FIC: "Hopeless" (Millicent, Pomona, Neville)
Reveals have been posted at hoggywartyxmas. I'm happy to report that (not counting the authors/artists I beta'd or knew from other sources), I correctly guessed eleven authors and two artists. That's right, my dears, you can't hide from Sybill Kelly and her Inner Eye (not even if you leave long comments on your own fic /g/).
My excellent gift, Four Christmases, was written by the inestimable squibstress; nobody does a better dysfunctional Minerva and Severus. Thanks again, my dear! (Yes, I WIN at exchanges again.)
For my contribution, I wrote "Hopeless," featuring a character I'd never written before -- Millicent Bulstrode. I've always thought there must be more to her than the little we see in canon and in JKR's interview comment that she is a "half-blood", so I really enjoyed exploring her possible backstory. Many thanks to you kind people who commented on it and/or recced it in your LJs; I sincerely appreciate the gift of feedback.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Title: Hopeless
Author: kellychambliss
Rating: PG
Word Count: 9400
Characters: Millicent Bulstrode, Pomona Sprout, Neville Longbottom, Pansy Parkinson, OCs
Summary: Millicent Bulstrode is hopeless. And that's not always a bad thing.
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: JKR owns the Potterverse. And she'll push you down if you try to claim it's yours.
Author's Notes: From my recipient (miss_morland's) list of lovely prompts, I used these: "a student's hopeless crush on a teacher" and "two unlikely friends."
My thanks to my ever-helpful beta, tetleythesecond, and to the wonderful fest mod, therealsnape.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"Hopeless."
The first time Millicent Bulstrode heard this word uttered in relation to herself, she was four years old, and she thought it meant "beautiful."
She was sitting with her papa in Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. Papa had been on one of his rare visits home (he worked for Gringott's and travelled a lot), and they were having a Day Out.
Mr Fortescue had come to their table. "My, my," he'd said, smiling at Millicent as she dug into her chocolate ice cream with chocolate sauce and a whole chocolate frog on top. "And who is this lovely young lady? Can you tell me your name?"
Millicent stared at him. Of course she could. What did he think she was, a baby?
"My name is Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode," she said, and bit the frog's head off by way of punctuation.
"That's quite a name," Mr Fortescue said.
Millicent nodded. It was. It was the best name in the whole world, much better than the names of the other children she knew. "Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode" was much longer than anyone else's name, and "Millicent" was prettier than "Daphne," and it was more grown-up than "Pansy" (which was a silly name for a girl anyway, since it wasn't a name at all, but a flower, and a boring flower at that. A flower for babies).
Then there was "Bulstrode." Auntie Enna said that "Bulstrode" was a good name because it was a pure-blood name, but that's not why Millicent liked it. She liked it because "Bulstrode" sounded like "bull." A bull was a strong, powerful animal that was in charge of things. In one of Millicent's books, there was a picture of a big black bull that stomped its foot on the ground and then went galloping across a field. It had a ring in its nose. Millicent loved it; she watched it over and over and stomped her foot, too.
But apparently sometimes bulls also got into china shops and broke things when they weren't careful, as Auntie Enna reminded her regularly. (Millicent tended to break things, too.) Still, Millicent never blamed the bull in such circumstances. If china got broken, it was the fault of the people who made the bull go into the china shop in the first place. Millicent was quite sure it didn't want to be there.
For herself, Millicent much preferred ice cream parlours to china shops, and Mr Fortescue's was her favorite. On that chocolate day when he said she had "quite a name," two ladies sitting nearby had liked it, too -- or so she'd thought then. One of them said something Millicent didn't understand -- "Parvenus" -- and the other said, "Yes, who else would give a child such a hopeless name?"
"Hopeless." It sounded rather pretty, and Millicent was so pleased that she'd put all the rest of her frog into her mouth at once.
It ended up being rather hard to chew, but only a very little bit of the chocolate dripped out onto her best robe, and really, there was no need for Auntie Enna to have got so crabby about it.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The next time Millicent heard the word "hopeless" in connection with herself, she was six and was standing in the entry hall of the Parkinsons' townhouse.
She'd just finished her dancing class, which took place in the Parkinsons' ballroom, and when Auntie Enna came to collect her, she said, "Wait here. I need a moment with Miss Morna."
Miss Morna was the dance mistress, who for years had taught the waltz and the quadrille and countless other steps to the children of upper-crust, pure-blood wizarding society. That's what Auntie Enna had called them -- the "upper crust" -- and at the time, Millicent thought it meant the literal crust on top of the loaves of bread that Boka the house-elf baked in the Bulstrode kitchen. She'd wondered if the people who weren't "upper crust" -- like mudbloods and Muggles -- had to eat bread that didn't have any crust. It would serve them right, she'd thought then. Millicent liked fresh-baked crusty bread.
By the time she'd figured out that "upper crust" was a metaphor, Millicent had figured out a few other things, too, like the fact that being "pure-blood" wasn't all it was cracked up to be.
And the fact that most of the time, Auntie Enna was full of shit.
As things turned out, Millicent found she didn't mind a little shit, or at least, didn't mind the smell of it, but that was a revelation for the future. When she was six and standing in the Parkinsons' entry, the only facts she'd cared about were, first, that she wanted her tea and, second, that Pansy Parkinson was staring at her from behind the parlour door and sticking her tongue out whenever Millicent glanced her way.
Millicent had been getting ready to go over and push Pansy down when she heard Auntie Enna say to Miss Morna, "Tell me honestly. Just how hopeless is the Child?"
"The Child" was Millicent, of course; she hated that baby word, but it was what Auntie Enna always called her. So Millicent turned her back on Pansy and crept closer to the door of the little cloak room where the grown-ups were talking. She wanted to find out if she was hopeless at dancing.
Since that day in the ice cream parlour, she'd come to understand that "hopeless" was not at all a good thing to be. She knew this because "hopeless" was what Auntie Enna called things she thought were stupid: Boka the house-elf and Muggles and Mrs Shunpike the robemaker's assistant (who had bad breath) and all those wizarding families who didn't have any upper crusts on their bread.
Millicent knew that Auntie Enna was wrong about Boka, who wasn't stupid at all, but she thought Auntie had the right of it when it came to hopeless Mrs Shunpike, who once famously waved her wand in the wrong direction and ended up sticking a lot of pins in herself instead of in the robe she was making.
So Millicent felt rather anxious as she waited for Miss Morna's response. Was she hopeless at dancing?
But Miss Morna tittered in that way she did -- behind her hand, Millicent was sure -- and said, "Hopeless? Oh, no, Miss Bulstrode, she's not hopeless in the least. Not in the least. In fact, for such a. . .well, sturdy little girl, Millicent is rather light on her feet."
Light on her feet, was she? Millicent heaved a sigh of relief and twirled around on her toe like a ballet dancer she'd seen a picture of, to show stupid Pansy just how light-on-her-feet she was. Of course, the effect was rather spoiled when she lost her balance and fell over, but she stuck her own tongue out at Pansy while she lay on the floor, which was very satisfying.
And from the floor, she was able to see the charmed pictures on the ceiling of the Parkinsons' hall: unicorns running about, and laughing girls in fluttery robes being chased by boys in old-fashioned clothes and high black boots. Silly boys. And silly girls, too -- they didn't run very fast. Millicent was sure that in a race, she could have beaten every one of them.
So engrossed did Millicent become in the pictures that she forgot all about Pansy until Pansy flopped down beside her to say, "That ceiling belongs to me and my family, and you can't look at it unless I say you can. And I don't say you can."
"Why not?"
Pansy poked her with two fingers. "Because your family only has one house-elf. And because you call your daddy 'Papa.'"
Millicent poked Pansy right back. "Piss off," she said, which was what her Granny Hendershot said whenever someone annoyed her. Millicent liked Granny Hendershot.
Unfortunately, Auntie Enna did not, and she chose exactly that moment to emerge from her talk with Miss Morna.
"Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode!" she cried, in tones so outraged and booming that up on the ceiling, the girls and boys and unicorns all fled to hide behind trees. "What is that language? And get off the floor this instant!"
She grabbed Millicent's arm and yanked her upright, muttering "hopeless!" as she did so. Millicent took advantage of the uproar to stick her tongue out at Pansy once more and to remind herself that even if she was hopeless, she was also light on her feet.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It was Granny Hendershot who helped Millicent understand that being "hopeless" wasn't always a bad thing.
Auntie Enna didn't like the things that Granny Hendershot taught Millicent. She thoroughly disapproved of Granny. In fact, Auntie Enna did more than disapprove: she told Millicent outright that people like Granny were lazy and weak and bad and were a threat to everything that wizards and witches held dear.
For Granny Hendershot, you see, was a Muggle.
Millicent vividly remembered the day she'd first heard about Granny Hendershot.
She had been five years old, and Papa had been home, and Millicent was being allowed to have grown-up dinner in the dining room instead of eating in the nursery.
"I have received a letter from Lucinda's godmother," Papa had said to Auntie Enna as they ate their soup. Lucinda was Millicent's mama. "She wishes to meet Millicent. I have agreed."
Auntie Enna had dropped her spoon with a clatter, which was something she would have scolded Millicent for doing. "Bentley!" she had exclaimed. "You can't be serious! It's far too early for the Child to be exposed to -- " she'd glanced sharply at Millicent and then said, "you-know-whats! M-u-g-g-l-e-s. I suppose she'll have to learn about her. . .her background some day, but not yet, not while she's still so young, and still has so much to learn about her magical world. It will just confuse her, and. . ." With another glance at Millicent, she waved her wand, and suddenly Millicent couldn't hear any more.
But she'd watched with interest as Auntie continued to argue, her mouth opening and closing silently, her face getting redder and angrier as Papa had shaken his head and then leant back and folded his arms in the gesture that Millicent knew to mean, "The answer is no, and I refuse to hear another word about it."
Abruptly, Papa had cancelled Auntie Enna's silencing spell and said, "Enough, Enna! My daughter is going to know her mother's people, and that's all there is to it. "
Auntie Enna had burst into tears and rushed from the room, dropping her napkin behind her as she left (another thing that would have earned Millicent a scolding if she'd done it).
It had been one of the most interesting evenings Millicent had ever spent. She'd always suspected that grown-up dinners were more fun than nursery dinners, and here was proof.
Auntie had started crying again later that night, when she'd come to tell Millicent goodnight. "Oh, I wish you papa would be reasonable!" she said, dabbing at her eyes. "For this to happen now, after all the work I've done to overcome his unfortunate past and get us accepted again by the right people. By the Malfoys and the Parkinsons. After all, the Bulstrodes are related to the Blacks, and you won't find purer blood than that. But now your father is going to spoil it. Child, mark my words, he will be the ruin of us. He may have been Sorted into Slytherin himself, but I don't think understands to this day what membership in our House means."
Millicent wasn't sure she understood what it meant, either, though she was willing enough to be a Slytherin when her Hogwarts time came, since Papa had been one. As for the Parkinsons and the Malfoys, well, as far as Millicent was concerned, Draco Malfoy was a sneaky git and Pansy Parkinson was a stuck-up baby. So she didn't think she'd care if she didn't play with them any more.
But Hogwarts had still been several years off when Millicent had begun spending one Saturday afternoon a month with Granny Hendershot, or "Granny H," as she told Millicent to call her. Sometimes they went shopping or out to lunch, but the afternoons Millicent liked best were the ones they spent in Granny's kitchen or garden, baking things or pruning roses. Granny never cared if Millicent got muddy or spilt batter on the floor.
And Granny told her all sorts of fascinating things.
