Chapter Text
Jack snickers from his spot high in the rafters as he waits for his prank to unfold below.
The clock-tower chimes half-past one, right when throngs of students start exiting the library on their way to their next class. Once a group passes the threshold to the hallway, they slip and stumble along the iced cobblestones. Shrieks of surprise and confusion make Jack laugh harder.
Still relishing in his prank’s success, he swoops from his perch and passes over the bumbling crowd of fallen students. With a flick of his hooked staff, a strong breeze follows behind him, making the girls’ skirts fly up. Choruses of embarrassed squeals from red-faced girls practically shake the castle walls.
Jack crouches atop a thick tree branch in the courtyard with a wide grin plastered on his translucent face.
“You should not have done that,” a prim voice intrudes on his merriment.
He does not react to the sudden interruption and just glances at a young brunette girl seated to his left, hands folded neatly in her lap. She pointedly glares at him, her lips pressed in a tight frown.
“It’s just a prank,” Jack shrugs, “no a big deal, Aggie.”
Agatha—or ‘Aggie’ as she likes to be addressed—shakes her head. “Someone could have gotten hurt, Jack.”
“No one did.”
“I do not understand why you must continue these silly games,” she sighs.
“Because they’re fun,” is his nonchalant reply, “and I’m bored.”
“You can do so much more with your time and energy. I know you can,” Aggie pleads-slash-scolds.
Jack rolls his eyes. “Here it comes.”
Agatha’s glare intensifies. Her eyes glow a menacing yellow. “Do not sass me, Jackson. You are smart and clever. I fail to see why you do not put those skills to good use for something else beside pranks and—”
“And what, Aggie? You want me to be like all those other dull ghosts and guide young witches and wizards? No thank you!” he snaps. “Besides…it’s not like they can see me anyway.”
With his joyous mood soured, he hops off the branch and floats back inside the castle.
The students have long cleared out of the still-iced hallway. Jack sweeps his staff along the floor, gathering his magic back in the knotted wood and returning the brickwork back to normal.
Talking with Agatha always brought up unpleasant memories. He recalls the past three-hundred years at Hogwarts, remembering generations of teachers and students blissfully unaware of a teenage ghost clambering for attention.
Since his arrival, Agatha has been somewhat of a guardian to Jack; he often wonders if she volunteered or was pressured. She is one of the very few ghosts who actually acknowledge him. The others snub Jack and think of him as nothing more than a bothersome poltergeist which, apparently, is the worst type of insult for their kind.
Pulling up the hood of his robe, Jack aimlessly drifts around the castle in search of something to boost his mood.