Y/N lays in her bed, staring at the ceiling. She just stays in the same position as the Sun slowly rises and the window's shadow slowly moves. She lays there either waiting for Lavender, Parvati, or Hermione to wake up or for it to be seven o'clock in the morning. Whichever comes first.
The inability to sleep is starting to pose it's affect. Well, the inability to sleep for more than three hours every night. Y/N keeps waking up every night, unable to go back due to the fear of dreaming again. Her mind is scattered at a constant. She thinks about that night at the Quidditch World Cup, then she thinks about the Triwizard Tournament, then to the events with Theodore Nott hours earlier, then on to her mom being pregnant, and repeat. it's a constant cycle of keeping herself busy in the mind, thinking about everything that's going on with her.
How could she go to sleep when there's so much to think about and when it always ends poorly.
She constantly looks out the window to see the clock tower. Lucky for her, there's a window right beside her bed, facing it. The Sun's peaking over the horizon of the mountains that surround Hogwarts.
Y/N, Hermione, Lavender, and Parvati walk into the great hall together. They split up as they keep going. Y/N and Hermione to side of the table, Parvati and Lavender on the other.
Chatter fills the hall as usual. Chatter blending from all the house's tables and the tables that the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students sit at. As she walks with Hermione, Y/N looks over to see Theodore Nott. He's watching her and when she looks to him, his cheeks go pink. Maybe she reacted to harshly on him the other night, but it doesn't excuse his behavior.
When Y/N sits down at the table, she sit's beside Fred. He immediately reacts by wrapping his arm around her.
"Morning."
"Good morning." She smiles in reaction.
Dumbledore takes the stand in front of the crowd. "Welcome Everyone! As a way to start off the year a pleasant and welcoming start for our guests, I've decided we shall sing them our sing. Please all Hogwarts students, stand and show our guests how hospitable we can be!"
Y/N rolls her eyes. "Oh, Merlin's beard."
"What?" Neville asks, naively.
"They walked in with phoenix's made of fire and blue, sparkly butterflies. So now we're gonna sing Hoggy Warty Hogwarts in reaction. I'm sorry, but this song is just sad in comparison."
Dumbledore walks down the isle and turns around to display the words for the song for everyone to see. Everyone begins singing the song, but Y/N just kind of mutters it. It's embarrassing to her.
Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,
Teach us something please,
Whether we be old and bald,
Or young with scabby knees,
Our heads could do with filling,
With some interesting stuff,
For now they're bare and full of air,
Dead flies and bits of fluff,
So teach us things worth knowing,
Bring back what we've forgot,
Just do your best, we'll do the rest,
And learn until our brains all rot.
The two other schools clap in response as Dumbledore heads back to his podium.
"Now everyone. Let the feast begin!"
He claps his hand and as usual, the plates and trays in front of them fill with food.
Fred hands Y/N an orange and she can't help but smile. "What's with you and giving me fruit?"
"I can hand you a croissant if you'd prefer." He laughs.
"Yeah that would work." She replies as she peels the orange.
He hands her the croissant and gives her a kiss. "There you go, darling."
Y/N puts it on her plate. "Thank you."
Harry and Ron rush into the room late.
"What happened to you two?"
"We woke up late. For some reason, our roommates didn't wake us up." Harry explains.
Hermione smirks at them. "Well maybe they thought you two could use the beauty sleep."
Ron gives her a look. "Don't start this morning, Hermione. We're tired and hungry."
Y/N finishes chewing the bite she took out of the orange and then asks. "Why are you so tired?"
"Why are you so tired?" Harry replies, sarcastically.
"Guys, look. Our time tables." Neville says.
Professor McGonagall hands them to all of them.
Y/N looks to Hermione. "How did you know that we have D.A.D.A. first period if we didn't even have our time tables yet?"
"I was talking to Moody yesterday and he told me so."
"Oh okay, well let's take a look at our schedules."
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Timetable: Y/N Arcturus Sparks
Monday:
9:00AM-10:15AM: Defense Against The Dark Arts (G+S)
10:30AM-11:30Am: Arithmancy (R+G)
11:45AM-12:45PM: Lunch
1:00PM-2:15PM: Herbology (G+H)
2:30PM-3:45PM: Care For Magical Creatures (S+G)
7:35PM-8:45PM: Dinner
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"Ugh, we still have Defense Against The Dark Arts and Care For Magical Creatures with Slytherin." Ron says, annoyed.
