Lucky Thirteen

[alt_seamus]

So today was my birthday and it was pretty good. Thanks for the card and pressie Padma! It flies around and around when you let it go. It was starting to get on Percy's nerves so I put it away after a bit. Mr Rosier couldn't send me anything but he wrote in his journal that he'd gotten tickets to go see the Kestrals play this summer. I can't wait! I guess that means he doesn't think I'll be home for spring hols. But at this point I can't say I'm surprised.

And pudding tonight was chocolate cake so no complaints there. Even if I didn't have any candles to blow out. He said I could have a cake with candles in summer if I want and we'd celebrate then. Actually the birthday that should really be wizard this summer is Draco's, if he's still planning to hold a party in June.

Anyway I said thank you over in your diary but thank you Mr Rosier for my present. I'm really excited to go see the Kestrals. I wish I'd be home sooner than summer but summer's not that far away really.

Comments

[alt_padma]

I'm glad you liked it! It was just a little thing they had at the new shop. I dunno who brought it originally, but it's yours now.

Oh, by the way, I meant to tell you that Perks was in the queue round the same time I was. Did you know she had brought lists from some of the older kids in Slytherin, with their shopping?

First I thought she was making a little mudblood of herself, doing their shopping like a house-elf. But then I thought of that book you were telling me about, the one set in Hogwarts way back in the 1800s, and how the poorer students used to fag for the older ones, you know, to make a bit of pocket money. I guess that little bit of change she made off those folded valentines gave her the taste for money. That and her association with Stretton - he's always got a scheme going. I'm sure he's been teaching her a thing or two about taking advantage.

Can you imagine? I mean, if Sandoval asked me to fetch her something, of course I'd do it, but that's because she's such a wonderful person, and a great friend. Not because she paid me.

Ooh! D'you think Parkinson pays her to be friends? I know Weasley hasn't any dosh for it, perhaps she just feels grateful that someone pities her enough to be friends without insisting on the benefit of payment.

[alt_seamus]

Well you remember he took up for her after she got crucio'd. Maybe Stretton fancies her?

If Parkinson was going to pay for a friend I'd think she'd look for someone more the thing than Perks. Maybe Perks needs the money so much because she pays Parkinson to be friends with her.

Anyway I'd stand in line as a favour for some people but if Towler wanted anything he'd bloody jolly well have to pay me! He can queue up himself the lazy git.

[alt_padma]

Well, now he's in the Cruciatus Club, too. Imagine having Stretton fancy one, ugh.

I dunno about her paying Parkinson, though. I mean, if I were looking for someone who's more the thing, I'd not choose Parkinson. Even if she is friendly with Mr Malfoy and Mr Black (the good one, I mean, not the nasty one), she's got some funny ideas, y'know? I think if she hadn't been from so important a family she'd have got herself into a lot more trouble last year.

Dames told me that when she was a first-year, there was a girl in her dormitory who thought that being pureblood meant she could say anything she liked. She took a fancy to start a whole salon where people read essays and poems and such about the 'injustice' of the mudblood camps and they told stories about how muggles used to live, and how nice they were. The prefects told her to stop it or they'd tell the Headmistress about it, but she kept on. Finally the Head Boy brought her up before the Governors and they said that if she sympathised with mudbloods so much, she ought to go and live like one. And they sent her and her family to the camps.

But Dames said that even though she was a pureblood, this girl, she wasn't well-connected. I mean, her family didn't have any money and they weren't anyone important, her father was a plumber at the Ministry and her mum was just a clerk in a shop. So when she started what Dames called 'activism' she didn't really have anyone important to defend her.

I mean, I've never heard Perks say anything right out that's plain daft, but Parkinson sure has. If Parkinson was a nobody like Perks, and been as idiotic as she was last year, she'd have never been fostered with Mrs Black, right, and given all those second chances? But if Perks is the one keeping Parkinson in line, well, it sort of makes sense, because no one else would bother. Because they all figure that Parkinson's got enough protection already. Maybe Perks feels the same about Weasley, too, like she has to make sure they don't slip up. I mean, she needs pureblood friends to protect her, but she can't actually make any pureblood friends apart from the likes of Weasley and Stretton and all.

And yeah, I'm just as happy that the Ravenclaw Corner lot are all nice. We've only got one or two like Towler. Whereas you've got Towler and also Wood and of course Weasleys all over the place. Parvati says she wishes she'd been Sorted into Ravenclaw, our blokes are much more fanciable. (But she knows she'd never feel right here, her marks are too low.)

[alt_seamus]

Do you know if that's really true, the story Dames told you? Did she have any brothers or sisters? Because it doesn't seem

A nobody who acted like Parkinson would've been in much worse trouble last year but thats always the way it is. What d'you have against Wood? He's probably the best quidditch player we've got! And he's never said anything daft that I can remember!

[alt_padma]

I dunno, that's just what Dames told me. But if she had brothers and sisters, they got sent to the camps, too, didn't they?

And I guess Wood's okay, though Chang says he's totally obsessed with Quidditch and nothing else. I think Perks stayed with him over the summer. And he's always seemed a little...I dunno. Parvati says he's a bit odd. She overheard him talking with Ito and Wentworth in the Common Room a couple times, about life outside Hogwarts, and she said he was really cagey about his parents.

[alt_seamus]

Whats wrong with being obsessed with quidditch?

Woods doesn't talk much about his parents but lots of people don't. Parents are boring!

I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_ron]

What do you suppose Patil pays Sandoval to let her sit in Ravenclaw Corner? She must pay them or they'd never let her hang about and be such a pest.

I was going to say this to her right out, but I figured you'd rather I didn't.

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Oh she doesn't pay in money, she pays her by licking Sandoval's boots clean every single day!

Re: I Solemnly Swear That I Am Up To No Good

[alt_sally_anne]

Things Pansy wanted to say to Padma in the journals today, but didn't:

1. I'm pretty sure there isn't enough money in the WORLD to get me to be YOUR friend.

2. I'd ask if you were this catty because it's your monthly, but that doesn't explain Finnigan. They should call you lot the Painters, cause they're always in.

(Ron, if you don't understand that second one ... well I'm not explaining it so you'll just have to live confused.)

She also pointed out Padma shilled her mum's robe pets all over the school, so it's a bit rich her looking down on my flowers, or running errands for sickles.