Disclaimer: As I am a simple person who does not own tons and tons of money, I must admit to being a plain American girl, and not JK Rowling. Therefore, I do not own Harry Potter and the connected involved characters. Oh, well...
**Canon until post-Ootp. Then my imagination takes over.**
August 4, 1993
A snowy owl flew in the window of a wizarding hotel in Egypt, and landed in front of Fred (or George) Weasley.
Ron, their younger brother, looked up with surprise. "Hedwig! What are you doing here?"
Hedwig gave the freckled thirteen-year-old a haughty glare, and held her leg out to George (or Fred).
Fred (or George) reached out, and divested her of the muggle-style envelope. His eyebrows rose. "It's from Eileen," he informed his twin (and everyone else at the breakfast table).
Bill, their oldest brother, (who lived here in Egypt,) grinned. "Who's Eileen? A girlfriend?"
George (or Fred) snorted. "She's Ginny's age," he said. "Besides, why did her letter come with Hedwig?"
Fred (or George) frowned. "That is a very good question, brother," he said. As one, the twins left the table, with Hedwig following behind.
*July 31, 1993*
To: The Carrot-Topped Twits Who Transfigure
From: Eileen Dunbar, the Transfiguration Dunce
Hey, twits!
I read about your family in the Daily Prophet. Congrats! Prank your brother Percy in one of the tombs, okay?
My summer homework is going miserably, and I wish you two were here to help me with Transfiguration. I honestly wish the subject didn't exist.
Missing you stupid pranksters horribly,
Eileen
PS. Isn't this Harry Potter's owl? Why did she show up at the here?
Fred (or George) looked at Hedwig. "You are one smart owl, aren't you?" he said amusedly, "How did you know that Ellie needed you?"
George (or Fred) grinned at his brother. "Ellie?"
Fred (or George) rolled his eyes. "Yes. Ellie. Eileen needs a nickname."
After looking around for a moment, George (or Fred) took out a piece of old parchment. "What do you think, old map?"
Words scrawled themselves across the page.
Mr. Padfoot agrees wholeheartedly with the Carrot-Tops, and suggests calling her Miss Elegant.
Mr. Prongs wonders why this Eileen is important to the Carrot-Tops.
Mr. Padfoot thinks it is obvious.
Mr. Moony thinks that Eileen is a beautiful name, but agrees with the suggestions of Ellie or Miss Elegant.
Fred (or George) looked at George (or Fred). "Let's write her back."
August 9, 1993
Eileen sat up tiredly on her bed, pushing back a limp wisp of hair and rubbing a bruised wrist. A tap on her window broke her out of some rather depressing thoughts.
"Oh, hello again, beautiful," Eileen whispered hoarsely to the gorgeous white owl. "A letter for me?"
The snowy owl bobbed her head, dropped the letter, and left.
Stumbling back to her bed, Eileen carefully unrolled the scroll of parchment.
*August 4, 1993*
To: The Brilliant Charms Mistress, Miss Elegant
From: The Carrot-Topped Twits Who Transfigure
Hello there, Ellie!
'Fred here insists on calling you Ellie.'
Wait a minute, you're Fred – I'm George!
'No, you're Fred.'
Anyway, how has Miss Elegant's summer been?
'Yeah, how's it been?'
We'll see you in Diagon, right?
'Yeah, cuz you need your stuff, right?'
You read about the escape of Sirius Black?
'Be careful Miss Elegant.'
Really – seriously, be careful Ellie. We want our student back come September.
'See you soon!'
See you!
Fred and George, the Carrot-Topped Twits
Eileen smiled fondly at the letter. Those two were the only people who really treated her like she meant anything. For a moment, she thought about getting a pen and some paper to reply. A sharp pain in her lower stomach convinced her otherwise.
Shutting her eyes, Eileen leaned back. Somehow, she thought. Somehow, I have to get to Diagon Alley.
The door to her room slammed open, and a tall man with blonde hair stomped in. Eileen shivered, and shrank into the bedclothes.
Robert Jones.
August 27, 1993
Eileen looked around cautiously, and staggered down the stairs of the orphanage slowly, carrying her trunk and wishing she could Levitate it.
Reaching the bottom of the staircase, Eileen leaned against the wall, breathing heavily. Tears streamed down her face in silent pain, while a similar pattern painted her legs in blood.
Trembling, Eileen pushed the front door of the orphanage open, and stumbled out onto the darkened street. About to breathe a sigh of relief, a hand came out of the darkness behind her and grabbed her shoulder.
Eileen shrieked, barely missing dropping her trunk. Standing drunkenly in the doorway of the orphanage was a man from her nightmares. Robert Jones.
Robert Jones had blonde hair that probably would have looked nice if he ever washed and brushed it. His muddy-brown eyes stood out somewhat in his skull, and his nose had been broken several times. Unfortunately for a weedy girl like Eileen, who stood barely four feet tall, escape was futile. Robert Jones, regrettably, was made from muscle and fat, out weighing the tiny brunette by quite a bit.
