Please keep in mind that this is my very first story on here. And the fact that English isn't my first language. I'm doing the best I can. I hope you'll like it either way.

She woke up, from a dream. Or... She wasn't sure if it was a dream or not, but she didn't mind. Dream or not, it was a brand new experience, a hint of joy and a little bit of adventure mixed together with excitement. And the first thing reaching her gaze was the faces of her friends.

Painted on her bedroom ceiling, a chain of words all connecting them together. It wasn't words, more like a word. The chain connecting her friends, was the word "friends". Because that's what they were, her friends.

As she was lying there, looking at their faces smiling to her, a feeling of longing struck her. It was summer, and she home on holiday. It was still a month left. 30 more days before she would see them all on the Hogwarts express.

She looked away from the familiar faces, sat up in her bed, and walked over to the window. The first thing that caught her attention was something black, flying over the tree tops. An owl, maybe? No. It wasn't even close to being an owl, she knew perfectly well what that flying creature was. She also knew that not everybody could see them. It was a thestral. A winged horse with skin just like old leather. And they could only be seen by people who've seen death. She knew her father couldn't see them. He wasn't there when it happened. And for a moment she let herself go back in time, to that day. The day her mother died. The thought didn't make her sad, because she knew she would see her again one day.

And as she walked over to the spiraling stair she looked at the moving picture at her bed stand. The woman in the photo had long blonde hair, dimples and a smile so familiar, it was just like her own smile. She waved to her mother before she walked down the stairs.

On her way to down, she walked passed her father, he was busy, working. Her father was actually the editor of a paper. The quibbler, to be precise. She wanted to know what kind of article he was working on, maybe a new sighting of the crumple-horned snorkack or maybe something about the blibbering humdinger? But she didn't want to disturb him. So she kept on going down in spirals, down to the kitchen.

And out the front door.

She stopped for a little while on the front steps. Taking a deep breath of clean, fresh air.

She continued walking down to the creek.

And there, by the shore of the creek was the little hut she and her dad made when she was a little kid, no more than six or seven. They built it out of small braches and stuffed the gaps with grass and pretty little flowers. While they were building the hut, her mother was sitting on a rock nearby with her feet in the water watching them work, humming the tune of her favorite lullaby, only interrupted by giggles when one of the branches fell down and the look of chock on the face of the amazed builders.

…

Now, so many years later the hut was still there, but the flowers that used to make the hut look like it had a very colorful case of chickenpox had now spread, covering the entire hut in a cloak of flowers.

She crawled inside and sat there. Closing her eyes, and listening to the rattling water of the creek. Smelling the sweet smell of flowers. She sat there for a while.

She didn't mind being alone. She never had. But that didn't mean she didn't miss her friends.

She crawled back out of the hut, scrubbing her knee on a sharp stone. It stung a little, but she ignored it and walked back to the house, where she found a piece of parchment, a quill and an ink bottle. She carried it all with her back to her hut. Before she crawled back inside, she kicked away the little stone responsible for her bleeding knee.

She sat down, dipped the quill in ink, but hesitated, with the quill just an inch over the parchment. She'd never written to anyone but her father before. What should she write?

She sat there… thinking…

Then she wrote down the first two words, with a smile running over her face.

"Dear Neville"

…