the kiss list, adrian pucey
𝒔𝒆𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒎𝒃𝒆𝒓, 𝟏𝟗𝟗𝟐

chapter nine, ADRIAN'S OWN PERSONAL OWL

✧ ━━━ · ✦ · ━━━ ✧

     IT TURNS OUT, ADRIAN HAD BROKEN HIS femur and was still suffering from a minor concussion, so was going to be in the hospital for a few days. Despite the pain and boredom, he was in fact slightly pleased, as it meant he was out of lessons for a while (obviously he'd have to catch up at some point, but that was beside the point).

     His day's consisted of sleeping in till noon, staring out of the stained glass window directly opposite his bed, and forcing the hospital food down his throat (it was nowhere near as good as the food the great hall provided and Adrian wondered why he wasn't just fed that, instead of what tasted like unedible gunk that Madam Pomfrey served him).

     He had a few visitors: Cassius came once, Graham twice and he hadn't even seen Marcus since he was in the air at the match. All they talked about was practice and it made Adrian miss normal life even more. So maybe he was beginning to think that lessons would be much more enjoyable. Well at least bearable. Bianca didn't have a broken femur or concussion. She wasn't going to visit him ─ why would she? She was in lessons and the idea of her being somewhere he wasn't, made him miss the snide comments they would exchange. Or maybe he just missed her. Seeing her walk around the school. Seeing her concentrate so much during potions. Seeing her laughing in the great hall. Why couldn't she have broken her femur as well?

     Bianca on the other hand quite liked not having him there. She could easily focus on the practical work in potions without Adrian constantly pestering her to 'do this' and 'do that'; she could peacefully pass on her own. She didn't have to come up with any snarky comments to say to him in the corridors whenever she passed him, because he was stuck in the same wing, all hours of the day. She almost felt sorry for him. She described her days as 'Adrian free'. And she liked it.

     Leo and Graham were unsuccessfully brewing the Oculus potion beside Bianca, who couldn't have done it more perfectly.

     "The Oculus Potion is a potion that has the ability to restore the drinker's eyesight, including counteracting the effects of a Conjunctivitis Curse," Snape explained not long before they were sent away with their instructions.

     Adrian wasn't bad at potions, he just wasn't as good as Bianca and always felt the need to annoy her during times when they were meant to be brewing. But now, she had never completed a potion with such ease and speed.

     She smiled at the sight of the fusion of liquids melt into a deep orange, just like the textbook said it should.

     "Hey, how did you do that?" Leo questioned, puzzled, as he too now stared at her cauldron.

     Graham walked over and peered his head into the bowl, "Why is ours green?"

     She rolled her eyes and chuckled as the two boys returned to their stations and began trying to figure out where they went wrong, which Bianca assumed was right at the very beginning.

     "Miss Larsson?" the professor called and she looked up from her perfectly brewed potion to see the potions master calling her over to his desk.

     She closed her textbook that was just open on the same page the instructions for the Oculus potion and approached the man, "Yes professor?"

     "Seen as you are finished, could you take your notes from today's lesson down to the hospital wing?" he asked.

     Adrian knew exactly what he was doing when he asked Madam Pomfrey if it was possible for him to study from inside the hospital wing. The nurse didn't usually have students work whilst in the ward, and it left them having to catch up afterward and sometimes they were out for weeks at a time, so when the Slytherin boy pitched the idea to her, she was surprised but agreed. His first lesson of the day was potions and Adrian knew who Snape would send down with notes for him.

     "The hospital wing?" she queried, "Why?"

     "No questions asked. You'll see when you get there," he said coldly, before dismissing her with his hand.

     She didn't have time to protest anymore, so she shuffled back to her desk, grabbed her bag and notes, and left the classroom in the dungeons.

     The halls were empty and as she passed the multiple doors, she could hear the teachers from inside; some shouting at students for whatever reason. She even heard one bang come from inside a charms class, shortly followed by the squeals of Professor Flitwick.

     The hospital wing was also very quiet. It was on the far end of the first floor and that meant it was out of earshot of all the bellowing teachers and spells that had ultimately failed.

