The morning of September first dawned bright and found me already awake. I had packed my trunk the night before with my new textbooks, uniforms and casual clothes, and all of the various things I'd need throughout the new school year. I got dressed and dragged my trunk to the front door of the house, pausing for a moment.

Mum was sleeping like a rock. She technically had the day off of work today, but I had heard her on the phone last night making plans about spending the day with some guy she met through her job. I stood frozen by the door for a minute or two, not sure if I should wake her up to say goodbye.

There was a honk from outside; the taxi I had reserved for this morning was here. I walked out of the house with my trunk without looking back.

I sat impatiently on the train going south towards Kings Cross. I would definitely make it to the train station on time, as long as nothing bad happened on this train ride. My leg was bouncing the entire time as I shared the train with business men and hungover people trying to make it home. I was the one who looked most eager to get anywhere. When the train finally did pull into Kings Cross, I nearly bowled over one thin and tall man in a patchy brown jacket in my rush to get to platform nine and three quarters.

"Sorry!" I called over my shoulder.

The man looked at me with amusement before smiling. "Not to worry. Go on and get where you're going." He waved me onwards, and I didn't waste any time listening to him and hurrying over to the platform.

The moment the coast was clear, I charged at the barricade and wound up standing on the platform right in front of the scarlet train that would take me to Hogwarts. I smiled widely at the sight of it, feeling that weight being lifted from my shoulders again.

There weren't a lot of people milling about, as it was still an hour left until the train took off. I got my trunk on the train and hurried on board to get dressed into school robes and wait for the train to take off.

It wasn't long for the platform to get crowded, but I stayed in my compartment and just looked out of the window at everyone getting ready. I spotted some people in my year walking around before coming on the train, and I eagerly waited to see Neville again.

When Pansy came into my view instead, I swallowed hard and retreated from the window for a lone moment until I deemed it safe to look outside again. I didn't want to confront Pansy just yet. There'd be plenty of time to do that during the welcome back feast. An uncomfortable knot formed in my stomach when I realized that I'd have to sit with the other Slytherins during the welcome back feast. I had spent most of the end of last year either petrified or eating down in the kitchens.

The compartment door opened and I flinched slightly before realizing that Neville was standing in the doorway. I shot up and exclaimed, "Neville!"

"Heather!" Neville exclaimed right back. He made a move to hug me but stopped himself before he actually tried. Neville had changed over the summer, having grown maybe another foot taller over the last couple of months. But he still had the same bright smile and I could hear Trevor croaking from his pocket.

"How was your summer?" I asked. "How're the bowtruckles?"

Neville beamed. "Oh they're great! The sprouts were pretty long when I left, and they'll be budding when I get back after this year."

"Your uncle will be watching over them?" I asked, knowing how Neville's uncle was the one who gave him the bowtruckle seeds in the first place.

Neville nodded. "Hopefully he does a good job. I left him a note with a schedule on it of when they should receive sun and what time they should be watered."

I shook my head slightly. "That seems like a lot of work for plants."

"The best plants are a lot of work." Neville replied, moving farther into the compartment. I sat down and he took the spot across from me, removing Trevor from his pocket and stroking the toad's head.

The compartment door opened again and it took me two minutes to recognize Ginny Weasley, a small girl with ginger hair and bright amber eyes. She started to greet Neville before catching sight of me, her eyes instantly narrowing the moment she saw my Slytherin robes.

Neville noticed. "Ginny, this is Heather. She's my friend. Heather, this is Ginny Weasley. She's going into her second year this year. What do you need, Ginny?"

Ginny looked back to Neville. "I was wondering if I could sit in here with you. The train is really full."

"Sure thing, Ginny." Neville replied, gesturing to the empty seats in our compartment. Ginny took the one beside Neville, and she offered me a small smile.

"Nice to meet you, Heather." Ginny said.

I smiled back at her. "Nice to meet you too, Ginny. You excited for the new year?"

Ginny nodded enthusiastically. "Anything will be better than last year."

