The Other Abby couldn't have said anything more infuriating. Aileen stared at her for a long moment, anger simmering beneath the surface, making her eyes hard and her expression stony. Abby, the real Abby, hopped to her feet and picked up the crup, who squirmed a little in her arms, ears perked at the duplicate of the girl. The crup let out a very half-hearted 'woof'.

"Abby," Aileen started in a warning tone, eyes still locked on the other girl. Abby opened her mouth, and then Aileen caught a whiff of... smoke?

Eyes widening, she took the Other Abby by her arm, her wand in her right hand, and walked quickly down the corridor, not about to let The Duplicate out of her sight. Panic and dread rose in her as she hurried towards her office, her suspicions confirmed when she saw shimmering lights reflecting off the bookcases and window. Not smoke. But magic.

Aileen scanned the room, then whirled on the girls again, expression furious. How could Abby do this to her? Judging by the sheepish look on the teenager's face, the office break-in wasn't a surprise.

"I can explain!" Abby finally piped up, setting the crup down and shooting panicked glances at Aileen and then The Duplicate.

"We- I wanted to help! Since the you-know-what has been taking months, and I got sick, and everything keeps happening, I thought another expert could-"

"Who is this?" Aileen cut her off, giving the Other Abby's arm a slight shake.

"Naomi?" Abby answered weakly, glancing at the girl as if she could get them out of this mess.

And, as everything came together, rather than feign ignorance, Abby ended up caving in. Naomi pressed her lips together as she rolled her eyes away distastefully. With her disguise and identity known, the only thin the young witch had left was her dignity.

 "What?" The fake Abby's voice swang into a more melodic hum as she jerked her arm away from Aileen and defiantly crossed it with her other arm, "Why are you yellin' anyway?" The once blue eyes had pulled into narrow frames and died into a melted into a hazel hue and settled on Aileen for a moment before turning away; her hair, while only getting whiter, scrawled into a long, familiar thick of curls, "Why you yellin' anyway? S'not like we're goin' anywhere different 'den usual."

After a year of teaching her, Naomi was sure that her professor would recognize her for who she was, regardless of how discolored and halfway morphed between her and Abby's appearance the young witch was. If she didn't feel completely guilty and ashamed of herself, the Jamaican may have changed back completely, but she was moody and grumpy and  whatever Aileen wanted to do to her, she was sure her mother would match it ten times over.

Naomi then twisted to look at Aileen once more, "Bein' th' oldest doesn't mean you need to do everyt'ing," her gaze fell and the picked an eyesore on the bookshelves to glare at, imagining it to be her oldest overbearing brother. She wasn't best friends with Abigail Reid, but she wasn't dumb enough to stand alone in that argument, situation--whatever it was, it felt about as common as other situations she'd had with her brother's: it was suffocating.

Naomi. As the Other Abby jerked her arm away, Aileen stared at her suspiciously, watching the eyes change color and the hair curl eerily as they frowned at each other. Even her voice had more of a lilt. Yes, this was definitely Naomi Foley, Slytherin third-year and metamorphmagi.

The knowledge eased the panic a bit, but not the anger. As Naomi complained about the yelling, which there wasn't any of (yet), and blurted out some defensive comment, Aileen shot a withering glare at Abby, then abruptly turned and waved her wand at the smoke in the office. The air turned clear again as she slammed the door shut and stood in front of it.

"You," Aileen turned on Miss Foley and put her hands on her hips. "Do you want to fail out of Runes? Are you angling for a lifetime of detention? Because that is what you're going to get. And your mother is going to hear why-"  She cut herself off, having planned to tell the Healer about the snooping but not the specifics, when the holes in their stories suddenly made sense.

Aileen shifted her stance and stared at Abby for a long moment. "You told Healer Foley," she accused the teenager flatly, finding that to be the only logical answer. Abby fidgeted, then shrugged.

"You've shown me no courtesy. None whatsoever! After everything that's happened, you still blab your life story to anyone willing to listen, and then expect me to clean up your messes!" She gestured angrily at the door. "I don't care if you have good intentions. I can't believe you'd be so thoughtless!"

"Well, I can't believe you'd put secrecy and your own hide over me and my health! Oh wait, I can!" Abby shot back, raising her voice and crossing her arms.

Aileen gritted her teeth. The crup let out a whine. The cat wisely stayed in the other room. After a few seconds, Abby let out a frustrated noise, shot an apologetic look at Naomi, and stomped away. Aileen gave Naomi a look that spelled murder in the corridor with the candlestick.

"Miss Foley," Aileen hissed. "You've done enough damage for the day. I'm sending you home immediately," she told her in a cold, low voice. "Where you may inform your interfering mother that I will be sending her an owl."

And there it was! Her mom was found out.

 Naomi could only bob her shoulders as Abby shrugged, and the Jamaican had to bite back an amused snicker… Had she not been facing away from Aileen, or been previously threatened with detentions and failing Runes, the whole realization may have just been too funny.

But, Naomi was still in trouble, and her skin melted back into a deeper brown and she pouted guiltily as Aileen went on and on condescendingly.

Then the sisters just exploded at each other!

Maybe it was because they were sisters or because Aileen had been Naomi's teacher for a whole year, but Naomi’s eyes grew with timid fear at the site of Abby picking a fight with her sister like that—she could pick a fight with students, but she was fairly hands-off towards teachers.

However, at the mention of thoughtlessness and secrecy, the hazel eyes calmed with narrow offense. It was like Aileen thought her mother was going to run off and tell the aurors, at any moment's notice; Naomi was quite sure mother would rather drown.

So it all ended with Abby storming out, and Naomi having done enough "damage," accompanied with a homicidal glare. Naomi thought she had been pretty level-headed and clean in this whole "mess," and she hadn't even done anything… except mess with some runes and been a bit mouthy.

But, at the mention of her mother, Naomi’s pride overwhelmed her fear of punishment, and being mouthy was an offense she was about to agitate even more as she turned to face her professor completely.

"My mother skin my hide regardless,” she informed her professor as her hair faded a shade whiter, “So don' really care what you do or say 'bout me--" Which was an outright lie. She did care. School was important, and runes were important, but family was more important to the witch than school was, and a finger jerked in the direction of where Abby had just been as Naomi kept her eyes pitifully locked on Aileen, "But your own sister's sick wit' Merlin knows, you nearly killed us all in Runes once," she was quite positive that had nothing to do with her anymore, and Naomi's voice sharpened with a harsh edge, "and who knows what else happened ‘fore ‘dis, or will, cus you won't ask for help."

Naomi then pulled out her wand and wordlessly and forcefully summoned her bag towards, "So you can just stuff it 'bout my interferin' mother, and I'll show myself out." The bag thumped into her chest, she tightly wove her arms around it as she picked up her incense burner and through the leftover unburnt incense on the ground, “An’ you ‘cin burn dat, it’ll clean up my mess,” and then Naomi quickly exited the room.

Her hair was still white, and getting whiter, even as she finally headed out back, found her broom and headed home. She was sure her hair would be white for days, even after her mom was finished with her, and she felt like it might be a good idea to skip Runes for the rest of the year, except the final.

For now, the young witch didn’t care much, she just wanted to go somewhere away from the Reid home.