Dispute in compartment nr. 7 pv: Aerith Nouveau

Today was the day his journey at Hogwarts would begin. It was early morning – early, at least, for him – as he was not used to waking up so soon. Most often, the very time he was now standing on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters would be the time he was only just waking up. He was quite an avid enjoyer of a late-night read, or simply sitting on his windowsill and watching the nocturnal animals that passed through their garden to hunt. Now he was standing with a sour expression on his face underlined by tiredness, watching people pass by.

His mother was fixing his hair for the hundredth time that day and talking in his ear about something to do with pride and the family name. He had stopped listening a long time ago. His father could not make it that day. He was too busy with work. His mother had just rushed out of the Ministry of Magic to see him off to Hogwarts. He could have managed without her too, but since she insisted… Finally, he felt the absence of her fingers on his scalp and relaxed. At last he was done with this humiliation ritual of being babied by his mother in front of all his potential housemates and classmates passing by. She said something about writing letters and he nodded passively. Then he felt her lips on his forehead, and they said goodbye.

As he walked away, he wiped off the smudge of her red lipstick she’d left and gave her a final wave over his shoulder as he boarded the train. Now he was inside, only hours away from the beginning of a new stage in his life. He stepped into the corridor that ran through the train, his eyes darting from one window in the compartment doors to the next as he walked further down, hoping to find an empty room. The last thing he wanted was to have to deal with another person in the same compartment. He was nowhere near as good at making friends as his parents would have liked him to be. He didn’t want to come across as a weirdo on his first day, before he’d even reached Hogwarts. It was better to keep his distance.

Eventually he came across an unoccupied compartment and slipped inside. It was like a breath of fresh air. Though the walls echoed with the already-begun chatter of students in the neighbouring compartments, this one had the safety of being closed off and his alone. After he managed to lift his trunk onto the luggage rack above the seats, he plopped down on one of them and stretched out his legs, clad in suit trousers far too big for him, since they were the only item of his father’s Muggle clothing that fit him (he didn’t have any of his own). His Oxford shoes smeared some mud from outside onto the seat, but he decided he wouldn’t let anyone sit with him in the compartment anyway, so it wasn’t a big deal.