A/N: Hi, guys! This didn't take as long as I thought it would, actually! I've just had the most amazing two weeks ever. I'm part of this play and we've been going on like a mini tour throughout the country and it's just been absolutely an amazing experience. It's also the reason why I haven't written anything. I got back last week and had to catch up with school work and the lot.

Anyways! Here's the chapter, quite the rollercoaster this one. Let me know what you all think in the reviews! Also, as always, I'd like to thank all of you who favourited and followed and reviewed this story since last chapter. Sassi15, Sra Salvatore, bookdragonslayer, tinlawia ad yulionde.

Lollypops101: I'm thinking about it actually, but I don't know, it's still a maybe. I mean, I've already got twenty six chapters and we're still only in Year six, so I feel like if I were to continue it into the actual books it would take forever? Like it'd end up having like hundreds of chapters and I doubt anyone would actually read them all.

Guest: I don't think anyone is prepared for James and Lily to die, let's be honest. Thanks so much for your kinds words cutie! You are awesome and I wished you had a username/ had logged in(?) so I could know your wonderful name and send you lots of love. Really appreciate the support.

Anyways, that's it for this A/N. As always, read, review, message me if you have any questions/doubts! Love you! xx

Chapter 26: Nightmare come Alive P. II.

Someone was using me as a pillow. That was the first thing I noticed. The second thing I noticed was that I was cold. The third thing I noticed was that everything was eerily silent. The fourth, that I didn't know where I was. After the fourth thing registered in my brain, my eyelids slid open on their own accord. I was hit by burning white. My eyes closed again.

It was a few moments before I dared open my eyes once more. This time, I realized the scary burning white was actually bright light coming from the tall window behind me. It took a few seconds of me doing nothing but staring at the bright light for my senses to come back. I wasn't just staring at the light, above it there was a stone ceiling, curving like a dome. I was resting on a bed; a surprisingly comfortable, soft bed.

I was in Hogwarts, the Hospital Wing to be precise, which was surprising because I had thought that if I woke up, it'd be in St. Mungo's and not here. I had thought I wasn't going to wake up, to be honest. But I had. And someone was using me as a pillow. I looked down with some difficulty, my neck was incredibly stiff, and saw James.

He was fast asleep, hand clasping mine, wireframes sideways on his face. His head was resting on my thigh like it was a pillow and any slight annoyance over the gesture vanished when I had a chance to truly look at him. Because while the pressure his head was applying in my already sore body was not nice, he looked like utter shit. He had a half-healed wound on his temple that looked pretty deep, not too fresh but not entirely cicatrized either; there were some fresh droplets of blood still shining as the light hit them. It looked like the wound had dried and been reopened on accident multiple times. His eyes were surrounded by dark circles but I didn't know if they were the product of exhaustion or violence. His nose was red, lips worried and almost without colour in the corners. I wondered if he'd been crying.

Lily was in another chair next to him, closer to my bedside table. Her elbow was propped on the arm rest as her hand held her face up, red hair cascading down to the side. Her eyes were closed. She looked fine and I was very glad that at least some of my loved ones hadn't gotten hurt in the mess that had been today.

Or was it yesterday? It must have been yesterday, because there was no way Madame Pomfrey would have allowed both Lily and James stay so long here if my wounds were so recent. What were my wounds anyway? My head hurt like hell and everything was stiff and sore but I couldn't really pinpoint the source of my ailment.

As I turned my head to see if I could catch a glimpse of the aforementioned healer, my heart skipped a beat in something very similar to dread. Because Sirius Black was sitting in another chair next to my bed. He had his elbows leaning on his knees as his fisted hands covered his mouth and even though his eyes were closed I knew he was the only one of my visitors who wasn't asleep. Something bad had happened. Something really bad. There was no other reason why Madame Pomfrey would allow not one, not two but three visitors to see me while I wasn't even conscious yet. Let alone let them stay long enough for them to fall asleep.

"Hey," I said as calmly as possible. My voice was so faint though, I didn't think it would have mattered if I sounded scared.

Sirius's eyes flew opened. They found me.

"You're awake," he said although his tone rose until it sounded like a question at the end. I nodded, confused. "No, no, I mean you're awake, this is not you just talking while unconscious."

"What?" I mumbled, confused. "My eyes are opened, Sirius." I rolled my eyes slightly.

