End of beginning
Taking a look at her watch she sighed. Monday, 7am. Alicia used to be excited for her first day at Hogwarts but that was long before she remembered the dress code. Robes, white shirts and skirts. Why did this old wizard, who preferred rather hilarious looking outfits, think that it was inevitable for girls to wear skirts? And why did you loose house points for refusing to show half of your butt at 7 in the morning? Rolling her eyes the Gryffindor got out of bed. Rummaging thought her trunk she pulled out robes and a white shirt and paused for a moment. *Those house points don’t matter anyway,* Alicia thought. With that the brown haired child started looking for her black jeans. *That ugly grey wizard can kick me out if he wants to, I’m so sick of this.*
After getting dressed in what is known as the boys dress code she made her way into the great hall. Grabbing a few waffles to go, putting them into a handkerchief and sliding them into her dark blue backpack, Alicia started her walk towards the dungeons. Before she arrived at her classroom however, she was greeted by her history of magic professor. Giving him a small smile, she made her way into Snape’s holy halls. *Dear Merlin please let Black keep his mouth shut. It’s too early for this* As if her prayer had been heard, Sirius kept his comment to himself and made his way further up into the castle. By now it was 7:45am. Reid entered the potions classroom and sat down in the back, waiting for her lesson to start.
As always, Severus Snape billowed into the room. Everything seemed normal. Weasley was chewing on the last bits of his breakfast, Granger was sorting her quills, Malfoy was busy throwing crumbled parchment at Longbottom and Reid was sitting in the back wearing pants. Not a second after ending that train of through the potions master stopped in his tracks. He raised an eyebrow and started staring at Alicia. The girl noticed that, looked into his black eyes and gave a small nod. That seemed to satisfy her teacher, though she could not make out why. *He’s the first one to take away points if something is wrong with your outfit so why doesn’t he care? What does he know that I don’t?* Irritated by his lack of care, Alicia got started on her task for the day: brewing the Wide Eye Potion.
The brown haired child was pleased with her potion but that pleasure only lasted until her name was called through the classroom. “Stay behind after class, I have a matter to discuss with you” Snape muttered. Scared of what was to come she watched her classmates hurry out of the dungeons. Once the potions room was empty except for the Slytherin and Alicia, the dark clothed man started to speak: “I believe it is best to advise you to be careful today. Professor McGonagall was very displeased to see you missing at breakfast this morning. She asked me to hand you this.” Pulling a small envelope out of his pocket he held it in front of her chest. The Gryffindor took it and quickly slid it into her bag. “I hope your head of house doesn’t catch you while breaking the dress code. However, if this is a more permanent decision I would advise you to speak to her directly.”, the black haired man sneered. A shudder went through her body. This couldn’t be happening. Feeling her heart rate rising and breathing become more shallow with every minute that passed, Alicia whispered a quick “I will try to remember it, sir.” and made her way out of the room. She was about to walk through the door when Snape called “And Reid, maybe next time you want to try an ironing charm on your pants.” Surprised by that statement she turned her head, gave him a small smile and went towards the Defense against the dark arts classroom.
Parvati and Ron were the only people left in front of her. Her heart was pounding in her ears and she couldn’t think of a single way to turn her boggart into something funny. When Professor Lupin had announced today’s topic, Alicia felt like she was going to be sick. Facing her fears was one thing but half of the year watching her? There was no way she would be able to survive this. When her name was called she took her wand into her shaking hand. Taking a step forward the boggart turned from Ron’s spider into a grown woman. The Gryffindor felt her heart stop. The woman in front of her had wavy brown hair that reached her shoulders, prominent curves and breasts and was wearing a dark pink dress. Her high heals were matching the outfit and when the boggart lady pushed a strand of hair out of her face it revealed a scar shaped like a lightning bolt. Alicia felt like she was going to be sick. Dropping her wand onto the floor she room her backpack and ran out of the classroom, leaving a confused and worried professor behind. The child stormed into the nearest bathroom, closed the stall behind herself and threw up into the toilet bowl. It took multiple minutes for her stomach to calm down and when it finally did, she collapsed onto the ground. Tears were streaming down her face and here hands were shaking uncontrollably. Feeling her airways close up Alicia started digging through her belongings until she found what she was looking for: a shiny metal blade.
