Once term began, Emile found herself in the library more and more often. All of her friends except for Lee were on the Quidditch team, and Oliver was working them harder than ever. Emile had shown Lee her little spot in the library, and he sometimes joined her there to study or to write an essay he had been putting off.

One day at breakfast the twins were unusually silent as they chewed on their toast.

"What happened?" Emile asked and they looked up at her in shock. She let out a sigh of exasperation. "I'm not stupid, you know. I know something's up."

"Well everythings fine, except," Fred looked over at George.

"Snape's refereeing my next match," George mumbled, not holding eye contact with Emile.

Emile restrained from rolling her eyes. Snape would probably be nicer to the Weasley's if they payed attention in his class, not that they payed attention in many classes.

Just then Lee sat down next to them.

"Hey Lee." The twins brightened immediately. Emile frowned and left the table.

"See you after potions!" Lee called after her before turning to the redheads.

Emile grumbled as she left the great hall. Was she a bad friend? Is that why they'd been acting so weird around her? With a sigh she trudged up to the library for some last minute studying before Divination.

The days passed by slowly, yet before Emile knew it the big Quidditch game was upon them. Though the twins had been avoiding her recently, she still figured she ought to be there to support her house. She put on her skinny jeans and her honorary Weasley sweater, and after glancing out the window wrapped her gryffindor scarf around her neck.

As she headed down to the Quidditch field, bookbag slung over her shoulder, Emile noticed Neville ahead of her. A knot formed in her stomach as she caught sight of her half brother, he didn't even know who she was. She followed him down to the field, sitting further down the row from him, Ron, Hermione, who were anxiously whispering about something. A group of Slytherins sat behind them.

As the teams marched onto the field, Emile felt more uncomfortable. There were the twins, who had been behaving oddly towards her, along with her roommates, facing off against her cousin, who had been a complete arse these past few months except when he wasn't around his hufflepuff friends.

As the game began, a sudden commotion on Emile's right distracted her. One of the slytherins sitting behind the three first years kept insulting the lot of them. Before Emile could intervene Harry went into a steep dive in the field, and her attention was distracted once more. As Emile cheered the slytherin learned once more at Ron and he snapped, leaping over the benches on top of him. Neville quickly followed.

Emile tried to go over to stop the fight, but as she got up to moved everyone began screaming and clapping. Emile looked over at the pitch to see Harry holding up the snitch. He had caught it within the first five minutes of the game. That put Gryffindor in the lead for the house cup.

Emile sat down on top of the stands as everyone left to celebrate. Why didn't she feel happy? Her house was in the lead for the house cup, they had just won a record breaking Quidditch match, yet she felt empty inside.

Emile didn't know how long she stayed outside, but once the sun had almost set and she could no longer feel her hands she decided it was high time to head back inside. As she entered the common room, the first thing that caught her eye was the streamers. Fred and George must have gotten the house elves to bring up the party platter.

Emile kept her eyes down as she walked over to the stairs leading up to the girls dorms, and thankfully no one noticed her. As she changed into her pajamas without bothering to close the curtains, she felt nothing. As she climbed up into her bed at stared at the ceiling, she felt nothing. As she slowly and uneasily drifted off into sleep, she felt nothing.

That night Emile dreamed. At first she was in a yellow dress, floating in a lake black as stormclouds. She swam over to the shore and went up to a cottage in the woods to find her father inside, drunk and unconscious. Suddenly he sat up and stared at her, but he had no eyes. Just gaping black holes. Emile ran through the woods, calling for her mother as the bear chased after her. She jumped into the lake, swimming away as fast as she could. Then she fell. And then she screamed.

In the few weeks that followed Emile didn't talk to anyone. She began skipping meals, and she devoted all her time to the library. All the professors seemed to have a shared thought that exams were suddenly upon them, even though they were over ten weeks away. The amount of homework Emile had received in classes was overwhelming.

Lee had tried to get Emile to study with him in her hidden space several times, but Emile had simply smiled and said 'perhaps later.' Then she sat out by a table near Madam Pince where no one bothered her out of fear of the librarian.

One day, driven more by hunger than need of companionship, Emile attended dinner at the usual time. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, she sat reading at one end of the table, hardly paying attention to the chatter going on around her, yet fully conscious of all the looks people kept giving her.

Halfway through the meal she decided she had had enough. Stuffing her borrowed copy of Advanced Potion Making into her bookbag, Emile escaped the great hall and headed to the kitchen. Once she entered the room, she sat down in the corner behind some barrels of butterbeer and resumed her reading. Several house elves came up to her and asked is she needed anything, but Emile turned them all away.

"Mistress Emile." One of the elves sat down next to her.

"Hello Kringle, how are you?" Emile smiled slightly at the house elf next to her.

"I am well Miss," Kringle squeaked. "Mistress Emile seems lonely."

"I just want some solitude, Kringle." Emile looked over at her book once more.

