CHAPTER ONE

An uncommon Christmas

Hogwarts was strangely empty, even for a Christmas holiday. This year stayed just about ten students at school and them, along with the staff, were having dinner at the Great Hall. Well, almost all of them. The library lights were still on and from between the shelves were heard steps. Without doubt, there it was a girl with her brown hair tied, she was not tall, but her posture showed haughtiness and her dark eyes were kind, but held traces of sorrow. She went towards the table already full of papers carrying two heavy books that she had taken from the shelves. She studied for what could have been an hour until, without noticing, she fell asleep over her papers. After a while she woke up at a start. Once again she had a nightmare.

"Merlin! Why did I have to fall asleep...", she said rubbing her eyes.

"You must love Ancient Runes if you rather stay alone at the library studying than having dinner..."

She turned to the source of the voice and faced a boy who was staring at her with his brown eyes framed with his flaming hair. "Well, it's none of your business...", she answered while packing up her stuff.

"Calm down, you don't have to run away. Don't you want help carrying those books?", he said as he came near her. Since she didn't answer, he continued, "I don't think we were introduced".

"Whatever...", she grabbed her bag and went toward the door. Well, she tried at least, because the boy held her up, "Could you please let go of my arm?"

"What have I done wrong? As far as I know, all I did was ask for your name, is that some sort of insult or anything?", he asked seriously.

"I just don't like being around people".

"But all I'm asking is your name. Please? Just so I'll be able to link to a name to the memory of your face", he smiled, the same smile she always saw when boys decided to flirt. But, well, it had never happened to her before, she had a special way of hers to keep them far away. She blushed. It skipped her mind for a moment the fact that she was leaving and stayed looking at the boy. He was way taller than her and, even though he tried to keep his hair out of his face, it kept coming back, like if the had a will of it's own, freckles lightly covered his face and made his smile seem even more childish.

"Dawn...", she answered when she came back to reality, "And you have no need to introduce yourself. I already know you name, Mr. William Weasley. Now, if you excuse me...", and she got out to the corridor.

"And how is it that you know my name?", said as he started following her.

"Unfortunately, I do share a dormitory with other four girls and, apparently, one of them is, or at least used to be, your girlfriend. So, as far as I try not to listen to her stupid murmurs, sometimes it's an impossible task".

"Sophie?", and as she went away he raised his voice and said, "But you can forget the Mister, ok? Call me Bill".

Without slowing her steps or at least looking back, she just shrugged and said, "Whatever", and went all her way to the dungeons. When she reached her dormitory, she laid her bag over her other things and threw herself over her bed with a book. But, before she started reading, she couldn't help but to think about Bill. Sophie wasn't so stupid after all, at least not on the subject of choosing a boyfriend.

"Well, well, well! Looks like someone woke up feeling good today!"

"It sure does, Charlie. And, by the looks of it, this someone is you", laughed Bill while they walked at the corridor.

"But I am always feeling good! I was even thinking about challenging you to a quidditch match. Although I'm guessing you might already have better plans for today".

"No plans at all... Just feeling happy because it's Christmas I guess", they kept walking in silence for a while, until Bill broke it, "Have you heard of a girl named Dawn?"

"Don't underestimate me, my brother. There isn't any chance of me not knowing at least the name of any girl in Hogwarts", Bill laughed at this remark, "Dawn Hadrian. Slytherin, sixth year, if I'm not mistaken. Odd girl... Never spoke to me. I believe she knows Sophie, am I right?"

"Yes, I think she knows Sophie... And you can't say a girl is odd just because she wouldn't talk to you".

"But it is odd..."

"You and your crazy theories... Anyway, can you believe that, although we are at the same year, I just got to meet her yesterday?", said Bill while both of them entered the Great Hall for breakfast and, as he saw Dawn alone at the Slytherin table, said, "She doesn't look that bad, does she?"

"Correct me if I am wrong", said Charlie as they sit down at the table, "You are seriously considering letting go of gorgeous Sophie to get along with that one?"

"I'm not considering letting go of Sophie for the simple reason that we are not together anymore. Besides, all I'm thinking about is to get to know Dawn better".

"Whatever... If you gave up the beautiful one it's just your problem... But let me tell you that will be an even greater problem if you insist in getting close to that Dawn... She is not what we would call 'sociable'".

Bill ate his breakfast and every now and then he would throw glances at Dawn's direction. Yes, it could be hard to convince her to allow him get close, but, for some reason he couldn't explain, he thought it would be worthy. And, who knows, maybe it wasn't such a crazy idea after all: he could swear that he caught her looking at him once or twice.

"May I sit here?", asked Bill when he reached her at the Christmas Feast table. There have been set just one table at the Great Hall. She didn't answer, just shrugged, "I shall consider this an yes...", he said as he sat down with Charlie at his side, "At least you didn't skip the feast to stay at the library today..."

"I'm hungry".

"Oh, yes, me too. I'm starving... By the way, Merry Christmas".

"Now that we are all here together", Dumbledore started his speech as soon as the last student joined the table, "we can begin to delight ourselves with the feast. Happy Christmas", and, with that, the table filled itself with the most delicious dishes and everyone started to help themselves.

"My brother got sick, you know, and, by the looks of it, it's a bit contagious, that's why mom thought it was better that me and Charlie spent Christmas here at Hogwarts..."

"Great...", she said without taking her eyes away from her plate.

"Why didn't you go spend the holidays with your family?"

"I didn't want to".

"Didn't they feel sad about it?"

"Look, Weasley", she answered looking at him for the first time that night, and he got a bit embarrassed to have her staring straight at his eyes, "I don't know why you are even speaking to me, but I will tell you something anyway: there are some subjects that are not supposed to be part of a conversation, my family is one of them".

"All right, I'm sorry. I just thought we could talk a little".

"Then you thought wrong. I'm serious. People ignore me and I ignore people. That's the way things are. I'm already used to it".

Dawn couldn't really understand why, all of a sudden, after six years studying at Hogwarts, anyone would want to talk to her. She didn't need company. She didn´t want company. Now, in her life, there was just space for her and her mother. She didn't want it to change. She liked the way things were. But then why did she let him keep talking to her a few other times during feast? Maybe it was because he looked at her in a different way, a way nobody had ever looked at her before... When this thought filled her mind she stood up and left, without saying even a single word to Bill.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed reading and that you leave me a review!