A comfortable train ride Open Closed

Leo stared aimlessly out of the window of the rust-coloured car as they passed another golden meadow. "It's a tradition!" His mother squealed from the drivers seat. "Your father and I agreed to keep the muggle experience of driving you and your siblings to your first day of school. You're the last one left! Are you excited? Are you nervous? Are you sure you have-"
"You're suffocating him ma." Laughed Leo's brother in the passenger seat. He turned back to look at his youngest sibling and pulled a face. Leo smirked. He'd miss moments like this with Samuel. Leo pulled a face back and his older brother grinned.

They reached the station and the two boys went to get out. "Hold on!" Their mother squeeled. "I have a surprise." Isabella plucked her wand from her sleeve - making sure no one would be able to see her in the empty car park - and gave it a small flick, summoning a medium-sized white casserole dish in Leo's lap, inside of which was a nice warm pumpkin pie with cling-film over the top. "Ta-daa!" Isabella beamed, before scowling at her son's lack of an over-exaggerated reaction.
"Well, what did you expect?" Samuel let out a booming laugh. "We had so many pumpkins left over from that fresh batch of pumpkin juice, and the muggles we sell it to aren't even that fond of the stuff."
Leo let out a light chuckle. "It's lovely ma, really." he said tenderly. Isabella began to well up as she put her wand away. Wiping away her tears, she suddenly noticed the time"Oh!" She flapped her hands. "We better hurry!"

"So you've got everything in there?"
"Yes ma."
"Are you sure? That suitcase looks awfully small."
"Yes ma, I don't need that much."
"But are you-?"
"Madre!" Samuel finally cut in with an amused tone. "Let him get on the train."
Isabella reluctantly waved Leo off as he got on the train. Finally he thought as his foot left the platform, I'm on the way. He clumsily stumbled across the train, catching a few snickers from people who saw the boy struggling with carrying both his suitcase and a pie. The heavenly scent reached the compartment before he did. Leo poked his head through the sliding doors and gave an excitable, goofy smile.

"Hi." He said, with a warm tone. " "Do you mind if I join you?."

Lavinia was fully engrossed in her book, trying to learn the history as much as she could. One particular passage, one about the terrible chocolate frog infestation of 1998, by the Poltergeist Peeves, where he had unleashed hundreds of chocolate frogs all over the courtyard, made her giggle, that it made her for a moment realie she was not alone in the compartment.

"oh! Apologies, yes, of course you may!" she smiled, keeping a finger to check where she was in the book. It was then when the scent hit her, making her hazel eyes widen. " Oh my, you brought a feast to the train huh? I suppose then you won't need to get anything from the trolley." she smiled, quickly scooting her bag away from the seat, as she wasn't sure where to even place such a dish, but as the compartment didn't seen to have a magically-appearing table, she assumed he'd either put it in his lap, or on a seat.

"I am Lavinia, Vinewood." she smiled at the boy, moving a stray piece of her blonde hair behind her ear. "First-year, If it wasn't obviouslö" she mused, motioning to her black tie. The sign of a not-yet-sorted student.

Leo sighed in grateful relief. "Thank you so much."He breathed. slinging his suitcase up on a luggage wrap and sitting down. He put the pie in his lap and peeled back the cling film, letting out a coil out tantalising steam. "Ah yeah." He chuckled wryly. "My mother made it for me, we grow pumpkins on our farm back home. Would you like some? I couldn't possibly eat all this by myself." He held up the pie before realising he hadn't introduced himself.

"Oh! I'm Leo by the way, Leo Del Mar." He used his free hand to tug on his own black tie indicatively. "It's nice that we've both met another first year already, huh?" He gave a giddy, almost conspiratorial smile, as if the two of them were privy to some ancient secret rather than that they were simply two children meeting each other on the train to school. It was true though, he felt a certain sense of kinship with Lavinia now that they had met. In the same way that an adult might feel loyalty to the person they first met at their new job, he felt like he and Lavinia could have each other's backs.

"your mother made an entire pie for your first day to hogwarts?" she smiled, giggling at the thought. "she must really worry about you not getting enough good food at Hogwarts then, as that thing seems to be able to feed half an army." she smiled softly, nodding at this proposal of sharing the pie. Now she really wished her mother had given her some food, rather than just telling her not to 'eat toomany sweets at once'. How typical of a mother, ut it's not like lavinia minded.

"It is nice, indeed! They say you always meet at least one friend on your first train ride." she spoke softly, beginning to stack some books to make a make-shift table for the pie, as she did not want to risk it falling on the floor, and even though he'd out it in his lap, she was worried the heat would burn him.

"It must be fun to be able to grow your own things.... I tried to grow a tomato once, but my mom said it looked more like a deformed apple." she giggled, taking another bite, trying not to slather herself, the books, or the chessboard. It wouldn't be very good manners, after all.

