Sunflower

Sixth year.

Olivia Sallow had no idea how she had already made it to her sixth year at Hogwarts, especially after such a disastrous year prior. Aside from the cruel and twisted punishments Umbridge had dished out to the students, shortly after her fifteenth birthday Olivia had begun to experience strange nightmares. Traumatic, and disturbing dreams that centered around a young witch who looked far too much like Olivia. Almost instantly Olivia understood what she was seeing during the strange dreams. They were glimpses of her great grandmother's memories. Some were during her time at Hogwarts, while others were from her time being an Auror. Around the same time the nightmares began her magic also changed. Much like what the memories showed her, Olivia had started to see wisps of ancient magic. In truth the punishments that Umbridge gave to her were the lesser of two evils. The physical pain of the enchanted quill was nothing in comparison to the mental torment she endured every night.

‘ Olivia .’ She heard a distorted voice whisper in her ear. Olivia whipped her head around but found no one near her. 'Its not real. There's nothing.' She thought to herself. Olivia had started to hear the voice over the summer. She had heard it during her dreams, she had gotten used to that, but to hear it while awake left her questioning her sanity.

To distract herself from her rising anxiety, Olivia checked her bags that sat on her trunk for a third time, making sure she had each one secure; but it was too late though. A panic attack had already settled in, spreading ice through her spine. She closed her eyes as her ears filled with white noise. In her mind, she counted out seven seconds for each breath she took, trying her best to relax as the grip she had on her cart tightened until her knuckles were white.

She did all she could think of to ground herself in the moment. Though both her hearing and sight were useless to her, as she focused on her breathing she began to pinpoint the scent of vanilla perfume. It was her own, she loved the way it reminded her of cupcakes. Touch was next to come back to her, the smooth metal of her cart had been warmed under her grip. After several minutes the conversations of the station came back to her ears, bringing her back to her senses. She slowly opened her eyes only to be met with everything tilted out of place. Olivia closed her eyes again and just kept breathing, in through her nose and out through her mouth.

Finally when everything had returned to normal, she glanced up at the clock that hung above the station, hours had passed since her arrival. She was exhausted and hungry. She had been early. Too early by many accounts, as she was one of the few students gathering first for the train. None of whom had been part of her social circle, but rather looked like first years saying their goodbyes to their parents. 

She felt a twinge of sadness as she watched the families hug each other, it was immediately replaced by guilt. Olivia’s mother worked tirelessly for the ministry, while her father was a Curse Breaker. Rarely, did she see either due to their hectic schedules. During holidays she usually stayed with her grandfather in the Fieldcroft highlands, summer was the only time she saw her parents at their London home and it was never both of them together. For the first few weeks she had managed to spend some time with her father. When he was whisked back to work there was a week's time to get through before her mother returned home. Unfortunately, her mother was always called to an assignment before even two weeks had passed. It was nothing new to Olivia. She would spend her time reading, writing letters to her friends, baking with the house elf who kept things in order, and practicing the instruments her parents owned.

Neither of her parents had seen her off at the train station since her first year, but still she told herself that was alright.

As she stared at the growing crowd a grin formed across her face when she saw a Slytherin sixth year running toward her. She waved, thanking Merlin that people scrambled out of the Slytherin’s path as he abandoned his cart; the teen let it crash into a pillar as he ran towards her at full speed. Olivia stepped away from her cart to intercept him, though she felt bad for the students he had more than likely scared with his wild antics, Olivia was far more excited to see him than she was concerned for others.

“Matty!” she exclaimed as he crashed into her open arms, his excitement caused her to stumble back several steps. As Mattheo wrapped his arms around her waist, Olivia felt the last of her anxiety melting away. There was safety in those arms, an unstable stability that she desperately clung to as often as she could over the years of their friendship.

“Livie! Fuck, I missed you!” Mattheo clamored. He rocked them back and forth for a bit before he picked Olivia up and spun her around. When she laughed he finally stopped, and placed her back down on her feet; he felt his greedy need to see her smile sated for the moment. Mattheo rested his head on her shoulder, the hold he had on her tightening slightly as he let her scent wash over him. The mix of her vanilla perfume and her cinnamon shampoo was comforting to him. He whispered just loud enough for her to hear, “It’s been way too fucking long, Olivia…"

Mattheo Riddle had met Olivia their third year in History of Magic when the two had been assigned as seatmates. They had rarely spoken the first few weeks of class, Olivia would always greet him and usually he would return the gesture and that would be the end of their interaction; until Mattheo had forgotten his textbook and Olivia happily shared hers with the brightest smile on her face. He enjoyed seeing that warm smile. The following two weeks of class went that way; he would conveniently forget his textbook and without hesitation Olivia would smile at him, and scoot closer to share hers with him. During one of those days, the professor had gotten into a long winded lecture, resulting in most of the class falling asleep. Olivia was no different, her head bobbed her a moment before she ended up resting on his shoulder. Mattheo’s first instinct was to shrug her off, but when he saw how utterly peaceful she was he simply held still for the entirety of the class and watched her. When she woke at the end of the class, he teased her relentlessly over it. That day had sealed it for Mattheo, he was inseparable from her from then on.

