Location: Hogwarts Express
Date: 1 September 2024
Interactions: Open

Ariel was never good at speaking to strangers, so she was pleased when she found an empty compartment. She slumped at a seat, and exhaled deeply.

She had stood between platform 9 and 10, not knowing where 9 and 3/4 platform was. She had become increasingly despondent, till she spotted a suspicious looking family casually walking through a wall. Thankfully, she had arrived at Kings Cross early enough that she didn’t miss the train.

When she received the letter from Hogwarts, she knew that there would be a lot of challenges. At first she hesitated a bit, but in the end ambition and curiosity won. She still didn’t regret her choice.

How could she ignore the opportunity to learn magic? She had read many fantasy novels, and fervently loved some. Ariel’s mind was constantly filled with endless questions.

To quiet her mind, she grabbed a book and began to read. It was titled Magical Theory. It was a bit boring, but her passion for learning what ‘magic’ truly is made her read it over and over.

However, before long, she stopped reading and glanced at the corridor nervously. Students were passing by, chatting with their friends and laughing. She left behind all her muggle friends, so she would probably have to make new ones here. Ariel really hoped that her life at Hogwarts would go smoothly.

Violet stood on the sidewalk, trunk in one hand and her phone in the other, as she watched her father’s car pull away. She took a deep breath, focusing on the air flowing out of her lungs to calm herself down. This was it. She was really leaving her entire life behind for a wizarding school, of all things. She had been in udder disbelief since the day she found out she was a witch, and it was only starting to hit her now how real this actually was.

Shaking herself out of her thoughts, Violet started to lug her trunk over to a trolley, struggling as she heaved it on top. As she pushed it through the station, she felt her heart starting to pound in her chest. This was the part where all of her knowledge would prove useless. She’d googled “platform 9 3/4”, of course, but nothing had come up. There was something kind of exhilarating about a lack of knowledge, she supposed.

Violet was a girl of reason, and reason suggested that the attendants at the station likely wouldn’t know of the mysterious in-between platform that would take her to the secret wizard school. Instead of asking for directions, she decided to stake out platforms 9 and 10, watching for anything suspicious. After seeing several families straight up disappearing through the wall, Violet worked up the courage to try for herself. As she started to move towards the divider, she squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for impact.

Emerging from the other side, Violet stared in awe at the hundreds of kids crowding the platform, all making their way towards the bright red train proudly boasting the title “The Hogwarts Express”.

As she walked down the aisle, Violet glanced in each compartment, scanning the scenes inside. A group of teenage boys, chucking what appeared to be wriggling chocolate at each other. Three girls braiding each other’s hair as they laughed together. Violet kept walking, eventually stopping next to a compartment empty except for one girl who looked to be about as old as she was, with her nose in a textbook. Violet pulled open the door and (in a voice softer than she may have hoped) squeaked out the phrase “Is it okay if I sit in here?”

Location: Hogwarts Express
Date: 1 September 2024
Interactions: @Violet Smith

Ariel flinched as she heard someone’s voice. She looked away from the book and at the open door and a girl who had just entered the compartment. The girl looked about the same age as her.

She realized that she didn’t give an answer, so she replied hastily. “Of course.” Her voice sounded coarse, and Ariel hated it. She discreetly put down her book. Her eyes met the girl’s, and she dropped her gaze to the nearby pile of books.

The door closed quietly behind the girl. Now, there were only two of them in here. The atmosphere was too awkward, but she didn’t know what to say. She got the sudden impulse to leave the compartment and find a new one.

Ariel inhaled deeply. She wasn’t good at starting a conversation, and she felt very uncomfortable when talking to strangers. But if she kept avoiding it, she would be a loner all again. She didn’t want the rest of her school years to be lonely and utterly without friends. At least she could give it a try.

Ariel smiled as gently as she could. “I am Ariel Lin, and I’m new to Hogwarts. Are you a first year, too?”

