6 Chapter 5: Classes

I woke up early and got ready before anyone of my roommates. Packed my bag with all the textbooks, quills and ink. My eyes went to the box lying on the bed, I get excited every time I see it. I opened it and for the third time held my wand, this time it didn't give off any sparks, but still felt a warmth course through my arm, I put it in my pocket. I won't be putting it back in the box anytime soon. There was a light breeze in the room that came through the small window. The scenery was magnificent, so I decided to go to the common room that had larger windows.

When I went down to the common room, I found professor Flitwick talking with some older students.

"Ah! Good morning Mr. Haven, excited for the first day?", Professor Flitwick greeted as he saw me enter the common room.

"Good morning professor, yes, very excited."

"Good, good. If you don't know, I'm Professor Filius Flitwick, I teach charms class and I'm also the Head of the Ravenclaw House, you can come to me any time if you have any problem. Even if you want to have a conversation you can come to my office in my free time, I do enjoy conversations with students, especially about magic. They always have interesting viewpoints," Professor Flitwick said smiling at me.

"Thank you, professor, I will keep that in mind," I replied gratefully.

"Oh, I almost forgot, here is your weekly schedule for classes", he handed me the parchment paper.

I took a look at it and realized that I only have four classes today, Charms with Gryffindor, History of Magic, Double Potions with Hufflepuff and Defence against the dark arts.

(AN: It's not written in the books but, I thought it would make sense for Ravenclaw and Gryffindor to have Charms together because Gryffindor has Herbology with Hufflepuff and Potions with Slytherin)

I took my leave with Professor Flitwick and went back to my room. I removed the books I didn't need today. My roommates were getting ready, so I greeted them and gave them a heads up that professor is in the common room before heading back down with my bag for breakfast. On my way out of the common room, I saw all the first-year girls talking with Professor Flitwick in the common room.

Finding my way to the great hall was really difficult with all those moving stairs. My left leg sank on one of the steps, but I got lucky that an older Gryffindor student was nearby. He pulled me out and even pointed out to me which step of which staircase is a trap and then directed me towards the Great Hall. I thanked him and went to sit at the Ravenclaw table where a few older students were already sitting.

I saw that I was among the only two first year's students to come to the great hall this early. Other student was of course Hermione, who was absent-mindedly eating a grape while reading the standard book of spell grade 1. That's what I like about her, she has a passion for magic just like me. She's easily my favourite of the golden trio because she does the most work throughout their problems, but Harry steals the show in the end, while Ron acts as comedic relief.

Removing my attention from her, I began eating my breakfast of toast and a glass of milk. After breakfast, I still had much time before the classes start, and many other students have now began to pour into the Great Hall. I saw that a senior has finished reading his copy of Daily Prophet and was now talking with his friends. So I went to him and asked politely if I could borrow it.

"Yeah sure, here, you can keep it", he handed me the paper and went back to his conversation.

'Older students here sure are helpful, none of the people I met gave me a hard time here, Tom the bartender, Thomas, McGonagall, Cho and Marietta, Gryffindor senior and now this senior were all incredibly nice and helpful to me. It's not so bad here as some of the fanfics described. You just have to ask and people will help you.' I mused on my own as I read the newspaper with its moving pictures and cheesy headlines. The attempt of Robbery at the Gringotts was still the biggest news with the culprit still at large, many interviews of experts giving their opinion were printed on it.

'If only they knew that the culprit is sitting here in Hogwarts at the teacher's table eating a banana, I wonder what their reaction would be', I thought, a little amused

I finished scrolling through the paper and saw that thirty minutes are left for the class. So I put down the newspaper and began making my way out of Great hall to the charms as I was certain that it would take me a few tries to get there and that would take time.

Sure enough, I got lost in a few minutes. I was going from corridor to corridor with no one in sight, finally, after a few minutes I saw someone to ask for directions but it turned out to be Hermione who was also lost it seems. She was standing in front of two opposing staircases.

"Do you know how to get to the Charms Classroom?", I went to her and asked.

" Oh, you are in Ravenclaw, we have charms together", she said matter-of-factly.

" Yes, that's why I asked you.", I said a little amused by her tone. 'Does she always talk like this, no wonder people get annoyed by her', I thought.

" I think we have to take one of these staircases to go there", she said.

Just then I saw two older girls in Slytherin uniforms coming up from another staircase. "Let's ask them", I said to Hermione.

"Are you sure? I think we can find it ourselves", she said hesitantly.

I gave her a confused look but went to the girls anyway,

"Excuse me, Miss, could point out the directions to the charms classrooms please?", I asked one of the girls.

"Damn! these first years are getting smaller every year", she said to her friend as they snickered.

" Sure little guy, take this left staircase, go right, it's the first class in the last corridor", she said pointing to the left staircase.

"Thank you", I said while thinking, ' who's getting smaller, it's who you are growing bigger every year, you female gorilla. Whoa whoa whoa! What's with these childish thoughts?'

I think it irked me when she called me little guy, she is not actually bad looking to warrant such an insult. I must be getting childish tendencies in this body. I went back to Hermione, "See, you just have to ask?", I said to her.

