Hogwarts is my Home (A Remus Lupin fanfic)

Chapter Three -Obliterated Cereal

Chapter Three:
Mel:

That morning, Mel woke with a start. Someone was persistently knocking at the entrance to her chambers. She reached for my wand.

"Lumos." Light flooded through the room, nearly blinding her. Glancing at the clock, she then realised that she had overslept slightly.

"Damn!" Throwing on a dressing gown over her nightie, Mel unlocked the door. Standing on the other side was a very short, cheery man with a look of slight impatience on his face.

"Oh, good morning Professor Flitwick." Melanie mumbled sleepily. She was up all night making lesson plans that She probably should have made during the summer when McGonagall came to visit, but like always Mel procrastinated.

"Finally my dear, I just came to remind you that breakfast is in half an hour and it may be a good way to meet the staff that you don't know already." the elder man reminded Mel of a drill sergeant. She smirked and leaned slightly on the doorframe.

"I'll be there professor." he was always one of Melanie's favourite teachers.

"I'll see you at breakfast then ms Warbeck." and with that he was gone, hurting along the corridors surprisingly fast in a swirl of blue robes. She stifled a yawn,

"Well then Mel, you'd better get changed." She said to herself and closed the heavy, wooden door.

After throwing on her favourite bronze-coloured robes and fluffing up her short, blue hair; She was ready. Her black combat boots scuffed the floor as she lightly dragged her feet across it. There were many, many stairs down from Ravenclaw tower to the Great Hall.

Soon enough, she was at the bottom and striding along the main corridor. There were many groups of students, excited first-years newly sorted last night. Mel remembered her sorting, her parents were really proud at the spring hat's choice because they were both Ravenclaw at school. Mel had wanted to be Gryffindor though, it was where all her friends were.

Most of the teachers were already seated at the teacher's table. McGonagall stood up from her seat in the headmistress's chair and waved. Mel gave her a small wave back and went to take the empty seat next to her and a ragged-looking man with dark circles under his eyes.

"I'm glad that you decided to come back ms Warbeck. I'm sure the student will benefit from your professional opinion." smiling grimly, Melanie replied,

"I'm glad to be here, I missed it here." and it was the truth. Even though her friends were long gone, it felt nice to be where she was first accepted for being herself.

"Madam Warbeck, this is Professor Lupin, our new defence against the dark arts teacher." the headmistress stated by way of introduction. "Remus, this is Melanie Warbeck, our new flying instructor." Then she left us to start up a lively conversation with professor Vector about something or other, leaving Mel and Remus pretty much alone. Melanie awkwardly stuck out her hand to shake and he took her calloused hands in his slightly scarred ones.

"Nice to meet you, Mel." he stuttered out. He looked to be in his mid-forties, a little older than me, but still fairly young. With only a slight mattering of grey, peppering his sandy-coloured hair.

"Nice to meet you too Remus." Mel smiled as nicely as she could, it probably looked more like a grimace though as she hadn't exactly had much practice at smiling lately. Mel looked away quickly as a frown crossed her face at that macabre thought.

"Melanie Warbeck! Is that you?" A person behind Mel said, startling her. She turned around and professor Slughorn, her old potions teacher was there.

"Yes professor, I didn't know that you still taught here. I thought that you had retired!" He chuckled and replied,

"Yes, yes. I didn't retire for a little while. I came back because I missed this old place. But look at you my dear, what happened to all your hair? I remember when you first came to one of my little gatherings, and you were half-hidden under those blond locks of yours! But I love the new colour! House pride?" She laughed a bit self-consciously.

"Yeah, I'd like that professor." Melanie gestured to my bronze robes and blue hair. "I guess that these are the Ravenclaw colours!" McGonagall stood up again to address the students and Slughorn took his seat at the other end of table.

"Students, welcome to a new year at Hogwarts school for witchcraft and wizardry. As you can see, this year we have two new teachers. Professor Lupin will be filling the defence against the dark arts post as professor Throneglass has dragon pox and will not be returning to teach anytime soon." There was a polite round of applause for Lupin, that quietened down when the headmistress started speaking again. "And madam Warbeck will be taking over from her aunt, madam Hooch. She was a chaser for the Holyhead Harpies and will be running quiddich tournaments as well as flying lessons for all years but first-years." Again there was polite applause and a small collective groan from a few first-years, to which Mel smirked.

"So, enjoy your year and your timetables will appear after breakfast has been served."

With a popping sound, the food appeared and Mel grabbed some cereal and milk, pouring herself a bowl.

"Can you pass me the milk when you're done?" Asked Remus.

"Yeah sure." and she passed him the jug of milk which he promptly poured into his tea. Melanie shuddered, and to his questioning glance she said,

"Milk in tea is gross!" He smiled with all of his teeth and shook his head.

"And how do you take your tea?"

"Like every normal person..." She glanced sideways at him and muttered, "three and a half sugars, no milk." to this he laughed again. "What? I love my sugar!" Mel glared, mock-offended. Lupin smirked and she turned back to her cereal, which was now the consistency of mush. She sighed and reached for the teapot. Even magic can't fix this problem, there's no spells to reverse the effects of obliterated cereal.