"If solitude is what Mistress seeks, than solitude Mistress shall get." Kringle stood up and jumped up and down excitedly. "Follow me. Mistress Emile, follow me!"

Emile stood up and followed the house elf as they exited the kitchen. She led Emile up to the seventh floor, up to a blank wall.

"Mistress Emile must simply walk back and forth three times thinking about what you need." Kringle said before disapparating, leaving Emile in stunned silence. She stood in front of the wall, waiting for something to happen.

After a few minutes some very familiar sounding laughter rang throughout the hall, making Emile jump. She hurriedly put together a thought in her mind, running back and forth in front of the wall with her eyes closed.

I need somewhere I can hide from the Weasley's.

I need somewhere I can hide from the Weasley's.

I need somewhere I can hide from the Weasleys.

When she opened her eyes a small door had appeared in front of her, resembling that of a broom cupboard. As she crawled into the opening and slid behind a shelf of brooms Emile was astounded to find, a television. It was sitting amongst a pile of boxes and old cushions.

Emile sat down on one of the cushions and opened one of the nearest boxes. It was filled with a rather large variety of Disney movies. As Emile looked through the boxes she couldn't help but smile as she pulled out several of her favorite movies. The Little Mermaid, Robin Hood, The Aristocats, and a whole lot more.

But Emile's happiness was short lived, because a moment later the door opened and two red mops of hair ran in, gasping as they shut the door behind them.

"I don't remember this being on the map," George said as he looked around the cupboard.

"Who cares?" Fred backed towards the shelves Emile was sitting behind. "Come over here so Filche doesn't see us if he decides to check inside."

Emile ducked behind one of the boxes, curling up into a ball in a miserable attempt to hide herself. And apparently it worked, for a few minutes anyways. As the twins began fiddling with the muggle contraption that was sitting in the broom closet, they also began searching through the boxes. Fred was trying to figure out how the VCR worked as he threw the movies over the sides of the boxes, and Emile let out a small yelp as one hit her on the head.

The twins stared, jaws dropped as Emile sat up, rubbing the back of her head with one hand. She didn't look them in the eyes as she picked up one of the fallen cassette tapes, this one being the Aristocats, and opened its box. She turned the TV on and put the cassette tape into the VHS. The twins watched in silent amazement as the movie began.

Emile sat in silence a few feet away from them, humming along to the songs. Halfway through the movies George leaned over and dragged her closer to them. Emile gave a small smile but didn't look at them as George put a blanket around her shoulders.

As the movie credits ended Emile got up and left the broom cupboard. The twins didn't stop her from leaving, both of the redheads were sound asleep.

The next morning when Emile headed down to breakfast she was shocked at what was in front of her. In a course of one night Gryffindor house had lost a hundred and fifty points.

"What happened?" Angelina asked, walking up to Emile. Emile smiled at her roommate, she still considered herself to be on good terms with the members of her sleeping compartment.

"I have no idea, but I think I know someone who might."

As the Weasley twins entered the great hall Emile cornered them along with Angelina.

"What did you two do?" Angelina snarled as Emile glared at them next to her.

"Why ladies, we're flattered," Fred winked at the cross armed teens.

"But I'm afraid we simply cannot take credit for this." George put his arms around the girls and led them towards the Gryffindor table.

"If not you then who?" Emile asked, ducking away from George's arm.

George simply shrugged at Emile, smiling as they sat down. Lee walked over to where the third years were sitting, frowning.

"It was Potter," he announced, sitting down beside Angelina. "He got caught out after hours with Granger and Longbottom."

Emile choked on her pumpkin juice at the mention of Neville's name. As she sat coughing in her seat Lee hit her on the back in an attempt to help.

"I'm fine," she choked out after a moment, taking a tiny sip of her juice to prove it.

"I see why you would react that way, who would have thought Hermione Granger would lose us 50 points?" Angelina said as she took a bite out of her toast.

Emile nodded as she loaded her plate with bacon, silently laughing inside. They thought she was surprised at Hermione. She actually thought it was about time Hermione got into trouble, Ron and Harry had finally started rubbing off onto her.

She looked over at Neville, who was sitting awkwardly with the trio. He often got teased for being forgetful, and it was no doubt going to be worst than ever. As Emile chewed on her bacon she made a mental note to stop any teasing she heard about Neville in the upcoming week, after that it was exams week and he was on his own.

After a moment of silence Angelina grabbed Emile's arm.

"I just realized something," she stage whispered as Emile leaned closer to her. Emile regretted that decision immediately as Angelina yelled "You're eating with us!" into her ear.

"Blimey don't scare her off, she's just starting to come around." Fred laughed as he threw a bit of toast across the table at Angelina. She caught it in her mouth and winked at Fred, who rolled his eyes.

Emile grinned at Lee, who was red in the face next to her. She was being ridiculous, and she had missed her friends.