]Sitting alone in the common room late at night wearing her favorite pair of lilac flannel footy-pajamas with a hood and cat ears, Kurumi turned the page of her book that was illuminated only by the glow of the fire. Walnut lay in curled up in a ball on her lap purring softly.

“Well, I think that is enough history for now,” she yawned setting the book down and petting the cat. Walnut stretched his legs at her touch and yawned himself. Not wanting to disturb the cat, Kurumi closed her eyes and soon felt her consciousness drift into Slumberland.

Feeling the gently rumble of the train beginning to slow day, Kurumi lifted her head from the windowpane where she had been resting it to see the familiar old buildings and tiny platform that made up the station. It was hard to believe that this was her last time getting off at this station. Seven years had both flown by and dragged at a snail’s pace.

Reaching for her bag, Walnut began to stir on the seat and he meowed softly. “Yep, we’re here,” she smiled down at the cat as she flung her bag over her shoulder. “Hogsmeade Station.”

Stirring another cookie dough concoction in a porcelain bowl, Kurumi looked over at her house elf friend. “Twinkle, could you please get me another wooden spoon?” she asked.

“Of course, Miss Hollingberry,” the elf responded snapping their fingers and making one appear next to Kurumi floating around her shoulder.

“Thanks,” Kurumi smiled plucking it out of the air. “Twinkle, why did you come to Hogwarts?”

“Headmaster protected Twinkle. Headmaster is very compassionate,” Twinkle responded with her giant tennis ball eyes aglow.

Smiling, Kurumi returned to stirring. House elves were often a reflection of their masters, and Twinkle was very kind.

Having now chopped up the carrots, onions, sweet potatoes, and browning the chicken meat a bit, Kurumi opened one of the larger cupboards in the kitchen for a large pot. Yet, the cupboard was empty. Looking at the sink, Kurumi saw that Ryunosuke hadn’t done the dishes yet and she was not going to do his chores for him. Looking in the closet, she found a large black pot with Ryunosuke’s name etched on it. “This will work,” she said as she filled it with water and set it on the stove. “I wonder why he needs this for school…”

Kurumi was beginning to wish that Hogwarts had offered classes on Wizard Studies for all those students who grew up in the non-magical world instead of just offering Muggle Studies. Sadly, the school didn’t so it was all trial and error for her.

Stepping a little closer to the fireplace, she glanced nervously at her fellow Gryffindor. “So…you actually want to burn yourself?”

“No,” the girl laughed. “Floo powder zaps you to another location. You just need to make sure you speak clearly.”

“Zaps?” Kurumi asked, eyes bugging out of her head. Kurumi wasn’t sure that sounded better than burn.

Kurumi groaned not knowing what made her accept that boy’s offer to go on a date. Oh, that’s right…HE WOULDN’T LEAVE HER ALONE! After several weeks of finding notes on all her desks in classes, Kurumi had finally caved, which is why she now found herself in the Three Broomsticks wishing very much to gouge her eyes out with a fork. At least Walnut was with her to help her keep her sanity.

Walnut jumped off her lap and waddled below the boy’s seat and swiped at the boy’s bottom creating a large hole in his pants reveling plaid boxers.

Kurumi kept trying to contain her giggles as her classmates continued to shout Diminuendo rather loudly. It wasn’t that she didn’t take Charms seriously, it was more the irony of everyone shouting the spell when it really meant getting gradually softer in terms of musical dynamics. There task was to try and shrink some rather large turnips that Kurumi assumed were going to be used for a soup later.

Kurumi cast the charm with a flick of her wand, missing the turnip, and hitting her red-headed friend sitting across from her. Great, she had turned her friend into a Leprechaun.

Having set another fresh batch of cookies on one of the tables in the Gryffindor common room, Kurumi turned to head back up to the girl’s dormitory when she smacked into something much taller than her. Looking up, Kurumi saw the amused face of Riley looking down at her.

“S-S-S-Sorry!” she squeaked beginning her bowing routine. “I-I-I didn’t mean to! P-P-P-Please take a cookie as an apology!”

Sighing both out of confused and amusement, Riley watched her bow a few more times before patting Kurumi on the shoulder. He swore that the young lioness had to be part House Elf.

