Blue Eyed Girl

Throughout the feast Roxanne chatted with everyone around her, getting to know them. She was asked a lot of different question about her old school and life in the US and her family. She had barely touched her food.

As everyone was finishing up, Katie stood looked over to Roxanne's plate and said, "Is that all you're going to eat?" referring to Roxanne's plate covered with food she had barely touched.

"Well...I'm not very hungry," Roxanne responded, not looking at Katie, even though her stomach was growling loudly.

"Okay, whatever," Katie said as she stood up. "Ready to see where you'll be living for the next nine months?"

"Sure," Roxanne answered, "let's go."

As they walked through castle, Roxanne was amazed at how beautiful it was. Her old school was nothing like this. She was fascinated by the portraits and was studying one particular portrait of a young woman in an elaborate blue dress when the woman suddenly stood up from her chair and said, "I would like to welcome you to Hogwarts. Now, could you please stop staring at me? You're making me uncomfortable." Roxanne jumped backed, stunned.

Katie laughed, "Haven't you ever seen moving portraits before?"

"No!" Roxanne replied, still slightly shocked.

"Well, get used to it, they're all over the castle," Katie said still smiling.

They continued walking and Roxanne cautiously looked at the other portraits in the corridors that were welcoming her to the school.

"Here we are," Katie said when they reached they end of the hallway.

"Where?" Roxanne asked puzzled.

"The Gryffindor dormitory, of course," Katie replied as the portrait of a fairly large woman in a pink silk dress asked, "Password?"

"Annuo Foris," Katie said. The portrait swung open to reveal a hole in the wall that Katie climbed through.

Roxanne followed quickly, not wanting to be left behind. On the other side of the hole was a large room filled with comfortable looking chairs and couches and a welcoming fire burning in the fireplace.

"C'mon I'll show you you're room," Katie said excitedly as she walked towards a set of stairs.

Roxanne followed Katie up the stairs speechless. This was unlike anything she had ever seen before. At the top of the stairs was a room with five four-poster bed with dark red velvet curtains.

"Wow," was all Roxanne could say.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Katie said, amused.

"This is incredible," Roxanne responded.

"That's your bed over there," Katie pointed to the bed right in the middle.

Roxanne walked over to the bed and flopped onto it. "I could fall asleep right now," Roxanne said yawning. It had been a long day. She could barely sleep the night before and woke up very early to make sure she got to the station on time. And, naturally, she had been nervous about going to a new school and all the worrying had worn her out.

"Aw, you can't do that. This is probably the only night all year when we won't have homework. We have to have a party or something," Katie said smiling as she walked over to Roxanne. "C'mon, get up," she said as she grabbed Roxanne's wrists to pull her up. Roxanne protested, but eventually allowed Katie to pull her to her feet.

"There, I'm up. Happy?" Roxanne asked, slightly moody.

"Ecstatic," Katie replied. "Let's go see what's happening downstairs."

Roxanne followed Katie down the stairs into the now crowded common room. They made their way over to a cluster of couches and chairs where most of their friends were sitting. Roxanne sat in an empty chair while Katie joined Fred and George on one of the couches. They all talked for a while about different things. Roxanne just listened because they were talking a lot about what had happened in years past and she had no idea what they were talking about.

"So how are you planning to save us all this year, Harry?" Fred asked Harry with a sarcastic smile on his face.

Harry's face reddened as he replied, "It's not my fault Voldemort's always after me."

Roxanne was baffled at this. She had heard about Voldemort before, but never really thought twice about him. She was always told he wasn't much of a threat as long as she was in the US, but now she wondered how much of a threat he actually was now that she was no longer in the US. And what did Harry have anything to do with him?

George must have noticed her puzzled expression because he said, "The famous Harry Potter has saved us from Voldemort a number of times. But I'm sure you already knew that."

"Wait, what do you mean? When has he saved you?.....Why are you famous?.....I'm so confused," Roxanne asked looking from George to Harry and back again.

"You can't tell me you've never heard of Harry Potter," Fred said.

"The Boy Who Lived?" George asked astounded.

Roxanne thought for a minute. When she had heard Harry's name she thought it had sounded familiar, but she couldn't remember where she had heard it before. Then, all of the sudden, she remembered. She had read about the incident with Voldemort and Harry's family in one of her old History of Magic books.

"Oh, wait a minute, I remember now," she said.

"Oh, okay, good, you had me worried. I thought you might have lived in a cave or something," George said sarcastically and almost relieved.

Roxanne smiled and was about to ask about what had happened with Voldemort since then, but when she saw the look on Harry's face she decided against it and tried to change the subject.

"So what are the teachers like?" she asked, seeing Harry visibly relax as he smiled gratefully at her because he was no longer the subject of the conversation. She returned the smile and turned her attention to George who was doing an impression of the Potions professor, who no one seemed to like.

A few hours later, the fire had died and most of the other students in the common room had gone to bed. Roxanne could barely keep her eyes open and kept yawning.

"Tired?" someone asked her as she jumped and realized she had fallen asleep. She opened her eyes and saw George standing in front of her with an amused look on his face.

"Exhausted," Roxanne said as she smiled and stood up out of the chair.

"You better get some sleep because tomorrow you get to meet all of those incredibly fascinating teachers we've been telling you so much about," he said as he walked with her to bottom of the stairs to the dormitories.

"Can't wait," Roxanne smiled and began to yawn again.

George laughed as he started up the stairs to the boy's dormitories, "Good night."

"Night," Roxanne replied. She climbed the stairs to her dormitory, kicked off her shoes, and flopped onto her bed still fully clothed.

"Good Night, Roxanne," Katie said who had just closed the curtains around her bed.

Roxanne didn't respond, as she had already fallen into a deep, dreamless sleep.