You, my friends, are the best people on this planet. Got it? The. Bloody. Best. Instead of getting shrieks and bricks pegged at me like I presumed, you were all fine with it, and most of all, supportive. I feel so good, because I can take a break without fear. And, even better, I still put out a chapter, and I'm going back into my usual flow again. I mean, I've still got like, four more weeks of holidays or something. Maybe five. I don't know. But I didn't get a tan. It rained almost the whole time. I swear we could pass for England at the moment, we get rain so much.

Also, I'm thinking that Marley is moving away from my personality and going into her own category, which I think is perfectly fine. She's just not exactly like me anymore.

But guess what? I have gotten the longest review ever on my other story! It was so big, that it didn't fit on my whole screen! And they loved it! *squeals*

Now, responses - for both the last chapter and the A/N:

ItsAKiliThing: No way in hell I'm catching the plague. I'd die from Writer's Block first. But . . . yeah. The nicknames are stupid. But, they're good to use instead of constantly repeating the actual names over and over again. They seem a lot closer this way.

Earth. bound. wolf: Yeah, that's not happening. HOW THE HELL IS BRISBANE THE BIGGEST PLACE YOU'VE BEEN TO IN YOUR LIFE?! Does Canberra ring a bell? Hello?! And you've never been there before?! What the . . . *groans* And I thought I was the hermit.

Pfft no they didn't die: Feel free to use the pineapples. But, yeah. Men. Thanks for the long review. I like long reviews.

Dr Crazy Glasses: Ikr! My knees hurt so bloody much, and I just keep thinking they're gonna break or something!

fourtris everpotter: Don't worry, I don't have any outright haters that are noticeable . . . at the moment, anyway, thank you, I will remember that :) xox

Guest: Whoops, completely unintentional on my part. Well, this update did get put out before Christmas, so it will definitely be there to read. Sorry for the wait *grins guiltily*

Karolz101: I relaxed :) and it was good. Though it's good to be writing again. Even though this chapter took forever.

Cheers!

Merry Christmas!

~Ice.

25 – "Are We Being Overprotective?"

James

The Christmas holidays were an enjoyable affair, as Sirius had stayed at James' house once again. The same routine as last year had been followed; Peter and Remus joined them on Christmas Eve for lunch, then returned to their families later in the day. Despite James' house almost drowning in the amount of snow they got, he and Sirius bundled themselves up in multiple layers and went outside to play Quidditch regardless, and came back in hours later as it was starting to get dark, blue-lipped from the cold. His mother always made a fuss over them when she saw this, plopping them in front of the roaring fire and having a house elf bring steaming cups of hot chocolate. James certainly knew Sirius was enjoying being well-treated. It was quite obvious he wasn't given the same love and affection in his own household. It was this fact that made James feel rather guilty; he practically lived like a king.

Wow. Did he seriously just admit that?

Erm . . .

Someone started talking, and he was snapped out of his deep . . . pondering.

'James, before you go, I want to give you something.'

James and Sirius, who were both sprawled over the couches in the lounge room, looked up.

'Dad?'

'Okay, let me get this straight,' Sirius said as they walked out of the house, trunks in front of them. 'That's actually an -'

'Yup.'

'And it will really -'

'Well and truly.'

'And this isn't a -'

'Nope.'

A grin split both of the boys' faces as they looked over the silvery material in James' hands. James wrapped one of the said hands in the material, and they both whooped when it disappeared, completely invisible, but still attached to his wrist.

'Filch is going to have fun this year,' James whispered. Sirius nodded in agreement.

'Loads.'

Lily

'Lily! Margaret's coming over in ten minutes; make sure you freaks stay up in your room! And no . . . funny stuff!'

Lily sighed and closed her eyes. 'Yes, Tuney!' she shouted back, hoping that Petunia could hear her downstairs. 'Absolutely!'

Marley, who was sitting on Lily's bed, crossed her arms and huffed. 'I can't believe she's treated you like that all holidays. She's a right cow.'

Lily shook her head slightly. 'She's my sister.'

'Not a very nice sister,' Kayla said, looking up from her book. She was sitting at the desk pushed against one wall, lounging back on the chair. 'I honestly thought you were overdoing it when you were talking about what she was like.'

'She didn't used to be like this,' Lily said. 'I mean, the last two holidays she ignored me completely, and before that, I wasn't even at Hogwarts. She was a lot nicer then.'

Marley quirked an eyebrow. 'I'm having a hard time believing that.'

'Don't believe it if you don't want to.'

