The long awaited morning finally came, the golden rays sneaking past the binders and making their way into the bedroom, its light too bright for the early hours

On the small bed in the left corner of the room, laid two girls underneath the covers, resisting the urge to wake up.

"Arlene, I swear, I am going to grab those mirrors and claw your eyes out with them" Sage grumbled as the blankets have failed to shield her from the light.

"Broken... beauty.... bacon..." Arlene who had gained an immunity to the sun, mumbled sleepily.

Hearing the last word and understanding that Arlene was still asleep, the girl pushed her friend, causing her to fall into the floor and wake up.

"Rude much?" Arlene said, groaning as she rubbed her back.

Rolling her eyes, Sage sate up, pointed at the mirrors and said "Desperate for aesthetic much?"

Arlene chuckled and got up, she absolutely loved Sage from the moment they rode the boat together in first year and tried to predict their houses, both had been wrong as Sage believed Arlene's recklessness was made for Gryffindor, while Arlene thought Sage's love for newspapers and magazines was Ravenclaw book smarts.

And suddenly, a very scary thought came to Arlene.

"Sage?" She said as soon as she picked herself up from the floor and threw herself beside her friend on the bed "We'll always be friend. Right?"

Sage raised her head and plopped her elbows on the mattress as she frowned "Of course, why not?"

Copying her movements as she used her elbows to support her weight, Arlene bite her lower lip as she avoided meeting Sage's eyes.

"We're already separated enough being in different houses, but this year, we have different classes, not to mention if I got into the team, we won't be able to spend the matches together and on top of that, we can't go to Hogsmeade together."

"Merlin, do you realize how stupid you sound?"

Startled by her bold statement, Arlene raised an eyebrow "What?"

"We already don't spend matches together because I co-comment with the beauty that choses to call itself Lee Jordan, we don't have to spend every moment of every day together to be friends, and if our friendship depends on being in the same classroom or same color of tie, then it wasn't that strong to begin with,

"And about Hogsmeade, I know you're upset, and don't even try denying it but you are, and I know it's horrible because you looked forward for it for so long, and I really wish there was a way for you to come"

Finishing her speech, Sage took a large breath and dropped her head into the pillow.

"Maybe there is." Arlene said, not really paying attention as she stared into one of the mirror shards, some may take it as disrespect, but Sage knew her friend was just deep in thought.

"Totally ignoring the fact I just made a heartwarming speech about friendship and weren't listening, what are you thinking?" She questioned, eyeing her suspiciously.

She turned to look at her with a large grin "You're friends with the twins, right?"

The raven haired girl quietly made her way out of the room, slowly closing the door as if trying not to wake Sage up.

"Good morning, Ari." A voice called out.

Between the doors of the two bedrooms, was a window seat that had the perfect view of the sky, and that's where her mother sate, her hair up in a messy ponytail as she painted the sunset.

Her jeans had several paint stains, she wore a deep red tank top that said 'what is done with love is done well, a rectangular canvas was on the wooden canvas stand that had gotten covered in many colors over the years, a color palette was in her left hand and a thin brush was in her right, frozen in midair as if she was about to touch the painting but was interrupted.

"Good morning, mum"

Her mother smiled and put down the brush and palette, then made her way to her daughter.

"The paint is going to dry." Arlene stated, desperate to avoid a confrontation with her mother.

Arlene loved her mother to death, but their personality diversity often crashed, with Arlene's infamous Black family recklessness and her mother's protectiveness, conflict was always bound to happen at every corner.

But it didn't make sense to Arlene, her mother was a magical lawyer, a dream of hers ever since she was a child, but making enemies was part of the job description, Paloma was putting herself in trouble but telling Arlene to stay out of it at the same time.

Arlene knew why, of course, Paloma had told her how she and her father loved each other but their relationship was happening during a war, and they all had to choose sides.

She said that she and her father were automatically thought to be part of the dark side due to their families, and her father had tried to leave it, but they killed him, and then when Arlene was born out of wedlock, her family kicked her out, Arlene was the only good thing left in Paloma's life, and it was her duty to protect her.

Problem is, Arlene didn't want to be protected.

"I'm using gouache colors, not acrylic," Her mother replied, then she bent down to Arlene's eye level "Ari, you know I love you, and I know you wanted to visit Hogsmeade and any other year I would have let you, but-"

"Sirius Black, yeah" Arlene said, looking down.

"I'm sorry, Ari, but if something happened to you, and I was able to stop it-"

Just then, a cry was heard, Sage shouted in pain and her mother was up on her feet in seconds.

"Sage? Are you okay, honey?" Her mother said, opening the door to check on the other girl, and the moment her mother looked away, Arlene ran to the other bedroom.

It was a very simple plan, really.

Step one: Distract Paloma, thus Sage (who was a gumdrop of sunshine and was horrified at the thought of trickery and schemes) pretending a mirror shard had fallen on her.

Step two: Arlene takes a picture of a random document that her mother signed.

Step three: Bribe the twins into forging the signature.

