Harry woke up and went for breakfast as he usually did at Hogwarts. McGonagall gave them their timetables and Harry noticed that a bit of sadness were in her eyes as well. Why was he the only one who didn't remember her? This was getting frustrating!

'Ms. Granger,' called McGonagall. 'Would you like to continue the subject of Ancient Runes?'

Hermione sat in silence, thinking.

'I- I'm not sure,' she said.

Ron looked at Harry shocked, but Harry himself was shocked. Hermione always spoke about how amazing and lovely Ancient Runes was… Why was she hesitating? Why was McGonagall even questioning it?

'Er, yes,' decided Hermione. 'Yes, I'll do it. Samantha would have liked it.'

'But you did all the pairing work together,' insisted McGonagall. 'You do know what this means.'

Hermione shut her eyes tightly and nodded.

'It's what Samantha would have done.'

'Don't let her do it!'

Harry turned to his left and there was Samantha. She was white but slowly gaining colour.

'You can't let her continue,' she continued. 'We used to get paired up together, but now that I'm not going she'll end up with Malfoy!'

'What?!' said Harry.

'She'll be paired up with Malfoy and they hate each other!'

'Hermione, you can't!' said Harry.

'I beg your pardon.'

'You can't do Ancient Runes, you'll get paired up with Malfoy!'

Hermione opened her mouth to reply and then stopped midair.

'How- How- How do you- you know?' she asked weakly.

'Never mind that, you can't!'

Hermione hesitated again.

'No, I am going to have Ancient Runes,' she said firmly. 'I just have too. Who else will put Samantha updated when she returns?'

McGonagall half-smiled and tapped a piece of parchment which she gave to Hermione.

Hermione scanned it once and then kept it in her robes.

'What did you get?' asked Samantha looking at Harry's timetable. 'Ooo, I have the same, only with the extra Ancient Runes.'

Harry looked up to her (because he was seated and she standing). Today she was white once again; well she never was quite white, more of a silver tone.

But her lovely locks were still there, the form and shape of them, and her round eyes.

'We have Charms,' she said. 'That has got to be good. Old Flicky must have something interesting for us to do.'

'Flicky,' repeated Harry with a raised eyebrow. 'Why do you give people nicknames?'

'Real names are so boring,' she whined taking a seat next to him.

He couldn't help but let a laugh escape him.

'What?' asked Ron.

'Hein, What?' asked Harry confused.

'Why were you laughing?' he asked.

Harry looked at once at Samantha.

'Colin's hair,' she said quickly.

'Colin's hair,' he repeated.



'Colin's-' and then they saw Colin with his hair all up, as if he had received an electric shock.

Everyone noticed and the Great Hall burst into laughter.

'Hey, Colin,' called Ron 'what happened to your hair?'

Colin turned red and dropped his head.

'I was trying to do a spell there was in our charms book, to get a good start but-' he looked up indicating his hair.

'Take out you wand and say "Cabelum Perfectis",' whispered Samantha.

'What?'

'Just do it,' she insisted. 'I can't, my wand's with Dad.'

He, hesitatingly, took out his wand, pointed it to Colin and murmured: 'Cabelum Perfectis!'

At once, Colin's burned hair became a shinny, clean, straightened hair.

Ron turned to Harry shocked.

'Where did you-'

'Don't ask,' said Harry.

Colin was too happy observing his new hair to care where Harry had gotten the spell from.

'My hair,' he gasped as he touched it. 'I- It's never been this smooth and- and- Want to touch?' he asked Ron.

Ron's smile faded and at once he became nervous.

'No, no need, Colin,' he said.

'Oh, come on, it's so sexy and-'

By then, the Great Hall was filled with laughs again.

Harry couldn't contain himself either, even though Ron glared at him every now and then.

And then, he heard Samantha's laughs.

They were like a Phoenix's sing; they were deep, filled with joy and happiness. They were contagious and whoever heard them wanted more, at least Harry did.

Seeing her laugh as she was laughing now, was an honour, a privilege. It was as though happiness had a human form and she was it.

She was clutching her stomach as more of those wonderful laughs left her mouth and then she supported her head on Harry's shoulder.

All Harry could feel was coldness and he wished he could have felt her when she was- well, when she was one of them. He was sure she must have had a warm, smooth skin.

