⋅︓︒︑∘∗✧∘︑︒⚬∙︓⋅⠄✯∘⠄✧⠄

𝙘𝙝𝙖𝙥𝙩𝙚𝙧 𝙛𝙤𝙪𝙧.
𝘪 𝘤𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶, 𝘑𝘰𝘴𝘭𝘺𝘯.

⋅︓︒︑∘∗✧∘︑︒⚬∙︓⋅⠄✯∘⠄✧⠄

"Could you stop?" Amy growled at Nicolas while we were waiting for professor Lupin.

Nico stopped hitting the bench with a pen and looked at Amy with his stupid eyes.

"Is there something wrong?" He smirked and started hitting the bench again with the pen, which I laughed at loudly.

"You are about to be disturbed by my fist on your face" she muttered and sent him a threatening look, and Nico just smiled wider.

I shook my head with laughter and looked back at my book from DADA, looking at the table of contents. Shortly afterward, Professor Lupin entered the classroom.

"Pack all your things" That was the first thing he said when he headed to his desk.

I looked at each other with Amy and Nico, and we stood up insecurely from our seats, packing our things. When all the students in the class got up from their desks and hid their belongings, professor Lupin called us to follow him and start walking us out of class. For a long time, we walked through the Hogwarts corridor, now and then descending or climbing the stairs. When we reached the teachers' room, professor Lupin opened the door and told us to go inside. With an uncertain step, the whole class stood in the teachers' room and professor Lupin stood by the old closet, which swayed violently, and a rumble came out from inside.

"There is a phantom inside" he started and everyone's faces got pale. "The phantom called Boggart, you certainly learned about him in the third grade," he said, and a few people nodded to him. "Basic question: what is a Boggart?" He asked and most of the class raised their hand, including me. - There you go, Miss...

"Joslyn Black" I answered when he pointed his head at me and professor Lupin widened his eyes when he heard my name, to which I wrinkled my eyebrows. "Boggart is a ghost. It takes the form of a thing that it considers most frightening to the environment at a given moment. Now it doesn't have any visible character, it just sits alone in the dark, because it doesn't know what the person outside is most afraid of. Nobody knows what a Boggart looks like when it is alone."

"Perfect," he said, continuing to look at me. "This means that now we have the biggest advantage over it, why?" He looked around the classroom and pointed his head at Cedric. - Please, Mister...

"Cedric Diggory," said Cedric. "There are too many of us and Bogart doesn't know what kind of character it has to take" he answered.

"Very well. It moved in here a few days ago. Dumbledore wanted to get rid of it right away, but I asked him to leave it because I can use it for practical classroom activities" he smiled. "When you're near a Boggart, it's best to have company, but you already know that. I once saw Boggart make such a mistake: it tried to scare two people at the same time and became half a snail. It wasn't very scary... What spell do we cast to overpower Boggart? Miss Black?"

"Riddikulus" I answered, moving uncomfortably under professor Lupin's gaze.

"Wonderful," he said. "Well, since you know the basics, I think we can go into practice. Line up in front of the closet."

The whole class lined up and professor Lupin pointed his wand at the closet handle and I began to wonder what I was most afraid of. Snape? Snape was terrifying, but certainly not something I was most afraid of. Lucius? Yes, I loved him like a father, but he kept scaring me. Voldemort? After all, he was the most powerful wizard.

And then I was caught up in an icy cold, and I was ripped off by the memory of the train.

"One... two... three... now!" he shouted, and from the end of the wand a beam of light fired, which opened the door from the closet, from which a huge spider came out, which - apparently - was most afraid of one of the girls, who immediately uttered a spell that caused the spider to started tap.

Then George came out of the line, who was most frightened by his mother, which I laughed at loudly with Fred, Amy, and Nico. When spell fell out of George's mouth, Mrs. Weasley's clothes turned into a clown's outfit.

Then Fred came out, and the Weasley's mother also came out of the closet. Fred did the same as George. After the twins, Nico came out, who was most afraid of Snape, and when he came out of the closet, I snorted with Amy. Nico gave us an annoying look and said aloud "Riddikulus" on which Snape had reduced to goblin level and his black robes were replaced by a pink dress.

Then there was Amy, in front of whom Voldemort came out, and the shivers flew over me. Amy, trembling in her voice, uttered a spell and Voldemort grew a huge nose.

Then it was my turn. Slowly I left the line and stood in front of the closet where something made it violently shake. With my eyes wide open, I watched the door carefully when suddenly they opened with a bang. I jumped up slightly, and I was poured in an icy cold, the same as I was poured on the train. Dementor flew out of the closet, his cold breath was flying through my body, once again freezing all my guts. My ears started to hum again as if I was underwater so that later I could only hear screams. Terrible and painful...