Arlene was currently executing the second step of her plan as she snapped a picture of one her trial documents (as Paloma worked in the magical law department) when she noticed something, her mother's closet was open, not surprising since she was just as messy as Arlene, and in the bottom of it was a shoe box.

Giving in to curiosity, she bent down and opened it, frowning as she saw what was inside, letters, hundreds of them and postcards and photos, picking one up, she instantly recognized the people.

It was the Black Lake, a girl sitting under the tree in her Ravenclaw uniform, her hands tangled with the boy beside her.

His attention was somewhere else, staring at something outside the frame, then the girl tapped his shoulder then pointed at the camera as she rested her head on his shoulder.

The boy smiled at the camera then looked down to the girl, who looked up and gave him a kiss then removed her head as the boy looked away again, and the scene started to replay.

It was her parents.

"Wait here honey, I'll get my wand to check your head" her mother's voice called out.

Snapping out of her thoughts, Arlene quickly put everything back to the way it was and snuck out of the room just in time to avoid her mother.

"Did you get it?" Sage said as soon as Arlene entered.

She nodded, not really focused "Yeah, yeah I did"

The platform was busy as usual, Paloma and Sage were in a deep discussion about Muggle pens and Arlene was scanning everybody, looking for a certain bushy haired girl.

Suddenly, her mother bit her lip and looked down, Arlene frowned and looked in the direction her mother was looking in and saw an old couple and two younger ones with their families, and they were all glaring at her mother.

The Burke Family.

Realizing Arlene was staring at them, they gave her a murderous look, but Arlene wasn't fazed, instead, she raised her hands and gave them the finger.

To say that the looks on their faces were priceless would be an understatement.

"Why are you smiling like that?" Sage questioned.

"Nothing," She replied, still smirking at the family "nothing at all"

Once they found a compartment, her mother helped Sage with her trunk, seeing as it was bound to take a while, Arlene decided to walk through the hallway.

And managed to collide with Hermione once again.

"We have got to stop meeting like this" The girl said with a light grin, Crookshanks dropping from her hands and land on its feet.

Arlene smiled nervously "oh er, hi Hermione!" She said, stumbling over her words, and almost stumbling over her legs as Crookshanks started to walk around her legs as he purred.

"Aw, he likes you!" Hermione said, smiling brightly.

Another thing she loved about Hermione, how her smile would light up the whole room.

She scanned her surroundings, recognizing the herd of redheads as The Weasly Family.

"Who is this, Hermione?" Mrs. Weasly said, smiling at Arlene

"Arlene Black-Burke, miss" Arlene answered for herself, giving the woman a polite smile.

Some of the Weaslys had clear distressed looks on their faces upon hearing the word 'Black'.

Before the man, Mr. Weasly, could say anything, her mother exited the compartment.

"Arlene, did you remember to- er, hello," her mother stopped mid-sentence, noticing the others, then she offered her hand "Paloma Burke"

"We're going to find Lee" Fred -or was it George? - announced, then started running down the hall.

Mr. Weasly chuckled in amusement at his kids then took her hand "Arthur Weasly and this is my wife, Molly, any relation to Sirius Black?" he questioned.

Paloma shot an irritated look at Arlene, as if to say 'seriously!?"

Paloma took a deep breath and smiled "We're Purebloods, he's probably a fourth cousin twice removed or something."

"He's my uncle" Arlene said, not sounding the least bit fazed.

Her mother sighed "Nice to meet you, Arthur, Molly."

"Maybe we should go find somewhere to sit." Ron offered.

Hermione nodded then smiled at the other girl and waved "bye Arlene."

"Really, Arlene!?" Her mother said as soon as Arlene entered.

Sensing another fight, Sage muttered something about going to the bathroom and left.

"Mom, one person in Azkaban does not mean the rest of the family is a mass murderer!"

"More than three people from The Black Family is in Azkaban, Arlene!" Her mother said, then she sighed.

"The rotten apple does not fall far from the fucked up family. Your father and his cousin Andromeda were the only two who were actually decent," She continued as she bent down to Arlene's eye level "but that's not what I wanted to talk to you about."

Arlene frowned, had she discovered she was in her room that morning? Her hand quickly went to the photo inside her pocket, it was a stupid move, and she shouldn't have taken that.

"Minister Fudge spoke to me a few a few days before your letter arrived and advised me not to sign the slip" Paloma started, her tone was so serious, it stopped Arlene from giggling at the name 'Minister Fudge'.

"He had visited Azkaban a while before Sirius Black escaped," She continued "he was talking in his sleep."

"Mum, what-"

"He was muttering 'they're at Hogwarts', he means Harry and you, Arlene, he's coming for both of you"

■■■

I'm so sorry for the late update, me and my family have been on vacation for the past week so I didn't have Internet.

Also, I believed  one of my favorite writers was dead because his 'cousin' posted it on every single one of his books and then I came to terms with my mortality and went through a goth faze but surprise! He had just lost inspiration and didn't have the balls to tell his readers so he decided to emotionally wreck us instead.

Again, sorry, I will try to update more often and thank you for reading, I love you guys.