The train had just begun moving, taking us back north towards Hogwarts. People were still walking around and trying to find seats. I caught sight of Daphne Greengrass passing by with a first year girl. But my fellow Slytherin glared hard at me and ushered the first year away, turning her nose up at me. I sighed; it seemed like the hostility wasn't going away anytime soon.

At some point, a second year girl with dirty blond hair and radish looking earrings walked past and looked in. Ginny pretended not to notice her until the girl walked away. I glanced back to Ginny and asked, "Who was she?"

"That's Luna Lovegood." Ginny said, her amber eyes still on the glass door. "She's a Ravenclaw in my year. She's weird."

Neville and I exchanged looks before turning back to Ginny. "How's she weird?" Neville asked.

Ginny leaned forward, finally looking away from the door. "Her father runs the Quibbler, and you should hear the way she talks about some magical creatures-things I've never even heard of! One time, Toby Lennox, another Ravenclaw, tried telling her that those creatures didn't exist." She broke off and giggled slightly. "That was a fun day in Charms class."

I had no idea what the Quibbler was, and I hadn't heard this girl talk about nonsensical magical creatures, but I immediately felt a kind of pity and understanding for this Luna Lovegood. I got up from my seat and peeked out of the compartment door, spying Luna Lovegood at the end of the train car. Ginny and Neville were both watching me closely and I sighed. "Ginny, does she have friends?"

Ginny frowned and looked to think about it for a long moment before shrugging. "I don't think so. I never see her sitting with anyone in class."

With that, I walked out of the compartment and hurried over to where Luna was standing, peering into other compartments probably looking for a place to sit. "Hi!" I said, maybe a bit too cheerfully. "Do you want to come sit with us?"

Luna Lovegood blinked her wide eyes and me and frowned. "Are you making fun of me?" She asked in a matter of fact, singsong like voice.

I flinched, taken aback by her bluntness. "Of course not. It's just that, I'd want someone to be kind to me if I was alone on the train."

Luna's smile crept slowly across her face and she straightened slightly. "Thank you."

I led Luna back to the compartment and let her inside. "Luna's going to sit with us." I said bluntly.

Neville quickly caught Trevor as the toad tried to escape. "Hi there, Luna. Nice to meet you. I'm Neville Longbottom."

"Hello, Neville." Luna said politely. "Hello, Ginny."

Ginny smiled shyly at Luna, looking embarrassed about her earlier comments even though there was no way Luna could have heard. I took my earlier seat and Luna sat down beside me. After a moment of no one saying anything, I started a game of Exploding Snap and the awkwardness slowly dissolved as Ginny and Luna started betting. When the trolley witch came by, Neville and Luna both bought large piles of candy and those were added to the betting piles. Outside the window, the rain was pouring and the glass was fogging up, showing how cold it was outside compared to the warmth inside the train.

"I really want the Harpies to win," Ginny was saying. Luna was leaning forward and hanging on every word as the Weasley girl explained her views on the Quidditch season. "But Joan Oliver twisted her shoulder on the last match of the season so hopefully she'll be able to come back in time."

Neville and I had our Potions textbooks opened in front of us, and we were going over the potions our class would be learning this year. "You see," I turned the book to face him and pointed to the picture of ground up nightshade. "This is going to activate the other ingredients and thicken the potion."

"Thickness is good in this situation?" Neville asked, glancing at me from over the book.

"Only for a while." I explained. "Once it's thick, it says to leave it chilled for forty eight hours. So I assume we'll start it one day and come back to our potions the next class time."

Neville nodded and scribbled a note down in his open notebook. "This year will be so much easier with you as my Potions partner."

I blinked and looked up, slightly surprised. Neville looked at me and his face turned bright pink. "Oh! I just assumed that since we're friends and Slytherin has been, well…" He drifted off.

I shook myself and smiled at Neville. "No, you're completely right, Neville. I guess I hadn't thought about who my Potions partner would be now. I don't see why we can't be paired up? Who was your partner last year?"

Neville shrugged. "Sometimes I was paired with Hermione. Other times Seamus and Dean. It really depended."