'Wait . . .' Kayla looked up from her book again. 'We're going in ten. We'll have no choice. We can't stay out of Petunia's way.'

Marley's seemed to think about it. 'That's true.'

'Anyway, on the bright side,' the other girl continued. 'We're going back to school. There's no Petunia there.'

Lily sighed regardless. She just wished that it wasn't like this. She wanted to know what happened to the Petunia that always used to play with her; back when they were best friends. She wondered if it could ever be that way again.

Maybe, deep inside, her sister felt the same way too.

Marley got to her feet and kicked her trunk closed, which had been sitting wide open up against one of the walls for the majority of the holidays. Kayla's was sitting closed next to it, and it had been packed up hours ago. Lily was yet to retrieve hers from beneath her bed.

'Come on,' Marley said. 'I want to see how much I can brass Petty off.'

'Marley,' Kayla groaned. 'Not again. Please?'

Marley thought over this, then sighed. 'Fine. But the idiot deserves whatever's coming to her.'

Lily just rolled her eyes. She had gotten used to this already, and didn't even bother trying to convince her friend to think otherwise anymore. Because, when it came to quite a lot of things, Marley was as stubborn as an ox.

Kayla threw her book at her. It hit Marley squarely on the head, and she yelped, whirling around. Both Kayla and Lily burst into laughter, and the other girl grumbled, muttering profanities under her breath.

'That's it,' she said. 'You've lost book privileges for a month.' She smirked triumphantly, pulling her trunk back open and plopping the book atop the mess inside.

'Oh no,' Kayla said mockingly. 'Not the books! My god, could anything be any worse?'

Marley narrowed her eyes. 'I will steal all of your books. Every single one. And Lily's, so you can't nick any of hers.'

'What did I ever do to you?' Lily squawked indignantly. Kayla just crossed her arms and smirked. 'I'd like to see you try and find them.'

Marley narrowed her eyes, an evil grin playing on her lips. 'Oh, you're on.'

A rather loud scuffle followed those three words. Marley dove for Kayla's trunk, and Kayla, who reacted immediately, vaulted onto Marley's back. Lily just backed away, wide-eyed. This was going to get dangerous.

Additional weight be damned, Marley flipped the latch on the trunk regardless. When it was lifted open, Kayla took advantage of this to tumble on top of her possessions, shielding them protectively. Marley ducked down instinctively to avoid any feet hitting her on the head and shielded her wildly bobbing curls with her arms, crossing them over each other. Kayla spread herself out so she had at least a limb covering every square inch of clothes, shoes, and books. She grinned triumphantly. 'Ha!'

Marley pounced and both girls ended up rolling to the other end of the room. Lily rolled her eyes. The way they behaved sometimes. But still, it was entertaining.

There was the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs, and Lily froze. The other two apparently failed to hear this, and when the door opened suddenly, Kayla almost punched Marley in the face. The other girl ducked to the side just in time, and they both looked up at Lily's mother sheepishly.

'I'm not even going to ask,' Rose said, sounding both tired and amused. 'I want you down in the car now, girls; we're going.'

Marley, who was kneeling with her hands on Kayla's shoulders, pushing the other girl into the soft, patterned carpet, flopped to the side, before rolling to her trunk on the other side of the room. 'Yes ma'am!'

Rose shook her head incredulously and looked at the ceiling, before turning and shutting the door behind her. She was used to Marley's insane antics but loved her regardless, and had also come to consider Kayla her "fourth" daughter. Really, with five females in the house, it was a wonder that Lily's father hadn't gone mad yet.

Chance, who had formerly been sleeping on Lily's pillow, stretched and got lightly to his feet, watching Kayla and Marley, both of whom had resumed their scuffle. Lily absently scratched him behind the ears. The cat meowed and butted his head against her hand, soaking in the attention.

Lily sighed and rolled her eyes, before scooping him up and plopping him in his carrier. She zipped it up; completely ignoring the noises of irritation Chance made, and crossed the room to lug her trunk over with the other two. Finally, she moved over to the tangle of limbs formally known as her friends, and gave them a good, hard kick.

Cue the yelping.

Lily stuck her nose in the air and ignored the sounds of protest they made, and went back to the trunks. 'We're going, if you didn't notice, ladies. Come on. I would like to get to the train station sometime this morning.'

Marley and Kayla grumbled, but like the obedient girls they were, got to their feet and brushed themselves off before joining Lily. 'Fine.'

Half an hour later, the three girls were milling around Platform 9 ¾, having already passed through the barrier. The Hogwarts Express loomed in front of them.

