Year 2 (pt. 1)
Michael is standing on Platform 9 ¾ saying goodbye to his parents before he boards the Hogwarts Express. The smell of the steam reminds him of last year when he met Hermione on the very same train. He had been exchanging letters with her all summer and was glad they would be able to talk in person soon. As he looked out across the platform he could see the usual group of redheads exchanging goodbyes.
Michael climbed onto the train and quickly found a car with nobody else in it. He wondered if anyone would care to sit with him like Hermione did last year but he doubted it given so many people were scared of him. He finally reached 6’ over the summer, and it was painfully obvious to everyone how he towered over other second year students. He watched out the window, the people scrambling to the platform and onto the train as he saw a particular frizzy haired girl who had a red head following her.
After a minute or two the car door slammed open. “Mike! Good, you have space for us.”, she breathed out. Herimone was standing a little taller than she was last year in the doorway of the car. Michael quickly grabbed her trunk from her and put it in the overhead compartment. Behind her was a small girl that Michael couldn’t mistake for anyone else but a Weasley.
“Oh, this is Ginny Weasly. She’s Ron’s sister and she doesn’t really have anywhere else to sit.”, Herminone explained. Michael nodded towards Ginny and gestured for her to sit with Hermione across from him.
Michael could tell that Ginny was scared of him. Who wouldn’t be. He was so tall and buff that even grown men were scared of him too. She keep glancing at him but tried to stare out the window or at other people passing by the car.
“No worries Ginny im not as bad as i look… most of the time at least” Michael said trying to lighten the mood with ginny she gave a fake smile at this and continued looking out the window. Hermione saw this and tried to change the subject
“Are you ready for another year?”, Hermione directed at Michael. “Yes, I hope it is as eventful as last year. Maybe without you almost dying from a troll though.”
They both laughed at this while Ginny looked at the two of them with wild disbelief. The train started with a jolt and the three of them settled for the long ride ahead of them.
~
After a while on the train Ginny said she was going to look for everyone else to see what cars they were in. After a bit she got back and told them that she couldn’t find Ron and Harry anywhere. While they thought it was odd, they ultimately blew it off thinking maybe she just missed them given it was a long train.
An hour passes and Michael sees something out of the corner of his eye. “What was that?”, he turns towards the window to get a better look. This catches the attention of Ginny and Hermione. All of a sudden a blue car flies past the window.
“Wait… Is that?”, Ginny starts. Then the car starts going at the same pace as the train giving the three of them a good view of who was inside it.
Harry and Ron were in the front of the car and they looked like they were scared shitless. Ron had his hands on the wheel looking as if he were going to cry while Harry had his hand back on the cage of his owl, Hedwig, making sure it wouldn’t fall.
As the car zoomed past, Ginny jumped up and quickly said she was going to find the twins and tell them what they had just seen. Hermione and Michael sat there in disbelief.
“I don’t think they know how to drive a car. Much less a flying car!”, Hermione exclaimed. Michael burst out laughing at how stupid this situation is much to Hermione's disappointment
Michael sat back in his seat thinking. I wonder how they will land at Hogwarts with that thing.
~
Michael sometimes talks with Hermione between classes and this time she looks over at him and says, “You know Harry has been hearing these weird voices in the walls recently” Michael looked at her thinking she was joking before realizing she's not.
“You think Harry has schizophrenia or something like that? You know that's not a normal thing that people hear.”, Michael said looking at Hermione who was angrily looking back at him. “I'm just saying my uncle Johnny started saying shit like that and ended up in a padded room, it was kinda because of the voices in the wall but more because she chased me and my cousin with a curling iron saying she's going to straighten the devil out of us. That's how I got this scar,” he pulls up his sleeve to show a long burn mark on his right arm. Michael starts laughing again, “So are you going to wait until Harry starts saying I'm the chosen one, I must kill voldemort before you bring him in or what?”
Hermione was not as amused as Michael was with his jokes. “Mike, sometimes I question if you need to be put in a padded room.” Hermione responds.
“That's fair,” Michael says jokingly, then waving goodbye to her as she went to the Gryfinndor common room.
~
On his way to the Hufflepuff common room, Michael heard Fat Friar, the ghost of the Hufflepuff house, mention something to do with a ghost party. Because this caught his attention he followed behind Fat Friar for a while to get more information about it.
According to Fat Friar, the Gryfinndor ghost, Nearly Headless Nick, was holding some deathday party. The official name being Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington's five-hundredth Deathday Party. It would be taking place in one of the roomier dungeons.
During Halloween night, Michael walked past the Great Hall, and went straight down the corridor where Nick’s party was supposed to be. The hallway was lined with thin black candles that burned bright blue. The closer he got to the party, the colder he could feel the air getting. He eventually came to a doorway and once he entered he was greeted with a horrible screeching noise, like hundreds of fingernails on a blackboard. He figured this must be ghost music. Michael looked around the room to see hundreds of pearly white ghosts dancing and mingling amongst each other.
As he looked around he saw three people at the end of the room, Harry, Ron, and Hermione.
