"So y/n did you decide where you are gonna go for holiday break?" Hermione asked as I sat across from her and Ron, sitting awkwardly next to Harry, I didn't think about how I'd feel seeing him. It was weird but not uncomfortable. "Yeah I decided to just stay here." I said eating a piece of bacon. I had already informed Hermione of all the things that happened last night, except the whole Draco in a bathroom stall with Harry thing of course. I felt bad for not being able to tell, but it wasn't my place to say anything. Which reminded me, I looked down the table to see Ginny sitting with some friends. I wonder if Harry told her or broke up with her. I nudged his arm and asked him whispering the question to him, "Oh I um I didn't tell her anything, I think i'm gonna wait till after break, I don't want to ruin her trip home. Plus I'm going to be staying with the Weasleys. I don't want it to be awkward." he hushed back to me. I looked down at the girl, laughing with her friends, she looked at me and smiled and waved, I returned the gesture then looked at Harry. "Well I guess that's nice of you, you know even after you guys break up, she's still our friend and Ron's sister, so you're still gonna have to see her." I reminded him, "I just don't want to hurt her." he said looking down, picking at his food. I rested a hand on his, "I'm afraid that's gonna be a result no matter what, but a way to help ease her pain would be telling her everything, I'm sure she'll understand. She's sweet like that." He looked down the table at her and nodded in agreement. "I will." he said, sighing. "Will what?" Ron asked, "Make sure to keep you out of trouble." I said giving a sarcastic grin, "More like i've got to write to them everyday to make sure they haven't gotten into any sticky situations." Hermione said giggling. We all laughed along and finished our breakfast.
"I will catch you guys before you leave. I need to take care of something real quick." I said excusing myself and exiting the dining hall. I walked out and turned down the hallway, I had planned to go see Dumbledore since he never came to breakfast, but stopped by the entrance hall, I walked over to witness Professor Snape handing over a certain bloody, black eyed, blonde haired creep to some ministry officers and guards. What happened? I looked curiously and confused at the scene, why was his face all fucked up? I also saw Dumbledore standing there giving information to the men. "What happened to his face?" one guard questioned looking at Severus. "He fell." Severus drawled as they took Lockhart. "I'm telling you I didn't do a thing!" Gilderoy screeched, he was relentless, and an idiot for thinking they would listen. "Save it for the judge." an officer said scoffing. They dragged him off out of sight, Dumbledore following to see them out. I walked up to Snape who was watching them yank the still squirming fool. A slight grin to his face. "So he fell huh?" I said quietly, stopping a few feet behind him, also enjoying the scene. I wasn't sure if he wanted to talk to me anymore after what had happened, but despite his yelling, insults, and deceptions last night, I still wanted to be near him. "Yes because he is an imbecile." he responded, not turning to look at me. I practically burned holes into his back with my gaze, shifting down to his tightly clenched fist. I noticed it looked a little red on his knuckles and that's when I put two and two together. "Did he happen to fall on your fist?" I said laughing a bit, trying not to smile too much at the thought of Snape beating the crap out of Lockhart. "What?" he said furrowing his brows and looking at me, "Your fist Sir, it's a little roughed up." I said motioning to the hand. He quickly crossed his arms hiding it from sight as soon as he realized. "It's fine I don't think they noticed and I'm sure as heck not gonna say anything, plus it's not like Dumbledore couldn't tell. You were practically giddy watching him being dragged off." I said smiling, "I was not giddy." I just nodded smiling, "Thank you." I said looking into his coal black eyes. "For?" he questioned furrowing his brows, "Punching him for me." I said walking closer to him, his eyes followed me and he tensed up a bit. "Not everything is about you Ms. L/n. I hit him because he's an idiot and deserves it." he retorted his normal cold face along with his deep stern voice. I guess we are completely back to this, last name and everything. "Right," I said nodding " well I will catch you later, thank you for beating him up for being an idiot." I added turning and walking back down the hall, he could continue to be normal to me, but that doesn't mean I wasn't gonna at least try to be nice so I could maybe have a conversation with him about everything. I still had lots of questions.
