Addie didn't understand lots of things. She didn't understand why people insisted so much on making eye contact with her, she didn't understand why people constantly told her that she looked depressed and she didn't understand why nobody wanted to talk to her. However, to her, these were all facts of life that due to the persistency of others, had ceased to affect her.

Since arriving at Hogwarts however, there was a rather more significant fact of life that she did not understand and did not want to become permanent. She did not understand why her brother hated her. As children they had been as thick as thieves – albeit not guilty of quite as many crimes as the neighbour accused them – and had always been there to support one another. They had been each other's entire support system. She had been ok with the fact that Dudley chased away all other potential friends, for she had Harry. When she had Harry, what did she need with another friend?

He had not only been essential to her for companionship, he had also been her champion. Aunt Petunia had never engaged with the special education unit at their primary school so she had not always had what she needed to succeed.

Aunt Petunia had only really given a care about how she would cope at school when she had realised that there was no such unit at Hogwarts. Before she had got on the train, Aunt Petunia had handed her a toiletry bag and made her promise to take care of it.

"I remember what your mother said about that school and how unruly everyone is, and I may not want either of you to go, but I also don't want you to make a fool of yourself. You must try and make everyone think you are normal. This is a new chance for you. I don't want to hear about you crying because someone makes a noise you don't like. You're on your own from now on. There isn't a pupil support system or educational psychologist like there was at your last school." Then she said something that Addie didn't quite catch, but she thought sounded like "He managed" and then something else she didn't catch.

Addie had the wash bag in her school bag now. She had opened it at the first chance she had had on the train and it contained a few sets of reusable ear plugs, some sunglasses, a sleep eye mask, a reading ruler, a tiny pair of scissors and a pack of pencil grips in different sizes. She had to admit that these had all been very useful to her up to this point. Except the pencil grips, that was.

Harry had been aware of the fact that this was all she had to help her at a new school. He had been fully aware of the lack of pupil support and the general view of wizards that mental health and disabilities beyond the physical were entirely mythical. Knowing all this, he had just left her on the train. Alone. She had turned around for a moment on the train, and the next moment, he was gone. She had spent the journey reading a book that she was not interested in and worrying about him. When the food trolley had arrived, she had bought a selection of snacks that she thought he might like and had endeavoured to save them until she saw him next. The next time she had seen him, it had been when they were waiting to be sorted. She had stood at rest beside him, as it had been perfectly acceptable to do throughout their childhood. She had tried to talk to him about what the sorting ceremony (which sounded hellish) would involve and tried not to cringe at Ron Weasley's suggestion of having to fight a magical creature. First of all he had ignored her, and she had assumed that this was on account of it being loud. Therefore, she had tried again, slightly louder. He had definitely heard her that time and was clearly not surprised to see her, so of course he had known her to have been there the entire time. He had turned to say something to Weasley, who had then given her a funny look before they both pointedly ignored her.

In that moment, all she had felt was anger. All they had been through together during their childhood, and he could not even do her the courtesy of letting her know that he would be abandoning her in favour of a person he had known since that morning. She understood – of course she understood – that she was a difficult person to be around. She had always reacted differently to situations than most people. She was averse to noise and smells and the sun (oh why did it torture her so?) and she reacted strongly to things that she felt were important to her. It had been through a hunger strike that she had been able to convince Aunt Petunia to cease forcing her to eat meat and fish when she was given meat at all. She of course knew how lucky she was to be fed sometimes, but meat and fish had always been overly chewy to her, and after a talk about factory farming at school (which Uncle Vernon had described as propaganda from the vegetable lobby) she had had ethical concerns as well. Harry had tried to understand, she knew that he had, but he couldn't understand her angle that she would rather not eat than have animals suffer. After she had started wasting away, she had begun to simply give her chickpeas instead of meat. Addie happened to be a big fan of beans and legumes, so this was not a hardship to her.