Michael could hear Hermione say, “Moaning Myrtle, she haunts the girl’s toilet on the second floor. It’s been out of order all year because she keeps having tantrums and flooding the place.” Just then a loud wail was let out across the room and a girl with pigtails and glasses flew across the room and into a wall.
Michael walked over to them, trying to avoid walking through any ghosts. “Hello Hermione, this party's pretty dead, wouldn't you say?”, he said with a grin. “It looks like you avoided Moaning Myrtle just then.”
Hermione laughed at his joke and then said, “I know right. Why are you here? Did someone invite you?”
“No, I just overheard something Fat Friar was saying to another ghost and decided to see for myself what this was all about.”, Michael responded.
Just then Ron looked over and exclaimed, “Look, food!” and as they all got closer to the table that was covered in a black velvet table cloth, they noticed the food was entirely rotten. There were platters of rotten fish, cakes burned charcoal black, and heaps of maggoty haggis. Even the cheese had a fine coat of mold keeping it warm from this cold room.
They all gagged at the sight of it but their attention was quickly taken away when they heard a familiar voice.
“OY, MYRTLE!”, Peeves said. He was a poltergeist and was known for starting up things. The only person who could control him was Slytherin’s ghost, The Bloody Baron.
Peeves started calling Myrtle names and heckling her. “UGLY MYRTLE! FAT MYRTLE! WHY DO YOU ALWAYS WAIL?”, he yelled out. With every new sentence Myrtle got more mad and you could tell she was about to throw a fit any second. Hermione was even starting to feel bad for Myrtle, despite thinking she was incredibly annoying.
Michael leaned over to Hermione and whispered, “You think we should do something about this?” Hermione looked at him and nodded.
Michael sighed and walked towards the ghost fighting, “Look, I know you’ve been dead for a while but that doesn't mean you get to be an ass to younger ghost you court jester fuck. Like what the hell do you even do here? Entertain the students?” Peeves looked and saw Michael staring at him and was dumbfounded that a human would talk to a ghost like this.
“My father told me stories of poor old Peeves the jester. He heard he came with the castle and that you just like to be a pain in the ass for no reason. You probably even remember my father, Bloodwic.” The more Peeves moved back away from Michael, the more Michael took this opportunity to move closer to him. “Yes, you remember Bloodwic clearly, don't you. Why don't you tell EVERYONE how my father got back at you?”
Peeves looked around nervously before speaking, “I was messing around with Bloodwic like I did with every other student but Bloodwic was different. He didn't take my bullying, he wanted to get back at me so he learned everything he could about us and convinced the Bloody Baron that I had killed his love, Helena Ravenclaw. This sent him into a blind rage, I’m glad he's not here right now because I still fear what he would do to me” Michael looked at Peeves coldly before saying,
“My father found a way for us mortals to touch your kind. You may not believe me but do you really want to find out if I'm lying or not, Peeves?” With this, Peeves went silent and quickly left the party room.
Michael turned to go back to Hermione but he felt something cold reach his shoulder. “Thank you.” a meek voice said to him. Moaning Myrtle looked to the floor and said it again. “Thank you.” With that, she also left the party. Michael assumed she went back to her toilet on the second floor girls bathroom.
“I think we have had enough of this place. I need to get some real food.” Ron said to the group. Harry quickly agreed but as they turned to leave Michael noticed guilt hanging over Hermione.
“Are you ok Hermione?” Michael asked. She let out a loud sigh, “I feel bad about what I said about Myrtle. I didn’t realize others were that mean to her. I would have tried to be a little more nice.” Michael nodded at this, he understood why she felt that way.
As they walked down the corridor with the thin, black candles they noticed something brown up ahead where two corridors meet. The closer they got, they realized it was Mrs. Norris, the caretaker's cat. She looked as if she was frozen and then tipped over. As they all kneeled down to get a closer look, Filch, the caretaker, rounded the corner and saw them.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO MY CAT?!” he shouted at them. They quickly got up all talking at once to explain themselves. “I swear we found her like this.” Harry tried to explain. Flich wasn’t having any of it and he picked up Mrs. Norris. The cat didn’t move one inch. It looked as if it was properly frozen. Flich quickly ran off to somewhere else in the castle. Michael assumed the hospital wing.
“Well that was weird, wasn’t it?” Ron said, “Now we have got to get some food.”
Michael and Hermione looked at eachother with knowing looks. That wasn’t just weird. That was extremely concerning. The cat was clearly not dead. It was just frozen there. Michael also took note that Harry looked a little off as they walked up to the Great Hall hoping to snag some food to take back to their dorms. They were able to snag food and started heading to their dorms. Michael was lost in thought about what happened to the cat. He remembered his father telling him stories about how there were spells that petrified people. No, that can't be the spell. That spell doesn't last for lengthy periods of time, it's short and temporary. Not likely next he thought maybe some sort of poison that made sense but not if it's a cat. Michael thought about this for weeks until the most talked about quidditch match was coming closer, Gryffindor vs. Slytherin.