Luna made her way along the corridor, humming to herself, her trunk (who she fondly called Rupert) wandering along behind her, apparently of its own will. She stopped just beside a window ledge and a moment later all that could be seen of Luna Lovegood was a large mound behind the curtain.
A little while later the curtain froze when three Slytherins entered the room and started to talk to each other in low voices.
"January 4th… I didn't think it would be so soon." Said the first, Morgan.
"You're not supposed to think about it at all, are you? The less you think, the easier it will be." Replied the second.
"Still – I didn't realise – I don't think I'm ready – "
"Don't think about it then," Broke in the third in a sensible voice, "just come down with us at 16:30, do what you have to and before you know it we're back at Hogwarts, innocent as a newly shelled pea."
"A newly shelled pea?"
"The simile doesn't matter." Continued the third one a little quickly, "It's the point I'm trying to get into your thick skull that counts."
"Here! Who are you trying to call thick?" Cried out the first.
"You."
"Oh."
"Glad you've understood so easily. Well, now we've got that sorted, we'd better get back to our compartment before someone misses us."
The curtain stirred a little and a little while later Luna stepped out, yawned, and made her way dreamily back to the compartment, followed by the obedient Rupert.
Dumbledore sat down and surveyed his student population with a twinkle in his eye. It was all very busy at the moment, with all the students hurriedly conveying to each other the stories of their holidays.
Harry, of course, was sat at the Gryffindor table, the slightly depressed look a permanent feature of his face. The unfortunately named Peter Radish, over in Hufflepuff, was yet again experimenting with making his potatoes dance, and only succeeding in yet again making them kick all the other occupants of the table. Although, he reflected, this could of course be seen as quite a success. Indeed, if one made the potatoes slightly bigger, it was guaranteed to have the element of surprise against Death Eaters when their Sunday roast suddenly began attacking them.
He looked over towards the Ravenclaw table, and his eyes widened slightly as they caught sight of Luna Lovegood's radish earrings, which were currently flashing a rather vulgar yellow, rather like an aeroplane coming to land.
She was apparently completely unaware of the attention these were causing, and was dreamily spooning the contents of a jar of peanut butter into her mouth, and smiling contentedly.
Suddenly she put down her now empty jar of peanut butter, and looked around. A house elf scurried up to her at once, bowed deeply, and handed her three extra jars. This caused a shocked whisper around the Hall, and even the Slytherin table looked vaguely impressed as she dipped into her second jar without even looking up.
Dumbledore smiled heartily. She was very good at her job.