Illusions

Illusions

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Tutoring Stinks

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"Now, get those ingredients here," Draco grumbled. As Longbottom hesitated, he snapped, "What? I'm not going to bite you! Just get those blasted ingredients!"

The plump boy hurried nearer, having enough sense not to drop the ingredients he had in his hands. Placing them on the table in front of Draco, he then looked at the Slytherin, expecting further orders.

"Look at the instructions," sighed the blond, rolling his eyes frustratedly. "I should think you are capable of reading. Are you?" he then asked sharply.

"Am - am I what?" Longbottom asked, taking a frightened step backwards.

"Are you capable of reading?" repeated Draco with a longsuffering voice. "Honestly, just how thick can even a Gryffindor be? And here I was thinking that Crabbe and Goyle were stupid!"

"I can read," the boy replied, although he did sound unsure. What a moron.

"So you aren't as thick as Goyle, at least," said Draco dryly. "Now, tell me whether we have all the ingredients required for this potion."

Longbottom took a quick look at the list, then at all the things in front of them on the table. "Yes," he said, "we have everything here."

"Excellent." Sighing a bit again, Draco continued, "Now, read the instructions through. Through, do you hear, not just the first step!"

Longbottom nodded a bit fearfully, then started to look at the instructions. While he did this, Draco -- who'd already memorized them, like was his habit -- tried to spend his time by observing the Gryffindor. He'd got a bit taller the previous summer, Draco noticed -- he'd got past the blond in height, and nothing could have irritated him more. Why, oh, why did he have to always be the shortest? The only consolation he had was that Potter was even shorter. Anyway, the fact that Longbottom had grown taller had made him look less fat. His face didn't look as round as before, either, which made him look a bit more his age. The dark hair didn't make any impression, good or bad, but the deep blue eyes could maybe be called attractive, under certain circumstances. All in all, Longbottom was not that bad-looking. Sure, he wasn't one that anybody would call handsome, but he wasn't ugly, either.

Oh, Draco had known for a long time now that he preferred boys. Girls had never interested him in that way, yet he'd always been attracted to boys. He wanted rather badly a good-looking boyfriend, yet he knew that his fate in life would be to marry a nice, Pureblood girl, and have an heir to continue the Malfoy line. Only after that he could take a male lover on the side, like his Father had done. Perhaps homosexuality was inheritable.

Yeah, he did know of his Father's various affairs. At times he had mused about the possibility of telling his past lovers that he'd been cheating on them -- at best he'd had, what, three different lovers, all kept a secret from the other two? At very best, he'd even slept with them all during the same night. Now that was something only a Malfoy could manage. Well, Lucius anyway. Even though his Father had confidentially told him that when he'd been younger he could easily slip between many lovers thanks to the bit of Veela blood running in their veins, Draco didn't think he could manage that. Sure, he was a sixteen-year-old boy, but even he had his limits -- unlike his Father, obviously.

"Err... Malfoy?" a shy voice piped up. "I've read the instructions through now."

Draco nodded, sighing. "And have you understood them?" he asked irritably.

The Gryffindor looked frightened and took a fearful step backwards despite the fact that he was almost a head's worth longer than the Slytherin. "I -- I think so," he stuttered.

"Excellent." Draco smirked a bit. Now, this part he would like. "Tell me, what are the three things you must absolutely not forget while brewing this potion?"

"Ummm..." Longbottom hesitated a bit, then seemingly decided to give it a try. "You must not let it boil?" he suggested.

Draco nodded, quite impressed by this display of a normally functioning human memory from this particular young wizard. "That's one of them, yes," he said, only the tiniest bit annoyed by the fact that the boy had actually remembered one. "And why not?"

"Because otherwise it will create poisonous vapours that will harm the brewer badly," the other boy replied. "It's quite logical, really -- Malica berries should never be heated."

Now Draco wasn't impressed -- he was amazed. "Why can't you ever use your obvious knowledge on Herbology in the Potions classes?" he snapped, trying to hide his amazement with an irritated tone.

