persistence || d.m. x reader

.two.

monday, september fourth, 1995

.before.

The weekend had rushed by you in a hurry, between getting settled into your dorm room—shared with two other Slytherin girls you'd never met—and readjusting to life at school again. You hadn't had much time to do anything important, not that you had much important things to do anyways. 

Friday, after arriving to the school, you got settled and unpacked in the aforementioned dorm room. The girls you share with are nice, albeit quiet. Which is good, and you'd prefer quiet over rambunctious any day. Saturday, you spent time in the library, both reading books and enjoying the atmosphere of the beautiful athenaeum. Along with the library, you visited your other favourite spots of Hogwarts. Your favourite tree on the shore of the black lake, the astronomy tower, and spending nearly too much time just walking through the halls. You loved this school, this place, as well as the Highlands in general. On Sunday, you did nearly the exact opposite, though. You don't tend to indulge yourself in laziness often, but the day before the school year starting seemed to be the best day for it. 

Typically, as in for the past three years of your life, you and your former friends would sneak into the kitchens on the night before classes starting. Along with all the sweets and snacks the group would bring from home—all from Diagon Alley or their random favourites from the muggle world—you would all steal a few food items, with the aid of a select few house elves who'd taken a liking to you and your friends. After the excursion to the kitchens, you would all go back to a common room, always either the Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw common rooms, and have a grand feast together. The lot of your friend group would all sit together, engorging yourselves with the undoubtedly unhealthy food options laid out in front of you. You'd all catch up, recap on your summers and vow yourselves to resolutions for the new school year that coincidentally you were never able to live up to. All in good jest, of course. 

After the feast and the fun conversations, there would be games. Card games, wizard games, some involving props or nature, if the weather deemed it possible, and rarely even a few rounds of Just Dance, which you didn't often partake in. For these nights, you would all vow to turn off your phones, and disconnect. Enjoy the company of each other, rather than being distracted by other means. After the games tired you all out, you'd get comfortable on the floor and couches of the chosen common room—or when necessary, a dorm room—and nominate three films to watch. The whole event would stretch on until curfew, and then those not from the elected house, would scurry back to their own common rooms and dorms, hopefully not being caught by prefects, professors, or poltergeists as you accidentally were out a few moments past. Peeves always did like to tattle, whenever given the chance. 

You missed your friends, and on Sunday you thought about them the most. Wondered if they were still having the routine without you. Wondered if the events that tied you all together initially into a tight-knit friend group, now happened without a second thought of your absence. You didn't, however, let yourself ruminate over them too much. You knew well enough that that wouldn't of been good for you. Instead you mostly hung out in your own common room, alone. Reading was one of your favourite pastimes, and you dedicated your time to getting through a whole novel in a new series you'd picked up. Thank Merlin for magic, you thought, that you could use it to stuff as many books as you wanted into your suitcase. 

But now, on this fateful Monday morning, when you should most definitely be in your first Charms class of fifth year, you're instead standing outside of Snape's office. You were supposed to be at his office at strictly 9:00am. But, now that you're severely lacking friends, and therefore any social life whilst at school, you didn't have much to do after you finished breakfast. So instead of coming at 9, or even a few small minutes before, you decided to instead come a whole twenty minutes before. Breakfast started for you at 8:03, and you finished all you could eat by 8:15. After the meal, you decided to go spend some time in the courtyard, and soak up some of the minimal sun that the Highlands ever seem to get. Though, as soon as you got out there, the light sprinkling of rain turned into a heavy downpour. Thank you so much, Scottish weather.