Sé que tu vas a volver / I know you will return

Saturday, June 16th, 1990 - Barcelona, Spain

OBS: This story contains a song, and if you want to listen to the song while reading, here is the video.

Elena Carter was a proud woman, who could take care of herself. She always had, and she always would. A prodigy in witchcraft, a powerful duelling machine, the sharpest mind of Europe, and she was aware of how great she was.

There was only one thing that made her question her decisions, and it had a very handsome face, dark blond hair and a very annoying pair of hazel eyes.

She was dreaming of his embrace when she woke up startled. In the dream, they were in the Yule Ball, the masquerade where she saw him for the last time. It had been on their final year in Hogwarts, and the year she decided to stop living the dream he brought to her life and face the cold reality again.

She had a promise of revenge to fulfil, and silly dreams of young love were not going to help her.

Elena Carter needed to forget Henrik Hagström. The tall Norwegian that found a way around her walls and into her heart needed to stay away. For her sake, but mostly, for his own safety. Nothing good would come out of associating with her.

But four years had passed since their goodbye and she was still dreaming of him. That was unacceptable.

Elena hadn't graduated from Hogwarts, she hadn't taken the final exams, and she vanished with half a year still ahead of her, leaving no trace behind. But she had learned more than enough, and Hogwarts library had become very small for her. It was time to find people with more answers, and that's why she had returned to her hometown.

Barcelona.

The city she loved the most, and also the city she hated the most. It was the city that gave her everything, and also the city that took it all from her.

Elena looked around the cheap flat that she had rented four years ago, thinking it would be only temporary. The place was filthy when she arrived, and she was at least happy that she had learned cleaning magic, and didn't need to rub that dirt with her own hands.

But on that particular morning, she was feeling completely and utterly drained. She was running out of money and had just lost yet another job. She had been waiting tables for a while, and thanks to her looks, the tips were always generous, but she always ended up beating up a client with a bold hand that got too touchy, and thus another restaurant had fired her.

And yes, she beat them up the muggle way. It was a great way to relieve stress, now that she couldn't find a guy that could relieve her stress the good way.

God, how I miss that idiot. She thought, as she tried to let the warm water of her shower clean the images of her dream.

But she remembered Henrik's everything, as if it was yesterday.

The touch of his skin bathed by the sun in a warm summer afternoon when they swam in the Black Lake. The flavour of butterbeer in his mouth after a stroll down on Hogsmeade. The glimpse of the stars in his eyes on the forbidden nights they escaped their common rooms to meet in the Astronomy tower.

Elena hated how she simply could not forget him. How come her life ended up taken by a man?

But Henrik Hagström was not an ordinary man, and she knew it.

That was yet another reason why she needed to forget him. Elena would never deserve a man like him.

Why did I accepted to hook up with that idiot? She complained with herself, as she left her shower and got dressed.