"Oh, I don't think your aunt Enna dislikes me personally," Granny had said, in response to Millicent's question. That was another fun thing about Granny H; she let Millicent ask any questions she wanted, and if she didn't want to answer, she just said, "none of your beeswax," and there were no hard feelings.
They had been making tarts, pitting the cherries and mixing the dough. "Enna doesn't really even know me," Granny continued. "But she knows that I'm one of those 'Muggles' she hates -- and I'm proud to be one. You know, Millie, magical people aren't the only kind of worthwhile people in the world, no matter what Enna Bulstrode thinks, and don't you forget it. Your own mother was a Muggle, and you're half a one, and your father didn't let any of that ridiculous 'pure-blood' nonsense stop him from loving either one of you."
She stopped and popped a pitted cherry into Millicent's mouth before saying, "He's a good man, Millie, your father, though I wish he paid more attention to you instead of leaving you to be brought up by that. . .well, there, I won't speak ill of Enna; she doesn't have it easy, either, poor thing. That's what comes of growing up in a world where women of her class and background have no way to support themselves if they don't marry. It must be difficult for Enna to be dependent on her brother like that. And it's not as if she doesn't earn her keep, running his house for him as she does. But it's still his house, you see."
Millicent didn't, not then, but it was one of the many things she thought about later, after she'd got to Hogwarts and learnt a few things about houses and Houses.
But on the tart-baking afternoon, she'd had other things on her mind, like whether she could be light on her feet and hopeless at the same time. She told Granny H the whole story, about the dancing lessons and the Parkinsons' ceiling and Boka and Mrs Shunpike and Auntie Enna asking Miss Morna if Millicent was hopeless.
Granny had taken a couple of deep breaths, and then she slapped the ball of pastry on the table and rolled it out quite vigorously (Millicent found the rolling-pin fascinating, though she thought that Boka's magical baking methods were a lot easier) and had said, "Well, it all depends on what you mean by 'hopeless.' Sometimes that's a good thing, and sometimes it's not."
"When is it a good thing?"
"If you're hopeless at something that's not good to be or do in the first place, then it's a good thing to be hopeless at it."
This didn't make any sense, and Millicent said so. Granny H let you say out loud when something didn't make sense, which was a great relief, since Millicent often had a hard time figuring out when you were allowed to say things and when you weren't. Auntie Enna had lots of rules about what you could say or how, and Millicent couldn't always keep them straight. Granny had only one rule: "if it is something that could make someone cry, don't say it."
But this time, Millicent didn't make Granny cry. Instead, she laughed and said, "Oh, so it's nonsense, is it? We'll see. You're a bright girl, Millie -- think it out. Who is someone who does something you really don't like?"
Millicent considered. Just about everyone she knew did something she didn't like.
"Vince Crabbe," she said at last. "At dance class, he pulls Pansy's cat's tail when no one is looking. Well, not any more, because now the cat runs away when Vince comes. But he used to. He did it for fun."
"Is that something you think you could do, hurt a cat for fun?" Granny asked.
"No!" Millicent was indignant. She'd punched a few people, or pushed them down, or pulled their hair, of course she had. But it was always to pay them back for something they had done to her. It was never just for fun. And she loved pets. "I'd never hurt a cat. I couldn't."
"There, you see? You'd be hopeless at hurting cats. And that's a good thing, don't you think?"
And then Millicent had understood. There were some things that you wanted to be hopeless at. Like Daphne Greengrass, who always cried when she saw a spider or a mouse or a blackbeetle. Millicent could never cry at something like that; she'd never be afraid of bugs. In fact, she'd be hopeless at it. And she was glad she'd be hopeless.
"Oh," she said to Granny. "I get it now."
Granny H had smiled and handed her some more cherries to eat. "I thought you would."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Over the years, Millicent learnt a lot more practical things from Granny: how to keep a garden, how to use a telephone and a public omnibus, how to figure out when Auntie Enna was full of shit and when she wasn't.
She also learnt more about her family: how furious her father's family had been when he'd married a Muggle, how her mother's relatives had found it difficult to adjust to the notion of magic, how her mother and grandmother had been killed in a Muggle automobile accident when Millicent was just a baby, how her father had been grief-stricken and had thrown himself into his work.
She even found out that Granny wasn't related to her: she'd been Millicent's grandmother's best friend since her school days and had loved her.
"Like a sister?" Millicent had asked. That had been when she was nine and in her second-last year at day school. Daphne was deep into a phase of passing notes, even when she could just as easily have spoken to you, and the notes were always signed, "LULAS." At first, Millicent had assumed this was Daphne's middle name, and a pretty stupid one at that.
"You're the stupid one," Pansy had said. "LULAS means, 'love you like a sister.'"
"Well, that's stupid," Millicent had replied. How could you love someone like a sister when you weren't their sister?
But then she'd thought it out, as Granny always told her to, and realised how it might work. Millicent knew she didn't love Daphne like a sister, though she'd got so she didn't really mind her. And she didn't love Pansy at all. Still, she could see how someone might have a deep, family member's love for someone who wasn't a relative. That's how she loved Granny H.
So that's why she'd said, "like a sister?" when Granny said she had loved Millicent's grandmother.
Granny had laughed a little. "Not like a sister, no. In a different way. But it was real love, and your grandmother loved me, too, even if it wasn't quite in the manner I might have wished."
Millicent had filed this information away. Though she would have shoved anyone who had accused her of being so soppy, she rather hoped that when she went away to Hogwarts, she'd find someone who would be the kind of friend to her that Granny Hendershot had been to the grandmother Millicent never knew.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
But things at Hogwarts didn't go as well as Millicent had expected. It wasn't much different from day school, except that she now had to be with Pansy and Daphne and Vince and the rest of them all the time instead of just during school hours.
They'd all been Sorted into Slytherin, of course, and while Millicent didn't really mind being in her papa's house, she'd wanted Hogwarts to be. . .well, something else.
Something more exciting. Something worth all those years of waiting. All the grown-ups had made it sound like Hogwarts was the greatest thing since Merlin, but when you came right down to it, it was just more school with the kids she'd known since infancy.
Yes, they got to learn magic, but it was just baby magic. Who really needed to know how to float feathers around the room or make needles out of matchsticks? If you were lost in the wilderness or something, you'd be more likely to need a match than a needle anyway. You might as well just keep the matchstick the way it was.
The only class that Millicent really liked during her first term was Herbology. Puttering around with plants reminded her of the days she'd spent with Granny H, learning about roses and weeds and how to trim a box hedge. Only, the magical plants were even more fun.
The teacher, Professor Sprout, reminded Millicent of Granny. They didn't look anything alike -- Professor Sprout was short and pudgy, while Granny was tall and looked more like Professor McGonagall from Gryffindor, only not so mean. But Sprout was cheerful like Granny, and they both liked to laugh, and then Professor Sprout was always telling the class to "Think! Come on, dears, you can figure it out!" -- which was like Granny, too.
So when Professor Sprout asked their joint class of Slytherins and Ravenclaws who would like to come to the greenhouses after lessons and help her prune the wrestling bindweed, Millicent found herself raising her hand.
"Excellent!" Professor Sprout said, beaming at her. "Miss Bulstrode, if you'll meet me behind Greenhouse Two at four o'clock, we'll be joined by Mr Longbottom of Gryffindor, and it will be a rollicking good time, you'll see!"
On her way back to the castle after class, Millicent felt something poke her in the back. It was Pansy.
"So what's all this about volunteering, Bulstrode?" she demanded. "Trying to be teacher's pet or something?"
"I like plants, all right? What do you care?"
"Oh, I don't care in the least," Pansy said airily, waving a dismissive hand. "It's nothing to me if you want to hang around with the biggest Gryffindor loser of all time, not to mention Sprout the hopeless Hufflepuff."
"You should be so hopeless," Millicent said. "She's nice."
"Oh, please. She's a Hufflepuff, and you know that's just another word for 'boring.' And the woman reeks of dragon dung. Positively reeks."
"Well, at least she doesn't smell like somebody who stole a whole bottle of her mother's 'Magical Temptress' perfume and put it all on at once," Millicent retorted, wishing she could just knock Pansy down, the way she had when they were kids.
"Ooooh, I think our ickle Millicent's got a wittle cwush-cwush on Professor Spwout-Spwout, don't you, Daph?" Pansy said, linking arms with Daphne Greengrass.
Typical, Millicent thought. That was always Pansy's way, to pull other girls into her orbit and then urge them to gang up on somebody else. "Do shut up, Parkinson," she said. "If I was as ignorant as you, I wouldn't let on."
Daphne giggled, and Millicent felt better. She pushed past the other girls and entered the castle first, pleased with herself. Pansy needn't think she could run everything. She probably wouldn't last a single minute with wrestling bindweed.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In the event, Millicent didn't find the bindweed to be a walk in the park, either.
She and Longbottom both showed up at Greenhouse Two at four o'clock on the dot. They nodded at each other and then stood around a bit awkwardly. Millicent was never good at small talk, and besides, what did one say to Gryffindors? They weren't to be trusted even if they were pure-bloods, and anyway, after all her years with Granny H, Millicent no longer put much stock in pure-bloodedness. Being pure-blood hadn't seemed to do much for people like Auntie Enna or Pansy, and as best Millicent could tell from the grown-up gossip she managed to overhear, her distant pure-blood cousin Sirius Black was even a murderer. So there you were.
As for Longbottom, he just stood looking at the ground and then turning beet red when he accidentally caught her eye. Luckily, just then Professor Sprout came bustling up.
"Hullo, dears, are you ready for a little exercise?" she shouted as she strode up the path. "There's nothing like a good tussle with wrestling bindweed to bring out the roses in your cheeks, that's what I always say."
She was out breath by the time she reached them. "Oh, mercy," she gasped, patting her chest and shaking grey hair out of her eyes. "That hill gets steeper every year. That's why I need young hands to help me. The bindweed won't stand a chance against the three of us. Come on."
She led them to a hedge behind Greenhouse Two, and Millicent hoped they were going to be asked to prune it. She thought she wouldn't mind showing Professor Sprout just how good a hedge-trimmer she was.
But the problem turned out to be that the wrestling bindweed was threatening to take over the hedge; they needed to root out the invasive vines so that the hedge could breathe, Professor Sprout said.
"It's only baby bindweed," she explained, "which is why I asked you first-years to volunteer. It's not strong enough yet to hurt you even if it does end up wrestling you to the ground, but it's a useful thing to know about for the future, that is, if you're interested in herbology?" She cocked a quizzical eye at them.
"I am," said Millicent, and Longbottom gave a nervous nod.
Professor Sprout beamed and brushed some loose soil off the front of her robes. "I thought so. It never fails, you see: whichever first-years volunteer to help me are the students who turn out to have a knack for herbology. I do it every year, and so far, it's been a foolproof plan."
She rubbed her hands together. "Now, then, Millicent Bulstrode of Slytherin and Neville Longbottom of Gryffindor. Take strong hold of a bindweed vine and pull, pull, pull. Put your backs into it. Let's see what you're made of."
Millicent grinned. She was the strongest girl she knew; this was going to be a cinch. She grabbed a strand of weed and gave it a good, tough yank.
The plant yanked right back, sending Millicent sprawling. She lay still for a moment, first shocked, then furious.
Longbottom, meanwhile, gave his strand a timid little tug; Millicent could have sworn she heard the plant chuckle. Or maybe that was Professor Sprout.
Whatever, it didn't matter. All Millicent knew was that no plant was going to make a sissy out of Millicent Bulstrode. Scrambling to her feet, she seized the vines, hitched them over her shouder, turned her back on the hedge, and ran up the hillside.
