Stop staring at me!

Harry had been in the dormitory for less than an hour and already he felt like he couldn't take it. There was nowhere to hide in here. No place to be alone.

The other boys had tried to talk to him at first but given up eventually. Now they were just talking among themselves, but every few minutes their eyes darted back over to him as though their questions might start again at any moment.

Bewildering questions. Questions he had no idea how to answer. Questions that didn't even make any sense.

"Are you Harry Potter? The Harry Potter?"

"Is it true that you grew up with mudbloods?"

"Were you surprised to be sorted into Slytherin? Everyone thought you'd go to Gryffindor."

"You'd have hated that though, wouldn't you? Being with a bunch of ill-bred, stupid oafs?"

"Mother says all Gryffindors are a bunch of stinking, blood traitors, no sense of pride at all... hang on, what in Merlin's name is that?"

Harry'd glanced down at the biro in his hand. Were they being sarcastic?

"I'm just writing a letter," he'd mumbled shortly.

"So it's a kind of muggle-quill?" The boy had persisted, "but where's your ink pot?"

And later, "what do you mean a post-box?"

***

He'd ignored them in the end. Muttering that he needed to finish writing, hoping that they'd leave him alone. After a little while they'd got the message although the staring had continued.

Harry wrote feverishly, focusing on his family and normality was the only thing which was keeping him sane at the moment. He knew his Uncle and Aunt wouldn't be able to cope with hearing about the unnatural things which had happened today, so he didn't mention any of that. Instead Harry scrawled copious pages, somewhat incoherently, about how much he missed them. He promised to behave perfectly when he got home, so they'd never need to send him away again.

***

"I'm going to nox the candle now, Harry. Just use lumos if you're staying up."

Harry looked up from his letter, his fingers stained with ink from his frantic writing. A moment later the room was cast in darkness.

They were obviously ready to sleep then. He had no idea what the boy had been talking about... lumos...nox, it sounded like gibberish to him.

Harry sighed and silently changed in the darkness, groping around to find his pyjamas. He would leave going to the loo and brushing his teeth till the morning rather than stumbling around the unfamiliar room.

Lying down on the bed Harry did his best to will himself to sleep.

***

Over an hour later Harry eventually had to admit to himself that it was hopeless.

He was never going to manage to sleep here, not surrounded by them. Considering all the magic he'd witnessed them perform so casually during the evening it was no wonder he felt like he was lying down in the midst of a ticking time any case, he was used to sleeping in his cupboard, more often than not, and the large dormitory seemed huge and alien to him.

Harry clutched the reassuring bulk of his note pad through his pillow. He knew his biro was next to his bed, within reach. Perhaps he could write some more, despite the darkness?

He'd just decided against this course of action, unable to bear the thought of wasting the thin pad of paper which he'd been given for Christmas on illegible writing, when his eyes were drawn to the thin crack of light creeping under the door. Hadn't the professor said he was allowed to be in his room or the common room? Perhaps he could creep out and write out there?

***

A couple hours later Harry eventually fell asleep, forming a crumpled heap on top of his notepad in front of the dying embers of the common room fire.

***

A rough shake from his head of house brought Harry abruptly out of his slumber. Startled he automatically sprang to his feet, away from Snape. He was half asleep but managed to stammer out an apology all the same.

"What on earth do you think you are doing?" the tall, dour man loomed over him, his voice menacing.

Muddled by sleep, for a moment Harry struggled to remember where he was.

"I...uh...I'm sorry Sir, I ...uh...um."

"Very eloquent, Potter," Snape snarled, "answer the question!"

As the events of the day before flooded back to him Harry was under the distinct impression that the professor would be yelling at him now, if it wouldn't have woken the other students.

"I just wanted to write a letter to my relatives, I'm sorry I fell asleep out here," he said in a small voice.

"You certainly will be," the professor promised darkly snatching up the crumpled mass of papers and noticing with distaste that the boy's face and hands were smeared with ink. "Why didn't you write this in your dormitory?"

"It was dark. I was using the light from the fire..."

"You will stay in your room at night time, Potter! Have I not already told you that I won't allow your flagrant disobedience?"

