Time flew by. At lunchtime in the Great Hall, a first-year approached me: 'I had to deliver this note from Professor Snape.' He did indeed give me a note with the potions master's puny handwriting.

Miss Brown,
your first lesson of occlumency will be in my office this evening at 8:00. Do not be late.

I thanked the freshman and looked at the staff table. But soon I looked away as my eyes met Snape's cold stare. Actually, I thought this was pretty ridiculous. Why couldn't he just tell me this himself? It wasn't that much trouble, was it? But the stress started to bubble up. I hadn't had time to read all the books yet. What if I failed? Would he not want to teach me anymore? Or worse, would he revoke his permission to enter the restricted area?
'You can do this Belle', I tried to calm myself down.

But that calmness was completely gone when I showed up at the door of the potions office at eight o'clock in the evening. I knocked nervously. The same ritual of 'Come in' and so played out.
When I was seated, Snape began:'First of all, I want to say that it is very rare for me to give you lessons, Miss Brown. I wouldn't do this for any student from an other house. So I expect your full commitment and an excellent result.' He raised an eyebrow to ask if I understood. I nodded quickly. It was typical Snape to give those demanding terrifying speeches. He gave our very first potions lesson also one of these.
'I suppose you've already studied the books from the forbidden section?'
'Not all of them yet professor, I didn't have enough time.'
'Then you will do that by next lesson. For now, we will see if you have already the ability to mislead a legilimens. The real purpose is that you can think about something and make the other person think you're thinking about something else. But we'll leave that out for now as this is well above your level.' I wanted to protest to this, but I realized he might be right, so I held back.
'Okay, what do you want me to think you're thinking about?' So apparently the potions master had another talent: making complex sentences.
'Let's say shrinking solution?' he cunningly answered his own question. Was this also a potions test in which I had to know the appearance of shrinking solution?
'Ready?' I just nodded and tried to remember what shrinking solution looked like again. When I had memorized the potions I looked at it from all sides in my head. You couldn't go in many directions with shrinking solution. Snape tried to distract my mind. Potion, recipe, books, library... No! no! Shrinking solution, only Shrinking solution! The professor tried to dig deeper into my brain, but in the end I managed to shut him out completely. When he had finished, Snape decided:'Under normal circumstances, no legimens would ever believe you.' I had to do my best not to say:'You're the one who chose the subject!'
'But, I have to admit, it could have been worse for a first lesson.' I couldn't suppress my grin. To the cantankerous potions master, this was equivalent to a lavish round of applause from the common man.
'I'll see you again in two months, Miss Brown, you can go.'

Afterwards I told Charlie everything. He was the only one who knew about my private lessons with Snape.
'Hey Belle, I was wondering if you don't want to spend the Christmas holidays with my family? Otherwise you'll be so alone at Hogwarts.'
'I'm not alone Charlie. But thank you very much, that would be really cool. You're sure it's good for your parents, are you?'
'Sure! And I thought now that you're away from Hogwarts, we could pay a visit to Gwyrdan ...'
'Ssshhh ...', I interrupted, 'at least whisper, maybe someone can hear us.'
'But someone doesn't know that Gwyrdan is a dragon', he whispered.
'If that someone heard you now, he does. Anyway, we can indeed pay a visit to Gwyrdan.' 'Awesome. Maybe we could go with my dad's Ford.'
"You know that will never be allowd'
'Yeah probably'

But before we could even think about vacation, there were exams, Charlie's birthday and of course Slytherin 's Quidditch match against Ravenclaw, which Slytherin won.

At Kings Cross station Mr and Mrs Weasley came to fetch us in the Ford Anglia.
'Oh euhm, is it okay if Belle and I go to her home for two days this holiday?' Charlie asked in the car.
'Oooo... what are you going to do there?' teased Charlie's brother.
'Shut up Bill! We're just going to watch Star Wars', he made up.
'What's Star Wars?' asked Mr. Weasley interested. After which I spent most of the way explaining what Star Wars, a movie and a TV was.

After spending a few days with the Weasleys and after Ginny showed me what she could do on her toy broom, we left for Wales. Mr Weasley took us to the nearest station in Devon, after which we took the train to Llanwrst, albeit with some changes. In the afternoon we ate a sandwich there and took the bus to the village of Druthpel.
As we climbed up a mountain on a mountain bike, I gasped exhaustingly: 'Next time, I 'll buy a golf cart. Or rather an entire Range Rover right away.' Because I doubted the golf cart would make it on the wooded ground. Although, for a Range Rover I first had to learn to drive and by then I could probably already apparate. After half an hour we arrived at the cottage. It was already three o'clock when I called Gwyrdan.
'Wow, you've grown so fast in such a short time, girl.' Lovingly I stroked her snout. Oddly enough, she still recognized Charlie. After we took a ride on her back, we had a barbecue. Gwyrdan lit it herself and even stole Charlie's satay which she ate, stick and all. The next morning we said goodbye to my Green Welsh and traveled all the way back to the Burrow.

There we celebrated my best Christmas ever. Mrs Weasley made a giant Christmas cake, the whole family sang songs and at midnight we went to the Midnight mass. We all got a self-knitted sweater with the first letter of our name on it. Mine was green and Charlie's was brown.

On New Year's Eve we counted down to 1985 together. It was a shame when we had to go back to Hogwarts .