"WRRRRAAAAAAAWW!" she roared as she ran, as if the sheer volume of sound could separate the weeds from the hedge. There was a horrible moment when she thought she might be flung to the ground again -- then, with a sound like a scream, the bindweed tore free from the ground.
Professor Sprout was laughing and clapping. "Oh, well done, Miss Bulstrode, well done, indeed! Ten points to Slytherin. Now wind it round your hands, quickly; don't let it stay on the ground, or it will try to flip and pin you. Good job, my dear."
Feeling slightly dazed, Millicent began to coil the bindweed around one hand. She'd done it! On (almost) the first try, she'd shown that weed who was boss and earned her House ten points in the bargain.
And Professor Sprout had said, "well done."
So proud did Millicent feel that she'd almost forgotten Neville until the professor said, "Now you, Mr Longbottom. See what you can do."
Longbottom's shoulders slumped, and Millicent thought he might be about to cry. "Will it hurt?" he said. "I mean. . .the plant, it screamed. Will it be hurt?"
"No, dear, don't you worry about that," Professor Sprout said. "It doesn't have a brain. But over the ages, it's learnt how to protect itself. Natural selection, you know."
"Oh, okay," Neville said. "It's just. . .I'm hopeless when it comes to hurting things."
Still flush with her triumph, Millicent felt magnanimous towards everyone in the world, even the Gryffindors. "Buck up, Longbottom," she said. "If you have to be hopeless at something, that's not a bad thing to be hopeless at."
Professor Sprout gave her a sharp glance. "Quite so, Miss Bulstrode. A good way to look at it. All right, now, Mr Longbottom. Shall we try again? Once more, with feeling."
It actually took Longbottom several more tries, but eventually, he managed to pull out quite a hefty sample of wrestling bindweed. He seemed pleased with himself despite the fact that the weed was able to flip and pin him three times.
Millicent only got pinned once.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In second year, when the Heir of Slytherin reared its scary head, Millicent and Neville were among the team of students who helped Professor Sprout raise and harvest the mandrakes that ultimately saved the petrified students and ghosts and cats.
Millicent had actually been quite worried about Mrs Norris and that quirky little Colin Creevey. Weird, that kid, no question about it, but he'd kind of grown on Millicent -- partly because he so obviously annoyed that git-and-a-half Harry Potter, but also because she rather admired him, Gryffindor though he was. He was a misfit, and a lot of people laughed at him, but he never let it get him down. Just kept pointing that Muggle camera and taking pictures no matter what anybody said.
Millicent had come to realise that she was a misfit, too -- she was big and ungainly where Creevey was little and spindly, but the principle was the same. The only reason Millicent didn't get laughed at (at least not to her face) was that she never hesitated to punch people's lights out if they gave her too much grief. Creevey, poor little sod, didn't have that option.
And if she had been pressed, Millicent would probably have grudgingly admitted that she wasn't sorry that Know-It-All Granger had been un-petrified, too. Millicent didn't like Granger -- being smart wasn't everything, after all -- but she didn't want her to stay petrified.
In fact, she would have been perfectly content to live-and-let-live if only Granger didn't try to show off so much. "I've been reading all about duelling," she had announced to Millicent when they'd been made partners in the Duelling Club. "I'll be happy to explain the principles to you, if you need extra help."
"As if I was too thick to get it on my own," Millicent said to Professor Sprout the next day, when she and Neville went to check on the mandrakes and to tell the professor all about the excitement at the Duelling Club meeting, how Professor Lockhart had got knocked down by Professor Snape (Millicent's part of the report) and how Harry Potter had duelled Draco Malfoy (Neville's part) and how Potter had talked to a snake (both their parts).
The professor had listened most interestedly, but she had seemed just as interested in hearing what Neville and Millicent themselves had done during the meeting. That's when Millicent had explained about Granger.
"She offered to help you, did she?" said Professor Sprout with a chuckle. "And what did you say?"
"I said, 'See if you need any help with this' -- and I put her in a headlock."
"Oh, Millicent." Professor Sprout managed to look both amused and sorry at the same time. Mostly sorry, though.
Millicent felt the need to explain further. "It's just. . .she's such a know-it-all. Why does she always have to make people feel stupid? It's like Parkinson always acting as if everyone is ugly but her. Like we're all hopeless, and they're not."
Professor Sprout checked a couple of mandrake pots for fungus before she replied.
"It's always possible," she said finally, "that both those girls are just trying to be unpleasant. Not everyone in the world is kind or compassionate, my dears, no matter how much we might wish they were. And Merlin knows, even the best of us have our difficult moments. But then again, maybe there is some other reason for their behaviour."
She checked another pot, and Millicent understood that the professor was giving her time to "think it out" -- to figure out what the "some other reason" might be.
Think though she might, however, Millicent still felt that "just trying to be unpleasant" was probably the right answer.
After a minute or two, Professor Sprout said, "Miss Granger might have been trying to be friendly, offering you the only gift she thinks she has -- her knowledge. She doesn't understand yet that people might like her even better just for herself. Just as some people -- " and here the professor tapped her nose and nodded her grey head first at Millicent and then at Neville -- "seem to think that others will only like them if they're strong or have a lot of magic."
Millicent scowled. She didn't want to hear about people who were strong, and as for magic, she had never understood why Longbottom wittered on all the time about being almost a squib. He had plenty of magic as far as she could tell, so what was his problem?
"That's completely different," she told Professor Sprout. She could hear Auntie Enna in her head ("Millicent, you're being belligerent again"), but she ignored Auntie Enna. "And what about Pansy?" she demanded. "She's definitely not trying to be friendly."
"Well. . ." Professor Sprout took off her hat and ran a hand through her riot of fluffy hair, making it even fluffier. "Miss Parkinson is a very pretty girl, and just between us, my dears, I think her family has high expectations for her -- they mean for her to be popular and sought-after. It can't always be easy for her."
She trailed off, shaking her head, and then laughed. "Listen to me, standing here nattering when there's work to be done. What a hopeless old gossip I'm turning out to be. Now you run along, children, before your Heads of House come to hex me for making you miss your dinner. Hurry, now. I think it's jacket potatoes and roast chicken tonight. With lemon pie for afters!"
Millicent made her way rather slowly to the Great Hall, wondering if Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall would really hex old Sproutsie for making them late to dinner. She could believe it of both of them, frankly.
Well, she thought grimly, taking hold of her wand, I'd just like to see them try.
Pansy spent the entire dinner talking about the new robes her mother was having made for her, but Millicent barely listened. She was too busy imagining how she would burst in on Snape and McGonagall when they tried to hex Professor Sprout, how she would take them by surprise and shout "Expelliarmus!" and then when their wands flew out of their hands, she would tackle whoever was nearest and knock them down flat. It wouldn't be hard: Snape was so skinny and McGonagall was old.
She'd probably be expelled, but it would be worth it, because Professor Sprout would be so happy and grateful to her. "You saved me, Millicent, my dear," she would say, and she'd pat Millicent's arm the way she sometimes did. "Whatever would I do without you?"
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
By the year of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, their pattern was clearly established: at least twice a week, Millicent and Neville spent the afternoon with Professor Sprout in the greenhouses, tidying up after the day's lessons and helping her prepare seed trays and cuttings and fertilizer packs for the next day's classes. "My lab assistants," Professor Sprout called them, and it counted as an "extracurricular activity." Each student was required to participate in at least one, and since Millicent was pants at Quidditch and would rather die than join a club, the arrangement suited her perfectly.
Of course, she would have done it even without the credit, just for the chance to spend more time with Professor Sprout.
Millicent hadn't found the bosom companion at Hogwarts that she'd dreamed of when she first started, but it didn't matter. The professor was better, and Pansy could sneer about "hopeless Hufflepuffs" all she wanted, because Millicent didn't care.
"We're going to have our work cut out for us for the next two weeks, dears," Professor Sprout told them one day as Christmas approached. "I've promised Professor Flitwick one hundred singing Christmas Crocuses for the Yule Ball. He's in charge of the decorations, of course. And I'm hoping you'll help me with the repotting."
"Of course we will," said Millicent, glaring at Longbottom in case he was thinking of declining. But he was nodding and smiling.
"Excellent; I knew I could count on you," said Professor Sprout. Millicent felt a little spurt of warmth inside her -- probably because of plant spores or something. She thought it might be time for the Flitterblooms to go into heat.
"We haven't seen preparations like this since the time Headmaster Dumbledore agreed that Hogwarts would host the annual conference of the International Confederation of Wizards," Professor Sprout went on. "And that was. . .oh, that must have been back in 1983 or '84. The Yule Ball is going to be such fun; I'm so looking forward to it. What about you two? Do you have partners for the ball?"
"I'm going with Ginny Weasley," said Neville, then immediately turned red and became intensely interested in capping his phial of bubotuber pus.
"I'm not going at all," said Millicent.
Professor Sprout set down her bubotuber and put her hands on her ample hips. "And why not?" she demanded.
Millicent shrugged. "Don't want to."
"Now, dear, this wouldn't have anything to do with a partner, or lack thereof, would it?" Professor Sprout asked.
If anyone else had asked her that, Millicent would have decked them. But since it was Professor Sprout. . .
"You know," the professor was continuing, "you could always ask someone yourself."
"I can't just ask someone," said Millicent, feeling angry with Professor Sprout for the first time ever. "For one thing, I'm a girl, and for another, what if they said no?"
"They probably will," said Longbottom. "At least at first. I had to ask two other people before Ginny said yes, and I think she only agreed because she's a third-year and wouldn't get to go otherwise. And I understand, I mean, look at me, I'm pretty hopeless, and -- "
"Stop that, Neville!" said Professor Sprout loudly. "Stop it at once!"
Millicent and Longbottom stared at her; they had never heard her speak so sharply before.
"There is nothing hopeless about you. Or you either, Miss Bulstrode. And it's high time that you both stopped hiding behind that excuse and put yourselves out there in the world, for better or worse."
She ought to have looked silly, Millicent thought distractedly -- a dumpy little witch standing there with leaves sticking out of her hair, her hat on sideways, her robes streaked with dirt. But instead, she reminded Millicent of a picture she'd once seen in a book of Granny's: "Virtue Triumphant," the illustration had been called. The woman in that picture had been tall and golden-haired and gowned in white, but her face had blazed with the same righteous power that shone out of Professor Sprout's face now.
Millicent felt almost awed, but then Professor Sprout burst out laughing and instantly was herself again, messy and comfortable. "There now, dears, I didn't mean to get on my high horse, but it does rather set me off to hear you two run yourselves down, when you're both among the best Hogwarts has to offer. If there's anything hopeless about you, it's that you're hopelessly responsible and conscientious.
"And I'm not trying to ignore how difficult things like dance partners can be at your age. It's ridiculous to make boys and girls pair off like this anyway, when you're all so young and have so many other things to think about first, but it's tradition, the Headmaster says, and so we'll have to make the best of it."
"It's not so bad, really," Longbottom offered. "I mean, Ginny did say yes eventually, and the ones who said 'no' were really nice about it. I did think of asking you, Millicent," he said, turning to her, "but. . ." He seemed rather shocked at his own boldness and looked down to mutter, "well, I. . .I thought. . ."
"You thought I might knock you down?" Millicent said.
"Er. . . something like that," mumbled Longbottom, his face now redder than red.
Millicent seriously considered knocking him down right now, but then the ludicrous side of the whole business struck her, and she began to laugh. Professor Sprout joined in, and then Longbottom did, and soon the three of them were gasping for breath, wiping their streaming eyes, and Millicent thought she would never find anything so funny again.