OOC Note

Reducio

Sorry for late reply! I was very busy for a whileTT

Violet had paused in the doorway after she spoke, letting the other girl speak as she waited. It took a beat for her to respond, though, so Violet found herself anxiously picking at the sides of her fingers as her mind rushed through the scenario that would happen here if the first person she met completely rejected her. She’d be all alone in her school, eating alone, finding her way to classes alone, everyone would hate her, she’d call her dad crying that she wanted to go home and back to her old life and her old friends.
She was pulled out of her imaginative spiral by the sound of the other girl’s voice. “Of course.” Violet felt a small smile spread across her face as she pulled the door closed behind her. This led to another awkward pause as Violet studied the other girl’s face, trying to mentally tell her that she should be the one to talk, as Violet had no idea what she should say next.
Again, the girl saved her from sure social awkwardness as she said “I am Ariel Lin, and I’m new to Hogwarts. Are you a first year, too?” With that one sentence, it was like a switch was flipped in Violet’s head.
“Yes, I’m a first year and oh my god I am terrified. This is all so crazy and strange, and I kinda feel like I’m hallucinating. Are your parents wizards? My dad isn’t a wizard, and neither was my mum, so this is even weirder because I didn’t know any of this even existed!” As she talked, Violet moved across the compartment to sit next to Ariel. She paused for a second, realizing that she was probably rambling. “I’m sorry, I tend to talk a lot when I’m nervous. Kind of a bad habit I think. My name is Violet, by the way.”

Location: Hogwarts Express
Date: 1 September 2024
Interactions: @Violet Smith

Ariel was startled as she tried to process all the things the girl just said. “I… It’s a pleasure to meet you, Violet.” She finally managed to say something.

Ariel realized that she probably needed to answer Violet’s questions. “And yeah, it’s all baffling here. My parents were ‘muggles’, so this whole ‘magic’ thing is over my head.” She chuckled a bit as she recalled the trouble she went through just to get into this train. “I didn’t even know where ‘platform 9 and 3/4’ was… If I weren’t lucky, I would have been late on the first day. It’s a relief that there are others like me.”

Ariel hoped that her response was decent. At least, it wasn’t terrible. She often messed up with words when she talked in uncomfortable circumstances, and it did little to boost her confidence.

As much as she hated talking to strangers, if she wanted to make friends she would have to chat with them and learn about them more. “So you’re from non-magical world, right? Did you have any hobbies back home? I dabbled in a lot of things, and it would be great if there are some ‘muggle’ hobbies we can share in Hogwarts… After all, I have no idea what wizards do.”

As Ariel started to speak, Violet tried to push her brain out of the heightened state it had been in since she had stepped foot into the station. She was fine, this was all fine, all she had to do now was have a conversation. She knew how to do that, right? She had friends back home, and she certainly had had to meet them at some point. Violet had strategies for this: talk about school! Your siblings! Where you were born! The conversation paths were firing off inside her brain and for once she was thankful for how overactive it could be. First, though, she had to respond to Ariel’s questions. And she really needed to stop picking at her fingers, because that was getting painful.

Violet shook out her hands and then almost immediately stopped herself when she realized how weird that probably looked. “Yep! I’m from the non-magical world, and just as new to all of this as you are. They really need to put stuff like the 9 3/4ers platform in the welcome packet for people like us, it seems insane that they expect us to figure it out! I really hope there’s nothing else like that once we get to the school, it feels really awful to be so behind in an area of knowledge I didn’t even know existed until this past summer.”

Violet paused then, remembering the day she’d been greeted at the door by a professor telling her that she was part of a magical community. The day her life had been turned upside down. She glanced at Ariel, scanning her face, looking for a similar reaction. “Oh, your question! Uh yeah, I had a lot of hobbies back home. I don’t know if it counts as a hobby, really, but the biggest one is that I am a ballet dancer. I really hope there’s something like ballet or dance in general at the school, but I have no idea if witches even do dance.” She wiggled her shoulders with the last phrase as emphasis, looking up at Ariel again before dropping her gaze back down into her lap. “You said you dabbled, what kinds of things were you dabbling in?”