Chapter Text
Shelby is exhausted.
It’s really just been this last month that’s run her ragged: between her Head Girl duties, preparing for NEWTs, and the Quidditch finals against Hufflepuff coming up in another week and a half, she’s barely found the time to complete her class assignments, let alone actually socialize or do anything actually fun.
This afternoon is no different. The Slytherins have had the pitch booked since two o’clock for practice and Shelby’s hands have nearly gone numb from the smack of the Quaffle. Their captain, another Chaser, has been drilling them until nearly sunset and Shelby’s arms had started aching about an hour ago. She’s already planning on skipping dinner to go straight to the dormitory and swipe a potion from Fatin’s collection to help dull the ache.
So now is really not the ideal time to also have to deal with Toni Shalifoe. And yet, as Shelby and her teammates are descending back to the pitch on their brooms, she can see Toni and the rest of the Hufflepuff team waiting impatiently on the sidelines, like they’re ready for a confrontation.
Shelby and Toni have a complicated history. Shelby would almost call them frenemies at times (emphasis on the enemy half), but their arguments often verge too far into genuinely biting for the term to completely fit. So it’s “rivals” instead, maybe.
It’d all started just a week into their first year, when they’d been paired up during a dueling exercise by a misguided Defense Against the Dark Arts professor who’d decided to “test their natural abilities”, and Shelby, a pureblood with a massive edge over a Muggleborn Toni, had knocked Toni flat on her ass with a quickness and humiliated her in front of the entire first year class.
She’d hurried over to her afterward, ready to apologize and offer Toni a hand, but Toni had taken one look at her Slytherin robes, put it together with her clear pureblood status, and snarled out, “You really showed the Mudblood, huh?”
Shelby knows her house and blood status have a bit of a reputation, and she’d grown up hearing the word back at home, but something about it had always made her uncomfortable. She’d even bonded with and eventually befriended Fatin Jadmani, a fellow Slytherin pureblood in her year who’d had a similar experience growing up and was equally eager to reject the prejudices of her family.
But as much as she’d denied any bigotry, and as much as she’d tried, initially, to be kind to the angry girl in the Hufflepuff robes, the most success she’d managed was a tentative friendship with another Hufflepuff, Martha Blackburn, who’d started trailing Toni on their first day at Hogwarts and all these years later is still Toni’s best and closest friend.
Shelby’d eventually compromised on a rivalry with an occasional playful hint to it, when Toni’s feeling a little less angry or, in the last couple of years, maybe has some alcohol in her to take the edge off.
At first, there’d been just the classes, and a not-so-subtle competition to achieve the better marks. Charms: Shelby, always. Transfiguration: Also always Shelby; Toni’s transfigurations are often infamously monstrous. Defense Against the Dark Arts: Toni in all but one semester across all seven years. Astronomy: Always Toni. History of Magic: Shelby. Herbology: Shelby at first by a mile, and then Toni. Flying: Shelby would never, ever concede defeat on this, but probably Toni by a hair, especially given her appointment to the Quidditch captaincy at the beginning of their seventh year. Potions: Neither, but Shelby likes to claim victory because her potions usually just don’t work and Toni’s explode. Fatin’s the real winner of that one; she’s prodigy levels of good at it, and has even started crafting some of her own in the privacy of the Slytherin Girls’ Dormitory, but Shelby’s been sworn to secrecy on that one in exchange for access to Fatin’s private stores.
Their third year, they’d both made their respective Quidditch teams: Toni as a Beater, Shelby as a Chaser, and their rivalry had been given a new battleground to be fought upon. Toni’s broken three of Shelby’s ribs and an arm in the last four and a half years as a direct result of Bludgers sent her way. Shelby’s given Toni a concussion once when she’d pelted her with the Quaffle in a particularly intense match that went off the rails a little (she’d earned a two-game suspension for that one even though there technically hadn’t been a rule against it, an injustice she still hasn’t quite let go of to this day).
