The Prefect led us out of the Great Hall, and up a long staircase. He then led us through sliding panels and hanging tapestries, and then we climbed more stairs. Finally, we all stopped in front of a large portrait of a fat woman all dressed all in pink silks.

"Password?" she asked.

"Wattlebird," the Prefect said. The portrait of the fat lady swung open to reveal a round hole in the wall.
We all scrambled through it. I was the last, as I had a little difficulty getting through it.

Inside was the Gryffindor common room. It was a round-shaped chamber, full of snug looking armchairs, and a blazing fireplace.

"Girls Dormitories are this way," the prefect said, pointing to the right where a there was a long staircase.

"Boys Dormitories are that way," The Prefect said, pointing toward the opposite direction.

I followed the other girls to the Girl's Dormitory. We went up the flight of stairs into a tower. We found five four-posters beds with dark red curtains hanging around each bed. All were made, with all of our belongings and trunks at the end of the beds. There were chairs at each bed that had Gryffindor school uniforms on them.

A few "Goodnights" were said, but other that no one talked very much. All the girls got into the beds and most fell asleep instantly.

I got into my bed, which was right in-between Lily's and some other girl, but I didn't know her name.

I lay there, letting the tears that I had been holding back for a while now come out. I had only been here for a day, and I felt hopeless and scared.
If anyone had been listening, they would've heard a few tiny sniffles, but that's it. I had learned to be a very quiet Cryer living with Aunt Cora.
It was a long time before I drifted off to sleep.

The next morning I awoke to the sound of something crashing to the floor. I sat up quickly, rubbing my eyes.
I looked around and tried to remember where I was for a second.

A raven-haired girl with round rosy cheeks was bent over a scattered pile of books and papers on the floor, picking each one up and placing them back in her trunk.

I looked around me. Everyone else must already be awake, for the girl and I were the only ones in the room.

I got out of my bed and walked over to where she was kneeling on the floor.
I bent down and helped her pick up the books. She didn't meet my gaze as I handed them to her.

"Thanks," she mumbled. I could see her hand shaking as she took the books from me.

"You're welcome," I said, smiling nervously. "What's your name?" I asked. I might as well TRY to make friends here, I thought to myself.

"Carry Arion." She replied in a small voice. "Uh, I have to go," she said, motioning to the door. She had barely said the last word before she was out the door and gone.
I sighed, feeling a stab of sadness go through me. Well, at least I tried.

I quickly dressed in my school uniform and went down to breakfast. I sat alone at the long table, eating breakfast quietly. I could see Frank with a group of First and Second years, who were all laughing and talking together. At one point Frank glanced over at me and smiled. He tried to get up and go to where I sat, but one of the boys motioned for him to stay, and he shrugged apologetically to me, sitting back down.

A few owls flew through the halls and dropped mail for some of the students.
Sirius Black received a howler from his mother. It went on and on about Sirius being a disgrace to the black name. I guess the Blacks were all supposed to be placed in Slytherin, not Gryffindor.

When breakfast was over, we were all handed our school schedules. The first class on my schedule was Charms.

As I walked through the school, up and down many staircases, I could see everyone staring and suddenly going quiet for a moment as I passed them. As I passed them they scooted aside as far from me as they could. Some even pointed at my leg or eye.
I ignored them the best I could and found my way to Charms Class.

Upon entering Charms, I looked around. Most of the students were already there. James Potter and Sirius Black were leaning back in their chairs, trying to balance on just the two back legs. Every few seconds James would look over at Lily Evans. Peter Pettigrew and Remus Lupin were murmuring and motioning at James, grinning.

Lily sat next to Alice and Severus Snape. Lily and Alice were talking and laughing, Severus Snape sat close to Lily, but didn't seem to be conversing with the two girls. All the students were sitting quietly, getting out their books, or they were talking to each other.

I saw Aileen Camio sitting next to two other Slytherin girls. Unlike my red-lined robes for Gryffindor, hers were green for Slytherin. She was writing in a notebook, and the three of them didn't seem to be talking. She glanced up as I walked in, but went back to her writing.

I eventually found Frank Longbottom, who sat with two other boys. After a long moment of hesitation, I walked over to him. The students all stared at me as I made my way over to Frank.