"And Divination during second period." Harry rolls his eyes.
Hermione looks to him. "Well if you dislike Divination so much then you should've dropped it. Then you'd be in another class like Arithmancy, like Y/N and I."
Y/N looks at her time table. "At least we have Herbology with the Hufflepuffs this time."
Harry points out. "You're the only one of the three of us, taking Herbology."
"Not true, Neville's taking it." She says as she smiles to him.
"Yessir." Neville responds.
Suddenly, the owls fly into the great hall.
"It's mail day." Ron smiles.
Y/N's Barn owl flies down to the table, handing her a white envelope.
"Thank you, Aurora. I hope you're behaving yourself. Be nice to the other owls, alright?"
She seems to give a nod in agreement, before flying off. Aurora looks majestic as she soars out of the room. It only takes minutes for all the owls to fly out of the windows and are heading back to the Hogwarts owlery. Almost like they were never there.
Y/N opens the letter and pulls out a note from her mom, Sierra. She looks at the letter and reads it.
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Dear Y/N,
As you know, I'm pregnant. I wanted to let you know that I've told your father and he's thrilled. So I thought it's time that I show you this. The truth is that I'm four weeks along and got an ultrasound the day before we had to go to Norway for the peacekeeping mission. I hope this picture brings you as much joy as it does to me and your dad.
Love,
Mom
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"Oh my god."
"What is it?" Fred asks, looking over her shoulder to see the note.
Y/N pulls the ultrasound photo out of the envelope. It's one of the magical photos that move. The picture of the monitor presents the tiny baby moving slightly. It's so early that you can just barely make out the shape of the baby. It's cute and tiny.
"What is that?" Fred asks further.
Y/N looks at her friends. "Well I don't want anyone other than you guys to know this because my parents probably don't want anyone to find out before they announce it."
Hermione puts her drink down. "No need to worry, Y/N. None of us are going to say anything."
She puts the photo down, revealing the ultrasound to her friends. "My mom's pregnant."
"WHAT?!" Ron asks.
"Shh! Ron, what about the term secret do you not understand?"
He responds. "Sorry, but wow."
Harry looks at the photo. "Aren't they a little old to be having a baby."
Y/N shakes her head. "No, they're not too old. They were only like twenty-one when they had me, so they're at a normal age for this."
"Do they know the gender?" Hermione questions.
"No, she's only four weeks along. They won't know the gender till around December or January."
Their conversation is interrupted by someone. "Y/N!"
She hides the ultrasound photo back into the envelope and looks over. "Parvati? What's wrong?"
"It's the paper, have you seen it?" She says, holding the Daily Prophet.
Y/N's confused. "No, but I can guess what's in it."
Everyone looks at Y/N and Parvati. The Patill girl's yelling has got the attention of the whole great hall. Some people are holding copies of the Daily Prophet. It's the students that look at the paper and then continue glare at Y/N that makes her most worried. What's the Prophet written in their article that could have everyone in such a frenzy.
Lavender follows her. "They sure do gossip in that paper. You'd think they follow you with a microphone the way they write about you."
She rolls her eyes. "Yep, that seems to always be the case."
The hall watches as Y/N opens the paper and looks down. In the Prophet lies her picture on the front page and two pages of writing.
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Y/N Sparks Leaves St. Mungo's And Yells At Reporter
After the Elemental Witch was in the hospital for two weeks, she's left and has presumably headed to Hogwarts.
The young girl was seen one night, standing in the lobby window. she was wearing a hospital gown and appeared to have multiple lines of stitching along both of her arms. Miss Sparks appeared to be very exhausted and seemed shocked by the reporters outside.
Y/N Sparks was caught by reporters leaving St. Mungo's on the last day of August. She was accompanied by her parents along with Molly and Arthur Weasley. As well as Fred Weasley, who she's currently in a romantic relationship with. One reporter apparently questioned where Fred was when Sparks was attacked and she started yelling at him.
"DON'T YOU EVER ASK HIM A QUESTION LIKE THAT AGAIN!"-Y/N Sparks
It was only yesterday that Sparks was seen in Diagon Alley. The young witch walked into Ollivander's wand shop and bought a new wand. This means that the witch's wand must've been broken on the night of the Quidditch World Cup. Y/N reportedly bought a wand made of quartz that has gold flaking on it. Does this mean that Y/N Sparks may not be the Elemental Witch anymore? Stay tuned to the Daily Prophet to find out.