All I wanted to know was what had happened; couldn't he give me that without me having to use my voice? Extremely dry throats did not go well with lots of talking. He met my eyes again, slowly nodding, before giving me a small, relieved smile. The worry in my chest grew.

"Yeah, they are." He agreed. I didn't know if he was talking to me or himself, though. "How are you feeling?"

"Sore... and really cold."

"Here," he said, taking off his maroon jumper and laying it on top of me.

I was slightly surprised at the action but didn't really say anything. Sirius, no matter how punk he tried—and succeeded—to look was still very caring to everyone. It'd just been a while since that care had been directed at me. I didn't know what to do with that. We stayed in silence for a few moments until my eyes went to Lily once I couldn't deal with the silence any longer. That action seemed to remind Sirius of something because he walked over to Lily and tapped her on the shoulder slightly. I was about to inform him that there was no way Lily, who could sleep through a tornado, would be woken up by just a small nudge, when Lily jumped, wide awake.

"What? What?" She asked, looking alarmed.

"She's awake, Flower." Sirius told her.

"Are you sure this time?" Lily asked, dubious.

"Yes." I answered, starting to get annoyed.

Lily threw herself at me, arms tightly around my neck in the most uncomfortable way imaginable. I hugged her back with just one hand, not really daring to move too much in case I woke James up. As I raised my arm to put it around her shoulders, I realized my right hand had been bandaged.

"Thank god," Lily said into my shoulder. I realized she was crying. "We were so worried, Mere." She added, pulling away and wiping her face quickly.

"I'll go get one of the healers." Sirius let us know before walking away.

"One of the healers?" I repeated. "What happened to Madam Pomfrey?"

Lily sobered down. My heart started to race again. Why had they been so worried? Why were there more than just the one healer needed in Hogwarts?

"Lily, what happened?" I pressed the matter when a few seconds passed and Lily hadn't said anything. She bit her lip. "How long have I been out for?"

"Ten days." A new voice said.

Lily and I looked down to see James had woken up and was in the process of sitting up right. As he raised his hand to scratch his eye with his fist, he sent me a small smile. I blinked. Ten days? I was unconscious for ten days? How was that even possible? Oh, Merlin, did that mean I peed myself for ten days straight? I had no idea how those things worked.

"Wait, what happened?" I asked, trying not to focus too much in the fact that I could be very well sleeping in a pool of my own pee. "Why were they there?"

"Professor Dumbledore says it's because they jinxed it," Lily explained. "You-know-who's name. Now we can't say it or they will show up. A lot of people got hurt, so St. Mungo's sent a few more healers to help out."

They jinxed Voldemort's name? I couldn't think of anyone else who could now be You-Know-Who. Either way, it sounded pathetic. Or cruel. I was still deciding. The face of the man who had warned me minutes before he died flashed before my eyes and I decided that it was definitely cruel, not pathetic.

"I got hit by a spell—a curse," I said slowly. Lily nodded while James got significantly paler, eyes stuck somewhere in space. "And then The Three Broomsticks exploded."

I wasn't so sure of this, though, as the memory was still somewhat foggy, so my voice came out as a question more than anything else.

"Yes. James found you." Lily nodded again, letting me know I was on the right track. I frowned, not remembering that. "You were in and out of consciousness several times, mostly just mumbling words that didn't make sense. The healers said it was to be expected. I don't know." She shook her head.

Well, that would explain why Sirius didn't think I was actually awake. But there was something about the way she said it, almost careful, that made me believe she was leaving something out. I turned to my cousin, ready to ask myself, when Sirius came back with a healer I didn't recognize.

He quickly ushered everyone out of my little semi-private space and started to examine me, waving and flickering his wand above me several times. He helped me sit up, which was more difficult than I'd like to admit. He checked my bandaged wrist and hand and said I would only have to keep it for a few more days, considering the strain on the muscle had improved considerably. He probed at this really sensible spot on the back of my head several times, happy when his fingers didn't come filled with blood. He took my warm blankets away so he could examine this nasty burn in my right calf, pink and raw. I cringed but it mustn't have been too bad because he nodded in approval.

And then—then he asked me, very politely, to lift up my gown so he could examine my torso. My stomach was bandaged all around from just below my chest all the way down to my hip, something I hadn't noticed most likely because my body had already gotten used to the pressure of the gauze. On my left side, the bandages were a light pink, most likely the blood still sipping through. My heart started to race again. I remembered being hit by that curse; I remembered the hot pain, the stickiness of the blood against my clothes.

