Life as I Knew It

As Pansy walked into the headmaster's office, he looked up at her wearily. "Right. Young lady, we get a lot of transfers to this school nowadays. Due to the influx we had last year, we have found the need to create a more strict admission policy for transfer students. I need to know a few things about you before we can proceed. What is the name of the last school you attended?"

Pansy hesitated and looked at her hands. How was she supposed to answer that? This time it would be much more difficult to change the subject. "Well, you see, Professor, I--"

When Pansy looked up she saw that Professor Dumbledore was staring at her with confusion. "Miss Parkinson?"

Pansy had given up hope that anything like this might happened. Her heart was racing. "Yes! Professor, do you remember me?"

Dumbledore blinked a few times. "No, I'm afraid I don't."

"Oh." Pansy realized then that he might have learned her name any number of ways, and that his knowing it meant nothing.

"I don't remember you, but I feel as if I should."

That had to be a good sign. Pansy's hope was renewed. "Well, Professor, we have met before."

Professor Dumbledore pushed up on his desk and stood. "Something is wrong here, Miss Parkinson. I've felt it for a while now. You are the first thing that seems right."

Pansy did not know what to say. Obviously, something was wrong, and if anyone was to be aware of it, it made sense that it would be Dumbledore. Should she tell him everything? She remembered reading once in a divination book that if someone knew the future, she must be very careful about how and when she reveals this knowledge. It seemed to Pansy that would apply here as well.

"Professor, how did you know my name?"

Dumbledore smiled kindly. "Because I've met you before somewhere, somewhere I don't remember being."

Everything thus far in the conversation confirmed that the world Pansy remembered was the true world, the world as it should be. The headmaster had said that something was wrong. This wasn't just an alternate reality; this reality was wrong. If Dumbledore had the capacity to remember, she wasn't sure if it was wise to force the process by giving him information before he was ready.

"For a year, since the transfer students began to show up, something has bothered me, a constant niggling at the back of my mind. With you here, it's more than that." He looked off into space for a long time. "I just don't remember. I would very much like to hear your story, Miss Parkinson." He sat back at his desk.

Pansy wanted to tell him. This was the first good thing that had happened all day, and she would love to have someone, especially someone as wise and powerful as Dumbledore, to share this nightmare with, but it still did not seem right. "I think..." No, she decided, that was not the way to start. "I agree that something is wrong. I have memories that do not fit in with what I see here. And you are starting to remember things, hopefully the way I do. I want to help you get my world back, but I think you need to remember on your own."

The headmaster beamed at her. "I think you may be right about that. I will not ask you to divulge anything more than this: are you really a transfer student or have you been attending Hogwarts all along?"

"I have been attending Hogwarts all along." It felt good to be able to admit that.

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled, but it was in a much different way than Snape's had, a better way. "Somehow I already knew that the moment you started to speak. In all my years as headmaster and in all the time I was merely a professor, there were only two transfer students before this past year. Both of those students came from Durmstrang because their parents disapproved of the education they were getting in the Dark Arts. We do take foreign students, but the fact is that is rare as well, although less so. Foreign wizards are more likely to want to send their child to a more local school. The whole phenomenon last year was quite odd."

A thought seemed to occur to him. "We did not send any of those girls letters. I hadn't thought about that before. We don't have open admissions; a student needs to be invited."

"I have my letter, Professor." Pansy knew she did not have it on her person, but she checked her pockets just in case. "It's in my trunk, although I don't know where that is. I suppose it would not have been sent to my dorm."

"I'm sure you have one. I have no doubt that you were telling the truth and that you were invited to attend from first year on. All the foreign students before were invited because their parents petitioned the board beforehand. Those two transfer students were a special case. I had met their parents years before, right after the defeat of Grindelwald. They were deeply affected by the Dark Arts and when they learned of their sons' curriculum, they contacted me directly to ask for a transfer."

Pansy was not sure why Dumbledore was telling her all this, and told him so.

Dumbledore smiled kindly. He was always smiling kindly. "Up until you arrived, I never thought about these things. I feel wonderfully lucid with you here, and I wanted to capitalize on it. But, of course, we should move on to more pressing matters, namely your transfer. Despite our new stringent criterion for transfer students, I have found that you will be allowed admission to Hogwarts."