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Y/N looks at the paper in utter shock. She knew that these incidents would be reported, but not all at once.
She feels Hermione grab onto her hand. "Come on, it's time for Defense Against The Dark Arts."
Y/N looks up around to her to see that everyone was exiting the great hall, many of them still looking at her. She follows her classmates to get to Moody's class.
The walk to D.A.D.A. class is quiet. None of the her friends say anything on the way there. They just walk in silence, like everyone's either too scared to say anything or they know better than to do so. Y/N is just baffled by the Daily Prophet's article. It's just a reminder, something to shove her own issues in her face. It may have been abrasive to yell at the reporter, but Y/N has no regrets. She makes no apologies for how she chose to react to someone else's cruel behavior.
On the way to Moody's class, Y/N see's Fred on his way to his class. He gives her a crooked smile and a head nod to signal her a message. A small motion to assure her that everything will be alright. She gives him back a smile, not a sincere one. Y/N gives him one of those smiles that clearly aren't happy ones, but one of the ones that just say that the person's trying to believe it.
When they arrive at Mad-Eye Moody's room, it's like everyone's voices have been stripped away from them. Almost every pair of eyes lie on Y/N.
Hermione whispers to her as she stands in the doorway. "Don't acknowledge it. They'll forget about it by noon."
"Somehow, I doubt it." She responds.
Y/N, Hermione, Harry, and Ron walk through the room to their seats at the front of the room. You'd think they were social pariahs by the way people were looking at them. Or looking at Y/N, to be more specific. Y/N looks to Draco as she walks past. He gives her a quick glance and then looks down at the piece of parchment, sitting in front of him.
The second she sits down, the whispers start.
'I heard, she ignored Seamus telling her to run away'
'Apparently she ran straight into the fires.'
'Someone told me that she fought off against "You Know Who's" followers.'
The sound of those sentences are like smacking her in the head, over and over. Like every single word is just a slap in the face. None of them stings like the next one though.
'They think she's not even got her elemental powers anymore. It's her fault, what a knob.'
Y/N stands up and turns around to look at the source of the sound. It's Pansy Parkinson, the one and only. She speaks calmly, but sternly.
"You know what. Shut up, Pansy. Just shut up. In fact all of you can shut up. It's an article. So what, I was in the hospital. And so what, I yelled at some reporter. And just so everyone knows, nothing about this, has changed."
She holds her wand up to the ceiling. A flame bursts out of nothing, forming into a dragon. It flies around the room and as soon as it had appeared, it disappears back into nothingness. Her peers watch, stunned by the reaction.
"Now. If you don't mind, we have a professor to learn from."
"Right you are, Miss Sparks."
They all look to the front to see their paranoid and creepy looking teacher.
He goes on. "Alastor Moody."
Moody speaks as he writes his name on a chalkboard. "Ex Auror, Ministry Malcolm Tent, and your new Defense Against The Dark Arts teacher. I am here because Dumbledore asked me. End of story, goodbye, the end. Any questions?"
The room sits in silence. The professor holds the attention of every student.
"No? Well then. After going through what you learned last year from Professor Remus Lupin, it seems you all have been educated well on defending yourselves against dark creatures. From Boggarts to Hinkypunks, you are knowledgeable on creatures. But you're still behind. Behind in curses." He tells them.
Y/N's shocked by this notion. She supposes that Lupin did focus onto creatures, but she never thought about curses to be honest. Then again, maybe it's an important lesson they all need to learn about. After all, a curse can be a deadly thing.
Moody continues teaching. "Now, who can tell me how many unforgiveable curses there are."
Y/N looks beside her at Hermione who answers. "Three, sir."
She seems to be very uncomfortable with the subject. Y/N remembers hearing that term before, the unforgiveable curses. Maybe, in a book? Or in the newspaper?
The professor responds to Hermione as he writes on the board. "And they're so named?"
She goes on. "Because they are unforgiveable. The use of any one of them wil-"
"Earn you a one way ticket to Azkaban." Moody responds.
When he's done writing with the chalk, the board reveals that he's written "3 Unforgiveable"
"Correct. Now the Ministry says you're too young to see what these curses do. I say different! You need to know what you're up against! You need to be prepared!"
