Stolen pain

1.) Intro

The war had changed everyone's lives; Harry Potter and Lila's cousin had saved the world, and Voldemort was finally gone. Lila finally gets to live her life freely with her dad, stepmother, brother, and cousin without being in fear that her family will be taken from her.

Lila woke up on a bright Sunday morning, yawning as she sat up in bed and turned off her alarm clock. Had Lila ever been a morning person? No, she hasn't, but she wasn't starting off the first day of her school year late. The ministry had thought it was best everyone return and restart their year, due to the war, of course. Lila was lost in thought when Remus knocked lightly on her door. "Hon, breakfast is ready. We're going to head to Dragon Alley after we eat, so please be ready." He said it softly as he walked away before Lila could say anything, so he could get Teddy and Harry up.

Lila took a deep breath as she skimmed her closet and found one of her school skirts and her uniform as she sleepily walked over to the bathroom. Luckily, Remus had decided to fix up Harry's parents house, and Remus and Tonks agreed to give her the room with the bathroom. Lila looked in the mirror, noticing how her light freckles sat on her face and her brown eyes stared back at her. She smiled softly, grabbed a hair brush, and brushed out her medium brown hair with her bangs bleached blonde. After the war, she decided she needed a new look that wouldn't remind her of how things were before the war. She just needed something that made her feel different. Lila had also learned to do some makeup; she grabbed her concealer and put some where she absolutely needed it. Lila didn't wear a lot of make-up, just some concealer, some brown eye shadow with some shimmer, blush, mascara, and eyeliner. Lila finished getting ready, grabbed her stuff, and headed downstairs.

"Looking as beautiful as ever, sweet girl." Tonks said softly as she handed Lila a plate of her favorite breakfast and sat down next to Remus, "Thank you!" She smiled back at her stepmother and sat beside Harry, saying, "New year back, am I right?" Harry said, chuckling nervously as Lila sat down. Lila had been dating George Weasley for almost three years, but out of nowhere, George left her for some girl he met at the joke shop. Harry was still really close to both Lila and George, even though Lila hated it. Harry smiled sympathetically at Lila, but it had been over six months, and it wasn't affecting her as much as it used to. Remus cleared his throat and looked up at them, signaling it was time to go, but was Lila ready to go back?

They got to Diagon Alley not long after breakfast and went straight to shopping. Lila looked down at her list and huffed a bit. Her wand had broken during the war, and she knew she was going to need to get a new one, so Olivanders is where she headed. "Hello, little Lupin!" Ollivander said as she smiled at him, "Good morning!" Lila smiled a bit as she explained what happened, but was interrupted when Olivander smiled and handed her a wand. It was the same one she had before the war. "Miss. Lupin, I always remember a wand I sold," he said, smiling softly as he looked at the wand. "Oh, and it's on the house." Lila smiled as she walked out of Ollivanders and started to go to her next stop.

Lila looked up, trying to find her family, when she was met with a face she had not been too happy to see. "Well, what do we have here? It kind of looks like a but." Matthew Riddle smirked, looking down at Lila, saying, "Still being a major douche even after the war.. shocker." Lila rolled her eyes and pushed him out of the way as she finally found her family. Lila hadn't always been so cold toward Mattheo, but things changed in the second year when Matthew convinced everybody that Lila had opened the chamber of secrets. The whole school hated her and picked on her until Ginny came back with Harry, and Harry cleared everything up; ever since then, Mattheo has made it his personal job to torment Lila the best that she could, no matter what he did.

Lila finally snapped out of her thoughts when she felt arms around her. Hermione. She could sense Hermione from a mile away; it was something about how close they had gotten during their time at Hogwarts that made Lila think of Hermione more as a sister than a best friend. "Well, hello to you too, 'Mione!" Lila said, smiling brightly and wrapping her arms around her, beaming as she smiled. "I am so excited about finally getting back to learning. So many new things to learn this year!" Lila chuckled a bit. "Well, if you look at it that way, then we're in for a good, unproblematic year." Hermione smiled and finished her shopping with Lila, avoiding the joke shop at all costs. She didn't think that she could do it right now, not with how fresh the situation was.

Lila, Hermione, and Harry all met Ron at the train, making sure to buy the whole trollie and talk about their summer before Lila drifted off into a nice nap. Lila wasn't sure what this year held for them and wasn't really ready to be back, but she knew one thing, and that was that she wasn't letting anything get her down this year. It was a fresh start she desperately needed after the war.