"Well, you've got me now." I said firmly. "To hell with Pansy." Even though the words made Neville chuckle lighty, it didn't bring any kind of amusement to my face. There was still a part of me that missed my first friend.

The train jered wildly and the brakes squealed as the train skidded to a stop. "What the hell?" I asked, my Potions book flying from my hands and falling hard onto the floor.

"We can't be there yet." Luna pointed out, her voice barely changing in surprise.

Ginny looked around and got up to stare out of the compartment. "I should find my brothers. Just in case something-" She cut herself off, an uneasy look clouding her face. Neville got up too.

"I'll help you look." He volunteered. "We'll be right back." Neville and Ginny left. Luna closed the compartment door after them and stared out through the glass for a long moment. I peered out of the train window, rubbing away at the fog clogging up the view.

"There's something moving out there," I whispered. There was a second jerk of the train and the lights of the entire car flickered and went out, plunging us into darkness. "Luna." I hissed.

Luna was frozen at the compartment door, her breathing coming in little gasps of terror. I looked past her as an icy chill fell over me like a heavy weighted blanket. Past Luna was a massively tall hooded figure, peering into the compartment back at us.

It felt like a weight was nesting in my gut as the cold sunk deep into my bones. The feeling of clawing isolation hung around my neck and I wanted to fall to my knees and weep. I felt like I was trapped back in that house in Newmarket, alone and aching for companionship, for Mum to finally come home and act like a true mother-

Luna was shivering so much I could see it. I saw tears streaming down her face as she stared unblinkingly up at the hooded creature, which continued to hover at our compartment door and stared down at us. Luna was whimpering now.

I shakingly got to my feet and gently grabbed Luna by the elbow, pulling her away from the compartment door and towards the relative safety of the seat by the window. When Luna was sitting, I faced the creature and I straightened under the crushing weight of loneliness.

"Get out." I whispered, not able to raise my voice past that. "Leave us alone."

The creature seemed to stare down at us for a moment before finally floating away, moving onto the next compartment. It took a long time, but gradually the warmth returned to the compartment and the weight that rested on my shoulders was slowly lifted and gone. I slumped into the seat beside Luna, where silent tears were still falling from her eyes.

"Are you okay?" I asked quietly.

Luna looked at me and nodded. "I think so. I felt like...like I'd never be cheerful again. It reminded me of my-" She cut herself off as fresh tears came into her eyes. I reached into my bag and pulled out a handkerchief and handed it to her. She wiped her eyes and the lights flickered back on, telling me that the creature was gone.

"What was that?" I asked, getting up and peering down the compartment. Luna didn't answer and kept batting at her eyes and keeping her breathing even. I only moved away from the compartment when I spotted Ginny and Neville running back. I opened the door for them and they rushed into the compartment as the train jerked back to life and started moving again.

"Did you see the dementor?" Ginny asked immediately.

"Is that what that was?" I asked, closing the door as they took their seats again. "What's a dementor?"

Ginny launched into a hurried explanation about the creatures that made you feel like no happiness could exist. I remembered the intense feelings of isolation, feeling like I was back in Newmarket, and a quick stab of guilt struck me for feeling that way about the house I shared with my mother.

It was very tense on the rest of the ride to Hogwarts, and it wasn't until we got off the train and started towards the empty carriages that Neville and Ginny finally spoke about where they went and what they saw.

"We found Ron and his friends." Ginny explained as we waited for a carriage. "We got there just as the lights went out."

"The dementor was right behind us." Neville picked up. "It came in after us and it nearly made me faint. Made Harry faint!"

"Potter fainted?" I asked, surprised by that. Neville nodded and before he could continue on, there was a sudden sharp push from behind and I was knocked into Neville hard as Draco Malfoy and Crabbe and Goyle shoved their way past me.

"Move, Mudblood." Draco snarled at me from over his shoulder. I blinked at his back and sighed as Neville helped me regain my balance.

"I may have to take more meals down in the kitchens than expected." I said grimly. Neville snorted in dark amusement and we climbed into the next carriage with Ginny and Luna.