Eileen began gasping for breath as Robert Jones shook her shoulder roughly.
"Where d'you think you're goin', gel?" he slurred, stepping forward drunkenly. "Not leavin', are ye?"
Eileen swallowed back a sob, memories of other rough nights swimming through her head. Weakly, she dropped her trunk.
Right onto Robert Jones' feet.
With a crack that made it extremely possible that it had broken bones, Eileen's tightly-packed school-trunk made contact with a force called gravity, teaching Robert Jones a very important lesson: Do not attack girls with heavy schoolbooks packed tightly into a large trunk.
Yowling, Robert Jones fell backwards, landing hard on the floor. Nursing his bleeding and broken feet, Robert Jones did not notice Eileen shakily grab her trunk and limp out into the night.
Feeling queasy from her extremely near escape, Eileen wandered through the darkened streets of London until she found a bench. Looking at the sign on the post beside the bench, she squinted as read that the first bus would be out at nine in the morning.
Sighing, Eileen set her trunk under the bench, and lay down on the hard metal.
August 28, 1993
The rising sun struck Eileen directly in the face, waking her rather easily from a restless sleep. With a startled yelp, she fell from the bench onto the pavement.
Wiping away tears of agony as the scabs that had begun on her legs ripped open once more, Eileen took a closer look at the signpost beside the bench, and held back a sob. It was Sunday. The first bus wouldn't come until 10:30 am.
Digging through her pockets, Eileen found four pounds and five pence. Going over to the (practically out of date) machine, she slid three-pounds-fifty into the slot for a full-day bus pass. That way, it she got lost, she had until the next day to reorient herself.
Looking longingly across the street at the dingy coffee-shop, Eileen dug through her pockets until she found a pair of apple drops, which she popped into her mouth in place of breakfast.
Wishing she had a humbug or two, (she'd unfortunately been nowhere near a normal candy shop this past winter,) Eileen sighed with relief as the bus pulled up with a loud screech and a snort.
Hoping she remembered where the Leaky Cauldron was correctly, Eileen boarded the bus.
Two false stops later, Eileen stood on the (rather dirty) street that housed an old-fashioned tavern called "The Leaky Cauldron" as the sun began to set.
Ignoring the pain in her gut and in her legs, Eileen walked steadily into the Wizarding World.
August 29, 1993
Staring up at the ceiling of her room in the Leaky Cauldron, Eileen decided that she would somehow manage to find a nice gift for Tom, the owner of the tavern and inn.
The night before, Tom had taken one look at her, and told her quietly that she could stay for a couple of days free of charge "just until the First." He'd even given her some potion to put on her legs to stop the bleeding!
After a long shower and a dig through her schoolbooks until she found her only other outfit that wasn't uniform, Eileen stumbled downstairs to get herself some breakfast – and bumped right into somebody only a tiny bit taller than herself.
From the ground, Eileen stared at the thin boy who was fumbling about for the glasses that had fallen from his face.
"Excuse me?" She made it almost into a question, and swallowed back a gasp as the boy slid his glasses onto his face and revealed a lightning-bolt scar on his forehead. Eileen, while intrigued by the scar, was more drawn to his eyes, though; they were a vivid green that evoked faint memories in the back of her mind.
Harry Potter looked sheepish. "Sorry for bumping into you," he mumbled, looking at his shoes. He held out a hand, and pulled Eileen to her feet. "I'm a bit tired. Wasn't really looking where I was going. You're a Hufflepuff, aren't you? Eileen Dunbar?"
Eileen gaped. "You-you know who I am?"
Harry shrugged. "Ron's older brothers mentioned you last year in passing, and it only took me a couple of days to put the name to the face. Want to sit with me for breakfast?"
Startled, Eileen nodded without thinking about it.
Eileen spent the rest of the day with Harry, and discovered that he was extremely smart. Wondering absently why rumors had it that he was barely an "Acceptable" grade student, her eyes widened as a snowy owl flew into the street and landed on Harry's shoulder.
Harry lit up. "Hedwig!"
"Is that her name?" Eileen asked curiously, reaching out and brushing the white feathers with a finger. Harry looked at her oddly. "You've met Hedwig?"
Eileen blushed. "She showed up at the orphanage just as I was wishing I had some way to send a letter to the Weasley Twins. They're my Transfiguration tutors, you know."
Ruffling Hedwig's feathers, Harry nodded. "They told me. About her just showing up like that, well, Hedwig's just smart like that. She's like a mother, for me."
Eileen smiled up at the preening bird. She could definitely believe that. Hedwig looked like a proud mother with her baby son. Holding back a snicker, Eileen wondered if Hedwig was worried about Harry's lack of wings.
