She lay on her back, the curtains drawn around her and her eyes wide open.
"Molly, are you coming to Hogsmeade with us?" one of her dorm mates called to her.
"No, I'm not feeling too good, I think I'll stay in bed," she said weakly.
"Okay then," she said and paused, probably putting her thousandth layer of lip-gloss on "you want anything?" Molly just wanted her to be left alone.
"No thanks," she mumbled.
"Suit yourself," came the short snappy reply of her so-called friend. Then the door banged shut behind her. That was it, Molly thought, 'I have no friends and no one cares about me.' Those thoughts gave her the courage to do what she did next.
She pulled out her wand from under her pillow and murmured "silencio" around her four poster bed. Then, she pulled out something else from under her pillow, it was a foreign object to her but a guy from her year, Arthur, had given it to her and called it a co-pasm? A cume-poss?...A compass, that was it. She gave a slight tug on her nightshirt and it rose just to expose her stomach and revealed pale bulging flesh. Molly cringed at the sight. Her stomach was huge and feeling around her warm skin she could only feel faintly the dips of her ribs. She hated it, she hated the way everything wobbled and most of all she hated herself. With the compass in one hand she drew it down onto her stomach and applied pressure. Dragging a long line from her left down, tears sprung to her eyes and she bit her lip to stop herself from crying out. Then when her first task was finished and all her compass-made lines were finished she let out a sob. There on her once smooth belly read the word 'FAT' clearly.
It had all started when she was younger, her sister was stick thin and Molly was always slightly jealous.
"Don't you ever stop eating?" Molly had asked her, jokingly.
"Well, at least I wont weigh 11 stone when I'm 10," she replied nastily in front of the whole family room. Molly's eyes started to water, she liked food but liking food wasn't a bad thing, was it?
"Now, I think that's quite enough," her mother said to Molly's sister. 'She'd never understand,' Molly thought and excused herself from the table, running up to her room and collapsing into tears. That's all her sister ever got...a warning, no punishments.
Then there had always been the teasing, she was short and so it didn't help much with her appearance, she had and always would be chubby. She'd always be an outcast and never be able to fit in. She knew deep inside she'd never be happy with herself. And so when she found out she was a witch, like her brothers, and was going to Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry she was undoubtedly nervous, there would be more people to bully her there.
Molly looked down, that girl was right yesterday she thought, my thighs do look like tree trunks. Swipe, blood was trickling down her leg and the wound that had been created was weeping even more blood. Molly had blacked out.
"Is anyone in there?" was what snapped Molly back to reality, one of the girls must have returned.
"Uh, yeah, sorry, I was asleep" Molly replied hastily looking down at her sore swollen stomach and blood stained sheets, wait, the silencing charm, she took it off with a flick of her wand and repeated her sentence.
"Righty-o, well, you missed breakfast and I wondered if you wanted to catch lunch with me" the girl said, as by now Molly had identified as Karen.
"Not now, I'm not dressed, and I don't feel too good still, you can go down without me," Molly bit her lips nervously hoping that she'd leave and not have to look in on her. She could see the shadow of Karen come closer near the curtain, was there any such thing as luck, Molly wondered.
"If you say so, but I hope you feel better soon," Karen said finally and Molly released her breath, of which she'd been holding. She heard the door click shut and she got out of bed, her thigh was sore and it hurt to walk on and her stomach felt painful just by the whisper of the air around her.
"Merlin help me, I'm a wimp," she sniffed. Her stomach was grumbling by now "owww" was all she could muster before she gave up and drank some healing potion from the first aid kit in the dorms bathroom. Maybe lunch wasn't such a bad idea after all, but first she used a cleaning spell on her sheets, so to not give away what she had done, the girls would just think she was doing it for attention or tell a teacher.
She grabbed a t-shirt and jeans and slid them on, then she walked out the dormitory and into the hectic chaos of the common room. She smiled to herself, when I have kids, I want it to be like this, she thought. The common room was filled with joy and laughter, the atmosphere light and amusing. It was a total mess, but she liked it that way, it was like Gryffindor was a big family.
"Molly!" Arthur called, he was playing a game of wizard chess in the corner. This was the kind boy that had given her the compass, she felt guilty for misusing it.
"Hi Arthur," she smiled at him, he was rather handsome, she had to admit, he had a cheeky grin and red hair that made him look mischievous all the time. "Who's winning?" She asked politely as she walked over to the table.
"He is," Arthur grinned at her, "he always does." She laughed slightly, he always made her feel…happy? She couldn't really explain it but whenever she had talked to him she would feel her mood lighten and the worries from the day disappear.
"That's…interesting, I always thought you'd be good at Wizard chess," she murmured, blushing knowing too late that what she just said may go the wrong way. He continued to grin at her.
"No, I'm absolutely rubbish!" He confessed, his ears going slightly red. She laughed, he looked really cute like that.
"So am I," she replied modestly.
"We'll be evenly matched then," he said eagerly and gave her a wink. She giggled girlishly and the boy at the other end looked on in horror.
"You two need a room," he exclaimed and with that stood up "see you later Arthur." He then walked away shaking his head. Things had become awfully silent all of a sudden, Molly had started to find the floor and Arthur's feet very interesting.
"Molly, would you like to come to Hogsmeade with me now?"