The force of the Portkey knocked Hannah to her knees. When the rush of colour finally subsided, Hannah looked up to find a tall, extremely pretty girl with purple hair down to her waist offering her a hand up.
"Hi. I'm Serena Selena Serafina Severusina Salazarina Saltinia Seabreezeina Startwinklina Serendipity Serenity Selenity Senility Snape-Slytherin. You must be the girl from Hogwarts," the purple-haired girl said, helping Hannah to her feet.
"Er, yes. I'm Hannah. Hannah Abbott."
"What's your full name?" Serena asked, as though Hannah had violated some unspoken social contract that one must introduce one's self with any and all middle names.
"Well, my middle name's Anne." Serena tutted as if this were a bad thing, not to have a few dozen middle names to spare. Hannah privately felt that even with her single middle name, the number of middle names in the room per person was still mildly ridiculous.
"I'm supposed to take you on a tour of campus. School hasn't started yet, so you can get settled before you have to start classes." Hannah finally had a chance to look around.
"Why are we in a clothes shop?"
Serena surveyed Hannah's robes with distaste. "Well, we can't let you go to classes looking like that, can we? You look like a nun! It violates our dress code to have so little skin showing." Serena managed to say this in a way that still endeared her to any and all passers-by.
"What's your favourite colour?" Serena asked mildly, thumbing through the racks of clothing.
"Er, yellow, I guess."
Serena pulled out a yellow sequined tube top. "How's this?"
Hannah thought it was in rather poor taste, and doubted it would suit her figure. "I don't think it would look very good on me."
"Nonsense."
Hannah soon found herself shoved into a dressing room with lots of halter tops and skirts that would make very nice belts. She had no idea how she'd gotten there. She tried them on, but agreed with her previous assessment that these outfits didn't suit her. She felt very self-conscious.
Serena knocked on the door to the dressing room. "Hey, come out here and let me see that outfit!"
"Er…I don't really like it."
"We've got to get going, and I've already paid for that with some gold from your trunk, so hurry up and get out here." Hannah felt very annoyed that Serena had bought this without asking her, but reluctantly opened the door.
"You look great," Serena said. She gazed at herself in the mirror. "Eww, I'm so fat, though. I need to lose some weight."
This was patently ridiculous, and Hannah told her so. If Serena thought herself fat, Hannah thought that she might as well get a job at Seaworld grabbing fish from trainers' hands.
"Oh, you're so nice, Hannah."
Serena quickly took Hannah through the rest of the shops and got her some makeup, a CD player, and some various magical knickknacks that Hannah couldn't discern the purpose of. "This mall is owned by the school. We can come back later if you like, but we're just getting you the bare-bones essentials tonight," Serena told her.
Hannah yawned. The time difference was making her feel completely exhausted. "Can you just show me to the dormitory? I'm really tired."
"All right," Serena said. "You have all the same classes with me, so you won't get too lost if we put off the grand tour." She led her away from the mall, across a field, and into a large, cathedral-like building. Hannah struggled to keep her eyes open up a few flights of stairs and down a few corridors, when finally they arrived at the dormitory and Serena unlocked the door.
The room's pink walls were plastered with posters of boys from Hogwarts. It was kind of creepy. Most seemed to feature Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, or Draco Malfoy. She did spot one of Blaise Zabini—he looked really girly in that picture, though. There were sparkly pink chairs next to a matching couch, and doors leading to individual bedrooms. Three girls were gathered around a big-screen TV watching something on it.
"Girls, this is Hannah Anne Abbott. She's from Hogwarts," Serena said.
"Wow, you're from Hogwarts?" a tall girl with long black hair asked, dreamily. "So, who are you eternally destined for: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, or Draco Malfoy?"
"Eternally destined for?" Hannah repeated blankly. "Well, Harry and Ron are all right and everything, but Malfoy's a Death Eater in training. I've been seeing Ernie Macmillan a bit, off and on."
"Never heard of him. I'm eternally destined for Harry, myself. I can see souls, you know," said the black-haired girl. "Plus, I'm totally his dead godfather's daughter. I mean, what says love like being the only child of your dead godfather who he conveniently forgot to mention?"
It struck Hannah as odd that this girl was referring to her father in such a manner, but she didn't say anything. Perhaps this was the girl's way of dealing with grief. "I always thought compatibility, common interests, and meaningful conversations said love, personally," she said quietly.
The black-haired girl plowed on anyway. "Plus, my name would be so cool: Persephone Polyphemia Pretty Pony Princess Pink Pyrex Plastic Pot Calling The Kettle Black-Potter. And we both have green eyes! It's totally fate. I mean, half the girls in here think they're eternally destined for Harry Potter, but he's mine. I mean, it's obvious!"