Care of Magical Creatures consistently goes to Toni, even though Shelby had enlisted Martha early on for some tutoring sessions. So does Muggle Studies, understandably. Ancient Runes and Arithmancy are Shelby’s domain, and so was Divination during the one year they’d taken it; Shelby had been atrocious at it but Toni had called it “bullshit” and outright slept through it.
Shelby’d shot for Prefect in their fifth year, so Toni had too, but only Shelby had managed to win the position, plus the spot of Head Girl two years later; Toni has too much of an affinity for losing house points by mouthing off in class or sneaking out of her dorm after hours to ever have a real shot at being handed a position of authority.
There’s a hint of respect between them sometimes, but more often than not, they either taunt each other, bicker, or argue. The taunting’s fun for Shelby, the bickering could be, but the arguing leaves her heated in a way nothing else ever has, because Shelby Goodkind just isn’t an angry person.
And then there had been the time last October in Hogsmeade, when Martha and some of the other girls in their year had dragged them out to the Hog’s Head and both she and Toni’d had a little too much Firewhiskey and Butterbeer…
Shelby has a vague memory of a bathroom stall, an angry mouth on hers and dark, wavy hair fisted in her hands, and they definitely do not talk about that, ever. Shelby’s got an ex with freckles and curly hair over in Gryffindor and Toni’d dated a Ravenclaw with an affinity for dark makeup all throughout their fifth and sixth years, so it’s not like there are any secrets about either of them—not as individuals, anyway, and not at Hogwarts, though back home is a little more complicated for Shelby.
But Shelby’s pretty sure she remembers putting Toni’s hand at the hem of her skirt on that night at Hogsmeade, and Toni being the one to pull away and stumble out of the stall with a mumbled apology and some comment about them both being drunk, and that’s one mutual understanding they’ve at least managed to silently come to, at least: it didn’t happen and no one will ever know about it. Shelby has plenty of reason to find it humiliating, but she doesn’t really like to think about why Toni would want to keep it a secret, because the answer might be that she’s just that embarrassed to have even kissed Shelby at all, even if she’d rejected the idea of doing anything more.
She’d been almost thankful when the “birthday gift” Toni’d offered her a couple of weeks later had turned out to be a Nose-Biting Teacup from Zonko’s, because it’d indicated a return to normalcy. On Toni’s 18th birthday last month, Shelby’d returned the favor by quietly paying off a first year Hufflepuff to plant a Dungbomb under Toni’s favorite lounge chair in their common room.
“I respect the hustle,” Toni’d mumbled to her in passing in the Great Hall the following morning, and Shelby’d smiled a little stupidly to herself over her breakfast until Fatin had arched a silent eyebrow at her from across the table.
They mostly don’t get along, though. Seriously.
“You guys went over your time slot,” Toni bites out at them as soon as they’ve landed. “We booked for half an hour ago.”
“Could’ve come up there and gotten us off the pitch yourselves,” the Slytherin captain sneers. “Or were you too scared?”
“Nah, just felt bad for you guys. I know you need the extra practice,” Toni fires back. “We won’t even break a sweat next match.”
“Wouldn’t be the last game you slept through while the other team flew circles around you,” Shelby can’t resist chiming in. Toni’s eyes narrow in on her.
“Did the last Bludger to your head fuck with your memory? We thrashed Gryffindor to get to finals. You guys barely got through, and only because the Ravenclaw Seeker can’t see for shit.”
“When your only strategy is to swing your bats blindly until you hit a Bludger because your Chasers can’t put points on the board,” Shelby snaps, “you won’t actually beat a team that knows how to fly.”
Toni laughs derisively. “Oh, ‘cause you’re known for dodging my Bludgers?”
“You should learn to dodge a Quaff—”
“Okay,” Shelby’s captain sighs out, cutting them off. “Enough foreplay, you two. We’ll settle this on the pitch in ten days. C’mon.”
