Percy Jackson and the Mirror of Erised

44) Exams

I'd been allowed to leave the medical wing only when exams started. I'd spent all of my time studying in there with Draco and Hermione. Ron had come to visit. Harry hadn't, but only because Draco hadn't left my side once. Harry also didn't know that Ron and Hermione had come.

Madam Pomfrey had seen Draco with his arm over me, and immediately deemed that it would be best if he stayed with me. We both blushed at that.

A few mornings after the initial snake-bite, Draco and I sat on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. I was resting my head on Draco's arm, and all was quiet.

Draco interrupted the silence, "Will you go out with me?"

I grinned, "Yes. I've been waiting for you to ask for awhile."

Draco nodded, "Couldn't find the moment. After you nearly died, I figure I'd just take the chance when I could. You're not in pain right now. If you're dissociating enough, the ceiling can look like cheese, and there's chocolate at the foot of the bed. Not a better time to ask, in my opinion."

"Oh, there isn't. You only ask people out when dissociating. Otherwise, you'd never get to see the cheese. Would you, boyfriend?"

"I guess you wouldn't, boyfriend."

My entire house cheered when I walked into the Great Hall for breakfast the morning of exams. They'd asked Hermione what had happened and everyone had come to visit me at some point. I think they were just happy to see me out of bed.

I was happy to be out of bed.

The classrooms were hot during our tests. It wasn't fun, especially considering I'd practically had a heat stroke from a fever. Bad memories.

We had to take the written tests with special anti-cheating quills. I didn't normally use quills, so this was very annoying.

We had practical exams too. In Flitwick's class, we all had to make a pineapple tap dance across his desk. That was awesome. In McGonagall's class, we had to turn a mouse into a snuffbox. She gave points for how pretty it was. She took points if it had whiskers though. And we had to make a forgetfulness potion in Snape's class. He was breathing down our necks the entire time.

Harry had been struggling ever since the forest. He was worried that Voldemort was going to take the Stone. Of course, we were all worried, but Harry hadn't been getting sleep at night.

Our last exam was History if Magic. We had to spend and hour answering questions about Emeric the Evil. Then we'd be free for the week until we got our exam results.

Everyone cheered when we were told to put up our quills. It was awesome.

"That was far easier than I thought it would be," Hermione said as we joined the crowd of students. "I needn't have learned about the 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct or the uprising of Elfric the Eager."

We went out to the grounds and flopped under our favorite tree. No one else ever sat there, and we'd all found shiny rocks to place around her base. The nymph, Ashley, had told me it was okay that we sat there. She joined us in conversation when Harry wasn't there.

The Weasley twins, the Stolls, and Lee Jordan were all tickling the tentacles of the giant squid as he basked in the shallows.

"No more studying," Ron happily sighed, stretching. "You could look more cheerful, Harry, we've got a week before we find out how badly we've done, there's no need to worry yet."

Harry rubbed his forehead, "I wish I knew what this means! My scar keeps hurting — it's happened before, but never as often as this."

"Go to Madam Pomfrey," suggested Hermione.