Leola awoke on the first of September long before dawn. After some time spent tossing and turning, she eventually swung her legs clumsily over the side of the bed, and moved to the trunk by her door, careful not to wake up her baby sister, who she shared a room with.

Swinging open the lid of her used trunk, Leola got to work going through its contents. This had become a tradition for her in the days leading up to the beginning of the month. The little eleven year old told herself time and again that she was simply checking to make sure nothing was missing, but that did little to stop her tiny hands from moving reverently over cloaks and beakers, or gently flipping through the pages of her schoolbooks.

Dawn was just beginning to break over the ramshackle buildings that made the skyline outside her second story bedroom window by the time she had finished her meticulous inventory for the very last time. In a few long hours, Leola would be catching her train.

However, before she could catch her train, there were other traditions which had to be met. The first was breakfast. Putting on a pair of socks to muffle the sounds of her feet on the hardwood, Leola crept down the stairs, tiptoeing past both her brothers' room (but not before taking a peek inside to observe Samuel lying in his bed, spread out like a starfish with his sheets sequestered to a pile on the floor. He was snoring, as was typical, and his longish brown hair—nearly the exact same color as Leola's—was tickling his cheek as he inhaled and exhaled. In the bed beside his was Robert, curled up in a little ball, the exact opposite of Samuel who seemed to be trying to take up as much of his bed as was possible) and the closed door of her foster parents as she made her way to the kitchen.

Once there she set about pouring cereal and making coffee. She knew that by the time it finished brewing her siblings would have woken up to the smell, so she set the milk on the center of table and tucked into her own bowl of cereal while she waited for them to come down.

As predicted, her whole family was downstairs by the time the coffee had finished. While the children all yawned and rubbed at the sleep still in their eyes, her mother and father poured their cups of coffee before going back upstairs for another few hours of shut eye.

Leola spent the remainder of her morning pacing the ground floor of her house. She didn't want to wake her parents up, as they would most likely be very cranky if she did, however, as time ticked away and the eleventh hour of the day grew nearer, she knew she had to.

"Mrs. Wright," she whispered to her foster mother, attempting to coax her gently from her sleep.

"Uhmph," was Mrs. Wright's reply.

"Mrs. Wright," Leola said louder. "Mama, it's almost time for me to board the train, we have to go."

"Go yourself," her foster mother spat viciously.

Leola paused, unsure what to do. "O-Okay. I'll see you at Christmas then, Mrs. Wright; I'll write to you soon."

Leola went back downstairs to say her final good-byes to Samuel, Robert, and Katie, before tugging her trunk and carry-on bag out the door behind her and making her way down the street to Tom's pub, hoping he would allow her to use the floo network to get to King's Cross.

As it turned out, King's Cross did not have access to the floo network. Thankfully though, the Ministry of Magic did, and Tom floo called a friend of his who worked in the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office. His friend arranged it so that Leola was allowed to floo to the Ministry's Lobby, where she met a balding red-headed man by the name of Arthur.

Arthur, she found, was a very polite, good man. He walked her the whole way down the street to Kings Cross so she would not be alone, or get lost, and explained to her how to find and get through the entrance to platform 9¾. He told her about his sons, who also attend Hogwarts, and asked her many silly questions about electricity and the purpose of a safety pin.

"Here we are then," he said to her once they'd reached the train station. "I've got to get back to work. Can you find your way from here?"

She shook her head. "Yes, sir, thank you very much for all of your help!"

"Best be on your way then, you're running very late! Have a good first term, dear." Then Arthur disappeared in the late morning crowd and Leola was left to find her way through the chaos of the train station to the correct platform.

As soon as she managed to get through the entryway to the platform—with only ten minutes to spare—she tripped over her own feet. Looking around to make sure no one was paying attention to her, Leola couldn't help but feel somewhat embarrassed, but was more so amused at her own clumsiness. Soon she was on the train, looking for a compartment to settle into for the duration of the trip.

After a few moments looking for a compartment she felt like kicking herself for being so late. Almost all of the compartments were entirely full, and the only one she had come across that had any room in it also had a snogging couple; Leola had blushed and walked away very quickly.

The next compartment she found had only two people, a red-haired boy and a black-haired boy. Leola was about to open the door when she heard the red head ask in a brash voice if the other boy really was Harry Potter. The dark-haired boy with the glasses nodded.

At first, Leola was very curious about Harry, after all, she'd heard all about the famous Harry Potter from Tom, and some of his regulars like Mundungus Fletcher; but her curiosity was quickly dispelled.

Harry was like Leola. He was an orphan. She wondered if he remembered his parents, or if like her, they were complete strangers, only missed because of the obvious void they had left in her. Did he know what they looked like, what their hobbies were, what their names were? Leola decided to keep walking. If she were Harry Potter, she would not want the attention; she would want to be left alone.

"Finally," she thought when she'd reached a compartment near the very rear of the train which only housed one very blond boy, who was like her, already in his school robes. She hesitantly opened the door. "Umm, hi. Most of the other compartments are already full, or they have older students in them…" she trailed off, thinking about the snogging couple. "Is it—I mean, could I join you in here?"

"Sure. Crabbe and Goyle went to get sweets but they'll be back."

Leola smiled at him, grateful for his kindness, and took a seat as far from him as possible, so his friends weren't inconvenienced by her joining them.

"My name is Leola…well, it's Alesea, but no one calls me that," she rambled.

"Draco." He told her, holding out his hand for her to shake. Then he smirked at her, and adopted a condescending voice. "Lion? Your name is lion? Hoping to be a Gryffindor then?"

She had the feeling that his Draco boy was attempting to bait her, and would be judging her worth based on her response. But regardless of the fact that he seemed to think poorly of Gryffindor house, Leola thought hard about everything she'd learned about all of the houses from "Hogwarts, A History." She was going to give him an honest answer, even if it was not the answer he wanted to hear.

