The air in the Evans' households was always stagnant, tracing back to my great-grandfather's personal vendetta against ceiling fans when they first became popular in the late nineteenth century – his story varied as he aged, but from what I could piece together, his ideas were stolen by some young American who introduced to the public the first electric ceiling fan. We haven't been allowed fans in our rooms since his first visit twelve years ago.

The week passed slowly, but the monotony was broken by an invitation from Irene and before I knew it I was scrambling around hidden corners of house to pull my stray books together ...There was just one last detail to attend to before the rest of my summer would be free.

The rest of our time together was less dramatic than I'd envisioned in those first few moments of disbelief. (He'd start tormenting me ... my hair would end up crispy ... Dumbledore would walk in on us in some compromising but completely innocent situation and my cheekbones would be devoured in flames of discomposure ... we'd end up with new respect for each other ... we'd become good friends but would understand that nothing could really put the past behind us ... he'd still be goofy but I wouldn't mind it ... )

We had only been on the train back to school for about fifteen minutes before we realized Betty hadn't shown up yet; a few girls had stopped by to exchange “I missed you!” comments already, which she normally wouldn't miss for the world. Irene was the pleasantry fiend, but Betty genuinely did miss everyone she came in contact with and was subsequently separated from. She explained in a few words that she had been busy setting her younger siblings up; being the big sister, I supposed, required some work in this world.

Potter was the sort of boy who would sit in the front of every classroom, despite what you might expect. The more I got to know of him, the less it made any sense. His trouble making tendencies made the back of a classroom ideal for hiding mischief, but perhaps he had figured out that those who sit in the front get less scrutinized – still, he was one to stick to conventions and I doubted the whole keeping-your-enemies-closer thing ever appealed to him. Like most guys, he was fairly simple and straightforward.

The rest of my classes were as to be expected: Transfiguration a chance to be outshone by the best, but I suppose McGonagall still wasn't one to show favoritism; Herbology a more fickle subject than I had remembered, and I felt the need to form a personal connection with each of my plants, a theory which I had never subscribed to before. But as I watched Severus Snape breathe life into a hideous plant, I felt that not all was lost in a collection of broken spirits that they called a man.

The first Hogsmeade trip of the year was soon upon us, though the concerns over Montrose were never far from my mind. If Muggle relatives were being targeted ... But I couldn't think like that, and it didn't make sense anyway, because I could be sure that there were more important wizards to go after before myself.

At the end of the week the first Quidditch match of the season would be held, and as usual there was tension between Gryffindor and Slytherin. It seemed that we would always be enemies, even when Ravenclaw had scraped together a strong enough team to win the Quidditch Cup two years in a row. I imagined that next year our team would be the strongest, as we had the fewest students graduating this year, but for now our chances looked slim at best. Our only bet was to beat Slytherin, though with our Seeker's debut performance there wasn't much hope.

The end of term quickly approached. I had to admit that I was excited for the next Quidditch match by the time it came around three weeks later; I couldn't explain it, but somehow it felt as if winning the Cup would be tantamount to regaining our youth and declaring that we wouldn't be giving up quite that easily, thank you very much. And in my newfound sense of house pride, I found myself rooting for Hufflepuff to not lose all that terribly if they could possibly help it, as Ravenclaw would be our biggest threat and a strong victory would not bode well for us.

I still had the mysteries of Sirius Black's haggard looks, Remus Lupin's unknown illness, James Potter's possible rule breaking and Peter Pettigrew's complete absence from the match when he had no business patrolling the halls to fill my mind, but thankfully, I would have time with all of them to answer my questions. When the last Hogsmeade weekend of term dawned, I was still convincing Irene to come with me.

Before I could catch my breath after the last class of term ended, I was already packing up to go home. Irene would be going to visit her uncle and I my family. Several half-blood students were staying over the break, as their parents thought it safest, but Muggle parents had no concept of danger and pure-blood parents had no concept of fear. The Grumman sisters would be staying, so early that morning we all said goodbye to Betty and Corrine and took the carriages to the train. It was an awkward ride, to say the least.

If I had been paying attention I would have noticed how my mother and father were only happy together when they could focus their energies on us, how my sister tried so hard to be someone she wasn't, how my father, as much as I cared for him, wasn't as responsible as we wished he was. I had been blinded to all of this by my overbearing mother, and for years blamed any tension on her; but it was this broken woman who held us together.

I was getting more and more anxious about my career, and it pushed any worries I had about my family momentarily out of my mind – there was nothing I could do for them from school but get a good education and find a job to support myself. There were still so many options, and Annalise's words about the Ministry had got me to thinking whether or not that was somewhere I wanted to work; maybe, like her, I could hold out until Voldemort had fallen – but how long would that be?

Talk had, of course, spread that Potter and I would be going together, and that was just how we liked it. Every now and then, when we sat in classes near each other, we would hear whispers and catch the other's eye, grinning like goons at our farce. The only problem came with my friends.

The table tensed but I just didn't care anymore, about any of it: I was in school to get my N.E.W.T.s and get a job and maybe vanquish evil, not appease people who had no hold over me.

All in all, though, I was much more at peace now that Sharon and I talked more; sometimes we talked a lot and sometimes not at all, but I didn't feel an obligation as I had with Irene to always have something to comment on. She still sat with her friends in her year a lot of the time, but I took to talking to Annalise and Mary and I realized that they really weren't so bad.

I might have talked over pros and cons with Irene were we on speaking terms, or even written about it to my mother, since even though I could be absentminded, I imagined that she would want to hear about romantic developments. But without these confidantes, I turned internally and tossed and turned quite a bit before sleeping.

Was I fulfilling an itch of curiosity or wheedling out important information? All I knew was that I needed to do it, and whether it was for me or not remained to be seen.

“I don't think of them as different worlds ... ” It was a difficult topic and I considered it for several moments; he looked hooked on my words. “It's really come to where I separate family and friends. Family – no magic, everything takes longer, everyone knows just how embarrassing I looked as a baby. Friends – well, you know that story. Top of the class, terrible flier, not so good with creatures.”

The first week of N.E.W.T.s was by far the worst I had ever known, and fulfilled its namesake to the most extreme extent. My classmates and I spent every evening revising, but I was of the honest impression that if I had paid attention in class and done my own thorough outside reading, there was no need to over prepare the night before; it was thus quite unnerving to be surrounded by students who suddenly cared about their futures.

But as for myself, I still had one task left before I could say that I was successful in my school endeavors, and that was the smooth passing of graduation.