A/N: Sorry again for the wait here. My muse is a little sporadic right now. It's being an obnoxious prat, actually, surprising me and then abandoning me, and I'm trying to get it back on track. Of course, it's not going well. I've attempted one-shots to revive it, but alas, the stupid thing remains elusive. So I'm trying, but Spider Solitaire has suddenly become too appealing to give up. Ugh.
Otherwise…erm…I promised you nostalgia now (plus drama), so nostalgia (plus drama) you shall receive. Do your best to enjoy it.
--
December 24
8:20 AM
Status: Brooding
Well…first off, before I go off into my brooding rants and emotional traumas from yesterday…Merry Christmas Eve!
The holidays always seem to sneak up on me this way. I mean, at school, I'm so busy with my classes that December glides by like a very vivid dream, as does the rest of the year; and then I come home and all of a sudden, as I'm settling in, it's Christmas. It's slightly disconcerting, to say the very least.
But anyway – it's morning and the only reason I'm awake before noon is because my mum was downstairs making breakfast when she dropped something and shattered the glass. It woke me up like an electric shock of something (information I might have to give to Alice and Livvy for future reference) and Mum, thinking I was functional, called me down to clean it up with my wand.
If there's anyone in the world that loves the fact that I am of age more than me, it would be Mum. She adores having a witch in the family. She thinks everything can be solved by magic.
So, there's the start to my morning. I'm already dressed and ready (oh, the horror…) but Alice and Livvy are still asleep on my floor, Alice snoring gently from beneath her covers. My friends are always funny to watch when they're sleeping, because Livvy sleeps restfully on her back, staying still the whole night, while Alice flips and flops like a fish out of water. I'm sure I'm some kind of mixture of the two.
We had quite a day yesterday – and that's kind of why I'm writing. When I left off two days ago, Alice and I were planning on telling Livvy about Frank. Well…yesterday morning, I set three different alarms for myself around my room, and got up at nine o'clock in the morning to call my friends over.
When I got on the phone with Alice, she whined about being out of Floo powder, so I told her to Apparate, which triggered further whining – Alice hates Apparition because she finds it awfully uncomfortable, despite the fact that she passed her test and everything. But I find that I can be very persuasive at the best of times, so I convinced her to Apparate over in the next twenty minutes, when I was done getting ready.
I made the same call to Livvy, who was already dressed – she offered to be over immediately, but I told her twenty minutes. Alice was coming too. She was quite pleased about the idea and said she'd be over in exactly twenty minutes. The moment I put the phone down on her, I sprinted to my bathroom for a record-short shower – because in Livvy-land, she says twenty minutes and comes in ten.
And sure enough, the moment I stepped out of the shower and slipped on my jeans and a sweater, I heard the Crack! noise of someone who has just Apparated into the room. Mum's shriek of surprise confirmed it, but she's so used to my friends coming and going through the holidays that she didn't really say anything. I heard her offer Livvy some cereal as I was coming down the stairs.
"Hey, Livs," I said. "You're a little early."
"I was bored," she replied. "My only entertainment at home was Mum arguing with Dad for being late from work again. They're always fighting over that."
"True," I said.
"I'll take some of that cereal, please, Mrs. Evans," she said very sweetly to my mother.
"Sure thing, Livs." Mum has always called her Livvy or Livs, like me and Alice – the few times she tried to call Livvy by her full name, Livvy insisted on Mum joining in the common trend. She got Livvy the cereal and asked when Alice was coming.
"Any minute now," I said, glancing at the kitchen clock.
"Floo powder or Apparition?" asked Mum.
"Apparition," I said. "She's out of Floo powder."
"Where's the rest of your family, Lils?" asked Livvy suddenly, looking around.
"At work," said Mum. "Petunia recently found work at a clothing store in the downtown area. She goes right when it opens so that she can be home at a reasonable hour."
"Ah," said Livvy delicately. She is not the biggest fan of my sister and we all know it.
We were quiet for a few seconds, the still air only punctuated by the crunches of Livvy's cereal-munching. However, we were presently interrupted by Alice's arriving in the kitchen, looking a little dizzy.
"Oh, hey," she said. "Merlin, I hate Apparition. It's miserable."
"It's so convenient," I said. "Shut up and hug me, Alice."
