Don't follow the crowd, I am always told. My dad says they are always wrong. The crowd and their normal ideas and their normal hunches almost never get anything right because the world just isn't normal. Dad writes that in every letter he sends, making sure that I know it. That I know that it is okay to be different, because it means that I am probably correct.

But this time I walked a comfortable distance behind Ginny and a group of her friends – Neville, Lavender, Parvati, Dean – to a door in a wall, a door in a wall that I am sure was not there before. But a shrug of my shoulders and I don't care. Stranger things have happened in Hogwarts.

In my head is a scream…

I clap my hands over my ears, shuffling into the room in a way that I hope makes me unnoticed. The room is amazing, but I can't focus on it. I can't focus on the questions that everyone else is asking of Harry and Ron and Hermione. The only thing I hear is when it is announced that we are going to practice a spell. The disarming spell.

Expelliarmus.

I know that one. Long ago, my parents used to act out little duels where they would show me all of the wonders of magic. And at one point my mom had pointed her wand – it was a very pretty wand, and I clutched onto mine all the more. Ours were made out of the same materials, mine and my mother's, but hers had perished in the flames – at my father and shouted out that word. Expelliarmus. And his wand had flown out of his hand, landing next to me. I had picked it up and prodded it at my mother, shouted the same word, made nothing happen.

Justin Finch-Fletchley came up behind me, taps me on the shoulder, blushes slightly when I turn. "Er, Luna, would you…"

I allow a smile to break across my face as I nod. "Quite. You've always been quite nice to the Narguls." What did I just say? I step towards an end of the room, near where Cho and Marietta – two girls I know in passing as they are in my house, but older – are practicing.

Justin and I begin to spar, me getting in most of the shots but not doing as well as I hope. I can't focus properly. Screaming, screaming, she's right here, she's in your head, she'll never leave… I watch Harry step up to Cho, see the coloring of both of their cheeks. I listen to their conversation about the Ministry and Cho's parents, and flick my wand absently at Justin, muttering the spell under my breath, not caring to see what happens.

The two fall silent, and I decide to pipe up with my father's stand. "Well, my father is very supportive of any anti-Ministry action!" My voice is louder than I had expected. Before I can stop myself, I'm rambling. "He's always saying he'd believe anything of Fudge, I mean, the number of goblins Fudge has had assassinated! And of course he uses the Department of Mysteries to develop terrible poisons, which he feeds secretly to anybody who disagrees with him. And then there's his Umgubular Slashkilter, which he sets on the children of his enemies on new moons."

No one is listening to me anymore. Even Justin, who had come up to me, is looking apprehensive. I sigh. Why I say these things when I know they aren't true I don't know. All I know is that I just have to protect father.

But now Harry says it's time to go and I walk quietly out of the room, biting my lip and tucking my wand into my robes. My long hair bounces slightly as I walk, and everyone fans out away from me. No one even waves. I fancy that Harry nods, but that was probably him saying that I didn't kill anyone, so it was good.

How am I supposed to talk to him if I can't even get him to see me as anything other than totally insane? I am not.

Luna, Luna, Luna, the fire will come for you too…

I fly towards my dorm on new wings, gasping. I fall into my bed and sob into the sheets, not caring if anyone hears. Not caring about Alodie or Jesimae, not even caring about Cassie. None of them matter…

A quick fantasy plays in my head, one where mother is alive, father is less crazed, and I fit in. One where Cassie will come up to me in public, Hermione Granger won't trip on her tongue and accidently call me Loony, one where my automatic reaction to everything is ramble about fictional creatures. That would be the life.

But it wouldn't be me.

O.o.O

Author's Note: Book scene recreation! A week late and… short. Sorry. Lots of tests going on for the end of the quarter. Next week is the same. Forgive me and review?