So, I continue enjoying Terry's company. It is easy to think about the positive things about him. He doesn't ask questions. He sits with me quietly. There is always an interesting historical fact in his head. In private, I continue reading the books my mother sent me, using the oil pastels, and working on the omnioculars.

The time mechanism is confusing. It's only been a few weeks and the mechanism inside is rather complicated, so I don't quite yet feel discouraged. In my attempts to get it to pause, it works. That is, until I head to the lavatory to wash my hands, and realize I didn't pause a moment in time playing on the omniocculars, but I created a temporal pocket in the entirety of the girl's dorms of Ravenclaw tower. The water comes out of the taps slowly. My hair and clothes are not living, so they drag behind me while I walk. It only takes three minutes to fix it, but in that time, I managed to draw the attention of half of the girls in our tower. When Professor Flitwick gets word, he confiscates the omnioculars.

Still, he lets me fiddle with them in the charms office, but only under his supervision.

Really, the temporal pocket should be a feat itself, if it were intentional. There is only one major mishap in there. I start working on it on Friday night, and only ten minutes later there is a knock at the door. Professor McGonagall comes. Apparently, it is Sunday evening. Some of the other Ravenclaws decided to tell someone I was missing on Saturday night. That was when they realized Flitwick was gone too. Finally, when they told McGonagall, she came to Flitwick's office.

Then, Professor McGonagall confiscates the broken onmioculars.

I am trying to write a letter to persuade Professor Dumbledore to give them back on the following Monday. It isn't going as well as I would hope.

"It was so wicked though," Anthony raises a hand. I high-five him absent-mindedly.

"Weren't you so thirsty?" Michael asks.

I shake my head, not really looking up from the letter, "it had only been ten minutes that I was in there with Flitwick."

"Wait, do you think you are actually three days younger now?" Anthony says. "I mean, did your body even age in there?"

It is hard to write with them distracting me. Truly, I've only spoken to the headmaster once. After the sorting ceremony, he asked me which other house it was that the sorting hat considered to place me in. He congratulated me on being so desirable. There is usually only one true hatstall every ten or so years. He admitted Professor McGonagall was one. Professor Flitwick was only thirty seconds away.

I beat him by a whole minute.

"You don't look older," Terry smirks at me from behind his book.

My smile is quite curt.

"Wait, do you think she could make an unregistered Time-Turner?" Michael looks over at Anthony.

Anthony gasps. Half the eyes at the Ravenclaw table turn to him from how dramatically loud the sound is, "Marty Turner, maker of Time-Turners?"

"The Nott family have been trying for years, allegedly," Padma offers. She wasn't even originally in the conversation, but she does tilt her way over to me. "I can see what Parvati and Lavender know. Only if you're interested, Marty."

"Maybe," I shrug.

"Oh, and Lavender thinks Hermione Granger had a time-turner in third year so she could take every class, but I don't know how true that is," Padma says. "Again, just let me know."

I offer a curt thank you. Anthony carries on with his questions about what it was like to be in the loop. Mandy is silent, and I appreciate the bliss. She wasn't in the tower at the time. Lisa Turpin was heading up the stairs though, so she can speak.

"I had no idea it was a time distortion," her voice is quite meek. "You know, I remembered how it was hard to turn my head because of the way my hair dragged behind me. It felt so heavy. Then though, it started floating behind me. Honestly, I thought I it was some sort of gravity effect. Now I get it. It was like I was living in a slow-motion clip in a muggle movie, but I was fast."

The discussion is enough for me to put work into my letter. Soon enough, the conversation moves on. I slip out of the Great Hall toward the Headmaster's office, hoping to catch him quickly. The Triwizard tournament has distracted from many of the scandals of this year. No one talks about the boggart escape from Professor Moody's office earlier this year unless they mentioned that Cedric Diggory didn't manage to catch it, only subdue it. People do still laugh about the "Draco Mal-ferret" situation and The Weasley Twins growing beards. Lots of witches are still less than kind to Hermione about her alleged seductions of Krum and Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived himself has been the subject of several nasty comments, and even a campaign of buttons teasing him.

At least with my scandal, there have been a variety of reactions. Some people think I am clever enough to create the pocket intentionally, dumb enough to create it accidentally, or foolhardy enough to try creating an actual time-turner. I'm praying that Professor Dumbledore ignores the whispers of the student body.

Besides, more people are talking about what the women experienced in Ravenclaw Tower than what caused it. Apparently, Luna Lovegood thought her clothing and hair had become infested with bugs. She nearly shaved her head.

It'll blow over, I convince myself.

"Time-Turning Turner," a voice calls behind me.

The nickname is new.

Behind me is Malfoy. The sight of him gives me more dissatisfaction than I had anticipated. Last I saw him was before Easter. I made an effort to keep my head down in class leading up to the break to avoid anyone calling out my name. Professors still called me Miss Turner, but no one threw out my first name in any class we share.

"If it isn't the ferret himself," I turn around, mock curtsying.

"I understand why you go by Marty," he points out. "Martina is such a muggle name."

So he has found it from all the rumours.

"You must not be very smart if you are this proud over discovering my name," I roll my eyes. "What kind of name is Draco, anyway?"

There is no one down this hallway, but I feel too exposed. Consequently, I continue to head toward the headmaster's office. I've never seen the inside of it. Perhaps he has other strange instruments.

"A proper wizard kind of name," he trails after me.

