I awoke to a loud bang coming from inside my dorm door. It was Blaise. He came over to my bed, lifted me up and dragged me to the common room while I was still half asleep, groaning as I was being jerked awake.

"Blaise why are you up? It's four in the morning!" I croaked, still not adjusted the bright lights in the common room compared to my pitch black dorm.

"I couldn't sleep. I thought we could go for a swim," he pleaded.

"What? Are you insane? You dragged me out of bed in the middle of the night to go for a swim because you couldn't sleep?" I sighed. "You're a terrible friend."

"Well...?" Blaise encouraged.

"Fine, but not for a long time. And if we get caught, I'm going to kill you with my bare hands. Got that? My bare hands, Zabini. It will hurt, I assure you."

"Yeah, whatever. Now go get ready."

I walked back up to my dorm, slowly and very carefully, trying not to make noise that the other girls in their dorms would wake up to. I then meticulously opened my door, tip-toed to my closet, and pulled out my swim suit.

I went to the bathroom, changed into it and put a beach dress over top of it. I tip-toed back outside of the bathroom into the dorm, now in flip-flops, and arrived back in the common room with an eager Blaise who held two dry towels in his hand.

We silently walked out of the school and made our way out towards the Black Lake. It was terribly dark out but I lit my wand and Blaise did the same. We left our wands stuck in the grass, pointed up so they could give us at least some light.

I took my dress off and made my way into the lake with Blaise's right arm around my shoulders. We took our first step and gasped, as it was extremely cold. I continued walking in the shallow part of the lake until I was about knee deep.

Blaise was about shin deep in the water and he gritted his teeth forcefully. I put my left arm on Blaise's back and forced out of his grip on my shoulder. I quickly walked behind him and with all my force I pushed him into the lake and he screamed my name before falling under the icy water.

He stuck his head back up and had an angry expression written all over his face. He asked if I would pull him back to the shallow end of the lake and I grabbed his hand, feeling slightly guilty after I pushed him so harshly. He then used all of his force and flung me forward, hurtling into the lake right beside him. I also screamed his name before toppling underwater. I came up for breathe and gasped harshly. I didn't even bother getting out now that I was completely soaked. We stayed there, treading water, and joking around for quite some time.

"I'm cold," Blaise complained after a moment of silence, causing him to think of the temperature.

"Same, let's go," I avidly stated.

We stepped out of the lake, wrapped the towels that Blaise brought around us and headed back to the castle with my dress and wand in my hand. I stayed very close to Blaise in an attempt and receive more body heat. He wrapped his right arm around my shoulder and I slung my left arm around his waist. We silently walked back to the common room, giggling out of nowhere.

We entered the common room and checked the time: too early for either of our liking.

We synchronously laughed and dried off in the common room while sitting in front of the almost-dead fire. After some time I told him I was going to go shower and he agreed. We parted ways up the steps and I went to my dorm. I then pulled some clothes out of my closet, grabbed a towel, and placed it all on the toilet seat.

I took off my bathing suit and hopped into the shower. While I was putting shampoo in I could hear rustling and grunts from outside the door. It was probably Pansy and Daphne starting to waking up. I continued washing my shampoo out and then started with the conditioner. It had a slight purple tint to it.

I must be imagining things at this hour.

I continued to put the conditioner in. When I washed my face, body, then shaved, brushed my teeth, and washed the conditioner out, I grabbed my fresh towel and started drying off. Once I was dry enough, I put my Slytherin robes on, as it wouldn't be long until we had to get to breakfast. Succeeding getting dressed, I wrapped my towel around my hair and went into my dorm and checked the clock once more: ten minutes until breakfast.

Daphne had already awoke and Pansy was grunting. I decided to go back into the bathroom and blow dry my hair even though Pansy was still asleep and this would most likely wake her abruptly. That wasn't my problem.

I mischievously turned on the blow dryer, stood in front of the mirror, and took the towel off of my head. My hair was a vibrant purple. I internally screamed but only winced out loud. I didn't want to explain to Pansy and Daphne that I had been pranked.

After blow drying my hair, I paced around the bathroom several times. I gave myself one last good look in the mirror. It honestly didn't look too bad. I played around with my hair and became content to the idea of the exotic color. Following the bizarre discovery of my hair, I put light makeup on and smiled at myself for what felt like the first time in years.

Maybe Draco's little prank wasn't so bad.

I walked out of the bathroom and my dorm, thankfully unnoticed by Pansy and Daphne. I grabbed my bag, wand, slipped some shoes on, and started chewing some minty gum. With all my belongings, I headed to the common room which was getting fuller and fuller as more people awoke. I began walking out with a few stares at the changes in my hair, however, I ignored them all and headed to the Great Hall.

While entering the great hall, the students were sending weird glared my way. Blaise who had already started on a bowl of cereal, widened his eyes at my appearance.

"What did you do?" he asked, astonished.

"I didn't do it! Someone put a hair jinx in my conditioner," I explained.

"I kind of like it," he replied honestly and went back to eating his cereal.

"Me too." I smiled, thankful for Draco's failed attempt to prank me.

I ate some grapes and a bowl of cereal, similar to Blaise. Once finished with breakfast, we headed off to our classes for Wednesday which was identical to my Monday schedule. We encountered the ladder and began climbing to divination.

After entering the crystallized room, we took our usual seat and listened to Professor Trewlany's words as we tried not to zone out.