When they all calmed down, Professor Sprout said, "My goodness, I haven't laughed like that since Professor Flitwick. . .well, never mind. Millicent, dear, I won't pressure you about the Yule Ball if you really don't want to go. But just one more comment, and then I promise not to mention it again. Do just think about asking someone, and it doesn't have to be a boy, you know. It doesn't even have to be a date. Just a friend. The two of you can go and have a wonderful time and not worry about the awkwardness that comes with being all dressed up and formal with someone you hardly know. For my first dance -- it wasn't anything as grand as a Yule Ball, just an inter-house hop -- I had the time of my life, and I went with my best friend."
She grinned at them, her expression mischievous. "Can you guess who it was? Someone you know."
"Professor Lockhart?" squeaked Longbottom, and Professor Sprout laughed again.
"Gracious, no. It was Minerva McGonagall."
"You're taking the piss," said Millicent, before she could stop herself.
"Language, Missy," said Professor Sprout, but she was smiling. "And no, I'm not. Your professors were young once, too, believe it or not. Now, mind you, neither Minerva nor I cared a fig about romance or anything like that when we were schoolgirls. But we did like parties, and I loved to dance. I taught Minerva the fox trot, and we went and had a marvellous time."
"Did Professor McGonagall let her hair down?" asked Longbottom, grinning. When the others looked at him, puzzled, he reddened again and said, "um, just a little joke, er, sorry. In class the other day, she said the Yule Ball was a good time for people to let their hair down."
Millicent snickered. She'd bet McGonagall's prim bun was held in place by a permanent sticking charm.
"Well, she wore it in plaits in those days," Professor Sprout said, ignoring Millicent. "But she's a person who knows how to have a good time. Knew it then and knows it now."
Longbottom's eyes grew round, and Millicent knew he found that idea as bizarre as she did. She frankly couldn't imagine McGonagall or any of the professors knowing how to have a good time, unless it involved giving homework or something.
Well, except for Professor Sprout. Millicent looked over at her. She was humming as she repotted bouncing bulbs, and she was the sort of person who started half her stories with the words, "I have a friend who. . ."
Yes, Millicent thought, Professor Sprout knew how to have a good time.
For some reason, this realisation made her feel odd, as if her clothes suddenly didn't quite fit. She didn't understand it, and when Longbottom glanced over at her, she glared at him.
He grinned at her.
Huh. Was she losing her touch? She wondered if she ought to pinch him when Professor Sprout wasn't looking, but then she reconsidered. Longbottom wasn't so bad. And he'd even said he'd thought of asking her to the Yule Ball.
Slowly, Millicent grinned back.
Maybe she'd see if Daphne wanted to go to the Ball with her. Last Millicent had heard, Daph didn't have a partner, either.
Maybe they could ask Professor Sprout to teach them the fox trot.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In years to come, Millicent would look back at that afternoon spent in Greenhouse Three as one of the best times of her school years and maybe of her entire life so far.
Because everything went to hell the next year.
She supposed she should have seen it coming. Unlike those stupid people with their heads in the sand, Millicent had believed Harry Potter when he came back from the Tri-wizard Championship bearing both Cedric Diggory's body and the news that the Dark Lord had returned. Millicent's papa had been hearing rumours -- as a Slytherin pure-blood, he had connections even though he had never been one of Lord Voldemort's supporters.
The summer between fourth and fifth year was an anxious one. Papa, when he was home, had been subdued and had spent even more time in his study than usual. Auntie Enna had been in a state of near-hysteria, and Millicent had once overheard her begging Papa to be more "diplomatic" and to "think of me and the Child."
So when, during the first week of term in fifth year, Millicent got an owl from her papa, telling her that he might have to go on an extended business trip, she had been worried. Worry had turned to fear when an owl from Auntie Enna brought a parchment filled with sentences in capital letters, with dozens of exclamation points and underlines.
"WE ARE IN DANGER!!!!" Auntie Enna had written. "Your papa is under suspicion from the Ministry because he married a MUGGLE and because he foolishly REFUSES to take a stand in favour of pure-blood RIGHTS!!!!" (That was how Auntie Enna saw the whole political uproar -- a matter of pure-bloods being denied their rightful superiority). "So now he is ON THE RUN!! I am doing my best to show everyone that the Bulstrode family is ON THE RIGHT SIDE of things, but Millicent, you will have to do your part, too. You are a half-blood; you will have to be EVEN MORE obvious in your support of pure-bloods and of Slytherin than people like Draco Malfoy, who of course is above suspicion. DO NOT LET THE FAMILY DOWN!!!! Do whatever you can to make it clear that you are not a threat to the new regime. Our lives may depend on it!!! YOUR FATHER'S LIFE DEPENDS ON YOU!!!!!! Don't let him down."
And Millicent had tried. She'd joined the Inquisitorial Squad with the rest of her Slytherin companions even though she found Umbridge the Toad just as loathsome as the Gryffindors did. Papa was depending on her. He wasn't going to get into any trouble that she could save him from.
But when Pansy had burst into the Slytherin girls' dormitory on that June day just after O.W.L.s to cry excitedly that "the Squad is needed! Potter just broke into the Headmistress's office!" it had taken every ounce of Millicent's willpower to get up and follow the others out. Not even the prospect of holding Granger in a headlock had lightened the ordeal. Millicent hadn't forgotten what Professor Sprout had said about how maybe Granger was just trying to be helpful when she went into "know-it-all" mode.
And besides, it all seemed so childish, the feuds they'd had in the past, the things she'd punched people over. Stupid kid stuff. But this was different. This was real.
Still, she'd done her best not to call attention to herself. She'd stood there stalwartly in Umbridge's office while the Headmistress had questioned Potter and had lost her temper with Professor Snape. She hadn't even said anything when it looked like Umbridge was going to use the Cruciatus curse; she'd just closed her eyes. (A punch or a headlock was one thing, the Cruciatus was something else again. Something Millicent didn't like to think about. She still remembered the writhing spiders from Professor Moody-the-fake's lesson on Unforgivables.)
And when Granger averted the Cruciatus threat by starting her absurd sobbing performance about weapons in the Forbidden Forest, Millicent totally kept her mouth shut. (That the Toad fell for it was yet further proof that she was mental, because Granger was the worst actress on record. It was a clever distraction, though; Millicent would give her that.)
Yet after it was all over, she felt. . .well, she felt like she needed to spend some time in the greenhouses. She took herself over on the next afternoon, while everyone else was busy gossiping about how Potter and Longbottom and the rest of them had flown Thestrals to the Ministry and had fought off You-Know-Who himself.
There was no one else in Greenhouse Three when Millicent first arrived, and she spent a calming half-hour pruning the Alihotsy shrubs. But she was not at all unhappy when Professor Sprout eventually came in and thumped a large carpet bag onto the main work table.
Millicent was about to say hullo when she realised something: Professor Sprout seemed to be crying. Certainly her shoulders were hunched over, and she had her hand over her eyes, and there were odd snuffling sounds coming from her.
And her robes were clean. That was perhaps the most astonishing thing: Professor Sprout's robes were whole and unpatched. And clean.
For a wild moment, Millicent considered just dashing out of the greenhouse and then later swearing blind to Professor Sprout that she hadn't seen her. Because something terrible must have happened, and Millicent didn't want to know about it.
Then the idiocy of this plan occurred to her. Even if it would have worked, which it wouldn't have, she couldn't just run out and leave Professor Sprout alone when she was obviously upset.
Millicent cleared her throat. "Um, er, Professor Sprout? Is there. . .is anything wrong?"
Professor Sprout gasped and clutched her chest. "Oh, Millicent, dear, you gave me a fright. I didn't see you there, I'm sorry. No, nothing's wrong. . .well, nothing too serious, that is. I've just been to St Mungo's to visit Professor McGonagall."
"How is she?" McGonagall wasn't one of Millicent's favourite people, but she didn't want anything bad to happen to her. Especially not when she was one of Professor Sprout's friends.
"Oh, she'll recover -- she should be back to her old self in a month or so. It's just. . .well, she looked terrible, Millicent, so drawn and ill. She couldn't sit up and I just. . .I mean, I hated to see her like that, not Minerva. . ."
To Millicent's horror, the professor's face twisted, and she began to cry again. Millicent felt like a berk, just standing there like a lump, so before she could talk herself out of it, she stepped over and put her arms around her.
Professor Sprout felt warm and solid, and her springy hair was surprisingly soft against Millicent's cheek. For the first time Millicent could remember, she smelt like flowers instead of dragon dung fertiliser. Roses, in fact.
They stood together for only a moment before the professor gently disentangled herself with a sniff and a watery smile and a pat to Millicent's arm.
"Thank you, dear. It's foolish of me to give way like this, especially when I know Minerva will be all right. But there, it's been a difficult year for all of us. How are you doing? I've already checked on Mr Longbottom, and he'll be fine, but I haven't heard anything about you or the other Slytherins. How do you feel?"
"Oh. . .well. . ." Millicent felt all mixed up, hot and icy at the same time. And furious.
She was furious. Longbottom had been at the Department of Mysteries, fighting for his friends' lives, while she had been doing nothing but keeping her head down, letting some of her friends terrorise younger kids just because they were called "The Inquisitorial Squad" and could.
Millicent slammed her fist against a bag of fertiliser and shouted, "I feel like I want to punch something, that's how I feel! Everything is hopeless, Professor, and it's just getting worse! You-Know-Who is back, and my father is in danger, and everybody's getting hurt, and I've been part of that stupid Inquisitorial Squad, and when the Toad was going to cruciate Potter, I didn't do anything to stop it!"
She was horribly close to bursting into tears, so she punched the fertiliser again as hard as she could. And again and again, until her hand ached and her shoulder felt like it was on fire.
Professor Sprout waited silently until Millicent had quieted and her tears had started despite herself.
"Things are bad, Millicent, and not even a hopeless optimist like me would deny it. I wish I could promise you that everything will work out for the best, but I can't. The fight against You-Know-Who is just beginning, and it will be a long and costly war, I'm afraid. But there are still things we can feel good about, my dear, and we need to concentrate on those. We're going to need all the good feelings we can get."
"Good things? Like what?" Millicent demanded, knowing she sounded truculent and not caring.
"Like the fact that Minerva and Neville and the others will be all right. Like the fact that you seem to have learnt something important in the last few days: like where your loyalties lie and where you will stand about what's right and what's wrong."
She looked at Millicent solemnly until Millicent gave a tight nod. Then the Professor began to smile, and when she was beaming as brightly as ever, she added, "And let's not forget the fact that it looks as if the Toad will be leaving Hogwarts for good!"
Millicent stared. Had she just heard what she thought she'd heard? Had Professor Sprout just called Umbridge "the Toad"? Apparently so.
Professor Sprout, meanwhile, touched the split-open bag of fertiliser and waved her wand to repair it.
"Now, Millie, dear, what do you say to a cup of tea?" she asked, pocketing her wand and leaving a smear of dragon dung on her clean robes. "I could certainly use one, and I'm sure you could as well. Come along. I've got a nice, cosy tea nook in the back of the supply room."
Millicent felt an odd sensation bubbling up inside her and realised that she felt almost happy. She was with Professor Sprout, and they had hugged each other, and the professor was talking to her like a real friend, and she had called her "Millie," the only person besides Granny who ever had.
Yes, here she was, with her world on the brink of war and her father on the run and her own future anything but assured.
And she was feeling happy.
