Fifth year, Apollonia found, brought with it a number of headaches and panic attacks that she'd forever deny she had experienced over the year. Her siblings had all warned her that her fifth year, and seventh year, would be spent revising every single thing that she had learnt over the years and they had certainly not been kidding. From the very first lesson in the first term, the Professors had been demanding the best work of them and Apollonia had really spent most of her time, doing her best to stay on top of her grades.
Yet despite all the studying, Apollonia had also made sure to make time for her friends, heading out to Hogsmeade with them or even just hanging out with them by the Black Lake or maybe at the Quidditch pitch. At least twice a week, the young witch locked her books away in her trunk and appeared in the common room, all smiles and easy words falling from her lips as she interacted with her classmates, making sure to easily sidestep any sort of confrontation, especially since with the exams coming up, her temper had slowly but steadily been reaching an all-time high with some of the people that she called classmates.
Once or twice she would get into a verbal confrontation but at least it hadn't ended with anyone landing in the Hospital wing because they stepped on the wrong mine when dealing with her. She couldn't wait until the OWLs were done and over with so that she could relax and wind-down from everything before finally starting it all over again in her seventh year where she'd no doubt be getting into even worse panic attacks.
When the OWL exams finally started, Apollonia had realized that there had been nothing to be panicked about and she had breezed through the exams, knowing that even though she wouldn't get O's all across the board, she had at least passed all of them and she could actually enjoy the last days of school and start her summer without worrying about anything, ready to start her sixth year.
Her summer had been spent mainly at her elder brother Damon's house, taking care of her niece and enjoying the warm weather by slipping into the pool or down to the beach whenever she could catch a few moments for herself.
Her start into the sixth year had been slow and mainly just getting back into the groove of things as it were, trying to find her footing while dealing with the ever drama-filled halls of Hogwarts. Which was how Apollonia had been informed of the big fight that had happened between Nikolai, Mimosa and Mercy, which led to the Slytherin boy and Gryffindor girl in detentions. She didn't know the reason why, she refused to believe the rumours that were sparking up but she had seen how angry Nikolai had been, pretty much steaming from everything.
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