I gave her a long, tight hug before allowing her to hug Livvy and my mother. Alice also accepted some cereal and my mother disappeared to go upstairs, leaving us three to chit-chat a little bit about the day's plans. Alice and I had an unspoken mutual agreement that we would spend a normal, happy day with Livvy before settling her down in the evening to prep her for the big news. That meant we really had to keep ourselves busy, so we wouldn't blurt it out all of a sudden.
We actually did have quite an interesting time together. We decided to stick around the house for most of the morning, finishing the box of cereal between the three of us and making chocolate-chip-cookies-with-any-other-random-bits-of-chocolate-we-can-get-our-hands-on.
This was a very interesting exercise, mostly because of Alice. Alice loves food, but she hates having to go through the trouble of cooking it; so once the cereal finished, she began to eat the chocolate we were going to put in our cookies.
It got to be so bad that I put careful, measurement-cautious Livvy in charge of making the dough while I confiscated any chocolate Alice might have access to.
I was doing really well – Alice stayed away from all the treats – until I realized that she had hidden some chocolate chips in her back pocket and slipped them in when she thought I wasn't looking. I had some fun hexing her for that one.
The cookies came out really nicely, thanks to Livvy's faithful interpretation of the cookbook. Alice gobbled her share up surprisingly fast, while Livvy and I made them last, nibbling them all day, driving Alice mad. Mum came down as the scents of cookies wafted through the house and had a couple as well. She said they were delicious. We agreed.
After cookies, Alice, Livvy and I went to the little tea shop on the corner of Tremont Street. Mum gave us a bit of Muggle money and we bought cups of tea, having missed good old English tea while up at Hogwarts. Livvy happily chattered away about all the mad conversations she had with Russell over the phone, and how he's dying to see her, and how she misses him even though it's only been two days.
"I mean, it's like I need him near me in order to function," she said dreamily, adding too much milk to her tea and turning it almost white. "I don't like being away from him."
"Darling, this is dangerous," said Alice.
"And because we care about you, we're going to say this as kindly, but honestly, as we can," I say.
I open my mouth to say something, but Alice cuts me off by saying, "You need a life. This is getting way out of control."
Livvy looked extremely insulted by this. "I do too have a life!" she insisted.
"But you feel like you don't if Russell isn't around you," I said. "That's not a life. We don't want Russell to have this much influence on you. He's a nice guy, but he's not so nice that you suddenly abandon living in favor of him."
"You don't understand us," proclaimed Livvy. "You don't get it. You've never had a love like this one, the one I have with Russell. It's worth it. I mean, I barely got to be with him at school, because we can't be together, and now that I have a chance to be with him, I want to."
"So you'd pick your boyfriend over your best friends?" demanded Alice, gesturing to herself and me.
"I'm not picking anyone over anyone," said Livvy, her tone firm. "I'm only saying I want to be with Russell. I'm not Apparating off to his house or anything of the sort."
"But you want to," I said softly. "That makes a difference."
Livvy went silent for a second, appraising us critically with her brown eyes. I could tell she was annoyed, but what could we do, let her moon around Russell her whole vacation?
Then, to both our surprise, her expression softened all the way down and she looked like she was going to burst into tears at any second.
"See, I knew this would happen," she said, alarmingly close to a mental breakdown. "I knew it."
"What?" asked Alice. She was as bewildered as me.
"This!" she wailed suddenly. "You and Lily rallying against me!"
"We're not rallying against you," I said before I could stop myself. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"You don't understand my relationship with Russell," she sobbed, "but you're both judging it and you're ganging up against me. I was afraid of that. I didn't want you to make me feel bad about the first real relationship I've ever had, and now you are, together, and I…I dunno, you make me feel so rotten, and then I go to Russell, and he's the only one who makes me feel like you aren't out to get me—"
"Livs, you're our friend," I interrupted her, reaching my hand across the table to touch hers. "We are never going to be out to get you. We're just telling you this because it's for your own good. We want you to have a healthy relationship—"
"You're on Alice's side!" she all but shouted at me, startling me with her shining eyes, blotchy red nose, raw, strangled voice. A minute ago, she had been mild and dreamy, and now her temper is rising in full swing.
"I am not on Alice's side," I said. "We only happen to think that—"
"This is how it always is!" she cries. "You and Alice, thinking exactly the same thing, because you've been friends longer than you've known me and you're always on the same page! I'm practically a third wheel to you guys – you are happy amongst yourself, you tell Alice things before you tell me, and you agree all the time! And when you don't, I try and help one of you, try to be part of the group; but then you make up, agree on something else, and I'm left out, like I don't mean anything at all. And now you're doing that again, ganging up on me when on the night of the train, I was helping you against Alice, a-and—"
By this point, Livvy was at the point of a psychotic break-down, sobbing and getting tears inside her overly milky tea cup. Alice and I were simply dumbfounded, looking at each other and then at Livvy, who was pretty much crying her eyes out and attracting all sorts of attention from passersby.
