Life at the Patil's was actually quite fun. Parvati and Padma, Poppy's triplet sisters, had Lavender Brown, their friend from school, over, so it was pretty busy with five girls all living in the same house.

Cassia quickly learned that she didn't have to try to fit in around the house. Pippa, the triplets' mother, was so welcoming, and made Cassia feel so happy.

And, of course, Poppy was the best friend ever. After Cassia told her what happened at her house that night, Poppy had asked her best friend if she wanted her to go and kill them. Cassia had snorted, but Poppy had been deadly serious, saying that they shouldn't've hurt her in that way.

So Cassia lived with the Patil's for a week, just her, Poppy, her two sisters, Lavender, and Pippa. Then others got involved. This, of course, was the visit to Diagon Alley.

The six girls at the breakfast table that morning all got their Hogwarts letters at the same time, and Cassia opened hers with interest, ignoring the letter informing her that she was going to Hogwarts for her third year and that the train would leave on September first, and the booklist, which she would read later, and seizing the third letter, the one that wasn't normally there.

"Hey, guys, there's a third letter in here!" She said to the four girls around her.

"Ooh, what's it say?" Poppy asked, leaning over her best friend's shoulder as they read the letter together.

Dear Miss Malfoy,

This year, third-years are permitted to visit the village of Hogsmeade at certain weekends. Please give the attached permission slip to your parent or guardian to sign.

Yours sincerely,

Professional M McGonagall

"Well, shit," Cassia rolled her eyes. "Sorry, Mrs- Pippa," she added as an afterthought.

Pippa just laughed. "No need to apologise to me, Cassia."

"Why are you so upset, anyway?" Padma asked.

"Well, I don't exactly have a parent that'll sign it, do I?" Cassia smirked bitterly. "So there's me watching you guys go off to Hogsmeade for a year."

"Oh, nonsense!" Pippa said. "I'll sign that darned slip for you, Cassia."

"Really?" Cassia asked.

"Yes, and if it's not good enough for McGonagall, then it's not good enough for anyone," Pippa rolled her eyes. "But she should take it, considering how arsey your parents sound-"

"Mum!" All three triplets yelled, faces going red. Lavender and Cassia laughed.

"What?" Pippa laughed.

Poppy sighed, rolling her eyes.

Cassia shook her head, grinning widely as she tapped her best friend's shoulder.

"Yeah?" Poppy asked, looking at her.

Cassia asked. "Did you hear about the Azkaban breakout? About Sirius Blac-"

SMASH.

Black's name wasn't even fully out her mouth before Pippa dropped the jar she was holding, the marmalade in it splattering all over the floor and mixing with the tiny glass shards from the now destroyed jar.

"Mum, jeez!" Parvati said, as her, Padma and Lavender were having a completely different conversation.

Pippa, meanwhile, was just staring down at the jar, tears starting to brim in her eyes, her hands shaking slightly.

"Mum, you okay?" Padma frowned.

"Mum?" Poppy added, really confused.

Then, suddenly, Pippa snapped back to life, wiping her eyes and clasping her hands.

"Yes, I- I mean, yes sorry," she said hurriedly. "Could you fetch me the mop, Parvati? I'll clean this up..."

As she did, Cassia just stared on in confusion.

What on earth was all that about?

❦︎❦︎❦︎

Sooner than later, it was time to go to Diagon Alley. The girls had their booklists, and they were all ready to go. Cassia was just praying that her family hadn't planned to go on the same day.

Well, it turned out that her family hadn't planned to go. But someone else had.

"Oh. My. God. Why is he here? This is my sacred, special time away from him!" Cassia snarled.

They had just arrived in the Leaky Cauldron, the gateway bar to Diagon Alley, and they had just seen the Weasleys there, with Hermione. And Harry Potter.

"Ouch, Cass, just chill," Poppy murmured to her. "Plus, have you seen how hot he's gotten!"

"He could have a literal six pack and I wouldn't care," Cassia snapped back.

"Arthur! Molly!" Pippa said, bringing Mike over to them and introducing him.