Millicent shook her head and grinned as she settled into a chintz armchair in Professor Sprout's tea nook.
Hopeless, she was. Positively hopeless.
This entry was originally posted at http://kelly-chambliss.dreamwidth.org/222769.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
My excellent gift, Four Christmases, was written by the inestimable squibstress; nobody does a better dysfunctional Minerva and Severus. Thanks again, my dear! (Yes, I WIN at exchanges again.)
For my contribution, I wrote "Hopeless," featuring a character I'd never written before -- Millicent Bulstrode. I've always thought there must be more to her than the little we see in canon and in JKR's interview comment that she is a "half-blood", so I really enjoyed exploring her possible backstory. Many thanks to you kind people who commented on it and/or recced it in your LJs; I sincerely appreciate the gift of feedback.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Title: Hopeless
Author: kellychambliss
Rating: PG
Word Count: 9400
Characters: Millicent Bulstrode, Pomona Sprout, Neville Longbottom, Pansy Parkinson, OCs
Summary: Millicent Bulstrode is hopeless. And that's not always a bad thing.
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: JKR owns the Potterverse. And she'll push you down if you try to claim it's yours.
Author's Notes: From my recipient (miss_morland's) list of lovely prompts, I used these: "a student's hopeless crush on a teacher" and "two unlikely friends."
My thanks to my ever-helpful beta, tetleythesecond, and to the wonderful fest mod, therealsnape.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"Hopeless."
The first time Millicent Bulstrode heard this word uttered in relation to herself, she was four years old, and she thought it meant "beautiful."
She was sitting with her papa in Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. Papa had been on one of his rare visits home (he worked for Gringott's and travelled a lot), and they were having a Day Out.
Mr Fortescue had come to their table. "My, my," he'd said, smiling at Millicent as she dug into her chocolate ice cream with chocolate sauce and a whole chocolate frog on top. "And who is this lovely young lady? Can you tell me your name?"
Millicent stared at him. Of course she could. What did he think she was, a baby?
"My name is Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode," she said, and bit the frog's head off by way of punctuation.
"That's quite a name," Mr Fortescue said.
Millicent nodded. It was. It was the best name in the whole world, much better than the names of the other children she knew. "Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode" was much longer than anyone else's name, and "Millicent" was prettier than "Daphne," and it was more grown-up than "Pansy" (which was a silly name for a girl anyway, since it wasn't a name at all, but a flower, and a boring flower at that. A flower for babies).
Then there was "Bulstrode." Auntie Enna said that "Bulstrode" was a good name because it was a pure-blood name, but that's not why Millicent liked it. She liked it because "Bulstrode" sounded like "bull." A bull was a strong, powerful animal that was in charge of things. In one of Millicent's books, there was a picture of a big black bull that stomped its foot on the ground and then went galloping across a field. It had a ring in its nose. Millicent loved it; she watched it over and over and stomped her foot, too.
But apparently sometimes bulls also got into china shops and broke things when they weren't careful, as Auntie Enna reminded her regularly. (Millicent tended to break things, too.) Still, Millicent never blamed the bull in such circumstances. If china got broken, it was the fault of the people who made the bull go into the china shop in the first place. Millicent was quite sure it didn't want to be there.
For herself, Millicent much preferred ice cream parlours to china shops, and Mr Fortescue's was her favorite. On that chocolate day when he said she had "quite a name," two ladies sitting nearby had liked it, too -- or so she'd thought then. One of them said something Millicent didn't understand -- "Parvenus" -- and the other said, "Yes, who else would give a child such a hopeless name?"
"Hopeless." It sounded rather pretty, and Millicent was so pleased that she'd put all the rest of her frog into her mouth at once.
It ended up being rather hard to chew, but only a very little bit of the chocolate dripped out onto her best robe, and really, there was no need for Auntie Enna to have got so crabby about it.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The next time Millicent heard the word "hopeless" in connection with herself, she was six and was standing in the entry hall of the Parkinsons' townhouse.
She'd just finished her dancing class, which took place in the Parkinsons' ballroom, and when Auntie Enna came to collect her, she said, "Wait here. I need a moment with Miss Morna."
Miss Morna was the dance mistress, who for years had taught the waltz and the quadrille and countless other steps to the children of upper-crust, pure-blood wizarding society. That's what Auntie Enna had called them -- the "upper crust" -- and at the time, Millicent thought it meant the literal crust on top of the loaves of bread that Boka the house-elf baked in the Bulstrode kitchen. She'd wondered if the people who weren't "upper crust" -- like mudbloods and Muggles -- had to eat bread that didn't have any crust. It would serve them right, she'd thought then. Millicent liked fresh-baked crusty bread.
By the time she'd figured out that "upper crust" was a metaphor, Millicent had figured out a few other things, too, like the fact that being "pure-blood" wasn't all it was cracked up to be.
And the fact that most of the time, Auntie Enna was full of shit.
As things turned out, Millicent found she didn't mind a little shit, or at least, didn't mind the smell of it, but that was a revelation for the future. When she was six and standing in the Parkinsons' entry, the only facts she'd cared about were, first, that she wanted her tea and, second, that Pansy Parkinson was staring at her from behind the parlour door and sticking her tongue out whenever Millicent glanced her way.
Millicent had been getting ready to go over and push Pansy down when she heard Auntie Enna say to Miss Morna, "Tell me honestly. Just how hopeless is the Child?"
"The Child" was Millicent, of course; she hated that baby word, but it was what Auntie Enna always called her. So Millicent turned her back on Pansy and crept closer to the door of the little cloak room where the grown-ups were talking. She wanted to find out if she was hopeless at dancing.
Since that day in the ice cream parlour, she'd come to understand that "hopeless" was not at all a good thing to be. She knew this because "hopeless" was what Auntie Enna called things she thought were stupid: Boka the house-elf and Muggles and Mrs Shunpike the robemaker's assistant (who had bad breath) and all those wizarding families who didn't have any upper crusts on their bread.
Millicent knew that Auntie Enna was wrong about Boka, who wasn't stupid at all, but she thought Auntie had the right of it when it came to hopeless Mrs Shunpike, who once famously waved her wand in the wrong direction and ended up sticking a lot of pins in herself instead of in the robe she was making.
So Millicent felt rather anxious as she waited for Miss Morna's response. Was she hopeless at dancing?
But Miss Morna tittered in that way she did -- behind her hand, Millicent was sure -- and said, "Hopeless? Oh, no, Miss Bulstrode, she's not hopeless in the least. Not in the least. In fact, for such a. . .well, sturdy little girl, Millicent is rather light on her feet."
Light on her feet, was she? Millicent heaved a sigh of relief and twirled around on her toe like a ballet dancer she'd seen a picture of, to show stupid Pansy just how light-on-her-feet she was. Of course, the effect was rather spoiled when she lost her balance and fell over, but she stuck her own tongue out at Pansy while she lay on the floor, which was very satisfying.
And from the floor, she was able to see the charmed pictures on the ceiling of the Parkinsons' hall: unicorns running about, and laughing girls in fluttery robes being chased by boys in old-fashioned clothes and high black boots. Silly boys. And silly girls, too -- they didn't run very fast. Millicent was sure that in a race, she could have beaten every one of them.
So engrossed did Millicent become in the pictures that she forgot all about Pansy until Pansy flopped down beside her to say, "That ceiling belongs to me and my family, and you can't look at it unless I say you can. And I don't say you can."
"Why not?"
Pansy poked her with two fingers. "Because your family only has one house-elf. And because you call your daddy 'Papa.'"
Millicent poked Pansy right back. "Piss off," she said, which was what her Granny Hendershot said whenever someone annoyed her. Millicent liked Granny Hendershot.
Unfortunately, Auntie Enna did not, and she chose exactly that moment to emerge from her talk with Miss Morna.
"Millicent Euphemia Violetta Justine Bulstrode!" she cried, in tones so outraged and booming that up on the ceiling, the girls and boys and unicorns all fled to hide behind trees. "What is that language? And get off the floor this instant!"
She grabbed Millicent's arm and yanked her upright, muttering "hopeless!" as she did so. Millicent took advantage of the uproar to stick her tongue out at Pansy once more and to remind herself that even if she was hopeless, she was also light on her feet.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It was Granny Hendershot who helped Millicent understand that being "hopeless" wasn't always a bad thing.
Auntie Enna didn't like the things that Granny Hendershot taught Millicent. She thoroughly disapproved of Granny. In fact, Auntie Enna did more than disapprove: she told Millicent outright that people like Granny were lazy and weak and bad and were a threat to everything that wizards and witches held dear.
For Granny Hendershot, you see, was a Muggle.
Millicent vividly remembered the day she'd first heard about Granny Hendershot.
She had been five years old, and Papa had been home, and Millicent was being allowed to have grown-up dinner in the dining room instead of eating in the nursery.
"I have received a letter from Lucinda's godmother," Papa had said to Auntie Enna as they ate their soup. Lucinda was Millicent's mama. "She wishes to meet Millicent. I have agreed."
Auntie Enna had dropped her spoon with a clatter, which was something she would have scolded Millicent for doing. "Bentley!" she had exclaimed. "You can't be serious! It's far too early for the Child to be exposed to -- " she'd glanced sharply at Millicent and then said, "you-know-whats! M-u-g-g-l-e-s. I suppose she'll have to learn about her. . .her background some day, but not yet, not while she's still so young, and still has so much to learn about her magical world. It will just confuse her, and. . ." With another glance at Millicent, she waved her wand, and suddenly Millicent couldn't hear any more.
But she'd watched with interest as Auntie continued to argue, her mouth opening and closing silently, her face getting redder and angrier as Papa had shaken his head and then leant back and folded his arms in the gesture that Millicent knew to mean, "The answer is no, and I refuse to hear another word about it."
Abruptly, Papa had cancelled Auntie Enna's silencing spell and said, "Enough, Enna! My daughter is going to know her mother's people, and that's all there is to it. "
Auntie Enna had burst into tears and rushed from the room, dropping her napkin behind her as she left (another thing that would have earned Millicent a scolding if she'd done it).
It had been one of the most interesting evenings Millicent had ever spent. She'd always suspected that grown-up dinners were more fun than nursery dinners, and here was proof.
Auntie had started crying again later that night, when she'd come to tell Millicent goodnight. "Oh, I wish you papa would be reasonable!" she said, dabbing at her eyes. "For this to happen now, after all the work I've done to overcome his unfortunate past and get us accepted again by the right people. By the Malfoys and the Parkinsons. After all, the Bulstrodes are related to the Blacks, and you won't find purer blood than that. But now your father is going to spoil it. Child, mark my words, he will be the ruin of us. He may have been Sorted into Slytherin himself, but I don't think understands to this day what membership in our House means."
Millicent wasn't sure she understood what it meant, either, though she was willing enough to be a Slytherin when her Hogwarts time came, since Papa had been one. As for the Parkinsons and the Malfoys, well, as far as Millicent was concerned, Draco Malfoy was a sneaky git and Pansy Parkinson was a stuck-up baby. So she didn't think she'd care if she didn't play with them any more.
But Hogwarts had still been several years off when Millicent had begun spending one Saturday afternoon a month with Granny Hendershot, or "Granny H," as she told Millicent to call her. Sometimes they went shopping or out to lunch, but the afternoons Millicent liked best were the ones they spent in Granny's kitchen or garden, baking things or pruning roses. Granny never cared if Millicent got muddy or spilt batter on the floor.
And Granny told her all sorts of fascinating things.