A few of the girls giggle as the teams start to split off, and Shelby fights off a blush and sends Toni a scathing look instead. Toni glares back at her, exhales angrily and then leaves.
When Shelby gets back to her dorm, Fatin’s lounging on her bed with a quill and a half-finished essay in her lap and Shelby immediately begs her, “Please tell me you have something for muscle aches.”
“Are you gonna let me sneak out late to the storerooms this weekend to replenish my ingredient stock, oh mighty Head Girl?” Fatin asks her.
“Naturally.” Shelby feels bad about signing off on Fatin’s rule-breaking sometimes, but also, Fatin’s been her best friend for years now and some of the stuff she brews has done wonders for Shelby: everything from pain to her ability to sleep or to concentrate, and even a potion to help boost her mood once, last year after her breakup.
She opens Fatin’s trunk, waves her wand and mutters the spell to reveal a secret compartment within, and then eyes the multicolored bottles sorted into neat little rows. “Which one is it?”
“The purple one near the top left,” Fatin tells her. “Just drink, like, half, and you should feel fine in a minute.”
“It doesn’t need anything else?” Shelby wonders. Sometimes there’s something she’s meant to say beforehand, or Fatin gives her some instruction about swirling it clockwise or counterclockwise some amount of times. Shelby doesn’t understand any of it, which is probably why Fatin’s practically guaranteed to get an “O” on her Potions NEWT with minimal effort required and Shelby had barely managed an “Acceptable” for her mark during her OWL back in fifth year, even after an intense several weeks of studying.
“You’re good to go, babe. Swig away.”
Shelby downs half of it and then puts the potions away and closes the trunk. It’s not long after she’s collected her own quill and parchment and set to work on her class assignments at her desk that she feels the aching in her arms start to fade. She sighs with relief, stretches for a moment, and then blinks herself back into focus and starts in on her next essay.
~~~~~
“Dottie, how on earth are you doing that?”
“What, this?” Dot waves her wand from the other side of the Room of Requirement and promptly conjures and then vanishes a fully-grown otter. “I thought you were getting the hang of mammals now?”
“Not ones that large.” Shelby sighs down at her own conjuration: a rodent missing a tail. With a huff and a wave of her wand, it disappears. “I’ll never get an O with this.”
“You’re always top three in our Transfiguration classes,” Dot reassures her. “Besides, you only need an E to qualify for most jobs that require a Transfiguration NEWT. You’ll be fine, Shelby. Don’t stress.”
“I’m stressed,” Shelby confirms. “I’ve been exhausted lately with all of our assignments, and practices, and studying… not to mention I’ve been up late every night with my Head Girl duties. It’s starting to fry my brain. I’m so tired.”
“Maybe Fatin could help you out,” Dot suggests. “Maybe she has something to keep you energized or help you concentrate, you know? She kind of always has something for everything, and if she doesn’t, she’d probably make it for you.”
“That’s not the worst idea.”
Dot taps her temple proudly. “Just call me an honorary Ravenclaw.”
~~~~~
Shelby runs into Toni on the way to take Dot’s advice, as Toni’s trying to sneakily edge her way out of the kitchens with an armful of bread rolls. Toni’s face falls when she realizes she’s been spotted. “Shit.”
“Are those meant to go out to the Great Hall for dinner?” Shelby confronts her right away, and Toni shifts awkwardly from foot to foot, avoiding her eyes.
“Yeah. But I was hungry. And I’m too busy getting my ass kicked by textbooks to make it to dinner tonight.”
“NEWTs?” Shelby guesses, having some momentary sympathy for her. “Me too.”
“Yeah.” Toni falls silent for a moment, like she’s thinking about something, and then winces. “So, uh… would you wanna maybe…? I mean, I was thinking—” Shelby’s eyebrows raise and Toni rolls her eyes. “Look, so, it’s mostly Charms that’s the problem for me, and I know it’s your best subject—”
“Is it?” Shelby asks, feigning innocence, and Toni scowls at her.