When the healers removed the last bit of the gauze, which got stuck to the wound and made more blood resurface, I gasped.

"I'm sorry," the healer apologized.

I shook my head, biting my lip so the welling tears in my eyes wouldn't fall. Because while, yes, it had hurt like a mother-effer, that wasn't what made me gasp. I thought it had been just a small cut, like one of those that hurt more because of the surprise. So I'd been expecting just that. Instead, what received my poor eyes were three deep gashes, one above the other, starting on my rib and going down to my hipbone in a horizontal manner, with a few inches in between them. The biggest one, the one in the middle, started at two or three inches away from my belly button. I didn't want to know where it ended. It looked like I'd been attacked by a rabid animal.

"It's healed beautifully," the healer said to me, looking up to meet my eyes. I just shook my head mutely. "It has." He insisted. I noticed he had brown eyes. They were really pretty. "You see this?" he pointed at the edges of the wounds. "That means it's almost already closed, and look at the gauze. Almost no blood."

I looked at the gauze as he asked. I guessed he was right, considering how big and ugly the cuts were, there wasn't that much blood on the bandages. Still, I was beginning to understand why my friends had been so worried. He passed his wand over the wounds once, twice, thrice, making them feel hot and tingly and then bandaged it all again with brand new gauze. After that, he made me drink a really disgusting, bright pink potion.

"Your head wound is fine and you don't seem to have any neurological side effects to the trauma. Your burn is great, no need to keep covering it up; we just need to keep applying ointment to it. You were lucky; it wasn't that bad of a burn. There won't be any scaring in either instance." He listed as he looked into my throat and made me follow his finger with my eyes. Then, he paused. "Now, your torso's wounds are quite severe. You've done great but I can't promise you they won't leave a scar."

"I don't care about the scars." I shook my head. "Just get it to stop hurting."

Because now that I'd been probed, touched, poked and bandaged up all over again, everything hurt even more than when I woke up. Especially my side, but I wasn't sure if that was because my wounds were more sensible after being cleansed and healed again or because I was now conscious about their existence.

"I will get you something for the pain." He smiled at me. "Would you like to see your friends again?"

"And my mum." I added, nodding.

As he left, I slipped Sirius's jumper on. It was quite big on me and it smelled of mint and the woods and old books and Sirius. It was the most welcoming thing I had ever worn in my entire life. Just when I was about two seconds away to just cuddling the jumper and sighing happily, James, Sirius, Lily and my mum rounded the corner from the curtain separating me from the next bed. James quickly went back to his old seat but Sirius and Lily stood by the foot of the bed, letting Mother decide what she wanted to do.

I thought she would scowl me. After all, I was the one incompetent in the very lesson she had spent six years teaching me. No Potter knew not how to defend themselves in a battle. Almost all of us were aurors, duelling came naturally to us. Apparently, I'd missed that genome. So as I prepared myself for the behind whopping that was about to take place, my mother walked closer to my bed, stood right by my side... and broke down.

"Oh, Meredith!" she cried, gathering me in her arms like she used to when I was little. And right now, I was very appreciative of her actions because I truly felt like I was seven and had fallen down the railing of the stairs again. "I'm so glad you're okay, honey."

"It's alright, mum." I patted her shoulder after a few moments had passed and she was still clinging to me like I'd blow away. "I'm fine. We're fine."

"You have to tell her." James blurted out suddenly.

My mother pulled away from me as she took a few steps away from the bed to regard her nephew.

"James—" she warned, using that same warning, stern tone she would often use in class.

"She has to know, Aunt." James protested, shaking his head frantically.

"Know what?" I asked, the same dread I'd felt before returning. "Know what?" I repeated after a few seconds of silence and nothing but every single person around me glancing at one another.

My heart started to beat faster. I made a mental list of every single person who had been at Hogsmeade that day. Maybe someone had gotten hurt. Maybe someone had died. I shook my head. No, no more deaths. Fabian had been the first and the last.

"Is it dad?" I asked, suddenly realizing my father wasn't here. "Is—is dad...?"