The two boys next to Frank were talking but became silent as they saw me.

"Hi, Frank," I said, smiling. "Can I sit here?" I asked, pointing to the chair next to him. I tried to ignore the two other boys looking at me from head to toe, their gazes lingering on my leg and eye. Both the boys had clouds surrounding them, but I ignored them.

Frank looked up and smiled.
"Sure," he said.

I sat down, fiddling with my hands. After a moment Frank spoke.

"So, are you excited about the first day at Hogwarts?" he asked me. "Well, the first day of classes, that is," he added.

"Oh, yes," I said, looking up from my lap, "I'm nervous, but I'm excited."

"This is Jack," Frank said, pointing to a brown haired boy he had been talking with moments before. The boy eyed me, his features set in a scowl, his eyes only focused on my left eye. The red one.

"And this is Corry." Frank continued awkwardly, pointing to the other boy, who had white-blond hair. Corry at least forced a smile, but it ended up looking like a grimace.

"This is Alexa," he said to the two boys.

They both mumbled hellos, and I smiled warmly at them, even though I felt like hiding my face with the curtain of my long hair. They both seemed greatly surprised when I smiled; as if they thought just because I had a missing leg and different colored eyes I was incapable of human emotion and gestures.

Then saying they had to say hi to someone, they both left to sit with someone else.

"Sorry," I said.

"Huh? Sorry about what?" Frank asked a little perplexed.

"I didn't think they would leave like that if I came over," I explained.

Frank looked a bit confused at first, but then he seemed to understand.

"Oh," was all he said for a moment. "that isn't your fault," he stated. "Just give them time. You'll see, things will get better."

I smiled at him in thanks, but I wasn't so sure about that.

The Professor, a very small man with a brown mustache that curled at the ends, and hair that was beginning to whiten walked in at that moment, and everyone quieted down. From a few seats over from where I was sitting, James Potter had tumbled down from his chair that he had been trying to balance on. Sirius let out a barking laugh.

Professor Filius Flitwick was the kindest teacher at Hogwarts, in my opinion anyway. He was part Goblin and didn't look at me strangely.
We were taught precise wand movements and proper pronunciation of spells. We were taught a Levitation Charm the first day in this class. I was happy at first when I was the first to make the feather float in the air. But when Professor Filius congratulated me on this achievement, all the students turned to look at me. Some wore scared expressions, some disgusted, and some surprises. None wore pleasant expressions, and I looked down, ashamed.

Frank patted me on the back encouragingly.

"Nice work, Alexa" he whispered, smiling at me.
I looked up and smiled gratefully back at him.

After Charms Class, Frank went back with those two boys he'd been with earlier, and I was left alone to navigate my way through the castle. In a few of the classes, like History of Magic and Transfiguration, I was able to sit right with Frank. But the rest, somebody else had already been sitting with Frank.

Professor Horace Slughorn taught Potions. There was always at least one cauldron that exploded in this class the first few weeks. Severus Snape quickly became Slughorns favorite student, as his potions were always just right.

Herbology was taught by Professor Pomona Sprout, a short, fat lady with curly blond hair that was beginning to gray.
There were all kinds of plants in the greenhouse. Dangerous ones and healing ones. We had to learn the difference between the two.

On Wednesdays, In Astronomy, we learned to study the night skies through telescopes at midnight and were learning the names of different stars and the movements of the planets.
I found the skies themselves fascinating and quite beautiful, but all the notes we had to take down made this class a bit dull. There was a star named Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. Sirius Black became quite smug upon learning this, and for the next few days kept insisting he was "The brightest star" to anyone who would listen.

History of Magic was taught by Professor Binns, an old looking ghost. A lot of the first years had been surprised that a ghost taught at Hogwarts.

Professor Binns made us take down names and dates of "Important" events in Magical History.
As Binns drones on and on, most of the students barely paid any attention, doodling, sleeping, whispering to the other students, or just sat there bored out of their minds.

McGonagall taught Transfiguration. She made it very clear that she would not accept any misbehavior from the beginning. I was one of the first to transform a match we had each been given into a feather. James and Sirius had also changed the match pretty quickly into a pencil. A lot of the students though weren't able to do for a while.

