Or worse: expelled [Ethan]

i don't give a damn 'bout my bad reputation

( YOU'RE LIVIN' IN THE PAST IT'S A NEW GENERATION )

It was one of those days where the sun was shining, the school was busy, and mischief hung heavily in the air. Mischief was what James Potter thrived upon, and with this particular atmosphere he was inspired. Impish epiphany only comes along every so often, and he'd be damned if he were to let this opportunity slip past him. That morning, he'd woken with an acute sense of "carpe diem". The idea that today was as good a day as ever to do the things he wanted to do. And James had made a plan a long time ago that he had yet to go through with. With a spring n his step, he left the Gryffindor common room. Before leaving through the portrait hole, he did a quick scan for Ben who was missing in action this morning. Usually, James woke up first to get a head start of Quidditch practice, then Ethan woke up, and Ben slept till half past noon when hunger finally got the best of him. His head of house had advised him to cancel Quidditch practice for the week on account of the bad weather, so for the first week all year, James had enjoyed the pleasures of a long sleep. Regardless of the fact that he could now sleep as late as he wanted, force of habit had him up by nine o'clock, leaving him with a fair bit of time before Ben ought even to have stirred from his heavy sleep. When James had woken to find both of his friend's beds empty he'd been confused to say the least. Especially since today was the perfect day for a prank.

Naturally, the teenage male wants food almost all the time, especially after immediately having woken up and therefore, not having gorged themselves for hours. James, however, ignored that natural instinct and skipping breakfast entirely, instead planting himself at the top of the Grand Staircase and looking down at everything. Yes, he thought to himself as he watched the other students go easily about their day, This'll do nicely.

What will do nicely? One may ask. In the fourth year, James had tried a particularly clever stint by trying to get up into the girls' dormitory (don't ask why. His intentions were less than innocent). As he soon learned, the presence of a Y chromosome causes the stairs to fold in on themselves and create a slide which promptly delivers the male perpetrator back to the bottom of the staircase. This had brought upon many attempts at finding out what exactly the enchantment on that was, because how clever would it be to slide down the grand staircase to breakfast along with all of the other unsuspecting students. Unfortunately, Hogwarts was particularly clever when it came to hiding her charms, so not only did it take him until mid fifth year to come up with the spell, but it took him until early sixth year to come up with a counter curse for it. The women of Gryffindor could now be blessed by his presence whenever they pleased. This also presented him with the opportunity to further transform the school into his playground: slide and all.

The only issue was in the possibility of detention afterwards, see at seventy-three detentions, the big number eighty was approaching rapidly. Eighty detentions, for those who don't know, meant an expulsion from Hogwarts. Apparently, no one had ever hit it, and the only other close call they'd ever had was with a couple of students in the seventies (who James didn't doubt were probably the two men he was named after). Any reasonable person would have watched their step and been certain not to accidentally tip the scales and earn any extra detentions, but James Potter had never been "any reasonable person". Without a second thought, he withdrew his wand from his robes. He had almost said the incantation when he was interrupted. He heaved a sigh as he turned around to see the Head Boy badge glistening on the other student's robes. Thank Merlin that he was best friends with the Head Boy, otherwise he'd have been expelled by now for sure.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]696
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Ethan Johnson
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Joan Jett - Bad Reputation
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]James you turkey. Behave, please.[/blockquote]

Honestly, Ethan should have seen it coming. Hogwarts had been far too peaceful for far too long. Frankly, it was just begging for James Potter's seventy fourth detention. Ethan kind of wished it would stop. On the other hand, he sort of... didn't.

That morning, he had woken up before his two best friends who were contently snoring in their respective beds. Usually, Ethan was used to a sleeping Ben, James having already headed to the Quidditch pitch a while back, but that morning, it seemed to be a group effort to try and snore awake the whole of Gryffindor. And everyone in a five mile radius. He tried to go back to sleep, honestly, he did. But you know like when your neighbour decides it's a good idea to drill holes into his wall at ungodly hours of a Sunday morning? And then mow the grass with the loudest lawnmower ever produced by mankind? Well, this was kind of like that.

He got dressed at record speed, hair already messy although his school uniform was as impeccable as always. Outside the door of the dorm, it still sounded like Jurassic Park. Ethan couldn't help but crack a smile, adjusting his glasses before heading off to god knows where. Usually, he'd stay in the common room and read a book, or head off to the library to finish his homework, but the former was too full for his liking and he had already finished all of his homework due. Oh, the woes of an academic student.