Conversely, Harry was quite happy to try and fit in as much as possible – to take the path of least resistance – which generally spared him from Aunt Petunia's vitriol and enabled him to live a comparatively easy life. So many times in their childhood, he had asked her to let things go. Addie had heard the phrase "choose your battles" and Harry seemed to take this motto on board, while also modifying it to be "choose no battles and conform at all costs" which Addie thought really lost something from the original.

Addie would have understood if he had told her that he wanted them to be less joined at the hip once they arrived at school. She would have honestly welcomed it really. They had different interests, they had different social styles and they were actually different people, no matter what people had previously said about them being the same person. Now they were their own people, and Adelaide was disappointed to learn that to Harry, this meant not associating with each other.

Addie didn't know what had changed, but something must have. She found herself often recalling the final days in which he had acknowledged her existence. It had been their final day at The Dursleys, and the two of them had been tasked with sorting through the kitchen cupboards. Aunt Petunia's cleanliness was really for show only. If the neighbours, guests of herself or Vernon or friends of Dudley's could see the mess, it was a disgrace. If it was easily hideable and not of interest to anything else such as flour, sugar, her deceased sister's children or cereal and easily concealed in a cupboard, she paid it little mind. The mess in the baking cupboard had therefore been building up for a long time, and Aunt Petunia had wanted them to organise it before they left. The Dursleys had been outside enjoying the sunny late August afternoon and had left them to their own devices so they had been able to talk as much and loudly as they wanted.

During their Primary School days, they had spent almost every minute of every day together, so that summer day, they had ended up talking about things that they had talked about countless times before. This mainly involved the many times that they had managed to outfox Dudley. Magic had also still been a recent revelation to both of them, so in slightly quieter voices, they had discussed what it would be like to be away from the Dursleys: all the friends that they would make, the things they would learn. Throughout their conversations they had constantly checked to ensure that Aunt Petunia was not standing at the door with Pimm's in hand waiting to find something to chastise them for. What had changed between those moments, Addie did not know. One moment they had been perfectly satisfied with each other's company and eagerly anticipating making friends at school, and the next, it was like they didn't know each other at all.

"What are you doing here?" she was in a secluded area, yes, but that didn't mean that people did not sometimes come across her. Usually they would just ignore her, and she was quite content with being ignored. Usually it was just the people who knew about it being an alternate route somewhere so she only usually had to deal with teachers and older students, who had initially looked at her with surprise, but now just said 'well carry on then' incredibly awkwardly before going on about their day. This time, however, it was Hermione Granger.

"Reading," she said, holding up her copy of A Concise History of the Number 7 in Just 777 Pages, which although an arithmancy book, was mostly history (thus the name) and more up her alley than pure arithmancy probably was.

"Why are you reading that? You're not really very clever are you? I never see you raising your hand in class."

"Why on earth would I want to raise my hand in class?"

"So that the teacher knows that you know the answer."

"Why would I want the teacher to know that?"

"So that you can tell them the answer."

"Then I don't want them to know that I know the answer."

"Why."

They were clearly going round in circles, as they did in every conversation.

Addie was still able to recall clearly what her first meeting with Hermione Granger had been like. She had been on her own in a compartment on the Hogwarts Express, moping. The trolley had just come round so she had eaten her weight in chocolate. She had also opened a chocolate frog, but and had been so scared that she had not opened another. She hadn't been sure where chocolate frogs fell on the scale of sentience. Did they feel pain? She had been going between these two subjects, when the compartment door had suddenly opened.

"Have you seen a toad?" a voice had come from just outside it. Looking up, Addie had observed the girl who had asked the question. She had been already in her uniform, making her wonder whether she should have got changed sooner. A brown haired boy was loitering behind her looking anxious.

"No, sorry," she had replied meekly. She had been tempted to say that if she did see one, she would tell a prefect, but that would have been a lie. Even if she had at that time known who the prefects were or indeed that there were prefects at all, she would have not willingly approached them. She had not said what she was thinking though, as she had known that what she was thinking was selfish.

"You're a first year as well then," the girl had continued. She had clearly noticed that Addie's tie on her robes, which were lying on the seat beside her, was still plain.

