear. He wished he could get on his knees and grovel, apologize to Snape for his stupidity and whatever else he'd done to earn such a wrath. Not Trevor, his beloved pet who always put a smile on his face for his shenanigan's. He'd rather drink this himself...

"Help me!" he moaned to Hermione.

She truly was the brightest witch of her age; only needing to hear the briefest explanation of what he'd been doing for her eyes to light up in understanding. She hissed at him that he could balance it out properly, whispering to him what should go in and to stir constantly now to help it all even out faster; and it worked! Trevor was saved from whatever madness he would have caused, but Neville packed up and sprinted along to his next class still fighting off tears. One more day like this and Snape would ruin his entire future.

He wished he could speak to his parents properly, just once. It probably sounded stupid and his Gran would scold him, if he could ask them one thing it shouldn't be how to deal with a terrible teacher, and he knew he would grow greedy quickly from this being granted. Just one more question, just one more minute...he stopped in front of the DADA classroom and took a deep breath. The new teacher wasn't even here yet to make yet another bad impression on. He could do this, stop these pitiful tears and just do one more class today. He would do this one thing properly, for them.