     It was when she experienced some deja vu of past times in the same ward and when she spotted the boy lying on a bed in the far corner, that she knew who she was passing notes to.

     "Adrian?"

     "Oh Larsson, great. I assume you are here with some potions notes for me?" he smiled.

     "Why did you ask for mine?" she asked.

     "I didn't." he shrugged, "I can't even read your writing."

"Okay, that's bullshit. A four-year-old could write better than you do." she scoffed.

     "Just give me the notes will you?" he whined.

     "Woah, lost all your manners have we? Broke a bone and you can't even remember the magic word." she tutted. "Cabin fever really getting to you huh?"

     "Sorry, yes. I guess it has."

     She filed through her bag and pulled out a fat notebook, due to the effort she had put into taking them, "Here's today's and yesterday's." she passed him the book and pointed to a particular part of it. "We made the Oculus potion today so . . . uh I don't know, read the instructions?" she shrugged, suggesting the best way for him to understand the brewing method used to make the potion he missed out on.

     "Thanks." he nodded and sent her a short smile.

     "Okay . . . uh. Anymore work you need?" she asked, with a dull tone.

     He thought for a moment, "Charms would be great."

     She once again filed through her bag and pulled out another separate pad, doing the same and gesturing to the pages he needed. "Here you go."

     "Thank you," he nodded his head.

     There was an awkward pause that lingered in the air, where neither of them knew quite what to say. Bianca decided against conversation and sent him a weak and very awkward wave.

     But before she could do any more than turn away from him, he grabbed her wrist, "Hey, hey, hey wait." he pulled at her arm and turned her back to him, "Could you possibly bring me something from the feast tonight?" he smiled at her pleadingly, "Please?"

     She sighed, "I'm not an owl."

     "Yeah, you're like my own personal owl. That's a good way of putting it actually." she huffed in annoyance, "Okay okay, sorry. But sausage and mash does sound very appealing right now."

     "Does it?" she smiled sarcastically.

     "Please?" he pleaded once again.

     "Do you want me to bring you your own little gravy train as well sir?" she said caustically.

     "That sounds great, thanks Bi." he smiled back at her, ignoring her tone of voice.

      She narrowed her eyes at him, "Can't you just use magic and 'Accio' what you want?" she suggested.

     "They took my wand."

     "What kind of school doesn't let an injured student have their wand?" she asked.

     He paused, "For exactly that reason."

     She scoffed, "Oh wow."

      "Anyways, you can forget the gravy, it's not essential," he said and she nodded slowly.

      "Can I really? Oh, how considerate. Is that all for you sir? Just the meat and potatoes?" she said, mocking his entitled attitude. He beamed a smile at her and she rolled her eyes, "Goodbye Adrian."

     As she walked away, Adrian still didn't know whether he was getting his sausages.

➼

     PREFECT DUTY WAS STILL VERY BORING and Percy was still very much in love with Penelope Clearwater.

     Come ten in the evening, the school hallway is empty. The roar of moving times between lessons, replaced with silence. Except not quite silent. Bianca's head was drooping to the ground, her arms swinging aimlessly by her sides, nodding now and then at whatever Percy was saying.

     "And then I asked her what her second favourite spell was, and we both said Accio and it was really funny because we both said it at the same time," he laughed to himself and Bianca faked a sort of laugh in return, just to show she was paying attention ─ which she obviously was not.

     There was a moment's pause when Bianca had nothing to say, nor did she particularly want to talk to Percy, and Percy had finished his nightly talks about the Ravenclaw girl he was so desperately in love with.

     The two of them had strolled to the end of the corridor. A familiar corridor. Bianca glanced to her right, to see a hallway that came off of it and a grand entrance that led to a larger room: the hospital wing.

     "Hey Percy?" she turned back to face the redhead. "Why don't you go survey the east side and I'll go west. You don't really get that many kids out of bed these days, so why don't we cover more ground seen as it doesn't take as many as two people?" she suggested.

     He furrowed his eyebrows, "Uh sure?"