Therefore, he wandered around aimlessly. Yep. Always a solution te everything, right? Only when feeling that all too familiar gnaw of hunger did Ethan decide it was probably time to go down to the Hall and, well, stuff his face. He paused, deliberating whether he should go back and check if his friends were awake yet, decided on doing just that, and turned around to head back to the seventh floor. Stepping out onto the Grand Staircase, Ethan spotted him just one level beneath where he stood. 'Oh, for the love of...' the boy thought, shaking his head slightly, running a hand through his hair, the ghost of a smile on his lips.

He silently walked up to behind the boy, clearing his throat loudly as James withdrew his wand from his robes. He heaved a sigh and looked around, Ethan just glad he caught the conniving little... uh... 'troublemaker' in time. "I'm stealing your wand off you next time you sleep," he joked and sternly said at the same. "Not even kidding." Honestly, if Ethan didn't act like a party-pooper every now and then, James probably wouldn't be around to snore him awake anymore.

Note: this is rubbish. sorry, you perfect human being

i don't give a damn 'bout my bad reputation

( YOU'RE LIVIN' IN THE PAST IT'S A NEW GENERATION )

Hogwarts letters come and go, usually in a pretty uneventful manner. The summer between their fourth and fifth years at Hogwarts, however, had been very different. For some odd reason, James' letter had been heavier than usual, and when he felt the outline of a badge he thought it was someone's twisted idea of a joke. In all honesty, when he opened that letter his hands were shaking. How in hell could he be a prefect? It didn't make sense? He'd broken nearly every single school rule and he was less than twenty detentions away from expulsion. When he finally opened the letter he realized what a dolt he'd been. Obviously he was Quidditch captain. Gryffindor's previous captain had graduated and James was nothing if not a brilliant chaser. An owl came the next day with news from Ethan. Occasionally, James wondered if making Ethan prefect in the fifth had been some clever way of keeping him and Ben in line. Ego-centric enough, he knew, to think that they'd based their prefect choice on who needed to reign in their friends the most. The way things had been going, anyway, Ethan's job was mostly just to keep James from blowing things up on a regular basis. And not blowing things up in a Finnigan sort of way, but in an intentional let's-see-if-I-can-take-out-the-Slytherin-common-room kind of way. Whether some master plan to keep Gryffindor's two most troublesome students behaving or not, Ethan had kept his prefect status and now, been named Head Boy.

Some days, like today, James counted his blessings that Ethan was Head Boy instead of some Slytherin prat. Their friendship kept him from earning detention twice a day. If anyone else had caught him perched at the top of the stairs with a spell on the tip of his tongue and his wand at the ready he would have been docked points and thrown in detention faster than you can say Quidditch. With Ethan, it was just the usual look that conveyed the last seven years of trying to reign in James' inherent stupidity and desire to wreak havoc. "C'mon mate," James protested, "It's just be a bit of fun. No harm, no foul." He had tried very hard to find a slide related pun to slip into his explanation, but sometimes even the brilliant of James Potter fails and he has to defer back to the basics.

Poor Ethan. Poor, poor exasperated Ethan. For a smart guy, he'd sure picked a stupid group of friends. In the first year, if he'd been thinking, the boy would have opened the train compartment, seen James and Ben throwing paper airplanes and he would have run away as fast as he could, however, a brief judgement lapse had given him the job of perpetual babysitter. The number of times Ethan had talked James out of the Whomping Willow were now innumerable. "James, come down from there, you'll break you're arm." Ethan had said in the fourth year shortly before he and Ben had carried an unconscious James to the infirmary where they had to mend, you guessed it, a broken arm. Despite his best efforts, James was born an idiot, and an idiot he would probably remain until the end of time. There was little to be done for that. Though the threat of expulsion had kept him on also his best behaviour, it was high time he did something. The school couldn't stay this quiet for long.

WORDCOUNT//

[/i][/color]577
TAGGED//[/i][/color]Ethan Johnson
LYRICS//[/i][/color]Joan Jett - Bad Reputation
CREDIT//[/i][/color]Little Miss Lacey
NOTES//[/i][/color]Not even. You are flawless. Let me love you.[/blockquote]