The first time Helena sees her is on the Hogwarts Express.

All the compartments are full and Helena cannot for the life of her find her brother and she really needs a place to sit. She's nearing the back of the train when she spots a compartment that is nearly empty, except for one person.

A girl sits by herself, already dressed in her robes (didn't they just get on the train like ten minutes ago?), glasses pushed up the brim of her nose, curly brown locks of hair covering her face, reading, oh god, a textbook? But it's the only place she can find to sit so she walks up to the door and knocks, but just as the girl looks up, Helena hears someone call her name.

"Helena?" It's a boy, and she thinks she recognizes him, but she doesn't remember—oh, they met outside, before they got on the train. William, she thinks his name is. He was nice. She smiles and waves at him. "Do you need a place to sit? There's some room with me and my friends."

Helena glances through the glass she just knocked on and finds the girl studying her with the most brilliant green eyes and her head cocked to the side. She smiles apologetically. "That would be lovely," she says, and follows William three compartments down to join his friends. She doesn't think about the girl again. After all, she was probably by herself for a reason. Helena wanted to make friends at school, not repel them. And she found that she would get along with William and his friends quite swimmingly.

She doesn't think about that girl again until the first time they speak.

It's the first day of classes and Helena is late and lost and, god why don't they provide first years with maps of the school? She doesn't even know what floor she's on because of those damn changing staircases, but she turns the corner and the first thing she notices is an interesting tapestry of trolls dancing.

The second thing she notices is the person she runs into.

They both fall to the floor and Helena's got all her stuff in her book bag so she's able to hold onto everything. The other girl isn't so lucky—she's carrying books and papers in her arms and her wand is behind her ear and her glasses are about to slip off the edge of her nose, and they all fall to the ground.

Overlapping apologies, Helena scrambles to help her pick up her things, it was partially her fault after all, she was distracted by that damned tapestry. The girl shoves the glasses back on her face first and then gathers her books. Helena picks up her papers and then spots her wand a few feet away.

"Thanks," the girl mutters, her cheeks bright red from embarrassment. Their eyes meet and Helena immediately recognizes her.

"It's no problem," Helena replies. "It was my fault, I wasn't paying attention."

The girl tucks her curly hair behind her ear, and suddenly realizes that her wand is no longer there. She panics, looking around the floor. Helena grabs it and hands it over. "Looking for this?"

She nods and thanks her again, and places her wand back in the same place behind her ear.

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name?"

"Myka," the girl replies. "Myka Bering."

"Myka Bering, it's a pleasure to meet you." Helena sticks out her hand. "I'm Helena Wells."

They shake hands and Myka smiles tentatively but sincerely. Helena gets up from the ground and helps Myka up after.

"So, Myka Bering, what are you doing here when classes have already started?"

And Myka turns bright red again. "I, uh, I'm kind of lost."

"Wonderful! Me too!" Helena exclaims, and Myka smiles, amused. "May I ask where you're headed?"

"Transfiguration," Myka mutters. That's when Helena notices the blue and bronze tie she's wearing and the eagle crest on her uniform. She recalls her schedule, Slytherin and Ravenclaw- Transfiguration.

"It appears we're heading for the same place," Helena says. "Shall we find our way or possibly get lost together?"

Myka nods and her smile grows. "We shall." And Helena didn't know it, but in that moment she became Myka's first friend at school.

They make it to class with five minutes left and receive an earful from Professor McGonagall. It's not the last time they're late.

The first time they kiss it's their third year and Helena absolutely does not want to (at least that's what she tells herself), but she will not back out of this game of truth or dare. Especially when the game is enchanted so that if you don't complete the dare or you're not 100% honest, your face will sprout boils or your tongue will turn green or something unpleasant and embarrassing like that.

So when Helena says "dare" and Pete Lattimer (who invited him anyway?) tells her, "I dare you to kiss Myka! On the lips!" and everyone giggles, Myka and Helena both turn more red than Professor Nielsen when he's had one too many butterbeers.

