Sophia laughed along with the tall boy next to her, unconsciously leaning in against Fred's cozy looking sweater. It wasn't long till they reached the famous Zonko's Joke Shop, and the four entered the crowded store. Fred and George had seemed to be in their element, as they excitedly ventured to each shelf for new products and ideas for new pranks. Sophia followed behind and was amazed at the number of magical products that would cause havoc back at Hogwarts. The teachers must hate this shop yet have close to no power when it came to what went on in the common rooms and during the student's free time.

"Look at these Soph!" Fred cried as he once again grabbed hold of her arm, pulling her over to a shelf where a row of seemingly normal teacups and saucers were placed. "Nose-biting teacups! Do you think Snape likes to drink from anything besides a cauldron?"

"I'm not sure, but I think Ron likes a cup of hot chocolate every now and again," Sophia suggested and Fred beamed at the idea, swiping one off the shelf and venturing towards another part of the store with Sophia's arm still clasped in his hand.

Sophia had chosen to purchase two Sugar-Quills at Zonko's, as she thought they would be useful for when she would get hungry or needed a perk up in class. George and Lee said that they wanted to go to Dervish and Banges, which both Fred and Sophia had no interest in. But Sophia said she wanted to go to Honeydukes, so the two went together to the sweet shop that even looked packed from the outside. Fred followed Sophia into the shop, and he watched as the girl beamed at the amount of delights that she didn't know she wanted.

"Wow, look at all those Exploding Bonbons!" Sophia exclaimed as a pyramid of Bonbons sat in front of her near the windows of the shop.

"How old are you again?" Fred joked as she resembled a child with her wide smile and enlarged grey eyes. Fred couldn't help but swoon privately at how cute Sophia looked and was acting, and resisted the huge urge to reach out and pinch her cheeks as if she was eight years old.

"Hey! Just because you're sixteen doesn't mean you're not allowed to like sweets Grandpa," Sophia retorted as she grabbed three boxes of Chocolate Frogs, a packet of Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Beans, some Fizzing Whisbees and a couple of Acid-Pops.

"Grandpa?!" Fred repeated from behind her as he clutched his chest in fake pain. "How dare you Lupin!"

Sophia stuck her tongue out at the boy before making her way up to the counter where a balding man stood serving mostly Hogwarts students with a good-natured smile. The girl put down all her products and went to pull the remaining galleons out of her pocket, when a hand appeared from next to her with the right amount of money for her items. She whipped her head to the side to see Fred standing there with a smug look, refusing to look down at her as the man took the money in Fred's palm.

"Fred! You did not just do that!" Sophia exclaimed as the man put the money in his cash register and started to load all of her sweets into a teal coloured paper bag.

"Oh but I did," he replied and finally turned to meet her glaring eyes. "Grandpas buy sweets too you know. For the youngins."

Fred grabbed the bag of sweets from the man behind the counter, winked at Sophia and turned to walk out of the shop still crowded with students. Sophia watched in awe, before turning back to the man behind the counter to thank him. The man smiled before saying,

"I remember when I did that for my girlfriend in my younger years. Might want to keep him close Miss, a boy like that won't wait forever."

Sophia was lost for words as she exited the shop, and found Fred waiting for her while leaning against the wall of Honeydukes with the teal bag still in his hand. He turned his head to meet her eyes once more with a lopsided grin, before pushing himself of the wall and walking over until he stood in front of her. Sophia stared up at him with face that asked him to explain himself, to which he ignored and slung his arm around her shoulders once more.

"Shall we go find Georgie and Lee?"

Fred led Sophia through the town with his arm glued around her shoulders, talking non-stop about the pranks him and George planned to pull in the coming year. He made no mention of the fact that he wasn't loaded with money either and had spent a portion of his allowance on Sophia's sweets. His chivalrous trait of being a Gryffindor sprung upon him when he saw her reach for her own pocket, and he decided that he didn't even regret his actions. He would just spend it on more Zonko products anyway and seeing Sophia over the moon about all the sweets made it worthwhile.