"Cassia! Poppy!" Cassia turned her attention to a bushy haired girl running towards them. Hermione caught both the girls into a hug before pulling back. "I didn't know you guys would be here!"

"Neither!" Poppy smiled.

"Yeah, it's great," Cassia sighed. "Well, it would be if he wasn't h-"

"Well, well, well. Cassia Malfoy."

Cassia turned. She knew that voice. But she really, really wished she didn't.

The raven hair that stuck up at the back. The round glasses that just slightly magnified his eyes. The piercing green eyes that everyone said came from his mother. The lightning shaped scar on his forehead that everyone gaped at, but she found annoying.

The last time she had seen this boy, he had sort of tried to save her life.

It still didn't mean she liked him one bit, though.

"Well, well, well, Harry Potter," Cassia matched his tone. "Do you want me to get out the trumpet and play a fanfare? Sorry we haven't boosted your ego enough yet."

Harry rolled his eyes as he looked at her. "I don't have an ego."

"You evidently don't have eyes, either, then."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Well-"

"Is that Cassia Malfoy I see?" Cassia grinned at those two voices as she turned around to see Fred and George, the Weasley twins. "Arguing with Harry Potter? Oh, that is unusual..."

"Yeah, I've never seen them bicker in my life!"

"Shut up, you two!" Cassia said, running forward, grabbing both the twins' heads and miming smashing them into each other. However, she never would. She loved the Weasley twins, and, unlike Ron and Harry, they had been really welcoming to her in Gryffindor in her first year, and they had continued to be friends from then.

"Oh, sorry, we didn't mean to interrupt!" Fred laughed.

"Yeah, we know what you two are like during a lovers quarrel- ow!" George complained as Cassia cuffed him on the head.

"You alright, kids?" Arthur frowned at the group as he came forward.

"Yeah, we're all good," Cassia smiled up at him. He frowned slightly at her and she elaborated. "I don't think we've met before. I'm Cassia Malfoy," she extended her hand.

She was used to the look by now. The one that was smiling as she said her first name, and then when she said her last name, the one that flipped. Cut off. Went cold.

"Malfoy..." Arthur said, shaking her hand rather flimsily, his lip curling slightly.

"Yeah, she's a Malfoy," Poppy stepped up beside Cassia, who was fiddling with her fingers. "But she's a beautiful, smart, amazing, brave, feisty and sarcastic Malfoy and she doesn't deserve to be looked at like that. She's not like the rest of her family."

Arthur's face went to shock, then a flicker of anger, then to a small smile. "My apologies," he said, shaking her hand more sincerely this time. "I didn't mean to judge you based on your name-"

"It's okay," Cassia looked down. "I know my father's an arseh- I mean, an idiot towards you and your family... I just..."

She bit her lip, squeezing her eyes together so the tears wouldn't come. She didn't want to think about her father.

"Brat!"

She could still feel her cheek stinging-

"Hey, Cass, you okay?" She flinched slightly as Poppy touched her shoulder.

"What? Yeah, I'm fine," Cassia said, looking at her friend and hoping her eyes weren't bloodshot or glassy.

"Okay, lunch is served! Come on, everyone!" Molly shouted all the kids over.

Cassia tried to smile as Poppy sat down and begged her friend to sit next to her. She was going to, as well, when-

"What was that?"

Cassia looked up, now praying that her eyes didn't say she was in pain. "What?" She asked Harry, as he frowned down at her.

"You- you flinched," he said, a look of realisation on his face. "Cassia, are you-"

"You are blind," Cassia lied, biting her lip to stop it from wobbling. "You know, getting taller and growing some hair over the summer hasn't made you a legend, Potter."

She sat down, her words stinging as much as her cheek, leaving a very confused and, for one of the first times, speechless, Harry Potter behind.

❦︎❦︎❦︎

"I want a pet," was the first thing Cassia said when they got into Diagon Alley fifty minutes later.

"Oh, come on, Cass, that is so not happening!" Poppy sighed. "I mean, I would love for you to, but your father's going to blow up if he sees you coming into the house with something furry or feathery or even scaley!"

