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thought of Hermione, Harry and Ron when Olly and Terry left the compartment to change into their school robes. She was looking forward to seeing the three of them because what came with facing a mountain troll along with a deadly course on the path to the most infamous wizard of all time, Lord Voldemort, wasn't even a friendship, but a kinship, something much deeper than any normal friendship could be.

However, getting to know the four Ravenclaws was utterly refreshing for the girl. Last year was a whirlwind of anxiety and trying to fathom accepting death for the good of her family, needless to say, it had taken its toll. Therefore, to be a normal twelve-year-old girl with Olly, Padma, Terry and Lisa was of great benefit to her and was something she wanted to revisit as often as she could muster, or at least with three of the four.

She soon thereafter began to debate if she would change that to two of the four, as once Olly and Terry left the compartment, Lisa took it upon herself to interogate Saffron. Or, to put it in a more accurate manner, to get Saffron to agree with how Lisa thought she was feeling.

"So, how long have you had a crush on Olly for?"

Saffron blinked. For a few moments, she thought she had misheard what Lisa had said to her. But when Saffron turned around from her position of getting changed she saw that Lisa was staring right at her, as though stalking her prey or confirmation, and was very much so intent on getting as much information out of Saffron as possible.

When Saffron didn't answer due to how taken aback she was, Lisa persisted. "Don't worry, you can tell me, tell us, we won't tell him, it'll be our little secret,"

Saffron shuffled back into her seat uncomfortably. "Um, sorry, but I don't,"

Lisa looked at Saffron with a unconvinced, almost knowing smile. Saffron tried desperately hard not to roll her eyes and barely stopped herself from doing so. She was also annoyed at herself for saying the word sorry, since she had nothing to apologize for. What Lisa was saying was completely untrue. Saffron had only ever looked at one person as a crush, that being another Olly, in the Gryffindor quidditch captain, Oliver Wood. She and Lavender often joked about marrying him, but excluding that she had never looked at anyone under that light.

"Oh, come on, we could all see it, you were basically all over him,"

"Okay, she wasn't all over him," said Padma pointedly, throwing an agitated look in Lisa's direction. "You know, a boy and a girl are allowed to be friends,"

Lisa still looked unconvinced. "We could talk to him for you if you want,"

Again, it took Saffron a second to realise that Lisa was talking to her. "Talk to him? About what?"

"About the two of you, you know,"

"I don't know," said Saffron blankly, attempting to do the calucations to come to the conclusion that Lisa had come to.

"Just leave her alone Lisa," said Padma firmly. "She's already told you she doesn't have a thing for him,"

"Okay, okay," replied Lisa defensively. "All I'm saying is that he barely lets anyone look through that notebook, so showing her has to mean something,"

"I think it just means that he wants us to be friends," Saffron was blushing harder and harder by the second. Lisa had taken her completely off guard. Saffron didn't really think she had any basis to a crush from either Saffron or Olly. They were allowed to be friends and nothing more than that. Besides, she was way too young to be getting involved in any of that. Her mother had fell in love at a young age and look where that got her, Saffron thought bitterly.

When Terry led Olly back into the compartment once the girls had finally changed into their school robes, he once again felt the need to say something that everybody would notice and remember.

"Wow, someones been blushing worse than Olly, ha," Terry scanned Saffron up and down, only causing her to feel herself going redder and feeling much hotter in the compartment. It came as a relief when an announcement came from the driver that they were to make their way to the doors as they had arrived at Hogwarts.

Saffron wasted no time in leading the way out of the compartment and setting off down the corridor of the train to stand amongst the crowd of students, awaiting the gradual slowing down of the train to come to a halt.

"I'm sorry about making you stay with us," Olly mumbled to her, as the train teetered momentairly before stopping. "Terry . . . he, well he doesn't really think before he says things, but he means well . . . most of the time,"

"It's okay," Saffron did her best to assure him, and in doing so was trying to assure herself that staying with the four Ravenclaws had been a beneficial expierence. For getting to know Padma and Olly better, it had been, though perhaps not for Lisa and Terry. "I have friends like that too, I mean I'm sure I can be like that too,"

Olly shook his head with a faint smile. "Oh, no, you're no where near that bad,"

"That's good to hear," Saffron laughed, just as the doors of the train opened. "Well, I'll see you during the year,"

"Think about joining the Charms club at least," Olly said to her, as they exited the train and stood under a light drizzle of rain pouring down on them. "I think it'd be fun to see you more this year,"

Saffron bit her lip so as to not beam. She liked the sound of that.

She bid her final goodbyes to Olly, and set off in pursuit of her Gryffindor friends. Mainly being Hermione, but she was also excited to see Harry, Ron, Lavender, Parvati and Dean. It would be nice to see Neville too, for she had found the boy quite endearing last year, whilst with her final second-year Gryffindor, Seamus, she really couldn't be bothered with.