She's about to protest, but Steve interrupts her. "He already said it! Now you have to do it!"

Helena mutters something under her breath about what she'd like to do to them instead, but she turns to Myka. Myka might have been pretending like she didn't hear, but her flushed cheeks gave her away. "Myka, we have to kiss now," Helena says.

"I know," Myka replies, and turns to face her. Before Myka can panic or bolt or whatever else, Helena leans in and presses their lips together for the briefest of seconds. Pete and Steve and William start yelling and laughing and Helena rolls her eyes. Typical boys. The game continues, but nothing as exciting happens again. And she doesn't tell anyone but for the rest of the night her lips tingle where they touched and whenever she glances over at Myka her stomach lurches. Well, that's new. But not unwelcome. And she doesn't know it, but Myka's thinking the same thing.

The first time they kiss, for real, isn't for another year. Everyone's on their way down to the quidditch pitch to watch today's match, but it's Gryffindor versus Hufflepuff and Helena doesn't even care about quidditch anyway, so she steals Myka away after breakfast.

"Helena!" Myka protests. "We have to be at the quidditch match!"

Helena just rolls her eyes. "Neither of us is in Gryffindor or Hufflepuff, I don't see why we have to be there."

"It's Pete's first match as seeker, I told him I'd be there to support him!" Myka explains. "If he doesn't see me in the crowd it'll crush him."

"He's not going to notice with the match going on and everyone chanting his name," Helena says. Myka frowns, a little hurt. "Oh, darling, you know he loves you, he can just be a bit egotistical at times. He is a Gryffindor, after all!"

Myka sighs. "I suppose."

"So what do you say, fancy a stroll down by the lake?" Helena asks. "I've heard the giant squid loves the biscuits." She reveals a bag full of the treats and Myka grins; she always did love interacting with the squid.

Thirty minutes later, the biscuits are all gone, the squid has said goodbye, and Myka is doubled over in laughter because Helena has just slipped and fallen on her ass in the lake.

"It's not funny!" Helena says, and splashes her with water, trying to get her to stop.

But Myka doesn't stop and she wipes the tears from her eyes and struggles to breathe because that was just too funny.

Helena glares for a moment, but then smirks as an idea comes to her. "Can you at least help me up?" she asks innocently.

Still laughing, Myka comes over and holds out her hand. Helena tugs her down into the water with her with a splash. Myka screams.

"What was that for?!"

"You wouldn't stop laughing!" Myka pouts, pretending to be angry. "Oh, come on, don't ignore me." Now Helena's pouting. "Darling, it was all in good fun!" Myka's pout however does not falter but Helena knows she won't stay angry forever so she tries resorting to dirtier tactics: tickling.

Myka's lips twitch after the first poke. And again after the second poke. But after that Helena climbs on top of her tickling her sides and Myka is shrieking and laughing and trying to fight back and soon enough they're both soaked and exhausted and giggling uncontrollably.

Helena rests her forehead on Myka's shoulder, trying to catch her breath, and Myka's cheeks hurt from smiling so much. Helena looks at her. "Tell me now you would rather be at that dreadful quidditch match than here with me."

Myka sighs and her smile grows again. "I can't."

"Good," Helena says. And then they're kissing.

Neither of them knows who started it but someone started it and neither of them is ending it anytime soon because Helena's brain goes fuzzy the moment it happens and, god, Myka's lips feel so good. She digs her fingers into the tangled, wet curls and leans into the kiss as Myka smiles against her lips. Someone initiates tongue, and neither of them can remember who, maybe it was both of them. But now their tongues are tracing lazy patterns into each other's mouths and it's slow and passionate and romantic and neither of them wants it to end but when oxygen becomes a necessity they pull away. And they smile.

They link arms and laugh and chat the walk up to the quidditch pitch. They get there with five minutes to spare and Myka gets to see Pete catch the snitch and the Gryffindors are so excited that no one even notices that Myka and Helena were gone for most of the match and showed up completely soaked.

