Disclaimer: I do not own any of the character of Shrek or the movie itself.
Author's note: Sorry it took so long. I was beginning to feel cheap not to update! Since the movie went out on DVD, the fanfiction was alive once again! I had once more some reviews:P
The next morning, April went directly to Artie's room. She knocked on his door only to see a very tired Artie opening it. His hair was in a mess and he had some rebel bangs, he had tiny eyes and his covers were stamp on his face. When he realized who he was in front of, he tried to regain his composure a little, but in vain. He still looked very tired.
"You've had a hard night in your room as I see… You seem even more tired than me!" she laughed.
"Erm…yeah… Jason didn't let me have one minute alone, it exhausted me! He wanted to be sure I wouldn't go out…" he lied.
"Sorry for that…"
"…How was the night, anyway? It wasn't too hard having to endure the King Brian?" he joked.
"Oh, he made a big scene…as usual! A lot of things happened yesterday that I think you should know about…May I enter your room?"
"Erm… Wait, Jason is still sleeping. I'll change myself in soemething more...suitable... and we can talk about this outside if you want, okay?" he said blushing, looking to his only bottom pyjamas.
April waited outside his room for some minutes the time he could dressed himself, trying to get rid of the red on her cheeks too. When he went out of his room, they made their way to their favourite place near the river. As usual, they lied, near of each other, on the same tree they were the last time.
April explained the whole night gesturing every situations: Merlin that has been turned into a bee, Brian who brutally kissed her, Guinevere cousin, the love potion, Mathis who kissed her on the hand and the fact that she did not feel in love with Mathis anyway.
"Whoa… A lot happened yesterday. Too bad I wasn't there!" he said in a fake tone. "…But you said…it didn't change anything…?"
"Whaddya mean?"
"The potion…"
"Nah. Strange, isn't it? I guess the potion has expired."
"…Are you already in love with someone else…? Maybe it can't beat true feelings…?" he said with a glimpse of hope in his voice.
"No!" she said to fast.
"Oh…okay. The potion must have expired then." he tried a little smile. "And Merlin… Do you think…he'll be okay?" he asked really concerned.
"I really don't know… I hope. He's such a great teacher. I hope he's gonna be alright." she looked down at the grass.
"Hope too."
April put down her head on his shoulders in need of comfort. Artie soothed her, playing in her hair. They stayed like this for a long time, not noticing anything around them. They felt just great like this, not having to think on how it would look if anyone would see them.
---
The week quickly passed and before they knew they were already Friday. Every student waited in Merlin class, eager to see their teacher again, hoping he would feel great. No one had seen him since the little accident.
After a while, their principal opened the door with some papers in his arms. He sat behind the desk of Merlin, cleared his throat uneasily and watched the children in front of them. He knew they wouldn't like his news.
"My dear students… I'm really sorry to announce you…"
Some students were already whining, anticipating what would follow. The principal gave a sympathetic look to these students, mostly the poor Brian who kept asking him about the progress of the health of the professor. The boy liked the teacher so much!
"…Sadly, professor Merlin can't teach for an indeterminate time. I can assure you, though that he's feeling quite better, but he needs some rest to really be himself again for, let's hope, next year…"
April turned to look at Artie with unshed tears in her eyes, she didn't know why but she felt kind of responsible of what happened to him. Artie tried to reassure her with a gentle smile. It did help her a little. She always liked it when he smiled.
Brian, on his side, wasn't feeling better. He buried his head in folded arms on his desk and cried silently. We could only see his shoulders shaking a little. He felt horrible.
Lancelot sneered at how pitiful Brian was and couldn't help but slip an insult so all the class could laugh at him.
'That's enough!' thought resentfully April. She did hate Brian for forcing her to kiss him at the ball because he wanted to make her fall in love with him with a love potion, but she did thought that no one deserves to be trampled down when we were already on the ground, helpless. She stood up angrily; ready to give Lancelot the lesson of his life when the principal intervene.
"April, sit down please. I understand what you're feeling right now, but don't do anything you could regret."
She took a big breath and sat back heavily on her chair.
"For you mister Lancelot…" the principal continued. "you have nothing less than 2 weeks of detention, you'll be cleaning our school, with the winter arriving quickly our caretaker needs some help." He said nonchalantly. "From now on, my dear students, I'll be your teacher of magic. It was, in fact, the subject I was teaching, long ago. Let's hope I'll be abble to make you like magic as much as Merlin did."
---
After the class, April rushed to the teacher's desk and asked to her principal if Merlin was still in the school. The principal nodded and asked her why she was concerned about that.
"Well… because since he is a great teacher and everyone is really sad of his sudden departure, I thought it would be great to send him a little card with a nice word from everyone… I could maybe… give him the card… personally?" tried April, inventing a plausible reason to be able to see Merlin before he left the school. She had something important to ask him… if he was still lucid.
"This is really nice of you April! Sure, you can see Merlin to give him this present! He's feeling better anyway!" he approved without hesitation.
---
By the end of the day, April had time to collect some words from everyone, even Brian. She thought he would feel a little better if he gave him this word. She decided to tell Artie about her mischievous plan to see Merlin before he left the school and why she needed to see him.