"As long as you leave Draco for me, I'm fine," said a red-haired girl who hadn't looked up from the television.
"Oh, come on Melina, stop staring at the video from Draco's bedroom and introduce yourself to Hannah," said Serena. "And he's mine anyway, so you might as well forget it."
"I'm Melina Melissa Marissa Medusa Methuselah Magenta Maventa Malevolenta McMuffin-McClaggan-McGonagall. Draco's One True Love," the redhead told her.
"Only Draco doesn't appear to know it, does he?" asked Serena nastily. Hannah finally looked at the screen. It was actually Malfoy, and he appeared to be in the early stages of being seduced by that girl who'd stolen her prefect spot.
"You mean, you actually watch people at Hogwarts on TV? How?" Hannah asked, bewildered.
"Well, mostly only Draco. Before our roommate took your spot at Hogwarts, there were three of us arguing over who was eternally destined for him. We wanted to make sure at least one of us got him. Since she got him, I'm a bit interested in Blaise. Serena won't give up on him, though," said Melina.
"That's really…creepy," Hannah replied. She glanced at the TV again. The scene was getting a bit close to pornographic. "Can we turn that off?"
"If you say so," said Serena. She picked up a pink sparkly remote and turned off the TV.
Hannah paused, hoping that she'd get a chance to get a quick nap now.
"I get Ron," said the brunette girl sitting on the armrest of the large pink couch. "But almost everybody who's nice thinks they get Ron if they don't get Harry, so I'm not holding out too much hope. I'm Princess Gretchen Gretta Gertrude Grout Glow-in-the-Dark Glitterglue Gray Green Girdle Riddle, by the way."
Hannah was quite sure by this point that there was a minimum middle name requirement to get into this school, which, with her lonely little Anne lurking between names, she could never dare dream to fulfil. Not that she really cared one way or another, mind. It was just one of those weird American things, she guessed. "You're a princess? Of where?" she asked curiously. She wasn't aware of many American princesses.
"Oh, she's the heiress to the Riddle estate, Princess of Darkness, Voldemort's daughter and all that. Doesn't want it, either, the lucky witch. What I wouldn't give to have all that stuff to give up and be redeemed for so I could get a hot Gryffindor," said Serena. This was all said with the casual air of one envying another's socks.
"So, are you a Slytherin or a Gryffindor, Hannah?" asked Persephone, before Hannah could comment on the fact that a person in the room had just been introduced as the daughter of a genocidal lunatic.
"I'm a Hufflepuff, actually."
"A Huffywhatsit now?" asked Gretchen.
"A Hufflepuff—Helga Hufflepuff's house."
"You've got to be making that up! Hufflypuff! Sounds like an H.R. Puffinstuf show! And I think we'd know if there were houses other than Gryffindor and Slytherin!" said Melina.
Hannah rolled her eyes. "I know Hufflepuff doesn't get much glory, but if you know so much about Hogwarts, where do you think Cedric Diggory was from? And there's Ravenclaw, too—what about Cho Chang, if you're so interested in Harry Potter's love life?"
"Cho? We hate her, the stupid witch!" said Melina vehemently.
"Yeah! She went on a date with Harry and all she did was cry about that stupid Cedric guy!" Serena added, venomous.
"I would never cry on a date with Harry!" said Persephone, "Except, you know, when I'm thanking the Nondenominational Deity that I got to go out with him. But even then, I'd only cry in the bathroom. And I'd make sure to use clear mascara, so he wouldn't know I'd been crying. I wouldn't want Harry thinking I was the sort of girl who'd go cry on him."
"The poor girl did lose her first love less than a year ago, and Harry was the last person to see him. That can't have been easy on her." Hannah felt an intense surge of pity for Cho. They'd never really talked outside of the DA, but anyone could see what a hard time she'd had.
"I never thought about it that way," said Gretchen timidly. "Maybe Hannah's right."
Hannah felt gratified that the other girl agreed with her. She'd rather hoped to make the others feel bad about insulting Cho, but all they could seem to do was glare at Gretchen.
"Whatever. She's still a bitch," Persephone said.
Hannah was feeling distinctly uncomfortable. "I'm a little tired from the long trip; which room is mine?"
Serena pointed to the door on the far left of the room. "That one. Oh, by the way, remind me to give you the form for the Columbus Day Ball when you wake up," she said.
"Columbus Day Ball?"
"Oh, it's great," Melina said, "We sign up for mystery dates from the Salem Wizards' Institute, and have a great dance."
Hannah stifled a yawn. "Sounds fun. Good night."
She walked into her room. It was decorated in much the same style as the living room. Hannah wasn't very fond of the colour pink, and was quite sure she'd be sick of the pink canopy and satin sheets very soon. However, she found that they were very comfortable, and fell asleep quickly.