"Your father is fine," Mother said, taking my hand with great care as if she were afraid it'd break. Then, she took a deep breath in. "You need to be really strong right now, okay? You can't react badly to what I'm going to say because if you get any sicker—I'll—" she stopped, closing her eyes momentarily.

When she opened them, they were shining with tears.

"Mum, tell me."

And so she did. I wasn't the only one who'd been really hurt. Ariadne had too. Her injuries had been much worse than mine, although my mother didn't really specify, and while they had taken her to St. Mungo's so she'd have even better care than here, Ariadne hadn't made it. She died three days ago. And Christian... Christian got hit with a killing curse that Holy Saturday. His body was one of the firsts they found. Authorities didn't think the curse had been aimed for him. Wrong place, wrong time they said.

I couldn't breathe. I hadn't even gotten a chance to say goodbye. One last 'I love you', at the very least. I felt nothing. I felt everything.

"We put them to rest together," my mother continued. More tears fell. I just looked at one spot on the grey blanket. "Back in the church at home. Next to grandparents."

"You gave a funeral without me?" I asked, not really thinking.

"No. No funeral." My mother shook her head. "We'll do a memorial once you get better."

"Can you all, please, leave?" I asked, finally snapping myself out of the staring contest with my blanket. "I'm really tired, just want to be alone for a while."

My mother looked unconvinced, but she didn't push it. "Okay," she sighed, kissing my forehead. "Come on, say goodbye." She signalled my friends over.

Lily got to me first. She hugged me really close, mumbled an 'I'm really sorry, Mere' and scurried away. Sirius hesitated, eyes jumping from my mother and then back to me. Apparently, he had no problem remembering her warning words to him. After it became apparent that my mother wouldn't hit him with a stick for simply looking at me, he walked closer to my bed, going as far as sitting on the edge of it. He met my eyes and for a moment I thought he would kiss me. I was ready to push him away—I'd just found out my siblings had died, it was not time for kissing—but all he did was press a kiss to my forehead.

"I'll come back tomorrow," he said, thumb stroking my cheek.

"Do you want your jumper back?" I asked instead.

He could come back tomorrow, that didn't mean I'd like to have visitors. Sirius shook his head. After he left, my mum turned to James expectantly.

"I'm not leaving." James shook his head.

"James." My mother requested, although it was more an order than a request.

"No."

"James, please." I asked. "I just want to sleep, I'm tired. I won't be any fun."

"You bled out in my arms, Meredith!" he exclaimed, meeting my eyes with red-rimmed ones. "I literally felt your heart stop because you didn't have enough blood or whatever. It took three different healers to get you back to life. Three. And even then they said you most likely wouldn't make it." He shook his head again. "You died, Meredith. You died."

His voice broke at the end. His eyes kept locked with mine and while I desperately wanted to look away, I didn't. Or maybe I couldn't. Suddenly, I was seeing James Potter in a whole new light. I had no idea he'd gone through that. I had no idea he loved me this much. He'd grown up so much this last year; long gone was the James who had pouted at me because he couldn't have a new broom. That James would have never been able to carry his dying cousin to safety; he would have been too flustered. He had aged a hundred years and had become younger as well, somehow, as if time when it came to him was circular, not lineal. This James Potter could move mountains, walk through fire for the people he loved. I could see it in his tearful eyes.

I took a sharp breath in, suddenly remembering. Because this James was the one I'd seen moments before I finally gave in to the darkness that day, moments before I died. And I was suddenly very, very afraid because this James was the stupid enough to fight him. To fight Voldemort. And I desperately didn't want him to. I'd already lost too much.

James sighed and got up, apparently taking my prolonged silence as a sign that he had to leave.

"Don't," I whispered, voice too raspy to really manage anything higher.

Scooting to one side of the bed, with less difficulty than I thought, I patted the spot next to me, basically pulling James into the bed with me. He half sat, half laid next to me. I lowered my head until it was on his shoulder, right arm around his torso in a half-embrace.

"I didn't know that." I admitted as an apology.

"They didn't want you to." James sniffed, putting his free arm around my shoulders. "They said it could have a negative effect on you and your recovery."

My mother sighed, gracing us with one last look before she disappeared behind the curtain, leaving me and my cousin alone.

"How come you were all here anyways?" I asked. "I thought visitors wouldn't be allowed."

"They made an exception." James admitted. I felt his voice vibrating on his chest. "You kept talking in your sleep this past few days; our names were there multiple times so they'd just figured our presence could help you recover."

