Hunched over her latest essay, Kurumi’s quill flew over the paper as she attempted to keep up with all the ideas that were flowing through her head before they got lost in her rather complicated thought process. Walnut pawed at her arm wondering just how much longer it was going to take before the girl remembered to feed him. Realizing that his pawing was going unnoticed, Walnut flopped himself right down smack in the middle of her parchment.

“Walnut! I can’t work on my essay with you sitting on it,” Kurumi sighed glancing at the time.

Exactly, the cat meowed.

Kurumi sat with Adam in the kitchen waiting for the oven to go off as another one of their baking creation’s aroma filled the room. The house elves had been in a panic when Kurumi had asked for a certain cereal seeing as they had never heard of it. One had even attempted to shut its hands in the over for disappointing her and would have done so if it hadn’t have been for Adam’s speedy reflexes. Kurumi checked the oven and hoped that these treats would bring the Quidditch team luck. They were made from Lucky Charms after all.

Kurumi frowned thinking about her first Hogwarts Prince graduating. She could still remember the day they met in Diagon Alley and, truth be told, she still had the chocolate frog wrapper from the one he had given her. Her blushing being hidden by the light of the fire, Kurumi turned to Josh.

“What are you going to do once you graduate?” she asked secretly hoping that whatever it was wasn’t too far away.

“I think I should be the Headmaster of Hogwarts,” Josh mused kicking his feet up on the table grinning.

“Why?”

“Because, I am the master of everything.”

Kurumi flicked the blank rune that sat on the table. Walnut’s golden gaze followed its movement and pawed at it as it came closer to him. The Blank Rune, also known as Wyrd, was a rune of infant possibilities…as their assignment prompt said. Professor Truebridge told them to make a rune that represented themselves. Kurumi had been thinking about what represented her, and strangely enough, it wasn’t a cookie like everyone else had suggested. Looking back at her textbook, Kurumi read that the rune could also represent loyalty. Looking at Walnut, she knew exactly what to carve into her rune.

Kurumi rushed to the front of the classroom and took her seat ten minutes earlier than the rest of her classmates, as usual. A few minutes later, Alex walked through the room with his bag slung over his shoulder look as smug and pleased with his self as usual. Kurumi took out her assignment and set it on the desk ready for the professor to come around and collect. Alex’s eyes widened and he snatched up her parchment hastily.

“What are you doing?” she asked snatching her parchment back and laughing slightly. “It’s called homework, not classwork, for a reason.”

Like a bolt of lightening, a lion’s roar in the dead of night, Kurumi’s eyes snapped open. Panting heavily, Kurumi sat up and grabbed her handkerchief to wipe the sweat from her forehead. She had had another nightmare, perhaps the worst one yet. Rolling onto her side, Kurumi turned on the lamp that stood on her bedside table. The movement woke up her roommate who squinted due to the sudden burst of light.

“Kurumi?”

“It was terrible,” Kurumi squeaked hugging her knees to her chest.

“What was?”

Kurumi turned her head slowly to face her friend. “They hated my cookies!”

Having finished reading the letter her daughter had owled, Kurumi folded it up and put it in a white box with the rest of them. She took another sip of tea before looking across the table at her husband. “She’s in love,” she smiled taking another sip. “He’s taking her to the Yule Ball next week.”

The couple smiled at one another. Love worked in mysterious ways and never how you expected it to.

“I wonder how it will be for her,” he mused sipping his coffee.

Kurumi thought quietly for a moment. “Exactly how it was meant to be.”

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” Heather said suddenly almost causing Kurumi to drop the scissors she was holding.

“I’ve cut my brothers’ hair loads of times,” Kurumi said reassuringly for the tenth time. Heather didn’t have to be so nervous. She was the one chopping off her curly ends and making her head look lopsided.

“O-O-O-Okay,” she stammered relaxing a bit. “Just be careful.”

Kurumi put the scissors against Heather’s hair and was about to cut when Heather’s head snapped around again.


“I told you not to move!” Kurumi sighed holding a chunk of hair in her hands.