Harry dipped his head respectfully. The Professor had actually told him he could go in the dorm or the common room, but it was understandable that he was angry. After all, everyone else was asleep and Harry knew full well that being different was one of the things that made people hate him.

"Look at me when I'm talking to you!"

Harry snapped his head back up immediately.

"Sorry, Sir."

"You conceited, self-satisfied little fool," the man's voice was icy. "We'll see if a week's detention makes any inroads into how clever you think you are. "

"Yes, sir."

"Well, what are you waiting for? Go to bed!"

Harry hastily spun towards his dormitory.

"Oh, Potter," Snape called after him, tossing the crumpled wad of paper towards him. "You wouldn't want to forget this now would you? I only hope your drivel is worth the trouble it's caused."

Harry caught the letter deftly and hesitated for a moment.

"Sir?"

The black stare seemed to bore into him, but Harry screwed up his courage to ask the one question which had been plaguing him all evening.

"How can I send a letter home? The others told me there aren't any post boxes here..."

"No doubt they also told you that we use owls, Potter? If you had deigned to read the official correspondence you would have realised that it was suggested that you consider purchasing one. As through your ignorant vapidness you have failed to do so you will simply have to make do with the school owls."

"I can't..." Harry said at once, before trying to frame a more polite explanation "that is... my Uncle would rather that I didn't send letters by Owl...they're used to Royal Mail, you see..."

"What I see," Snape interrupted in a scathing tone, "is a self-absorbed, spoilt, little boy who thinks that his Professors should run around in circles setting things to his liking. You will use the school owls, Potter, or go without post. Indeed, a little less hero worship and attention would no doubt be of benefit in bringing you down to size. Your affected, puerile nature disgusts me and will be stopped. Is that clear?"

"Yes Sir, sorry," Harry muttered towards his bare feet.

"I said that you are to do me the courtesy of looking at me when you speak," the professor ground out.

"Yes Sir," Harry said meekly forcing himself to look up. "I'll be good. I won't do anything else wrong."

"More lies Potter!? I'd advise you not to make promises you won't keep," Snape said sharply. "Now get out of my sight before I lose my patience with you."

***

Harry didn't manage to sleep again that night.

***

The next morning Harry toyed with his scrambled eggs at breakfast, he couldn't get rid of the panicky feeling in his chest as he watched the witches and wizards around him.

The first lesson was charms, where Harry did his best to sink into the background. All the other children appeared excited and eager to learn.

Harry couldn't stop himself taking a sharp breath in as he watched the other students practising lumos and nox, charms which were quick and easy according to some of the children from his own house. All the other children, including those from non-magical families, were having a go. And many of them managed the spells.

Harry by contrast, sat on his own, silent and wide eyed. He was appalled at the thought of joining in with their abnormal behaviour, yet too terrified to dare to look away.

***

A transfiguration lesson followed charms, during which Minerva McGonagall watched Harry closely. She still couldn't believe that he wasn't in Gryffindor like James and Lily, and the fact that he had ended up in Slytherin of all places...well, it simply beggared belief.

She'd also had an alarming conversation with Severus that morning during breakfast. He'd been complaining about the boy- ranting that he was an arrogant, conceited child who was already causing trouble.

"The insufferably spoilt brat started to suggest that I run around delivering his post," Severus had said. "Although, of course, I put a stop to that soon enough."

"Of course, owling home won't be easy for him," she'd replied thoughtfully. "Those relatives of his seem to be quite the worse kind of muggles: ignorant and scared senseless of magic."

"So much the better, it will do him some good to learn that the entire world doesn't resolve around him," Severus had sneered unpleasantly.

"You'd do well to remember that he's not his father," she'd told him. "And I would've thought you of all people would appreciate his predicament. How would your father have reacted if you had dared to owl home from Hogwarts?"

"We're not talking about me." Severus had replied coldly. "Although in any case you have proved my point; I didn't communicate with my parents during term-time and was none the worse for it."

An assertion that could be disputed, McGonagall had mused to herself. Still it was obvious that Severus' mind was made up. She would simply have to take Harry under her wing. She would have done so anyway, for James' and Lily's sake if nothing else.

