'Cry me a river, 'cause I cried a river over you.' - Michael Buble, Cry Me A River

One Year Later

Al's POV

We're on the train to Hogwarts for our seventh year. Our last year at the castle and it's off to a devastating start.

It's so familiar, yet achingly different. Something is missing, and we all know what.

I lean my head back on the soft worn seat, and look around the carriage.

Rose is sitting opposite me, flipping through the Charms textbook feverishly. Her ginger hair has been painstakingly straightened and styled in a French plait, and her make-up has been applied carefully; to anyone else it may seem that she's just looking good for the first day of school, but to me, who knows her so well, it's obvious she's put so much effort into her appearance to take her mind off other things. She frowns at the pages fiercely, eyes narrowed as she concentrates hard on the book. I would believe that she is studying early to get a head start on the other seventh years, but the book is upside down, and she isn't wearing her reading glasses.

Lysander sits next to her. Like Rose, he's put care into what he's wearing, in an effort to look normal. He's the glue that binds us all together, and I know there's no way we'll get through this without him. He is holding one of his favourite books, War and Peace, but his lips are pressed in a hard line, repressing emotion, and he has just been staring aimlessly at the same page for the last half an hour, so I know he isn't reading.

Emma sits on the other side of Rose. The girl whom I thought only owned skirts is wearing trousers and a hoodie, with her hair carelessly thrown into a bun, a lack of motivation evident. She is hunched over her sketchbook, frantically drawing dress designs, but I know her heart isn't in it because uncharacteristically, her pencil often tears through the thick paper, and every two minutes she rips out the page she is drawing on, scrunches it up, and throws it on the floor.

My heart aches for them because they are all trying so hard to act normal, but we're all hurting so much.

I look to my right, to the one who is undoubtedly hurting the most.

Ria is wearing black jeans and a grey jumper, her black hair loose. She is curled up in a tight ball on the seat, staring out of the window, watching as the heavens open and a torrent of tears slap against the window.

A flash at the door of the carriage catches my eye. Someone is trying to open the door, smiling sadly and beckoning me to go over and let them in, but I turn away. Rose has put a charm on the door so that no one can come in with their whispered condolences. Condolences for a boy whom they may have loved, but didn't know as well as we knew him. I don't think any of us could take that, least of all the girl silently crying next to me.

I sigh. Where did it all go so wrong?

I think back to last year in this same carriage. We were so carefree then. Funny how things change.