Typically, Mac went home during the summers however this year was different. This year Mac had stayed at Merlin's not because she missed her parents but because she was sort of avoiding them. Earlier that year, Mac's parents had given birth to another little girl, Lillian and while Mac was thrilled, she sort of felt left out. She wasn't jealous, or at least she didn't think she was but that fact that her parents had suddenly created a new little human eighteen years later hurt. They had written their reason in a letter when they told her about the pregnancy and it had been something along the lines of them missing two little feet made of their DNA running around. Mac knew that they weren't doing it to hurt her but that's what it felt like. Also, the past year something had happened at Hogwarts, however Mackenzie hadn't been allowed to know the details. All she knew was that it had been bad enough for her parents to move away to an uncharted location meaning even if she wanted to visit, she couldn't.

The breakup between Mac and Parker had taken it's toll on her. So much, that it even caused her relationship between her and Braelynn to become strained. Mac, for the most part, was busy holed up in her room - their room? - only to be seen for meal times and class times. It wasn't even that it was Parker's fault, in fact it was both of their faults for it had been a mutual decision. Neither seemingly had the trust or emotional stability to be in a relationship at that point and it caused several fights. Mac felt horrible about it, especially since they'd never had the time to make things right before Parker had left for some trip or something. Parker leaving after their horrible breakup made her realise what a horrible friend she'd been recently to Brae and Nova and everyone else she'd ever spoken to. It made her realise that she should never fight with anyone or get frustrated because what if something would have happened to Parker while away? Their fight would have been the last words they'd ever exchanged.

Her fingers touched the wood of her guitar, brushing off some dust and cobwebs. When she first arrived at Merlin's - she was incredibly homesick. She spent her days sitting on a slab of rock by Sapphire Lake, doing absolutely nothing but thinking about how sad she was to be away from her parents. That was - at least until she met Braelynn. Braelynn had helped her learn to play guitar, or at least she'd taught her the basic chords, the foundations of playing. If it weren't for Braelynn, the wooden instrument would have never been gifted to Mac, it would be sitting in the room of someone who played it often, someone who cherished it and wore it down from the amount of love they gave it. However after Parker and her had split, Mac lost interest in all things musical - guitar playing and piano playing. She had also quit drawing and for a while, she wouldn't even attend classes because to her, there was no point. She would be forever alone, she'd never have her first kiss and she'd never have a family. Mac sighed and closed her fingers around the neck of the guitar.

The strap hung loosely around her body allowing the wooden instrument to rest along her back as her feet carried her down a well known path. The blue lake came into view as did the gray slate of granite rock. Mac sat down on the ever so familiar rock, her legs crossed with the golden brown instrument propped on her knee. The sight of her reminded her of the day she met Brae, the day before Parker ever existed to her and she smiled. She missed those days, not because she hated Parker and he didn't exist to her yet but because she missed Brae. She missed her best friend. Mac would give everything to have Braelynn back as her best friend. The girl tuned the guitar and then strummed it, playing and singing a song Braelynn had so often played and sung. Mac had picked it up easy, possibly easier than she had picked up playing the piano. "This is my heartbeat song and I'm gonna play it been so long I forgot how to -" The string popped and slapped her across the hand, cutting in and causing her to cry out. One thing she didn't know how to do was fix the strings so she'd have to get Braelynn to show her how. She looked down to her hand to see blood now coming out of the stinging cut.

She set down the guitar and leaned over, putting her hand into the lake to clean it off a bit. The water was cold, like ice and it was only August which was sort of shocking. Pulling it back out, she noticed that it was still bleeding though not as bad and she made a mental note to stop by the Healer later before the Lake water caused an infection to grow. A slight glance to her left and Mac thought she saw someone but that was near impossible. She was quite sure that she had been the only person to have stayed in the dorms this summer meaning there was no other students on campus, or were there? She looked back down to her now broken guitar and frowned. It had been the last gift from her parents that she'd received. She'd asked for it for her birthday/Christmas gift and when they presented it to her, she was quite shocked. She had quickly fallen in love with it and she was so excited to show it to Braelynn only to have the whole breakup incident which resulted in the guitar never getting used properly. However now, she vowed to use it only if it got fixed.