Chapter One: Hannah's first day
Hannah's powers had been odd getting used to. She started noticing how she could make strange things happen. Her hair was always how she liked, bullies never found her on the playground, and her rock collection always found its way back to her. No one ever noticed the things she could do, since no one ever paid attention to her. She was always the weird girl with rocks.
She couldn't explain it, but she loved rocks for as long as she could remember. When she was a toddler she tended pick up any rocks she found and bring them home. She still did that now, but the difference was she didn't put these in her mouth. Rocks were always so different, no rock was the same. They were sort of like people in a sense.
For a while, rocks were her only friends. She would pick them up as she talked to them, and feel their textures for a response. Sadly, the rocks never talked back, but it wasn't like she had anyone else to talk to. She had a couple gold fish, but she couldn't touch them. Rocks, like fish, were nice. They would never hurt you emotionally, just physically. The only difference is that fish hurt you on purpose.
She truly knew she was different when she accidentally killed her fish by making everything in her room levitate. The fish died from being out of the water too long, and she hasn't had a pet since. Only pet rocks, since she couldn't kill them. They were the one thing she could bond with; they couldn't hurt her, and she couldn't hurt them.
They seemed to be the only things that would understand. When she told her workaholic parents about her, they didn't believe her, and when she showed them her levitating room they freaked out. They had momentarily considered having her sent away for medical study, which caused the spell on her room to break, and all the objects to fall back down. They then decided that they would not speak of Hannah's 'differences' to anyone ever. She was then on a secret her family was trying to hide.
She was relieved when someone told her she was a wizard. It was explanation she was waiting for, although her parents denied it at first. Otherwise, they didn't care. They drove her to the leaky cauldron where they dropped her off to do her shopping with her money. She then had to ask for assistance transferring her muggle money to wizard money, and getting into Diagon ally, and going to the right stores.
The day of the train was lonely. Her parents dropped her off at the station before going to work, leaving her to find the platform by herself. Luckily, she found another family going through. She didn't catch them in time to ask them how to get through, so she just tried by herself and it worked, surprisingly. She then boarded the train by herself, and found an empty compartment on the train.
As everyone hugged and waved their parents a good-bye, Hannah sighed, since she had no one to say good-bye to. Her parents had given her a quick, no eye-contact, "Bye." Before racing off in their car, but it wasn't the same as the loving fare-wells she could feel oozing through the walls of the train. She was very lonely.
Before the train took off, she took out her rock collection for some company. "It's just us again," she said sadly, she thought she would be alone for the whole ride until a girl came over to her compartment, walked inside and said, "Everywhere else is full." Hannah immediately felt the urge to hide her rock collection, everyone who saw it back home thought she was weird.
The girl had dark brown eyes, black hair, and mocha coloured skin. It reminded Hannah of a sandstone pebble she had one day on the beach. She introduced herself as Bonnie Durwood, and that she'd be first year just like her. Bonnie said that both her parents were magical and had met at Hogwarts.
"What about you?" She asked,
"What about me?" Hannah asked back,
"What about your parents?" Bonnie explained,
"Oh," Hannah sighed, and reluctantly added, "Their non-magical."
"So, their muggles...that means you're a muggle-born."
"I guess." She said sadly, not liking that part of her life.
Bonnie quickly changed the subject, "What house do you think you're going to get?"
"Excuse me?"
"You probably don't know. You see, once we get to Hogwarts, we will be sorted into one of four houses. These houses are Hufflepuff, Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, or Slytherin. My parents were muggle-borns as well, and they got two different houses, so you don't have to worry about that being a deciding factor."
"How do they decide which house?" She asked,
"Well, Hufflepuffs are hard workers and fair (that's where my dad was sorted), Gryffindors are brave and loyal, Ravenclaws are intelligent and creative (that's where my mom was sorted), and Slytherins are Ambitious, sneaky, and cunning. My parents say it's bad news if you're sorted there, because then it's almost definite that you're going to turn evil."
"Then why do they keep that house around?" Hannah asked confused, because it just seemed illogical to her.
"I read in Hogwarts: a history that it's to respect the wishes of the four founders. They all wanted to admit different types of students into the school. Gryffindor wanted to only teach the good hearted students, Ravenclaw wanted to teach only the brightest students, Slytherin wanted to teach the pure-bloods, and-"
"What's a pure-blood?" Hannah interjected,
"Someone with a long magical ancestry; so then Hufflepuff wanted to teach... pretty much anyone, she wasn't too picky. So they divided the school into four different houses so they could each teach who they wanted." Bonnie finished.
"That's a good compromise."
"It is."
"So does that mean we won't be sorted into Syltherin, because we're not pure-bloods?"
"No, they removed that a few years ago, now anyone can be sorted into that house as long as their ambitious and cunning." Bonnie admitted, that made Hannah nervous,
"So where do you think you're going to go?"
"Me? Well, I don't know." She said hugging her rock collection,
"Maybe you'll be sorted into Ravenclaw. I'm guessing you know a lot about rocks?"
