Chapter 11: The Rest of Christmas (And a bit after that too!)

A/N: Sorry about that last chapter. Really, sorry. Warning: A few tiny little rude words. Got to live up to the Teenage rating, eh?

The rest of Christmas went really great, even greater because Peter wasn't there, and too fast, in Sirius' opinion. What he found rather irritating, was that throughout the whole day, owls kept dive-bombing him, delivering cards and presents. Most of them read "Sirius, I love you,".

"It's not Valentine's Day," he said to the owl as he ripped open the letter.

Dear my lovely Sirius,

I love you so much and I hope you have a brilliant Christmas,
Signed, ?.

"I understand now what someone told me about Hogwarts mostly being filled with idiots," Sirius said loudly to James at dinner.

All the girls who had sent him letters, and heard, glared and started crying.

"Siriusly!" Sirius said, while James laughed. They'd started a think where they said that instead of "Seriously".

"Seventh-years sent me them! Is this a prank, or what?"

At the beginning, Sirius rather enjoyed it. After about 10 cards, he was mildly annoyed. After 50, he was rather irritated. When he hit 100, he got really, really annoyed, read them, ripped them up and burnt them. And laughed at the heart-broken girls.

They went to bed at 10:00 that night. All their beds were surrounded by cards, presents, and, in Sirius' case, burnt pieces of paper.

Three of the four Marauders woke up the next day to find the fourth in bed. James walked over to the sink and filled a glass with cold water. Walking quietly over to Peter's bed, he poured it on his face.

Peter yelled like a little girl. "ARGH!" he yelled in a high-pitched voice. "Stop attacking me, dolphin!".

Then he woke up properly and blushed.
"What did you just call me, Pete?" James asked.
"Sorry! I was dreaming about dolphins and them pouring water on me. No thanks to you!".
"When did you get back?" asked Remus.
"Sometime around two," Peter answered, yawning.
"Weren't you meant to spend the whole holidays at your parent's house?" asked Sirius.

Peter rolled his eyes.
"Well, until my mum had a heart attack, yeah,".

Remus and the others gaped at him.
"….Okay…" said Remus. "That's bad…".
"Yeah," Peter agreed. "But hey, I get to come back anyway! What did I miss?"
"Sirius got Valentine's Day cards from seventh-". Sirius clapped his hand over James' mouth, promptly cutting him off.

"It was Christmas cards," he insisted.
"Can someone explain to me what you are talking about?" asked Peter.
"Mm mhm mm!"
"Oh, sorry James," Sirius lifted his hand from his mouth.
" Bastard," said James, glaring at him.

Remus rolled his eyes and leaned over to Peter to tell him about the cards.

"…And that's why there are burnt pieces of paper by his bed," Remus finished off.
Sirius threw a book at him.
"I didn't want you to tell him! It's embarrassing!".
"..And when did you try to stop me?"

Sirius glared at him again.
"Whatever."

They went down to breakfast and again, most of the tables were empty. James saw Snape and grinned.
"Remmy-"
"Don't call me that. What?"
"What's the spell to make someone speak in rhyme for the rest of the day?" he asked.
Remus saw him looking at Snape and sighed. "You always drag me into this, don't you?"

James nodded eagerly.
"Fine, it's Habla en rima."

James practised it a couple of times without a wand, then walked (very obviously) over to the Slytherin table right in front of Snape. He raised his wand, while Snape looked worried and said,

"What are you doing?"
"Habla en rima!" James pronounced.

"What did you do?" asked Snape, then it kicked in.
"I hate you!".

"Very original…" said James.

"You are so annoying! You think you're a king!".
"Pathetic…"

Then James ran from the hall laughing. Remus quickly followed; he didn't want to get into trouble. Sirius and Peter looked at each other, shrugged, and followed them.

"So it worked then?" asked Remus.
"Oh yes!"
"What did you do?" asked Peter; he hadn't been listening.
"Snivellus will be speaking in rhymes for the rest of the day!" James said happily.
Peter and Sirius laughed.

"You do realise, James, that I might get into trouble? I taught you the spell!" pointed out Remus.
"Oh, the teachers won't know what I did. I won't tell them it was you."
"Yeah, but they'll want to know how you did it!"
"I'll blame it on Sirius," James replied.

"You will not!" he shouted.
"Kidding! I'll say I found it in a book in the library, which I have now returned."
"Fine," nodded Remus.
"You can be so bloody pedantic at times!" James moaned.

Sirius gaped at him.
"What? It's true!" said James.
"Not that, the fact you knew such a long word!".

James rolled his eyes again.
"It's only…" he counted on his fingers, "Eight letters! I know one that's about twenty-six!"
"Prove it."
"Antidisestablishmentarianism," James said proudly.
"How do you know that word?" asked Remus, "I bet you don't know what it means!"
"Last August, I read some random words in a dictionary. Does it mean something about Churches?"
"I think so, I don't actually know," admitted Remus.

"How does around twenty six letters compare to eight, Siri? Bet you didn't know that word!" James said gleefully.

"I didn't," Sirius said, yawning. He was bored with this conversation already. "Can we go and fly or something?"

Remus looked out of the window. "It's raining."
"So? You don't have to come!" replied Sirius.
"Can I come?" asked James.
"Sure!"

James and Sirius went down to the Quidditch pitch followed by Remus. He could always cast a charm to stop him from getting wet. And he wanted to watch them.

Peter decided to stay behind to try and find Remus's hidden chocolate stash.

James and Sirius each grabbed their brooms, but Remus stopped them. "Wait, No te mojes," he cast that twice, once on each of them.

"What was that?" asked James.
"So you won't get wet,".
"Thanks!" James and Sirius said together. They mounted their brooms and seemed to be trying to see who could fly the highest and the furthest. After a couple of minutes of watching them, Remus got bored. He forgot he hated flying, and grabbed a broom to catch up with them.

"Hi, guys!" Remus shouted over the raging wind and rain.
"Hi, Remus!" Sirius shouted back. "Let's have a race!"

They all flew over to one side of the pitch, and James counted down, "Three, two, one, GO!" Remus, Sirius and James all raced over to the other goal hoops.

James got their first, but then, he did have the better broom. Sirius was second, and Remus last. They flew down to the ground, all a bit tired.

"I'm rubbish," Remus said, grinning. He'd had a lot of fun.
"No, you got the rubbish school broom," James pointed out.
"Yeah, it's a piece of shit," admitted Remus.

Sirius and James gaped at him.
"It's weird to hear you swear," James told him.