Hey! It has been a couple of years since I posted because guess what? I am a teacher now! I just could not maintain getting a degree and drafting a story on top of each other. I hope you all enjoy this story and that you leave me some reviews (: - Rex

The train to Hogwarts was red. Not just any red either, this train was scarlet. Hermione personally had never seen a red train before. As she stood on the platform taking in all the bold redness of the train, she happened to accidentally lock eyes with a boy. This boy was a little bit taller than her; he had eyes the color of ice and hair that looked as if it could be mistaken for snow. Hermione absently stared at the boy vaguely wondering if Jack Frost was real and this boy somehow one of his decedents. Surely, he had to be part magical creature of some kind for she had never seen a boy with a face so pretty and sharp as a glass statue. Suddenly, the train's horn blew, forcing Hermione to look away from the boy and make her way to the train. She had already said goodbye to her parents. The professor had told them that her parents would not be able to see the train, and that there was magic around it that would make them uncomfortable. This meant that she was forced to get herself onto the train alone.

A few minutes later Hermione walked through the train isles looking for a place to sit. She passed a cart with a redheaded boy who was sitting by himself and briefly considered joining him. This boy was hunched into himself as if he were bored and hoping to sleep. He had a mess of freckles and seemed to be in somewhat of a temper, so Hermione continued past in the hope of finding a friendlier face to sit with.

After what felt like hours, but was in reality, only a few minutes Hermione found a cart that was empty. She dragged her heavy trunk into the cart and started contemplating how she was going to get it into the compartment above her head. It was heavy, and she silently cursed herself for bringing so many books from home. As she was struggling to lift the trunk it suddenly became light as a feather and lifted itself up onto the rack above her. Confused and bewildered she looked behind her, wondering if the train had some sort of magic for stuff like that. She looked through that glass door to see the blonde boy again with his wand out. He shot her a smirk and then joined a group of students who looked about his age in the next compartment over.

The rest of the train ride was relatively eventless, Hermione was eventually joined by a few other students all first years. One of them had a toad he could not seem to keep ahold of. Although why you would want to have a toad for a pet was beyond Hermione's comprehension. While trying to help the poor hopeless boy find his toad, she ended up meeting the boy with the red hair. He was sitting with Harry Potter, who Hermione knew was famous for defeating a dark lord while he was just a baby. She had thought he was good looking in a sort of malnourished, melancholy sort of way. He had a sort of darkness surrounding him that she could not seem to understand. She spent the rest of the ride wondering how on earth nobody else had noticed the signs of abuse their hero was displaying.

The boat ride was a nice touch. Hermione had lost her breath when she got her first glimpse of Hogwarts. However, now she stood awkwardly in front of hundreds of her peers waiting for an old hat to decide her fate. She had read about the four houses and there was not a single house she felt was a perfect match for her. If she had to choose then she was perfectly okay with Ravenclaw or Gryffindor. She liked the idea of Hufflepuff, but she knew herself well enough to know she was not that kind. The only thing she was completely sure of is that she would not be put in Slytherin, even though she was adopted and could possibly be pureblood. Hermione had been raised by non-magical people and felt that would void the possibility.

Hermione watched as one by one the students around her got sorted. Finally, after she had worked herself up, the Professor called her name. She tried to talk to herself as she approached, telling herself it was just a hat. An old wrinkly hat was going to decide her future at this school. What an introduction to magic this was becoming. The professor sat the sorting hat on her head, and she felt as if she could almost hear it mumbling to itself. She could not quite make out what it was saying though, it was the sort of mumbling you would hear if you were listening to a conversation through a wall. It went on for a few minutes when out of nowhere it suddenly shouted, "Gryffindor!". A table full of red clad students erupted into applause and she skipped over to it, glad her ordeal was over.

She watched as Professor McGonagall sorted the rest of her students, the redheaded boy, the scatterbrained boy, and Harry Potter all 3 got sorted with her into Gryffindor. The pretty pale boy however, turned out to be sorted into Slytherin. His name had been unique, Draco Malfoy. Why would a parent name their child "Dragon"?

The food they were given was fantastic, but it did not take very long for Hermione to figure out that she was much smarter than her peers. The boy with the toad, Neville, was talking with the redheaded boy, Ronald, about ghosts and whether they could be dead if they were back as ghosts. "That doesn't make sense though! The ghost is still walking around and talking and thinking." Ron said with an adamant look on his face. Hermione could tell that she and this boy were not going to have too much in common. She scanned the table as it filled with treats. There was an extremely attractive stack of lady fingers in the middle of the table, and she reached her hand out for one, instead she accidentally grabbed the hand of Harry Potter, who had been sitting across from her most of the night. He had not said much to anyone and had eaten scarcely, he jerked his hand back from her as if she had burned him. Then he blushed, obviously embarrassed. "I am so sorry" she said to him. He shot her a smile but did not say anything else.

It was not until she lay in bed later that night that she realized his smile did not reach his eyes.

I hope you liked my chapter! It has been a while since I wrote anything that is not a lesson plan. -Rex