Hannah smiled, "Do I ever!" she looked up more on rocks since she figured that if she liked them she should know more about them.
"That's great! Then maybe we'll be in the same house! I'm hoping to get one of the houses my parents were in, but hey, even if we're in different houses, I bet we'll still be friends."
"Except if either of us are sorted into Slytherin, right?" Hannah asked,
"Nah, probably even then." Bonnie concluded, and they laughed. For that moment, Hannah was happy. At least she had made one friend.
Bonnie had helped her once they got off the train. She had lent Hannah knowledge on how the boats worked and assured her they were going to be fine when the boats started moving by themselves. Bonnie didn't need to reassure her, she was positive that a school wouldn't deliberately put their students in danger.
Once they had made it to the castle, Bonnie and she had stuck together while under the attack of peeves and all the way into the great hall. Bonnie had told her about the enchantment on the ceiling to make it look like the night sky. All these bits and pieces of knowledge were comforting to hear, although unnecessary. She liked to know that Bonnie wanted to tell her these things; no one had wanted to tell her anything before.
Then the sorting ceremony had begun. The hat sang it's song but Hannah couldn't really hardly pay attention to what it was saying since she was still trying to grasp that it was a singing hat. Then they were called up to the stool, and since Hannah's last name was "Brooks" that meant she meant she would be going before Bonnie. Bonnie wished her luck as she walked up to the stool. She felt exposed with all these eyes staring at her; she wished she had a rock in her hand to comfort her.
She sat on the stool nervously as the hat was placed on her head and fell over her eyes. She clasped the sides of the stool firmly out of anxiety. Strangely, she heard the hat talk inside her head.
"Let's see, you have a bursting desire to fit in and remove a sense of loneliness. You also have a vast knowledge on rocks?" The hat said as if it was strange,
"I sense a great fear in you as well, yet a desire to push past that fear and move forward." Said the hat, she figured she wouldn't be put anywhere. She wasn't hard working or ambitious, she only had knowledge of rocks and nothing more, and apparently she wasn't brave.
"I think I know where to put you." The hat said, and surprisingly it bellowed, "GRYFFINDOR!"
"What?" she immediately thought, she was very confused. Everyone else just looked happy, even Bonnie, who she now knew she wouldn't be grouped with. She didn't know what to think, Didn't the hat just tell her that she wasn't brave. Before she had a chance to ponder further the hat was taken off her head and she went to go sit down with the wild, whooping, Gryffindors.
She had sat there and listened to all the other placements, and especially when Bonnie was sorted into Hufflepuff, which was also surprising considering how Hannah was almost absolutely certain she would be sorted into Ravenclaw. She guessed that the hat knew them better than they knew themselves.
Other than that, she hardly paid attention. She heard there were a few Slytherins, a few Ravenclaws, and many, many Hufflepuffs. Whenever the hat called a Gryffindor the entire table shouted causing her attention. They seemed to shout extra loud when a boy named Albus Potter joined them and a girl named Rose, but she didn't see why.
She was shocked when the food magically appeared on the table, and when the ghosts showed up, but otherwise she was pretty nervous most of the time. She had never eaten with so many people before, not even in her school cafeteria. She ate what she could, although her nervousness effected her hunger.
When people started talking about their magical heritage Hannah didn't speak up. She knew she had no reason to feel ashamed , since it was Slytherins that liked pure-bloods, but she didn't want to feel like more of an outsider than she already was. With everyone talking about their misadventures of their magical parents, she didn't want to bring the mood down by talking about how she didn't have magical parents.
She wished she could've been eating with Bonnie, then she would've had someone to talk to. Normally when she ate she said nothing. No one let her bring rocks to the table, no matter how much she explained what a good center piece a rock would make. Besides, even she could bring rocks to the table, she wouldn't talk to them. She only talked to rocks when she was alone, which was often, and it was pointless to talk to rocks about food since they didn't eat. However, if she was holding a rock right now than she might be calmer and more open to conversation.
After supper was finished, and the headmaster said a few announcements discussing the school rules like "Don't go into the dark forest" the prefect, who Hannah didn't remember the name of, lead them up to the common room where she soon found out they would be sleeping. When the painting on the door asked for the password, she thought she was dreaming, yet she paid attention when the prefect said the password was, "Patronus."
They entered the room, and after the prefect "their things had already been brought up." She was ready to bolt to the room. She waited until the prefect was done and ventured into the dormitory. She found her bag next to the bed where she was going to sleep. She frantically opened it and took out her rock collection.
From the smooth section of rocks she took out a small, smooth, black stone in one hand; and in the other she took a pink, pointed, rock with sparkles and jutted edges. She pressed each stone into her palm as she breathed deeply, trying to sooth herself. The pink stone kept her alert, while the black one calmed her nerves. "This is going to be a long year." She decided, as she pressed her fists holding rocks into her chest and hoped that tomorrow would be better.