“Kurumi! That’s not how you play dragons and knights,” Junichiro whined stomping his foot and looking at his brothers for backup. “You are the girl, so you have to play the princess that needs rescued.” He waved his kendo sword around for emphasis.

“That’s not fair!” Kurumi frowned crossing her arms. “I am much better at kendo than you are. You be the princess.”

“Just get back in the dungeon,” he demanded pointing at a large box.

“I hope the dragon eats you,” she snapped sticking her tongue out and pointing at the family dog they had painted green earlier.

Kurumi sat in the compartment looking around nervously at the overly hyper Slytherin girls she had found herself sitting with. Her first day and she was already feeling overwhelmed. She wasn’t used to being around so many people, especially when they wanted to talk with her. Soon, the girls began playing a strange game called ‘Truth or Dare.’ Not feeling confident enough to join in, Kurumi sat and listened while the others participated. As she did, she wasn’t sure she saw the attraction. It seemed like all one did was voluntarily embarrass yourself.

People in the wizarding world were weird.

Kurumi had been working harder than a house elf for the past month in preparation for her shop’s grand opening. The walls were made out of sponge cake. The window panes licorice. The door was a giant chocolate cookie with a caramel apple for the doorknob. The room was an assortment of cookies that were charmed to sparkle and she had even made a welcome mat out of frosting.

Placing the last cookie on the roof, Kurumi stepped back to admire her cookie cottage that stood in the middle of her shop ready to be feasted on by hungry customers.

Kurumi entered the empty classroom and ran her hands across each desk until she found the one she was looking for. Still looking as though they had been carved yesterday, Kurumi traced the outlines of the runes she had carved during her second year. Time had seemed to have gone by in the blink of an eye. It was the eve of her final Closing Feast and perhaps the last time she would step foot in any of the classroom where she had not only learned about magic, but herself. Smiling, Kurumi walked out and closed the door behind her.

Kurumi hated the word ‘Muggle’ and she hated the word ‘Pureblood’ almost as much. She had had enough of people putting a label on her so she fit nicely in a box all her life – she didn’t need new ones being thrown at her in the wizarding world. Did it really make a difference is you were one or the other or mixed? From her understanding of magic, it was all about intention.

Glaring at the older boy, Kurumi’s hair turned crimson in agitation and punched him square in the nose.

“Funny, your blood doesn’t look any better than mine.”

Kurumi stood in the defense room with Walnut by her side and her wand ready. She knew what memory to use, but she was nervous as to what shape it would take. What if it was something scary like a giant cockroach?! Kurumi shuddered at the thought. Swallowing hard, she looked down at the cat who purred in encouragement. “Here goes nothing,” she whispered nervously flicking her wand and saying the incantation. A bright silvery mist came out of her wand and took shape beside Walnut. Kurumi giggled and knelt down next to the two munchkin cats. “Well, that’s a relief!”

Kurumi felt like a zombie and she probably looked like one after several hours of just staring out the window watching the rain fall on the grounds. It was one of those Saturdays that seemed to go by slower than a snail’s pace and all energy was zapped from the body making even the simplest of movements seem like a chore.

“Hey Kurumi!” chirped a third year. “Want to go down to the kitchens and bake cookies?”

Yawning, Kurumi shook her head. Still, if she sat on her bed much longer she was going to bore a hole in it.

Finally reaching the Quidditch pitch where the first annual Hogwarts Carnival was being held, Kurumi set a very large basket down and began dividing its contents into five even portions. Handing a large tray of peanut butter chocolate chip cookies to the representatives of each house, as well as Professor Vindictus representing the Professors, Kurumi turned and addressed the crowd. “The time limit will be five minutes. Eat as many cookies as you can, but be sure to pace yourself. Any cookies that come back up will not be counted.” And she didn’t want to clean them up. “Ready? Begin!”

Kurumi looked down at her first pair of shoes without Velcro and sobbed.

“What’s the matter?” Takashi asked taking a seat next to his little sister.

“Can’t…tie…my…shoes…”

“Aw, I’ll teach you. You just go under over around the tree…”

“Takashi, you are teaching her wrong,” Ryunosuke interjected. “Everyone knows the bunny boy chant is the easier method.”

