CHAPTER 3
As Tulip look out the boring window on the boring country house into the boring gardens she felt like she would never laugh again. It's been nearly two months now. She was going to start her third year at Hogwarts soon. Even though she would be leaving this awful place in two weeks, she felt like more lonely and sadder than ever. If she wasn't utterly isolated (if you didn't count her very pureblooded realitives and family friends) maybe then she could enjoy the country side.
Her grandfather owned a bit of land up north where they raised wand making trees for generations now. Since she was eleven, her mother insisted they come up north to take care of the land every summer. Trees were quite lovely if she were to be honest so was the gardens. That was it, that was the only good thing she could say about this place.
The land and the house was in a small wizarding village. Most residents were old and very old fashioned in other words predijuced. She honestly couldn't take another warning for to dress appropriately and not to cross her legs and not to speak back and don't get her started on their utterly ignorant ideas of muggleborns. There wasn't much children here and specially children in her mind set. She had a aunt and cousins but they were older. Still she at least like their company better but she couldn't stand their father. An abusive, ignorant pig that he is. She was a bit afraid of him too.
So she spend her days at home reading and drawing practicing her spells without wand of course. Her mother would burry her alive she caught her using a wand out of school being underage. Tulip thought that even if she used her wand against a vampire trying to kill her her mother would have a fit. At nights she read in secret the books Hermione send her. They weren't illegal but they were enough to make her mother punish her because the books were written by muggles.
As she was looking out the window she wondered when her next letter would come. She was writing to her friends but since she was up north the letters would take forever to arrive.
She like to believe she was known in her house mostly due to her brother being a prefect. She get along with mostly everyone but the friends that were close to her were a few. She was very close with Blaise and Tracey in her house. She would spend her time in common room with them. But her closest friend from the train ride had been Hermione. Despite being in Slytherin and their little dispute in the first year they were still as close as a button. Tulip didn't like her griffindoor friends though, that Potter and Weasley boy. She was annoyed by them, they always put Hermione into troubled situations and she kind of hated the fact that she had to share Hermione with them. Still she was best friends with Hermione and even though she loved Tracey, she would always share a deep bond with Hermione.
And there was Cedric. It was a funny story how they met. The first thing you learn as a Slytherin is that not everybody likes you in Hogwarts. Mostly they think you are a bad person so they treat you badly. Even if you are a first year and they are fifth.
Her brother warned her and kept close to her in her first weeks but Tulip was curious and independent. So at first chance she got she went on her way to explore the castle. She was looking to find a place that was secluded from everyone. While she was skipping along the halls she come across a couple kids from griffindor. They were older than her at least by 5 years. She didnt want any trouble so she try to quietly walk past them but they had other ideas. She suddenly felt a force hit her from her back and she met with the marble floor. Her hands and knees were aching from the impact and all her books and quils were scattered, drenched in her ink.
The boys were laughing and making fun of her. She turned to glare at them and yell at them but they were towering above her and seeing how big they are suddenly made her cower with fear. She tried to gather her stuff but the boys started to pick them up and then throw them away.
"Stop! Don't touch my stuff!" she yelled, finally finding her voice.
"Did you heard that Sammy, I think it was a fly buzzing" said the boy with blonde hair.
"Snake hissing would be more accurate" the boy in his right said looking tauntingly at her.
Tulip cringed at that and she was about to say something when she heard another voice behing her.
"Leave her alone!" said a boy coming towards them. He was wearing a hufflepuff uniform and he was also older than her but not as much as the Gryffindors. One of the boys look at him amused.
"What's it to you?" he said to the Hufflepuff.
The boy looked the others dead in the eye and said.
"Leave before I call Mcgonnagal and tell her how you were bullying a first year."
The boys paled at that and decided to back down with a last throw of her books they walked away.
She quietly started gathering her books. "Thank you" she said looking towards him. He had crouched down to help her. He looked up to see her eyes were shining with unshed tears.
"Those guys were jerks"
She quickly looked away. " Yeah, they were."
" I have ink on eveything" she clearing her voice.
" Oh, don't worry. I know a spell to help that " he said pulling out his wand. " Tergeo" he said pointing at the ink. All of the ink staining her belongings vanished.
She looked at it in awe " That was brilliant, thanks." She said to him.
"Your welcome ..., I'm Cedric."
"I'm Tulip." she said tucking everything back to her bag. " I didn't thought being Slythering would be this... hard"
" Oh, everyone isn't like that. Those guys were idiots believe me and you wouldn't want to hang out with idiots, would you?" he said smiling.
"No, I wouldn't" she smiled back. They had started to walk down the hall.
" I would like it more if people didn't look at me funny. Before Hogwarts I wanted to make friends from every house and now I feel like everyone acts as if I am their enemy."
" First year is always the hardest but I can see that being in Slytherin has its holdbacks. Don't let dunderheads like those boys to ruin your fun. And look at the bright side you already made a friend in Hufflepuff." he looked at her expectently as if waiting for her response.
She smiled with joy. "As my friend would you please show me towards which way the great hall was because I am definitely lost."
Cedric laughed at that and walked her to the great hall. That was the start of their friendship. It only grew more and more from that on.
Cedric was in Flitwick's music club and he convinced her to join. He was playing the trumpet and she had piano lesson when she was younger. She would spend her lonely time playing it when she was home, she wasn't brilliant on it but good enough. But he wasn't really interested in the club. He had discovered muggle records in Flitwick's music club and he introduced it to her. He was really happy that he finally found someone else to enjoy this music with. Appearently his other friends didn't like it very much. But she really loved it. She found it brilliant. So they spend a good amount of time in that music room.
She only knew the songs composed by wizards and witches before. So when Cedric showed her the records of Beethoven and Bach she was blown away. She had thought of piano a bit bore really. Playing the songs of Althea Finnick was only so much fun. But these muggle composers had such passion in their songs that even her wild imaginary couldn't match.
But both of them wanted to play the muggle guitar. When they had free time they would rush to the music room and meddle with the guitar. Their passion for muggle music only brought them closer. Cedric was her closest friend. Some people thought of them weird at first but then got used to seeing them together.
She hadn't heard from Cedric in 10 days and he was supposed to send her a article about a music band they both enjoyed. Of course she hid all things muggle related hidden from her family. They were carefully hidden between her underwear. She couldn't imagine what her mother would do if she found out.
She was expecting a letter from Hermione too. She was in France. Oh, how she wished to be in France now. Why couldn't her family go to France in the summers. With a huff she picked up the book from her table. She turned away from the window to read. Just as she become lost in the words, little brown spot in the sky came to view.
I moved the timeline foward. I tried to paint the picture of her life a little. Hope you like it.