"Oh, I don't think your aunt Enna dislikes me personally," Granny had said, in response to Millicent's question. That was another fun thing about Granny H; she let Millicent ask any questions she wanted, and if she didn't want to answer, she just said, "none of your beeswax," and there were no hard feelings.
They had been making tarts, pitting the cherries and mixing the dough. "Enna doesn't really even know me," Granny continued. "But she knows that I'm one of those 'Muggles' she hates -- and I'm proud to be one. You know, Millie, magical people aren't the only kind of worthwhile people in the world, no matter what Enna Bulstrode thinks, and don't you forget it. Your own mother was a Muggle, and you're half a one, and your father didn't let any of that ridiculous 'pure-blood' nonsense stop him from loving either one of you."
She stopped and popped a pitted cherry into Millicent's mouth before saying, "He's a good man, Millie, your father, though I wish he paid more attention to you instead of leaving you to be brought up by that. . .well, there, I won't speak ill of Enna; she doesn't have it easy, either, poor thing. That's what comes of growing up in a world where women of her class and background have no way to support themselves if they don't marry. It must be difficult for Enna to be dependent on her brother like that. And it's not as if she doesn't earn her keep, running his house for him as she does. But it's still his house, you see."
Millicent didn't, not then, but it was one of the many things she thought about later, after she'd got to Hogwarts and learnt a few things about houses and Houses.
But on the tart-baking afternoon, she'd had other things on her mind, like whether she could be light on her feet and hopeless at the same time. She told Granny H the whole story, about the dancing lessons and the Parkinsons' ceiling and Boka and Mrs Shunpike and Auntie Enna asking Miss Morna if Millicent was hopeless.
Granny had taken a couple of deep breaths, and then she slapped the ball of pastry on the table and rolled it out quite vigorously (Millicent found the rolling-pin fascinating, though she thought that Boka's magical baking methods were a lot easier) and had said, "Well, it all depends on what you mean by 'hopeless.' Sometimes that's a good thing, and sometimes it's not."
"When is it a good thing?"
"If you're hopeless at something that's not good to be or do in the first place, then it's a good thing to be hopeless at it."
This didn't make any sense, and Millicent said so. Granny H let you say out loud when something didn't make sense, which was a great relief, since Millicent often had a hard time figuring out when you were allowed to say things and when you weren't. Auntie Enna had lots of rules about what you could say or how, and Millicent couldn't always keep them straight. Granny had only one rule: "if it is something that could make someone cry, don't say it."
But this time, Millicent didn't make Granny cry. Instead, she laughed and said, "Oh, so it's nonsense, is it? We'll see. You're a bright girl, Millie -- think it out. Who is someone who does something you really don't like?"
Millicent considered. Just about everyone she knew did something she didn't like.
"Vince Crabbe," she said at last. "At dance class, he pulls Pansy's cat's tail when no one is looking. Well, not any more, because now the cat runs away when Vince comes. But he used to. He did it for fun."
"Is that something you think you could do, hurt a cat for fun?" Granny asked.
"No!" Millicent was indignant. She'd punched a few people, or pushed them down, or pulled their hair, of course she had. But it was always to pay them back for something they had done to her. It was never just for fun. And she loved pets. "I'd never hurt a cat. I couldn't."
"There, you see? You'd be hopeless at hurting cats. And that's a good thing, don't you think?"
And then Millicent had understood. There were some things that you wanted to be hopeless at. Like Daphne Greengrass, who always cried when she saw a spider or a mouse or a blackbeetle. Millicent could never cry at something like that; she'd never be afraid of bugs. In fact, she'd be hopeless at it. And she was glad she'd be hopeless.
"Oh," she said to Granny. "I get it now."
Granny H had smiled and handed her some more cherries to eat. "I thought you would."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Over the years, Millicent learnt a lot more practical things from Granny: how to keep a garden, how to use a telephone and a public omnibus, how to figure out when Auntie Enna was full of shit and when she wasn't.
She also learnt more about her family: how furious her father's family had been when he'd married a Muggle, how her mother's relatives had found it difficult to adjust to the notion of magic, how her mother and grandmother had been killed in a Muggle automobile accident when Millicent was just a baby, how her father had been grief-stricken and had thrown himself into his work.
She even found out that Granny wasn't related to her: she'd been Millicent's grandmother's best friend since her school days and had loved her.
"Like a sister?" Millicent had asked. That had been when she was nine and in her second-last year at day school. Daphne was deep into a phase of passing notes, even when she could just as easily have spoken to you, and the notes were always signed, "LULAS." At first, Millicent had assumed this was Daphne's middle name, and a pretty stupid one at that.
"You're the stupid one," Pansy had said. "LULAS means, 'love you like a sister.'"
"Well, that's stupid," Millicent had replied. How could you love someone like a sister when you weren't their sister?
But then she'd thought it out, as Granny always told her to, and realised how it might work. Millicent knew she didn't love Daphne like a sister, though she'd got so she didn't really mind her. And she didn't love Pansy at all. Still, she could see how someone might have a deep, family member's love for someone who wasn't a relative. That's how she loved Granny H.
So that's why she'd said, "like a sister?" when Granny said she had loved Millicent's grandmother.
Granny had laughed a little. "Not like a sister, no. In a different way. But it was real love, and your grandmother loved me, too, even if it wasn't quite in the manner I might have wished."
Millicent had filed this information away. Though she would have shoved anyone who had accused her of being so soppy, she rather hoped that when she went away to Hogwarts, she'd find someone who would be the kind of friend to her that Granny Hendershot had been to the grandmother Millicent never knew.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
But things at Hogwarts didn't go as well as Millicent had expected. It wasn't much different from day school, except that she now had to be with Pansy and Daphne and Vince and the rest of them all the time instead of just during school hours.
They'd all been Sorted into Slytherin, of course, and while Millicent didn't really mind being in her papa's house, she'd wanted Hogwarts to be. . .well, something else.
Something more exciting. Something worth all those years of waiting. All the grown-ups had made it sound like Hogwarts was the greatest thing since Merlin, but when you came right down to it, it was just more school with the kids she'd known since infancy.
Yes, they got to learn magic, but it was just baby magic. Who really needed to know how to float feathers around the room or make needles out of matchsticks? If you were lost in the wilderness or something, you'd be more likely to need a match than a needle anyway. You might as well just keep the matchstick the way it was.
The only class that Millicent really liked during her first term was Herbology. Puttering around with plants reminded her of the days she'd spent with Granny H, learning about roses and weeds and how to trim a box hedge. Only, the magical plants were even more fun.
The teacher, Professor Sprout, reminded Millicent of Granny. They didn't look anything alike -- Professor Sprout was short and pudgy, while Granny was tall and looked more like Professor McGonagall from Gryffindor, only not so mean. But Sprout was cheerful like Granny, and they both liked to laugh, and then Professor Sprout was always telling the class to "Think! Come on, dears, you can figure it out!" -- which was like Granny, too.
So when Professor Sprout asked their joint class of Slytherins and Ravenclaws who would like to come to the greenhouses after lessons and help her prune the wrestling bindweed, Millicent found herself raising her hand.
"Excellent!" Professor Sprout said, beaming at her. "Miss Bulstrode, if you'll meet me behind Greenhouse Two at four o'clock, we'll be joined by Mr Longbottom of Gryffindor, and it will be a rollicking good time, you'll see!"
On her way back to the castle after class, Millicent felt something poke her in the back. It was Pansy.
"So what's all this about volunteering, Bulstrode?" she demanded. "Trying to be teacher's pet or something?"
"I like plants, all right? What do you care?"
"Oh, I don't care in the least," Pansy said airily, waving a dismissive hand. "It's nothing to me if you want to hang around with the biggest Gryffindor loser of all time, not to mention Sprout the hopeless Hufflepuff."
"You should be so hopeless," Millicent said. "She's nice."
"Oh, please. She's a Hufflepuff, and you know that's just another word for 'boring.' And the woman reeks of dragon dung. Positively reeks."
"Well, at least she doesn't smell like somebody who stole a whole bottle of her mother's 'Magical Temptress' perfume and put it all on at once," Millicent retorted, wishing she could just knock Pansy down, the way she had when they were kids.
"Ooooh, I think our ickle Millicent's got a wittle cwush-cwush on Professor Spwout-Spwout, don't you, Daph?" Pansy said, linking arms with Daphne Greengrass.
Typical, Millicent thought. That was always Pansy's way, to pull other girls into her orbit and then urge them to gang up on somebody else. "Do shut up, Parkinson," she said. "If I was as ignorant as you, I wouldn't let on."
Daphne giggled, and Millicent felt better. She pushed past the other girls and entered the castle first, pleased with herself. Pansy needn't think she could run everything. She probably wouldn't last a single minute with wrestling bindweed.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In the event, Millicent didn't find the bindweed to be a walk in the park, either.
She and Longbottom both showed up at Greenhouse Two at four o'clock on the dot. They nodded at each other and then stood around a bit awkwardly. Millicent was never good at small talk, and besides, what did one say to Gryffindors? They weren't to be trusted even if they were pure-bloods, and anyway, after all her years with Granny H, Millicent no longer put much stock in pure-bloodedness. Being pure-blood hadn't seemed to do much for people like Auntie Enna or Pansy, and as best Millicent could tell from the grown-up gossip she managed to overhear, her distant pure-blood cousin Sirius Black was even a murderer. So there you were.
As for Longbottom, he just stood looking at the ground and then turning beet red when he accidentally caught her eye. Luckily, just then Professor Sprout came bustling up.
"Hullo, dears, are you ready for a little exercise?" she shouted as she strode up the path. "There's nothing like a good tussle with wrestling bindweed to bring out the roses in your cheeks, that's what I always say."
She was out breath by the time she reached them. "Oh, mercy," she gasped, patting her chest and shaking grey hair out of her eyes. "That hill gets steeper every year. That's why I need young hands to help me. The bindweed won't stand a chance against the three of us. Come on."
She led them to a hedge behind Greenhouse Two, and Millicent hoped they were going to be asked to prune it. She thought she wouldn't mind showing Professor Sprout just how good a hedge-trimmer she was.
But the problem turned out to be that the wrestling bindweed was threatening to take over the hedge; they needed to root out the invasive vines so that the hedge could breathe, Professor Sprout said.
"It's only baby bindweed," she explained, "which is why I asked you first-years to volunteer. It's not strong enough yet to hurt you even if it does end up wrestling you to the ground, but it's a useful thing to know about for the future, that is, if you're interested in herbology?" She cocked a quizzical eye at them.
"I am," said Millicent, and Longbottom gave a nervous nod.
Professor Sprout beamed and brushed some loose soil off the front of her robes. "I thought so. It never fails, you see: whichever first-years volunteer to help me are the students who turn out to have a knack for herbology. I do it every year, and so far, it's been a foolproof plan."
She rubbed her hands together. "Now, then, Millicent Bulstrode of Slytherin and Neville Longbottom of Gryffindor. Take strong hold of a bindweed vine and pull, pull, pull. Put your backs into it. Let's see what you're made of."
Millicent grinned. She was the strongest girl she knew; this was going to be a cinch. She grabbed a strand of weed and gave it a good, tough yank.
The plant yanked right back, sending Millicent sprawling. She lay still for a moment, first shocked, then furious.
Longbottom, meanwhile, gave his strand a timid little tug; Millicent could have sworn she heard the plant chuckle. Or maybe that was Professor Sprout.
Whatever, it didn't matter. All Millicent knew was that no plant was going to make a sissy out of Millicent Bulstrode. Scrambling to her feet, she seized the vines, hitched them over her shouder, turned her back on the hedge, and ran up the hillside.
