An American at Hogwarts

First Flight

The next week went mostly the same as the previous. Snape was still treating me noticeably better than the average student, which continued to bother me, but I didn't dare ask him why. The remaining first classes were enjoyable enough. Unfortunately, Defense Against the Dark Arts, the class I was most excited for, was taught by Professor Quirrell, seemingly the most anxious man in existence. His room absolutely reeked of garlic, something that Fred and George claimed was to ward off vampires. He also stuttered constantly. I certainly didn't hold this against him, but it did make understanding his lectures a bit of a chore at times. Professor Sprout, the Herbology teacher, was a rather upbeat woman whose class I quite enjoyed. I wasn't particularly great at it, mind you, but I enjoyed it. Professor Binns was just as dull as Stanley had warned. I actually found the subject matter interesting, but his lectures were all but unbearably dull. It took all my focus and will to stay alert and keep up with my notes, and as time went on, my dedication to said notes fell off. The following Thursday I awoke fairly late, at least for me. I went down to the common room to find Percy pinning a piece of parchment on the notice board. I groaned when I read it.

"Percy do we really have flying lessons with the Slytherins? Who's bright idea was that one?"

Percy shrugged. "Don't complain, they're only for a couple weeks."

I was about to complain more but thought better of it. Percy was not someone I wanted to dislike me, with him being a prefect and all. I sat around reading a book on advanced charms that Professor Flitwick had assigned to me, and soon enough Harry and Ron emerged from our dorms, followed shortly by Hermione and Marie from the girls dorms. They all seemed equally bothered by the situation, especially Harry.

"Great, thats just what I needed. I get to make a fool of myself in front of Malfoy."

Ron patted him on the shoulder reassuringly, as did I.

I smiled at him. "You'll do fine Harry, trust me. I've got a good feeling about today."

Harry smiled weakly back as I went off to join Hermione and Marie, who were heading down to eat. I was rather excited for flying. I had always rather enjoyed it when I got a chance to, even if that did not happen as much as I would have liked. My mom played Quidditch when she was at Hogwarts, so she would take time out of her day sometimes to teach me to play. As class time approached, Malfoy was getting more and more annoying, telling anyone who would listen about his supposed exploits on a broom. I could tell from the way he described them that they had never happened, but it didn't make it any less obnoxious hearing him play himself up over and over again. Soon enough, we were on front lawn of Hogwarts, Madam Hooch handing out the school brooms, which seemed rather ratty compared to the one I was used to back at home. She had all of us stand to the side of our broom and explained how to call it to your hand. Soon enough, a chorus of varyingly confident "up!"s sounded out. Me and Harry got it on our first try, Draco, to my displeasure, achieved it on his second. Hermione and Marie were struggling, as was Ron.

"You have to be confident. You're ordering it into your hand, not asking it to come to you." I said, placing my broom back on the ground and demonstrating once more. Soon enough, everyone had accomplished this first step, but not before Ron managed to cause his broom to whack him in the face. Madam Hooch then had us fly slightly up and forward, being sure to stress not to go too high. As we were about to lift off, however, Neville began rapidly rising into the air on his broom. I shouted for him to jump off before he got too high, but he was too panicked to react. Before we knew it, he had managed to fall from his broom some twenty feet in the air. Fortunately, his robes somehow caught on a pole, partially breaking his fall, but he still landed hard, arms first, with a noticeable crunch. A small orb rolled out of his robes as he writhed around on the ground, clutching his wrist, presumably the Rememberall Harry had told me he had been sent by his grandmother. Madam Hooch quickly diagnosed a broken wrist, and hauled him off to the infirmary, ordering us all to stay grounded under threat of detention. Malfoy, however, had other ideas. He walked over to the Rememberall, picking it up.

"Hey! It's that thing Neville's gran sent him! Maybe if he'd used it properly he'd have remembered not to fall!"

"Shut it Malfoy." Cried Parvati.

Penny Parkinson glared at her. "Defending Neville are you? Didn't think you'd be the type to fancy fat morons."

Me, Harry, and Ron gave Malfoy our best death glare.

"Hand it over, Malfoy." Said Harry, with a rather serious tone."

"Or what? You'll make me? No, I think I will put it somewhere for him to find. Maybe on the roof!" With that said, Draco hopped on his broom and took off, Harry following closely behind him despite Hermione's pleas for him to stay on the ground. I had half a mind to follow as well, but I saw Crabbe, one of Malfoy's goonish friends, reaching for his broom and saw an opportunity to test out a spell that Flitwick had been trying to teach me. I quickly drew my wand and pointed it at Crabbe's broom, which he had yet to pick up off the ground.

Accio!

It took a bit longer than I would like, but the broom sure enough flew towards me, and I caught it with my spare hand.

"You're not making it a two on one, sorry Crabbe."

Crabbe glared at me but backed down when I pointed my wand at him. I didn't actually know enough to do much damage to him, but I imagine he knew even less and didn't want to risk anything. My attention was drawn away by cheering, as Harry flew low to the ground clutching something in his hands. Turns out, Malfoy had thrown the Rememberall and Harry somehow managed to catch it. I ran over to pat him on the back, as did most of the Gryffindors, but our celebration was quickly broken by the cries of Professor McGonagall, who must have seen what had happened.

"HARRY POTTER! I can't believe... so reckless... could have gotten hurt... come with me this instant, young man!"

Harry's smile faded and it looked like he was on the verge of tears as he followed McGonagall into the castle. Hermione ran up to me.

"You're lucky you didn't get in trouble as well."

I sighed. "Yeah, probably. But I wasn't about to let Crabbe get up there too."

Hermione frowned slightly but seemingly decided not to argue. "You think he'll get expelled?"

I shook my head. "Doubt it. Worst that'll happen is he gets a week or so of detention. My mom did worse when she was here and she never got expelled."

Marie came running over. "That was brilliant, Y/N! Did Flitwick teach you that one?"

I nodded. "Yeah, never had it work that well for me though. Hold on."

I looked around and saw another broom a couple feet away.

Accio!

The broom shifted slightly towards me, but didn't fly into my hand as Crabbe's had.

Accio!

No luck again. I sighed. "Well it worked when I needed it to at least."

Marie gave me a reassuring smile. "My dad said something once about emotions being important for magic. Maybe that has something to do with it? It worked when you really wanted it to, but now it isn't working as well because you don't want it as much."

I shrugged. "Maybe, that would make sense. I'll have to ask Flitwick what he thinks in our next session. Anyways, y'all want to head in? I want to find out what happened to Harry."

Marie snickered a bit.

"What?"

"You said y'all, just kind of funny is all."

I blushed slightly, giggling. "Shut up, I'm not that American."

She punched me lightly in the arm, smiling. "Come on, lets go find Harry."