“Yeah, you’re fucking good, alright? The best in our class. And I need help. So I was thinking we could, like… help each other out, maybe. If there’s something you’re struggling with, too? Aren’t you doing Defense Against the Dark Arts?”
“I can get an E,” Shelby dismisses, mostly just to antagonize her, but Toni sees right through her with a scoff.
“And I’m supposed to believe that’s good enough for you?”
Shelby considers it for a moment and almost starts to think Toni might have a point. They do have a bit of a mismatched skill set, and it probably would benefit them both to spend some time studying together. But then she’d have to take her NEWTs knowing she’d accepted help with them from Toni Shalifoe.
Shelby steps up to her and swipes one of the rolls out of Toni’s arms, tells her, “Stop stealing from the kitchens, Toni,” and then heads off to the dungeons to retire for the night. Toni says nothing, but Shelby feels eyes on her back all the way down the hallway.
~~~~~
“What are you digging around in my trunk for?” Fatin huffs at her when she catches Shelby at it half an hour later. “Jesus, you’re like a potions fiend. Stop jacking my stash without my permission; I worked hard on those.”
“I’m just looking for something to help me concentrate until our NEWTs,” Shelby straightens up to explain.
Fatin folds her arms across her chest. “Not that I don’t admire your determination, but that’s cheating. They check you for potions effects before the tests, too, so it’s not even good cheating.”
“Not during the test,” Shelby clarifies. “Just leading up to it. We sit our NEWTs on May 15th, so in about three weeks. Do you have anything that’ll last that long?”
Fatin sighs and admits, “Okay, yeah, technically. I was kind of saving it for myself, though.” She smirks. “But I guess I can make an exception for a friend. Well, another exception, because I let Leah have some, too.” Shelby gapes at her and Fatin laughs. “I’m sorry, okay! She offered me six bars of this candy called ‘Snickers’ she brought here from her Muggle dad; I swear to God it’s the best thing I’ve ever tasted, Shelby—”
Shelby cuts her off with a groan. “Just tell me what to take.”
“Alright, keep your vagina on, Jesus.” Fatin makes her way toward her nightstand. “It’s this pink one, and you just say the date out loud you want it to last until, but only up until a month—”
Shelby spots a pink potion in the trunk, withdraws it, and announces, “May 14!” then downs the entire bottle at the same time that Fatin whirls around by her nightstand, wide-eyed.
“Shelby, wait—” she starts, and Shelby freezes in place, the newly empty bottle in hand, when she sees a second pink bottle in Fatin’s hand, freshly withdrawn from a compartment in her nightstand, clearly ready to be offered to Shelby.
There’s a long silence. And then Shelby starts panicking. “Fatin, what did I just take?”
“Hold on.” Fatin sets the bottle in her hand down immediately and moves quickly to Shelby, kneeling down by the trunk and rummaging through the compartment. After a moment, she pauses, stares, and then swallows thickly and rises to her feet with a guilty look at Shelby. “Shit.”
Shelby starts hyperventilating. “Do I need to go to the Hospital Wing? Oh, Lord, I should; I should go now—”
Fatin grasps her wrist to hold her in place. “Uh, you could definitely do that, but you might want to hold off for a second. You’re not dying.”
Shelby gulps and closes her eyes, trying to calm herself down. “Okay. Good.”
“It’s gonna be okay,” Fatin prefaces, and then hesitates. “I think.”
Shelby’s eyes pop open. “You think?”
“That one was experimental,” Fatin admits. “For… personal use. Except I hadn’t used it yet. But look, I’m totally confident it’s gonna work as intended.”
“As intended,” Shelby echoes immediately, still breathing hard. “Okay. And what does that mean?”
“It’s not gonna hurt you,” Fatin starts again, and Shelby grabs for her shoulders, impatient.
“Fatin. Details.”
