Krystal watched with narrowed eyes as Decimus walked into the common room, soaking wet and shivering.
“Where have you been? Runt and I have been waiting here for hours!” Krystal exclaimed angrily. She motioned to Runt, who was trying his hardest to beat her in a game of chess.
Decimus almost laughed. A monkey could beat Runt in chess, let alone Krystal. Runt picked up his king and positioned him first in one place, then another. His tongue was stuck out in thought. Finally, he was satisfied with where he put it, and he crossed his arms proudly.
Krystal sighed as she moved her knight and took the place of Runt’s king. She said without a trace of remorse, “Sorry.”
“I-I’m going t-to go ch-ch-change,” Decimus said, more of a question to Krystal for permission to change out of his freezing clothes.
She smiled. “First, tell us where you were.” She motioned towards a chair for Decimus to sit in. When Decimus seated himself, she commanded, “Tell.”
He sighed. “I was tutoring someone in Transfiguration,” he finally said after a minute’s pause. He got up to go, but Krystal pushed him down again.
“Who was it?”
Decimus mumbled something and Krystal couldn’t make out what he said. “Who?” she asked again.
“Tabitha Potter.”
Runt and Krystal gasped. “You didn’t!” Runt exclaimed. His usually simple mind was whirling with thoughts. He covered his face with a blanket when he saw Krystal’s eyes turning red.
Decimus noticed, too. “Krys,” he started tentatively, “let me explain. Professor Cook asked me to tutor her because she is having trouble in his class.”
Krystal’s eyes slowly turned their natural blue once again. “Why didn’t you say so? I didn’t know Potter had trouble in Transfiguration.”
Decimus rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, she’s horrible.”
This sparked Krystal’s interest.
“Really? Tell me more.”
~*~*~
Decimus had just had another double period of Transfiguration, and- listening to the rumble in his stomach- knew that he was looking forward to lunch.
Hurriedly, he walked to the door in the back of the room: His gateway to food.
“Mr. Malfoy,” he heard the professor call out to him. “Please come here.”
Decimus cursed under his breath and wondered what Professor Cook wanted with him. Transfiguration was his best class, and he didn’t mess up often. Never.
“Um, Decimus,” Cook started, “I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind tutoring a student of mine. She needs help, I think.”
Decimus was only half-listening; he was paying more attention to the giant gurgle his stomach just emitted.
“‘Course I’ll do it,” he said half-heartedly. “When and where?” He was looking forward to getting this over. He felt his mouth start to water as Cook pulled out a grape and ate it.
Professor Cook looked relieved as he chewed his grape. “Meet us in this classroom at seven. I’ll introduce you two. She isn’t in your year.” He scampered out of the room giddily, leaving a ravished Decimus behind him.
It was only when Decimus was half-way to the Great Hall when he remembered that he didn’t ask Cook who “she” was.
Decimus was late. He was in the middle of teaching Runt chess strategies when Krystal said, “Don’t you need to leave now?”
He sprang up. “Damn!” he exclaimed, and he sprinted out of the common room and up three flights of stairs to the Transfiguration room.
“S-sorry,” he panted.
Then nearly fell over.
The “she” standing next to Professor Cook had red hair and green eyes, and was actually a “Tabby.”
He pointed at her. “This is the person you wanted me to tutor? HER?!”
Tabby rolled her eyes as Professor Cook clapped his hands. “So you already know each other? Good. This makes my job easier. Must dash.”
Tabby put her hand on his shoulder as he tried to leave. “Wait. You’re leaving us? Alone?”
The professor looked at her in surprise. “Of course I am! If I didn’t need to leave you alone, then I would tutor you myself! But, alas, Minnie has a pool going on who wins the arm wrestling championship we are having. I put all my money in on Filius!”
He dashed out of the room quickly, leaving a shocked Tabby with her mouth hanging open in surprise.
“You shouldn’t hang your mouth open like that. You’ll get bugs stuck in there,” Decimus said coolly.
Tabitha snapped her mouth shut.
Decimus looked out the window, which revealed a bright pink sunset. “Shall we go outside?” he asked.