"I think she's just worried I'll miss home cooking." He chuckled awkwardly. Leo aided in this makeshift table by pulling his suitcase down. He flicked open the weathered object and pulled out a wizard chess board. "We can use this as a surface." He grinned, opening up the board and placing it on top of the books so that the hardback covers wouldn't be ruined if either of them spilled. He served up two slices with the pie cutter his mother had provided with the treat and handed one to Lavinia. The pie had been seasoned with several herbs from the Del Mar's farmstead, and the aroma's mixed beautifully.

"Oh tomatoes? I can help you grow some if you like, My parents sometimes sell produce on the market" He shovelled healthy chunk of pie into his mouth and covered it with his hand while he spoke. "So what were you reading?" He peered at the book in Lavinia's lap. "I've been meaning to do some reading up on Defense Against the Dark Arts, but I haven't had the chance yet." Even as he mentioned the subject, it seemed palpable that the boy was nervous at the concept of the subject.

"she sounds kind." she spoke softly, accepting the slice handed to nher, taking a bite her eyes widened again. "Merlin's beard, this is amazing!" she spoke, making her voice sound almost shrilling with how louds it went, quickly clearing her throat.

"I'd love if you taught me, I've always found plants fun!" she smiled, looking down at her lap, at the book. "oh, just Hogwarts: a History. Mom and dad told me that it would help me in getting lost, to know the history of the halls, and if I am lucky, that this year they finally provided people maps. My mom told me that she ended up somehow in the Potions' classroom trying to find the astronomy tower because the staircases decided to mess up, and she no longer could tell if she went up and down." she giggled at the story.

"what about your parents? You've given me the idea that your mom bakes, and they farm, but did they tell you anything aboyut the school before you came here? Or about their time here?" she asked, smiling at the boy, taking a hairtie to tie her hair away, to not get pie in the long strands.

A smile bloomed on Leo's face as Lavinia complimented his mothers pie. He was glad that she was the first person he had met. "Thank you." He said. "Ah, I've heard there's some great information in there about the castle. Apparently there's all sorts of secret passageways and exits you can find!" He remembered some of the stories that his brother had told him before he got on the train, the rumours of moving staircases and disappearing doors. The idea sent a jolt of excitement through him. What kind of a new existence waited for him at this school?

His smile faltered ever so slightly at the mention of his family and the school. "Well, my family didn't actually go to Hogwarts, my mum and my siblings all went to Beauxbatons." He composed his expression and continued. "-But I'm really excited! Hogwarts sounds so different to how things were back home." In truth, it bothered Leo somewhat to know that he would be the only one not going to Beauxbatons in his family, but most of those feelings became neutralised the more he learnt about the castle, the classes and the many other things that awaited him at Hogwarts.

Lavinia blinked, as Leo mentioned Beauxbatons. His family... wasn't from Hogwarts?

"The Beauxbatons... it's a french school, no? or close to france... I've never known anythuing other than England, so." she smiled. "then, since you're more unsure about Hogwarts than even me, we can read together!" she spoke excitedly, almost dropping the piece of pie, but thankfully caught it in time. Giggling at the blunder for a moment, she cleared her throat.

"Let's see.... Oh, something I was not aware of before i read it, is that Hogwarts is also home to many ghosts! And assumingly, one Poltergeist, but the book doesn't say if he still is in the castle..." she spoke, smiling as she read quietly for a moment, her eyes dancing over the page with a speed that seemed almost too fast for her age.

"apparently, all houses have their own 'house ghost'.... wonder why." she spoke softly, reading the passage slowly. All sorts of ghosts were named, and many even unnamed... The house ghosts, and the poltergeist she already knew of, but apparently, once, a ghost even hosted their own class! She caught herself wothering just hiow a class run by a ghost would go... How would they even help students?

"It's in the French alps." He nodded. "But I'm from Toledo- Spain." He clarified the last part as he realised she might not know where Toledo was. Leo's eyes glittered with excitement as she proposed reading together. His eyes darted over every word, with his lips silently translating for his brain. Every so often he would reach a word that didn't quite seem to translate for him, but he dismissed this issue. After all, the point of going to this school would be to learn about all of these new terms and ideas.

"Ghosts?" Leo's eyebrows rose in surprise. "I suppose that makes sense. I mean the castle is thousands of years old. I wonder what you have to do to become the house ghost." He pondered this thoughtfully for a moment. "Ooh! Look, there's a section on the founders." He pointed to four moving oil portraits of the founders, each wearing the bright colours of their house. He wondered for a moment what house he would be sorted into. After all, Leo had little prior knowledge of what each of these founders might represent, what their values were. Decisively, he liked the one in the yellow robes.