It was a Thursday, and you had just been released from the hospital wing early that morning. You tried to muster all your courage and remind yourself that you had nothing to be ashamed of because the way you were mistreated had nothing to do with you and everything to do with your classmates who had hurt you.

Susan was glad to see you out of the hospital wing again, saying how much she missed you in all of your shared classes.

Before you both left for your first class of the day, you made sure the bandage on your forehead was secure over your newly formed scar, not wanting any extra attention because of it. You adjusted your robes before Susan hooked her arm in yours and walked with you to Transfiguration class.

As you walked, you kept your head up and calmly made your way down the halls. You expected sneers, but you were shocked as students left you alone, smiled at you, or even greeted you.

You entered your class with Susan, and the room went from loud chatter to absolutely silent for a moment. You swallowed and bit your cheek but kept your head up. You took your seat and bent down to grab your textbook from your bag when Neville came up to you with a single sunflower. He smiled at you before setting it on your desk and wordlessly walking away. Following his lead, other students slowly came up to you with sunflowers of their own.

You blinked in confusion at first, but as students kept bringing them to you with gentle smiles, you too began to smile.

Sunflowers were your favorite.

Susan gripped your hand under the table and murmured, "They all chose to support you."

Hermione, Harry, and Ron entered the room soon after, and you saw the shock on their faces before they too brought their own sunflowers over. Staring at the pile of flowers in disbelief, Ron murmured, "Wow. I didn't expect so many to do it."

You grinned at the three of them and wondered, "You organized this?"

They nodded with hesitant smiles, but you jumped up and pulled all three of them into a hug. You backed away after a moment and cheered to the three of them and then to everyone, "Thank you. Thank you all. You're all too sweet."

As the three of them took their seats, you sat down next to Susan again. She tapped you softly, and you turned to her beaming. She carefully handed you a small box and grinned, "I made you something."

You quickly opened the box and gasped when you found a beautiful sunflower ring inside. You pulled it out and admired it while Susan chuckled, "Well, I was bored since you were in the hospital the past few days, and mum keeps telling me about all of her projects making jewelry for her clients. So, I decided to see if I had the same skill as her. Clearly, I don't because it looks so terrible."

It had a beautiful, intricate sunflower design around the band that looked professionally done. You ran your pointer finger over the beautiful figures. The metal was slightly warped, and the band was a bit boxy at spots, but its imperfections made it unique and personal. The ring felt like a symbol of the beauty to be found in imperfection.

You slipped the ring onto your finger, and it was slightly big. You grinned up at Susan and sighed, "This is the most beautiful ring I've ever seen. You absolutely do have her same talent. Oh, thank you!" You threw your arms around her and gave her a bone-crushing hug.

You pulled away as Professor McGonagall entered the room, and she was taken aback by the sheer number of flowers on your desk. She collected herself and began lecturing without saying a word about them. As you watched her though, you noticed the way she grinned ever so slightly whenever she looked at you or your flowers.

The rest of the day went by similarly. As you went into classes, students would bombard you with beautiful sunflowers, and professors would try to contain their shock at this. As you would move through the hallways, students in other years would come up to you and hand you sunflowers, sometimes silent and other times offering their verbal support to you. Each time, you would thank them and tell them, "This is too much. Thank you."

Luckily, you caught Hermione, and she was able to put a spell on your backpack to make it able to hold more. Hermione seemed to have a spell for everything.

When Fred and George approached you after your first class and handed you two huge, vibrant sunflowers, you felt like your heart would burst. You crushed them both in a hug, and they seemed shocked by this gesture, but you didn't care if they teased you. Those two had been incredibly supportive since this all happened, and you were so happy at how close you had gotten with both of them during your stay in the hospital. You pulled back after squeezing them half to death and beamed at them.

At the end of the day, in the time between your last two classes, you had collected a few more sunflowers, holding essentially your own bouquet when two Slytherin girls approached. They both handed you some sunflowers, and the black-haired girl on the right greeted, "Hi, Y/N. We're really sorry for all that happened at that party."

The blonde next to her sighed, "Truly. We did our best to help you at the time, but those two dimwits were being pure evil."

"We may have slightly gotten in trouble for punching them after Crabbe tried to kiss you in that awful state," The black-haired girl admitted while she rolled her eyes at the thought of the two boys.

The blonde added, "And we saw what Malfoy did too. What a prick."

You immediately shook your head and sighed, "No, no. I don't wish for you to hate anyone on my behalf. But, I'm so grateful for everything you girls did that night to try to help me and for these beautiful flowers. You are both so lovely. Thank you for all of it."

They each grabbed you by an arm and dragged you in for a hug, squeezing you tight for a second before pulling away. They both grinned at you and turned around to head to their classes.

You were about to head into your class then, but you were stopped when June stepped right in front of you with a sunflower in her own hands. She just stepped in front of you with eyes downcast and mouth in a grimace. The two of you were both absolutely silent for a moment, but June finally looked up at you and handed you the sunflower.

You tried to contain your shock, but you knew you were doing a terrible job at it as your eyebrows had risen to your hairline.

June shifted from one foot to another and murmured, "I'm sorry, Y/N. I'm so bloody sorry." Before you had a chance to reply, she bolted down the corridor and out of sight.

After you watched her disappear into the crowd, your eyes shifted to a spot behind them. Your eyes fell on Draco, who was staring at you with round eyes and parted lips. He was standing on the other side of the hall, frozen in his place, but he looked like he wanted to say something. You clutched the sunflowers to your chest and hurried into your next class, trying to shake that painful encounter off as you took your seat.

You didn't receive any more flowers in that class or the one before it since you had already run into most of your peers at that point, but every single flower you received was more than you expected. It was an incredibly thoughtful gesture your friends had organized for you.

Without them even realizing it, they had helped you feel safe in this school again, and that was a gift that you knew you could never repay them for.