Saffron strolled through the corridors of the now immobile train, offering a bright smile to Maya's friend Melanie Jensen before she finally spotted her.

Hermione's large bushy brown hair couldn't be missed. Saffron hurried forward towards the exit, in order to catch up with her as quickly as possible. She presumed Harry and Ron would be with her too. She felt excited to be with them in Hogwarts again, no matter how many fatal and life-threatening memories they had together, they had an inordinate amount more positive ones from their first year in Hogwarts and she couldn't wait to make some more.

"Hermione!" Saffron felt cold as she stepped out of the warm Hogwarts Express, keeping her eyes fixed on Hermione's mane of hair. This year they would be taking enchanted carriages up to the school, rather than the boats which they took with the Gamekeeper, Rubeus Hagrid, the year previous. "Hermione wait!"

The other girl had stopped waiting outside a queue of students, all of whom were stepping inside of the carriages briskly, in order to get to the castle to feed their grumbling stomachs. She looked around upon hearing her name and her eyes landed on Saffron a moment later.

Saffron grinned. Before narrowing her eyes in confusion. "How did you get on----? Wait, did you not sit with Harry and Ron?"

Hermione was eyeing her with even more confusion. She looked somewhat agitated and upset. "I could ask you the same question,"

Saffron blinked. "What?"

"If this is supposed to be some sort of joke Saffron, it's not funny,"

"Honestly, I haven't seen them," answered Saffron in a mixture of confusedness and defensiveness. "I couldn't find any of you; you, Harry, Ron, Lavender, anyone, so you know Olly and Padma, the Ravenclaws from Astronomy, well they asked me to sit with them and, well, I -- I said yes, because I couldn't find any of you,"

Hermione seemed disinterested in her excuses. "I didn't sit with Harry and Ron, I actually spent most of my time with the craziest person I've ever met, Luna Lovegood was her name, the stuff she told me, you'd never guess . . . "

Saffron followed Hermione into a carriage, and she was followed by a group of chatty Gryffindor third years.

"It's strange," said Saffron thoughtfully after a minute of Hermione ranting about the first year Luna , pondering of where the location of the boys could be. "Do you think they might have ended up with Dean and Seamus?"

"Apparently not," Hermione jerked her head towards the carriage opposite them, as their set off at some pace towards the castle. Saffron could see the rest of the Gryffindor second years, less Harry and Ron, huddled up in a carriage together. Dean, Seamus and Lavender sat opposite Parvati and Neville. Dean gave them a wave before their carriage vanished out of sight.

"I'm sure they're somewhere," said Saffron confidently. "They probably just couldn't find you either, we'll have to come up with a plan for next year,"

Hermione dropped the subject of being ignored by Saffron on the train and on the entire carriage ride, in which they were accompanied by four loud Ravenclaw fourth years. Instead, she took much more interest in speculating over which house Rachel and Rowan would be sorted into, and as they discussed the subject, Saffron found herself becoming more and more nervous, to the point where she found herself biting her empty fork in anticipation and anxiety, once they reached the Great Hall.

"I just can't stand the thought of them not being together," Saffron slammed the fork down and looked up to see if everyone had entered the Hall yet, to still see knots of students entering the hall. She wished they'd all hurry up so they could start the sorting quickly. "They've always been together,"

"Well, they have a fifty-fifty chance with being with you or Maya, although, I imagine we could rule Slytherin out, so a one in three chance, really,"

Saffron dry swallowed. After what she experienced about the house last year, she hoped desperately that Slytherin could be ruled out. Neither Rachel nor Rowan was as awful as certain Slytherins were last year, so she inwardly prayed for one of the other three to be called out for the pair, although, preferably for them both to join her in Gryffindor.

When the large golden doors of the Great Hall came to a close, the true realisation dawned on Saffron that Harry and Ron had missed the train. This realisation was echoed throughout her fellow Gryffindor second years.

"I do hope they haven't done anything stupid," said Hermione nervously, as the certainty of their absence was confirmed to her too.

"I'm sure they'll show up," Saffron wasn't nervous, just confused. Her nervousness was fixed on the twins. For all, she knew they were climbing up the narrow steps to the front of Hogwarts as she spoke. Hopefully, neither fell into the mud as she had done the year previous. "Ron's parents will sort it out,"

Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil were discussing whether or not they should inform some member of staff on the abscence of Harry and Ron, across from where Saffron and Hermione sat. Lavender seemed intent on do

"I've never heard of anyone missing the train before – not even Fergus, me cousin, who is not that good at being on time." said Seamus.

"I dunno," said Neville "Maybe they'll send a letter or something,"

Somebody would have answered him, but the opening of the grand doors of the Great Hall signalled the arrivial of the first years. Which, in turn, signalled the arrival of the sorting of Rachel and Rowan Mitchell.