Invitation to the Ball
“Ella-Jane’s in the nick again,” giggled Cecilia. “Did you hear about it, Sally-Anne? Flavian says she’s the black sheep of the family.”
I tried to think of a polite way to end the conversation.
“Sally-Anne, did you hear what I said?” Cecilia stamped her foot impatiently. “It’s very rude not to answer when I speak to you! I asked if you knew about Ella-Jane’s latest detention.”
“Of course.” I hoped the one I knew about really was the latest; the news was three days old.
“She really is a meff, isn’t she? She has no feminine grace at all.” Cecilia made a preening gesture over her own plump curves and tossed back her dark curls. “Flavian boasted to Granny that Ursula and I are already queen bees among the boys. But he called Ella-Jane a tomboy and Molly-Rose a bluestocking. I don’t imagine they’ll ever get married, do you?”
“Cecilia, do you even know what the word ‘bluestocking’ means?”
“Are you calling me thick?” The ready tears glittered in her eyes again. “It means a girl who’s too busy reading to bother doing her laundry. Molly-Rose’s like that. If Mummy didn’t tidy up after her, she’d be smelly. But even though you’re mean to me, Sally-Anne, I’m going to say something nice to you. Flavian told Granny that you were a homebody. That means you aren’t going to end up an old maid like your sisters, because some men like the homebody type.”
She paused for me to say something, so I said, “I can’t predict the future.”
This time she flushed with anger. “That isn’t magic, that’s just common sense! You’re a half-blood with no Galleons; you aren’t pretty and you never tease boys; your sisters are an absolute embarrassment to you; you aren’t even nice. So anyone would think you didn’t have a hope with the wizards. But as long as you keep up your cooking and cleaning, some wizard will want you for his housewitch. And talking of you not being nice, I’m going to tell Flavian what a toe-rag you’ve been today!”
I wasn’t too worried about that, because Cecilia usually forgot to write home. But I knew I would lose my temper in earnest if I didn’t get rid of her quickly. I put my hand on the owlery door and said, “I’m going in. Are you coming?”
“That manky place! No fear!”
So when the owlery door closed, Cecilia and I were on different sides of it. I did in fact have letters to send.
Dear Mum and Raymond,
Everything is fine. I know you’re worried about Ella-Jane, but it really isn’t a problem by Hogwarts standards. Professor Snape put Ella-Jane in detention because she threw a box of live lizards at Astoria Greengrass. We blame Astoria because she threw Billywig stingers at Ella-Jane first.
Yes, Ella-Jane had to spend all Saturday morning shelling snails, but this is a very normal kind of thing at Hogwarts. I know she’s been complaining that Snape didn’t punish Astoria, but unfair treatment between houses is quite normal here too…
I was exhausted with trying to explain away Ella-Jane’s behaviour so that Mum wouldn’t worry and Cressida wouldn’t make excuses to give her extra punishments. As I tied the letter to a school owl, the boy in the next stall turned to look at me. It was Terry Boot from my Potions class.
“Was that your own owl?” he asked.
“No, just a school one. Oh, yours has purple eyes!” Terry’s eyes were blue, and his face had a fresh, scrubbed look.
“He’s a spotted wood-owl from Java. That is, the breed is Javan; Tychicus was hatched at Eeylops.”
“He’s beautiful. You’re lucky if you have a place to keep an owl at home.”
Terry laughed; he laughed a great deal. “I don’t, really; I hate cages, so I have to be very careful to keep Tychicus clean. It’s surprising that my parents tolerate him, actually, as they’re Muggles.”
“My stepfather is a Muggle, and he had real trouble understanding why my sister keeps her old Shooting Star indoors –it drops twigs everywhere, and she can’t fly it in the house. And when my stepbrother…”
But before I could enlarge on the complications of living with Muggles, Anthony Goldstein poked his head around the door. Terry hastily patted his owl, apologised to me and fled. I followed him out, to find that Cecilia was still lurking in the corner. I pretended not to see her, but her voice rang in my ears anyway.
“Sally-Anne! Did you hear what Molly-Rose did to Xavier on her last access weekend? Flavian says she must be still jealous of him!”
