The first night in the hospital was anxiety-inducing. There was a privacy curtain around my bed and I kept imagining that I saw shadows of people standing directly behind it. I finally drifted off to sleep only to jolt awake, I believe just a few hours later. It was now pitch black, I couldn't see the privacy curtain, much less the shapes of objects behind it. Somewhere in the distance, a baby was crying. I wondered why the night lights had been turned off. It didn't seem like a magic hospital should have to save power by shutting them off. Suddenly, there was a loud thud and I jumped and instantly my bed was surrounded by light. I poked my head out from behind my curtain. Light spilled out of the curtain. Not into the curtain and onto my bed, but out into the room. It shone onto another patient, who was standing next to his bed and clutching their foot. I closed the privacy curtain again and returned to bed, the light dimming as I fell back asleep.

I was in the hospital for two weeks, time mostly spent reading and making notes in my textbooks. The reality of the situation dawned on me as it began to seem unlikely to me that I could successfully dream up so many days of such consistent length. I realized that, in less than a month, I would be meeting many characters from the actual Harry Potter books! Not to mention the fact that I'd already spoken face-to-face with Professor McGonagall, but that was when I was still entirely convinced I was in a coma. One day, I was reading The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection when a thought occurred to me.

I'm changing this world just by being in it, I thought. I could fix the stuff I don't like about the story. I could save Sirius Black. I could free the house elves. I could overthrow the Ministry of Magic and implement an anarchist utopia. Obviously, I wasn't going to be able to do all those things myself, but if I changed the right small things – I reasoned – the butterfly effect would take care of the rest. It would certainly help that I knew how this story was supposed to go.

My capacity for magic had also come as a great relief to me, since I wouldn't have to worry about turning out to be a muggle after all, though it was more frustrating to have so little control over it than I was expecting. Maybe if you're a kid and you don't understand what's happening, it's not such a big deal. For me, every time I got startled or frustrated and I accidentally apparated or made something glow, it felt like a spasm. Little bursts, sometimes so slight you wouldn't notice if you weren't expecting it, every day with every strong emotion I felt and pubescent children experience a lot of strong emotions. One time, the patient next to me was left pink roses, reminding me of my girlfriend, Rosa. I cried gallons, forming a small pond around my bed, and I couldn't tell anyone why.

When the two weeks were up and no one had come forward as my parents, the healer came into my room to tell me I would be meeting the foster parents this afternoon. I was very frustrated that I needed to have a babysitter when I felt perfectly capable of getting by on my own. When the time came, I went with the healer down to the fifth floor, where the visitor's tearoom was. Waiting for us at a table covered in paperwork, there was a short woman with long, frizzy orange hair that was beginning to go white.

"Branchus, this is Ms. Freddie Frank," the healer said. "Do you think you'll be okay to leave with her today?" Something about his tone made me roll my eyes.

"I'm not some scared little kid," I said, sounding more like a little kid than I think I ever have. "I just want to be out of this damn hospital." Ms. Frank gave a short but friendly laugh.

"I'm sorry you've been all cooped up so long," she said. She seemed like a very regular lady to me, which was almost disappointing. "I hear you haven't gotten your school robes or your wand." When my school robes were delivered, I was given some casual robes for daily wear (I couldn't exactly go around in the same ripped up jeans and hoodie all my life), which were fine enough, but a little short on me because Branchus was rather tall for his age.

"Yeah," I said. "I guess I don't have to figure out how to afford those with my five sickles now." Frank laughed again, though I didn't think my joke was very funny.

"Nope, you're pretty much covered from here on out," she said with a wink.

x x x

We travelled to Diagon Alley by floo powder, which I took to much better than Harry had in the books. Maybe it was because I'd been a bit of a smoker back home or that I liked to spin around in circles a lot as a kid, but I didn't find it nearly as disorienting or difficult to breathe as I was worried I might. We got my robes first, saving the best for last and all that. They weren't really how they looked in the movies, which is to say that wizard robes do not resemble muggle school uniforms. There was a close fitting garment which resembled a plain dress more than anything else, a looser robe with many pockets to be worn overtop and covered the under-robe almost entirely, and a winter cloak so heavy it was almost difficult to walk in. I was very glad to not have a very firm grasp on wizard money because I was sure the price tag for so many tailored pieces (some of which were required in multiple) would be truly gasp-inducing.

After I had my robes, I walked – so gleefully and light that I felt like I was floating and may have been – with Frank to Ollivander's. I grasped her hand and squeezed, because I couldn't say in words how I was feeling, and she smiled and I felt, somehow, that I was in the presence of my mother and that everything was right.

Walking into a place you've always dreamed to go to can be a complicated experience. On one hand, there's the elation for a fantasy that is coming true. The tall shelves full of wands – full of potential – partially concealed a man who, until now, had only existed in legend for me. I could feel the power bound up in the small space. On the other hand, one can't help but notice the things one was not imagining, like the stench of wood polish or the uncomfortably damp air. Nevertheless, I couldn't help but grin when Olivander himself approached the front desk to greet us. I guess my expression was contagious, because he cracked a fatherly smile when we came into his view.

"Put off getting our school things, did we?" he said jokingly.

