Sungkyu pushed his trunk through the barrier between platform nine and ten. Around the fire-red Hogwarts Express, only a few families were already flocking around their children that they wouldn't see until the winter break. Sungkyu sighed and walked past them. Nobody he knew was here yet and… well, maybe that was a good thing.

He didn't wish to find excuses for why his parents hadn't brought him again. Nor why they never picked him up.
Well, why should they?, he truly wondered at times. He'd already said goodbye at home and they had to work, so why that extra hour or two just to see him drive off? Then however a different voice in his head said they were his parents. Shouldn't they want to spend as much time as possible with him before he left for half a year?

Those two nagging voices had fought in his head the last week of his summer holidays. More than once had he wondered whether he should just ask his parents to accompany him but then he'd chickened out. So in the end, here he was. Alone.

Well, at least he had no problems finding a compartment now.

⋘ ──── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──── ⋙

Slowly, the platform filled and soon he caught a glimpse of more familiar shocks of hair. Dongwoo arrived in the same cackling fashion he always did and soon Sungkyu's Slytherin comrades slipped into his compartment.

„Hullo.” Pucey greeted and sat opposite him. Derrick and Bole took the seats next to Sungkyu, as usual talking about Quidditch. Finally, the crew was completed when Warrington fell on the seat beside Pucey. He didn't bother take his trunk from the last empty seat. In secret, they all knew why; Sungkyu hid a smirk when Flint and Montague walked by and looked into their compartment.

Not this year, not this year.

As soon as they were gone, everyone broke out into laughter. Pucey sighed in relief and Warrington jokingly hung an arm around his shoulder and rubbed the younger one's head. „Did you think we'd let him send you away again?”

Pucey shoved him off, rolling his eyes, but he too was laughing. „Oh, sod off. I know you just want someone to order around.”

„Not us!”, Sungkyu said innocently.

„You most of all.” Pucey returned and crossed his arms.

„I would never!”

Pucey shook his head. „Well, anything is better than driving with those first years. I swear, that Malfoy freaked the hell out of me.”

„Can't believe he and his trolls passed the year!” Warrington agreed and Sungkyu remembered that last year's first years were now in their second. „I bet he and Potter would make great friends. Honestly, they're both so stuck up.”

„I feel really sorry for Hoya to be in a year like that.” Bole said and joined their conversation hungrily. „Probably the only decent fellow among them.”

Sungkyu remembered the boy and nodded. He wondered where he was. Sungkyu didn't have to worry about him being mistreated by his parents - he'd made sure Hoya wrote him about how their conversation had been. Of course, as Ex-Gryffindor aurors, they hadn't been happy about their son being sorted into Slytherin, but a delighted letter had arrived barely two days into their summer break, going into raptures about how proud they were of him that he took his own way and wasn't changed by 'that house'.

It was also touching to read how much he thanked Sungkyu for helping him out. Of course, Sungkyu had made sure nobody would bully him last year. Still, the situatio