She clutches Sally-Anne's nervous letters in her fist as she enters the compartment - Sally-Anne and Susan had never really previously spoke, but Susan has found her letters oddly comforting over the summer. She has never pegged Sally-Anne Perkins as the frightened type, but each of her letters became increasingly more afraid as the summer went on.
My mother gets the Daily Prophet, and listens to everything it says. She isn't sure she believes all this hype, Susan, but she didn't see Cedric's body. She doesn't worry when she goes out of the house, and I know she isn't prepared... it makes me think something's going to happen to her, Susan, and I just don't know what to do...
On the train, Sally-Anne doesn't look at her as they pass in the corridor. That's fine with Susan. She can understand someone being embarrassed at all the nervous, frightened writings they send a nearly perfect stranger. Still, Susan cannot help but feel a bit stung as Sally-Anne gives her older, Ravenclaw boyfriend a kiss - Susan doesn't think she would have told him all those things, and still he is the one she is going to...
But still, Susan and Sally-Anne were never friends. Letters can't change that, she supposes...
Terry looks relieved when she gets to the compartment - Hannah and Ernie are off in the prefects compartment, and so is Anthony Goldstein, and Michael Corner is apparently off with his girlfriend - Ron Weasley's little sister. Terry is alone.
He politely invites Susan to play chess with him, and Susan accepts. She's still awful at it, but she never minds playing with Terry.
"Susan," Terry says after a long and pleasant silence. He is unsure of himself. Terry is never sure what lines he is crossing. "Do you really believe all those things that Harry Potter's said?"
"Yes," replies Susan calmly, moving her knight to take his bishop, "I do. Don't you?"
"I..." He stares at her a moment, but she won't look at him. "I mean.. the Prophet's always saying that there's no merit to the story, and... I don't mean to upset you, but... it does seem slightly preposterous..."
"Harry wouldn't lie about something like that," says Susan. Terry looks rather unconvinced.
"I don't know... Michael says he doesn't believe a word of it, even though Ginny insists Harry wouldn't lie, and-"
"I've never been able to figure out why you put so much stock into what Michael Corner thinks, Terry," Susan says, unable to keep a rather scolding tone out of her voice. Terry looks shamefaced.
"It's just... you trust Harry with your life and you've never even spoken to him... It doesn't seem quite... logical..."
Hannah, Ernie, and Justin enter the compartment at that moment, and Susan doesn't feel like playing chess anymore.
Susan slowly walks the steps up to her dormitory, and when she closes the door behind her, immediately proceeds to hit her head repeatedly against it. She cannot believe that her first conversation with Harry Potter is about his Patronus.
Hannah tells her that it's a good start, at least now he knows her name, but Susan can't help but think that Harry only knows her as Amelia Bones's neice...
And she saw the way he stared at Cho Chang, who was Cedric's before, but isn't now, and from the way she stared back, Susan thinks Harry could have her if he wanted...
She hopes that Harry doesn't see that, and won't do anything about it, and that Harry will talk to her more now that he knows her name.
Susan lives for Dumbledore's Army meetings. The Room of Requirement is the only place she can get Harry to notice her. She has never hated Hogwarts before, but now that Umbridge is here, she cannot see herself here anymore. This is not where she belongs.
She sees the words on Harry's hand when he helps her with her Stunning Spell, and hates Dolores Umbridge and needs the DA even more.
She has never been able to defend herself before. She feels powerful, like she did when Zacharias kissed her. Zacharias doesn't talk to her anymore. She isn't sure he minds, either, the way he always questions Harry.
She sees him help Cho Chang every lesson and it makes her stomach turn. After the holidays, she hears they are together from Luna Lovegood, who is able somehow to say it as though it's not the worst thing in history. Still, she can't decide whether she's more upset or happy about it. After all, he seems quite happy, and it is impossible for her to begrudge him that. She is too dedicated to his smile.