After class we went to the common room to be greeted by Draco Malfoy himself.

"Nice hair, y/n," he said sarcastically.

"Thanks Malfoy, all credit to you right?"

"What are you going on about?"

"Please, we all heard you say you would 'pay me a visit' at night while we were on the carriage. Your words don't always go unnoticed."

He started saying something but Blaise dragged me away. We walked to the library and did our divination work. It was fairly easy because we merely used our textbooks that provided all of the answers.

•••

The day seemed to fly by pretty quickly and we were already off to dinner. I sat there eating my salad appetizer and then dug into a chicken quesadilla. Blaise ate a salad as well and an enormous Hogwarts-seasoned taco.

Throughout dinner we talked about random thoughts that popped into our heads. I looked over at the Gryffindor table and noticed that Harry, Hermione, and Ron were missing. I was very intrigued as to what they were doing as it is obviously more important than having dinner.

"Do you want to go see what three troublemaker Gryffindors are up to?" I smirked at Blaise.

"Of course I do," he replied, grinning evilly.

We headed to the Gryffindor common room and peered through the door as a first year said the password. We couldn't see a bright red head through the crack of the portrait door as the small boy walked in, deciding to check somewhere else. We then went to the library, moaning Myrtle's bathroom (we heard they used to hang out there in second year a few times), and finally we stepped outside into the crisp autumn outdoorsy air. We didn't see them anywhere and decided to head back inside and investigate another day when they chose to vanish.

We headed indoors, talking and laughing. We decided to skip down the hall to get to the Slytherin common room. Before we could open the door Pansy Parkinson stopped us right in our tracks.

"Hi, Blaise. I have some Potions homework I need help on. Do you mind getting away from your stray puppy?" she pleaded at him while unsubtly glaring at me.

"Uh — er — Y/n?" he asked looking at me.

"Go Blaise, I will be fine." I sighed.

I heard him whisper a thanks and walk with Pansy, hands intertwined. As much as I despised Pansy, I was ultimately glad that Blaise was happy. Exceedingly awkward, but happy.

I said "pureblood" and the Slytherin common room door didn't budge.

"Pureblood," I repeated, though slightly louder. The door decided to stay at a standstill so I kicked it out of anger. Of course it didn't work but it boosted my mood quite a bit.

I felt a hand on my back and they pushed me to the side. I almost lost my balance but I gripped the wall behind me so I wouldn't fall.

"Potions," Draco Malfoy proudly stated and walked through the open common room door.

Once I saw him, I scoffed and walked into the room after him. Of course, the password changed when I left.

I headed to my dorm but there was some kind of traffic jam on miniture staircase. A long line of girls were waiting to enter and the ones at the bottom didn't seem to know what was going on, including me. I heard bloody awful screams and I flinched. A small girl with a knocked out front tooth and black eye emerged from the top of the stairway. The girls made a gap to let her through, already starting rumors and gasping at her injured face. Everyone looked around wondering what to do and I took initiative.

I walked up to the girl and gently grabbed her hand. She was only a few inches shorter than me, flinching and glancing upwards to see who had a hold of her. I then gently led her out of the common room.

"Hi, what's your name?" I asked softly.

"I'm Astoria," she replied.

"I'm Y/n. Can you tell me what happened up there? It looks serious. You've got blood running down your nose."

"Some bloke put a kick me sign on my back and when I went up to the girls dormitory one girl started kicking me violently and I'm only eleven so I couldn't stop her. She was so tall." She started tearing up.

"Hey, it's okay, we will get you to the hospital wing. Do you remember who put the sign on you or who kicked you?" I politely asked, making sure she felt safe.

"Some tall blonde boy, I'm not exactly sure what his name was. But he is the one who put the sign on my back. And I don't know who kicked me, she was behind me and I ran out as soon as I could get away. It really hurts, Y/n." More tears began to fall down her face.

I knew exactly who put that sign on her back. Although I pushed that thought away and led Astoria to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey gasped as I told her what I knew. She finally nodded and took Astoria to a bed in the hospital wing. I told Astoria I would visit her whenever I had time and she smiled gratefully as I exited the hospital wing, retelling the story to Madam Pomfrey as instructed.

I sprinted back to the Slytherin common room and searched for a certain git who was starting to become number one on the list of people I despised. I glanced around and noticed a pile of messy blonde hair lounging on the cushioned couch. Marching over, I aggresively grabbed him by the collar and hauled him all the way out into the empty potions classroom in the dungeon.

"You — foul — git!" I said in between punching his chest with my hands in a fist.

"Why are you hitting me?" he asked rubbing his chest as if I actually hurt him.

"Never mind that Draco! You just caused a little first year to get beaten up!" I said angrily.

"Oh L/n don't act like you don't put kick me signs on the back of first and second years too!"

"Yeah, well — at least they never actually get beaten! Some older girl started kicking her because of you!"

"L/n why do you care so much anyway?"

"You're so stupid, Malfoy. A child was abused and you're standing there like nothing even happened? Do you seriously have no sympathy whatsoever?"

"I know what I did was stupid, okay? But what makes you think that you have to defend her? She's not a lost dog that you need to feed and bathe."

"Maybe because after I killed my sister I don't want to see another drop of blood on somebody else," I said through gritted teeth.

I stormed out of the potions classroom faster than a track star and discovered a new spot to be alone: the astronomy tower.