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Aurora's time at Hogwarts continued quite unremarkably. Despite her issues with her potions professor, all her classes were going well. By late October, Aurora had realised Astronomy was the subject she'd excel in. This, she was quite happy with, it was nice to have something that was just hers.
As for friends, Aurora couldn't have been happier. Her, Padma, and Susan were still good friends though Parvati had found a new gang. Aurora and Padma had also become friendly with two other Ravenclaw girls: Su and Elizabeth (or Lizzy as she preferred to be called)
All in all, Aurora was happy about her first two months at Hogwarts. It wasn't until the last day of October that things went awry for Aurora.
Aurora had left her friends at the Halloween feast to go to the bathroom. One of the Ravenclaw boys, Kasper Entwhistle had accidentally knocked a goblet of pumpkin juice across the table which had unfortunately caught Aurora's favourite jumper.
Amid all the chaos of Kasper apologising and Aurora's friends berating him, Penelope Clearwater had come over to clean Aurora up and warn the first years about getting too excited. Aurora had decided to take a trip to the bathroom anyway, mainly to get away from Kasper's repeated apologies.
Aurora made a beeline for the mirrors to make sure her jumper was in fact clean. Penelope's spell had worked perfectly, thank goodness, and Aurora's clothes looked as good as new.
Aurora was ready to head back to the Great Hall for dessert when she heard a small sniffle from one of the stalls. She frowned to herself and stepped towards the offending stall. There was definitely noise coming from there, someone must be inside.
"Hello?" Aurora asked tentatively, "are you alright...?"
"Go away," a voice said from inside the stall. The girl sounded tearful, as if she'd been crying for a while. Aurora hesitated. She wondered if maybe she should go away, but Aurora rarely wanted to be alone when she was crying even if she claimed she did. Maybe this girl was the same.
"Is there anything I can do?" Aurora asked her, "anyone I can get?"
"No," the voice wept, "no one... no one at all..."
Aurora thought she'd found the root of the problem. This poor girl. There was no way she could leave now. Besides, she thought she knew who was behind the door. "Hermione?" Aurora asked softly.
There was a very long pause before: "Yes," Hermione Granger replied in a sniffly sort of tone. Aurora felt a pang of sympathy. "Listen, I miss my family too, I'm sure everyone here does. We'll see them soon, though."
Hermione sniffed behind the door. "It's not that," she murmured reluctantly. "I mean, of course I miss my parents but..." Hermione paused and Aurora heard her blow her nose. "I thought this school would be different."