The things she was saying were ludicrous. She was babbling. She was upset, goodness knows why, and all of a sudden, the fragile balance of her world overturned and pinned her underneath it. She pulled her hand from under mine as though it was on fire and she sobbed great heaving sobs – real ones – into her palms, while Alice and I wondered what the hell we were supposed to do.
Alice, being Alice, gave me a look that told me to handle the emotional stuff – she wasn't getting in the middle of it. Alice has the emotional sensitivity of a chainsaw at the best of times, a shortcoming we were both well aware of, so I nodded and tried to size up how to comfort my friend.
The things she were saying, while mildly peculiar, had a little bit of truth in them.
I mean, in a group of three, there's always going to be two of them that are a tiny bit closer than the other set of two; and in ours, it's true, Alice and I are just a tiny bit closer than I am with Livvy. Alice and Livvy are mostly bound by me, because they're complete polar opposites, so I am the central cog in this group, trying to keep them together. But I can't deny that Alice and I have been friends since first year and she knows me as well as she knows herself. Sometimes, that changes things.
Once she ranted at us, I could see why she favored being with Russell over us sometimes. She felt like a third wheel; she felt like she was hindering us, and therefore herself; and when you're with someone like Russell, who cares deeply and tenderly and wholly, it's difficult not to miss that and judge your friends a little more critically.
But that still doesn't make it right – because regardless of everything, I know that Alice and I love Livvy very much, and that won't change.
Carefully, I edged my chair towards Livvy, and I tried to think of what to say. My mind drew a blank. Alice, obviously, was no help, gulping down her tea and avoiding my eye. So, this in mind, I decided to say nothing. I set my chair beside hers and gently pried her up from her hands, taking in the sight of her red, tear-stained face.
Wordlessly, I eased her head onto my chest and she hugged me, her head on my collarbone, her hiccups and sobs reverberating into my throat. I stroked her soft hair and held her as she calmed down, as Alice finished her tea and watched us anxiously.
We were quiet after that, the cheerful winter atmosphere we'd had dissipated quite a bit. Eventually, Livvy stopped crying and finished her then-cooled tea, much to Alice's inner disgust (because she hates cold tea).
"Sorry," was the first thing she said. "That was really out of line, I shouldn't have said all that…o-or cried…"
"It's okay," said Alice. "You needed to say it. So you did."
"I really don't know what I'm doing," she said.
"Does anyone?" I asked.
She smiled weakly. "I love you guys. I do. But I mean…"
"We get it," I said. "But you have to remember – this is how it is with groups of three. There are always going to be quirks in the way we communicate, but it doesn't mean we love each other any less."
"We know you love Russell," said Alice. "All we were trying to say was that we want you to love him properly, without smothering him, or smothering yourself."
"I'm trying," she said with a sniffle.
"That's all we ask," I said. "I mean, we've all had boyfriends, so we know how hard it is to balance the two relationships. We want you to be with Russell. But if he interferes in your life to the point where you literally cannot live with him, we have a problem. All of us."
"Sorry," she said again.
"You don't need to be sorry," said Alice. "Just…I dunno…think about it. Work on it."
"And Alice does have something to share with you when we get home," I said, sharing a look with her. "Some news. It's important."
"Do you already know it?" asked Livvy.
I blushed, caught. "Well…yes…but…"
"I called you first," said Alice. "You weren't home, so I called Lily. We wanted to tell you this evening."
"Oh, okay, sorry about that," said Livvy, pacified. Disaster averted. "Yeah…I'd like to know. What is the nature of this news?"
"Awesome," I said with a grin.
"Can't wait!" chirped Livvy, back to her former cheerfulness. "So…d'you want to head home, then?"
"Sounds good," said Alice. "Let's go."
At this point, we got up from our table and took the tube back to my parent's house. The ride wasn't too long, and we talked about silly, trivial things on our way, but I felt a little uneasy all the same. Livvy's mood seemed fragile, like another good push could throw her over the edge once more, and Alice's enthusiasm felt the tiniest bit forced. But I didn't want to say anything. Saying something would jinx it even further.