"Well, there are many other purebloods with normal names," I shrug. "I'd say Millicent and Pansy are just as befitting as old muggle women as my name. Theodore is normal too. Are you saying they aren't really purebloods?"

Malfoy seems silent. I'd rather not have him follow me to the headmaster's office, lest he discovers my plan. So, I decide to take a detour. Truthfully, I need somewhere private.

Down at the Ravenclaw table in the Great Hall, Terry should still be with the others.

Against my better judgment, I head away from Professor Dumbledore's office. Malfoy trails behind me. Perhaps Professor Moody should have made him into a dog, rather than a ferret. I think a chihuahua would suit him perfectly.

"Off to go cause another disaster?" Malfoy sneers behind me.

"Only if you are with me," I turn around to glare at him as we get stuck on a rotating staircase. "You know, if I found the right spot to hide us, I could keep us in a temporal distortion so strong that I'd only be with you for an hour, and sixty years would go by."

"Content to ruin your life to spite me?"

I quicken my pace, "it would be a small sacrifice to remove the likes of you from proper society."

"As if I could even stand five minutes alone with you," he manages.

"And yet you are still following me," I murmur the sound just loud enough for him to hear it still.

He mostly grumbles to himself until the stairs settle, Malfoy trails behind me. I find myself wandering to a room that I don't often frequent, but that I know Malfoy wouldn't dare enter.

The door is unlocked, although I could have opened it if I wanted to get in, I'm sure. Dragging the heavy wooden door open, I peer inside. It is quite dark. With my wand, I light a torch as I slip inside.

His footsteps continue. He shuts the wooden door behind us.

Finally, I turn around. The room has a yellow glow from the light.

In addition to the choir room, there is an art room. Like music, art is an extracurricular. In both extracurriculars, the students spend two weeks every year learning about Muggle music and art. A lot of Ravenclaws join those clubs to pass their time, but I don't bother. Improving at art isn't my goal anyway. Professor Burbage showed me and the other muggle-borns this room a long time ago. It is a storage unit, for muggle art and artifacts. Everything she uses for her classes goes in here when it isn't in use. In addition to the strange collection of objects on different shelves, there are dozens of paintings on the walls, and more stacked on top of each other on the shelves.

"You aren't really snogging Terry Boot," he says.

I shrug. He gets predictably red. Instead of focusing on that, I look at the items on the shelves. On one, there is a collection of muggle books. They aren't classics like I had expected, for some strange reason. There is a self-help book, a memoir about someone I've never heard of, three fantasy books, and a cardboard book for children. My hands find the cover. It is so dusty, perhaps older than Professor Burbage.

"Are you listening?" Malfoy persists.

"Barely," I say.

The cardboard spine is still. It cracks as I open the book, and I almost expect the cover to snap off. It's one of those books with different textures inside for children to play with. There is something crinkly on the second page, and something shiny opposite it. I flip a page again, and a large pop-up folds out.

Something bangs behind me. I turn to watch Malfoy holding his arm, wand ready. He winces. It seems he slammed into the shelf.

"What, see a rat in here?" I laugh.

Malfoy glares at me, "I wasn't anticipating some rudimentary muggle trick."

I keep laughing, "you mean, the pop-out? You were scared by the cardboard in a book for children younger than two years old?"

"Are you going to answer my question about Boot?" he asks.

I put the book back on the shelf. He seems to relax, staring at it, rather than me. In the light of the lamp, he almost looks like he has colour to his face. Usually, he is pale, nearly a sickly colour. His hair is a stark white still, but he looks less like an animated corpse.

"No," I tell him. "I was hoping to shake you off in here."

"If you really wanted to escape me, we passed several girls' lavatories on the way here," Malfoy blinks at me. He pockets his wand and then crosses his arms. He leans back against the shelf behind him, smirking. "I think you like being chased. You're still hopeful I'm going to kiss you."

"Really?" I raise an eyebrow. "You're the one who brought up who I've been snogging. I'm busy with other things."

He chuckles to himself.

I realize, in his reaction, he has gotten closer to me than he ever has before, aside from when a glass window acted as a partition between us. There is only a metre that separates us. Well, there are so many things between us, but physically, there is mostly air in that space, and less of it than ever before.

"Right," Malfoy says, "like nearly trapping yourself and Flitwick in a pocket dimension."

"You're just embarrassed because you couldn't have done it," I shrug.

"I wouldn't have tried," he shakes his head. "Fool's errand?"

Then, I smirk, "you try alchemy, don't you? Is that now more difficult and dangerous than time magic? It isn't even an elective until sixth year."

Malfoy looks over my face. He must know I saw the book in the library.

"You're lucky your magical item was only confiscated, and you weren't disciplined by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement," Malfoy snaps. "Time magic is highly regulated. If you weren't with Flitwick, McGonagall should have hauled you off. You're lucky the board of governors hasn't shown up to investigate you yet."

Worse things happen all the time, every year, and practically every minute. The board of governors didn't come when Malfoy was turned into a ferret, or an underage wizard was forced into a highly dangerous tournament. Still, I swallow.

"Maybe I will just go back in time and fix it then," I roll my eyes. "I can handle myself."

He doesn't have an answer. I suppose neither do I. The thing that burns inside my chest. Something tightens. Something solidifies.

I don't know how to handle it. He raises an eyebrow, probably catching the shift in my face. My feet bolt out the door before I can think properly. He doesn't quite follow me.

~~~~~

Closer and closer, metre by metre. I am excited for this to come out, but also for the next chapter, and the next. What do you think is going on in Draco's head? Let me know in the comments!