A week later, it seemed that Terry Boot was following me everywhere! I first noticed it over dinner, when he seemed to be hanging around the Hufflepuff table. But he didn’t speak to anyone, and Michael Corner soon called him away. Then he chose a seat near me in the Quidditch stands. But Susan and Megan sat themselves down on each side of me, and with a startled look at all of us, Terry gave up the effort to speak. He even threw a paper dart at me during History of Magic, but it missed, and Draco Malfoy picked it up with a snigger. The note couldn’t have been very interesting, since Malfoy seemed disappointed by the contents, but I knew it would be asking for trouble to claim it from the Slytherins. Terry would come and talk to me if it was important.
But he didn’t. He walked right up to me in a Potions lesson, almost as if he wanted to share my cauldron, but Snape put a stop to that.
“Trying to chat up the girls in class-time, Boot? I assure you, no conversation with Miss Perks will raise your Potions marks. Sit here next to Smith at once!”
“Terry Boot seems very friendly all of a sudden,” remarked Hannah, as soon as our practical work was underway.
“Do you think he does fancy Sally-Anne?” asked Megan.
I shook my head. “It doesn’t look like that kind of thing.”
“It doesn’t look as if he wants to borrow your homework notes either,” pointed out Susan.
“I know. I can’t work out what he wants. But it isn’t either of those.”
“Does it annoy you?” asked Hannah.
It didn’t; but I was surer than ever that I wasn’t imagining it. I meant to ask him about it after Potions, but Snape set so much homework that we decided to go to the library instead.
Terry didn’t finally catch me alone until the weekend, when a few of us volunteered to help Professor Sprout with some new supplies. Neville Longbottom was building a moist habitat for the jewelweed and angelica, a task that Sprout couldn’t entrust to anyone else, and I was building a dry corner for the prickly pears. I had been at it for fifteen minutes when Terry Boot came over to my side of the greenhouse.
“Did you lose a quill?” he asked. He putdown his trowel and held out a grubby goose-feather with split ends. “Did you drop this in the owlery the other day?”
I couldn’t remember; my head had been full of my altercation with Cecilia. “I might have, but it’s all right – I have plenty of spares.” We grinned: it was rather absurd that he had been chasing me around the school to return such a wilted specimen.
“So perhaps you don’t want this either?” He held out a dog-eared parchment, printed with the unmistakable pattern of a shoe and signed with my signature.
This time it wasn’t funny. It was my letter to Dad. “But how could I forget…? Anyone might have read it!”
“I don’t think so; no one else went into the owlery while I was talking to Anthony, and I went straight back inside afterwards. I’m sorry I stepped on your things before I noticed them. I didn’t like to owl your letter for you in case it was a draft or a stray essay.”
“Thank you for rescuing it,” I said, feeling foolish. “I’d rather you saw it than… some other people. Oh, what on earth did I write?”
“No idea. I only saw the signature.”
I scanned it. I had indiscreetly written all about how Astoria Greengrass had started the fight with Ella-Jane, and how Xavier’s version of what Molly-Rose had done to his wormery need not be either accurate or a lie, and how Mum had no spare money for a piano exam… Our personal business was all over it!
“Terry, I am so lucky that you are the only person who saw this. It’s out of date now; it needs to be ripped up.”
“Here, let me burn it. Incendio!”
The paper flared up for a second, and then a spark jumped onto the mini-desert.
“Oh, look out! Aguamenti!” Fortunately, I managed to make the correct wrist movement, and water gushed out of my wand, drenching the flames before the prickly pears were harmed.
“Trust me to forget how dry that sandy soil is,” he said ruefully. “And under the greenhouse lamps, too. Judgment by fire! Every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”
I winced. Terry dropped the preacher-pose and asked if I had pricked myself.
“No, it’s just… Well, this judgment-by-fire is rather old-fashioned, isn’t it? Even if you were only joking. At my church, the Rector says that God is love.”
“And at mine.” He didn’t seem at all annoyed that I had criticised his beliefs. “But don’t you think that love and judgment – ”
“Good work, students,” interrupted Professor Sprout. “But I’m going to ask Longbottom to finish this task. Boot, I’d like you to clean up the Shrivelfigs – some of the second-year Slytherins made rather a mess of pruning them yesterday. Miss Perks, can I send you to Greenhouse One to deal with the burst puffapods that the first-year Gryffindors dropped?”
So that was the end of that conversation with Terry.
A week before term ended, Professor McGonagall announced that there was to be a Yule Ball. “It is a traditional part of the Triwizard Tournament,” she said. “It is your opportunity to do your part towards establishing international goodwill among wizards by socialising with our guests. Everybody in fourth year and above is invited to attend… Yes, Miss Perks?”
