Do you...?

Charles Gaunt POV

Charles stared at his pewter cauldron intently, waiting for the solution inside to change colour. 'Should happen any moment now… ah, it's done!' He quickly grabbed a container filled horned slugs that he had already prepared and promptly began going over the instructions in his head. 'Add four horned slugs, wait ten seconds, take the cauldron off the fire. Then add two porcupine quills and stir clockwise five times.' He then checked the recipe steps already written down to make sure he had remembered correctly. A moment later he nodded and began the process.

Charles went through each step quickly, but cautiously, not wanting to mess his potion up. When he finished stirring, he pulled out his wand and waved it in the same motion he had for the first part of the brewing. His nerves only lessoned once the cauldron emitted a small puff of white smoke, the clear sign of a successful brewing. Once the potion cooled, it would be tested on a poor little rat Snape had caged up in the corner.

The man himself had appeared in a flash as soon as he saw the floating smoke. "Very quick," he nodded. "Clean up and help Miss Moon with her potion. We will test your potion first and I will allow you to cast the jinx required to cause the rat boils."

Charles nodded enthusiastically as the Professor moved on and got to work with clearing his desk of the extra ingredients. It wasn't a difficult job as he was not a messy person in the first place.

Charles sat in his seat, occasionally looking at Lily's progress, but this time it didn't look like she would need any help. In fact, while slower than him, she was still ahead of the majority of the class - making Charles realise she was most likely smarter than she looked.

Not that she particularly looked like someone stupid in the first place.

As he had earlier, Snape made his way over to their desk quickly upon noticing the white cloud from Lily's potion. After a brief glance at her work, he nodded, before gesturing for Charles to follow him.

Snape led Charles towards a cupboard near the front of the classroom. He opened it and pulled out a cage with an unruly rat which was trying to bite at the man's hand through the metal bars.

"Pay attention and watch closely," said Snape, rendering the rodent unconscious with a wave of his hand. It looked like a practised movement and Charles wondered how many times this poor animal had been used as Guinea pig. He felt a little sad for it, but decided it was at least better than ending up in the jaws of one of the predators within the nearby forbidden forest.

Charles forgot his pity however, as soon as Snape started teaching the spell for boils to him. He now felt grateful to the rat.

The spell was called the Pimple Jinx and casting it was by no means a complicated task, as was demonstrated by Snape. Prior incidents had apparently led to the professors being unwilling to promote the spell and Snape had Charles give his word not to use it on another student. His speech was promptly interrupted by a loud hissing sound followed by a seeping acid green smoke which smelt of rotten fruit.

Extraordinarily, Neville had managed to somehow melt through the bottom Seamus Finnigan's cauldron leaving their failed potion drooping onto the stone floor. It blobbed and popped releasing more foul-smelling smells.

"Idiot boy!" Snape snarled, rushing over. Some of the potion had landed on Neville, and his skin was beginning to boil over. He screamed out in pain and horror. Seeing this, the students jumped up onto their stools, watching the slowly moving mixture crawl across the classroom. Snape vanished the potion with a single wave of his wand. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?" Neville merely whimpered in response. "Take him to the hospital wing!" he ordered Seamus, before turning swiftly in order to face Harry and accuse him of blame.

The incident had left Snape in a bad mood for the rest of the lesson. Unfortunately for Charles, that had resulted in him no longer being allowed to use the Pimple Jinx on the rat. Having already finished his potion, he spent the next hour in a hidden sulk as he waited for lunch to come.

Slytherin first years got the afternoon off on Friday's, the thought of which brightened his mood a little by the time Snape finally let them go. Theo and Blaise were all smiles as they left the classroom.

"Did you see Longbottom's boiled face," laughed Blaise. "I could hear the idiot crying for at least until he made it to the stairs!"

Theo nodded giddily, "I could as well, it was so hard not to laugh. Not to mention how many points Potter lost for Gryffindor. The Slytherin winning streak continues, right Charles!"

"It does look like we have the lead right now," Charles affirmed tentatively. "What do you two want to do after lunch? I'm supposed to meet Tracey later to help with her homework."

"Gobstones? Maybe we could go for a swim, if its warm outside," Theo suggested. Gobstones was a wizard game many of the first years played, it was simple, but Charles preferred Wizard's Chess as it was a bit closer to what he was familiar with. Also he won more often than when they played Gobstones.

"Swimming sounds good," said Blaise. "We haven't gone to the lake yet and its our first afternoon off." It was decided then. After lunch they would get a few towels from their room and head down to the water.

"Um, Charles," came Emily's voice from behind, interrupting the flow of conversation. She was accompanied by four of her friends who stood with her. Charles only recognised two of them, Fay and Lavender. Emily looked across them nervously and only faced him after their encouraging looks.

"Can we talk for a moment, please," she asked him, her bright eyes staring straight at him expectantly.

'Why is she acting like this?' Emily didn't usually ask. He was used to her running up and dragging him off to do whatever she wanted whenever she had the chance. But here she was, looking at him shyly and asking his permission. She was never such a meek girl, so why was she acting like one now? It had only been a week.

"What do you want Clark, we don't have time to entertain you," demanded Blaise.