Olivia shook her head as she filled with laughter. She gave him a few gentle pats on his back as she reminded him in a light tone, “Mattheo, we saw each other a month ago when you demanded we hang out for the summer festival. Remember?”

Mattheo scoffed playfully, pulling back enough so he stared down at her with a look of feigned hurt. Olivia moved her hands down to rest on his arms, grinning back up at him. It was easy being with Olivia. It was effortless for Mattheo to let any walls he had up down around her. He reveled in the time he got to be around her. Teasing her, making her laugh and smile, seeing her face flush at his suggestive comments. Even the few times she was angry, he found her adorable. “That was a whole month ago, we should have made plans to see each other every week. We aren’t doing that bullshit again next break, I’ll just come home with you next time.”

He grinned proudly at his plans, his eyebrows wiggled at her. Olivia gave him an incredulous look before she let out another wave of laughter. His grin dropped as he glared down at her. “What's so funny? I’m serious, grandpa Ominis loves me.”

“I don’t think it's a matter of my grandfather loving you or not.” She said through her laughter. 

Mattheo raised an eyebrow at her. “What’s the problem-?”

“Merlin are you two at this already? Can’t you at least wait until you have a private compartment?” Draco Malfoy’s irritated voice interrupted as he joined the pair. 

“Jealous, Malfoy?” Mattheo asked with a pointed glare as he begrudgingly dropped his hold on Olivia. Draco scoffed in reply, fidgeting with his suit uncomfortably.

“It’s lovely to see you as well, Draco. You look nice.” Olivia gave him a cheerful greeting.

“It’s always a treat Sallow.” Draco replied as he rolled his eyes. 

Olivia had been introduced to Mattheo’s group of friends shortly after they’d begun to hang out with one another. She had easily won most of them over- the exception being Draco Malfoy. “Did you have a nice break?”

Draco clicked his tongue as he answered. “Stellar as always. Nothing but the best after all. No muggle festivals.”

Mattheo cocked his head, taking a step towards Draco. There was something in his tone that set Mattheo off. “Fuck does that mean?”

Olivia barely managed to get a grip on Mattheo's arm and pull him back to her side. “Actually, we didn’t attend a muggle festival this year. My grandfather's hamlet held their summer festival and my grandfather wanted Mattheo to help out.”

“I didn’t ask.” Draco said in an irritated tone.

“Stop being an arse.” Mattheo said in warning as he took half a step forward. Olivia’s hold on Mattheo’s arm tightened.

She kept her voice even as she responded. “No you didn’t ask, but there seemed to be a misunderstanding.”

“Whatever, let's just go get our seats before the compartments fill up.” Draco snapped as he turned to leave the pair. When it was just the two of them again Olivia sighed, and turned back to look up at Mattheo.

“He’s certainly as pleasant as ever that cousin of yours.” She muttered in a flat tone.

“We should do something to fuck with him.” Mattheo said, his anger still very apparent. As hard as it was for him when others were flirty with Olivia, it was worst when they were rude.

Olivia looked up at him. “Like what?”

“I dunno. Something humiliating.” He replied, his eyes narrowed as he watched Malfoy board the train. 

Olivia shook her head at him. “You are incorrigible. Come on, let's go catch up with Draco. Grab your cart.” 

Olivia quickly grabbed her own cart as Mattheo jogged off to where he’d let his crash.  When Mattheo returned to her side the pair headed off towards the train. “How’s your collection going?”

Olivia glanced up at him and smiled. It never ceased to amaze her when he recalled something about her, even something they’d spoken about frequently. “It’s going quite well, I found some new books over the break. I'm excited to read them and add them in.”

He returned her smile with a grin as he watched her, her eyes brightened before him while she spoke about her books. Olivia had confided in him during the Triwizard tournament when they spoke about what they would do with the prize money, that she wanted nothing more in life than to run a bookstore. She wanted to be surrounded by old and new books that would find new readers through her. When she called it a silly dream, Mattheo automatically started in on her about how if anyone could do it she could.

He leaned down towards her as he asked, “Are you going to let me read any of them this time?” 

Olivia eyed him for a moment, mentally going over the books she had with her. “Maybe one of them.”

***