The next morning I wake up and the light blinds me. I roll over and pull a pillow over my head. After a few minutes of convincing myself to crawl out of bed I finally sit up and rub my eyes. I look around and find the domertries almost empty. There were a few girls left. I look over and see a tiny girl with red hair. She’s fast asleep. I get up and find my bag at the end of my bed. I open it and pull out some more robes. After brushing my hair and teeth I feel more awake and refreshed. I look around to see if anyone else has gotten up when I see the redhead from earlier staring at me. I smile and wave at her. Her red hair is messy and she has bright green eyes. Freckles adorn her face. She’s very pretty. I walk over to her.
“Hello, my name’s Zina. What’s yours?” I ask her. She looks at me.
“My name is Autumn” She smiles and holds out her hand. We shake hands.
“Nice to meet you. I love your hair, by the way” I say. I look at my light brown hair with blonde highlights and frown. It’s so plain. Everything about me is average. Average weight, smarts, build. My eyes are by far my favorite thing about me. They are dark brown almost black with a ring of gold around my pupil.
“Trust me yours is way better. With hair like this I get noticed everywhere I go. I should probably get ready. Do you want to head downstairs together?” She asks me. I knew that I was just stalling because I didn’t want to go downstairs by myself so I nod eagerly. Autumn stands up and pulls out her robes. Then she pulls the curtain around her and changes. I sit on my bed and play with my hair. When she emerges she smiles at me and we head downstairs.
“So, your last name is gryffindor but you're a slytherin, so I have a feeling that there’s more behind that.” Autumn says as we begin our walk down the stairs. I think about how to phrase my response in the nicest way when I decide to just flat out tell her.
“Harry Potter is my great-great-great grandfather. I was supposed to be a gryffindor but here I am.” I smile a little. Autumn looks stunned for a second but then I can see the wheels turning in her head.
“So I expect that you’ll be getting a howler soon,” She says. I decided that I like her.
“Yup, I’m surprised that I haven’t gotten one yet” I say. “You know, I could use all the friends I can get. You wanna hang out sometime” I say. I wanted to be friends with this girl. I liked her fiery spirit.
“I was just about to ask you the same thing. Funny enough Ron Weasly is my great-great-great grandfather so this is some coincidence to be friends with you” She says. My head spins. I can imagine my parents now. “Look you're already on the path to be like Harry” and “You better not mess this up, Zina” I roll my eyes and continue the conversation with Autumn.
“That explains the red hair,” I say just as we hit the last step on the staircase. I look around and find Blake. He’s sitting alone in front of the fire. The flames cast shadows on his face, making him look like some amazing god. He looks very attractive. I can see some of the other girls in the common room staring at him. Jealousy rages through me. Why am I jealous? He can date whomever he likes.
“You need some water, Zina? Because you’re looking really thirsty.” Autumn says. I immediately feel the heat rise to my cheeks and look away from her.
“Shut up, we’re just friends” I say and walk over to him.

Autumn follows behind me. Halfway there another group of girls call her.
“I’ll be right back,” She says. I nod and continue my walk over to Blake.
I sit down beside him. He looks at me and smiles.
“Good morning” I say
“Mornin”
“Sleep well?”
“Like a baby”
“I’m sure you did”
“Who was that redhead that was with you?”
“Oh, her name’s Autumn we just met”
“Oh”
We sit in silence for a little. Then, another figure walks over to us. At first I thought it was Autumn but I quickly realized it was Noah.
“Hey Zina,” Noah says. I look at him.
“Hey” I say. Blake stiffins beside me and shoots daggers at Noah. Why is he so mean to him? I shake it off.
“You look nice.” Noah says. I blush and twist my hands in my lap.
“Thank you. Was there something you came over here to talk about?” I ask him.
“Yes, actually. I was wondering if you’d like to hang out with me tomorrow after our classes,” I am shocked by his request. I barely know the guy. Maybe he wants to be friends.
“Just us two?” I ask him
“Yup, just me and you”
Why does he want to be alone? Is Blake scaring him that bad? I knew I didn’t have the guts to tell him no.
“Um, sure” I say.
“It’s a date,” He says. He walks off before I can respond. He wants to date me? Why? I don’t know if I want to date him. I put my head in my hands. That went so wrong. Blake rubs my back and I immediately relax.
“Are you okay?” He asks me
“Honestly, I don’t think so”
“Lets go get some air”
“Okay” We get up and head outside, stopping for directions a few times. When we finally get outside, it is warm and sunny. I look around and find the lake.
“Can we go over there?” I point and ask him.
“Sure” he says
“Race you”
“You're on” I take off running as fast as I can, stunning Blake and giving me an advantage. He quickly catches up with me. I look over my shoulder to check how close he is but before I can, I trip and fall on my back. Blake trips over my foot and lands on top of me. All of the air leaves my body. People point and whisper. Someone shouts “Get a room already” I blush.


“Hey, Blake?”
“Yeah?”
“Could you get off of me, please?”
“No, I quite like where I’m at”
I blush and shove him off. I close my eyes and lay there for a moment. When I finally open them Blake is standing up and offering me a hand. I take it and stand up.
“Thanks” I say as I brush off my robes. I realize that we're standing very close and I take a step back. “What was that comment for?” I ask, genuinely curious. He smirks a little.
“What comment?” he asks, not looking at me
“The one where you said quote on quote No, I quite like where I’m at?” I look at him.
“Funny but I don’t remember saying that” He says with a smile. I punch him on the shoulder and let it go. We finish walking to the lake and sit down.
“Hey, Blake?”
“Yes, Zina?”
“How’d you get that scar?” I looked into his eyes.
“If I tell you then you need to answer my question 100% honestly, okay?” he asks, not looking at me. Maybe I had misstepped, maybe he didn’t want to tell me.
“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” I say gently.
“It’s okay,” he says. I wait for him to explain, my mind wondering about inside my head.
“When I was younger my mother and father always fought, one day we woke up and my dad was sitting downstairs with divorce papers. My mother went psycho, she lashed out and threw all of his stuff out of the window. Shortly after that, she left and came back late at night. You could smell the alcohol from a mile away, she began screaming that if he was going to take everything from her, then she would take everything from him so she ran upstairs, pulled me out of my bed and brought me downstairs. She grabbed a knife and began cutting right here.” he paused and traced his scar line. “Before she could go any further, my dad tackled her to the ground and took the knife from her.” He looked far off. I thought about it for a minute but I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I grabbed his hand and squeezed it, reassuring him that It was alright.
“Hey Zina?” he asked.
“Yes”
“It’s your turn to answer my question”
“Okay, shoot” She perked up at the thought of changing the subject.
“Will you go to Slughorn’s party with me?” Blake asked hesitantly. Zina thought about it for a minute.
“As friends?” she asked cautiously. Blake suddenly remembered that she had a date with another boy and changed his answer.
“Yeah” he said sadly
“I would love to,” she said happily, oblivious to Blakes sadness.
They hung out for a while but went back when it started getting dark. He hugged Blake goodnight and thought about what she was going to wear on her date tomorrow. She picked out a light blue blouse and her nicest pair of jeans and laid them out.