When we got home, Livvy was in the mood for something delicious, since her tea got cold in the afternoon. Mum was nice enough to make us cups of hot cocoa to take upstairs. Night was beginning to fall, early because of winter and everything, so we cuddled into some of my sweaters and sat upstairs around my room, our feet cuddled in blankets and my lamps casting a sweet golden glow on my furniture. It was a lovely atmosphere for talking, and Alice took advantage of it, sipping slowly at her cocoa as she began to tell Livvy the story.
She told it very much like she told me, but she did add a couple of details she hadn't told me. This could be because she feels guilty about Livvy's outbreak, or because she genuinely remembered, or even because she's fabricating the truth just the tiniest bit, but I don't dwell on that. I sit mutely, drinking my cocoa, as Livvy gasps and squeals at the idea of Alice and Frank.
"Oh my word!" she cries out, her hand on her chest. "This is so exciting, Alice! Frank is in love with you!"
"I know," she shrieked. "What the hell am I supposed to do?! It's the weirdest feeling, knowing your best friend fancies you, and I don't know what to say, what to do, what to wear…I mean, I have to send him a Christmas present, and I don't know if what I have for him will work!"
"Well, what did you get?" I asked reasonably.
"I was going to make him a little cake," said Alice. "He loves to eat. He's like you that way."
"Ha. Ha. You're hilarious," I said sarcastically.
"No, but seriously," said Alice. "Should I get him something cuter? Something girlfriend-ish? Should I even be his girlfriend?"
"Of course you should be his girlfriend," I said. "You belong together."
"But this is so unexpected!" wailed Alice. "I haven't had time to think, or consider my feelings, or freak out about how he might feel! It's like I've fast-forwarded through all of that vital, getting-used-to-mattering-to-someone stuff. This isn't how it's supposed to work! I don't know what do!"
"Well, it's not that hard," said Livvy practically. "You've been friends since you were pretty much in diapers. You know him; he's not some stranger you picked up off the street. Going out with him wouldn't be hard, because you guys go out all the time. Dating isn't some fancy sacrificial ritual – it's just being with someone who makes you happy."
"And you're already kind of a girlfriend," I added. "You tease him, you flirt with him, you sit on his lap and make him help you with your homework. You know his family and friends, all his secrets and fears and desires. All the base stuff is there. It's just a matter of making it official in both your heads."
"But…it's so…it can't be that easy," said Alice, her eyes wide. "With all the other boyfriends I've had, it was such a long, hard slog to get them to be with me. This…it can't be right!"
"Love doesn't always have to be hard," said Livvy. "Sometimes, it just happens. I guess this is one of those times."
"Personally, I think it's great," I said. "You've got a love story ready-made for you."
"It's so…out-of-place," said Alice wondrously. "It feels like something is missing."
"Nothing's missing," I said, grinning. "You're just fabulous, Alice. And now, the future of this relationship is all on you. Do you want to take the next step, or do you not?"
"I'm…" Alice's voice trailed off, her eyes worried. I could relate to this worry. I mean, it is strange to think that, out of the blue, you have a relationship that's suddenly pending on your shoulders. And with your best friend at that. Poor Alice. In this case, I'm so glad I'm not her.
"I don't know," she said, subsiding. "I think I'm going to send him my cake and see him again at school to sort it out."
"That's a good idea," agreed Livvy. "Sleep on it. Best way to solve any problem."
"Yeah, pretty much."
I smiled at both of my friends, sitting on my floor with me, wearing my sweaters and drinking my cocoa. They are such a central part of my life, they really are, and seeing them there, in that atmosphere, after what we'd just discussed, made me feel warmer than I ever thought I could be.
We fell asleep to the inane conversation of exhausted teenage girls, right there on my floor, and that's where we are now. The mugs of cocoa still need to be taken downstairs. I'll ask for the sweaters back once they get up.
You know, it's about nine now. I think it's time to help my friends wake up in the morning, for once…I think when they are conscious, they will appreciate the irony.
Until later tonight, then.
10:30 PM
Status: Nostalgic
Alice and Livvy left ten and a half hours ago.
They stayed for breakfast (more cereal and the three cookies we had to pry out of Alice's hands) but at noon, Alice said she had to go back to her family and Livvy said she was expecting Russell. They Apparated off and I was left home with my mum and sister (who didn't have to work) – Dad would be home at around five.
Mum, who hates cleaning, had me magically tidy the house for her in a matter of minutes. I didn't mind that. Tuney purposefully left the room every time my wand came out, which was troubling, but not altogether unexpected. She spent a lot of time in her room on the phone with Vernon.
