First Day Jitters Closed

Elizabeth practically bounded into the class. The day had finally arrived! All she could think about last night was the fact that she would be starting classes today. As such, she barely slept, and (much to the annoyance of her dormmates), kept waking them up to tell them how excited she was. "It's gonna be the best!" she had said one time. "Make sure to wake me up when you get up, okay? I can't sleep through my alarm!" she had asked another time. They were all very grumpy that morning.

Elizabeth still had on her Muggle clothes, as she had forgotten her suitcase back at platform 9 3/4 with her parents and her sister. It still hadn't arrived. Elizabeth was a little bit disappointed that she hadn't received them yet, and she was a little worried the professor would be angry, but she was so excited to start classes that those thoughts were completely pushed out of her mind.

She looked around the classroom. There were several rows of desks and a large table in the front, as well as a couple of boards for writing. She even saw a couple of symbols on the board but had no idea what it said. For a moment, she thought she had gone to the wrong room. After all, this was transfiguration, not ancient runes. However, she checked the room number and double checked it and was sure this was where she was supposed to be. Besides, she had looked for all her classes the previous day so that she wouldn't get lost. And then she saw her. "Eloise!" she exclaimed, quickly walking up to where the girl sat. "It's finally here! We get to learn magic!"

Eloise looked at Elizabeth with a smile. "I'm so excited! But I'm also a little nervous. I really hope that the teacher likes me. And our class" she added hastily. Eloise hated being placed in the classes that had all of the students who enjoyed messing around and joking the entire period. Although sometimes their jokes were enlightening, most of the time they ended up being horrendous and annoying. Almost every time whatever came out of their mouth was not funny in the slightest.

Eloise glances from her books back to Elizabeth. She was wearing Muggle clothes. She didn't want to say anything about it, but perhaps something had happened to her trunk. Elizabeth obviously knew what happened, or else she would be wearing her robes. It wasn't a big deal though. She was sure that the teachers had been alerted about such matters. "Do you have any clue what the symbols on the board mean? I haven't come across them in my studies. Or in any of my transfiguration textbooks." Eloise cringed. That sentence had truly made her sound like a nerd. She was alright with that, however, she didn't want to seem too uptight to Elizabeth. She was beginning to like the girl, and didn't want to drive her away.

Elizabeth sat down in an empty seat next to Eloise. She opened the desk, which, much to her disappointment, was empty. She let it drop back down, which caused some dust to fly up into her face. She coughed a little bit, and waved her hand in the air, trying to clear it.

"I haven't *cough* the faintest," she said, redirecting her attention back to the board. She also had read through the transfiguration book - well skimmed was more like it as there were so many new things, she felt like her mind was being pulled in a hundred different directions. "It looks like it's in some kind of ancient language." Suddenly, a thought struck her. She jumped up, her eyes shining with excitement. "You know how there are other creatures? Not just humans and stuff? Well, maybe the writing is in their language. Like there's going to be gnomes in this class or something!!!" She was so excited, she could barely contain her self. "We're gonna to meet a gnome!"

Elizabeth peered back at the door, hoping that at any moment a gnome, or half-giant, or some other creature she hadn't even heard of would wander into the room and sit down at one of the desks, just as excited as they were about transfiguration. She wondered if they'd all become friends and go on adventures together. "What do you think, Eloise? Wouldn't that be so cool??"

Eloise highly doubted that there would be any goblins or gnomes joining them in class today. But, this was Hogwarts after all, and nothing of that nature would come as a surprise to her. "That would definitely be quite an experience." Eloise gave Elizabeth's idea some thought. She found it hard to imagine sitting in a room with magical creatures.

"I'm not sure. Maybe it has something to do with transfiguration in history?" Eloise was truly clueless, lost in thought as her friend sat down next to her. The long, sleek black desks fit two people each. Looking at the tops, Eloise studied the words and images doodled there during classes. Obviously, it would come off easy with a simple swish and flick of the wand. However, if they were being cleaning manually, it would take an extremely long and excruciating amount of time.

Eloise crosses her ankles, waiting for the teacher to arrive. She wanted to get learning. The longer she had to wait and anticipate the class, the more nervous she became. If the teacher walked through the door right about now, that would be wonderful, Eloise thought. Biting her lower lip, something she did when she was deep in concentration she traced the swirling patterns on top of the desk with her finger.