"WRRRRAAAAAAAWW!" she roared as she ran, as if the sheer volume of sound could separate the weeds from the hedge. There was a horrible moment when she thought she might be flung to the ground again -- then, with a sound like a scream, the bindweed tore free from the ground.
Professor Sprout was laughing and clapping. "Oh, well done, Miss Bulstrode, well done, indeed! Ten points to Slytherin. Now wind it round your hands, quickly; don't let it stay on the ground, or it will try to flip and pin you. Good job, my dear."
Feeling slightly dazed, Millicent began to coil the bindweed around one hand. She'd done it! On (almost) the first try, she'd shown that weed who was boss and earned her House ten points in the bargain.
And Professor Sprout had said, "well done."
So proud did Millicent feel that she'd almost forgotten Neville until the professor said, "Now you, Mr Longbottom. See what you can do."
Longbottom's shoulders slumped, and Millicent thought he might be about to cry. "Will it hurt?" he said. "I mean. . .the plant, it screamed. Will it be hurt?"
"No, dear, don't you worry about that," Professor Sprout said. "It doesn't have a brain. But over the ages, it's learnt how to protect itself. Natural selection, you know."
"Oh, okay," Neville said. "It's just. . .I'm hopeless when it comes to hurting things."
Still flush with her triumph, Millicent felt magnanimous towards everyone in the world, even the Gryffindors. "Buck up, Longbottom," she said. "If you have to be hopeless at something, that's not a bad thing to be hopeless at."
Professor Sprout gave her a sharp glance. "Quite so, Miss Bulstrode. A good way to look at it. All right, now, Mr Longbottom. Shall we try again? Once more, with feeling."
It actually took Longbottom several more tries, but eventually, he managed to pull out quite a hefty sample of wrestling bindweed. He seemed pleased with himself despite the fact that the weed was able to flip and pin him three times.
Millicent only got pinned once.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In second year, when the Heir of Slytherin reared its scary head, Millicent and Neville were among the team of students who helped Professor Sprout raise and harvest the mandrakes that ultimately saved the petrified students and ghosts and cats.
Millicent had actually been quite worried about Mrs Norris and that quirky little Colin Creevey. Weird, that kid, no question about it, but he'd kind of grown on Millicent -- partly because he so obviously annoyed that git-and-a-half Harry Potter, but also because she rather admired him, Gryffindor though he was. He was a misfit, and a lot of people laughed at him, but he never let it get him down. Just kept pointing that Muggle camera and taking pictures no matter what anybody said.
Millicent had come to realise that she was a misfit, too -- she was big and ungainly where Creevey was little and spindly, but the principle was the same. The only reason Millicent didn't get laughed at (at least not to her face) was that she never hesitated to punch people's lights out if they gave her too much grief. Creevey, poor little sod, didn't have that option.
And if she had been pressed, Millicent would probably have grudgingly admitted that she wasn't sorry that Know-It-All Granger had been un-petrified, too. Millicent didn't like Granger -- being smart wasn't everything, after all -- but she didn't want her to stay petrified.
In fact, she would have been perfectly content to live-and-let-live if only Granger didn't try to show off so much. "I've been reading all about duelling," she had announced to Millicent when they'd been made partners in the Duelling Club. "I'll be happy to explain the principles to you, if you need extra help."
"As if I was too thick to get it on my own," Millicent said to Professor Sprout the next day, when she and Neville went to check on the mandrakes and to tell the professor all about the excitement at the Duelling Club meeting, how Professor Lockhart had got knocked down by Professor Snape (Millicent's part of the report) and how Harry Potter had duelled Draco Malfoy (Neville's part) and how Potter had talked to a snake (both their parts).
The professor had listened most interestedly, but she had seemed just as interested in hearing what Neville and Millicent themselves had done during the meeting. That's when Millicent had explained about Granger.
"She offered to help you, did she?" said Professor Sprout with a chuckle. "And what did you say?"
"I said, 'See if you need any help with this' -- and I put her in a headlock."
"Oh, Millicent." Professor Sprout managed to look both amused and sorry at the same time. Mostly sorry, though.
Millicent felt the need to explain further. "It's just. . .she's such a know-it-all. Why does she always have to make people feel stupid? It's like Parkinson always acting as if everyone is ugly but her. Like we're all hopeless, and they're not."
Professor Sprout checked a couple of mandrake pots for fungus before she replied.
"It's always possible," she said finally, "that both those girls are just trying to be unpleasant. Not everyone in the world is kind or compassionate, my dears, no matter how much we might wish they were. And Merlin knows, even the best of us have our difficult moments. But then again, maybe there is some other reason for their behaviour."
She checked another pot, and Millicent understood that the professor was giving her time to "think it out" -- to figure out what the "some other reason" might be.
Think though she might, however, Millicent still felt that "just trying to be unpleasant" was probably the right answer.
After a minute or two, Professor Sprout said, "Miss Granger might have been trying to be friendly, offering you the only gift she thinks she has -- her knowledge. She doesn't understand yet that people might like her even better just for herself. Just as some people -- " and here the professor tapped her nose and nodded her grey head first at Millicent and then at Neville -- "seem to think that others will only like them if they're strong or have a lot of magic."
Millicent scowled. She didn't want to hear about people who were strong, and as for magic, she had never understood why Longbottom wittered on all the time about being almost a squib. He had plenty of magic as far as she could tell, so what was his problem?
"That's completely different," she told Professor Sprout. She could hear Auntie Enna in her head ("Millicent, you're being belligerent again"), but she ignored Auntie Enna. "And what about Pansy?" she demanded. "She's definitely not trying to be friendly."
"Well. . ." Professor Sprout took off her hat and ran a hand through her riot of fluffy hair, making it even fluffier. "Miss Parkinson is a very pretty girl, and just between us, my dears, I think her family has high expectations for her -- they mean for her to be popular and sought-after. It can't always be easy for her."
She trailed off, shaking her head, and then laughed. "Listen to me, standing here nattering when there's work to be done. What a hopeless old gossip I'm turning out to be. Now you run along, children, before your Heads of House come to hex me for making you miss your dinner. Hurry, now. I think it's jacket potatoes and roast chicken tonight. With lemon pie for afters!"
Millicent made her way rather slowly to the Great Hall, wondering if Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall would really hex old Sproutsie for making them late to dinner. She could believe it of both of them, frankly.
Well, she thought grimly, taking hold of her wand, I'd just like to see them try.
Pansy spent the entire dinner talking about the new robes her mother was having made for her, but Millicent barely listened. She was too busy imagining how she would burst in on Snape and McGonagall when they tried to hex Professor Sprout, how she would take them by surprise and shout "Expelliarmus!" and then when their wands flew out of their hands, she would tackle whoever was nearest and knock them down flat. It wouldn't be hard: Snape was so skinny and McGonagall was old.
She'd probably be expelled, but it would be worth it, because Professor Sprout would be so happy and grateful to her. "You saved me, Millicent, my dear," she would say, and she'd pat Millicent's arm the way she sometimes did. "Whatever would I do without you?"
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
By the year of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, their pattern was clearly established: at least twice a week, Millicent and Neville spent the afternoon with Professor Sprout in the greenhouses, tidying up after the day's lessons and helping her prepare seed trays and cuttings and fertilizer packs for the next day's classes. "My lab assistants," Professor Sprout called them, and it counted as an "extracurricular activity." Each student was required to participate in at least one, and since Millicent was pants at Quidditch and would rather die than join a club, the arrangement suited her perfectly.
Of course, she would have done it even without the credit, just for the chance to spend more time with Professor Sprout.
Millicent hadn't found the bosom companion at Hogwarts that she'd dreamed of when she first started, but it didn't matter. The professor was better, and Pansy could sneer about "hopeless Hufflepuffs" all she wanted, because Millicent didn't care.
"We're going to have our work cut out for us for the next two weeks, dears," Professor Sprout told them one day as Christmas approached. "I've promised Professor Flitwick one hundred singing Christmas Crocuses for the Yule Ball. He's in charge of the decorations, of course. And I'm hoping you'll help me with the repotting."
"Of course we will," said Millicent, glaring at Longbottom in case he was thinking of declining. But he was nodding and smiling.
"Excellent; I knew I could count on you," said Professor Sprout. Millicent felt a little spurt of warmth inside her -- probably because of plant spores or something. She thought it might be time for the Flitterblooms to go into heat.
"We haven't seen preparations like this since the time Headmaster Dumbledore agreed that Hogwarts would host the annual conference of the International Confederation of Wizards," Professor Sprout went on. "And that was. . .oh, that must have been back in 1983 or '84. The Yule Ball is going to be such fun; I'm so looking forward to it. What about you two? Do you have partners for the ball?"
"I'm going with Ginny Weasley," said Neville, then immediately turned red and became intensely interested in capping his phial of bubotuber pus.
"I'm not going at all," said Millicent.
Professor Sprout set down her bubotuber and put her hands on her ample hips. "And why not?" she demanded.
Millicent shrugged. "Don't want to."
"Now, dear, this wouldn't have anything to do with a partner, or lack thereof, would it?" Professor Sprout asked.
If anyone else had asked her that, Millicent would have decked them. But since it was Professor Sprout. . .
"You know," the professor was continuing, "you could always ask someone yourself."
"I can't just ask someone," said Millicent, feeling angry with Professor Sprout for the first time ever. "For one thing, I'm a girl, and for another, what if they said no?"
"They probably will," said Longbottom. "At least at first. I had to ask two other people before Ginny said yes, and I think she only agreed because she's a third-year and wouldn't get to go otherwise. And I understand, I mean, look at me, I'm pretty hopeless, and -- "
"Stop that, Neville!" said Professor Sprout loudly. "Stop it at once!"
Millicent and Longbottom stared at her; they had never heard her speak so sharply before.
"There is nothing hopeless about you. Or you either, Miss Bulstrode. And it's high time that you both stopped hiding behind that excuse and put yourselves out there in the world, for better or worse."
She ought to have looked silly, Millicent thought distractedly -- a dumpy little witch standing there with leaves sticking out of her hair, her hat on sideways, her robes streaked with dirt. But instead, she reminded Millicent of a picture she'd once seen in a book of Granny's: "Virtue Triumphant," the illustration had been called. The woman in that picture had been tall and golden-haired and gowned in white, but her face had blazed with the same righteous power that shone out of Professor Sprout's face now.
Millicent felt almost awed, but then Professor Sprout burst out laughing and instantly was herself again, messy and comfortable. "There now, dears, I didn't mean to get on my high horse, but it does rather set me off to hear you two run yourselves down, when you're both among the best Hogwarts has to offer. If there's anything hopeless about you, it's that you're hopelessly responsible and conscientious.
"And I'm not trying to ignore how difficult things like dance partners can be at your age. It's ridiculous to make boys and girls pair off like this anyway, when you're all so young and have so many other things to think about first, but it's tradition, the Headmaster says, and so we'll have to make the best of it."
"It's not so bad, really," Longbottom offered. "I mean, Ginny did say yes eventually, and the ones who said 'no' were really nice about it. I did think of asking you, Millicent," he said, turning to her, "but. . ." He seemed rather shocked at his own boldness and looked down to mutter, "well, I. . .I thought. . ."
"You thought I might knock you down?" Millicent said.
"Er. . . something like that," mumbled Longbottom, his face now redder than red.
Millicent seriously considered knocking him down right now, but then the ludicrous side of the whole business struck her, and she began to laugh. Professor Sprout joined in, and then Longbottom did, and soon the three of them were gasping for breath, wiping their streaming eyes, and Millicent thought she would never find anything so funny again.
