Rebel Rebel (A Fred Weasley fanfic)

7

Stevie was wrong. It turned out that most, if not all of her fellow Ravenclaws had opted to go home for the holidays so on Christmas Day, she awoke to an empty dormitory since Ribh and the other two fifth-years that they shared with were gone.

When she wakes, she lays in her bed for another ten minutes thinking. Just how is she going to amuse herself over these two weeks.

Perhaps going home would have been better.

When she does eventually decide to get up, she finds a small pile of presents on the bottom of her bed and she gathers them up into her arms so she can go down and open them by the fire.

The pile was small - she never really received gifts from anyone other than Kaye and Ribh. Her parents so graciously would send her something and this year, it was a textbook. ONe that was for first years and one that she was pretty sure that she already had but knowing them, they probably just went into her room and grabbed the first thing they saw.

From Kaye, she got some new fancy quills and colour-changing ink that she would use to send her a letter thanking her.

Ribh got her a selection of her Hogsmeade favourites and she helped herself to the cauldron cakes. It was Christmas and those could be her breakfast.

After eating, she gets changed, writes her letters for her friends before wrapping up warm for the walk up to the Owlery.

The snow glistens and crunches under her feet as she makes her way across the grounds and as she walks by the Whomping Willow (which is a truly volatile tree), she can't help but smile as she recalls the story Fred had told her about how he and George spent almost the whole of their second year trying to get by it - only giving up when he was hit by one of the branches and just normally missed being knocked out.

Fred...Stevie still couldn't believe that he had offered to stay at the school with her. They had been speaking for just over three months and there he was, saying that he'd give up going home to see his family so that she wasn't alone.

She bites her lip to try and stop her smile growing as she continues to think about the Weasley boy - the way that he somehow always knew how to make her laugh or feel better, the light scattering of freckles across his face. The way-

She lets out a shriek when her foot lands on a patch of ice, legs flailing around as she tries to keep her balance but her efforts are pointless and she ends up on her back on the cold ground.

Brilliant.

~~|~~

After sending her letters off with two of the many school owls, Stevie takes a walk around the grounds, marvelling at how the school looks in the wintertime.

If she was braver, she might try and sneak down to Hogsmeade but she can't bring herself to go any further than the Quidditch Pitch.

There's a first-year boy sitting by the fire when she returns to the common room who informs her that the Christmas Lunch was going to start at one - which was in just ten minutes.

Excellent. The cauldron cakes that she'd had earlier were starting to wear off.

The two of them make their way downstairs once she's tossed her jacket and scarf over the chair to dry by the fire and as they enter the hall, they find that the House Tables were resting against the wall and in their place, is one single table with twelve places set. Seven of them were taken by five professors, Filch and a rather sour-looking Slytherin.

Dumbledore, who's at the head of the table, stands as Stevie and the first year make their way into the hall, "Ah! Merry Christmas! And to you three as well."