Longbottom mumbled something inaudible. When Draco merely raised an eyebrow, showing that he had not heard, the Gryffindor sighed. "I'm afraid of Professor Snape," he confessed.

"And you should be, with your grades in Potions," mumbled the blond. Then he focused his gaze at Longbottom again. "Is it just that, then?" he asked. "If you weren't afraid of the professor, would you do well in Potions?"

The brunet shook his head. "I don't think so," he said quietly. "It's not all just about herbs and such, you know. There's so much I've missed on the lessons because I'm too scared of Professor Snape to even listen to him. I -- I've been trying to get over it -- but the more I try, the more nervous I get, and the more catastrophes I cause. And the more catastrophes, the more effort he puts into intimidating me."

This made Draco smirk inwardly. So in fact Severus had himself created this worst disaster that had ever entered his Potions classroom. And whenever he tried to scare Longbottom "back to order", he in fact only made it all worse.

This he didn't say aloud, however. Instead, he asked, "And the two other things you must remember? What might those be?"

"Well... Venderroot has to be added in before the bat wings, because otherwise it causes an explosion, right?" As Draco nodded in confirmation, Longbottom went on, "And when you're stirring the potion, you must knock the side of the cauldron with the ladle every fifth minute, because that... that..." After a moment of more or less patient waiting, Draco got the rest of the answer he was looking for. "Because that balances the magical levels of the potion," finished Longbottom with a huge grin of relief on his face.

"Exactly," Draco said. "Now, what ingredients should be prepared before we start brewing the potion, and how?"

"Well, Venderroot needs to be diced," the brunet replied immediately. "The boa's toe nails have to be sliced, and you need to -- to crush the beetles?" he tried hopefully.

Sighing, Draco shook his head. "Sadly, no," he said dryly. "The beetles have to be powdered, not merely crushed. Now, start dicing the Venderroot -- I think you have more possibilities for succeeding in that one, as it's a part of your specialty anyway." And with that, he grabbed the bowl with the beetles and started carefully powdering them.

For a moment they both worked in silence, only the quiet cuts of a knife and the crushing of the beetles breaking the silence. However, having practically grown up in the Slytherin dungeons, Draco missed for noise and babble all around. Down there, in his own familiar surroundings, there was never a day without at least one loud fight, explosion, or screaming fit to be heard. "What's your family like?" he asked in an attempt to continue their conversation.

However, it did rather the opposite of what he'd meant to do. Longbottom fell deadly silent for a long time. Then, after a long, pregnant silence, the brunet boy finally managed to stutter, "I -- I don't really have that much of a family. Just me, and my Grandma."

"Oh?" asked Draco warily, sensing that he'd come to a dangerous area. "What happened to your... parents?"

"They -- they are not there," replied Longbottom softly. "They're not dead, but -- they are not."

"What are they, then?" asked Draco, his curiosity suddenly overdriving his senses, which were all screaming 'SHUT UP YOU BLOODY PRICK!" from top of their lungs.

Now Longbottom stilled completely. Then, finally, when Draco just thought he would not answer at all, he snapped, "Death Eaters tortured them when I was just a baby. Drove them insane. There. Happy now? Going to run to your friends to tell them that Longbottom's parents are in the closed ward?!"

Draco was a bit taken aback by this sudden outburst. He certainly had not been expecting this kind of a reply, or this kind of fury and fierceness behind the answer. Seemingly Longbottom hadn't been Sorted into Gryffindor for nothing.

The silence stretched, and Draco suddenly realized that the other boy obviously expected him to say something. So, he managed to say, "I -- I didn't mean it that way. And I'm not going to tell anyone." Then, after a long moment, he finally said the phrase he'd never thought he'd be saying to anyone, least of all to Neville Longbottom. "I'm sorry."

And he was. He was, for he knew what it felt like to lose a parent. True, his both parents were alive and sane, but he hadn't really had any true interaction with his mother ever since he'd been about three. He was getting along with his Father pretty well, very well to be honest, but to Narcissa, he might just as well been a stranger's child, not her own son. Usually Draco didn't pay much thought to that, but now, however, it felt almost... hurtful. And Draco did not like being hurt, in any way.

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