A/N As usual, I don't own Harry Potter. Wish I did though.

Thank you to DorothyNightingale for your brilliant review - I hope you enjoy this chapter!

One thing that anyone who ever managed to get into the Hogwarts kitchens agreed on was this - no matter how exciting the feasts were, the process of making them were just that bit more interesting. Behind an oil painting of a fruit bowl lay a long room decorated with candelabras, their light glinting off of hundreds of brass pots and pans lining the walls. Four long tables, just like those in the Great Hall stretched out across the room, but where students would normally be eating, were house elves. They rushed from table to table, adding finishing touches to meals that were being placed on large, silver platters. Some elves stayed at the sides where tiny stoves held bubbling pots of stews and soups. One stove in a far corner was slightly taller than the rest, and shone just a little brighter. In front of it was an elf whose face was lined with wrinkles. His dark, narrow eyes flashed in every direction, from his stove, to other elves, to the four grand tables, shouting orders all the time. Craggs the house elf took pride in his work, and his work was the kitchens.

This was the sight that greeted Olivia as she stepped into the room through the portrait hole. It never ceased to amaze her, despite the fact that she had lost count of the times she had seen the kitchens. 'Oi, Craggs!' yelled George. The ageing house elf turned towards the three teenagers, and immediately his eyes widened with his small, crooked smile. He rushed over from the stove, barking orders to a nearby elf to look after what he had just left.

'Back already sirs, miss? I must remember to put out more food at breakfast.' His voice was cracked from overuse and age, but he still enunciated every word. 'Don't worry Craggs mate, we're just here to say hello,' answered Fred cheerfully, shaking Craggs's tiny hand.

'Well, I can never turn down a visit from the three of you,' the elf croaked, and he clicked his fingers, conjuring over a few chairs next to a table. 'Sit down, sit down, I'll get you something to eat. And don't you touch anything on the table!' he snapped at George, who had been about to stick his finger into a custard trifle. 'That's for your dinner, and I'll get complaints if I send up something imperfect!' George rolled his eyes but obediently took his hand away. Olivia sat down at the table and watched a tiny house elf carrying a huge golden bowl full of fruit stagger over to the table, throw it down, and knock everything over. 'Here, let me help.' she said, picking up an apple that had rolled in her direction. 'Such a kind miss,' said the elf, her tea towel wrapped around her like a toga. Craggs meanwhile had returned to his stove, and three more elves were walking towards them, each carrying a plate and one carrying a pitcher.

'Three of the usual!' squeaked the leading elf, who held out his plate.

'Mine!' said George quickly, grabbing the bacon roll and the pitcher from the elf. 'Cheers!'

'And the boiled egg and soldiers,' continued the elf, taking the second plate and holding it out to Fred and Olivia.

'Thank you, tell Craggs I say thanks too!' Fred said as he relieved the elf of it's plate.

'And finally, brandy snaps and cream!' Olivia took the plate with a thank you, and immediately put one in her mouth. 'You know, when you have an afternoon snack, it's not just meant to be a dessert,' joked George, as Olivia munched on the treats.

'Shuffup,' she said, spraying the twins with biscuit.

'You are disgusting,' said Fred, before throwing a toast soldier at her. Olivia swallowed the rest of her brandy snap before sticking out her tongue at Fred, who retaliated immediately by throwing another toast soldier. 'Actually, give me that back, I'm starving,' he said, grabbing it off of her head and putting it into his mouth. 'That's repulsive, it tastes like hair product!' Fred shrieked before pretending to gag into George's pitcher of juice.

'Step away from the juice,' said George, bringing out his wand.

'You'd never curse me, Forge.'

'I would if you spat in my drink, Gred.' Fred laughed before pushing the pitcher back to George, and returning to his own food. Olivia checked her watch and sighed. 'Well, it is officially 12 o'clock. Halfway through the day and I've failed to do anything productive,' she said.

'Don't be so hard on yourself, you've got all afternoon to pretend to be productive before admitting defeat,' said George cheerfully.

'Yeah, and it's a sin to be productive on the first day back anyway. We'd have to start pretending we didn't know you,' added Fred.

'More so than we usually do anyway.'

'I don't want to know what you do to people you do say you know,' gigged Olivia.

'You don't get it that bad, Liv,' said Fred, smiling. 'Think of Ron, I still have trouble admitting he's related to me.'

'I have trouble admitting I'm related to you Fred,' quipped George.

'What, you think people know we're brothers?'

'No, you're hideously ugly and I'm devastatingly attractive.'

'Wrong way round, Georgie dear.'

'Lets ask a non biased third party,' said Fred, grabbing George around the shoulder and pressing his face next to his. 'Liv, who's best looking?'

Olivia laughed and looked at their identical faces. Well, they weren't totally identical in her opinion. The freckles that appeared on their faces seemed to show up in the exact same patterns, and as far as their eyes were concerned, their irises were too close to tell the difference. However, George always smiled less than Fred. Fred's smile was over the top, clownish, whereas George never bothered to be overdramatic. He didn't need to be, after all. Fred didn't need to be either, but he loved to play the fool, and it was far harder to tell when Fred was upset, because his smile was constantly too big for his face. George's smile only got bigger when he was faking it.

'Liv, come on, this is taking hours.'

'George.' George immediately celebrated, shoving Fred off of his chair and striking a pose as if cameras were flashing at him. Fred grumbled as he got off the floor. 'Would you look at this knife someone's left in my back? I hope they didn't need it!' he said, pouting.

'Oh shush Freddie, at least I can tell you apart!'

'Only with an examination lasting several minutes and after seeing several forms of identification,' he replied, still faking hurt.