They went together to the infirmary and gave to the nurse a little piece of paper signed by the hand of the principal allowing them to see Merlin. The nurse nodded and let them enter his room.
They slowly opened his door, not wanting to disturb him or afraid him. 'The room is so silent…' thought April. This atmosphere was for her suffocating. She hated to be there, but she had to.
April and Artie sat silently of the chair beside the bed of Merlin who was sleeping steadily.
"I'm feeling bad to disturb him in his sleep… Should we wait that he wake-up?"
"And feel asleep on his bed holding his hand his despair? Would be a great scene." smirked Artie.
"Ahah. Funny."
"What? I'm only trying to make you smile a little. You don't seem quite at ease."
"I'm not… Never been to found of hospital."
"Neither I am… but it's not as if he was agonizing. He feels better and better, he just needs some time to rest a little. To relax."
"You're right. I'm doing a big fuss for nothing."
He squeezed her hand to calm her a little.
Merlin woke up at that moment, aware that he was not alone anymore in his room. He was quite surprised to see two of his students.
"My! What a nice surprise! We did let you pass? Oh, I'm sorry my dear children, you do not see the best sight of me right now…on this hospital bed with all this tubes everywhere…"
"Professor! We're so happy to see that you're alright! Yes the nurse let us passed, we had a note from the principal giving us the right to, because we're here to give you a little present from everyone. And you are radiant really! It's not a simple spell that will change you!" she said quickly, not taking time to breathe.
Merlin chuckled. "You are such a nice girl April! A nice girl to have as a gilfriend, hum?" he turned to look at Artie who reddened in a record time "…And what is this present?" he said suddenly curious.
"Oh! Almost already forget about this. Here it is!" she gave the card to Merlin.
He opened it and read the message of all his students and some tears began to appear in his eyes. He washed them away before they fell on his cheeks.
"Please forgive an old man to be emotional. I do not have the strength that I had when I was younger to be able to hide my tears."
April was almost crying at the sight of this helpless man. She gulped, shook her head to get a grip on herself and tried to enter in the subject she needed some enlightenment. The main reason of her visit.
"…Merlin… I'm sorry to ask you this right now…but something weird happened at the party, other than your attack… and I thought that maybe you could explain to me what happened." tempted April.
"I will answer with the best of my knowledge my dear. What is it that perturbs you?"
"Well… Brian got me to drink a love potion, because he has kind of an obsession for me. However, he was not the first to kiss me, it was Mathis. He kissed me on the hand indeed, but kissed nevertheless. So why I am not feeling any affects of it?" she blurted out. "I brought you the bottle where the potion was, hoping it would maybe help you to answer me…"
Merlin took the bottle and watched it meticulously. "Hum, strange…"
"What? What is it?" April said eagerly. Arthur eyes widened also when he heard the last sentence of Merlin.
"This is perfect, fully working potion, made by Fairy Godmother!" said gladly Merlin.
"Oh. But then why…?" asked a very puzzled April.
"Well you see... It is absolutely impossible to resist this potion, except for one exception. The only chance for this potion not to work is if it has simply nothing to create. The moment Mathis kissed you; the potion was destroyed, because its affect already existed. And it HAS to be mutual. One love-side is not enough." stated Merlin.
"Love? Mathis was nice and charming but I'm not in love with him! This is impossible!"
"The voice of people singing is not so different from people talking, my dear. Think of a moment." smirked Merlin.
By that time, Artie was redder than boiled lobster.
"...You mean the band?"
"No later that night my dear children, the singing contest." he smiled.
"But you weren't there anymore! How can you kn... can you... can..." said Artie now really stressed.
"You're right my boy. I wasn't there anymore, but thanks to magic I had the chance to see the whole night back while I was prisoner of my bed... Bed that I'm still prisoner."
Artie eyes widened. He knew all about it! 'Ok what do I do? Run? No... Would be suspect... Stay there? No April will know the truth! Ooooh, I'm such in a big mess!'
"What? I'm not sure I understand you professor? It's kind of late and I'm not to in for riddles…"asked a still puzzled April.
Artie was now looking Merlin with pleading eyes almost waving "noooo" with his arms at the back of April.
"Merlin?" frowned April.
"I'm a buzzing bee! Bzz! Bzz! Bzz!" gave Merlin as an answer.
Artie breathed out in relief. "We should maybe let him sleep… He must be exhausted because of the surprise and all…"
"You're right… I don't think I'm more advanced than I was before though."
"…Erm...Too bad you did not have more explanations." blushed Artie once more.
"Are you alright? You are so red!"
His eyes widened as he blushed even more. "Fever. Yeah! Might be a big fever."
"Ok then… I'll let him rest. You come?"
"Yeah I follow you just in a second!" When April was far enough, he turned to Merlin and thanked him for his trickery.
His only answer was: "I'm a buzzing bee!"
'I guess I'm just a lucky man then!'
He leaved the room and closed the door quietly when he heard April dashing to him.
"Artie! I talked to the nurse of your fever! She will examine you and you will be feeling better!" she said happily.
'Damn!'
Author's note: Big thanks to Mike619 for his idea! I almost took it literally, but well the idea was so good :)
Also sorry for the many mistakes on this chapter... It's two in the morning here and I'm almost sleeping on my laptop. :P