My eyes, which had been slowly closing thanks to James' comforting voice, snapped opened at that. My mind went back to the horrible visions I had had and I was certain my calling for James and then Lily had nothing to do with me unconsciously needing them and more to do with me wanting to warn anyone who would listen. Fear suddenly gripped me, not helping at all with the pressure on my chest the grief I felt was creating. Because Sirius had been here when I woke up, which meant I'd probably asked for him as well, which meant he had been part of my visions. I did my waiting; twelve years of it, in Azkaban! I hadn't known whose words those belonged to but I'd known it sounded really familiar. Could it be...? No, I yelled at myself.

"Did I—" I started, clearing my throat. "Did I ask for Sirius as well?"

There was a pause before James answered. "No, but he wouldn't stand still until they let him in."

"Oh, thank god." I relaxed.

It had been nothing but a false alarm. Sirius would be fine. James misinterpreted my words.

"Don't be like that, Meredith." I could hear the frown in his voice even if I couldn't see it. "He's barely slept, that's how worried he's been."

His words produced a weird tingling sensation all over my body. If I didn't know better, I'd say it was giddiness. I lifted my head up to look at him and try as I may I didn't see anything but absolute honesty in his face. And worry and sadness. I wondered if those would ever go away.

"Really?" I asked, trying to keep any sighs of hope away from my voice.

I didn't fool James, however, because when he nodded, he sent me a very knowing look. I bit my lip, trying not to smile. This was not time for smiling; today there would be no smiling coming from me. My family was down two members and I didn't really know what to do with that. I was extremely sad and I desperately wanted to cry to relieve some of the pressure that seemed to be drowning me but the tears wouldn't come.

"You scared the shit out of me," James said after a few seconds. "You're like my little sister."

"We're the same age." I pointed out.

"You know what I mean." He rolled his eyes slightly.

"I love you too, James." I answered, resting my head on his shoulder once more.

It took another whole week before I could stand for more than five minutes before feeling like I was going to faint, another more before I could walk more than ten steps before actually almost fainting. The healers, which were now just Arcadius, the one who had been assigned my case and Madam Pomfrey, were reluctant to discharge me as they knew very well Hogwarts wasn't exactly small. If I couldn't walk for a long period of time, there was literally no way I'd be able to get to class. It didn't help that the deepest one of my cuts kept reopening if I stretched too much. In other news, recovery was hell.

That was why I asked to go home. My friends kept showing up with chocolate and flowers and sympathetic smiles. And I kept asking them repeatedly to leave. I didn't want their pity. Whenever they visited, they'd start to laugh and suddenly remember, hey, her siblings died, let's be respectful. They didn't realize that their laughing and suddenly stopping while glancing at me cautiously made me feel even worse. They didn't know what to do with themselves. And I was too busy trying to fix me to tell them what to do. My mother didn't think it'd be a good idea, me going home, and neither did Professor Dumbledore. The school year would end soon and I had to sit for my exams, so I had to stay in Hogwarts.

At this point, the memorial for Ari and Christian took place in the first half of May, the tenth of May, early in the morning. Professor Dumbledore gathered us all together and said a few words of encouragement. He expressed his condolences to my family and a few others that had also perished in the attack. And then he asked if anyone wanted to say something. So many students got up and spoke about Ari and Christian and Henry, a fourth year Ravenclaw, and Dana, another Gryffindor, who had died as well. I turned it all into white noise.

It was my first day back to school and a bunch of people crying over my brother and sister wasn't exactly helping with my morale. Long story short, I didn't touch my breakfast or talked to anyone, really. I just stared at nothing as I leaned my chin on my propped up hand.

"You need to eat." Lily admonished me.

I blinked and turned to her, her words snapping me out of my gloomy thoughts. With a start, I realized all of them were looking at me almost like they were afraid I'd break down any moment. I rolled my eyes, poking the scrambled eggs in my plate with my fork.

"Okay, everybody, listen." I sighed. "I feel fine. I'm not dizzy or in pain. My hand doesn't hurt when I use it, neither does my leg. My side is sensitive but fine. Yes, I'm sad. No, I'm not going to break. So can you please stop looking at me like I'm mad?"

"We're just worried." Remus let me know.

"I know and I appreciate it. But tiptoeing around me will not make me forget the situation." I finally admitted, raising my eyebrows slightly.

