Bell Luminary POV
I woke up to the sound of well nothing, the bed was super comfortable though. I slowly got out of it and dressed myself, short pants, a purple shirt and my robe going over it. I looked around the dorm, some parts were filled with strewn out clothes, what can I say my dormmates weren't exactly the most neat people in the world.
Lucy and Emma, they were sleeping soundly, and Emma's mouth was hung open, her nostrils flaring and her throat straining, it seemed like she was snoring, not that I could hear her. I'd learned to notice these little visual cues over the years. The slight vibration of certain objects when someone made a loud noise. The way people's throats moved differently when they spoke at different volumes. It wasn't the same as hearing, but it was something.
Something seemed to wake them up as both of their eyes opened up in an instant, Lucy jolted so much that she fell to the floor and hit the wooden floorboards which made me laugh.
I felt my vocal chords strain so I knew a sound was coming out. Mom had always told me my laugh was pretty, though I wasn't sure if she was just being nice. I couldn't modulate what I couldn't hear, after all.
Lucy looked up at me, her eyes teary which made me shut up, I read her lips as she said.
"I hate that merlin dammed radio, does it have to be so loud, and they never take my suggestions, sing Anne Murray, sing Songbird!!!"
Well I thought she was yelling since she was emphasizing everything. One good thing about being deaf—when your roommates complained about noise, you could just smile sympathetically without sharing their pain.
Emma looked at Lucy smiling, as she mouthed.
"He already told you he doesn't know Anne Murray songs."
"I don't care, he should learn them then, at least that would make the radio actually good," Lucy said, before swinging her wand in the air. "Why don't silence charms work, explain it to me, I'm telling you he has voodoo magic or something."
I smiled at her antics but honestly I was a bit sad, sure I was proud of who I was but that didn't mean that I wouldn't have liked to hear. I always imagined voices to be something weirdly uniform, I'm not exactly sure how to explain it. Music especially was something I wished I could experience. Felix had tried to describe it to me once, saying it was like "feeling rhythms but in your ears instead of your body," which didn't really clarify anything.
So when people ever said that Felix had a good singing voice, I really couldn't picture it, or for example what did strings sound like, sure people told me but it wasn't really the same. I'd press my fingers against the wood of his guitar when he played, feeling the vibrations travel through the instrument.
Sometimes I'd watch people's reactions when Felix played music on his radio broadcasts. Their expressions would change, some would smile, others would groan, a few would even tear up depending on the song, which made me only want to hear all the more.
Thinking of all of this I was reminded of my first meeting with Madame Pomfrey, her telling me that there wasn't any spell that could cure deafness, I was kind of bummed out when I first heard her (well not really heard I read her lips). That had been a particularly difficult day. I'd gone into the wizarding world with such hopes—surely if magic could regrow bones overnight or transform a desk into a pig, it could fix my ears. But apparently not.
Bell stop thinking like that, I thought to myself. You literally have magic powers, come on lots of kids would want to be in your shoes.
That thought cheered me up, and just like that, another day of mine began. I tied my hair back with a red and gold ribbon—a Christmas gift from Felix, who claimed the colors suited me. Lucy had taught me a spell to keep it from coming undone during the day, which was especially useful during flying lessons.
I smoothed down my robes and checked my bag to make sure I had everything I needed for the day's classes. My quill case, ink bottles (one standard black, one color-changing for emphasis in my notes), textbooks, and a special notebook Felix had enchanted for me. The pages would glow subtly when someone nearby said my name—a clever solution to the problem of not being able to hear when I was being called on in class.
I walked out of my room and into the common room of house Gryffindor. Some people were already awake their mouths opened wide singing in conjecture, with wide smile on their faces. The twins were at the center of it, as usual, conducting the impromptu choir with exaggerated gestures.
I read their lips.
"Come quickly, lay aft to the break of the poop,
To me way, hey, blow the man down
Or I'll help you along with the toe of my boot
Give me some time to blow the man down."
I mouthed their words a second after reading their lips. It was a game I played with myself sometimes, trying to keep up with songs I couldn't hear. It helped me practice lip reading, which was essential for surviving in the hearing world.
"Pay attention to orders now, you one and all,
To me way, hey, blow the man down
For see high above, there flies the Black Ball
Give me some time to blow the man down."
It looked fun but I was quickly pushed along by Lucy across the common room and soon opening up the portrait to a Hogwarts corridor. I wondered briefly what the song actually sounded like. Was it fast? Slow? Were the voices harmonizing or just shouting together? I'd never know.