"I just want to talk to Charles; I don't care about your time so get lost Zabini!" she replied curtly.

'Guess I was wrong, not meek at all.'

Theo went to back his friend up, "Charles doesn't have time for you…" He stopped talking once the four girls stepped in front of him, glaring daggers. Four against two weren't very good odds. His friends turned to him.

"You guys go get lunch, I'll catch up in a minute," Charles told them. "Honestly its fine. I won't be long." They walked off hesitantly leaving Charles alone with the five girls.

Charles waited for Emily to speak up, but she kept quiet. "You wanted to talk to me?" he reminded her.

But it was her blonde friend who responded. "She wants to know why you're ignoring her!"

"Sophie!" Emily cried out in a panic.

Her friend shrugged, "What? It's the truth."

A bit surprised by the sudden accusation, Charles looked to Emily for answers. She hid from his gaze.

'She thinks I'm ignoring her? I know I haven't talked to her recently, but it hasn't even been a week...'

Charles could tell by the look on her face that she was upset with him and he couldn't say it didn't rub him the wrong way. What right did she have to be annoyed with him? He hadn't gone out of his way to avoid her and something told him she couldn't say the same.

"Well it's nice to see you two again," he said to Lavender and Fay, earning their awkward waves, then gesturing towards the girls he hadn't met before. "Charles. Nice to meet you."

"Sophie."

"Ah, I'm Parvati," the darker skinned girl introduced. She looked familiar and Charles remembered her having a twin in Ravenclaw. It had confused him once when he thought he saw the same girl wearing different robes pass him twice.

Charles nodded, glad to finally know who he was talking to. "So, what's this about me 'ignoring' you?" he asked Emily.

"Erm… it's not that I think you're ignoring me," the girl started. "It's just that you haven't talked to me all week…" she said, her voice quiet and her hands fidgeting.

"And you haven't talked to me." He hadn't meant to say it so unkindly, but it had come out so.

"Right… ah this is stupid!" Emily grumbled suddenly. As if a fire had been lit inside her, she rushed at Charles until she only a few centimetres from his face. For a moment, Charles thought she was on the attack but when he saw her eyes staring up at him, he felt a hint of relief.

"Do you like me?" Emily questioned firmly, almost glaring at him.

'That's better.' As long as Charles had known her, Emily had always been a strong-willed girl. She did what she wanted, said what she wanted and above all else, she didn't run. As much as he used to finds these traits annoying, especially when she would follow him and chatter in his ear whenever she could, he also liked that the most about her. Out of everyone in his life, she was the first to not give up on him. That was why seeing her act so subdued and meek had thrown him off so much.

He was pleased to see her return to what he was used to, even if he thought it was a stupid question.

'What do you mean, do I like you? Of course I do, you're friend one.'

As silly a question he believed it to be, it was clear she wanted an answer.

"Yes," he answered plainly, and it was followed by a few audible gasps from Emily's friends who then started huddling together. The girl herself just stood there as a wide grin emerged on her face.

"Good!" She laughed a little stupidly and Charles joined her for a moment.

"Why did you think I wouldn't like you?" he asked her, it didn't make much sense to him after all.

Emily explained that she thought she had upset him on the express train and that he wasn't talking to her because of that. He remembered her looking at him strangely, and a bit warily, and in truth he had felt a little hurt by that. But after the Sorting Ceremony and his talk with the Headmaster, Charles had figured out the reason she had done so and forgotten about it completely. Obviously, Emily hadn't, and had been worrying about it all week like an idiot. Charles made sure to tell her she was overthinking things and that next time she should just come straight to him.

By the end of the conversation Charles had somehow agreed to hang out with them at some time and it worried him to have to be surrounded by so many girls. A little fearful of the oncoming days, he made his way to the Great Hall to meet up with his friends.

-

Emily Clark POV

Emily was in a good mood as she sat on the steps leading out of the dungeons with her friends. She felt silly for ever having been scared to talk to Charles and wished she had done so earlier. That way she could have told him all about the spells she had learned, though she knew he could most likely do each of those spells himself. She had wanted to rant on to him about them just now, but he had been quick to return to his fellow Slytherins. Somehow, she liked them even less than she had before, especially Zabini. Still, Charles had promised to hang with her soon and she would be able to speak about all of that then.

"You really surprised me, you know," said Sophie, bringing Emily out of her thoughts. "I really didn't expect you to be so bold!"

"Hmm?"

"We really underestimated you, Emily," Fay stated.

Emily didn't really understand what they were talking about, but she wasn't one to turn down praise. "Thanks guys. I'm really grateful you came with me."

"Don't worry about it, that's what friends are for right? Plus we got to see something amazing as well." 'Something amazing?' Sophie continued, "I thought Gaunt was the cold type, but he has an unexpectantly nice smile." The other girls nodded in agreement, surprising Emily.

'I thought Sophie was the only one who liked Charles…'

"Too bad he's off the market now," Fay sighed, looking at Emily proudly.

"Eh? What are you guys talking about?"

"You obviously!" said Parvati. "I can't believe you confessed like that."

"And he said yes! I'm a little jealous," Sophie admitted.

Emily had a sinking feeling in her stomach. 'But that's not what I meant!'