"But being a bitch will?" Peter scoffed.

Everyone turned to him with widened eyes. Besides me, Marlene flinched. I gaped at him in surprise.

"Excuse me?" I asked.

"You have been kind of harsh towards us, Mere." Dorcas hesitated, looking at me with hurt eyes.

Oh, my god. Were they being serious right now? My body had been severely injured; I'd spent the last month and a half in the bloody hospital, terrified of falling asleep for too long in case I died out of septic shock or some scary shit. My brother and sister, who had basically taught me everything, were dead, five feet under. And I'd been so sick I hadn't even been able to say goodbye to them before they were buried. Not to mention the aftermath of the trauma I went through, completely unprepared, to top it off. Of course I didn't want to go around talking to everyone and chilling like nothing had happened!

"And you need us, even if you don't want to admit it." Remus explained.

"Yeah, especially now," Peter nodded, interrupting Remus mid-sentence. "That everyone you love seems to just..."

At this he trailed off, his mind finally connecting with his mouth. Or maybe it had to do with the fact that Sirius, very obviously, had kicked him under the table very hard, if his flinch of pain was anything to go by. Peter turned to Sirius, most likely ready to ask him what the hell he was doing. Sirius just frowned at him very, very hard, eyes deadly serious, until Peter caught up with his mistake. His eyes widened and he turned to me with regret all over his features.

"No, please, do continue." I nearly growled at him. "Seem to what? Be dropping like flies? Is that what you wanted to say?" I snapped with as much venom in my voice as I could.

No wonder I'd never liked Peter. He was a brat. Or a dick. Most likely a dick.

"Meredith, that's not what he meant." Lily started to shake her head.

"Whatever." I mumbled, getting up and starting to walk away.

"Where are you going?" James called to me.

"Leave me alone." I snapped.

I hadn't gotten too far when I heard the distinctive sound of flesh hitting flesh, a yelp, and then James saying:

"Real smooth, mate."

I was now in Ancient Runes, piece of parchment in front of me, quill in hand. It was the first exam of the finals and I was screwed. All the students were hunched over their sheets, writing furiously. The girl in front of me, a ginger Slytherin, was in the middle of eating the end of her quill absentmindedly. I wondered if that meant she was just as lost as me but one sly glance at her parchment let me know she was actually already halfway through and was simply thinking her answer.

I looked down at my piece of parchment again, biting the inside of my cheek. The only thing written on it was: Meredith Potter, May the eleventh, nineteen-seventy-seven, and the exam questions I was supposed to answer. We had ninety minutes to answer the very long exam. Currently, it was minute sixty-five and I'd written nada. I was great at reading the future using runes. I could talk about that for hours. But Professor Babbling wanted us to write how to use said runes to create bounding spells and fix things and blood curses and things like that.

I sneaked a glance at Sirius, who was sitting to my right. He was relaxed as could be, leaning back on his chair, right hand writing down the answer to question thirty. He was almost finished. My eyes jumped to Professor Babbling, whose eyes were swimming around the classroom carefully. It was a big classroom, though, and I was in the last row. My eyes went back to Sirius.

I could so easily just copy off of him. Nobody had to know. I could just change some words here and there so it wouldn't look exactly the same as his exam and be done with it. We'd both get an Outstanding, nothing unusual about that. But I had never copied before and I couldn't exactly tap him on the shoulder so he'd go back to page one so I could answer the first questions, could I? I huffed, going back to my own parchment.

I could do this by myself, I decided. So I went back to the first question, thinking really, really hard about the answer. But then I realized there was no point. I didn't know what would happen if you draw Isa and Naudiz and Uruz together. I knew in Divination it wouldn't exactly be a good combination, but I didn't know what I could do with it. Could I make a door lock forever? Could I accidentally kill somebody? I had absolutely no idea. So, I just went straight to question number two, draw down every single rune there was in the Elder Futhark, plus their alphabetized meaning and got up.

I felt Sirius's eyes on me all the way down to Professor Babbling's desk, where I silently handed her my mostly empty exam. She looked down at it and then back at me, eyebrows furrowed together. I knew what she was thinking. I had never handed an empty exam sheet.

"Are you sure about this, Miss Potter?" she asked.

"That's all I remember." I shrugged, hearing the sadness in my voice.