"Ridikulus!" I heard professor Lupin's shout, who ran out in front of me and raised his wand high and the dementor, as it appeared, disappeared.

Suddenly, I lost feel in my legs and, when I was supposed to be in contact with the hard floor, I felt someone catching me, saving me from pain. Later, all I saw was darkness.

★★★★

"You think she'll wake up?"

"Why wouldn't she?"

"What if she's dead?"

"Nico!"

"Could you shut up? I'm trying to sleep" I groaned and cover myself even more with a comforter.

"Joslyn!" I heard Hermione scream and I sighed loudly, discovering my head from under the comforter.

"I will go get Madame Pomfrey," said Ron and left us to come back with a nurse in a moment.

"How're you feeling?" she asked as soon as she approached me.

"As if life was sucked out of me" I groaned and sat on the bed with Nico's help.

"You were incredibly lucky that professor Lupin reacted quickly. Dumbledore was stupid to let the dementors in Hogwarts" she muttered and I laughed gently. "You have to stay here until tomorrow morning, but you can leave before breakfast."

"Sure" Madame Pomfrey smiled and left.

I sighed hard and turned my head to see everyone looking at me closely.

"What?" I rolled my eyes up and lay down again.

"Are you okay?" Amy asked and sat next to me on the bed.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, you kind of fainted in the middle of a lesson when you saw Boggart in the form of a dementor" Nico snorted, sitting on the other side of me.

"Why did it even happen?" Hermione, who was standing next to Harry and Ron, asked me.

"And how should I know?" I sighed. "In one moment, everything was fine and at another, I woke up here."

"It was the same as on the train, right? Same feeling?" Harry asked me when he came closer to me, and I nodded.

"I felt this icy cold again, and then screaming. That's it" I shrugged my shoulders.

"Okay kids, it's late, go back to the Common Rooms," said Madame Pomfrey.

"But—"

"Nicolas, no talking!" She warned and with a quick goodbye, everyone left, and there were only me and two students left in the hospital wing, who were also lying here.

With a sigh, I fell on the mattress of my temporary bed, and looked into the ceiling, lost in my thoughts. Why did Boggart act on me in this way? Was it a goddess at all, and not a real dementor? But Dumbledore wouldn't let them in, would he?

Why did dementors works on me like that in the first place? Yes, maybe my parents were Death Eaters as well, but nobody knew about it, nobody except former Death Eaters, our family, and Dumbledore. Unless somebody spied and now, by the end of the year, I will be screwed by the presence of dementors, which I very much doubted about. Why did professor Lupin react to my name like that? Okay, yes, I have the same name as Sirius Black, but it's not my fault that both my mothers are his cousins. I don't even remember if I ever had any contact with him. I do not influence my relatives.

Maybe it has some connection with my biological parents? From what I've heard from the stories they told me about them, they were Death Eaters too, and they were the most faithful, but I do not influence that either. Besides, they are dead, so what does that have to do with anything. My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door opening from the hospital wing. I turned my head towards them to see Cedric enter through them. I wrinkled my eyebrows and raised on my elbows.

"Cedric? What are you doing here?" I asked, sitting on the bed.

"I came to see how you are doing," he said and scratched his neck.

"Awe, Cedric Diggory is worried about me?" I smirked and Cedric snorted.

"In your dreams," he said and smirked too. "I must admit that it is boring without you on patrol."

"Of course it is, patrols even with me are not exactly exciting" I raised my eyebrows.

"Modest as usual" He shook his head with laughter and I smiled. "I don't have much time, if somebody sees me here, I'll be fucked, but I wanted to see if everything is okay."

"Nice of you" I nodded. "You didn't have to."

Cedric just nodded his head and headed towards the door. When he was about to leave, he stopped and turned around, looking at me.

"I care about you, Joslyn," he said and with that, he left.

I smiled widely, wrinkling my eyebrows slightly, and lay down on the bed again, drowning in my thoughts.

It's been over a week since the first day of school and since then, my relationship with Cedric has changed significantly and by that I mean, no more stupid pranks. We continue to cut ourselves some jokes, but it's not really anything that hurts or makes a big difference. These are rather "friendly" jokes.

Patrols with Cedric are quite nice. Even if we walk on the seventh floor in silence, it's incredibly nice. We are both tired after the whole day and such silence is good for both of us. Of course, we talk to each other, but we don't have to do it on the patrols to them to be nice. A pleasant silence is enough.

Although how much I didn't want to admit it, I started to like Cedric. Not that I didn't like him. I just didn't exactly tolerate him, but when he doesn't do stupid antics to me, Cedric is a really nice and interesting companion, maybe even a good candidate for a friend. You can normally joke with him, talk to him, complain and Cedric will always fit in well with the job.

And, although how much I did not want to admit it, it seems that my crush on Cedric has started to come back.