“Jessica?”

Oh God.

Jessica internally groans as she wakes up to a distinct pressure between her temples. When she peeks through her heavy lids, the morning sunlight makes her headache a thousand times worse, but the hand that suddenly shakes her is even worse yet. She tries to muster a, ‘morning,’ but the only sound that makes it past her lips is a sad, coarse croak.

“Jessica? I’m sorry, but you gotta wake up.”

The hungover witch manages to muster the strength open her eyes and takes in the bleary sight of Yoona hunched over her, all dolled up and ready to leave. Jessica doesn’t even have to be fully conscious to know that she must look like a total wreck right now.

“Where …?” she manages to croak out, dragging a palm down her messy face.

Yoona smiles and the whiteness of her teeth makes Jessica’s head throb, so she covers her eyes with her arms. “Why is it so bright?” Jessica slurs.

“Wake up, sleepy. It’s, like, past noon.”

“Where am I?” Jessica rasps.

“My room.”

When Jessica finally realizes that Yoona’s sitting on the edge of the mattress and leaned over her, she suddenly feels flustered. Even though she’s half awake, she still has enough functioning brain cells to remember the first time she encountered Yoona in the cafeteria when the other girl practically shoved her face in Jessica’s and nearly spat fire out. Now, she’s sitting at Jessica’s bedside and gently rubbing her shoulder.

She almost blushes from how sweet the Hufflepuff girl actually is. “How’d I get here?”

Yoona laughs. “You really don’t remember?” She watches the Slytherin witch shake her head slightly. “You were really drunk last night. Taeyeon-unnie found you nearly passed out on the Puff dorms steps.”

Groaning in embarrassment, Jessica rolls her face into the pillow.

“I gotta say…you sure are a…weepy drunk,” Yoona teases.

Jessica sinks further into the pillows as humiliating images begin to trickle into her memory. “No, no, no,” she murmurs to herself.

The Hufflepuff girl chuckles and pats Jessica through the thick covers. “Hey, look, I’m really sorry, but I need to head out. You okay to get up? Or do you want to stay and sleep some more?”

Even with her foggy mind, Jessica still has enough clarity to sit up and tell Yoona, “no, no, I’m up. You’ve done enough for me already. Thank you.”

Softly smiling, Yoona reaches out and pats down Jessica’s messy hair. “Come on, I’ll walk you back to the Slytherin dorms.”

***

***

At the sound of two shy knocks, Sooyoung leaves the comfort of her beanbag chair and finishes stuffing the last few bites of her granola bar into . Reaching her dorm-room entrance, she unclips the silver lock and slides open the black, wooden doors to find the sight of her bright-faced junior on the other side.

“Seohyunnie.” Dusting off the granules of oats off on her pajama shirt, Sooyoung rolls her eyes when she notices the younger girl sporting her school uniform on a weekend. “Come in, come in,” she says, waving the girl inside.

“Hi, Sooyoung-unnie,” Seohyun politely greets as she steps through the doors and slides it closed behind her.

“Which textbook did you need to borrow again? Fantastical Beast Classifications?”

“Yes. And your white magic notes, if you have them handy.”

Sooyoung laughs and shakes her head before rummaging through her bookshelf. “It’s Saturday! Seriously, just take the day off and relax a bit.”

“I’m the youngest in my year. I have to keep up with everyone else.”

“Keep up?!” Sooyoung cackles as she retrieves two small, stitch-bound books. “You already skipped a year. You’re the one that’s going to leave your seniors in the dust,” she says as she pushes the books into Seohyun’s eager hands. “They’re going to hate me for giving these to you.”

The younger girl chuckles and gives a polite bow of her head. “Thank you, unnie.”

“Seriously, listen to unnie and gain some flexibility in your life. Did you even have fun last night?”

Seohyun’s years ahead of her own age, but it’s remarks like these that makes her real age show as she whines and playfully nudges at the older girl. “Unnie! I’m not as bad as I used to be, right? I at least showed up to the party last night, didn’t I?”