“Please, Professor…” I gulped. “Is it compulsory?”
Professor McGonagall blinked. “Not compulsory, no. We cannot actually require students to be on school premises on Christmas Day. But we strongly recommend that you make the effort. After all, the whole point of the Triwizard Tournament is to make friends.”
So it was official. Hufflepuffs were invited. But I could go home for Christmas if I preferred.
No, I couldn’t. This year I was due to spend Christmas at Dad’s house. Cressida might not particularly want me there, but she would certainly kick up a fuss if I tried to go to Mum’s. So the choice was between Christmas with Cressida and Christmas at Hogwarts. Put that way, I was glad that Cressida was already in favour of sending us to the ball. Of course, I would need dress-robes. But even if I wore my school uniform and spent the evening serving drinks, it would be fun to watch my friends dancing.
“What are you wearing?” asked Susan.
“I… well, I hope it will be all right…Mum and I made the robe together,” said Hannah. “What about you, Megan?”
“Mine’s red,” said Megan. “It has dragons woven into the silk, although you do have to look closely to see them. What about you, Sally-Anne?”
I could see that Sophie didn’t like the clothes-talk any more than I did, so I changed the subject. “But the really important question is – who is taking us to the ball? Are we just going together as a group, or are we pairing off with boys?”
Hannah flushed pinker than ever. “Well…I… goodness, I thought Professor McGonagall meant we were to look for partners! Ernie thought so too, because he asked me to be his partner on the way out of Transfiguration.”
“Yes, I’m sure that’s what McGonagall meant,” agreed Susan. “But no one has asked me yet.”
“Is it all right if we do ask the boys?”asked Megan. “It doesn’t seem fair that we have to wait around until they do think of it, is it?”
“I expect we can give ’em a little ’elp in thinking of it,” said Sophie. “But what if they still don’t ask? Do wizard rules allow people to go to balls without any partner?”
“Oh, yes,” I said. This was one point on which Great-Grandma Flourish’s plain-bound book had been quite clear. “The original purpose of a ball was to help young wizards find suitable spouses. So it’s quite all right to turn up alone and hope to find dance-partners after you arrive. And I can’t really think who would invite me.”
“I can’t dance!” exclaimed Hannah. “Sophie, do you know anything about…?”
Talking about the ball did not seem to “help the boys think of it”. We sat around discussing dance-steps, dress-robes and possible partners, but boys would walk straight past us, pointedly staring in the opposite direction and whistling. Occasionally one boy seemed to be daring another to speak to us, but his friend would always refuse the challenge.
“They aren’t interested in the ball,” said Megan.
“Or they’re pretending not to be,” said Susan.
We didn’t realise that the boys were nervous about girls being in groups until Sunday afternoon. Susan was writing to her parents, and Hannah was taking a walk around the lake with Ernie and Justin. I was discussing with Megan and Sophie whether we wanted to brave the cold and watch the Quidditch practice when Wayne and Stephen sidled up, looking sheepish.
“Er… Sophie,” said Stephen. “I mean Sally-Anne. I’m meaning, both of you.” He drew a deep breath and began to speak very fast. “Have-you-a-copy-of-that-essay-question-that-McGonagall-set-for-homework-because-Longbottom’s-toad-jumped-on-my-parchment-and…”
While Sophie and I tried to make sense of Stephen, Wayne furtively beckoned to Megan to follow him around a corner.
“It’s this one,” I said, pulling a parchment out of the Transfiguration section of my bag. “Here you are, Stephen.”
“Oh…” He looked deflated and glanced at his watch. “Thanks. Well… yes, that’s kind of you, Sally-Anne. And I…” He looked at his watch again. “Yes, I was also wanting to ask… if you know about that Potions test… Jabbering Jarveys, Wayne’s taking a long time!”
“What did you think of Professor Sprout’s cassia plants?” I asked. “Did you manage that Anti-frosting Charm?”
“It’s bad about what happened to Terry Boot,” Stephen spluttered.
“What?” I hadn’t heard anything; instinctively, I took a step towards Stephen (who looked as if he was about to run away) while Sophie moved in the opposite direction. “Stephen, what happened to Terry?”
“Morag told me that Terry’s cassia plant caught fire and he burned his hands. He – he’s going to be all right. But it was a bad accident. And he – Where is Wayne?”
Sophie reached the courtyard door at the same time as a fifth-year Ravenclaw.
