Love, Potions and Legacies: Fifth Year (UPDATED)

Chapter 4: A missing friend

Stupid bloody cat! I swear he gets a kick out of stressing me out! I mutter to myself as I grab my bag, trying to get ready for today. 

He'd gone missing many times before, but there was something about this time that just felt wrong. He'd disappeared so many times before that last summer, I'd begged Dad to buy him a muggle GPS tracking device for cats and attached it to his collar. Not that it had made much of a difference now, as I'd found just the tracker out on the stone steps where he liked to sunbathe when I'd gone to find him to bring him in for the night a few days ago.

I look over at the cat tree in the corner of my room and try not to let my worries overwhelm me. He was a tough little thing when he wanted to be but it didn't stop fear filling my stomach. There were so many dangers outside of the castle walls for a little cat, something I wish he seemed to understand. But I was sure he thought he was a tiger or invincible, constantly wandering far too close to the castle walls or the forest for my liking.

The school bordered onto the Forbidden Forest, filled with all sorts of creatures that would eat a cat as a snack. It made my stomach icy at the thought of him being attacked by another creature. A part of me hoped that I was completely overreacting and that he was still somewhere in the castle. There was every chance he was still on the grounds somewhere, making big eyes at other students in the hope they would feed him.

I stare at my phone background, a cute sleepy selfie of him and I that I'd taken when he'd curled up under my chin and against my chest one morning in bed. I'd had him since he was a tiny kitten and in truth, he was probably my closest friend. Pathetic sounding maybe, but he'd always been here for me when I felt I couldn't talk to anyone else.

On Sunday night, I had gone out to the red hotspot that was showing as his current location to find him and bring him in for the night and when I'd got there all I'd found was the tracker and his broken collar. I'd scoured the nearby bushes and trees to no avail and had had to give up my search as curfew kicked in. That was three days ago and despite asking my friends to keep an eye out for him, no one had managed to spot him anywhere.

Every lunchtime and break time I'd searched for him, even cutting down to the Hufflepuff Common Rooms to see if he was hanging around down there or near the kitchens. I'd even put on my politest, friendliest smile and approached people I knew in the other houses in the hope they could keep an eye out for him. The girls had told me to relax and that he's probably fine but in all honesty, I found their reactions really irritating.

If Astoria's precious (and rather ugly if I'm honest) white persian cat had left her dorm, she'd have had all of us Slytherins out looking for it. Putting on a big show of tears for sympathy in the hope of manipulating Draco (who so clearly had a crush on her it was painfully obvious) and his friends into finding the cat for her. I nearly scoff at my breakfast as I imagine him shouting commands at them all, offering tens of galleons of a reward to the friend who would bring him the damn cat so he could take it to Astoria and win her favour. It was exactly what he would do. I didn't have anyone like that really. Except maybe Matty. He always came through for me when I needed help. Actually no, Enzo probably would too.

I rush back up to my room to get fully ready for the day, realising that even though it was only still September it was already too cold for a skirt, so I shove my trousers and fleecy leggings on underneath them to keep out the cold. As I retie my tie to look somewhat presentable and shove my jumper back on the right way round, I grunt in annoyance at myself. I was so stressed recently that I was doing every little thing wrong. This was the second morning in a row where I couldn't seem to get dressed properly and last night when doing my homework I'd snapped the nib on my favourite quill.

I knew why I was stressed outside of my cat going missing. We'd been given the exact syllabus breakdown for every subject in the run up to the exams at the end of the first term and the dates for the January mock exams. Even though they were both months away, it felt like a tonne of pressure was being put on my shoulders. There were now ten rolls of parchment of exam information just staring at me from the wall around my desk, haunting me from the moment I woke up and saw my desk to the minute I went to sleep.