"Sally-Anne Hudson", you repeated now that you were closer to her. Her magic reacted just the way her magic inside your mind had reacted when you had heard her name for the first time earlier in the month. Every object circling in the air around you came to a full stop.
"I know who you are", you shouted, when her eyes fell on you. You could feel her icy presence inside your mind as if she was roaming through it to look for memories relevant to her. You would feed her how sorry you were for what had happened to her, if you knew how to. Instead, she took what she wanted. Images of your life flashed into existence in front of your eyes.
"I know that you don't want to hurt anyone, Sally-Anne", you said lowering your voice this time. The screams behind you lost in volume as the thick magic that was in the air found a moment of pause. It was as commanding a present as you had ever felt.
"I would never… hurt" the little girl said, who had been eleven years old for far longer than your parents had been alive.
"I know that, Sally-Anne. You would never hurt anyone. You just want to go to your classes and learn about magic", you offered, when she stopped talking. "I know that, because I am like that, too. I just want to learn new things and see all that Hogwarts has to offer."
Her eyes brightened at your words. Someone was shouting something from behind you, but you kept your focus on the brightest mind in the room.
All of this was only possible because of one little girl, who had left the world too early. She would have been a force of nature otherwise. Her magic had kept her in this world, disregarding the possibility of just merely being a ghost and choosing to cement herself as a force inside Hogwarts' walls.
She could have been one of the strongest witches to ever roam the world. But she wasn't. She had been robbed of that possibility. Instead her life had found a cruel end.
"I just want to do magic. Like my parents. Why wouldn't he let me?" she asked. She was looking through you, not really talking to Jacob Basques, but to her own destiny. It had given her a bright mind and all the talent in the world, only to take it all away and kill her after two months at Hogwarts.
"But you are doing magic, Sally-Anne", you said, stepping closer to her again. You were now only a few feet away from her. If she wanted to kill you, there was nothing that you could do to stop her… but you knew that she would not want to hurt you. All of her self-imposed rules had been there to grant her own wish of being part of Hogwarts, without hurting anyone else.
People forgot about her, because she didn't want to impact their lives. She just wanted to have some happiness for herself.
"I am?" she asked, her eyes never focusing on you.
"Yes, you are. I've never seen something like it before. You come back every year and live inside the castle and no one ever notices. You let people see you, but never remember you and you are so strong that not even the most powerful of us could do something against it."
Her magic had rules and it had power… but it was fundamentally centered around a little girl that just wanted to be in class and learn from the Professors. She wanted to hear her own name when they praised her. Which was the reason why her magic had failed the moment that you thought you'd heard her name in the kitchen below the Great Hall.
The magic inside your head had been affected by that for just a second, still weak because it didn't have the time to cement itself inside your being over the years. That short weakness had been enough for you to remember. It had been enough to get to this very moment.
"You are awesome and extremely powerful", you said, finally reaching her place in the middle of the Great Hall.
"So, I can go home?" she asked. "I am not a failure? I am not a Squib?"
"No", you answered, letting your hands fall on her small shoulders. You could touch and feel her, but she felt cold against your skin. She felt wrong. As if she wasn't supposed to be here.
The air was thicker the closer you got to her. For the first time in your life you could actually feel magic. It vibrated against your skin, pushing against you and making it hard for you to breath.
"You are the single most talented witch I have ever seen", you said. Sally-Anne took a moment to register your words, before she smiled. She was looking right through your chest as if you weren't even there.
"Don't you want to go home and tell your family how strong you've gotten? They will surely be missing you", you said.
"Yes", she answered as her skin turned silver. She looked up, locking eyes with you for the first time. Your mind was attacked ever so softly as she remembered her mother's last words to her.
I love you.
"Yes, I want to go home", she said.
"Then go home, Sally-Anne. Hogwarts will always be waiting for you. The doors will never close for such a bright mind", the tears that dropped down your face were not yours. They were hers as she tried to feel human emotions for one last time through your mind.
The tears dried up by the time that Sally-Anne had disappeared, never to return again as she left this world for good.
