Stargazing

The carriage moved along the road that would eventually drop them off at the Hogwarts Express. They bumped along the rougher patches and Lacie looked out the window to see trees pass by.

Lily, who sat across from Lacie, was smiling cheerily with her bright red hair swaying loosely. A stark contrast to the Slytherin boy beside her who’s black hair was orderly and wore an expression of distaste. He was quiet, but readily responded when Lily directed a question in his direction. When he did speak it was in a low tone and he seemed confident enough in his responses. Lacie thought he seemed like he’d rather not be here, albeit she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen him in a situation where he was completely comfortable.

“So… What are you going to do over the break?” Lacie asked.

“Not much,” Lily replied. “I’m hoping to see some of my muggle friends. And, of course, hang out in the park with Sev.”

“Maybe Marlene and I could come visit you over the summer as well.” Lacie knew it was more difficult for muggles to get around. They weren’t connected to the Floo Network and couldn’t apparate instead they used automobiles. She’d never been inside one but she’d seen them all around when walking through the muggle neighbourhoods.

“That would be fun!” Lily agreed, “My parents have been wanting to meet some of my friends from school. They’ll probably want to ask your parents questions as well. They are fascinated by what magic can accomplish.”

It wasn’t long before they descended from the carriages and made their way onto the Hogwarts Express. Lacie felt a bit bad about the relief she felt when Severus left to find some of his Slytherin friends to sit with. They boy seemed lonely, but his cold demeanor made it hard for Lacie to want to befriend him. She, however, didn’t miss Lily’s pursed lips as she watched her childhood friend walk away.

Their friendship would burn, Lacie decided to herself. It would burn brightly or burn out. Lacie was not friends with Severus nor would she claim to be acquaintances, but she was friends with Lily. They were both opinionated and steadfast; brilliant in their own ways, she wouldn’t deny that. However, she also listened to the rants Lily would go on about Severus’ friend choices and Lacie worried for her friend. She would either learn to accept it or not. Lacie could only be there for whatever happened.

The train began to move, slowly at first, then faster and faster. The scenery out the window was flying by and Lacie took a last look at the Hogwarts Castle she would have for a couple months. It was strange to think about; she was going home and yet she was also leaving home.

She sighed. Lacie was looking forward to seeing her parents, but she didn’t have many friends there and her parents both worked. She clapped her hands together, surprising Lily who was reading a novel.

Lacie was determined to enjoy her summer. Free to read books, explore, and all together relax before her fourth year at Hogwarts. If only she could practice magic outside of school. There were so many things she wanted to learn, to try, but there was never enough time between classes. Even less with the electives in the following year.

“I hope we’ll see Marlene before she leaves the platform,” Lacie said.

“She’ll probably find us there,” Lily agreed. “I think she’s sitting with the Hufflepuffs. She’s sweet on Fletcher, I swear they’ll be dating by the middle of fourth year.”

Lacie started, she hadn’t realized Marlene might like one of the Hufflepuffs she had been hanging out with this past year. Although it made sense and Fletcher seemed nice enough.

She wasn’t going to bet against Lily on this, nor was she going to risk getting caught by Marlene who would likely find this conversation less fun. It was a coin toss, depending on how much she really liked the boy. “I guess we’ll see. Don’t let her catch you saying that or you might be in trouble.”

The potion was starting to wear off, the dark blue strands of hair were tinged slightly darker than usual as her natural hair colour was faded back in. The thin strands of silver were barely noticeable, merely an effect of the light.

Neither Lily nor Marlene had ever seen her natural hair colour, however, she was sure they knew she dyed her hair for a reason. They were kind enough not to pry too hard when Lacie redirected the conversations. It wasn’t so much them as it was Lacie’s lack of self confidence surrounding the matter.

A rattling came from outside the train compartment and soon enough an older witch with frizzy grey hair pushed a trolley into view. It was piled with colourful sweets, at least a dozen different kinds. “Anything from the trolley, dearies?”

“Two Liquorice Wands, please,” Lacie handed over the money, setting one aside for later and keeping one to nibble on through the rest of the ride.

“I would like two Chocolate Frogs and a Pumpkin Pasty,” Lily requested, fishing around her pockets to find the coins she hand placed there. She gave her thanks before turning back to Lacie. “One of the nice things about our Hogwarts robes is their pockets. It makes carrying things around so much easier, but these pockets,” she said motioning to her pants, “can barely fit a few Sickles.”

Lacie nodded in agreement. Some students may not like their robes, but she had no issue with them. The pockets were undoubtedly handy to have, especially the wand pocket on the inside.

“Have you been collecting the cards?” Lacie looked in the direction of the Chocolate Frog boxes. “I usually see you with the Cauldron Cakes.”

“No, I’m not collecting the cards. I’ll either eat it over the summer or,” Lily grin mischievously, “if Tuney is going to be unpleasant to me again this summer I’ll surprise her with them.”

Something had happened last summer, Lacie didn’t know what, but it had caused Lily’s sister Petunia to lash out; she was a muggle but wanted magic according to Lily.

“That will probably scare her! Muggles don’t have spelled candy, yeah?”

“It would be too much trouble to add a mechanism to make candy move without magic. But at least their flavours are predictable.”

Lacie laughed, remembering when Marlene had bought a box of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans in their first year. “Envelope glue was an unfortunate first flavour.”

“The pastel yellow deceived me. It really did taste like licking an envelope, but worse because the unpleasant aftertaste was stronger. I still think mine was better than yours though.”

She shrugged in response, “Black pepper wasn’t so bad until the sneezing.”

The light grey bean hadn’t seemed appealing in appearance back then and neither had it tasted particularly good. Lacie had decided to try it anyway. It wasn’t awful, but then a tingling at the base of her nose caused her to start sneezing.

“Marlene had it easy. Strawberry, out of all the different flavours she got the most normal one,” Lily said in an exasperated tone. “And then she got peach.”

“You didn’t have to continue,” Lacie laughed, taking a bite of her Liquorice Wand.

Lily quipped back, “Neither did you and yet I recall you bemoaning a sardine flavoured one followed by fresh grass.”

“You’re right,” Lacie sighed, overdramatically. “Marlene dared me though.”

“She dared me too,” Lily raised an eyebrow at her friend.

“You took her dare as well!”

“Ah, but you see,” Lily folded her hands on her lap and tilted her chin giving the air of someone important. She continued with a prim voice, “Unlike you, I didn’t regret it because I got cinnamon and blueberry pie.”

“You-” Lacie spluttered and the two friends devolved into laughter.

The train continued to rumble as it continued its long journey. It would be dinner by the time they arrived at King's Cross station. It would have been much faster if she had asked to be picked up by her parents in Hogsmeade to aparate home, but then she’d miss saying a proper goodbye to her friends. There was something about the hustle and bustle of all the students getting on the train to go to Hogwarts and then off the train for the summer. It made the year feel complete.

Lacie rolled her wand between her fingers; its composition was that of hazel wood and unicorn hair. It would be strange to be apart from it over the summer, as strange as that felt to say. Her parents would have her put it back in the box and in her dresser’s drawer to keep it safe and so she didn’t accidentally try to use magic forgetting that she wasn’t at Hogwarts.

Just a few years ago the only magic she used was accidental magic or magic that was tethered to an object and didn’t require any magical input. Albeit, the years at Hogwarts had changed that. She was expected to use magic regularly for her classes and even without her classes she would have studied various spells. Her wand was constantly in her pocket or hand ready for the next challenge.

She slipped the wand into her sleeve. While not the most comfortable, it worked for now since her regular clothing didn’t have a wand pocket.