"I've been in hospital," I said by way of explanation. I don't always know what I'm supposed to say to the random observations of adults. 'You're not supposed to be doing that', 'you're late for class', 'that's not what the staple gun is for'. Like, it's great that you noticed, but what has that got to do with me? I was thinking about this problem when I abruptly noticed that Olivander and Frank had been talking to each other for several minutes and were now waiting for me to answer a question.

"Oh, yes," I said, hoping that was the right answer (or at least a coherent one). It apparently was because I simply nodded with a smile and disappeared to get some wands. You got away with it this time, Vivian.

I wasn't surprised when the first wand didn't have any effect. I was surprised when the third one had no effect, since that totally broke the rules of three. I was even more surprised when the fifth didn't work but somewhat less surprised when the seventh didn't. Clearly, I was becoming visually agitated because Olivander said "don't fret, don't fret. It's perfectly normal for some wizards to take longer to match with a wand."

I'd entirely stopped listening to the wand descriptions when he handed me a long, intricately carved wand the colour of bone.

"What did you say this was?" I asked.

"Aspen, fourteen inches, dragon heartstring core," he said. "Unyielding."

I reached out and took the wand. As soon as my skin touched the pale wood, I was flooded with warmth. It was as though I was meeting a part of my body that I hadn't realized was missing.

"A wand for a big personality," Olivander said as Frank paid.

"Thank you," I said, my eyes transfixed on the wand. "For the wand, I mean." Leaving the shop, I felt a surge of confidence in myself. I am a wizard.

We arrived at the foster home very quickly, since it was just off of Diagon alley. "That way we don't have to worry about the little kids accidentally doing magic in front of muggles," Frank explained, though I certainly wasn't complaining. There were three other kids living in the house, all of whom were too young to have gotten their Hogwarts letter yet. They were introduced to me as Shaun, Abigail, and Sophie. I got a small room on the top floor to myself where I set out my few possessions – my school books on a shelf and my school robes in the wardrobe. As soon as my things were the way I wanted them to be, I got right back to studying. I wanted to master a couple spells on the off chance I got into a duel. Technically, we're not allowed to use magic outside school, but I happened to be aware that that rule was enforced based on location and it would be hard to tell if a minor was doing magic in the middle of Diagon Alley. I was throwing books in the air and trying to use a shield charm to stop them falling on my face when there was a knock at the door and Frank walked in. I quickly put my wand behind my back, but not quickly enough.

"I heard thudding. Are you-" she cut herself off. "Have you been doing magic?" she said in a playfully suspicious tone.

"No," I lied. You can't trick me with your little 'pretend not to disapprove so I'll give myself over' routine. She smiled knowingly at me.

"Just so you know," she said. "You're not allowed to purposefully use magic outside school. Don't make me confiscate your wand." I couldn't help it, this made me fume.

"It's just a shield charm!" I protested, sitting on the bed in a huff. Noticing how whiny my voice sounded, I tried to make it softer. "Come on, my first memory is being hit by a car. Let me have this." Frank sighed and sat next to me on the bed.

"I know you only want to protect yourself," she said softly. She was quiet for a long moment. It struck me how unsure she was. I'd always thought grown-ups just know how to deal with kids. "Keep it in your room," she said finally. "And don't go bragging about it to the other kids."

"Thank you," I squealed, wrapping my arms around her. She seemed surprised, so I quickly pulled back. "Er, sorry."

"No need to apologize,' she said hastily. "I'm glad you seem so comfortable here." She was on her way out the door when I had a sudden thought.

"What sort of kids usually come here?" I asked.

"Children go into foster care for lots of reasons," said Frank, apparently taken aback by the question. "Sometimes it's kids like you, with no known relatives. Sometimes it's muggle parents who don't want a magical child. Often it's because the birth parents aren't in a place where they can care for a child."

I nodded. I'd wondered how common it was for muggle-born and squib kids to come to magical foster care, but it seemed rude to ask outright.

"Dinner is at six," was the last thing she said to me before closing my door to leave me to my illegal magic.

x x x

I quickly found that my favourite subjects were herbology and potions. I loved the idea of magic that could be saved until the user needed it, that could be tended to and crafted. I greatly looked forward to taking ancient runes in third year. I considered asking Frank if I could get extra potions ingredients for my personal use, but I didn't want to trouble her for the money. I would just have to wait for the school year to put the instructions into practice. In the meantime, I felt a little thrill in trying to know the ingredients better than Hermione Granger did.

I felt that my knockback jinx was coming along nicely, as I had managed to get several small items to fly across the room, but I struggled much more with the shield charm. By the end of the summer, my face was covered in bruises which – just before we were about to leave to catch the train to Hogwarts – Frank decided to do something about.

"I won't have you going to school on your first day looking like a brawler," she said as grabbed my cheeks and poked her wand at each of the bruises on my face. I personally didn't mind looking like a brawler, but I had to admit dropping books on my face wasn't a story I wanted to tell. As soon as I was presentable again, we were off, my mind travelling to all I would accomplish at Hogwarts – academic or otherwise.

Author's note: Thank you to all who have decided to follow this story after only one chapter! I honestly didn't expect this to get any attention at all, so the fact that a few people have shown interest is really a pleasant surprise. Please let me know how you feel about my original characters, as well as my portrayal of the official ones once we get to Hogwarts. I feel I struggle a bit with character voice, so tips are much appreciated! :)