Author's note: Thank you all so much! This has become my most-reviewed story ever, passing something that's several years old and far from my best work, so it's really great to see people reviewing and enjoying this. We're just about halfway through now. Plenty more to go. If you're celebrating holidays in the next couple weeks, enjoy! The story and the real calendar have synced up well right now by sheer dumb luck...

It was a thinner crowd than usual for Christmas. The professors of the "Three A's"—Astronomy, Arithmancy, and Ancient Runes—had all left for the holiday. Professor Binns never really came down to meals, of course. Plenty of students, but then again not too many and that was by the year's already-thin standards.

Late Christmas Eve the professors had gathered for what turned out to be a very brief reading—McGonagall interrupted Amycus and they had a short, heated debate about the relative merits of reading about "unwashed sheep-herders" (Amycus' phrasing) and "abstraction you are twisting in order to obfuscate" (McGonagall). Truth be told, I wasn't sure who was obfuscating who, but Professor Sprout told them to be civil on Christmas and they, very grudgingly, complied.

I slept in, not really expecting any presents, but woke to find a tiny package from Professor McGonagall that quivered a bit as I drew near it. Thought you might enjoy this, Minerva, she'd written.

Curious, I opened it to find a miniature figurine of Emilio Cabañas, the Peruvian genius of a Chaser. Of course, the Quidditch World Cup would be the next year in Australia—but would they hold off on it for almost a full year, so it could be in their summer?

Emilio paced the floor while I tried to think of what would be open on Christmas Day—I wanted to give McGonagall a present in return. Could I wait a while, pass as Oliver-of-1998, and snag her a free ticket to Puddlemere's next opening day without anyone telling the younger version of me? Was I going to give free tickets to my family? Why couldn't I remember anything important?

Wait, no, I had an idea. I'd just need a couple more days to wait, was all. Wouldn't want to bother people on Christmas. In the meantime, I walked up to the Owlery to send off a few letters—it'd help to give people warning.

"Now, if they write back to you, whatever they say, come back to me. Me, here, in Hogwarts Castle, do you understand? No matter what the envelope says," I asked the owl. It just sort of pecked at me. What did they know, anyway? They were just beasts.

I half-expected to run into a student or someone, sending an actual Christmas card, but the Owlery was empty bar the owls and me. Maybe I'd just slept in too long. I was about the only one left for breakfast. But by lunch everyone was back. "Thanks so much for your present, Minerva," I said—it was still so weird calling her that. "I, er, have something lined up for you as well. But it'll take a couple days to come through."

"Thank you," she smiled.

Trelawney started pulling crackers with the students, who had all congregated at Slytherin table since there were so few of them. What would the Great Hall look like after they got rid of houses, I wondered? Silly question, but I was curious.

I felt like doing something festive—singing Christmas songs, maybe? The only other person who really wanted to sing, however, was Nearly Headless Nick. He sounded like drunk Jenkins at a party. I didn't know ghosts could drink egg nog or anything, but he sure faked it well.

Somewhere, my family—and I—were sitting around a fire together, playing games or something. Worst-case scenario, it'd still be two and a half years before I could speak to any of them again. Not the kinds of thoughts I wanted to be moping about on Christmas.

So I went flying, over the lake and over the snow, trying to clear my head. I guess it worked, sort of, as there was nothing particular I remembered thinking about. Except that it was cold.

When I got back, I figured I'd test some charms on the Comet again. The nice thing about having the broom somewhat broken was that I had no qualms about using it as a test subject. I'd tried every Acceleration Charm I could think of, but never got anything more than a very bumpy ride.

It'd have been nice, I figured, if I could find the secret before the start of term. It wouldn't be so bad a place to leave the staff, would it? The bulk of the first years had already, officially, passed their test. I wondered when I'd get back—right when I left, or would five months have gone by in 2000 as well? Maybe I could control when I went to.

Since the Acceleration Charms weren't working, I tried to shorten my stick instead. (That's really not that funny. The Muggle book of sciencies had said that everything that's going fast looks shorter, whether it be a broomstick or a spaceship or a helicopter, and presumably even teeny tiny things that are too small to see anyway but Muggle sciencers can look at them.)

Again, it didn't work. Festive day.

I wondered what the other professors were doing...as far as I knew, none of them were married or had kids or anything, but at the same time they weren't joining my renditions of "God Rest Ye, Merry Hippogriffs," so clearly they had something to do.

Over the weekend, I Apparated to the Puddlemere pitch on a whim, bringing a school broom. Yeah, I sort of hoped I was not ever going to bring it back (at least not for three years), but that was the least of my problems.

I flew through the goalposts. All of them, both ends of the pitch, from the front and back. Nothing happened. I hadn't expected much to, truthfully—I hadn't cast any spells on them, not wanting to travel to a third destination. All things considered, I had a pretty cushy post at Hogwarts. Still, I had to try.

Monday after Christmas, the school owl came back. To me. I could only hope it'd been exactly where I sent it, and nowhere else, otherwise I wouldn't be in trouble.

Well. I wouldn't be in trouble. I would...

...no, that can't be right.