“I always thought it was over under…” Junichiro chimed in.

Kurumi watched as her brothers fought over how to tie shoelaces and frowned even more. At this rate, her shoes were going to remained untied forever. Maybe she should just glue them together?

“Don’t touch the tray yet,” Kurumi warned her daughter as she took the tray out of the oven and set it on the counter. “It is still very hot.”

Unable to resist the temptation of eating a cookie fresh out of the oven, the little girl reached up, burnt her hand, and immediately burst into tears.

“I warned you,” she said gently picking her daughter up and running cold water over her hand.

“Can’t you just fix it with magic?”

“Magic is something we can do, not who we are. You shouldn’t become dependent on magic. You’ll only limit yourself.”

Kurumi entered the common room with an unusually bouncy spring in her step as if she had just baked the world’s most delicious cookie. The moon in the common room was quite the opposite and felt like someone had passed away. “What’s got you all so down?” she chirped sitting down on the sofa nearest the fireplace.

“O.W.L’s,” her housemates groaned in unison.

“They dictate what classes we can take next term!” sniffed one girl.

“My father will kill me if I don’t get an Outstanding in Potions,” sighed a boy. “Why are you so cheerful?”

“O.W.L’s start today!”Kurumi smiled.

Setting her trunk down next to her bed, Kurumi sat down on it and was soon joined by Walnut. “Feels…strange…doesn’t it?” she asked looking at the cat who was sniffing his new surroundings. “Welcome to your new home,” she smiled scratching Walnut behind the ears. Kurumi looked around the room she had grown up in and couldn’t help but feel like something was different. She had been told that home was where the heart is, but she couldn’t help but feel that her heart was somewhere far away in a great castle sitting on the edge of the Black Lake.

“You come back here!”

Kurumi was fuming and practically had steam coming out of her nostrils as she stormed through the corridors chasing after a certain furry creature. He come his closest to eating her pygmy puff that morning and Kurumi had had to pry the poor pink thing from Walnut’s jaws and then taken him to see Professor Saylen to treat its injuries. Then he had gone and mistaken her fresh oatmeal as a litter box. Spray bottle in hand, Kurumi charged down the corridor after the feline. Walnut was getting wet in return for wetting her cookie ingredient.

“Interesting…yes…very interesting…” the hat said doing some sort of creepy dance on top of Kurumi’s head. “Are you sure you want Gryffindor? I sense much fear in you…and a true Gryffindor is brave at heart with their daring, nerve, and chivalry set them apart.”

Kurumi shut her eyes tight and tried to forget the crowd that was watching her in the Great Hall. Was she sure she wanted to be sorted into Gryffindor? Well, she wasn’t sure of anything at the moment. She just wanted to find herself. The hat moved and set the wheels of fortune in motion.

“GRYFFINDOR!”

I have sat down many times before and tried to plan out what my life would look like, but I have come to realize something Diary. As I worry more and more about things to come, I have been ignoring the here and now. I need to live more in the present, launch myself at every opportunity, and find eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of existence and look toward another land. There is no other land and there is no other life but this. Today is a gift, that is why it is called the present.

Looking into the mirror at her own violet eyes, perhaps for the first time in her life she did not see a girl full of fear and insecurity, but a brave lioness looking back with a confident smile on her face. There had been a lot of ups and downs over her seven years at Hogwarts, but she wouldn’t trade any of them for anything. All those experiences had built her the future she was now on the brink of stepping into. Not knowing where the road would take her, Kurumi opened the door and stepped out into the light.

Looking back at her life now, Kurumi felt a sense of tranquility like she had never felt before. Yes, there had been suffering beyond belief, but there had also been hope, friendship, and love of the deepest kind. She closed her eyes for a moment to allow her senses to take in whatever they could. The smell of the cherry blossoms. The sound of the wind through the trees. The warmth of the tiny hand that held onto hers. Squeezing the hand that held hers gently, she spoke. “I have finally found myself, here at the end of all things.”


author's note: and now we find ourselves at the end of all things. Thank you all for reading and supporting me through my drabble writing!