After my birthday in February, it soon became Easter. Like Christmas, Charlie went home and I stayed at Hogwarts. I did get gigantic chocolate eggs sent from Het Nest, which mine were seriously inferior to.
After the Easter holidays, we had to start studying for the big final exams, even though they seemed like an eternity away. Also, the last two quidditch games still had to be played: Gryffindor against Hufflepuff and Slytherin against Ravenclaw. Gryffindor and Slytherin won. So that meant Slytherin won the Quidditch cup! The Quidditch team threw a big party for all of Slytherin in the common room the day after the award ceremony. To forget the stress before the exams. Although I needed that, I decided not to go. Until a rather shy Slytherin girl my year convinced me. Jess wasn't mean or popular at all like most Slytherins, when she got over her shyness she had a great sense of humor.
'But I don't have anything to wear', was my excuse.
'Oh come on, please Belle? I don't feel like going alone, please ?'
I just couldn't refuse. 'Okay, but then we have to find me a dress.'
No problem, Twilfitt and Tattings latest fashion magazine just came out. If you have enough money we can order a beautiful dress by tomorrow.'
'Oh money is not a problem. My father is almost a bit of a billionaire', I whispered after, giggling. 'Wow, what does he do then?' Then I realized I should have kept my mouth shut.
To change the subject, I asked: 'And do you already have a dress?'
'Yes, yes, my mother made it.' Jess took a beautiful black dress with green trim from her trunk. 'Beautiful', I admired her.
'Now we have to make sure you look beautiful too tomorrow', she pulled out the fashion magazine. Even though I didn't want to admit it, I really enjoyed doing a girl thing. In the end I chose a dark green dress with the front just above my knees. The belt was a silver snake, which could not have been a better fit for my house. Beautiful lace gloves matched the dress, just short of reaching my elbows and not covering my fingers. Before the party I had hair up my dark brown curls and Jess had added another silver snake. She herself had put a big bow in her golden blond hair. I had never seen the common room so busy. Everyone was dressed in their best. There were tables everywhere with food and drinks. There was even music.
'Look, would you like to have missed this now?' Jess asked, a little reproachfully.
'Not for a hair', I admitted.
At the drink table there was butterbeer and pumpkin juice, as well as other things I'd never seen before.
'What is that?' I asked an older boy who was scooping a cup of red liquor from a bowl.
'I don't know, but way too hard for you first-year.' He said it in such a mocking tone that the urge to prove otherwise became too big. I took a plastic cup and scooped it into the bowl until it was almost full.
'Belle, are you sure this is a good idea?' Jess warned me concerned. But I didn't listen. Right before the boy's eyes, I drank the entire cup in one gulp, without so much as making a sound. 'You're a daredevil', he said with a wink before walking away.
'Wow, that was some really hard stuff', I confessed to Jess.
'Here, have a butterbeer, that'll soften it up a bit.' We each took a butter beer. The warm liquid did indeed soften it.
'I wonder how they got those alcoholic drinks. Isn't this illegal at Hogwarts ?'
'Well, do you know one Slytherin who completely follows the rules?' After thinking carefully, no one came to my mind.
'Well, rules are made for breaking I guess', I concluded.
After a while it turned out that Jess was right, all that alcohol was not good for me. My stomach almost flipped.
'Jess, is it okay if I go to the bathroom? I don't feel so good anyway.'
'Come on, I'm going with you, so we can get away from the hustle and bustle for a while.' What did I owe such a dear friend to?
In the nearest toilets, the red drink went out again.
'Never again!' I had learned my lesson now. After freshening my breath with some mints, we walked back to the common room. And guess who we bumped into along the way? Charlie of course.
'Charlie, what are you doing here? It's getting late.' It was already 10 o'clock.
'Hi Bell, wow you look beautiful', his cheeks turned red when he said that.
'Thanks, it's a Quidditch cup party.' When I saw that he looked disappointed at the words "Quidditch cup", I pinched myself on the arm. What was that with me?
'So... now you still haven't answered my question, why are you here?' I changed the subject.
'Oh um, I had to get rid of Filch.'
'I wish you could come to the party too, but that wouldn't make me very popular', I said pitifully. 'Does not matter.'
'Yeah, she's had enough already', Jess said, raising her eyebrow.
'Jessss', I chided her.
'What, Bell have you been drinking?'
'Just a little bit', I admitted. But luckily Charlie had to laugh about it.
For a moment Charlie looked uncomfortably at Jess, but then decided to talk anyway: 'Well uhm Belle, I wanted to ask you if you uhm ...'
'Should I leave you alone?' asked Jess.
'No, no, stay. I just wanted to ask Belle to come over to my house this summer vacation, Mom asked.'
Unintentionally, I had to grin: 'Of course, but come to me first. I feel better if I invited you first.'
'Awesome! You can expect an owl', Charlie walked away with a smile.
'Omg! Belle, that boy loves you', Jess giggled at me.
'What no!' I tried to deny. But despite my occlumency lessons, I burst out laughing.

The next day I barely had time to recover from the party. A cold shower and then studying for the exams. Especially potions and astrology I had to catch up. Of the latter I only knew the planets of our solar system and a few important stars. We had to know about 50 of them. Also for potions we had to know almost 30 recipes by head. Although I didn't see the point of that. There are recipe books for something.

All in all, the exams went well. In my best subjects, defense against the dark arts, incantations and transfiguration, I even got an excellent. But also for potions and astronomy I passed, with an acceptable.

At the end-of-year banquet we finally found out who had won the house cup. On my way there, I heard a Slytherin say: 'Let's see how many points Dumbledor is going to give his favorite house now.' Everyone knew that the headmaster had his favorites when it came to the house cup. And it was true, Gryffindor won the cup.

Although I had been a great year, I was dying for a vacation. Charlie's owl said I could come at the end of August, then we could directly go to the Diagon Alley together. I myself had invited him at the beginning of the vacation.