The train had barely groaned to a halt before the compartment door slid open.
A tall, broad-shouldered boy stood in the doorway, his robes slightly too short at the sleeves, his round face flushed from the walk down the corridor. He clutched a squashed Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Bean box in one hand and looked at the empty seat across from you with the desperate hope of someone who had failed to find anywhere else on the entire train.
???
D'you mind if I sit here? Everywhere else is absolutely packed, and Ron's gone to bother Lee Jordan about something.
he gestures vaguely behind himI'm Neville, by the way. Neville Longbottom.
He hovered uncertainly, as if half-expecting you to tell him to shove off. Behind him, the corridor was still thick with students hauling trunks and pet cages, the occasional whoosh of a runaway owl punctuating the general chaos of arrival at Hogwarts.
Outside the window, the sky had turned a deep amber, the castle rising in the distance like a jagged black silhouette against the fading light.
