Nora was in the kitchen, in an attempt to escape the summer heat. Her hair was collected in a messy bun at the back of her head. In days like that, Nora wished she could just cut her hair short like a man. She hated how her head sweated during the summer and then her hair was glued on her neck. At least, being lower class, she did not have to wear as many clothes as the women of the upper class. Her corset was loose and she was just wearing a thin white chemise and a plain skirt made by cotton.

She did not really have anything to do today, so she decided to fix some of her clothes. She was holding a needle and she was trying to fill the holes of some of her socks. Truth to be told, Nora loathed socks during the summer. She loathed clothes generally. If it was proper, she wouldn't mind walking around naked, or at least not in long sleeved chemises and ankle lenght skirts.

Muireann walked into the kitchen, but unlike her sister she loved to have her hair down, even during the summer. Her clothes was white, and proper, but her corset was sitting loose, so she could breath easier and just enjoy her life. "Nora, can I help you?" she asked with a smile, she loved to help Nora, especially when she knew it was something that Nora hated to do.

Muireann didn't mind doing boring stuff, if she knew that it helped someone that she cared about. It had led her to all kinds of trouble in the past, but she couldn't see how something so innocent as filling some holes in socks could give her any problems.

Nora had almost finished, but she couldn't say no to some help. She nodded to her sister and then she handed her a pair of socks. " Just be careful with the needle." Nora said to her sister and a faded hint of smile appeared on her lips. She could not really smile after her sister's death.

Muireann took the socks and the needle, sat down on a chair and carefully started to fill the holes. "Of course. no need for a blood spot on the socks." she said and just looked at Nora. She also missed their sister, but she knew that they had to get over it, but she couldn't force Nora to get over it now. the faded smile therefore meant a lot to Muireann, she couldn't help but think that it meant that Nora was slowly starting to come over it.

Nora's smile grew wider at her sister's comment, but she soon became serious again. Even if there were spots on the socks, they could easily make them disappear using magic. Or, their mother could, because they were still too young to use magic legally out of the school.

" Do you have any essays to write?" Nora asked her sister lazily as her fingers worked carefully.

Muireann got a little annoyed over the question, and the needle therefore pierced her skin and a very small drop of blood appeared after she had pulled the hand from the sock. "Auch.. and yes, but I can't write it, I don't understand it." she said with a little voice, hoping silently that Nora would offer her help, so they could get the essays done faster

Nora raised her eyebrows at Muireann and then she shrugged. " Well, if it's about Transfiguration, I could help you." Nora said to her sister, kind of sure that it was the answer her sister was waiting for. She knew children well enough. Even she used to ask Sib for help that way when they were younger.

Muireann smiled widely. "One of them is. But you could also help me with the others. You are older, I know you can help me." she said, hoping to send some confidence into her sister, mostly without thinking about it, she hoped that Nora would offer to just look at the other essays and then maybe she could point her in the right direction. it would be a little help, and hopefully it would be enough.

" Well, sure. We could start with the Transfiguration one." Nora suggested to her sister. Transfiguration was her best class and she was confident that she could help her sister with it. She could be helpful with the other subjects, it was an essay for a second year, after all, and what Muireann would have to write about would be something easy.

Muireann quickly put the sock and the needle down on the table and walked quickly to find her school stuff, so they could start on the essays right away, so she still had most of the summer to finish them. she really didn't want to push it to the end of her vacation, even though a small part of her told her to do just that, so she could enjoy the vacation while she still had it.

While Muireann was searching for her school supplies, Nora searched for the notebook containing her notes from her second year. She never did any notes on her books, because her parents could not afford the books, so the Sheenan re-used books instead. She placed the notebook on the table's kitchen and then she waited for her sister to come.

Once Muireann entered in the kitchen with her needed supplies, Nora took a big breath to prepare herself to help her sister. " What's your essay about?" she asked her sister as she sat down.

Muireann pushed the parchment over to Nora, so she could read what the essay was about, she had written it carefully down the minut the teacher gave it, so she could remember exactly what the teacher had said when she decided to make it, just like she did with all of the written essays she got during school. the problem was, that she for some reason allways seemed to barely manage in school.

Nora's eyes quickly scanned the paper and she smiled when she finished reading it. " Oh, that will be easy." Nora assured her sister. Second years learnt how to turn animals into inanimate objects.

