Falling Slowly (A Hogwarts Lovestory) - Fred Weasley Fanfiction

36 | The Longest Night

I passed my O.W.L.s quite well considering the current circumstances. It turned out that all the hard work with Lupin after class was totally worth the effort. With his help and the strength I gathered from my short but intense conversation with Sirius, I passed even my DADA exam with an "Outstanding".
To take the boggart, I simply had to take Harry as an example and blow my alter ego in the mirror up (just as Harry did last summer with his aunt) while using the Riddikulus Charm and the boggart was defeated. Everybody who was watching laughed and Lupin gave me a thumb up after.
It was a true shame he now had to leave school because people found out about him being a werewolf. Thinking about that made me very angry. Why do people always have to judge about what's on the outside? Why did it matter more that he was a werewolf than that he was by far the best teacher of Defence Against the Dark Arts Hogwarts ever had? I never understood why people always fear what they don't understand.
For some of his students, including me, Lupin was not only the best teacher but also a very good friend. I hoped he knew how much he meant to the few of us.

The corridors of the castle were flooded with an euphoric atmosphere because tomorrow was the last day of school and everybody would return home to their families. Everybody but me, of course.
I would spend this summer at Hermione's. The Weasley's needed every space they could get since they planned on housing almost their entire family in the Burrow this summer - the Quidditch World Cup was taking place in Britain in July and everyone was meeting up at the Burrow before.
I wasn't mad about that (Fred tried to convince me to stay with them anyway) but I didn't want to be in their way. So I gladly took Hermione's offer. I knew I'd miss Fred like hell but yet I was looking forward to the summer holidays. It's been a while since I had lived under muggles and I had to admit that I missed the ordinary life more than I expected.

I was sitting with my friends at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall, where the tables were all filled with the greatest selection of cakes, cookies, pastries and other sweets you've ever seen. The walls were covered in red and golden decoration - Gryffindor had finally won the Hogwarts Quidditch Cup, after all this years, which was another reason everybody (except Slytherin perhaps) was in a good mood for celebrating.
In his final speech, Professor Dumbledore honored Oliver Wood for his remarkable results in Quidditch this year and he turned red like a tomatoe. I smiled brightly at him and raised my glass to show him how proud I was - winning the Hogwarts Quidditch Cup has always been his greates goal and it made me happy to see he finally made it in his last year. And he totally deserved it. I got a little sad thinking about the fact that he'd never return to school after the summer holidays. Hogwarts wouldn't be the same without him.
Well, at least Fred now had one reason less to be jealous about.

"Since when is mail delivery by owls at this time of the day?", Hermione asked sceptically and looked up to the enchanted ceiling.
I followed her eyes and there was indeed an owl flying into our direction, carrying two huge parchment envelopes. It was no ordinary owl, it was Harry's owl Hedwig. She let one of the envelopes fall on my plate and one on Harry's, stole a cinnamon bun out of Ron's hand and flew right away back to the owlery.
Harry opened his letter first and I immediately knew by the way he smiled while he read it that it was Sirius who wrote it.
"Who wrote you a letter?", asked George curiously.
"Ehh, no one", said Harry and quickly hid the letter in his bag. "I mean, it's from no one you know. Just my... uncle."
"And your uncle is writing to Julie, too?", asked Fred with raised eyebrows, but gladly he didn't get the chance to ask any further questions. In that moment, Dumbledore declared the feast over and sent us all off to bed. We should make the last evening count, he said. We should make sure it wouldn't be forgotten, he said.
And Dumbledore, as always, was right. I would never forget this night. But I sure as hell would regret it.

We celebrated in the Gryffindor tower until midnight, but since we all had to get up early to take the Hogwarts Express home, most people set off to their dormitories quite early. So did Angelina, Alicia, Katie and me, but we stayed up in our beds a little longer speculating about what next year will bring. We only had two more years to go at Hogwarts.
Later, when I was sure everybody was fast asleep, I grabbed the letter I got from Sirius and quietly snuck out of my dorm and down the staircase to the empty common room. I needed to make sure nobody saw me reading the letter. It had to stay a secret that Sirius stayed in contact with Harry and me, it was too much a risk for him. It could lead the ministry to him.
I sat down on my favourite armchair, the red one next to the fireplace, opened the letter and started to read.