The afternoon wore on into the evening, and before long Olivia found herself in her favourite armchair in the common room, lazily reading over the Charms textbook while Fred and George entertained the rest of Gryffindor tower. Currently, they were using magic to create bursts of different coloured flame, which would intertwine to create beautiful loops in the air. Katie was sitting opposite her watching them, laughing at the first years faces as they gasped and shrieked when either twin would put his hand in the flames, which were of course cool to the touch. 'They are sort of brilliant, aren't they?' she said. Olivia looked up from her book and smiled.

'If you're going to try and get over Davies by going after a Weasley, I'd try Ron.'

'Oh stop! I'd never fancy the twins. I mean, they're cute, but they're impossible.'

'What do you mean?' Katie pondered for a minute, choosing her words carefully.

'Well, it's no secret that they've been with a fair few girls. And they always have another one chasing them! Plus, I think they've even… shared a girl, if you get my drift.' Olivia let out a laugh so loud she made a second year jump.

'No they haven't! Who told you that?' Olivia could barely contain herself, she was laughing so hard.

'Alicia! Goddamn Hogwarts rumour mill, it obviously wasn't true.'

'Trust me. If they had, I would have heard in hideous detail and I'd be scarred for life.' The two girls were both laughing now, getting ugly looks from some seventh year girls who were trying to study. A fourth year girl named Carrie French, one of Katie's friends appeared, sitting down in the next seat along from Olivia and flashing her a smile.

'Katie, have you done the work for McGonagall yet? I can't find my Standard Book of Spells…'

'No not yet, hang on and I'll get it.' Katie stood up and rushed off to their dorm. Olivia and Carrie sat in awkward silence. The two didn't know each other much at all, as their only mutual friend was Katie. Carrie was a very pretty girl, with long, dark hair that she clearly took great care of and clear, brown skin. 'So,' she said slowly. 'How are OWL classes?'

'Um. They're a bit harder I guess?' said Olivia. She immediately felt rather stupid, and tried to clarify it. 'I mean, I know I'm going to need to work a lot once Easter comes, you know?'

'Yeah,' answered Carrie. Olivia spotted Katie coming down the steps of the girls dorms and excused herself, regretfully abandoning her comfy armchair and moving to the desks where she spread her textbook and parchment out in front of her. The annotations she'd made along the sides of the paragraphs didn't make much sense due to her terrible handwriting and habit of writing in incomprehensible short hand. After straining to read it for several minutes, she accepted defeat and began rewriting out her notes onto fresh parchment.

As it got late, Fred and George finally abandoned their games and approached Olivia where she was dozing over her books. 'Hey Liv,' said Fred softly, poking her in her ear.

'Umf.' Olivia rubbed her eyes sleepily and looked up at their two, freckled faces.

'Don't stay up too late, alright? You're hitting the books heavy for the first day back.'

'I won't,' she mumbled, straining her eyes in the dim lighting as she started to reread the chapter she had started hours earlier. George laughed and rubbed her back before heading to the boys dorm, yawning loudly. Fred put his hand out awkwardly and patted her head, to which Olivia looked up at him with complete bemusement.

'Sorry, who are you? Cause you can't be Fred Weasley.'

'I try to be nice…' said Fred, throwing his hands up in the air, laughing. 'Night, don't read too much. It's bad for you.' He headed after his brother, and Olivia tried to bring her eyes to focus on the paper. However, the sleepiness she had felt earlier had left her, and an overwhelming sense of boredom and replaced it. She glanced around the empty common room and sighed. There was nothing to distract her from her work apart from herself. Suddenly, she realised she wasn't in fact alone. There was someone in an armchair facing away from her. The only thing visible to her was their arm, which was tapping off of the side of the arm. 'Well,' she thought, 'I'm not about to talk to someone just because I'm procrastinating.'

Time dragged on, and she realised that talking to the stranger was becoming more and more attractive than going over silencing charms a fourteenth time. Besides, it was nearly midnight. If she didn't say something, they'd go to bed and it would be her, charms and nothing else.

'Er. Hi there.'

The arm in the chair straightened, and a head turned towards Olivia. The person that was sitting there was a boy, with brown hair. He had a thin, gangly frame and had the look of someone that was recovering from being ill. He didn't say anything but gave her an odd look.

'Sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you, I just-'

'No, it's fine.' He didn't look in any way annoyed or upset to have had his silence disturbed but just mildly surprised to see another human being.

'I'm working, except I'm really bored and I hate Charms, I can't do it. So, I just thought…'

'That you'd distract yourself,' the boy finished for her. He was smiling now, and it put Olivia at ease.

'I'm Olivia Flume. I don't think we've met?'

'Marlo White.' His voice was soft, almost difficult to hear.

'Cool. Why are you up so late then? Seeing as I've confessed to you all about my procrastination,' said Olivia jokingly, spreading her arms out towards her books.

'I don't really sleep much. It's just a thing I have. It used to bother me a lot when I was younger, but I've kind of gotten over it.' It made sense to Olivia, after all anyone would be that pale if they never slept…

'It's good to meet you Marlo,' she said. He nodded and turned back around, while Olivia cringed at her own overeagerness. Making small talk was never her forte. For the final time that night, she stared down at her books, and began to work on the next chapter. Her mind kept drifting to the day she had just had, and to Katie and Davies, and to Fred and George, and to Fred… It would be okay if she put her head down for one minute, like a power nap… Her Charms book looked particularly soft…

A/N This dragged on a lot but I really want to take my time with introducing new characters and just developing Olivia's character. Please review if you enjoyed (or if you didn't and I'll try and improve for next time!)