Tabby considered him through narrowed eyes, then shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
She brushed past him and out the door. “You coming?” she called out over her shoulder. Decimus had to run to keep up.
Out the front door they went. Decimus spotted a shaded patch of grass underneath a big oak tree. “Wanna sit there?” He looked at Tabby, at her green eyes. She looked back at him.
“Fine.”
Once again, she leaded the way. She glanced down at the ground first- looking for bugs- before she made herself comfortable.
“So,” Decimus said after he sat down, “what do we have to practice?”
Tabby smiled slightly. “We have been working on turning a raven into a robin lately.”
Her companion looked around. “Well, we don’t seem to have a raven with us at the moment. So have you been working on anything else?”
“We have been turning alligators into crocodiles,” she said with a full-fledged grin.
Decimus rolled his eyes. “We don’t have alligators either,” he said grimly. “What else have you been doing?”
“We’ve been turning crocodiles into alligators.”
Decimus raised his eyebrow. “Don’t you want me to help you?” he said with a tint- just a tint- of annoyance.
Tabby- who was laughing- stopped when Decimus said that. “I was just kidding around. Well, not really. We have been turning crocodiles into alligators lately.”
“We should start with basics, then work our way- or your way- up to more challenging stuff,” he said.
Tabby stuffed a lock of her bright red hair behind her ear. “I already know the basics,” she said defensively. “I’m not an idiot.”
“I know you aren’t,” he sighed. “But it wouldn’t hurt to run through them again, would it.”
Tabby knew that was supposed to be a question for her to answer, but he didn’t say it with a question mark at the end. He said it with a period, as if to state a fact.
Tabitha answered the question anyways. “No, I guess it wouldn’t.”
“We’ll start with how to hold your wand the best way when performing a Transfiguration spell.” He shifted her index finger on her wand, so it was now on top of her thumb.
“That’s the way to do it,” he said, looking her straight in the eye. “Many witches and wizards make that mistake. They don’t realize that if your index finger is over your thumb, it holds your wand more securely.”
“I didn’t know that,” Tabby said.
Decimus smirked proudly. “Not many people do. They don’t teach it. I had to find out myself.”
Tabitha held out her wand, and Decimus grimaced. He scooted over so that he was sitting right behind her.
“Here,” he said. He placed his hand on Tabby’s lower back to stop her from slouching. “Hold your arm like this.” Decimus moved her elbow out from where it was tucked next to her body.
“What now?” Tabby asked, looking over at Decimus, whose head was right behind hers.
“Now we practice wand movements,” he whispered in her ear. Tabby felt tingles running up and down her spine.
Decimus was leaning closer towards her, and their mouths were only an inch apart. Just a bit closer, he thought.
Tabby pulled back when she felt a water droplet on her forehead. “I think it’s going to rain,” she said as if they hadn’t just almost kissed each other.
Just as she said that, it started pouring. Tabby got up and said, “We should get to the castle, or we’ll get soaked.”
Decimus was thinking about how obvious her last comment was, and was going to make a joke of it, when he noticed that she had already started the long walk to the front doors. He sat underneath the tree, cursing the weather, for several moments until he finally got up and followed her inside.
~*~
The events of that night flashed in Decimus’ eyes as he replayed the story to Krystal and Runt, conveniently leaving out the part where he nearly kissed Tabby Potter.
He looked at Krystal. “Can I go change now? I’m freezing my arse off,” he said lightly, trying not to notice that his skin was turning mauve from the cold.
Krystal sighed. “Go ahead.”
Decimus practically ran up to his dormitory, wondering why on earth he let Krystal tell him what he can and not do.
It’s the eyes, he told himself.
AN~ Many of you will be saying that Tabby and Decimus’ relationship is moving to fast, but you’ll find out more in the 9th chapter :D Next chapter we find out a little more about Nikki and her past.
This chapter goes out to my good friend Hailey (grangergurl).
Side note: The first draft of this story was written in a diary form. But a mod rejected it, so I re-wrote it in third person. I may have re-wrote it, but the title stuck.