As he turns his back and continues writing, he keeps yelling. "You need to find another place to put your chewing gum besides the underside of your desk, Mr. Finnigan."
Everyone's shocked as they look back to see Seamus, about to place his gum on the bottom of his desk. How could Moody have seen that if he's faced the other way?
Seamus whispers to Dean. "No way. The old codr- can see out the back of his head.'
Moody turns around and throws the chalk at Seamus. "I can hear across classrooms! So, which curse shall we see first?"
Y/N looks to Hermione, concerned. Is this man about to perform illegal curses in class?
"WEASLEY." He yells.
Ron quivers. "y-yes?"
"Give us a curse."
"Well, my dad did tell me about one. The Imperius Curse."
Moody nods. "Oh yeah, your father would know all about that. Gave the Ministry quite a bit of grief a few years ago. Perhaps this'll show you why."
Y/N can not believe it as the man walks over to his desk and opens jar. He pulls a cave spider out of it and points his wand.
"Hello little beauty, Engorgio."
The man makes the spider as big as a tarantula, even bigger.
"IMPERIO."
The spider flies up and moves along with the motion of his wand. All Y/N can think in her mind is 'absolutely not'.
The spider flies onto Neville's desk as Moody waves his wand to do so. He then motions it to jump onto Crabbe's head.
"Don't worry, she's completely harmless."
He continues to force the cave spider over to Padma's hand. She's freaking out by the sight of it. Y/N's never seen someone's face go so faint. Some people are laughing. Others like Hermione and Y/N look just mad and horrified.
Next thing, Y/N knows, the ugly spider's head straight to her and Hermione's table. The creature begins heading towards her hand, but Y/N's not having anything of the sort. She grabs her wand and waves it.
The arachnid flies across the room in a gust of wind and lands onto Ron's head. He starts freaking out and trying to shake it off. Spider's are his worst nightmare, so Y/N grabs her textbook and walks over.
"Sorry, Ron." She says as she's about to give the little bugger a whack.
Before Y/N can help, Moody's got his own ideas.
"What're you laughing at?"
The spider flies over onto Draco's face and crawls around. Y/N sits back down beside Hermione.
The professor's all happy. "What should I do next? Have her jump out the window?"
The room goes silent.
"Have her drown herself?"
The brings the cave spider back to his hand. "Scores of witches and wizards have claimed that they only did You Know Who's bidding, under this curse. But here's the rob, how do we sort out the liars? Another curse. Can anyone think of it?"
Only five people raise their hands. Hermione, Neville, and Harry are among them. Hermione and Harry look to Y/N with concerned looks on their faces. She has no clue why.
"Neville Longbottom. Professor Sprout tells me you've got a knack for Herbology."
He stutters. "There's the um.. The Cruciatus Curse, sir."
The name of the curse hits Y/N like a truck. There are three unforgiveable cures, the Imperius Curse, the Killing Curse, and the Cruciatus Curse. It's a painful realization.
Moody responds. "Correct! Come on now."
He leads Neville over to the desk and watch.
Moody points his wand at the cave spider. "Crucio!"
The spider tingles up and begins rolling. As if it were trying to escape it's own body. it's a familiar thing to Y/N, having faced the same battle.
Neville looks in pain, having to watch this. He's trembling and his teeth are clenching.
Y/N feels like she's been frozen in her own tracks. Like someone's punched her in the stomach or like she's just drank a glass of cyanide. It hurts to watch as the spider rolls around, feeling a pain like no other. The pain of being eaten alive, the pain of being set of fire, the pain of wanting nothing more than to not be there. It's almost like Y/N can feel it all over again. She can feel tears filling her eyes and her hands are clenching into fists so hard that her nails are digging into the palms of her hands.
All emotion is building up and someone finally says. "STOP IT. CAN'T YOU SEE IT'S BOTHERING THEM."
It's Hermione. Her voice slices like a knife when she's yelling.
It's only a second before Y/N slams her fists on the desk. "Professor, THAT'S ENOUGH."
The room is completely stunned by their outbursts of emotion. Moody stops to look at Y/N, Neville and Hermione.
It's not enough to yell in this moment for Y/N. There's a feeling, a need. A need to escape. So that's what she does. Y/N gets up from her seat and rushes out of the room. She goes on to run away down the halls.