“Oh yeah?” Sooyoung challenges, raising her brows. “What time did you leave?”

“Eleven-thirty,” she replies matter-of-factly. “Curfew’s at midnight.”

Sooyoung drags her hands down her face. “It’s improvement…I suppose.”

“Have you heard from Tiffany-unnie yet? I wonder if she’s feeling okay. She drank a lot last night,” Seohyun frets.

The older girl scoffs as she plops back down into the comfortable divot in her beanbag chair. “Don’t you worry about her. I saw Yuri taking her upstairs last night. I’m sure they’re both fine—and hungover as hell. I wonder where Sica went though.”

“Oh! I saw Taeyeon taking Sica-unnie to Yoona’s room last night.”

If Sooyoung had a mouthful of water, she could have done a spit take. “You saw them go where?!”

Seohyun gives the older girl a reassuring smile. “I see them together for lunch pretty often. I wouldn’t worry.”

Crinkling her nose, Sooyoung grumbles, “you’d worry too if you saw what I saw.”

Seohyun frowns when she thinks about the infamous incident between the two older girls. She takes a seat at the edge of Sooyoung’s mattress as she asks, “did Taeyeon really do all that to Fany-unnie? I don’t think I’ve even seen her angry, not like the way Hyoyeon gets.”

“Seohyunnie,” Sooyoung sighs, sad about ruining the young girl’s good faith in people. “I literally came into the classroom and saw Hyoyeon and Yoona struggling to pull Taeyeon off of Tiffany. The girl was crazy—wild, even. I think she has serious anger issues or something.”

The other Ravenclaw student sighs. “Kids used to pick on me too, but it was never that bad. I know how it feels…I don’t know Fany-unnie still carries herself so well after experiencing something that scary,” Seohyun whispers, lowering her head. “I totally just shut down when it was happening to me.”

“Hey.” Being a bundle of comfort, Sooyoung doesn’t think twice before tugging Seohyun off the bed and guiding the girl into her little nest on the beanbag. She wraps the younger girl into a big bear hug as she says, “that was a long time ago, okay? You’re too strong to ever have to deal with dumb kids like that again.”

The other girl smiles. “I know. Still, I really admire Fany-unnie.”

“Fany’s definitely strong-willed, I’ll give you that,” Sooyoung chuckles, letting Seohyun rest her head on her shoulder. “If Fany was a weak, then Taeyeon would just be some brainless playground bully. The only reason why they have such high tensions between them is because Tiffany isn’t the kind of girl that lets anyone push her or her friends around.”

“I know,” Seohyun sighs, thoughtful of her admiration for the older girl. “And we’ve got her back, no matter what.”

***

It’s been a day since Taeyeon’s seen Jessica and she can’t help but to chuckle once she catches sight of her potions partner entering the lab. “Well, well, well, look at what the cat dragged in. Though Jessica’s walking, she may as well be crawling at the rate she’s approaching the bench. “I gave you all of yesterday to get over your hangover,” Taeyeon says while watching the other girl set down her notebook of messy notes and calculations.

Jessica groans as she takes a seat next to her partner. “Well, I should’ve taken the whole weekend off. This is a two-day-hangover.”

“I figured as much,” Taeyeon remarks before sliding over a flask, hall-full of faint blue liquid. “Here, I made this for you. Drink it”

Jessica uncorks it before she leans down, taking a shallow whiff of it before abruptly snapping away. “Ugh, that smells awful!” she grimaces, trying to fan the smell of sour, wet towels from her nose.

“It’s hangover juice. Trust me, you’ll feel better,” Taeyeon offers again, nudging the flask over once more.

“It smells like old laundry!” Jessica whines. “Old laundry and…cucumbers! I hate cucumbers!”

Cucumbers? Taeyeon flares her nostrils and easily picks up the familiar, sour scent, but she’s surprised that Jessica can catch the dim scent of vegetables used in the potion too. “Sica, we have a whole day’s worth of work to do and I need your brain, functioning. Just drink.”

The other girl grimaces and continues to whine. “It smells!”