"I wanted to stay a bit longer," I signed. My fingers moved swiftly through the motions, that were basically second nature by now.
Lucy looked at me before smiling. "Well ok then I guess I'll have to eat all the morning pastries by myself."
Hearing her words, my mouth drooled, merlin sake were some of those pastries delicious, could they have been made with magic, wait no the transmutation law said that you couldn't transmute objects into food, so did Hogwarts just have really good cooks. McGonagall had said something about house-elves, but I'd never seen one. Another mystery of the wizarding world I guess.
We ran together to the great hall, a table was filled with a few people I recognized, Roger, Adrian, Drake, Marcus Dominic, Rebecca, Rosie and Charlotte and even Kenneth another Gryffindor were already indulging in the food. Our little inter-house group had grown since the beginning of the year, and I was grateful for it. Being the only deaf student at Hogwarts could have been isolating, but instead I'd found myself surrounded by friends who made the effort to communicate with me.
"Move," Lucy seemed to yell as she ran to the table and making a space for her and me, which we sat down in. The bench shifted slightly under our weight, and I caught Drake's eye across the table.
"I still feel bad about always having breakfast without Felix," Drake said and signed, he had picked it up pretty quick. It warmed my heart to see how many of my friends had taken the time to learn sign language. Even Marcus and Dominic had picked up the basics, though they often mixed up similar signs in hilarious ways.
"He enjoys singing, besides the more time he's on the radio the less chance that he mends someone's buttcracks, or silences the entire year with mouth zippers," Marcus grumbled.
"Yeah but still—"
At that moment I stopped reading their lips and indulged in my own food, soon I felt a tap on my shoulder and it was time to go to class.
It was Monday so our first class was charms along with Ravenclaws something which luckily I was pretty good at, I wasn't great but I could manage, honestly the hardest class was most definitely Transfiguration. Professor McGonagall was a wonderful teacher but relied heavily on verbal instruction, which meant I had to focus intently on her lips for the entire class. It was exhausting.
Potions was easier in some ways—instructions were written on the board, and it wasn't as if I the potions relied on words for brewing. Defense Against the Dark Arts was a mix—practical demonstrations were fine I guess, professor Blackwood would always go a little easier on us gryffindors, since Sarah his daughter was also in our group.
I'd learned to adapt to each professor's teaching style, but it was still tiring. By the end of each day, my eyes ached from the constant focus required to read lips and catch visual cues. It was like running a mental marathon while everyone else was taking a leisurely stroll.
There waiting in front of the door were two pretty short people, well I was short myself so it wasn't like I could say much. Actually we were all short we were all eleven or twelve.
Either way I was getting sidetracked what mattered was that the two people at the door were obviously the charms professor Flitwick and his star pupil, radio show host and first magical friend, Felix Serendipity.
Felix turned around saying something to professor Flitwick which I couldn't quite read as he had turned his head.
I think he said, something like "you can have me ass and mentos."
No that couldn't be right, as all of this was going in my head. Felix had already come up to us.
"Sup," he said as he signed the word for hello. "You guys ready for class, we have exams in a few weeks."
"Ready as I'll ever be," I signed back, my fingers moving through the familiar patterns.
"A little anxious but I think it will go fine."
After that short greeting we entered class, Felix weirdly hadn't helped me as much in the past two months not that I could blame him or anything I was super grateful for him teaching me, he was one of the major reasons as to why I was so good at charms even though professor Flitwick also said I had a talent for it, but I honestly didn't think so.
Still it was weird, that Felix hadn't helped me or anyone else in the group a lot in the past two months, I mean he did help every once in a while but it was as if his advice was more shallow. Maybe he was just busy with his radio show and other projects. Felix had always been someone with too many ideas and not enough time to pursue them all, yeah that was most likely it.
I took my usual seat in the front row, where I could clearly see Professor Flitwick's demonstrations. Today we were working on the Severing Charm—a tricky bit of magic that required precise wand movement and clear enunciation, or in my case tons and tons of practice.
I practiced the wand movement carefully, watching as Professor Flitwick demonstrated.
I turned around wanting to ask something to Felix, however he didn't seem to notice me as tens of tiny pieces of paper were floating in front of him, constantly being severed again and again.
He looked to be concentrating so I kept quiet and focused on my own piece of paper, performing the wand motion. A bit of the paper was severed this time.
A/N: Hope you enjoyed the chapter, wanted to show Bell now since she is definitely one of the more interesting characters. Also even Ice-felix is out here showing off, I guess that personality trait stays even if he's not real. Send stones too ladies and gents, since those pump up my dopamine levels lol.