"Yes," she had replied, hoping more than anything that the girl would go away soon and stop making very intense eye contact with her.

"What house do you hope to be in?"

"Don't really mind. They all sound interesting," she had said apathetically. At a certain point in the summer, she had conjectured with Harry as to what being at Hogwarts would be like. She had flicked through Hogwarts a History and had mostly felt glad to be leaving Privet Drive.

"I hope to be in Gryffindor, myself. Lots of great wizards have been in Gryffindor and I see myself in the description."

"Hmm," at that moment her eye contact, which she had been working so hard to maintain slipped. She had been going through the motions, which had served her well in the past, but she wasn't used to someone having such intense eye contact.

"I've already read all the books and have written thorough summaries…" the girl had continued, before noticing that Addie was no longer making her previously formulaic eye contact which usually passed the expected standard. "You really ought to make eye contact, you know.

"I…"

"People will think that you're up to no good if you don't. My parents are dentists and they say that eye contact tells you a lot about a person. A good person who is honest and well-meaning will always keep eye contact."

Addie at last managed to resume usual business and smiled cooly at the girl. "Yes, I've heard that one before."

She had heard that specific line more times than she could count. When she had been a small child, eye contact had not been as difficult as she had not yet had her first understanding of what it was to be embarrassed. She had also been shorter, and it was more acceptable for her to not make eye contact. Nowadays, however, making eye contact was akin to sticking her hand in a blender. The girl and her shadow had then left, presumably to pester other people.

Present day Hermione looked at her in the same piercing manner as she waited for Addie to answer her question. Addie on the other hand did not feel as though this was a line of questioning that she wanted to continue, so she merely said, "Just because." She knew that it was not really an answer, but Hermione Granger was one of the most exhausting people she had ever met. Her educational psychologist had had nothing on an eleven-year-old girl with 1001 questions.

Hermione clearly realised that that part of the conversation had reached a plateau so changed her conversation to the matter of Addie's book.

"I assume that you've put a dust jacket on another book so you look like you're cleverer than you actually are," she said nastily. "No one our age could read this book. It's designed for fifth years."

Addie held her book up at the current page, adjusted her reading ruler, and started to read. "The Number Seven in Fiction. The number seven has had significant mention in fiction, especially that of muggle origins. The muggles do not seem to understand its relevance and instead relegate it to a mere plot device. Indeed, in the very popular Discworld books by British muggle author Terry Pratchett, the number seven is substituted with the number eight, and refers to the eighth colour. This colour is rather humorously the colour of magic 'octarine' which can only be seen by magic users. Even the protagonist of the first Discworld book, The Colour of Magic, a rather mediocre wizard called Rincewind…"

"Hmph," Hermione said, before leaving Addie alone with her thoughts. Addie didn't really like Hermione. Her first meeting with her had been unpleasant to say the least, but she was entirely willing to try and get on with people before she didn't. It took a lot of effort to dislike someone. She knew she frustrated Hermione. Hermione was an all rounder. She found joy in all books, no matter their content, and while they had sat together in the library in the beginning, she now preferred to hang out with Harry and Ron. Now she made the same strange facial expression as Ron did when she looked at her. Addie had tried not to be jealous. She had thought that Harry's abandonment of her was a boy thing, but now he had a friend who was a girl who he didn't ignore. He only ignored his sister. This confirmed her theory that she had done something very wrong, that had hurt him.

She decided to move from her spot and go for a walk around the castle. She generally knew where to go if you wanted to avoid seeing any other living person. She had yet to figure out how to avoid ghosts, but she was working on it. Eventually, she came to a stop outside the trophy room. The most frequently viewed trophies and awards were kept at the very front of the room in a glass case and there, on the very first one she looked at it said:

James Potter

Chaser

1974-78

Seeing it there in silver and more silver made it even more real than it had been when Neville had mentioned it. Harry had known about this, that there was something that she might have wanted to have known about their dead dad, and he had kept it to himself. At this point she was no longer surprised, but she was still disappointed.