Nothing really changes for them after that, except sometimes their study sessions in the library would lead to making out behind bookshelves and walking back from class would lead to making out in a broom cupboard, and, well, their friendship just now consisted of a lot more making out than it used to.

The first time they fight is Myka's sixteenth birthday.

It's been about nine months since that kiss by the lake and they had been continuing their friends-with-benefits sort of thing. It was like an unspoken agreement.

Helena was quite proud of her birthday gift for Myka: she had enchanted a copy of Myka's favorite muggle novel, The Time Machineby HG Wells, so that it would read aloud in her voice. Myka had always thought it was funny Helena shared the same initials as her favorite author.

Unfortunately, as she sneaks into the Ravenclaw common room (although, it's really not that difficult to sneak in, all you have to do is answer some silly question), she sees Myka kissing some boy—Sam, she thinks his name is—and Helena gets a little, well, jealous.

She's calm at first, when she questioningly says her name, hoping that it's not actually her. "Myka?"

Myka and the boy suddenly break apart and Myka sees her and her eyes grow wide with shame or guilt or…whatever, Helena doesn't care. "Helena!"

"What are you doing?!" Helena's shaking now, trying to keep her anger under control.

"Um, I'm gonna…go." Sam bolts up the stairs to the boys dormitories.

"We were kissing," Myka says hesitantly.

"Why?" Helena shouts.

"Why does it matter?" Myka asks.

"I just thought we were…" Helena trails off, unable to finish her thought.

"What, Helena? You thought we were together?" Myka asks. Helena shrugs. "Well, yeah, we kiss and stuff, but that's it. I want more." Helena looks at the ground and says nothing, so Myka continues. "Sam likes me and he's not ashamed of wanting to be with me."

"I'm not ashamed! I just thought that was what you wanted because you never said otherwise!"

"You never asked," Myka accused.

"I shouldn't have to!" Myka stares at her for a moment, her mouth agape, trying to think of something to say. But before she can say anything, Helena throws the book at her. "Happy birthday," she says, and storms out of the common room. She sits at their spot by the lake and cries and doesn't return to the castle until the sun comes up.

It's not until Myka and Sam break up, on the Hogwarts Express at the start of their sixth year that they make up.

Helena's sitting by herself because she and Myka are fighting and Myka should be in the prefect's carriage anyway, and her other friends are prefects except for Pete who stopped talking to her when she and Myka started fighting and everything was complicated and Helena was lonely. So she sits by herself in a compartment, reading another one of Myka's favorite muggle novels, Pride and Prejudice, until she hears the door slide open and a body shuffle in and sit across from her.

"Hello, Myka Bering," she says, without looking up from her book.

"You were right." With those words, Helena looks up and sets her book aside, encouraging Myka to continue. "I knew what I wanted from you but I didn't tell you because I was scared. I shouldn't have blamed you. I'm sorry."

Helena nods slowly. "I'm sorry too. I may have overreacted a bit." Myka nods, but doesn't say anything. "Is that it?" Helena asks. If she was being honest, this was a bit awkward. They hadn't spoken in months.

"I broke up with Sam," Myka says.

Helena tries to hide how happy that statement makes her, but probably fails miserably because Myka smiles and moves over to sit next to her.

"Why?" Helena asks, struggling to breathe at the proximity she had been deprived of for too long and she gets tingles under her skin when their knees touch.

"He's not what I wanted," Myka states simply.

"And what's that?"

Myka just smiles and leans in. She captures Helena's lips and Helena feels like she's on fire; she hadn't realized how much she missed the touch and taste of Myka and to have her back so suddenly was…overwhelming to say the least.

Myka's lips are gone far too soon, Helena thinks, but before she can protest, Myka whispers something and Helena doesn't care anymore and she reattaches their lips desperately and passionately and lovingly.

"I love you."

It's the first time either of them says it, and it's definitely not the last.