I didn't want to disturb her. Girls get weird when you try to interfere with their boyfriend-time.
Mum and I fixed up the kitchen and decided to make more Christmas cookies. This was the only time I spent properly with Petunia all day – 'we girls,' as my mum called us, have made Christmas cookies together from scratch every single year, without fail. It's one of those mother-children things that you have to do.
We spent a long time, giggling and putting frosting on the cookies and making a mess. Mum had me clean that magically too, which Petunia didn't like, but none of us could deny that it was fun anyway. We made a plate full of thirty cookies and ate a few of them early, just to make sure they weren't poisoned or anything. Thankfully, they were not. Crisis averted.
Then I had to go and owl off all my presents so that they got under the tree on time. George, my owl, was ready for the task at hand. He has had this assignment every year and he does it proudly. When I had finished wrapping up all the presents I'd bought so lovingly at Hogsmeade, he stuck his leg out proudly for me to tie the bag full of gifts. I told him which friends I had to go to and he hooted in an understanding sort of way.
I love George. He is such a smart, strong little thing. When I got him at the Apothecary, shopping for my first-year supplies, it was because the moment I walked in the door, he hooted loudly from his cage and flapped his wings. I knew we were destined to be soulmates.
Dad came home shortly and gave us all a big hug. He called us his women. Following the age-old Evans family tradition, we all changed into pajamas and watched It's a Wonderful Life. Obviously, we all cuddled together on the couch and cried, but it's part of the Christmas experience. It wouldn't have been right without it.
Owls fluttered in and out, making Petunia shriek and holding out bags of gifts for me to pick mine out of. My parents dug out the presents from their signature hiding spot (in the very back of the linens cupboard) and put them under the tree, which we promptly decorated. We always leave that to the last second, because it's the most fun and adds the final Christmas touch to the evening. And by that point, it was ten o'clock and we were banished up to bed, told to wait until Christmas morning, like children, so we could open presents.
I'm currently in bed, like I'm supposed to be, looking at my walls and the picture frames, the memories floating through my head. This is the magic hour, the hour that has been the subject of so many Christmas stories. It feels familiar, like I've been thrown back in time to when I was seven and missing my two front teeth and hoping Santa would give me my adult teeth already. But it also feels unbearably, bitter-sweetly nostalgic.
It has not escaped my notice that this Christmas is the last of its type. It's so fragile, this idea of Christmas – being at my parent's house, the house I grew up in, and doing all the familiar things I've done. It feels like the only Christmas that matters is this one, the one I know. But when you do the same thing every year, you can see with an alarming clarity how much you yourself have changed as a person; and I have never felt farther from my quirky, hopeful baby self than I do right now.
Earlier today, after watching It's a Wonderful Life, my dad put on the evening news to hear the top headlines. There have been a few very strange disappearances lately, and after consulting Livvy's copy of The Daily Prophet, I know that there have been more, and the Wizarding world is worried. No one can figure out who committed those crimes.
That's the world I'm going to go into, in June. The world I'm expected to grow up in, navigate on my own. Of course my parents are going to be here to help me if I need it, but how long can I need them? When is it finally time for me to be my own person? Do I even want to be? Is that a bad thing?
Tonight felt like the last night of its type and it left me more fragile than I can say. When I came up to my room, I sat on my bed for a little while, but I felt restless, so I snuck back downstairs and brought up the rest of the Christmas cookies I'd made with Mum and Petunia. I put on a Christmas record on my record player – soft, of course, so I don't wake anyone – and let the tunes play while binging on sugar. Screw the goals. I am not in the mood to munch on carrots – they are not nearly as comforting.
If this is what being an adult entails, I don't want to be one. I really, really don't. Take me back to age six any time. I'll go.
Merry Christmas.
'Night.
--
A/N: As a soon-to-be-junior in high school, some of the feelings discussed mirror my own at the moment. This chapter was particularly intimate that way. Hope you liked it and please remember to review on your way out of the browser.
Otherwise, yes, yes, I know, you crave LJ fluff – you must be a little annoyed by now, because it's not coming, but don't worry. Very soon, you shall have nothing but LJ fluff for chapters at a time. But for the time being, I swear some pleasing developments shall take place next chapter, Christmas Day. Please trust me on that one, yeah? Your lamentations have been heard loud and clear.
Review button is down there. Give it a click. It'll be fun!