"Yeah, well, my father's probably not going to want me in the house ever again, so fuck it," Cassia shrugged. "Come on, Pops, can we just, like, wander over to the pet shop and-"

"Okay, girls, we've decided what we're going to do!" Arthur came over and lay a hand on each of the girls' shoulders and Cassia tried very hard not to flinch this time.

"Yeah?" She turned, a well practiced fake smile on her face.

"We're going to go and buy your books for you, and you can all go and get everything else you need, plus any other things," Pippa smiled at Cassia, knowing she wanted to get a pet. "Then we'll all meet back here at five for dinner."

"Noice," Cassia said, twisting her accent and making both Poppy and Ginny, the youngest Weasley, giggle. "Let's go-"

"Uh, not so fast!" Molly Weasley warned them. "No going near Knockturn Alley and please be on time for dinner, okay?"

"Yup," Poppy nodded. "Can we-"

"Go? I'm right ahead of you," Cassia said, linking her arm with her best friend's. She knew she was being kind of annoying towards Molly and Arthur, but she needed to get away from everyone. She still wasn't ready to tell anyone what had happened with her father, but she felt a lot more comfortable in Poppy's presence than anyone else's.

She and her best friend wandered for the afternoon. They got all their equipment, of course, and some new prank stuff, then they went to the broomstick shop.

The Firebolt was the talk of the town right now, and Cassia couldn't wait to see it. It was a new brand of broom that went ten times faster than all the Nimbuses, and about a hundred times faster than Cassia's Cleansweep Ten.

"Can you imagine Potter and I racing if I was on this?" She scoffed in disbelief as she looked at it. She played as a chaser on the Gryffindor quidditch team, so she and Harry often got opportunities to race. He always beat her because he had a better broom, but she had come close a few times.

"Yeah, you would definitely beat him, Cass," Poppy smiled.

Cassia nodded, pressing her lips together. "Okay, enough dreaming, let's go to the pet shop."

Poppy looked at her friend. "Cassia-"

"Nope, don't talk me out of it," Cassia said decidedly. "I'm getting a pet today and I'm so excited!"

Poppy sighed, versing the two sides against each other before realising that her friend was not going to change her mind.

"Okay, let's go!"

They entered the pet shop a minute later, Cassia just looking around. She didn't know exactly what she wanted but she was getting something today.

She was instantly drawn to this one owl.

"Oh, I wouldn't take that one," the shop owner told her. "Been in here with a broken wing for six weeks, the poor thing... there's better options around the shop."

Cassia narrowed her eyes.

The owl in question was a barn owl, with big round brown eyes, a lovely beak, and yes, a broken wing.

Cassia looked between Poppy, who shrugged, the shopkeeper, who shook her head, and the owl, who didn't give her an answer.

But she already had one.

"Actually," she turned her head to the shopkeeper. "I'll have him. It is a him, isn't it?"

"Yup, sure is," the shopkeeper gave her a sour look as she got up and took the owl out of its cage before putting it into a shiny new one and putting it on the counter. "That'll be twenty galleons."

Cassia handed over the money as Poppy nudged her. "What are you naming him?"

Her best friend smiled. She had had a name on her mind from the beginning. "Oswald," she said. "I think it's just right."

Poppy smiled as Cassia picked up the cage, finally happy.

Her father would kill her, of course, but she didn't care.

She had a whole year left before that happened.

❦︎❦︎❦︎

Oh, and of course, Harry Potter had something to say on the subject.

As soon as Cassia and Poppy walked in, just a tiny bit late for dinner, Arthur, Molly and Pippa raised their eyebrows at them, and the owl in the cage.

Potter just hooted with laughter.

As he and Ron laughed, he said. "Malfoy, I don't know if you were aware, but that's not an owl, it's a runt."

"Oh? Then you two'll make perfect friends," Cassia snarled back.

Harry raised his eyebrows. "You bought him."

"And you insulted him. Now watch your mouth, Potter. Because I won't be so forgiving at Hogwarts, when there's no adults to save you."

Cassia smirked as she said it.

She didn't notice Arthur take Harry off for a chat that night. Nor did she notice his detached manner after it.

But what she did know, was that she was ready for Hogwarts this year.

Roll on September first!