"Very well." She sighed.

I watched as she checked question number two as correct, and turned the pages around, sighing once more when she realized I truly hadn't written anything. I could feel the hard beating of my heart on my throat as she wrote a T at the top of the parchment. I very nearly ran out of the classroom. Instead, I managed to keep my composure until the door closed behind me. And then I ran. The school was nearly empty, almost everyone was still in class, so it wasn't hard for me to ran down hallways and stairs until I reached the school grounds. The moment my shoes touched grass I stopped, breathing heavily through my mouth.

I sat under the beech tree by the Black Lake, school bag thrown somewhere to my left, wand in hand. My wand was made out of yew, dragon heartstring core. I remembered the day I got it like it'd been yesterday. My mother had a fir wand, my father, a larch one. Christian and Ariadne had both had Elm wands. All four of them had unicorn cores. So, naturally, when my time came to get a wand, Mr. Ollivander focused on giving me fir wands and Elm wands and even one larch one. All with unicorn cores. And none of them worked properly. So then he passed me the same wood, different core. Still nothing. It was a curious thing; most families had similar wands within them. We spent fifteen minutes in the shop, until I looked to my right and pointed at one of the wand boxes and said:

"What about that one?" I had asked in the most confident voice my eleven year old self could muster.

Mr. Ollivander had been ecstatic over my initiative and had quickly handed me said wand. It was a perfect match. When Mr. Ollivander let me know it was made out of yew and dragon core, Christian had joked about how that meant I was secretly evil. I had been extremely freaked out about that, so much, that Mr. Ollivander had rushed to explain to me how my wand just meant I would be a natural in protective and defensive spells, good in both light and dark arts. He said I'd be brilliant, especially at duelling.

The whole thing was quite ironic, wasn't it? I bet my poor wand spent the entirety of Holy Saturday face-palming itself over my ineptitude. Right now it was probably wishing it'd chosen someone better six years ago. Because I was not brilliant, not really. What good was it, knowing how to turn a parrot into a teapot and a teapot into a mirror if I couldn't fight for my life? What good was it, knowing how to make things fly and conjure things to me and make things bigger on the inside and know all the theory in the world on how to cast the best protective spells if I couldn't protect the people I cared about? If my mind went completely blank at the face of danger?

Had I been better, Ariadne might have never gotten hurt, Christian might not have died, James wouldn't have had to carry me to safety. I would have been okay; my family could have been alive. Instead I had freaked out, I hadn't paid enough attention and I had gotten hurt. Not to mention I got a Troll today. A TROLL. I had never ever in my six years of education gotten anything below an Exceeding Expectations. At this rate, I would be laughed out of the Auror Academy.

As I hugged my knees, resting my chin above them, I finally began to cry. I hadn't cried at all since my mum had given me the devastating news of the twins passing. I had been given and experienced many reasons to cry this past weeks but apparently all that was needed to finally set me off, to relieve some of the crushing pressure in my chest, was the knowledge that I had failed a test.

Time passed fast and before I knew it, it was almost nightfall, which meant I was about to miss dinner, which also meant there was no way I could sneak back into the castle without being noticed. Great now I would have a Troll and detention handed to me on the same day. That realization only made me cry harder.

I didn't stop crying at all until I heard a twig snap behind me. I rolled my eyes, assuming it was one of my friends. Nobody else would approach a crying girl deliberately, that I had learnt after Sirius and I broke up.

"Go away." I called over my shoulder, not moving from my current position. My voice was tearful.

There was a moment of silence on the other end. And then I heard more ruffling. I frowned in confusion. Why were they not answering? Being all quiet and sitting silently next to someone did not mean 'go away'. At the very least they could grace me with a 'no' instead of being incredibly creepy. My heart stopped when I heard a small growl.

"This is definitely not my year." I deadpanned as I finally turned my face to look to my left.

Because sitting not too far away from me was a huge black dog. It was the same animal I'd mistaken for a wolf when I saw it out my window that brisk morning, what felt like ages ago now. It was a perfect replica of the shaggy black dog I kept drawing in the corners of my notebooks. It was my patronus. It was the Grim.

All I got as a response was a loud bark.

A/N:This chapter is so heavy, jesus christ. It's not even that long but wow I feel like I aged ten years just proof-reading it. Raise your hand in the air if you know what the ending is about 0/

anyways, bye.