Lovingly, not yours.

Chapter 4

"I never want to let go of you, hold onto me so tight that the time I think I will have to, you'll hold me back, reminding me just who I am"

Chapter 4 : "Sorting Hat and the all too familiar eyes"

Once the doors of the giant castle opens, Odele is met with a sight of an elderly lady, calling her old woman would do injustice to the sheer elegance and authority she simply stood with. Odele felt a surge of respect for the lady as she found herself wanting to be someone like her someday. The lady had a stern look on her face as she saw the students but the little girl with the sandy brown hair had an innocent grin on her face as her green eyes looked closely upon the other.

Odele hears the exchange between the big man and the lady, mentally registering their names. Hagrid and Professor McGonagall.

Odele furrowed her eyebrows as she tried to comprehend where she heard the name and then it clicked to her. Professor McGonagall, the transfiguration teacher! Her father often spoke of her as an elder he looked upto but when he was in the school he said he was afraid of her, and Odele could see why. Odele let out a small chuckle at the memory, realising that there might be more people she'd know and not know at the same time.

But more often than not, she found her eyes wandering to Draco. Not understanding what she feels frustrated her but she wasn't too keen on knowing it either, because the lines of origins were clear when they divided them both. 

Having been lost in her thoughts, the voices around her faded as she tried to make sense of what her intuition and her mind was fighting to tell her soft heart. Though she understood what was going around her, she felt a weird sense of foreboding pooling in her stomach, an uneasy feeling as she let her guide her into the castle with the others.

‘What is this unsettling feeling?’ As she waited with the others for Professor McGonagall to return.

A gust of wind flew past her as near about twenty different ghosts of the castle gathered around everyone, seemingly appearing from the stoned wall. She’d heard of them, even read about some of them but seeing them in real life, set the experience apart from her; as if the winds they flew past her with took away her worries. The Hufflepuff ghost, Friar she’d recognise from the jolly smile and easy acceptance of the ever known notorious Peeves. She smiled back at him, when she felt his supposed eyes on her. But her attention from his monk attire was driven away by the sharp voice of Professor McGonagall.

She giggled as she slid in between two identical, beautiful tan skinned girls. Another set of twins for Odele to marvel at. She whispered her apologies to both of them with a rather unapologetically smile on her small round lips.

Odele looked onto the hat placed on the four legged stool ahead of everyone near the end of the small staircase that lead to the teachers and the headmaster, professor Dumbledore himself who wore a look that either told he was anticipating it, or he was indifferent to everything as he should be, unbiased like a headmaster is.

Her eyes glanced around all the teachers, as she hummed along to the song that the sorting hat was singing. Though she wouldn't necessarily call it singing, can she with that screeching voice? But nonetheless she clapped along to the rest of the school after it ended the song.

Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment. "When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Abbott, Hannah!”

She saw the students get sorted one by one with a gentle smile on her face. The hat seemed to be quite quick on making its decision.

The boy before her, Millicent Bulstrode was sorted in Slytherin and she assumed he'd be the same, cunning and ambitious, as the rest of Slytherin is said to be.

“Burton, Odele” Professor McGonagall called upon her name as she shyly made her way to the stool. A bundle of nerves, was she as she sat on the stool with the hat on her head.

The hat seemed to hesitate at sorting her and that didn't help the nerves of the poor girl. She heard a small voice in her ear, “Little one, you have a brilliance I have seen before.” She thanked the hat for its kind words and the hat made a chuckling sound before booming, “Gryffindor!” Her roaming gaze caught the eyes of Draco, Neville, Hermione, Harry and the red headed boy. Each had a different look in their orbs, some had disdain, some pride and some had curiosity.

She didn't have much expectations of what house she'd want to be in, considering her father was a Hufflepuff himself.

She smiled at Professor McGonagall and skipped down the stool to the Gryffindor table, beaming brightly and settling beside one of the ginger headed twins she'd seen at the train.

The one beside her extended his hand, “I'm George Weasley.”

She shaked his hand back firmly with her usual polite smile, “I'm Odele. Nice to meet you, George.”

He simply winked at her before returning his gaze to the other students getting sorted and she did the same.

Hermione too got sorted into Gryffindor and flopped beside Odele with the bubbly smile, happy that she'd already had a friend in the house and Odele reciprocated the same. Ron Weasley, otherwise known as the redhead freckled boy with Harry to Odele, got sorted in Gryffindor as well. And that's when she realised why he was looking familiar he was Mr. Weasley’s son who he said was around her age! But she mirrored Mione's smile as Neville got sorted in their house.

But the little girl's lips formed into a thin line as she held Draco’s eye when he went to the Slytherin table with a smug look on his face.

She sighed as Mione asked her if she's alright. Together with her friends she sat, eagerly looking at the others getting sorted.

The atmosphere got eerily quiet when Harry Potter’s name was announced. Though Odele herself wondered where he'd go, she thought to herself that he might be a Ravenclaw. He seemed intelligent to her.

But she laughed softly as the Weasley twins got up on their feet and exclaimed, “We got Potter! We got Potter!”

Introductions then went around everyone as all the first years got sorted into their respective houses. Hermione then exchanged Odele and Harry's greetings, “Harry, this is my friend Odele Burton and Odele, this is Harry Potter.”

Odele had a tender smile on her lips as she shook Harry's hand, “Hello Harry, hope you have a good time here at Hogwarts with everyone.”

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