“You’re the one who wanted to get ahead on this assignment! Come on, drink up!” Taeyeon tells her, picking up the flask and shoving it to Jessica’s lips.

Begrudgingly, the girl takes a hold of the flask herself and chugs down the mouthfuls of the sour liquid. Once she’s finished the contents, she breathes in a fresh gasp of air, and the putrid taste amplifies on her tongue, making her gag.

Taeyeon chuckles and pats the girl, who’s hunched over the work bench and retching. “Take it easy on the absinthe next time, huh?”

“I-I’ll be,” she pauses to gag, “sure to do that. I never want to taste this again,” Jessica wheezes.

The Gryffindor girl feels a little bad that Jessica looks like she’s on the verge of vomiting. Patting her on the back again, she asks, “do you…feel better though?”

Once the vulgar flavor dwindles on her taste buds, the Slytherin witch sits up on her stool and tries to focus on her headache and feeble state. She’s surprised by the potion’s reaction rate when she feels…amazing. “Woah,” she sighs, surprised that the vile taste has vanished from her taste buds too, leaving no trace, whatsoever.

“Better, right?” Taeyeon chuckles. “I used to make them all the time for Sunny and them when we used to party all night. High school was wild with them.”

“Now, look at you,” Jessica laughs, “in the lab, on your weekend. What a keener.”

“It’s not by choice. My potions partner is demanding.”

Head now completely clear, Jessica smiles at the light-hearted jab before she says, “hey, uh, I never got a chance to thank you for the other night.”

Taeyeon modestly waves it off. “It was Yoona that took care of you.”

“She said you waited till I fell asleep before you left that night,” Jessica says shyly. “I-I’m sorry, I don’t remember much, but thank you. If it wasn’t for you, I probably would have out in the corridors somewhere.”

“Really, it was no problem.”

“Well, thanks again anyways,” Jessica tells the girl, reaching out to hug her potions partner.

Not used be overly affectionate, Taeyeon goes stiff in the other girl’s embrace. “Y-you’re welcome.” When the main door starts to slide open, Taeyeon pulls herself away from the girl as a familiar face enters the classroom.

“Oh. Ladies,” Professor Choi greets as he spots his students in the lab. “What’re you doing here?”

“Hi, Professor,” Jessica politely greets back. “We’re just getting ahead on the nāga venom assignment so that we don’t have to worry about it during the midterm weeks.”

Siwon chuckles as he heads to his desk to grab a stack of papers. “I’m starting to think Jessica is a good influence on you. In the lab, on a Sunday! You sure are a different person, Kim Taeyeon. Nice to see you putting that gifted brain to good use, for once.”

The girl in question sticks her tongue out at her professor.

Once the professor finishes chuckling, he asks the young wolf-girl, “you feeling okay, kid? How many transitions did you get through last night?”

Taeyeon groans. “One and I’m tired as heck.”

The professor gives her a thin, sympathetic smile. “You should eat more to replenish your energy. If the cafeteria selection’s crap tonight, stop by my room and I’ll cook, okay? You need to take care of yourself.”

“Yes, mom,” Taeyeon replies, grinning.

Siwon snorts. “Anyways, I just stopped by to grab some labs to mark tonight. You girls stay out of trouble,” he says as he takes his leave.

“Have a good night, Siwon!”

“Bye, Professor.”

As soon as the professor is out the door, Jessica immediately turns to her potions partner with suspicious eyes. “Is nothing really going on between you two? You guys are like...friendly.”

Taeyeon sighs and rolls her eyes. “Because we are friends, dummy,” she replies, starting to busy herself with the assignment by rummaging through the assortment of glass bottles on the rack.   

“No leaves, just floral based ingredients,” Jessica corrects her partner, resetting some of the ingredients Taeyeon’s selected. “Anyways, friends are one thing, but you guys are, like, friendlier.”

“Ew.” Taeyeon crinkles her nose as she leans back, letting Jessica work her magic. “Don’t be gross. He’s like my brother.”

Jessica chuckles as she preps the base of their potion, hanging