" First of all, you need to find something similar between those objects. That often has to do with the size, or the colour of even the material of the item." Nora explained to her sister. " Let's take for example the beetle into button charm. What is the similarity between the beetle and the button?"

Muireann closed her eyes and thought about it. Nora maked sense, unlike Professor Beckett did most of the time. "I guess, size and color?" she said hopefully and looked at Nora, she really wanted to be right, but with her luck it was probably wrong.

" Right." Nora said and gave her sister a smile. " Both the beetle and the button a about this small and they have the similar colour."

" Basically, all you need to write is this. And of course concentration. And imagination. I always belived that magic had to do with imagination. I always try to picture the final product of my spell, and it usually works better that way."

Muireann quickly wrote it down, she didn't care if the end result of the essay looked very neat. as long as the words she wrote was the right one, then her writing skills didn't matter, at least not if you asked her. "How come it make more sense when you tell me how, then when Prof. Beckett tells me?" she asked and looked at Nora with a wonder in her eyes. "You should be the proffessor, not him, you make it so much easier"

Nora blushed sligthly because of Muireann's compliment. She could sort of understand her sister, Transfiguration was not exactly an easy class, and a lot of students were confused by the things they had to learn. Nora herself had the same feelings for some classes.

" Perhaps you do not pay enough attention?" Nora asked playfully her sister and gave her a smile.

Muireann sighed. she knew she probably wasn't paying enough attention if you asked her professor, but she was bored during classes, it was more fun to talk with the other girls. "But it is boring." she said, hoping Nora would tell her a way to get out of school.

Nora sighed. Muireann could still not understand that her education would benefit her in the future. " It may be boring, but it will be extremly useful to know that stuff in the future, Muireann." Nora said to her sister with a serious voice. She wanted her sisters have a better future and that wouldn't happen if Muireann was not trying hard enough.

Muireann nodded, she knew it was right, but she couldn't exactly see a bright future after school. "I know, but how many do you see get a happier life after school?" she said and looked a little annoyed at all the still need to be written essays she had

Nora looked at her sister for a minute, trying to find an answer to her quiestion. Muireann was somehow right. Even those with a proper education sometimes just could not find a good job. Both of her parents were smart, but neither of them had an especially prestigious occupation.

" Well, if I ended up living on the streets I would at least want to know some basic spells. Like how to make a fire or something like that." Nora finally replied. "Or, well, you could always use the amortentia on someone." Someone rich, preferably.

Muireann laughed a little. she had heard about the amortentia potion, even though she didn't knew how to make it. "Who knows if I ever get that far in Potion? besides, I would still prefer to marry out of love." she said softly, a little bit dreamy.

Nora was not sure if she really wanted to marry out of love. Sometimes, poverty killed even love. She did not want to marry someone who could not bring up children. She did not want her children to suffer because she didn't have enough money to feed them and buy them clothes. Sib was one of the few lucky ones who got to marry out of love someone rich.

" I think I wouldn't mind marrying a Middle Class man who respects me." Nora said. She was not sure if she valued love more than her comfort. Truth to be told, she didn't really want to be an upper class lady. Only the clothes seemed nice when it came to that life style. Middle Class people seemed to have it better, they were conciderable free, they could actually marry out of love and they didn't have to starve to death because of the lack of money.

Muireann thought a little about it, once again Nora seemed to be right. "At least I still have some years." she said. Muireann hoped they could close the subject and get back to the essays. she found the next parchment and started reading, hoping she could figure out what to write, and with Nora's help make it sound just a little bit clever.

In Nora's opinion, lower class girls had a longer childhood. Upper Class girls were usually betrothed in a young age, usually to someone ten or twenty years older than them. They could not really enjoy their childhood, because their mothers wanted them to be the perfect little ladies from a young age. The Sheenan girls never had much, but at least they grew up like normal children.

Muireann put another piece of parchment. Well, that was going to be a really long afternoon, seeing that Muireann wanted Nora's help for all of her essays. " What's this one about?"

"Potions, it's not the worst." she said softly. Muirean preferred potions, because she just had to do what stood in her books, instead of imagine the things she had to do. She was safely in the middle of most of her classes, but she really hated transfiguration.