"I'm just hoping to fit in somewhere, really," she decided ultimately. "I suppose it doesn't much matter to me where I end up."

"Well, I know I'll be in Slytherin," the boy informed her in the same haughty tone, and she figured that whether or not she'd passed it, she at least hadn't failed his test. "Father says it is the noblest house, and I agree. My whole family has been in Slytherin for generations."

"Merlin was a Slytherin," she agreed with him that Slytherin was a good house, though she thought he probably already knew about Merlin. "I hope you end up there just like your father."

Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle returned then, and Leola was not impressed by them. Though, if she'd had any lingering guilt over her almost immediate dislike the two, their obvious disdain for her would have quickly dispelled it.

She did feel a moment of sympathy for them when Draco condemned them for not returning with any sweets. To her, Draco seemed to be a nice, if high strung boy, but it was clear that he did not see the two large wizards as friends. If anything, from the way he treated them and the way they seemed to expect it, they were his personal assistants. Although she had immediately begun to think of Crabbe and Goyle as Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum, she did not think it right for Draco to use them this way.

With this in mind, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the sweet that she had been saving for later in the train ride. She had many more in her trunk so parting with this one was no real hardship. She held it out for him to take, which he did, looking very confused all the while.

"What's this?"

"It's my favorite sweet. Tom buys them for me, and he sent me with enough to keep me full until Christmas." She told him, not wanting him to feel bad for taking her candy.

He took an experimental bite, which made her suppress a smile; honestly, it wasn't poison.

His eyes grew wide, and her smile grew wide at his reaction. He had just shoved the entire sweet in his mouth at once, and now looked a bit like a blond hamster.

"York Peppermint Patty," he read from the wrapper. "Where do you get these?"

"Dunno; like I said, Tom always buys some for me. I can write and ask." She offered.

"Please!" He said before blushing at his own enthusiasm.

Eventually, Leola fell asleep, which was not an easy feat with Tweetle's Dee and Dum taking turns glaring at her, and Draco loving the sound of his own voice. It wasn't until she heard Crabbe and Goyle excitedly announcing Harry Potter's name that she awoke.

"W'as going on," she asked, feeling very confused.

"Harry Potter is on the train," said Draco, sounding excited.

"We've just come back to tell you," Goyle said, not once looking at Leola. "Let's go take a look at him."

This made Leola very angry. Harry was just a boy, not a bearded lady or any other attraction in a freak show. He didn't deserve to be "taken a look at" by them. "Well, that would be incredibly rude," she said, making sure to inject as much venom into her voice as possible. "Don't you think? Ogling the poor boy. I bet every other student on this train has had the same idea. I know I'd be sick of it. Especially when you consider why he's famous. If I were him," she said, "I'd be pretty sick of it all." She looked up at the large boys as though they were particularly dim-witted.

"Yeah, don't be stupid," Draco said after a moment, and Leola smiled at him, very happy that he had agreed with her. "He's not a magical-circus attraction. We'll see him at the feast."

Draco surprised her again when they arrived at Hogsmeade station by leaving his henchmen behind and offering to help her with her carry-on; although when he criticized the very tall man named Hagrid (whom he'd told her was half giant) she did find herself a bit disappointed. Perhaps Hagrid shouldn't get drunk on school grounds and set a bad example for the students, but there was nothing wrong with living in a hut, or being different. He didn't seem so very savage to her. "I bet he gives fantastic piggyback rides, though," she thought aloud, hoping he hadn't heard her.

"Piggy-what?"

She felt her face heat up. "Umm, never mind."

The two climbed into a boat with another boy, Blaise Zabini, who spent the entire time complimenting Leola on various things, from her hair, to her eyes, to the way her nose scrunched up when she was embarrassed. This left Leola feeling very flustered.

Draco was very quiet, but she thought that had to do with the loud girl sitting across from him and trying desperately to get his attention.

When Leola saw the castle for the first time, its silhouette looking very dramatic against the back drop of the setting sky, she thought she might cry. This would be her home now. Not a house filled with too many children and not enough food, not a place to sleep and be away from as much as she could manage. It was more than she ever imagined. Leola was about to belong here and she could not stop the joyful smile from erupting.

So overwhelming were her thoughts that she reached over instinctively and grasped Draco's hand in hers. She squeezed. Draco squeezed back. They looked on in silence as the castle loomed ever closer.

Leola and Draco held hands until his name was called by the stern looking Professor McGonagall. She was so happy for him when he was almost immediately sorted into Slytherin, and she gave a loud cheer as the rest of the room clapped, hoping he could hear her above the din.

Her name was one of the very last names called. She stepped up to the hat and sat down nervously. Professor McGonagall had barely lowered the hat her head when she surprisingly, heard the hat speak to her. It said only, "It is very rare, Alesea Williamson, that a student so perfectly represents the characteristics of one house. GRYFFINDOR!"

She was sad to be separated from Draco. He was the first friend that she had made in the Wizarding World, and she had a feeling he would be disappointed that she was sorted into the house disparaged on the train. She hoped he would still want to be friends.

With her head held high, she joined her new housemates, and was soon listening to the different conversations, occasionally even joining in. She and a fluffy headed girl named Hermione found they had a lot in common, included the same favorite book. And Ron and his older brother's, Fred and George (whom she learned were Arthur's sons and happily told them all about how kind and wonderful a man she believed him to be) were eager to teach her and Harry, who was even more clueless than herself about the magical world, all about Quiddich and games such as exploding snap.

She walked with her fellow first years to their common room, and fell asleep soon after, surrounded by the color scarlet. She was utterly exhausted.

She could not wait for tomorrow.