Harry was so into trying to figure her out that when Ron called he didn't hear. Eventually Samantha stopped laughing.

'Come on, Harry,' she called, still with a big smile on her face. 'We'll be late.'

'You're not silver anymore,' he told her.

She looked down and at once saw her brown locks.

'We'll figure it out later,' she said. 'Come on, Flicky's waiting.'

Harry grabbed his bag and followed her out.

Charms was defiantly different with Samantha. She pointed out the most hilarious things and Harry just couldn't ignore them and remain serious, he just had to laugh.

Sometimes Hermione and Ron noticed but all he did not to be discovered was point the same thing out and they'd laugh as well.

They had Transfiguration next and then Potions, which Harry got right because Samantha helped him out.

Slughorn even said that his was the best of all, even better then Hermione.



At lunch time Samantha wasn't with Harry but Harry understood. There really wasn't a point, she didn't eat.

After lunch he, Ron, Hermione and Samantha went to the lake to get homework done.

'The first day,' said Ron 'and they're already drowning us in homework.'

Hermione rolled her eyes.

'Honestly, Ron, it's not that bad,' she said. 'We're sixth years now.'

'Still,' he insisted 'it's loads! Flitwick told us all to practise that stupid Charm but Harry, who managed to do it! And in Tranfiguration McGonagall wants us to practise Vanishing Spells and write a report about it! Slughorn's the only one who didn't ask for anything!'

'And Hermione disagrees with that,' she murmured to Harry.

'And that is completely irresponsible of him,' said Hermione not a second later.

'Told you so,' said Samantha looking down at Harry's report.

'You want homework?' asked Ron.

'If that's what's going to take for me to have a good grade in my N.E.W.T.'s, then yes,' she said 'I do.'

'We had our O.W.L.s just a few months ago,' he said.

'So,' asked Hermione. 'N.E.W.T.'s are even more important, complicated and hard!'

'Guys!' called Harry. 'Not now, please,' asked Harry who couldn't stand their arguing anymore.

The two crossed their arms and began doing their homework.

'Harry,' called Samantha 'why don't you practise the Vanishing Spell and I'll write the report…'

Harry opened his mouth to talk but Samantha gestured to the others who couldn't see or hear her.

'Are you sure,' he mouthed.

'Yeah,' she said 'just to keep me busy.'

He shrugged. If that was what she wanted, he'd let her do his essay.

She smiled and at that moment thousands of butterflies invaded Harry's stomach.

Hermione had brought several objects for them to Vanish and Harry joined them as Samantha wrote on his essay.

'Ron, no, no, no, no,' said Hermione frustrated. 'It's counter-clock.'

'Oh,' said Ron. 'Oh, ok, ok, sorry.'

Hermione managed to Vanish all of her objects but Harry and Ron were having a bit of a hard time.

'Hey, Harry,' called Samantha.

He turned to face her.

'Try losing up your hand a bit, your wand hand, and then do the movement firmly,' she instructed.

Harry nodded and turned to his objects. He took a deep breath and did as instructed. There was no need for second tries. One-by-one all of them disappeared.

'Harry,' gasped Hermione 'that was a great improvement.'

Samantha walked up to Harry.

'Tell Ron to do the same,' she instructed.

'Hey, Ron,' called Harry. 'Loosen up your hand.'

'What?'

'Just- Trust me,' asked Harry.

Ron shook his wand hand and then looked at Harry.

'Loosened up my hand,' he said. 'Now what?'

'Do the movement firmly,' he added.



Ron took a deep breath and tried. His first object disappeared into thin air.

'I- I did it,' he said. 'I did it! I made it Vanish! It's gone! I've done it! Look, Harry, Harry, I did it! I did it! I actually did it!'

Harry smiled and noticed the smile on Samantha's face as well.

Whenever she smiled there was something that showed unhappiness. It was in her eyes that Harry saw something was wrong. Although her lips had a smile models would kill for, her eyes showed somehow pain. As if, by seeing Ron is such a status, she was remembering something sad, something that had caused all that sadness in her eyes in the first place.

For the first time, Harry wished he was alone with her, without Ron and Hermione. He would like to know why such sadness filled her chocolate eyes, who had made all that joy from earlier disappear, who had filled her mind with such horrible, sad memories they haunted her lovely eyes... He wished he could ask. But he couldn't, not there with Hermione and Ron besides him.