Luna Lovegood

Hogwarts Again

            As the thestral-pulled carriage continued onward, making its way towards Hogwarts, Ginny said,

            “Did you all see Professor Grubbly-Plank?  What’s she doing here?  Hagrid can’t be gone, can he?”  No, Luna thought, an eight or nine foot tall grounds keeper couldn’t simply disappear off the face of the earth without someone noticing, now could he?  But she didn’t think she’d be in tears if he did.  She remembered last year’s lesson on blast-ended skrewts.  Luna ended the year with far too many visits to the Madam Pomfrey, the nurse.

“I can’t say I’d be upset if he is.  He wasn’t a very good teacher, was he?” she said calmly, voicing her opinion.

“Yes, he is!” Harry, Ginny, Neville, and Ron exclaimed.  Then they turned to glare at Hermione, who was sitting there looking uncomfortable.

“Umm, well, yes…he’s quite good,” Hermione stated reluctantly.  Luna saw this reluctance and smiled.  Maybe Hermione wasn’t so bad after all.  Why hadn’t she been placed in Ravenclaw, though, with brains like hers?

“Well, in Ravenclaw, we think he’s a bit of a joke.”

“You’ve got a rubbish sense of humor then,” Ron retorted rudely to Luna’s comment.  But Luna didn’t care.  She just sat and stared at him.  She looked between him and Ginny.  There was definitely a family resemblance.  There’s of course, the bright ginger hair, startling blue eyes, freckles across the bridge of the nose and cheek bones, and the same kind, rounded face that gave off a welcoming look.  Then Luna’s thoughts drifted to the rest of the people in the carriage. 

Ginny had always been kind to her, even when others weren’t.  She stood up for Luna.  Ginny was a valuable friend to Luna.

Ron had already proved himself to be funny, but a bit dim-witted.  He always seemed to be fairly confused.  Ah, well, Luna thought.  A friend’s a friend.  Ron could turn out to be a great friend, given the chance.

Neville Longbottom was an interesting character.  Carrying his odd plant around gave Luna the idea that perhaps he liked Herbology.  Luna liked it as well.  She enjoyed telling Professor Sprout about all of the interesting specimens she and her father grew at the house.  On her ears hung a special type of orange plum she grew in her garden.  Neville had a round, perhaps a bit chubby, face.  He had wandering brown eyes and combed brown hair.  She thought he would be a good person to talk to.  Perhaps they could find more things in common.

Hermione Granger seemed to be an extraordinarily intelligent witch.  She seemed to know the answers to everything and always came up with a clever way of doing things.  Luna had heard that Hermione was the top of her class.  Even marked a mudblood (a horrible term for someone who’s parents are both muggles, or non-magical people), she still stood strong and showed them down, teaching the Slytherin’s that you don’t have to be a pureblood to be excellent at magic.  Hermione had wavy brown hair that often looked fairly frizzy, chocolate brown eyes that melted you with any look- hatred or love, and pale skin that shone against the dark backdrop of the forest and the night sky.

And then there was Harry Potter.  Well, what could she say about him?  She had heard so many rumors about the boy who lived.  Some said he was stuck up and snooty, basking in the glory of his fame.  Others said he was as humble as anyone and basically a pretty nice kid.  From what she’d seen of him so far today, she assumed the later…

There was a sudden lurch of the wagon and Luna realized they had arrived at Hogwarts already.  Hermione, Neville, Ron, and Harry had already gotten out, when Ginny tapped Luna on the shoulder, snapping Luna out of her daydreams.  Still in a daze, she clambered out of the carriage and onto the stony walkway that lead through the iron gates, complete with frowning gargoyles, up the drab steps to the entrance to Hogwarts.  The door was held open by the caretaker, Argus Filch, who did not look too pleased to be doing so.