***

At the end of transfiguration lesson Professor McGonagall asked Harry to remain behind. Which he did, albeit reluctantly.

"I'm sorry..." he started as soon as the door swung shut behind the last student.

"For what?" she asked.

Anxiously the boy's eyes drifted across to the table where he'd been sat. Other children had managed to transfigure match sticks into pins. Most had at least made a feasible an attempt.

"I wasn't very good..."

"Hush, Harry, you're not in trouble," she assured him. "That was your first transfiguration lesson. You only got your wand yesterday; success will come given practise and patience. My own first attempt at transfiguration was much worse."

He glanced at her in question wondering what she'd class as worse. His match was completely the same as at the start of the lesson.

"I was somewhat younger than you, and had the misguided idea of trying to transfigure the candle on my bedroom dresser into a wax figurine... ended up with wax everywhere. Terrible mess," she said crisply, "although of course I was only seven. In any case, the reason I wanted to speak to you was about your relatives. Professor Snape mentioned that you wanted to write to them but that they wouldn't be very pleased to receive your post by owl. Well, I have a solution to propose."

Harry looked at her eagerly. As soon as he'd mastered controlling his magic he could write home. When the letter was delivered his relatives would allow him to return. He couldn't wait.

"Arabella Figg, your neighbour is connected to the floo network. It is perfectly simple for me to pass her any letters and she can hand deliver them and any replies."

Mrs Figg?! Old Mrs Figg from down the road... Harry's jaw dropped.

"She's a-a-a w-witch?" he said weakly. He would never have believed it.

"Well, not quite. She is what we would call a squib, meaning she was born into a magical family although she is not magical herself."

Everywhere. These freaks... this madness is everywhere.

Even when he got home, she would be there reminding him. It made his head feel faint to consider it.

"So just pass the letter to me when you've finished it..."

No!

Shaking his head wordlessly, Harry backed away towards the door.

He wouldn't do it. He wouldn't subject his family to anymore of them. They'd been through enough already.

"I need to go..." he said. "I'm late."

Puzzled, Professor McGonagall watched him hurry away. Something was very wrong with Harry Potter.

***

It turned out that Harry's hurried departure meant that he soon caught up with the other first years on their way out to their first flying lesson. As soon as they were all lined up beside a broomstick and given instructions by Madam Hooch, Harry was disturbed to realise that he could feel the broom reacting to him. It took all his concentration to make sure it stayed down on the ground and didn't rise towards his hand straight away.

Sickened, Harry looked around at the others. All the children were eagerly stood over their broomstick with the exception of one of the Slytherins from Harry's dorm who was looking at the broom at his feet with an expression of disgust.

"How can they expect us to use these things?" the boy complained to another Slytherin beside him.

For a moment Harry felt a moments relief.

I'm not the only one who doesn't want to use them.

"Why don't you want to use them, Draco?" the boy larger boy asked.

"Use your head, Goyle. I haven't flown on anything quite so rudimentary since I was about eight years old. They're simply not up the speeds and flying that I'm used to. Alas, I suppose one has to put up with them, but I will be owling my father, I'm sure he can't realise how shocking the school brooms are these days,"the slim blond boy replied disdainfully before making his broom hover in front of him with a practised air.

Harry turned away deeply troubled.

Everyone here is convinced that magic is exciting and good. If only I can find a way to sort myself out then perhaps some help could be found for them?

***

Lunch followed the flying lesson and Harry ate barely anything. He sat between Draco and another Slytherin, a huge, broad boy, and contented himself with stirring his food and moving it around the plate.

Harry's stomach began to growl in protest.

"Aren't you going to eat that?" the large boy asked.

Harry shrugged, "not hungry."

A lie of course but completely necessary.

"I'll have it then," the boy decided scooping the slice of quiche off Harry's plate and onto his, quickly followed by his potatoes.

"Hurry up, Goyle," Draco hissed. "It's potions next and I wanted to get there early."

"What's the rush?" Goyle replied with his mouth full.

"It's potions," Draco replied as though that explained everything. "Anyway Severus expects us to be on top of it. We're in classes with Gryffindor and need to show them up for the dross they are."

***