I awoke to the sound of my alarm clock. "Eh. 5 more minutes" I said to myself. But nevertheless, I reluctantly stood up and headed to the bathroom. I showered quickly and felt much more awake as I dressed in my brown school robes. The same clock that had woken me up now said 7:18. I was excited to start school again so I rushed through my breakfast, grabbed my Firebolt, and flew out the door with my backpack on strapped on my back.

I live in a special town. It is much like Hogsmeade, but much bigger and with a bigger population, it is the wizard town of Griffstown. It is named after the many wild Hippogriffs that used to roam, and still do, around here. The hippogriffs were rarely seen in the town, but my friends and I visited them in the fields far from Griffstown during the summer. I've become particularly fond of one, and he lets me go on a ride every time I'd visit him. But before I left to the big castle that is my school, I went to visit him. I flew over to him, landed with a thud and bent my body into a bow. I stared at him until he bowed back. I walked over and patted him on his beak. I had decided during the summer that I'd call him Blackwing. Blackwing had the body and back legs of a dark black horse and the head and front legs of an inky black eagle. I petted him for a while and he lay down to offer a ride, but I had to refuse.

"Sorry, but I have to get to Talons. I'll come back after school." I patted him on the back, mounted my broom and kicked off from the ground and flew towards Griffstown.

I flew over the city and looked down to see Yvette walking down on the sidewalk. I dived down towards her. Yvette was a short brunette. She had a dreamy look in her eyes but if you mention it to her she'll give you hell. She was wearing a Talons uniform (imagine the Hogwarts uniform, just brown robes).

"Merlin! Don't do that, Jose. You know I hate it when you do that." She said, startled. She was holding books in her hand and had a backpack slung over her shoulder.

"That's exactly why I do it." I said with a grin.

"You're impossible," She said with a sigh. Slightly agitated. "Did you visit your little pet?"

"Little? Blackwing isn't little. He's quite the opposite. But yes, I did." I let out a laugh and ruffled my curly hair. "Have you seen anyone else this morning?"

"Yeah. I stopped by Xavier's house and he was still asleep. But Chris was in a hurry to get to school. I just saw him fly by." She said in a bored voice. I walked next to her with my Firebolt on my shoulder my and checked the time on my watch.

"I don't blame him. School starts in a half hour. I'm surprised to see you're in no hurry. You don't want to start off the year with a detention from old Maggio."

She looked at me. "You're in no hurry either. Your parents won't let you visit Blackwing anymore if you're late on your first day."

"Nah, I have this." I raised my Firebolt. "I can get to Talons in 2 minutes with this. Walking at the pace you're going, it'll take us 45. Then we won't have enough time to get to Transfiguration with Professor Beltran." Suddenly there was a fast Swoosh and Xavier landed next to me.

Xavier was a tall, blond kid, with blue eyes, your typical surfer dude. He looked like he had just woken up. But you could see he was in a good mood. He swung his Nimbus 2001 over his shoulder and started walking alongside of us.

"What's up?" He gave Yvette and me a wide grin.

"Hey, Xav." I greeted.

"Hi Xavier." Yvette said.

"Hey, have you two heard from Connor? I haven't seen him since he left for Amsterdam."

"No. Me neither. He'll probably be back next week. He told us that he might be late for school, remember?" I said. "Everyone's probably already at school. Mercedes, Troy and Julie will be waiting for us."

"Yea." Xavier said. "Why don't we just fly, Jose?"

"Because Yvette doesn't have a broom. We can't just leave her here." I looked at her as I spoke. "I think I have a Cleansweep I can let you borrow at my house." I took my wand out of my pocket and pointed it at the air. "Accio Cleansweep! There."

2 minutes later a broomstick with no one on it came rushing towards us and stopped in front of me. I grabbed it and gave it to Yvette. "Let's go."

"Fine." She mounted the Cleansweep, stuffed the books she was holding in her bag, and took off from the ground. She didn't even wait for Xavier and me. We just saw her rocketing to Talons and shook our heads. We kicked off of the sidewalk and sped towards her.

With our brooms, catching up with her was an easy task. Once we caught up to her, we told her to speed up so we could get there faster. But Yvette was known to be a stubborn witch, and refused. Neither Xavier nor me will ever understand her. So, instead of arguing with her, we left her in our dust and were at the school in a couple of minutes.

Xavier and I landed next to the rest of our friends; they were all sitting in the stone steps that led to the entrance into Talons. Troy and Julie were sitting next to each other and Chris was talking to Mercedes about the year before.

"Hey Jose. Hi Xavier." Mercedes said as we sat down.

"Hey" I smiled.

"Hi" Xavier said. "I got to go but my broomstick in the cupboard by the Quidditch field. Want me to put yours, Jose?"

"Nah, I'll go with you." I stood up and walked down the steps. On the way to the Quidditch field, we met up with Andrew and his friends.

"Well, well. Look who it is." He said smirking at me. "Jose and Xavier. Where are the rest of your little friends? The big guy isn't here to stop you this time."

During the summer, I had almost knocked his teeth out, but Chris had stopped me before I could. "Come on, let's finish what we started." He pointed his wand at me. His friends stood snickering behind him.

"Jose, give me your broom, I'll hold it you knock this guy's brains out." Xavier whispered. I gave him my Firebolt and took out my wand. There was a crowd gathering around us now. A bunch of kids stood around us in a circle. Yvette, Troy, Julie and Mercedes stood at my left.

Chris had walked through the crowd and stood behind me as my second. He was a tall kid, taller than Xavier; he was big and had brown hair. "Alright, if anything happens, I'm right behind you." He said as he took his wand out of his pocket.

"Ok. Thanks." I glared at Andrew.

He chuckled. "Furnunculus!"

I deflected the jinx. "Levicorpus!" Andrew was lifted off the ground and he was dangling in the air. It looked as if an invisible hook was holding him up by the ankle.

"Get me down now!" He yelled. His face was becoming red now.

I laughed at him. "Liberacorpus!" and he fell from the air and landed on the ground with a thud.

"You'll pay for this. You wait." With that, he stalked off towards the castle. Xavier walked back from the broom cupboard.

"I'm already having a great day and class hasn't started yet." I told my friends. We walked back up the stairs and into the castle to begin the first day of school at Talons.