'Lily!' Lily turned to see Sev hurrying through the crowds of people towards her. Marley made a noise of irritability and tugged Kayla away. Lily ignored this, as she usually did, and instead ran to greet her friend. 'Hey!'

'How were your holidays?' Sev asked, hugging her.

'Pretty good, actually. Yours?'

Severus' face darkened slightly, and Lily began wishing she hadn't asked. Oh. Right. She remembered now.

'Were they yelling again?' she asked quietly. He nodded mutely, then after a short moment put on a forced, but happier face. 'Come on. Let's go find a compartment.'

Lily looked back around, then remembered her other two friends had already left. 'Okay.'

Kayla

Marley shook her head as they walked away. 'Why the hell does she hang around with him?'

Kayla chewed her lip, unable to come up with a reasonable answer on the spot. In all honesty, she really didn't like the Snape boy either. There was just something about him that wasn't right.

Marley spread her arms out, palms facing upwards. 'See! That just reinforces my point.'

'He doesn't exactly seem like the most pleasant of people,' the brown-head murmured.

'That's because he's not,' Marley said pointedly. 'He's just as bad as any other Slytherin. He's only ever nice to Lily, and I know someday that's going to change as well.' She turned to Kayla, actually seeming a bit anxious. 'I don't want him to hurt her.'

Kayla nodded. 'Don't want anyone to hurt her.'

There was a long moment of silence before Marley finally popped it. 'Are we being overprotective?'

Kayla gave a short laugh. 'No.'

Marley made a satisfied noise and nodded. 'Thought so.'

'Where are we going?' They were both apparently wandering around on the platform, with no purpose whatsoever. Or, no purpose that Kayla knew about, anyway.

'Looking for real men,' Marley responded. Kayla quirked an eyebrow, then her question was answered as four people came into view. 'Rem!'

All four of the Marauders looked around, and Remus grinned. Hugs were shared all around because, hey, girls like hugs. Well, Kayla and Marley did, anyway.

'Holidays?' James asked, grinning broadly. Marley grinned back at him. 'Not too shabby.'

Sirius poked his head over James' shoulder, looking at Kayla. 'You've got that cat, don't you?'

Kayla just laughed as Chance started meowing from the depths of his cage. Sirius groaned audibly. 'If you're staying with us, he'd better not attack me!'

Kayla rolled her eyes. 'It's not you he hates, it's Remus.'

Remus bristled. 'Hey!'

'I also sometimes wonder why that is.'

'Hey!'

Remus

Over the course of the train ride it was pretty uneventful, however there was a good five minutes of entertainment provided when Chance tried to get on Sirius' lap again. Quite frankly, Remus was starting to wonder if the poor cat would ever recover from that much screaming. No, he wasn't even going to sugar coat it. It was screaming.

When they trolley lady turned up, there was also a scuffle as Kayla dumped large amounts of purchased chocolates and lollies onto the spare seat, mainly in a desperate attempt to get the chocolate frog cards. Remus wondered if anyone was going to recover from that one.

Seriously, the friends he had . . . Hogwarts really ought to be a school for the insane and chocolate crazy rather than witches and wizards. It was a more fitting concept.

Hogwarts . . . the school where everyone was mad . . .

Remus laughed inwardly to himself.

His eyes wandered over the others. The topic of Animagi had not been brought up again since before the holidays, and Remus had still been desperately attempting to convince them out of it. James and Sirius had become a bit brassed off, saying 'we want to help you, you prat. Can you at least be grateful?' and Remus had backed up a little, as they were pretty riled up. But they were absolutely insane. They couldn't go through with this. The worst bit was that they were acting so bloody happy-go-lucky about it all. He could tell nothing good was going to come out of it.

But, Remus continued as though it hadn't been bothering him, and that he hadn't given it any consideration since. It seemed to have worked, and (he was really hoping here) they may have forgotten about it. The rest of the Marauders weren't the brightest of people in regards to remembering stuff. So maybe that topic was disappearing underneath all of the troubles of life.

Maybe.

Hmm.

Question: Do you use the internet for purposes other than FanFiction?

Answer: Yes, I have an Instagram art account which I've barely touched, a FictionPress which I've also barely touched, and a Wattpad I haven't touched at all. I only made the account so I could finish reading a story. Though, if I get digital drawing software and stuff for Christmas, I will put together a Tumblr blog with artwork for some of my stories. So, you'll get to see what these guys look like! :) All links are in my profile, btw.

Leave your answers in the reviews! (I don't know if you'll have to review as guests or not)