Thicker than Water (Marauders Era)

18 December, 1975 - Results

A little more than a week after the mock, which Lavinia had decided had gone reasonably well considering it was her first experience with OWL-type exams, she sat down in Potions next to Severus, feeling at ease with her friends for the first time in what felt like months. The holidays were almost upon them and their first set of mocks was over, their professors assuring them that they would receive their grades at the start of the spring term. This was a relief to Lavinia as it meant her holiday break could be spent with no fear that her mother would catch wind of an unfavorable grade. Any failure on her part would have to be dealt with via letter and hopefully hopefully that would give Rhea the chance to cool down before she dealt with it in person. If she was lucky.

But she'd rather try to be lucky than guarantee disaster with the grades coming in sooner.

It was therefore, with a sense of utter dread that Lavinia listened to Slughorn announce that he'd managed to grade their mocks sooner than expected and would be handing them back at the end of the period. Lavinia felt her heart in her stomach, her thoughts suddenly filled with prayers to made up gods that she'd done well. That Rhea wouldn't kill her for her lack of perfection. She knew she hadn't aced it. She'd gone over every question she could remember afterwards, checking in her notes and she'd forgotten at least two ingredients on each of three separate potions and had misremembered the right timings for several others.

Just let it be okay, she repeated over and over in her head, completely distracted as she began brewing her wit-sharpening potion. The result of this inattention was that at the end of class, her potion was more of a vague lilac trending towards pale blue than the rich purple it was supposed to be.

She was saved by Slughorn's favoritism and was exceedingly grateful for the old professor's complete lack of fair evaluation. He smiled down at her potion and tutted slightly. "Holiday mindset already here," he sighed. "I completely understand. A passable effort, Miss Selwyn. Full marks this time, but don't let it become a habit, eh?" He winked at her jovially and moved on to raving about Severus's potion as Lavinia deflated slightly in relief.

She was already kicking herself for letting it happen, of course. In any other class, that would have resulted in a mark down for the day and she would have risked her position in the top two of the class. Which would have meant an even worse holiday break than she was already going to have thanks to the mocks Slughorn was now handing out.

He handed Lavinia's exam papers to her face down, as he had with everyone in an attempt to preserve their privacy. Lavinia took it and put it into the pages of her book, which she closed before stuffing it into her bag, not once looking at the grade. Thankfully, Severus was too absorbed in reviewing his own exam to notice. She would deal with it later, she told herself as they prepared to leave class.. After dinner. Just in case.

Unfortunately, much of dinner was spent comparing results while Regulus commented on how ridiculous they were being, and Lavinia spent half the conversation hoping they wouldn't make her lie outright about her grade. Then again, it might be easier just to lie. They'd probably be suspicious if she didn't say anything. Still, she'd rather not lie to them if she didn't have to. If she got caught it would be far worse than mere suspicions.

"I mean, I didn't expect to be perfect," Eloise was saying. "And an A is fine I suppose. I mean, Slughorn said that was average, so I guess I'll take it."

Alexandra nodded. "We can only improve from here," she said, ripping off a piece of bread to dip in her stew. "We haven't even finished the curriculum anyway."

"Of course Sev probably got an O," Thomas said, nudging the other boy slightly. "Come on, out with it. Put us commoners with our As in our places."