Kurumi sighed loudly as she collapsed on her couch in the living room of her flat. Walnut, shaking as he walked due to old age, attempted to jump onto the couch next to her, but found that his hind legs just weren’t what they used to be.

“Come here you,” she laughed leaning over to pick him up.

Walnut meowed and curled into a ball on her lap. Cookie business was booming and she had a lot of projects under her sleeve, but sometimes she wished she lead a quieter life instead of the sonic lifestyle she found herself in.

Kurumi needed to remind herself that not all her friends had grown up in the non-magical world. That, and she also needed to remind herself that Eino always created his own little world that sometimes it was best to just not try to understand.

“So…you put this saddulu thing on the back…and then you climb on it?” Eino asked holding up the leather saddle.

“Right,” she replied setting hers on the back of her horse and mounting it.

“I do not see how the horse uses this,” he shrugged with the thing strapped to his back. “Muggles certainly are strange.”

“Momotaro! Where are you?” Kurumi called. She better find the pygmy puff before Walnut did. She shot a quick glance at the cat, who was even lower to the ground then usual seeing as he was on the prowl in what he considered his domain, and frowned.

A flash of pink and Walnut lunged forward. He dashed left, then right, then swiped his paw and just missed the pink fluff ball. Momotaro scampered towards the bed where Kurumi had been looking. Not wasting another moment, she scooped the pink pygmy puff up and shoved him back in her dresser drawer.

Kurumi took out a large photo album with neat gold calligraphy written on its scarlet leather cover. Smiling to herself, she opened the album and began flipping through the pictures until she found the one she was searching for. Taking it out and flipping it over, she read the handwriting on the back and felt her cheeks grow hot as she remembered her school days.

“Why do you still use that thing?” her husband chuckled sitting down next to her. “Pensieves are much more memory efficient.”

“Perhaps, but I find photographs better than any Pensieve,” she said with a wink.

It had been nearly 20 years since Kurumi had last seen her and Kurumi felt her hands trembling with anger and confusion as she waited at a local café for her former best friend to show up. The last time they had seen each other, Hitomi had run away from Kurumi as her classmates threw mud and kicked her all because she was not pure Japanese. Now the woman wanted to be friends again, most likely because Kurumi had become a well known baker in the Muggle world.

“That is impossible. I am allergic to ignorant people,” Kurumi said coldly.

Leaning over her Care of Magical Creatures homework, Kurumi found herself strangely attracted to the winged creatures she was reading about. The image on the page was not very flattering, and looked like something from one’s nightmares, yet the description below described them as gentle and misunderstood. Kurumi wrinkled her nose not wanting to believe that something that scary looking could be gentle. It was so…different.

Kurumi squeaked as she realized she had thought the exact word she had come to hate. She had been ostracized for being different. Had been labeled based solely on appearance.

“I’m just like you.”

Kurumi hugged her knees to her chest as her and her three brothers hide themselves behind the door leading into the living room. Ryunosuke had his hands covering her ears in a feeble attempt to muffle the sounds of their parents’ fighting.

“Charles! There is no discussing this,” their mother cried.

“Yukie, I cannot keep doing this! I can’t keep on lying to our children burlesquing to be something that I am not,” Charles retorted pounding his fist on the table. “They have the right to know.”

“No! Your world has caused nothing but pain,” she said revealing her scar.

Kurumi and Walnut stared at the dictionary sitting on one of the Gryffindor study tables. Sighing heavily, Kurumi looked at her cat.

“I am not sure this is ever going to happen.” Walnut meowed and pawed at the book sadly. “Fine, I’ll try again,” she laughed giving the cat a quick scratch behind the ears. Focusing all her energy on the book, she flicked her wand and repeated the incantation. “Catusslifors!”

There was a flash of purple and then the book transfigured into a beautiful white cat with blue eyes. Walnut purred loudly and licked Kurumi’s hand.

“Happy Birthday, Walnut.”