Nora's best class was certainly not potions. She was good at it, or at least she tried to be good, but she was certainly better at classes which required more wandwork. " Well, that won't be thaat hard." Nora commented with a shrug.

"I still think it's easier." she said with a smile. she looked at Nora, she had a feeling that Nora would prefer to go out and be herself. "Nora, you really don't have to help me.. I figure it out," she said and looked waitingly at Nora

" No, no, we can do this." Nora replied to her sister with a reassuring nod. She didn't really have to do something today, so it was not that she wasted time helping her sister. Besides, it was rather fun spending time with Muireann. Nora was not especially close to her younger sisters and she was glad when she got to spend some time with them.

Muireann looked at Nora with smiling eyes. she pushed more of the parchment towards Nora, so she could choose which they should do next. meanwhile she wrote finishing notes about her potions essay, so she could finish it up, without missing any of the things she had thought about she wanted to write in the essay

After she carefully read what the essay was about, she wrote some tips on a piece of paper and handed them to Muireann. She could have written the essay, but Professor Carrington surely knew what her hand-writing looked like. Besides, she did not want it to be that easy for Muireann. She wouldn't try hard enough. It was funny, concidering that Slytherins were well known cheaters, still, Nora was not particularly fond of cheating. Sometimes Nora seriously thought that she was not a true Slytherin. Still, the sorting hat knew better than her.

She picked up another piece of parchment, which had to do with Charms. She wrote knew tips on another piece of pachment. If they worked like this they would finish with all the homework by afternoon.

" What electives did you choose for next year?" Nora asked her sister as she carefully wrote on her parchment.

Muireann accepted that Nora didn't just wrote the essay's but helped her with a few words so she could write them herself. "Arithmancy, earth magic and care of magcal creatures? Do you think I've taken too much?" she said at looked at Nora, counting on her older sister's advice. after Murieann had anwered she took the next essay and started writing some more words so she could finish writing it later

" You'll do just fine, Care of Magical Creatures is not that hard." Nora assured her sister. It did not really require any homework, they just learnt about magical creatures and how to feed them and clean their poo and other stuff like that.

Muireann smiled, she was happy that Nora would support her, it seemed like many subjects, but she had trouble deciding, so she had only taken the three she really couldn't decide between. "Thanks, I really hope I will like these classes, hopefully they give me some inspirtion to the other classes." she said, hoping she was right.

" Care of Magical Creatures is rather fun, especially when you learn about interesting stuff like unicorns." Nora said to her sister. She only took Care of Magical Creatures from the classes she had referred, so it was the only class she could speak about. " But I'm not gonna lie, it is rather dull when you learn about some exploding worms and stuff like that."

Muireann nodded, Nora was right like always. "Well, I guess most of the classes are a little dull in the beginning." She said with a sigh. She couldn't wait to go back to school and start on her new classes. She knew that it wasn't exactly the most usual classes she had taken, perhaps except care of magical creature.

" Oh, you will actually do something fun in the first class." Nora said to her sister. " You will probably talk about the Creatures you have seen or something like that. Or perhaps the professor will bring a unicorn." Nora's first class was rather entertaining, though she soon started to dislike it when they had to do less interesting things.

Muireann nodded, the teachers tried most of the time to show the students how interesting their subject could be, in the first lesson, before they started on all the boring stuff. "All the teachers are the same. they try to make it interesting from the beginning, but give it a few lessons, then it always ends up being boring." she said but she was stubborn and wouldn't let the fact that the lessons were boring give her a reason to stop making her homework.

Well, it wouldn't be normal if in the first class the students were required to clean up a unicorn's poo or something like that. Nora kind of understood the reasoning behind her professor's actions. Besides, the first days of school were usually the most exciting. After a long summer it was quite fun to get to use your wand again.

" Perhaps you should find a class that you like, Muireann and try hard at it." Nora said to her sister. " I mean, Hogwarts is not that bad and the classes there are pretty exciting. Imagine being a muggle! Their schools are way more boring than Hogwarts." Not to mention that they were usually only for boys.

Muireann thought about it. she didn't knew that much about muggles, but they couldn't use magic, and many of the things in the world, they didn't even know excited. she couldn't imagine how boring their life must be. "I guess you are right, maybe I should just be happy that we have the magic and that our classes is exciting in some ways." she said with a smile.