Marietta, was Slytherin's Reputation

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 185668

Magpie:
> Marietta still has pustules in the following book, after the summer.
She's wearing heavy make-up to cover them, and Harry smirks when he 
sees her.
> 
> Which is why I assumed they were permenant. When I saw them at the
end of OotP I think I just assumed they'd fade over time, but when 
JKR went to the trouble of giving Harry a smirking moment in the next
book that indicated that I should assume they were on-going. JKR then
by her admission "forgot about her" so left me with a last impression
that her pustules were an on-going feature of hers. When asked in an
interview she said eventually they faded but left a few scars and that
she loathed a traitor.
> 
> I would put the responsibility for them totally on Hermione, just
as, if Hermione's teeth proved unshrinkable, I would have considered
Draco responsible. I assumed Draco used a known spell that anyone
would know wouldn't be permenant while Hermione intentionally created
one that would take years to fade. So Hermione scarred her face for
life but only gave her pustules for months or years as punishment for
telling about the DA.

Carol responds:
But it's not just pustules and scars in a random pattern, which would
be ugly but would not cause psychological damage. What's important,
IMO, is the word they spell out, "SNEAK." A girl who's so distraught
that she's hiding her face under a balaclava three months later is
probably suffering emotional damage. And JKR says that even though the
pustules eventually go away, the scars don't. (We see her trying
vainly to hide them under thick makeup at the beginning of the next
school year.) Hermione's act of vengeance has scarred another teenage
girl for life, physically and emotionally. And, whatever Cho has told
Marietta, Marietta herself doesn't even remember the incident that
prompted the jinx. I can see that exact punishment if it lasts a week
or two. But a lifetime of having SNEAK branded across your face is too
great a punishment, IMO.

Carol, agreeing with Magpie but adding a point to her argument