Making her way through the crowded station, Kurumi looked around to make sure that no non-magical eyes were looking before she ran through the pillar and arrived at Platform 9 ¾ . After being greeted friends who she hadn’t seen all summer, Kurumi began to think that perhaps living in London after graduating wouldn’t be so bad. In Japan things were much more formal. If two friends are separated for a long time and they meet they bow and bow and bow without exchanging a word. Here they smile, slap each other on the back, and say, “I’ve missed you.”

Kurumi opened the package from her brothers to see a selection of fortune cookies and a note saying to choose wisely. Smiling, she set the card down on the bed beside her and reached into the bag and plucked out a cookie. Cracking it open, she eagerly pulled out the slip of paper to read her fortune only to find it said only one word: ‘Blank.’ Was this their idea of a joke in giving her a cookie without an awe-inspiring epiphany? Or, was that exactly what she got? Was it saying that her future was yet to be written?

Kurumi held her tray holding her school lunch as her classmates sloppily dropped the food onto the plate and slammed the bowl of cream soup onto the tray as well. A few gobs of it splattered onto her purple sweater, but she had gotten used to such treatment. She was even used to them not giving her milk and going to get it from the crate. There was a loud crash followed by a muffled thud. Her classmates had thrown it out the window and it lay broken on the ground outside.

“There’s no room for half-breeds here!” they chanted.

author’s note: this drabble is based on real events that happened at one of the schools I teach at. Bullying is a very serious problem in Japan, as well as all over the world. I hope that everyone does their part to put a stop to this inhumane treatment.

Dragon Lady…
Did she really need to
look like she
was going to
devour them?
Kurumi’s hands shook
as she continued to drop
dragon’s blood into her cauldron.
Kurumi was still convinced that the woman was
going to turn her into a newt. “Your potion should be
a vibrant blue now,” the Potions Mistress hissed turning her
attention to the class. Kurumi checked hers and breathed
a sigh of relief to see that it was blue. Kurumi didn’t want
to bottle fame, brew glory, or learn how to put
a stopper in death. She just wanted
to survive class with Lafay.

Kurumi wasn’t sure what made her decide to break out her old Japanese calligraphy set, but perhaps it was the feeling of loneliness that came with everything that had happened recently. She was beginning to miss home, and it hurt even more knowing that she could no longer call it that. Dipping her brush into the black ink, Kurumi began to let it fly across the paper. Walnut, curious as to what was going on, stuck his nose where it ought not to be and knocked the ink well over and all over his once white paws. “Nice socks, Walnut.”

Sitting in the courtyard with her nose stuck in yet another book that probably weighed more than she did, Kurumi felt something hit the back of her head. Turning around, she saw a small piece of parchment crumbled up into a ball on the ground along with a pair of laughing Slytherins watching her. Picking up the paper, Kurmi say the word 'Gryffindork' written in rather messy handwriting. Closing her book, Kurumi walked over to the pair and handed back the piece of paper.

“Excuse me, but you seemed to have forgotten how to spell my house’s name,” she said.

For the first time in many years, Kurumi pulled out her old Hogwarts yearbooks and began flipping through the pages until she found her seventh year page. There was a picture of her winning the costume contest in her second year, another of her handing out cookies in the Gryffindor common room during her sixth, and a large picture of her and Walnut sitting by the cherry tree she had planted in the student garden. Smiling, she closed the book and leaned back in her seat. Hogwarts wasn’t just a school, it had been the grounds for her own narration.

All her life, Kurumi had been pulled in all directions. Classmates telling her to give up because she was never going to be anything. Her mother who would have preferred that she leave the wizarding world entirely and focus on the piano. Her father, he wanted her to become an Auror and perhaps follow in his footsteps. Her brothers had all abandoned the kendo dojo in other pursuits, leaving her to feel as though it was her duty to take it over. Now here she was on the brink of graduating and wondering how she ever handled this balancing act.

Her father’s birthday ruined by someone eating over half the cake forcing Kurumi to go out and buy a new cake since she didn’t have time to make another. Ryunosuke had blamed the dog, but Kurumi didn’t believe him. Which is why, with her mother’s birthday approaching, Kurumi had added something special to the cake sitting on the counter.

Running into the kitchen to see that the cake was half eaten, she heard Ryunosuke scream from the bathroom about his teeth being black.

“That should teach him not to mooch,” she giggled pulling the real cake out of the cupboard.