Breakfast had ended and all the kids had begun to exit the hall, all of them in their friend groups, I went and found the group, including Ginny and Draco, and all the kids that were leaving got ready. "Are you sure you don't want to at least come with us to the station?" Draco asked for the second time now. "Yes I'm sure I don't feel like the trip." I reassured him. "Alright, well we are gonna be leaving soon, so Goodbye, I hope you find some fun stuff to do, you can always write to me as well." he said as I hugged him, "And us too!" Ginny said, turning from her conversation with Harry, giving me a hug as well. "I will keep all of this in mind." I said hugging Harry, Ron and Hermione too. I hated saying my goodbyes to my friends because that meant I was gonna be all alone. I was probably gonna be bored out of my mind, Draco told me to just try and sleep most of the day or visit Hogsmeade to pass the time. Which was convenient the first couple days, but it was the day before new years eve and I had already slept enough to last me a decade, and had already been to hogsmeade three times, all within the span of these five days. I had tried convincing Dumbledore to throw a little New years eve party for the remaining students and staff, but all he could agree on was a small firework show. Which alone took me an half hour of persuasive talk and a little bit of guilt tripping to get. I walked to the dining hall for dinner, nose in the book I had been reading, Lolita, I had paused reading for a moment when the yule ball got closer and I got distracted. As I walked down the hall I bumped into a figure, my book falling to the floor. Hoping it wasn't my professor, since I knew he was one of the only ones that stayed here at Hogwarts. "Oops my bad sorry, I wasn't paying attention." I said as the man kindly picked up my book, "That's quite alright." he said handing it to me, I smiled thanking him and he just gave a curious look when he read the title, when I realized his face I put my hands behind my back with it. I didn't recognize the man, he had light brown hair, pretty blue eyes, a small beard and mustache, and a few scars on his face. He had dark brown dress pants with a matching vest over a beige button up and tie. He was a fairly handsome man in all honesty. I smiled awkwardly when I realized I had been staring, I didn't want him to think I was trying to be rude. "I'm Y/n L/n a sixth year Slytherin." I said, smiling up at the man and extending one of my hands to shake, "I'm Remus Lupin, I'm going to be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. '' he said, accepting my hand and shaking it softly. "Well I hope you aren't like the last one." I said in a more serious tone, but still with a small smile. "I can assure you I am nothing like that goon." he said grinning. I could tell I was going to like this teacher, he seemed nice and put together and normal. "Have you found your way around alright?" He put his hands in his pockets and nodded, "I actually used to attend Hogwarts as a boy, so I'm very familiar with the grounds." he said smiling. "Oh well that's good because this is my first year here so I don't know where every hall leads." I laughed lightly. "Well thank Merlin one of us knows." he chuckled joking, "What house are you in?" I asked after a moment. "I am in Gryffindor actually." I nodded in response, "Well it was nice to meet you, I look forward to your class and talking some more, also I have convinced Albus to have a firework show tomorrow night for new years, so I hope to see you there." I said smiling and patting his arm as I walked past him, "Great, I'll be there, it was nice meeting you as well." He smiled sweetly as I nodded and walked to the great hall.
This was my first time actually going to dinner, the past couple days I either spent it in Hogsmeade or ate in my room. I walked in getting the first glimpse of the students that stayed behind, most looked to be at least fifth years. I looked over to the staff table to see who stayed behind. I saw Trelawney, Hagrid, Filch, Madame Pomfrey, and my beloved Professor Snape. I looked around at the Slytherin table, not recognizing any of the students there and sighed, I looked over at the other tables and skimmed over the scattered students. I got to the Ravenclaw table and smiled when I saw Luna sitting and smiling reading a book. I walked over to her and sat down across from her, "Hey what are you reading?" I asked looking down at the cover, she smiled looking up at me, "Hello Y/n, and i'm reading The Interpretation of Dreams by Freud." she responded, closing her book and putting it down on the table. "What about you?" she said motioning to the book tucked in my arm. "Oh I don't know just some book called Lolita." I said awkwardly, hoping she hadn't read it before, I didn't want her to think I was odd. "What's it about?" she questioned with big eyes, "Um well, it's about a man and a girl he likes." I said trying to be as vague as possible. "Cool." I nodded, smiling awkwardly. We both looked over as Dumbledore walked in, he walked up to his podium and smiled. "Hello everyone, I hope you all are having a good break so far, I wanted to inform you of the small firework show my goddaughter has convinced me to have for new years. It will start at midnight obviously, and will take place in front of the lake. Now let's eat." he said as the food appeared. It wasn't as much as usual since there were only a handful of kids, but each table had its own as usual. "So lovely you convinced him to do that." Luna said, cutting her food. "Right? I thought, we are here for the new year and it's only a few of us so it would be fun, I'm glad he agreed." I smiled, taking a bite from a roll. "I love fireworks." she said quietly as she took a sip of her drink, I nodded in agreement with a full mouth. "Yeah they are real fun, " I said swallowing, " it was my sister's favorite part of the new year." I added smiling. "Yeah my mom loved them too." I was so happy to find out Luna was here, we may not be best friends, but she was still a friend of mine, and I knew she was happy to talk with and see me as well.
Once dinner ended, Luna and I went for a walk outside around the school, talking about all kinds of things. We hadn't even realized how much time had passed until it had gotten too dark to see clearly. "Wow it's already almost ten o'clock, we should probably start making our way back into the school." I said looking down at my watch. "Time really does fly when you're having fun." she said smiling, we walked up back into the school and I walked with her to her common room. "Do you want to come in and talk some more?" She offered, opening the door. I contemplated for a moment then nodded, "Yeah sure." I said as I followed her in. I gawked at the interior, it was beautiful in here. I followed her to the couch and we both sat down. "So did you hear about the new DADA teacher?" I asked, still looking around at the room. "No, what happened to Lockhart?" she said softly furrowing her brows. "Oh he um, he got arrested." I said playing with my fingers. "Really? Wow how interesting, who is replacing him?" she said, smiling at my amazement of the room. "This man named Remus Lupin. I ran into him and we talked, he seemed nice." I said smiling, "Oh the one that used to attend Hogwarts?" I nodded, "Yeah he's in Gryffindor. How'd you know about him?" I said furrowing my brows. "He was brought up by a painting I was talking with one day." she answered smiling softly. "Oh that's cool, what did they say about him?" she thought for a moment, "Just that his friends and him would cause trouble sometimes, and were a pretty tight-knit group and that there are rumours about him." I furrowed my brows, "what rumours?" I asked very intrigued, "Oh I don't know, just suspicions he's like a... werewolf or something. But I don't know those are just rumours and kids like to make up stuff all the time here." she said laughing, me laughing with her. "I wonder what the school was like back then." I said looking around the room. "I don't know, but i've heard stories." We continued for a few more hours, her telling me all the stories she had heard, and more about herself. I had a great time talking to her she was so nice and smart. She even told me her patronus was a hare, which tells you everything. She was very pleased to hear what mine was, she thought that was a sign that I was special, but I just laughed it off. Eventually we both started getting tired and I headed back to my room.