Chapter 9 – Lonely this Christmas

"SIRIUS BLACK YOU COME BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!"

Hermione looked up from her Arithmancy text to see a very irate James running down the stairs, covered in a substance that looked suspiciously like honey. Just in front of him, Sirius shot past the couch where Hermione was sat, while behind him there was a rather large swarm of bees.

"Reverto ut northmanni." Hermione yelled, as she attempted to reverse whatever spell had been placed on the Chaser, who was now turning a rather stunning shade of bright red.

Instantly the honey disappeared, leaving the swarm of bees zipping around the room in confusion.

"Evanesco." Remus said, lazily flicking his wand towards the mass of creatures, never taking his eyes off of his reading. Hermione grinned at the action, noting that Remus took the occurrence totally in stride, as though he was more than used to such events.

With Christmas rapidly approaching, spirits were very high, particularly among the marauders, who'd decided amongst themselves that they needed to cause as much mayhem as possible before being separated for two weeks.

Hermione was not as excited as the rest of her classmates, instead she was dreading Christmas vacation, knowing that all of her friends would be returning home to spend time with their families, while she would be left at Hogwarts with one anti-social second year girl and two rowdy third year boys to keep her company. As she was reminded again of the lonely holiday that approached, she thought of Harry and Ron. This was not unusual, although as time wore on she had found herself thinking of her friends less each day.

She wondered what they would be doing this year. Would Ron stay at Hogwarts with Harry? Where they could run around, relatively unsupervised, sneaking out to Hogsmeade in the evenings. Or would Harry go to stay with the Weasleys, where they could all enjoy a real family Christmas, with a fire roaring, Christmas decorations, the twins playing pranks on everyone in sight. Mr Weasley talking Harry's ear off about eklectricity and Mrs Weasley making more food than they could possibly manage between the already large group.

"Mya… Mya are you alright?"

She looked up quickly, having lost herself in the images of her closest friends. Remus was crouched down next to her, a concerned look gracing his face.

"Of course I am, why?" she replied, confused by the worry in his eyes.

"Because normally when people are okay they don't sit there crying to themselves."

Hermione suddenly realised that warm tears were coating her cheeks. She quickly raised her hands and rubbed her face dry, turning a light pink as embarrassment overcame her.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Remus asked softly, whispering so as not to attract attention from James, Sirius and Peter, (who were currently engaged in a bizarre version of wizard wrestling which seemed to involve James and Sirius competing over who could find the most amusing spell to hit Peter with, before he worked out how to pronounce the international wizard wrestling official safe word.)

Hermione smiled slightly, before replying. "I really am fine. I was just thinking about my friends back home. I wish I could see them again."

Remus stared thoughtfully at her for a moment. Hermione was just about to ask him what he was thinking when he jumped up, a decisive look on his face, and told her that he'd be back in a few minutes, he just needed to get a book from the library. Then he raced out of the portrait door, causing Sirius and James to freeze watching in bemusement as their friend disappeared. It was then that Peter managed to counter the various hexes placed on him and he returned the favour by placing the jellylegs curse on them.

As Hermione looked over at the two yelling boys, she put aside all thoughts of Harry and Ron and concentrated on giggling at the ridiculous friends that were in front of her.

"See ya Mya!"

"Bye Pete."

"Happy Christmas Mya."

"You too Robert."

"Mya are you sure you're gonna be okay?" Lily asked her for what seemed like the billionth time that day.

"I'll. Be. Fine." Hermione replied, trying desperately to push the younger girl towards the carriages waiting to take the students who were leaving for Christmas to the station.

"I really don't think my parents would mind having an extra person…"

"No." Hermione said decisively. "I refuse to impose myself on your parents. Now hurry up before you miss the coach and we both get stuck here!" She laughed as Lily did a funny little hopping motion between the carriages and her friend. "Oh and tell the boys I said goodbye. I barely saw them as they rushed past earlier!"

"Okay, have fun Mya." Lily yelled, having finally decided that she should really get on the coach, seeing as the last one was moving away from them. "HAPPY CHRISTMAS!"

"Happy Christmas!" Hermione yelled back, giggling as the redhead ran down the drive at top speed in an attempt to catch the coach.

Hermione stood there waving until the coach passed the gate and then continued to stand watching until it became a mere pinprick on the horizon. Slowly she turned and wandered back inside, preparing to spend her first Christmas away from family and friends.

When Hermione arrived back at Gryffindor tower she climbed through the portrait door, looked sadly around the empty common room and gave a long, lonely sigh. She could felt the boredom settling in already.

"That may well be the most depressing sigh I've ever heard." Said the big red chair that faced the fire. Now Hermione wasn't particularly shocked by the concept of furniture talking to her. Hell, the mirror in the girl's dorm had been 'bumped into' and 'accidentally' knocked over many times thanks to the rather rude comments that it was known to give out in the mornings.

What did surprise her was that this chair sounded extremely familiar for a chair that had, to her knowledge, never chosen to speak before.

She stared at the piece of furniture for a moment, trying to work out why it sounded so familiar to her, when a person stood up from the chair and turned to face her.

"REMUS!" She squealed, before remembering that she wasn't the kind of girl who squeals. Suddenly she realised something. "But if you're here, then that means you're not there."

Remus' eyes crinkled slightly as he stood grinning at the confused brunette, who was currently making some very bizarre hand gestures between himself and the door, whilst muttering something to herself. "I decided to stay here and keep you company." He replied, trying not to laugh at the confusion on Mya's face.

"REMUS LUPIN YOU GO HOME THIS INSTANT!"

The sudden change from befuddled to enraged took the werewolf by surprise and he actually took a couple of steps back. "Now Mya, let me explain first."

"What's there to explain? You are absolutely, positively, definitely not missing Christmas at your parents just so…"

"Silencio."

Hermione paused when she realised that, while her mouth was quite happily yelling at Remus, her voice didn't seem to be cooperating.

"My parents were given tickets for a week long trip to Italy for Christmas from my Granddad. They were going to cancel the trip so that I wouldn't be home alone, but when I realised that you were gonna be stuck here I owled them and told them to enjoy the holiday as I'd managed to make other arrangements."

Hermione looked abashed and mouthed 'I'm sorry' to him. Grinning victoriously Remus replied, "Now I have a really hard decision to make. Do I take the spell off now, or shall I wait until after Christmas? It will definitely be nice to have some peace and quiet around here. What with you being such a chatterbox an' all." Laughing again at the panicked look on Hermione's face, the joking boy allowed Hermione to speak again, but only after she'd silently promised not to yell at him once for the next two weeks.

Hermione smiled at the realisation that maybe she wouldn't have to spend the next two weeks alone and crying after all.

A/N: Wizard wrestling is one of the few sports to pass over to muggle society, though in a slightly different format. In wizard wrestling, the two opponents must use any legal spell to force their opponent to quit. The loser is the first to yell the official safe word 'suoitodilaipxecitsiligarfilacrepus'. The event takes place in a room with walls and windows that are impervious to magic to protect the audience from becoming caught up in the fight. Such precautions were put in place after 1376, when Impono the Pointless decided that, after two hours of waiting for his opponent to quit, he would simply levitate the poor man's youngest child over a cage of lions kept in the corner of the auditorium.