The only thing I know about Harry Potter is that he is dead. And the only reason he is dead is because of Lord Voldemort.
The only thing I know about Lord Voldemort is that he almost killed my father.
And the only thing I know about my father is that he left us.
So when old Professor Binns assigned us a five foot essay on Harry Potter, I immediately awoke from my usual History-Of-Magic slumber.
"I am sure-" The ghost said, tiresome and slow. "that most of you could gain some valuable information from your parents, most of who were at school with Mr. Potter. I know that your parents, Miss Weasley-"
He pointed a translucent finger at me.
"-your parents were quite good friends with Harry Potter...yes..."
Professor Binns then preceded to fall back through his desk and into his armchair, asleep.
The class was silent for a moment until my cousin Simone stood up. Simone was the envy of every third year girl. She was extremely beautiful, but it was often hard to find her beauty under her pink streaked hair and excessive jewelry. But what we most envied was her comfort and confidence even in front of large crowds. Like now. She jumped to Binns' desk with an energetic hop and picked up the scroll of parchment lying there.
"Right. Looks like he wants us to pair up for the essay...Shiva, your with Longbottom, and Hooper is with Creevey. Sloper, your with MacMillan, I'm with McLaggen and Weasley your with Finnegan." she finished, staring at me.
"Wisteria. That's you." she told me clearly, so that the whole class giggled.
"Right." I said. "Wait, who?"
"Finnegan." she said, jerking her thumb behind her. I looked to see a brown haired boy staring back at me. He was thin and looked to be tall, and his desk was littered with many sheets of paper. Embarrassed, I waved at him and quickly turned around. There was a minute of awkward silence, as Simone sat down and we had nothing to talk about. Saved by the bell, I ran out, my heavy book bag flying behind me. To say the least, this was a bad idea, because within seconds I heard, or rather felt a thump as my bag hit someone walking behind me.
"Oh! Oh, I'm sorry!" I said. With a jump in my throat I realized it was Finnegan. With another jump I realized I didn't know his first name.
His stack of loose papers had flown to the ground in a scattered pile. I bent down and started to gather them up, but he seemed very protective of them and grabbed them all before I could help.
"Sorry..." I said.
"It's fine," he said. "Really. Well, about that essay, we probably should..."
"Yeah we probably should start on it. How about-?"
"The library?" he interrupted, glancing at his wristwatch.
"Yeah." I said hastily, straightening my glasses. "The library, after lunch."
"All right then." he nodded.
"Okay, bye erm..."
"Eamon." he said.
"Right! Eamon. Bye Eamon."
He began to walk away, when I turned around and shouted:
"I'm Wisteria."
"I know." he called back.
"Right." I said blushing, and quickly hurried off to potions.
After lunch, I hurried off to the library to meet Eamon Finnegan. I was so nervous, because I had to work with someone I didn't know, that I totally forgot what we were supposed to be writing about. He arrived five minutes later, a stack of books and parchment in his hands.
"Hi." I said. He looked at me and dropped the stack of books on the table.
"Those are all the books that Madame Hurst has on Harry Potter," he said plainly, "We should probably get to work."
"Right." I said, and grabbed the book closest to me. I wasn't sure I liked Eamon Finnegan.
The book stated, in rather boring terms, that Harry Potter attended Hogwarts School until his seventh year. He then preceded to defeat the Dark Lord Voldemort and was killed in the process.
"There are absolutely no details in this book." I complained ten minutes later.
"I agree. There's nothing here we don't already know. Are there any old newpapers around here?" he said, looking around. I knew where they were and so I went over and retrieved a Daily Prophet from 1997.
Eamon snatched it from my hands and began to skim the articles. For five minutes I watched him, his eyes darting back and forth across the page.
"Nope." he said. "There is no mention of Harry Potter anywhere in here."
I wasn't listening. I was day-dreaming, thinking of my father, and how Binns' said that my parents knew Harry Potter. How did that old ghost even know Ronald Weasley was my father? It was probably my appearance, I decided. It wasn't exactly a secret that I didn't look a thing like my mother.
"Hey, Wisteria." Eamon said.
I came out of my trance.
"Wha?" I said quickly.
"Binns said that your parents knew him." he said.
"Who?"
"Harry Potter!"
"Oh." I said, nervously, "Well, yeah I guess they did bu-"
"My parents knew him to." he said.
"...really? Well, we should ask them then." I said, hoping not to get my parents involved.
"Well, that's kind of what I was thinking. Instead of combing through these books all day lets just interview our parents." he said not meeting my eyes.
"Erm...sure. I guess that works."
I knew that wasn't going to work, but what could I say?
"Okay then." Eamon said cheerfully. "Write to your parents and get the information. Let's meet back here on Friday and see what you've got, okay?"
I sighed. "Okay."
"Good." He said. Then he smiled at me and left.
I really didn't have any intention of asking my mother about Harry Potter, and I most certainly didn't have any intention of meeting up with my father for the sake of a stupid essay. Nope, Eamon Finnegan can go ahead and do that himself, I will not-
"Miss Weasley?" It was Mrs. Hurst, the librarian.
"Huh?" I spun around.
"Don't you have a class?" she asked me. I looked at my watch. Sure enough, I was seven minutes late for Divination. Great.
"Yeah...Divination." I stood staring at her.
"Well, run along." she told me.
"Right." I said, grabbing my bag and flying out the door, hitting Mrs. Hurst with it as I flew past her.