A day later, Alex and Jessi decided they wanted to go ice skating. They woke up early and headed outside to the pond they had gone swimming in earlier that week, pulling out their wands and carefully casting freezing charms. As they sat in the snow around the pond, they laced up the skates they had conjured and watched the pond freeze through. Then they pulled on the hats the boys had insisted they have, buttoned up their little pea coats, and pulled on their gloves. When ice skating, warming charms just didn't seem right.
"Perfect!"
Alex and Jessi stood up and carefully got out onto the ice, Alex falling down almost instantly. As she pulled herself back up she was more careful and soon she was gliding across the ice fairly gracefully with Jessi, who was far more experienced than she was. Eventually she got brave and tried a couple of small turns, but she ended up falling every time so she just continued to glide across the ice and smile at the snow coming down around her. Jessi laughed and glided along side of her flawlessly, the two girls perfectly content to just skate together in silence.
"Jessi! Alex! Are you out here?"
"We're at the pond!"
The boys came running over and smiled as they saw Alex and Jessi smiling serenely.
"Mind if we join you?"
Alex shook her head for both of them and motioned for them to join her.
Remus was the first one out onto the ice and he started to slip so Alex came up behind him and supported him for a second until he got his balance, then she helped James, while Jessi helped Peter, and Sirius.
Alex twirled across the ice and tried yet again to spin, but she fell and slid across the ice, knocking over James in the process.
"Sorry!"
James laughed and helped Alex up and the pair was off skating around again. Alex skated past Remus and suddenly slipped, starting to fall backwards. Remus reached out to catch her, losing his balance and the pair crashed to the ice together. Alex started laughing as Sirius tripped going around them and fell down, Peter then crashed into them and Sirius tripped James and Jessi so the entire group was sitting on the ice laughing at their inability to skate.
"Come on; let's go get some hot chocolate."
"Only if it's yours! That was amazing!"
Alex smiled and nodded. "I think I can make some for you boys. Now come along, I don't want you getting sick."
"Alex, you're doing the mother hen thing again." Jessi laughed, making Alex blush.