After the breakout from Azkaban, Ernie, Hannah, and Justin look at her strangely a lot, as if she's going to fall off the table and break. Many people question her about her uncle, aunt, and cousins who were killed, and she is glad she can't really give them any information. Her father doesn't like to talk about his brother, and Susan never met them. Aunt Amelia sometimes mentions Uncle Edgar, but she is soon silenced by Susan's mother, who knows how much it tortures Susan's father.
Susan finds she doesn't much like to talk about dead relatives and the people who killed them. She tells Harry she knows what it's like to be him, but doesn't think he realizes how much she means it.
Susan helps to distrubute copies of Harry's article in The Quibbler disguised as pamphlets for the Gobstone Club. Terry helps her. As they hand out the pamphlets, Terry turns to her and grins. "You know," he says, "I don't think Harry even knows how much support he has."
The thought makes Susan smile and hurt at the same time.
They are practicing Patronuses the day everything ends. Susan watches her hummingbird flit around the room. Ernie's is a small elephant who is playing with Hannah's porcupine. Terry (who was one of the first to get his Patronus - a squirrel) is helping Justin with his. It forms in a moment into a dog of some sort - Terry proudly identifies it as a dingo.
Michael wonders as his fox Patronus dances around his feet, how a squirrel is supposed to protect someone. Terry looks sheepish. Susan makes her hummingbird peck at the fox's eyes.
Then it is all ruined by that stupid Ravenclaw girl, Cho's friend, who tells Umbridge what they're doing. They don't meet anymore.
Susan sees Harry and Cho argue in the corridor, and can't help but beam all the way to her next class.
Susan talks to Professor Sprout about her career. There isn't much to say. Susan still has no idea what she is to do for the rest of her life. Sprout suggests something with Herbology because "I've seen the way you worked with the Mandrake's three years ago, and they are hard to deal with." Susan thanks her, and leaves the meeting more worried about the future than when she entered.
Hannah is stressed because of O.W.L.'s, Ernie is obnoxious because of them, and they make Justin faint. Terry, who has never seemed flustered about anything academic, helps Susan study in the library. She doesn't know what she's going to do.
After the examinations, Susan and her friends lay outside under the trees, cloaks off, hair down, wands relaxed by their sides. Justin and Anthony Goldstein begin to play catch lazily with acorns laying under the tree. Hannah and Ernie whisper to each other. Terry reads. Susan stares at the clouds and wonders what she's going to do with her life.
They learn about the battle at the Ministry the day after it happens. Susan feels awful. She wasn't there. She could have helped. She thinks of what could have happened to Harry and it makes her sick.
The Ministry admits what Harry's been saying all along is true. The wizarding world is in panic. Susan's mother writes her twice a day. Susan spends the rest of her free time at Hogwarts in the dormitory, playing with her Patronus. She wants so badly to feel safe.
On the train going home, Susan chooses the compartment right next to Harry's, just in case. When Malfoy amushes Harry, Susan is sure he is a Death Eater, and fights like he is one. When he turns into some sort of slug like creature, Susan cannot say it's much big loss.
The Hufflepuffs agree to keep writing each other. Hannah hugs her and looks tearful. "You'll come visit sometime, won't you?" she asks, and Susan says of course, even though she knows her mother won't let her out of her sight all summer.
Terry tells her to "Please, stay safe." She tells him the same thing, and hugs him harder than she meant to. He's grown so much taller than her. She remembers he used to be shorter, and skinnier. His glasses still slip down his nose and his hair is still just a little too short for him, but he's grown up. They all have, really.
"Would you mind writing me?" asks Terry shyly, even though Susan's always written him. She smiles.
"Everyday," she says. He is her best friend. She will never abandon him. She is too loyal for that.
A/N: I'm so sorry for the lack of update. My computer's been down for weeks. Hopefully I'll be finished by the time the seventh book comes out.
I just want to let everyone know that this is not going to be an AU story until the seventh chapter, and that's only because I don't know what's happening in the seventh book. So sixth year will go the same way it did in the book, just from a different point of view. Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it.