When they all calmed down, Professor Sprout said, "My goodness, I haven't laughed like that since Professor Flitwick. . .well, never mind. Millicent, dear, I won't pressure you about the Yule Ball if you really don't want to go. But just one more comment, and then I promise not to mention it again. Do just think about asking someone, and it doesn't have to be a boy, you know. It doesn't even have to be a date. Just a friend. The two of you can go and have a wonderful time and not worry about the awkwardness that comes with being all dressed up and formal with someone you hardly know. For my first dance -- it wasn't anything as grand as a Yule Ball, just an inter-house hop -- I had the time of my life, and I went with my best friend."
She grinned at them, her expression mischievous. "Can you guess who it was? Someone you know."
"Professor Lockhart?" squeaked Longbottom, and Professor Sprout laughed again.
"Gracious, no. It was Minerva McGonagall."
"You're taking the piss," said Millicent, before she could stop herself.
"Language, Missy," said Professor Sprout, but she was smiling. "And no, I'm not. Your professors were young once, too, believe it or not. Now, mind you, neither Minerva nor I cared a fig about romance or anything like that when we were schoolgirls. But we did like parties, and I loved to dance. I taught Minerva the fox trot, and we went and had a marvellous time."
"Did Professor McGonagall let her hair down?" asked Longbottom, grinning. When the others looked at him, puzzled, he reddened again and said, "um, just a little joke, er, sorry. In class the other day, she said the Yule Ball was a good time for people to let their hair down."
Millicent snickered. She'd bet McGonagall's prim bun was held in place by a permanent sticking charm.
"Well, she wore it in plaits in those days," Professor Sprout said, ignoring Millicent. "But she's a person who knows how to have a good time. Knew it then and knows it now."
Longbottom's eyes grew round, and Millicent knew he found that idea as bizarre as she did. She frankly couldn't imagine McGonagall or any of the professors knowing how to have a good time, unless it involved giving homework or something.
Well, except for Professor Sprout. Millicent looked over at her. She was humming as she repotted bouncing bulbs, and she was the sort of person who started half her stories with the words, "I have a friend who. . ."
Yes, Millicent thought, Professor Sprout knew how to have a good time.
For some reason, this realisation made her feel odd, as if her clothes suddenly didn't quite fit. She didn't understand it, and when Longbottom glanced over at her, she glared at him.
He grinned at her.
Huh. Was she losing her touch? She wondered if she ought to pinch him when Professor Sprout wasn't looking, but then she reconsidered. Longbottom wasn't so bad. And he'd even said he'd thought of asking her to the Yule Ball.
Slowly, Millicent grinned back.
Maybe she'd see if Daphne wanted to go to the Ball with her. Last Millicent had heard, Daph didn't have a partner, either.
Maybe they could ask Professor Sprout to teach them the fox trot.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In years to come, Millicent would look back at that afternoon spent in Greenhouse Three as one of the best times of her school years and maybe of her entire life so far.
Because everything went to hell the next year.
She supposed she should have seen it coming. Unlike those stupid people with their heads in the sand, Millicent had believed Harry Potter when he came back from the Tri-wizard Championship bearing both Cedric Diggory's body and the news that the Dark Lord had returned. Millicent's papa had been hearing rumours -- as a Slytherin pure-blood, he had connections even though he had never been one of Lord Voldemort's supporters.
The summer between fourth and fifth year was an anxious one. Papa, when he was home, had been subdued and had spent even more time in his study than usual. Auntie Enna had been in a state of near-hysteria, and Millicent had once overheard her begging Papa to be more "diplomatic" and to "think of me and the Child."
So when, during the first week of term in fifth year, Millicent got an owl from her papa, telling her that he might have to go on an extended business trip, she had been worried. Worry had turned to fear when an owl from Auntie Enna brought a parchment filled with sentences in capital letters, with dozens of exclamation points and underlines.
"WE ARE IN DANGER!!!!" Auntie Enna had written. "Your papa is under suspicion from the Ministry because he married a MUGGLE and because he foolishly REFUSES to take a stand in favour of pure-blood RIGHTS!!!!" (That was how Auntie Enna saw the whole political uproar -- a matter of pure-bloods being denied their rightful superiority). "So now he is ON THE RUN!! I am doing my best to show everyone that the Bulstrode family is ON THE RIGHT SIDE of things, but Millicent, you will have to do your part, too. You are a half-blood; you will have to be EVEN MORE obvious in your support of pure-bloods and of Slytherin than people like Draco Malfoy, who of course is above suspicion. DO NOT LET THE FAMILY DOWN!!!! Do whatever you can to make it clear that you are not a threat to the new regime. Our lives may depend on it!!! YOUR FATHER'S LIFE DEPENDS ON YOU!!!!!! Don't let him down."
And Millicent had tried. She'd joined the Inquisitorial Squad with the rest of her Slytherin companions even though she found Umbridge the Toad just as loathsome as the Gryffindors did. Papa was depending on her. He wasn't going to get into any trouble that she could save him from.
But when Pansy had burst into the Slytherin girls' dormitory on that June day just after O.W.L.s to cry excitedly that "the Squad is needed! Potter just broke into the Headmistress's office!" it had taken every ounce of Millicent's willpower to get up and follow the others out. Not even the prospect of holding Granger in a headlock had lightened the ordeal. Millicent hadn't forgotten what Professor Sprout had said about how maybe Granger was just trying to be helpful when she went into "know-it-all" mode.
And besides, it all seemed so childish, the feuds they'd had in the past, the things she'd punched people over. Stupid kid stuff. But this was different. This was real.
Still, she'd done her best not to call attention to herself. She'd stood there stalwartly in Umbridge's office while the Headmistress had questioned Potter and had lost her temper with Professor Snape. She hadn't even said anything when it looked like Umbridge was going to use the Cruciatus curse; she'd just closed her eyes. (A punch or a headlock was one thing, the Cruciatus was something else again. Something Millicent didn't like to think about. She still remembered the writhing spiders from Professor Moody-the-fake's lesson on Unforgivables.)
And when Granger averted the Cruciatus threat by starting her absurd sobbing performance about weapons in the Forbidden Forest, Millicent totally kept her mouth shut. (That the Toad fell for it was yet further proof that she was mental, because Granger was the worst actress on record. It was a clever distraction, though; Millicent would give her that.)
Yet after it was all over, she felt. . .well, she felt like she needed to spend some time in the greenhouses. She took herself over on the next afternoon, while everyone else was busy gossiping about how Potter and Longbottom and the rest of them had flown Thestrals to the Ministry and had fought off You-Know-Who himself.
There was no one else in Greenhouse Three when Millicent first arrived, and she spent a calming half-hour pruning the Alihotsy shrubs. But she was not at all unhappy when Professor Sprout eventually came in and thumped a large carpet bag onto the main work table.
Millicent was about to say hullo when she realised something: Professor Sprout seemed to be crying. Certainly her shoulders were hunched over, and she had her hand over her eyes, and there were odd snuffling sounds coming from her.
And her robes were clean. That was perhaps the most astonishing thing: Professor Sprout's robes were whole and unpatched. And clean.
For a wild moment, Millicent considered just dashing out of the greenhouse and then later swearing blind to Professor Sprout that she hadn't seen her. Because something terrible must have happened, and Millicent didn't want to know about it.
Then the idiocy of this plan occurred to her. Even if it would have worked, which it wouldn't have, she couldn't just run out and leave Professor Sprout alone when she was obviously upset.
Millicent cleared her throat. "Um, er, Professor Sprout? Is there. . .is anything wrong?"
Professor Sprout gasped and clutched her chest. "Oh, Millicent, dear, you gave me a fright. I didn't see you there, I'm sorry. No, nothing's wrong. . .well, nothing too serious, that is. I've just been to St Mungo's to visit Professor McGonagall."
"How is she?" McGonagall wasn't one of Millicent's favourite people, but she didn't want anything bad to happen to her. Especially not when she was one of Professor Sprout's friends.
"Oh, she'll recover -- she should be back to her old self in a month or so. It's just. . .well, she looked terrible, Millicent, so drawn and ill. She couldn't sit up and I just. . .I mean, I hated to see her like that, not Minerva. . ."
To Millicent's horror, the professor's face twisted, and she began to cry again. Millicent felt like a berk, just standing there like a lump, so before she could talk herself out of it, she stepped over and put her arms around her.
Professor Sprout felt warm and solid, and her springy hair was surprisingly soft against Millicent's cheek. For the first time Millicent could remember, she smelt like flowers instead of dragon dung fertiliser. Roses, in fact.
They stood together for only a moment before the professor gently disentangled herself with a sniff and a watery smile and a pat to Millicent's arm.
"Thank you, dear. It's foolish of me to give way like this, especially when I know Minerva will be all right. But there, it's been a difficult year for all of us. How are you doing? I've already checked on Mr Longbottom, and he'll be fine, but I haven't heard anything about you or the other Slytherins. How do you feel?"
"Oh. . .well. . ." Millicent felt all mixed up, hot and icy at the same time. And furious.
She was furious. Longbottom had been at the Department of Mysteries, fighting for his friends' lives, while she had been doing nothing but keeping her head down, letting some of her friends terrorise younger kids just because they were called "The Inquisitorial Squad" and could.
Millicent slammed her fist against a bag of fertiliser and shouted, "I feel like I want to punch something, that's how I feel! Everything is hopeless, Professor, and it's just getting worse! You-Know-Who is back, and my father is in danger, and everybody's getting hurt, and I've been part of that stupid Inquisitorial Squad, and when the Toad was going to cruciate Potter, I didn't do anything to stop it!"
She was horribly close to bursting into tears, so she punched the fertiliser again as hard as she could. And again and again, until her hand ached and her shoulder felt like it was on fire.
Professor Sprout waited silently until Millicent had quieted and her tears had started despite herself.
"Things are bad, Millicent, and not even a hopeless optimist like me would deny it. I wish I could promise you that everything will work out for the best, but I can't. The fight against You-Know-Who is just beginning, and it will be a long and costly war, I'm afraid. But there are still things we can feel good about, my dear, and we need to concentrate on those. We're going to need all the good feelings we can get."
"Good things? Like what?" Millicent demanded, knowing she sounded truculent and not caring.
"Like the fact that Minerva and Neville and the others will be all right. Like the fact that you seem to have learnt something important in the last few days: like where your loyalties lie and where you will stand about what's right and what's wrong."
She looked at Millicent solemnly until Millicent gave a tight nod. Then the Professor began to smile, and when she was beaming as brightly as ever, she added, "And let's not forget the fact that it looks as if the Toad will be leaving Hogwarts for good!"
Millicent stared. Had she just heard what she thought she'd heard? Had Professor Sprout just called Umbridge "the Toad"? Apparently so.
Professor Sprout, meanwhile, touched the split-open bag of fertiliser and waved her wand to repair it.
"Now, Millie, dear, what do you say to a cup of tea?" she asked, pocketing her wand and leaving a smear of dragon dung on her clean robes. "I could certainly use one, and I'm sure you could as well. Come along. I've got a nice, cosy tea nook in the back of the supply room."
Millicent felt an odd sensation bubbling up inside her and realised that she felt almost happy. She was with Professor Sprout, and they had hugged each other, and the professor was talking to her like a real friend, and she had called her "Millie," the only person besides Granny who ever had.
Yes, here she was, with her world on the brink of war and her father on the run and her own future anything but assured.
And she was feeling happy.
Millicent shook her head and grinned as she settled into a chintz armchair in Professor Sprout's tea nook.
Hopeless, she was. Positively hopeless.
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