“Long story short?” Fatin checks, and Shelby nods swiftly. Fatin bites her lip, tilts her head like she’s thinking about the best way to put this, and then finally confesses, “Well, you’re gonna get really horny.”
Shelby’s hands slip from Fatin's shoulders and she feels most of the worry drain from her immediately. Mostly because she’s pretty sure this is all some sort of elaborate joke. “Horny,” she deadpans. “As in—?”
“As in, you took a lust potion,” Fatin says. “Well, my attempt at one.”
And now Shelby’s less certain, because Fatin still doesn’t look like she’s joking. “You’re serious?”
“Dead,” Fatin confirms. “I thought it’d be fun to try, you know? With the right guy, anyway.” Something occurs to Shelby and she panics again, slams her eyes shut and steps away from Fatin, then places her hands over her eyes to make extra sure she can’t see anything. There’s a moment of silence, and then Fatin asks, “What the fuck are you doing?”
Shelby blushes and lets her hands fall, opens her eyes to look at Fatin and mumbles, “Oh. I thought it might be a ‘first person you see’ kind of situation…”
Fatin blinks at her. “I mean, did you have the sudden urge to fuck me? Any more than usual, of course.”
Shelby rolls her eyes. “I wasn’t sure how long it’d take to kick in!”
“My guess would be a few hours. Definitely by tomorrow morning.” Fatin sits down on her bed and mulls it over. “Again, it’s untested, but how it’s supposed to work is that it makes you feel turned on, and it doesn’t go away until it’s…. taken care of. And not just once. It’s like, a repeat problem.”
“Like Viagra,” Shelby blurts.
Fatin’s eyebrows furrow. “What’s Viagra?”
Shelby blushes. “I’m not totally sure, but I heard Toni make a joke about it once; I think it’s for men—”
Fatin dismisses her with a wave. “Anyway, you’re going to have to take care of it over and over again until the effect wears off.”
“When does that happen?”
Fatin grimaces. “Well, you picked a date, didn’t you?”
Shelby feels her eyes bulging out of her skull. “Until the day before our NEWTs? Fatin!”
“You’re the one who downed a random potion!”
“That was not my fault; you said it was pink!”
“I didn’t say it was in the trunk.”
“Where else would it be?!” Shelby huffs and reaches for her robes. “I’m going to the Hospital Wing.”
“There’s almost definitely no cure,” Fatin tells her idly. “I just invented it myself. Most they could probably do is curb it, and on top of that, everyone at Hogwarts will know Shelby Goodkind’s on horny mode for the foreseeable future. You know how easily gossip spreads at this school.”
Shelby gives her scathing look. “Well, what else am I supposed to do?”
“Take care of it until NEWTs,” Fatin says like it’s obvious. “Why don’t you ask Becca to—”
“Absolutely not,” Shelby cuts in, shaking her head emphatically. “I’d sooner ask you.”
“Well, that’s because I’m hot and you have a big lesbian crush on me,” Fatin replies with a shrug. “Your other option, of course, is to just ignore it. But I don’t recommend that. I mean, I have no idea how hard it’ll actually be, because again, it’s untested, and I’m pretty sure you can’t technically die of sexual frustration, but if you could, I’d be genuinely worried for you.”
“I’ll figure it out,” Shelby decides. “And by keeping myself under control, not throwing myself at someone just because a potion’s making me a little uncomfortable. Can you just give me the concentration potion too, now?”
Fatin laughs. “Uh, yeah, you’re gonna need it just to function even remotely like a normal human being. If the lust potion works like it’s supposed to, you’re gonna have a hard time thinking about anything other than sex for the next few weeks. It’s not something to take lightly, Shelby.”
Shelby scowls at her as she accepts the potion, mumbles, “May 14,” and then downs the remaining contents. Instantly she senses her mind sharpening, and it makes her feel just a little relieved. “This won’t be that bad,” she says, and Fatin just shrugs her shoulders.
“If you say so.”