“Miss Roper, I believe,” he said. “I saw you in the library on Friday – you were asking about that new release on Quidditch. You can borrow my copy.” He held out a brand-new book.
“Ta… I mean, thank yer. But won’t yer want it…?”
“You can give it back to me at the Yule Ball. You are going, aren’t you? Good. Who’s the lucky man?”
“No one yet.”
“Then you can go with me. Excellent, I’ll be wanting to hear all your thoughts on Quidditch Teams of Britain and Ireland.”
He walked off at the same moment as Wayne and Megan came marching around the corner, not looking at each other. Stephen charged off towards Wayne.
“Did he ask you to the ball?” I asked.
“Yes!” exclaimed both Megan and Sophie.
“I did say no,” said Megan.
“He dinn’t give me t’ chance to reply,” said Sophie. “I think that means I’ve accepted.”
“But you don’t know him,” said Megan to Sophie.
“I do that. ’Is name’s Eddie Carmichael.”
“And you refused Wayne,” I said to Megan.
“That’s because I do know him. Come on, let’s go and watch the Quidditch. That’s where we’ll meet boys.”
But although we cheered enthusiastically at the boys on broomsticks and discussed the defence tactics loudly enough for the boys sitting on the stands to hear, no one invited Megan or me to the ball. One sixth-year Slytherin did try to show off his pet lizard to Sophie, but he lost interest when he realised that she already had a dance-partner. Then two brooms collided, Andrew Kirke fell spectacularly to the ground, and the lizard-boy guffawed raucously.
Why did some girls find it so easy to attract a partner? Hannah, who was a blonde, had taken about five minutes. Megan was so vivacious and enthusiastic that she could afford to refuse a good offer. Susan had a calm confidence, so she was certain to be invited soon. It wasn’t so obvious why the boys were interested in Sophie, but clearly some of them were. Whereas I…
My thoughts lingered on Terry Boot’s smile. It would be such fun to go to the ball with Terry! I pushed that idea to the back of my mind. There must be lots of girls who wanted to go with Terry, and he had probably chosen one already. So… would Stephen muster the courage to ask me? Would Wayne transfer his interest in Megan to me? Or should I try to enjoy myself as a wallflower?
One thing was quite certain. I would rather go alone – I would rather not go at all – than go as the partner of a guffawing Slytherin with a lizard.
I met more guffawing Slytherins the next day on the way down to the library. Draco Malfoy and his cronies could be heard from the stairwell. But when I arrived at the library doors, Malfoy was pulling his gang inside. Only Blaise Zabini was standing outside, smiling as if he had been waiting for me.
“Amazing what some people find funny,” he was murmuring to himself. “Sally-Anne! Could you by any chance lend me a quill?”
I handed him one.
“You are so well-organised!” His long-lashed lids dropped swiftly towards my bag, then up at me. “Everyone says so, of course, but I never realised… I expect you manage your time efficiently, too. You must have finished that Transfiguration essay by now.”
His eyes were like liquid treacle and somehow large, so that I couldn’t look away. He probably wants me to write his essay for him, I tried to remind myself. I drew a steadying breath and said, “Yes – yes, I have. How did you find it?”
“And you must be completely organised for this Yule Ball too. I’m not so sure I’ll bother to go – all the nice girls are taken.” His fingers stroked through the quill before he moved it into his bag, and he dropped his voice conspiratorially. “So tell the great secret – who’s taking you?”
“I – er – ”
His face suddenly lit up like a sweepstakes-winner’s, and the treacle-eyes seemed to sparkle. “You mean I’m not too late? Would you go with me?”
It had happened – a boy had asked me! I nearly lost balance – nearly tumbled into those deep, black wells of eyes. “I – that would be…” I forced myself to breathe through my grin. “Thank you. I’d like that!”
“Good.” His warm breath fluttered near my forehead for a second, not quite close enough to be called a kiss. “I’ll see you then, beautiful one – if not sooner!”
An instant later, the library door had swung closed on Zabini, and I was left standing outside, completely forgetting that I had homework to finish in there. What had I done? I had agreed to go to the Yule Ball with Zabini! Blaise Zabini, who swaggered and showed off all through the Herbology lesson and never spoke a word to us half-bloods! I had heard Cecilia giggling with Ursula about how she fancied him, and that was hardly a recommendation.
But Terry hadn’t asked me to the ball, so I needed to forget about him and plan to enjoy myself with Zabini.