The three of them; Harry, Eileen, and Hedwig; spent the late afternoon and evening going over homework. Finishing her Potions essay, Eileen glanced up at Harry's work to see him "dumbing it down."
"What – what in Merlin's name are you doing, Harry?" Eileen gasped. With her own desperately bad grades, she couldn't understand why anyone would purposely sabotage their own work.
Harry turned red. "I – erm –"
As Harry continued to stutter, Eileen remembered one of the only times she'd had a friend, back when she was four. Her friend had been rather unmotivated, so Eileen had purposefully made her schoolwork worse, so as not to lose her friend.
"It's for your friends, isn't it?" Eileen whispered.
Harry jumped. "How did you…?"
Eileen shrugged. "I've done the same. Of course, now I have no friends to speak of."
Harry's green eyes flashed. "That's not true. You have Fred, George, and me!"
Tears filled Eileen's eyes, and she wiped them away furiously before Harry could notice them. "I'm – I'm your friend?"
Harry rolled up his essay and hugged her. "Course you are. Erm – just come find me, 'cause the times I tried last year, I couldn't find you."
Eileen blushed. "I was probably hiding."
Harry's eyes darkened. "Hiding?"
Eileen's eyes widened at what had slipped out. "Um, er, I mean – I have to go!"
Knocking over a bottle of ink, Eileen gathered up her now-finished homework, and fled.
August 30, 1993
Eileen rubbed out a splotch of ink and looked at the letter she'd written.
Dear Carrot-Topped-Twits,
You guys are coming to Diagon tomorrow, aren't you? Would you meet me outside Flourish and Blotts? I have a… request.
Yours Truly,
Miss Elegant
She glared at the letter for a moment, and sighed. To send it, she'd have to go talk to Harry again. Eileen wasn't certain that she wanted to do that.
A tap on the door to her room made Eileen jump, and nearly spill her ink. Grumbling about clumsiness, Eileen stumbled over to the door to find Harry standing there sheepishly.
"Hi," he said; his eyes on the floor. "I just – well, I just wanted to, y'know, say I'm sorry for upsetting you yesterday, and well, Hedwig here thinks that you have a letter that needs to go out, so –"
Eileen blushed so hard that she could feel her cheeks getting internal-sunburn.
"S'my fault," she mumbled. "I was embarrassed – what type of person is disliked by Hufflepuffs? Especially when she is a Hufflepuff?"
Hedwig lifted off of Harry's shoulder as he started forward abruptly, his arms going around her shoulders hesitantly. Sniffing, all of the wild emotions of the past week caught with her, and Eileen began to cry.
"I don't know – Ells-Bells, don't cry, please – Merlin, Ellie, tell me what I said wrong, what I did –"
"S'nothing," Eileen sniffed. "I just – I just…" Shaking, Eileen pulled away and wiped her tears with the end of her sleeve. "Sorry."
Harry shook his head. "Nah, it's fine. Hed' will stay with you today, and she'll find me when you don't need her anymore. That alright?"
Eileen nodded, and barely even looked at Harry as he left.
Closing the door to her room, Eileen let out a sigh. Why did Harry Potter have to be so nice?"
August 31, 1993
The Weasleys did come to Diagon Alley on the thirty-first, but Eileen barely saw them. After a rather nasty run-in with the youngest boy, Ron, Eileen decided that staying out of the way was the best idea. She did wonder, though, how such a nice person as Harry could be friends with such a nasty person as Ron Weasley.
Mid-afternoon, Eileen met the Twins outside of Flourish and Blotts, and they briefly discussed resuming the tutoring during the school-year. It was then that Eileen made her proposition.
"I could – well, I could help you with your pranks, but only if…" Eileen bit her lip. "Only, only if you guys promise…" She couldn't continue.
Fred looked at her. "You want us to protect you from less nice pranks, don't you?"
Eileen's head shot up, cricking her neck. "I – I –"
George put an arm over her shoulders. "Don't worry," he said, "You're like a little sister. Special."
"Yeah," agreed Fred, "Except that you've got brown hair. But that's alright. Just ask Harry – he's the black-haired Weasley!"
And with that, the conversation wandered on to less solemn subjects.
September 1, 1993
Eileen slipped onto Platform Nine and Three-Quarters with little fuss – just herself and her trunk, unnoticed by the muggles.
She got on the train without any trouble, thankfully. Unfortunately, once she was on the train…
"Oooh, look, it's baby Leenie!"
"Dumb, dopey, Dunbar!"
"Fails her classes, cries at detention!"
SCREECH! The train stopped. Eileen, who had been running, slammed headfirst into a wall. The world went black to the sound of Robert Jones' voice.
END OF THE SUMMER OF 1993
AN: Please, Please, Please: REVIEW! I need to know that this is not a stupid idea, diary style is not my ordinary style of writing! So please review!