'Seriously what's with these guys' obsession of not asking for help', I thought.

Well, I'm sure the other Gryffindors must have filled her mind with bias against the Slytherin. Maybe that's why she hesitated to ask them. We finally reached the class 15 minutes before the start. I went to a corner bench in one of the back rows by the window and she sat on the bench just in front of the teacher's table without a word.

It seems we are not friends yet. I looked out the window, it was a beautiful seen of mountains and greenery, I could see the quidditch field in the right and a small part of black lake on the left.

"Good Morning Professor Flitwick", I heard Hermione say. I turned to see Professor Flitwick enter the classroom through the door connected to his office.

"Good Morning to you Ms Granger and to you again Mr Haven", Professor Flitwick said he clambered up the stack of books placed for him behind his desk. I wished him good morning again.

Few minutes later, other students started to come in just before the start of the class and many were late but Professor said nothing as it's their first and they might have gotten lost. Last people to come in Harry and Ron who made some excuse about Peeves harassing them under his breath. But as soon as Professor Flitwick saw Harry Potter, he squeaked his name and fell down from his stack of books.

Class finally started after Harry made a lot of commotion with the students too. Professor taught them introduction to some basic magical theory related to charms. He asked a few questions about incantations and wand motions which Hermione eagerly answered earning her some house points for Gryffindor.

He saw that the class was getting a little bored so he said, " Enough about the theory let's try doing some magic shall we. Now, who can tell me about wand lighting charm?"

Hermione was of course the one who answered, " Wand lighting charm or Lumos lights up the end of the wand with a white light. It is said to be the easiest charm to master."

(AN: I made this theory up, please don't get on my case if something about it is wrong because in the end these things are irrelevant.)

"Very good Ms. Granger, 1 point for Gryffindor. Next, who can tell me the wand motion this charm?"

Hermione was again the first to raise hand but Professor asked Anthony Goldstein this time who also raised his hand. I guess he didn't wanna get showed up anymore. He showed it correctly earning Ravenclaw 1 house point.

Professor continued, " Now, I will show you, how to do it properly. Then you will try, I'm sure you all will be able to do it by the end of the class because as Ms Granger said it is quite an easy charm."

He held his wand delicately with three fingers like an opera conductor, waved his wand in the particular motion and said, "Lumos".

" With some practice you will be able to cast it without the wand motion, or make the light separate from the wand and even make multiple lights", he showed us these things as he said them.

"Now who will tell me how we can make the light go away?" He asked.

This time he asked Padma among the few hands that were raised.

"With the spell Nox," that earned her a house point.

Professor said Nox and the multiple lights were extinguished in an instant.

We were then allowed to try, it seems some of the students have already tried this spell before because they did it in first try including me. All those who got it in first try received a house point.

At the end only Neville was having some trouble with the spell, still his wand was glowing weakly with a slight flicker. We were finally dismissed. I made sure to ask the direction to the next class from professor Flitwick.

History of magic was very boring, scratch that, History of magic was made very boring by Professor Binns, who droned on and on, in a monotone, without any pause. I slept at the back bench as I has already read the chapter. It was quite interesting but Professor Binns can make an insomniac asleep in a few minutes.

I reached Potions class on time fortunately without getting lost because dungeons weren't as confusing as the stairs. This was double potions with Hufflepuff.

Professor Snape gave his usual speech about potions, he really gives strong impression that he doesn't like students. He then proceeded to give a brief overview of the instructions and ingredients for the Potion they were going to make today which was a simple Potion to cure boils.

"There is no point in talking much about potions you will only learn properly by doing it yourself" He said and I agreed fully.

I got paired up with Michael Corner as Anthony and Terry paired up and my roommates paired up. I followed every instruction of the book to a T And instructed Michael to do the same. I don't exactly know why in some cases you have to stir clockwise or anti clockwise or in figure eight motion, How does number of stirs impact the end product but I did as the book said and kept an eye on Michael so he will do the same. These things shouldn't make sense but they do in this world, but what can you do.

Our end product looked similar to what was described in the book and Professor Snape passed by our table with a single glance while with some other, he was giving them dirty looks and making snide remarks. So, I guess we did the best along with Anthony's and Ernie MacMillan's table who also got a single glance from him.

Only Justin Finch Fletchley's table got a straight scolding and a point taken from Hufflepuff because their potion giving off putrid fumes.

My Last lecture of the day was Defence against the Dark Arts, for which my dorm mates were very excited but only I knew what was about to come.

Professor Quirell didn't disappoint me which means he very much disappointed my fellow dorm mates. It was hardly understandable what he was saying because of the stutter. It gets worse when he gets scared reading something, which I knew was all acting. I'm not foolish enough to mess him though, I also didn't try to look at his face, I don't know if Voldemort can read minds through Quirell's eyes. My guess is he can because he knew Harry was lying about the stone even before Quirell opened the turban.

I was grateful to leave the foul smelling classroom when the period ended.

'Finally I'm free , it's time to explore.'