Callisto

5

The cup stood in the middle of the Grand Hall. Day by day, students added their names. The more showy did it during mealtimes. If Callisto had been old enough, she would probably have just crept in privately when the hall was empty.

But it was during dinner several days later that some more of the older students wrote their names on parchment and dropped it into the cup, to cheers and applause.

"I wish we could do the Quidditch cup this year," Adele said morosely. "It's my last chance to win it."

"You could enter the Tournament instead," one of the boys suggested. Callisto had noticed that most of the girls avoided Adele. It was only really the boys who spoke to her, and for most of them, it didn't even seem to be because she was attractive. Sure, there were the ones who whistled at her in the halls, and said things that made Callisto blush, but Adele dealt with them well, with sharp words or a smack upside the head. She seemed to have adopted Callisto as a kind of little sister, sitting with her at meals and pushing her way through crowds for her. Callisto was grateful. She might have thought Draco would help too, but her brother hardly looked at her.

"I might," she said thoughtfully. "Why not? Hey Cal, have you got some parchment?"

It took Callisto a minute to realise she was talking to her. She blinked, then pulled some out of her bag and handed it over, as Adele pulled a quill and a bottle of ink from hers. Callisto might have expected her signature to be spiky and impatient, like the girl herself, but Adele's handwriting was swirly and girlish. She folded it up, strode across the hall, and tossed it into the flame to applause. Then she turned around and gave a theatrical bow.

Callisto wished she could be as confident as her, especially when she saw her talking to Jaron Travers. He was a popular boy in her year, a Ravenclaw. Jaron was a handsome boy – he had thick black curls and clever dark eyes, and she knew for a fact that most of the girls (and probably some of the boys) had a thing for him, though he never seemed to notice them. He was the sort of cool that was aloof, the sort of cool she had often ached to be, back when she had been Orson. Though Montague claimed to be the leader of the pack, it was really Jaron everyone looked up to. For Merlin's sake, they even all called him by his first name, something the other boys rarely did. He was a prefect, and bloody perfect, and – honestly, she had more than a little crush on him, and though he had never noticed chubby Orson, she thought she saw him look at her, and ducked her head quickly, blushing.

Callisto turned back to her food, but she heard two girls nearby muttering. One was a Slytherin, but the other wore the bronze and blue of Ravenclaw.

Callisto looked down, but it was too late. The Ravenclaw girl shot her a bright smile. She had shining brown hair that was back in a French plait, and striking blue eyes. "You're the one who's related to Draco Malfoy, right?"

She nodded, and a slim hand reached over the other girl, clasped hers and shook. "I'm Sarafina Dearheart."

She knew the name. Her father worked with Sarafina's.

Sarafina gestured to the other girl. "This is Louisa."

Louisa nodded to her shyly. She had long blonde hair, the sort of fairy princess waves she'd always longed for as a child, when Lucius had read storybooks to her.

"I'm Callisto," she said. "Black."

Sarafina switched places with Louisa so she was sitting beside Callisto, who poked her food uncertainly.

She looked over to Adele, who was still talking to Jaron, and Sarafina followed her gaze.

"That Adele is such a show off. The guys are only interested in her because she dresses like a stripper."

"Oh," Callisto said. "She....she's nice, I thought."

Sarafina raised an eyebrow.

The bell rang, and as they gathered their things, Louisa asked her, "Where are you heading now?"

"The library."

"Oh, us too! You must sit beside us. We'll walk with you."

"Oh, well – I was going to go with Ad-"

Sarafina took the bemused girl firmly by the elbow and steered her out of the Great Hall.

Callisto was sitting in the common room later when Adele sat down beside her. Her uniform was even scruffier now, and her socks, which should have been knee high, were rolled down.

"Homework," she said in distaste, seeing Callisto's Charms questions.

"Haven't you got homework to do?"

"Fuck it. I'll see what I can get done in the morning. So many essays," she groaned, closing her eyes. "You don't know how good you have it."

Before bed, Adele told Callisto she could borrow some of her old notes, so Callisto followed her up into the seventh year dormitory.

It was pleasantly cool, and quieter than the common room. It was easy to know which bed was Adele's. The trunk in front of it was open but not unpacked, clothes and books spilling out of it. Makeup was strewn across the surface of her dressing table, and textbooks were in untidy stacks beside the bed. Adele bent to get one of them, but she stopped still.

"Adele?" Callisto asked, wondering what was wrong.

She straightened quickly, her cheeks pink. "Fucking bitches," she said. "The fucking bitches in this dormitory –"

She stormed out of the dormitory and Callisto followed, but only after she too had seen the word written on the dressing table in vicious spiky letters, DYKE WHORE.

Adele strode up to the common room and demanded to know who had done it, but obviously, nobody owned up. After she had told Snape, Callisto helped her wipe the letters off.

"He won't do anything, you know," she said quietly.

Adele was still red in the face, but her black hair hid it as she scrubbed viciously. "Who?"

"Snape. He won't do anything," Callisto had first hand experience of this. When she had gone to him about Montague and co, he had told her to ignore it, which was pretty hard to do and was about as useful as telling somebody to use a plaster on a broken arm.

They scrubbed in more silence until Adele spoke again. "I'm not, you know. A whore."

"I know."

"No you don't. That's what most of the girls say. It's so much easier to have guy friends. I do like girls. And guys."

"Cool," Callisto said faintly, not sure what she was supposed to say. Adele laughed, and then she joined in.