“I think you should wave your wand first
before saying the spell,” Janet suggested as she looked at her pointy needle
that was a match minutes ago. They were practicing Transfiguration during their
Saturday afternoon.
Lisa did as Janet suggested and her match
finally turned into a sharp pointy needle. “Finally!” Lisa cheered with joy.
“Mandy got it right during her first few tries in class, she’s really good.”
Lisa was concentrating on her spell in class to notice that it was not Mandy
who managed to turn her match into a needle.
“She did not,” Janet said in a low voice.
“What do you mean?” Lisa stopped admiring
her needle and turned to Janet, looking surprise, “She did turn it into a
needle. Professor McGonagall examined it and awarded her points for that.”
“She did not do that on her own effort, she
took credit for something she didn’t do, from someone who deserved the credit,”
Janet said with a tone of dislike.
“Janet, you’re influenced by Terry. I know
Mandy can be a bit boastful at times but you have to admit that she…”
“She exchanged her needle with Su’s. Su’s
needle was the perfect one. Mandy just took it from Su and left her imperfect
one in front of Su. I saw that,” Janet’s tone of dislike increased.
Lisa let out a gasp of surprise, “Really?
Are you sure?”
“Positive.” Janet nodded firmly.
“And Su didn’t say anything?”
“Nope, she would let Mandy do anything to
her as long as Mandy brings her along everywhere she goes. Su thinks that Mandy
considered her as a friend.”
“She does, doesn’t she? They always go to
classes together,” Lisa said. It was true that Mandy would always appear in
class with Morag and Su by her side, they followed Mandy around like little
minions which was really silly in Janet’s point of view.
“She had them around because they were the
only one who would listen to her stories. You don’t see me in her clique, do
you?” Janet asked sarcastically.
“Well, her stories are not the most
interesting thing to listen though, but poor Su, she would just let Mandy step
over her like that?”
“She certainly didn’t mind at all. She told
me that Mandy was not stepping over her,” Janet recalled their conversation
during the morning.
Just then, the door of the Ravenclaw common
room creaked open and Su walks in. Janet and Lisa sat upright guiltily seeing Su
walking in.
“Hi,” Su greeted dully and walks straight into
the girls’ dormitory.
Janet and Lisa smiled back awkwardly and
watched Su disappeared through the door of the girls’ dormitory.
Lisa waited till the door was tightly shut
and anxiously shook Janet’s hand, ”Do you think she heard us?” she asked.
“I don’t think so,” Janet answered trying
to hide her guilt with all the effort she has to remain a calm voice. “The door
opened after we stopped talking.” Janet tried to convince Lisa and herself that
Su did not hear that they have been talking about her. “She could not have
heard anything from outside.”
“But… she did look quite sad, didn’t she?”
Lisa still feels guilty.
“She did? I’m not so sure, I wasn’t paying
attention, I was just curious that she came back alone,” Janet answered.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, she would usually stick with Mandy
and Morag. They went down to breakfast together, remember?” Janet recalled.
“Maybe she decides to come back first? I
don’t see anything wrong with that,”
“The thing is, Mandy will never move around
the school without Morag and Su by her side, haven’t you notice that? It is her
way of saying that she is popular and how she would always have people by her
side.” Janet elaborated; she has stereotyped Mandy as the attention seeking,
self-claimed school princess she has seen in her muggle primary school. Who
will usually travel in cliques shrieking with laughter or chattering away just
to prove that they are popular, which, in Janet’s opinion was really annoying.
So, Janet thought there was no way that Mandy will let her “clique members” out
of her sight when she is in public.
“Now that you have mentioned, I suppose
so,” Lisa replied uncertainly, she was quite surprise how attentive Janet was
about Mandy; she never notices that Mandy never moves around without Morag and
Su by her side. Her eyes lingered around thinking of something else to change
the topic of the conversation. A small piece of parchment lying on the floor
caught Lisa’s attention, “Janet, that piece of parchment wasn’t there just now,
right?” she points at the piece of parchment lying in front of the door to the
girls’ dormitory,
When Janet stretch her neck to get a closer
look, Lisa walks over and picks up the parchment, she flips it over and saw the
contents where written in characters that she did not recognize. “I don’t know
what’s written here, it looks like another language I have never seen this
before, look,” Lisa passes the parchment to Janet.
Janet takes a look at the parchment, the
characters on the parchments did seem familiar to her, “It looks like Japanese
though,” she muttered. Although Janet could not really read Japanese but she
could tell that the characters are similar to the Japanese Kanji character that
her Japanese grandmother has taught her when she was younger, “But,” she
hesitated and looks closer, “I think it is not Japanese, it might be Chinese.”
Being part East Asian, Janet has been exposed to the Japanese and Chinese from
her grandmother’s side.
“Chinese?” Lisa tilted her over towards the
parchment for a closer a look, “I wonder whose it is?” Lisa looks at the
characters with interest.
“I think I know to whom this belongs to,”
Janet suddenly remembered Su mentioned that she was previously staying in
China.
“Who?”
“Su,” Janet answered.
“Her? Oh well, she does look Chinese. If I
were to guess, she would be the first person to come to my mind too,” Lisa
mumbled. “Should we give it back to her?” Lisa looks at Janet for a respond.
“Er…” Janet hesitated. She did felt guilty
about talking about Su behind her back.
“Come on. Let’s return this to her and we
could also check on her. If she did hear us say something that have hurt her, we
should apologise,” Lisa stood up and tugged Janet’s arm to make her follow
suite.
Janet stood up as a sign of agreement and
they open the door to the girls’ dormitory.
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