     "Great." she smiled, "I'll meet you back here in say an hour?"

     "O-okay." he stammered and she waved him goodbye, as she started heading to the hospital wing.

     She was just as surprised that he agreed to leave a prefect on her own for duty even though she was the one that suggested it, as much as the fact she had actually kept her word.

     Earlier that night, Bianca tried her best to sneak as many sausages into her robe pockets, whilst trying to wrap them in a napkin simultaneously. She wasn't sure if anyone saw her as Leo was too busy chatting to Alicia for him to notice and she didn't really think that if she saw anyone trying to steal some pork that she would say anything.

     She managed three.

     She approached the boy, who was snoring slightly, lying on his side, asleep. Bianca nudged him once and waited for him to wake up, "Psst." nothing. "Psst!" still snoring. "PSST! Adrian! God wake up will you?"

     He groaned and yawned a few times before eventually opening his eyes, where he was met with Bianca Larsson standing over him, holding a bundle of napkins. He abruptly sat up and rubbed his eyes, focussing on the girl that had placed the bundle on the bedside table, before she slumped into a chair next to it. His eyes widened as he watched her do this, surprised by the possibility that she might be staying longer than just to drop something off.

     "They might be a bit cold, but my robes aren't accustomed to storing three sausages and keeping them warm. Plus, this was all I could get without looking like a complete psycho when stealing food from the feast," she said, yawning through her words.

     "You actually came?" he asked.

     "Yeah well I feel sorry for you." she shrugged, "That, and I needed an excuse to get away from Percy even though I didn't tell him where I was going."

     "Oh, you're on duty?" he asked.

     "You didn't think I'd stay up late just to deliver you some sausages did you?" she said, causing him to laugh a little.

     "Fair enough. But thank you." he nodded in appreciation, before hastily grabbing the napkin pile and immediately tucking in.

     "Wow, they must starve you," Bianca laughed.

     "More or less, unless they actually think that whatever they've been serving me has been fuelling my hunger," he said, before describing what he had been forced to eat for the last few days to Bianca, who grimaced at the image he was painting for her.

     She yawned once again.

     "It's ten o'clock and you're tired?" he questioned.

     "I literally just woke you up did I not?" she replied.

     "Yeah well, Madam Pomfrey makes me go to bed at eight-thirty. She says I "need as much rest as possible"." he made bunnies with his fingers.

     "You broke your thigh, not your skull," she said and he laughed a little. "When do you get out?"

     "Next week." he took another bite out of the second sausage. She nodded her head slowly, not looking at him, but at the wall opposite. "Are you staying, or something?" he immediately regretted asking that, knowing it sounded ruder than he intended: he was glad she came and even gladder when she sat down.

     "Oh sorry," she held her hands up in defense, "I have an hour before I have to meet Percy for the end of duty, so is it okay if I stay?" she asked, forcing a sweeter tone.

     "Well of course, because why would you actually do your duties, Larsson?" he said with a laugh. "Where did you send him?"

     "To the east side corridors. I made up some bullshit excuse to get away from him."

     "Just to see me? Oh, Larsson, I'm flattered," he put his hand on his heart sarcastically with his free and non-greasy hand.

     "Har har," she whined, "It was actually to escape Percy and his endless stories about Penelope Clearwater. Did you know, her second favourite spell is 'Accio', same as his?" she asked in a jokey tone.

     "Oh wow. I'm sorry you had to sit through that," he said, faking sympathy for her.

     "Technically I wasn't sitting." she corrected.

     "Oh whatever," he said, cleaning his fingers from any remaining grease after finishing his third sausage.

     "That was quick," she noticed how quickly he scoffed what she had brought him.

     "I told you what they serve me. It's not fair," he stated as a joke, but he spoke in a tone that made his voice sound serious. "So, have you decided who your next target is?" he asked.

     She thought for a moment, "Actually no. I guess you'll have to wait and see."

     The two surprisingly shared laughs and reminisced past times at Hogwarts together, through several yawns and smiles. They couldn't even feel themselves falling asleep together in the hospital wing.