She rolled her sleeves up and paused for a moment. Uncle Vernons bruises were still there. If she cut through them she’d bleed more than she could manage. *But it will end the pain. I **need** to end the pain.* Pressing the cold metal onto her forearm she paused for a moment. Taking a shaky breath she pulled the blade away from where she was holding it. Her skin ripped open. The wound was white for quite some time until the first drops of blood started to emerge. Setting the blade onto a purple coloured bruise she repeated the process until she was satisfied. Her brain had finally gone numb and she managed to stop crying. Her arm however wasn’t looking too good. There were open wounds everywhere and her uncles bruised had now started to bleed like they were waterfalls of blood. Alicia took another shaky breath and began the process of cleaning everything up. Her hands and the floor were covered in blood and her legs felt like pudding. Having done this too many times before she was done after about 10 minutes, which left enough time to get out of the castle before everybody else went into the great hall for lunch. She had missed history of magic but the Gryffindor didn’t care. If Professor Black even noticed that she was absent he could just give her detention or scream at her or whatever came to his mind today. She didn’t care. Her biggest fear and her biggest secret had just been exposed to everyone around her. Everyone knew she was scared of growing into a woman. Of living as a woman. No punishment could bring her to attend class. Not while she was feeling like she was dying. Everyone knew about it now and soon she would be the freak of the school. Not like she wasn’t already.
After picking her bag up and washing her hands Alicia made her way towards Hogwarts grounds. She needed an escape and the lake was the only place she would be left alone. If her head didn’t feel like exploding she might’ve remembered the advice Snape had given to her this morning but now it was too late. In front of her was standing her head of house, Minerva McGonagall. “Ms. Reid. Would you care to explain to me what has been going on?” The woman spoke with the strongest Scottish accent the teenager had heard in a while. She knew this wasn’t going to end well. “First you miss breakfast, then you storm out of Professor Lupins class, miss Professor Blacks class and now I catch you breaking both the dress code and the attendance rules? Ms. Reid, I’m very disappointed in you young lady-“ her teacher didn’t get to finish her sentence because Alicia bolted out at hearing that term. She was no lady. She had never been one but no one seemed to care. No one seemed to notice. There was no point in trying to explain the pain she was in, it wouldn’t get any better. This misery was going to kill her. She was going to kill her.
Reaching the lake she let herself fall onto the ground. Blood had started to drip from her bandages so she ripped them off. Alicia didn’t care anymore. If the wounds got infected there was at least a small chance that she’d die from it. And oh how she couldn’t wait to die from it. After uncle Vernon had tried to kill her and failed she thought that this was it. She believed that there was no way out. But after figuring out that her accidental magic had saved her from her uncles hits with the baseball bat she regained her hope. Now was the time to do it, now was the perfect moment. Everyone already hated her and there was no reason to go back to class. No reason to continue this miserable life. Alicia was so consumed by her thoughts that she hadn’t noticed the dog that laid on her lap. It was the same one she had seen last night but now it was licking the tears from her face. *Why was he doing that?* The teenager closed her eyes and whispered “Somebody help me.” She didn’t know why. There was no reason to safe her. She was going to die. Slowly, with each wound becoming infected over time. But, at some point soon, she was going to die. As if he had understood what she was saying, the dog got up from her lap and started to walk away. Alicia regretted that statement. She didn’t want him to leave. She didn’t want to be alone. She didn’t want to get help. It took multiple minutes of silent cries until she was able to hear footsteps approaching. Taking a deep breath she wiped the treads from her cheeks and collected her thoughts. When she saw who was standing in front of her, all her efforts of pretending to be fine fell useless.
*This couldn’t be happening.*