Silver Eyes
By: FreakyHotGeek
Note: Here we go, chappie 3. Sorry it took me so long!
Disclaimer: Still not owning Harry Potter, sadly. Oh well.
Chapter 3
Into the Great Hall
I enter the Great Hall, feeling alone despite the fact that I am surrounded by people. That is probably because, while they are all talking amongst themselves, they don't try to talk to me. I figure it must be a vibe I send out now… that "stay away" vibe.
The Hall is filling up now, everyone chattering away in anticipation of the sorting. I find a spot that isn't occupied and sit down, surveying the area.
Harry Potter was, for once, not with his friends, his many, many friends. I figure he must be off charming ladies or whatever it is that the famous do. He does not interest me. His friends I find more worth my time.
Among them, Ron Weasley, who still remains a mystery, and Hermione Granger, our resident know it all. In fact, they make a strange trio… Harry Potter, the famous boy, Hermione, infamously bossy and smart, and Ron Weasley, the poor one, just another Weasley.
I wonder suddenly what my own title in society is. Everyone has them, even people like me. I shudder to think what it might be. Probably something related to the many rumors, that I've got a heart of ice, that I'm the daughter of an Unspeakable. That's me… Unspeakable, and ice. At least, that's me to the rest of the world.
I chance a glance over at the Slytherin table. I see Blaise, smiling and laughing with some friends who were not with us on the train. He is sitting, naturally, beside Draco, who is next to his girlfriend, Pansy. It makes me feel terribly alone to see that even someone like Draco, who is cruel to everyone around him, has more friends than I do.
"I can't believe the sorting is taking so long to start," someone says. I turn and look, seeing a younger Gryffindor.
"It is… strange," I force myself to say. She jumps, as if it hadn't occurred to her I would say anything. She looks at her friend, then back at me.
"Oh, here they come now," she tells me, jerking her head towards the door and scooting away.
Even when I try, I fail.
But she's right, it isn't just an excuse to look away. The first years are filing in through the door, looking as nervous as I myself remember feeling that day, that moment.
"It's going to be fine," I'd like to tell them. "It will all be fine."
But if someone had said that to me… I wouldn't have believed them. And I'd have been right. The way things were for me now were not what I would consider fine. So how could I know any of these first years would be fine?
The sorting hat begins the sorting with another song, another warning. I sigh. Even the dangers we are all facing now, against Voldemort, who's name I have come not to fear, do not seem to apply to me. What would the "Dark Lord" want with a girl like me? No, from him I am safe. If the school was raided, his enemies killed, he would leave me where I lay, the world seeming no more empty then than it did when I went to bed.
The food is the thing I was looking forward to. No socializing for me. Just sit, eat, listen, and go to bed. Not the most active life in the world, but it works.
Dumbledore does a little speech, but I'm not paying attention any more. I just want this night to be over, want to be in bed.
At some point, Harry Potter slips back into the room, his face a mess. I wonder what has transpired, and wonder it has anything to do with the brief interval when I'd left Draco and Blaise's compartment and when I'd returned. I don't pay attention for long, however, as it could really interest me less.
The plates fill up with food; mounds and mounds of every food you could ever imagine. I smile a little bit, just ever so slightly, when a few boys attack it as if they've never seen food before in their lives.
I try and wait until most everyone has already grabbed what they want. After all, an incident of clanging hands against someone else is too terrible to imagine. Eventually I give in and reach forward towards a plate of chicken legs. Just as I'd predicted, my hand brushed on someone else's. I look up into Ron Weasley's face. I can tell already he's a bit caught in my silver eyes. I, too, am trapped in the gaze.
"Oh… sorry…" he mumbles, his voice sounded quite unlike I recall it being. I wonder why this always happens, what's so strange about my eyes.
"It's okay," I respond, breaking the gaze and sighing as he shakes his head a bit and looks away, as if spooked. I sigh. I really don't try to capture people in my eyes, but it seems to always happen.
I keep my head down the rest of the meal, sad that this year seems to be going the same as every other year.
The feast ends, I load up on chocolate during dessert. I am, like many girls, mad for chocolate.
A bit tired, and very full, I stand up with everyone else, though my feeling of being an outsider has intensified, when I'd thought it impossible to do so.
I'd nearly made it out of the Great Hall without incident when I, naturally, trip over my own robe. It's a lot like me to be so clumsy, so I'm not actually very surprised. Just embarrassed.
I jump to my feet, but it's not quick enough to avoid being in the way. Stumbling a little, I reach out, hoping to grab at the wall, only a few feet away. Instead, I grab onto something… different.
"Get off me, you slime," Draco sneers. I gulp and draw my hand away very, very slowly.
"I'm… er.. .I'm sorry," I say, frightened by the look of murder in his eyes.
"What gives a Gryffindor like you the right to grab me?" he asks, looking down at me, because I've forgotten to stand. I jump up at once.
"I didn't mean to," I mutter unhappily. "I… er… just I…"
"Oh for heaven's sake, Malfoy, it's the first day," Blaise says. "Let off them a bit? The torment can always begin tomorrow." He says this as if he intends to torment me later, but he's smiling at me.
"Oh all right, but only because she's not worth it."
And just like that, they sulk off, and it occurs to me to wonder if Blaise Zabini just rescued me from Draco Malfoy.
End note: Well well well… what do we think of this chapter? Review? –puppy dog eyes-