There were Flying Lessons for the First Years in the second week at Hogwarts, taught by Rolanda Hooch who appeared to be the youngest teacher at Hogwarts.
She had short, spiky dirty blond hair, and her eyes were a yellow color, like a cat's eyes.
James and Sirius took an instant liking to Flying Lessons.

Defense The Dark Arts was taught by Professor Kingery, a tall, skinny man, with hollow cheeks and a long pointy nose. His skin had a gray tint, and most of the students were frightened by him.
In this class, I sat next to Aileen Camio.

I quickly came to realize that it was quite hard navigating Hogwarts on my own.
There was what seemed like hundreds of staircases; Staircases that moved a lot.
There were all different kinds of doors, Some wouldn't open until tickled them enough to make them laugh, or until I asked them nicely. Doors that weren't doors at all, but walls that just looked to be doors.

It was tough to remember where anything was because everything seemed to be moving around constantly.
The people in the portraits that hung everywhere in Hogwarts kept going to visit each other, and that only confused me as to where I was.

The ghosts at Hogwarts liked to fly out of nowhere, startling the daylights out of me.
After a while, I got used to the ghosts and was no longer scared of them though.
A ghost named Nearly Headless Nick was always happy to point me in the right direction when he happened to see me struggling.

Then there was a ghost called Peeves The Poltergeist.
If I were late for class, which I was frequently due to not knowing my way around Hogwarts and getting lost often, Peeves would fly over me and drop wastepaper baskets on me as I was hurrying to class, pull rugs from under my feet, and throw chalk at me.
One time he even snuck up behind me, grabbed my wooden leg and yell, "BREAK A LEG!"
He was positively horrible. But I was consoled by the fact that it wasn't only me he did these things too. He delighted in annoying the whole school of students.

There was the caretaker, Argus Filch, who owned a small gray kitten called Mrs. Norris.
Unlike most kittens though, she was not cute at all. She was scrawny, with bulging bloodshot eyes, her fur did not look soft, it looked bristly, and there wasn't much of it.

If the kitten saw any student break any single rule, she'd run off for Filch, who'd appear a few seconds later, all out of breath pointing an accusing finger at the student.

The kitten liked to follow James, Sirius, Peter, and Remus around, who had all made a reputation for themselves as trouble making pranksters who enjoyed breaking the rules and creating all kinds of mischief.

Filch seemed to know the secret passageways of Hogwarts very well, for he was able to pop out of nowhere as if he was a ghost himself. Most of the students hated him, and it was clear that everyone also disliked the small kitten, and a lot of them were actually afraid of the cat.

I didn't like the kitten either at first, but I felt sorry for it. We were kind of in the same boat, so to speak. I tried to befriend it, but it didn't seem to want me to be its friend. Just like most of the students here, I reflected sadly to myself.

Filch and Peeves didn't seem to like each other very much, as Filch was regularly complaining and insulting Peeves, and Peeves delighted in angering the Filch and his kitten.

In my free time, I mostly studied in the library, away from everyone else.

I was pleasantly surprised one day when Aileen came to the table I sat at and sat down next to me. She didn't say anything, and we studied in silence at first. In the beginning, when I tried to talk to her, she would answer me in simple sentences, most comprising of one word. But, after a while, we began to talk more.

Some times I would go exploring the castle and grounds. Aileen joined me sometimes. We even discovered a few hidden passageways.

Here and there I would hang out with Frank, but he had plenty of other friends, so it was hard to get him alone. Despite his willingness to be my friend, I could tell that his friends didn't approve, and seemed to keep him away purposefully. Frank didn't appear to notice this, though.

The first few weeks at Hogwarts were the hardest thing I had to go through in the last three years. If the students didn't whisper about me, stare at me, or run away from me, they just ignored me completely. The only people in the whole school who bothered even talking to me were Frank Longbottom and Aileen Camio.

I know, this was a bit longer than 2,000 words. Nearly 3,000. But this IS the first three weeks! I mean, it's one thing writing a day or two in 2,000 words, but three weeks!? Well now, that's a bit harder. For me at least. I hope this chapter didn't seem boring or anything! I was just trying to explain the first three weeks before I got onto anything more exciting.

In case anyone was interested in knowing, Alexa started her first day of classes on Thursday, September 2nd, in the year 1971, at the age of 11.