"Well you two look cozy," George stated as soon as they came into view, the same lop-sided smile on his face that was identical to Fred's. Sophia half expected Fred to pull his arm from around her in embarrassment, but was delighted to see him shrug in a nonchalant way and smirk back at his brother.

"Just because you haven't been successful with Lee doesn't mean you can try and turn it back on me brother," Fred snapped, and Sophia burst out into a fit of giggles. Lee and George looked at each other with a look of disgust, before Lee was able to jump in with a comeback.

"Why don't you two sod off to Madam Puddifoot's."

George and Lee began to walk back towards Hogwarts where other students were beginning to retreat also. Sophia was confused at Lee's last words and turned her head towards Fred for an explanation. The smirk that was once on his face was now wiped clean, and for the first time, he wore a light pink colour on his skinny face.

"What's Madam Puddi-"

"Nothing! Let's head back!" Fred cut her off and started to follow his brother and Lee back up to the castle. Because of his arm's position on her shoulders, she was forced to stumble next to him and oblige to his decision to head back to Hogwarts. She had no idea what Madam Puddifoot's was besides a tea shop and decided to brush it off as another one of Lee's retorts to make the two feel embarrassed. Judging by Fred's reaction, it worked on one of them.

---

The night soon came around that she dreaded the most out of the whole month. She looked at her Sky map to confirm the fact that her father would be undergoing his first transform at Hogwarts, and she wasn't surprised to walk into Defence Against the Dark Arts to find Professor Snape teaching their class for the day. Hermione, Ron and Harry looked at Sophia questionably about her father's lack of appearance, but she shrugged in a way that convinced them that she didn't know why her father wasn't here. But she knew he was going through painful pre-transformation side effects, making him unfit to teach for today.

What surprised Sophia though was the fact that Professor Snape stated that they would be looking at page 394, which had the title 'Werewolves'. She knew immediately what Snape was doing and turned around in her seat to look at the greasy-haired man who had also caught her eye. He raised his eyebrows at her in a way that said he knew about her father's condition, and a curl of the edge of his lip said that had power over her and her father. The glare she gave him only fueled his smugness and turned to teach his class.

"The difference between an Animagus and a Werewolf is that an Animagus can choose when to transform, a Werewolf has no choice," Hermione informed when Snape had ignored her raised hand to one of his questions. "Without a Wolfsbane potion, a Werewolf's mind is completely taken over by the animal side. The person can have no control over themselves when transformed, he could kill his own best friend in this state."

Sophia felt a shiver run down her spine at Hermione's words. As Snape decided to ridicule Hermione for 'speaking out of term', Sophia was now lost in her own returning worry for her father. She knew he always feared being around her when he transformed, and hearing Hermione say that he would even kill his best friend (or in this case, his own daughter) made Sophia fear the coming night even more.

After classes had finished, Sophia was itching to go see her father before he would transform that night. The last time she had seen him was two days ago in Defence Against the Dark Arts, and he was beginning to look severely ill with his extra pale skin and sunken in eyes. Not even the Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Beans she had bought him had cheered him up as much as she hoped and felt immense worry for her only parent. She always wondered how her mother must of felt during these times, especially once Sophia had been born and there was more than one family member to care for.

Hermione and herself went to watch the Quidditch team have their last practice before tomorrow's game with Hufflepuff, and even then, she felt down and solemn about the coming night. Hermione had noticed her friend's depressive nature but chose not to mention it and just try to cheer her up with some usual teasing about Fred and help with her homework. While practicing, Fred had been doing his usual instinctive glances over to the stands to see if Sophia was watching him, only to notice her deep frown and sad eyes. He noticed this sudden change in her usual happy and inclusive attitude, and it began to distract him from his position as Beater. Twice he had missed a bludger that was heading for Alicia Spinnet, which resulted in scolding for Oliver Wood and laps around the pitch as punishment.