Snowflakes in a Storm - [Scorose]

Chapter Two: Thoughts at the Lake

The next morning I awoke, once again, to an empty dormitory. I had a feeling that the next two weeks were going to be hell - I had no one to talk to but a few little Slytherin kids... what was I supposed to do? Talk to them about NEWTs? Of course not, two of them would be focussing on their OWL exams and the other one probably didn't even know what NEWTs were. 

I was genuinely feeling a little lonely. Although, having grown up as an only child in a home as large as mine, with parents that barely spoke to me and house elves that were afraid of me, I had got used to the feeling of loneliness - but being at Hogwarts without anyone to talk to felt alien. It was as if everyone had been taken away from me, which to be fair, they sort of had. But who wants to be stuck at school for Christmas? I never had until this year, my sixth year, but I sensed that it would not be fun. Having to spend the day eating Christmas dinner with a bunch of teachers who decided to stay here for the holidays didn't sound like a Christmas I'd want to remember.

I got dressed into a black turtle-neck sweater and put on a pair of grey, ripped jeans, grabbed my wand and a couple of text books and headed downstairs into the common room which was empty. After all, it was only 7:30am and I wasn't expecting a couple of younger kids to wake up this early when they didn't have to. 

I sat down on the floor in front of the blazing fire, placed my textbooks beside me on the floor then opened my copy of 'Standard Book of Spells Grade 6' and began waving my wand and whispering the incantations of a few spells I had yet to master. Charms was one of my best subjects, I had always had a knack for learning the spells quickly, although as the years went on and the spells got harder, I too found it harder and now in my sixth year, I had had a few problems when it came to mastering a few of the spells.

After what must have been three or four hours, the two fourth year boys who I had seen the previous day battling it out in a game of Wizard's Chess came down into the common room dressed in their pyjamas and chatting quite loudly about Quidditch. It was distracting but it was the perfect opportunity to have a break and stop with my charms work - I had been working for about three hours straight, so I think I deserved a break.

I grabbed my two text books and placed them on the table that was against the large leather sofa in our common room then cast a spell on them which would give an electric shock to anyone who tried to touch them to make sure no one would. "Accio scarf" I said, flicking my wand slightly and my scarf appeared before me on the sofa, I grabbed it, slipped my wand in my jeans pocket and left the common room.

The snow had been getting worse and worse for a few weeks before the end of the term and the start of the holidays and now it seemed to be a blizzard outside... Okay, so that's a bit of an over-exaggeration, it was just snowing quite a lot, there was nothing blizzard-like about it. I strolled through the empty hallways, occasionally glancing out the window to watch as the snow landed and created a brand new layer on top of the snow that had begun to melt - the ground was covered in a mix of picturesque layers of snow and lumps of slush and ice but they blended together to create a weird mix of slushy greatness.

I walked outside, instantly being hit by the icy cold breeze as snowflakes fell and landed gracefully on the top of my eyelashes and my hair. I wrapped my scarf around my neck and put my hands in my pockets and took a stroll down to the black lake. I stood below a large oak tree that had no leaves on it and rested my back against it as I looked out at the lake; left alone in the snowy silence with my thoughts. I hadn't been able to think of what could have been the reason that I wasn't able to go home for Christmas. It couldn't have been anything very bad otherwise surely I would have been told about it - unless my father had thought I wouldn't be mature enough to handle whatever was going on, which would be completely wrong. I was sixteen, not a child.

My train of thought was cut short when I heard to high pitched laughs coming from behind me. I turned around to see Rose Weasley and her younger brother Hugo having a snowball fight. I rolled my eyes.

"Immature." I muttered under my breath. "Seventeen and Fifteen years old and they're playing in the snow." I said, shaking my head before turning back to the lake, facing the same way as the snow was drifting, to stop it going in my eyes. I closed my eyes and rested my head back against the tree, flicking my long side bangs out of my face.

Suddenly, I felt a cold impact on my cheek and I shot up to a straight stand. My head shot round to see Hugo with a scared look on his face and Rose laughing and staring at me. I wiped the snow from my face and shoulder and pulled my wand out of my pocket, pointing it at the tree that towered above Hugo and waved it. The snow that had piled on the branches instantly fell on top of Hugo and he was covered from head to toe. Rose stopped laughing and went to help her brother whilst I snickered and walked away back to the castle.