From Beginning to End

Chapter 9: Secrets

The Winter Holidays were only a few days away. Final examinations were taking place in the current time which left little time to dwell about snow angels or Father Christmas. Most students were bent over desks in various locations among the castle, studying charms, runes and other magical properties with haste.
Groups had been formed to study together.

Lily, Mary, Peter and Remus had claimed a back corner of the library and were discussing the last few Transfiguration lectures. The four worked well together. All were quiet and desired to learn. Plus, neither reacted poorly to constructive criticism.

Unfortunately this did not appear to be the case for everyone as Sirius, James and Marlene's shouts and laughter could be heard from quite far.

The librarian had shushed them a multitude of times, even tried kicking them out to no avail. They did not care. Studying was stupid. They were only doing so because there was nothing else to do.

Lily smiled to herself. Oh well, she thought, their exam marks will teach them a lesson soon.

    "Yep that's correct," Remus said as he was quizzing Lily, "you're wicked smart."

    She ducked her head, blushing profusely. For some reason Remus' words had that effect on her. It was annoying. She hated feeling like a puddle of goo when he was around.

Her mother would probably say something about her fancying him. Ridiculous. But perhaps she was at an age where these things started happening. Blimey, she fancied Remus Lupin. The worst part? Severus had been right.

All the students were in the great hall eating their final supper before they were to finish packing to go see their families for the first time in months. Everyone was chatting about their various plans.

"Yeah, my family and I always go and see the Weird Sisters' Christmas Eve concert and have loads of butterbeer. We alway have the most amazing homemade pumpkin pasties for Christmas breakfast and then open our presents. I'm hoping for another book on Quidditch Through the Ages." Marlene McKinnon explained her Holiday plans that sounded so extremely foreign to Lily Evans. "What do you guys do for Christmas?"

      "Well I'm a Muggleborn so we do the traditional opening presents under the tree, baking sugar cookies, and cozying up to the fire and all that. Nothing nearly as extravagant as you two described," Mary explained. "What about you, Lils?"

Lily nodded. "Same here, except we usually go to a ski resort or something."

"Ski resort?" Marlene asked. Given she was from a prominent Wizarding family it wasn't all that surprising that she wouldn't know.

Lily shook her head, unable to properly explain skiing to the witch. "Sorry, I can't describe it. It's just some Muggle sport in the snow."

Marlene nodded. Apparently that was enough for her to understand. It sounded fascinating.

Meanwhile a few seats down, the boys were having a similar discussion.

It was clear James had similar plans to Alice, while Remus' and Peter's plans more closely mirrored Mary's.

Sirius on the other hand had a more extravagant holiday. His family still held seventeen and eighteen hundreds' traditions. Which included but were not limited to; a huge luxurious ball on both Christmas and New Years. Those were the events of the year and were held with high esteem. All a black tie and ball gown affair, corsets were not uncommon at these parties. They were of course only for the purest of wizarding families.