The next morning everyone got up early to get their things packed. After breakfast all that where going home where brought to the Hogwarts express. "Well I'm looking forward on meeting your family James." Sirius said when they had found a compartment all could sit in. "You already know them." "No I don't. I've just seen them once, I can't say that I know them." James nodded at that comment. "Well James, you have a little sister right?" Patricia asked. "Yeah Cathrina. She is my little sister, even though she's just one year younger than me, she is smarter than me … she could give you a run for your money." James said smiling at Particia. "Well then she has to be really smart."
"She managed the Wingardium Leviosa Charm at the age of 4 when she first heared my mom use it. I don't know why, but she was able to use my mothers wand. Since then my mom knew she would be very smart. She read moms old school books and learned some of the easier charms." James explained. The other were staring at him like he just told them of an impossible thing. Patricia was smiling. "Yeah I learned it at the age of 4 as well. "Oh yes I remember …" Sirius said. "She once lifted up my toys so I wouldn't be able to play with them until I would let her join me." Particia laughed and began to blush.
"Well I think I'll like your sister. Perhaps she would help us prank someone." "Sirius, she's not that mischievous. She really could be a smaller Patricia, except for the hair and that she sticks to the rules a bit more than Pat." "Well, then we have to change it don't we?" Sirius asked smirking. "It wouldn't be too bad having another person putting you in your place from next year on." Remus and Patricia said. "Oh can't you be a little bit more mischievous?" "And helping you on your pranks that could get you expelled? No thank you." Patricia said and Sirius frowned. "Oh come on! It's fun! And we're not that stupid to get expelled." "I wouldn't be too sure about that" Remus said smirking.
That moment the train already stopped. "Are we there yet? This was way shorter than the ride to Hogwarts." James said a bit surprised. "James the way home is always shorter, no matter where you travel home from. Did you never notice?" Patricia asked. "No I didn't. as a matter of fact we didn't go on vacation that often." "We neither." Remus said. Then all got out of the train. Sirius was very exited to meet Mr. and Mrs. Potter, so James and Sirius hurried out of the barrier where James parents and his little sister where waiting. "James!" Cathrina yelled and ran to her bother. She hugged him lovingly and laughed. Sirius smiled at her. He had a brother, but he never welcomed him as lovingly as Cathrina had just welcomed James.
"Oh hi Sirius!" She said giving him a big smile. "Hi Cathrina." Sirius said smiling back. "So you're James best friend Sirius, pleased to meet you." James father Erik said smiling at the boy. Clarice didn't smile at him but she hugged him tightly with a laugh that melted Sirius heart. It was a laugh that said so much. A laugh that sended out so much warmth and safety as he never expected anyone to have. "Come on you two we have to get going mom ordered the house elves to make us a lovely dinner. They'll should be ready any minute. And we don't want the food to get cold now do we?" Cathrina said. James eyes shimmered and Sirius already expected a very good meal, for James eyes didn't shimmer when he saw the wonderful food in the great hall in Hogwarts.
"So you have house elfes aswell?" Sirius asked. "Yes wonderful little creatures especially Trally. She's a wonderful companion and knows how to cheer someone up and draw dark thoughts away. She was kind of my and Cathrina's Nanny when mom and dad were off to work and Aunt Minerva couldn't take us, because she was teaching at Hogwarts." James explained. Cathrina was talking to her mother about some new charm she managed for colouring her hair every colour she wants to and turn her colour to the old one. " Sirius … I planned a little prank for my neighbour. His name is Dursley. He's just and a real pain in the ass, for he's one of the nosiest people I've ever met. Every time me and Cathrina were out in the summer holidays he looked over the fence. We can't use magic though." James added. Sirius nodded he knew that they weren't supposed to use magic outside of school. Especially not, when a Muggel was looking.
When they got out of the car Erik Potter had bought a few years ago Sirius already could smell the food the house elfes were cooking. "Oh look. Little Verny is spying on us again!" Cathrina said pointing to a window. That moment the curtains closed again and James began to laugh. "He really things we can't see him. He supposes something strange to go on here, but he never saw something, that's why he watches us all the time." Cathrina said beginning to laugh. Erik opened the door an Sirius was astonished when he entered the house. It was very beautiful and filled with friendly environments. "Sirius, you'll stay with James in his room. I hope you don't mind that." Clarice said. "No not at all. As a matter of fact I feared sleeping in our dormitory in Gryffindor tower all alone for the next two weeks. And now I'm here." James grabbed Sirius arm and ran upstairs to his room with him.
"Cathrina, I know you were practicing magic, just go on. Perhaps Sirius and James could tell you something about the things they'd already done in Hogwarts." Cathrina nodded and ran upstairs. She knocked at the door of James room. "Come in Cat." James voice said. "Hi … I wanted to ask you if you could tell me some of the spells you already learned." "Well, most of them you already manage. The Feraverto Spell, the Levitation Spell." James told her every thing. Cathrina was surprised she knew almost all of this charms and had no problem with them.
"I have to say, you are really a very bright witch Cathrina. You could give Pat a run for her money, really." Cathrina started to laugh at that comment. Suddenly Cathrina threw a pillow right in James face and James threw it back. The pillows flew across the whole room and no magic was done. Cathrina was astonished how good that game worked. She had never tried it before. One of her Muggle friends had told her of it. Although she was the daughter of two wizards Cathrina went to a Muggle primary school and she loved it. Everyone was really nice and everyone liked her. She had her magic under control and no one noticed she was a witch.
James never went to a Muggle school, that was why he never met many Muggle children.
"Come on lets go outside. I want to tease little Vernon." James said. "Oh James, leave him alone you know nobody likes him." Cathrina said trying to stay serious. "Oh come on Cat, that'll be fun." James said smirking. Cathrina gave in and the three children ran outside. The moment they stepped outside and immediately James could see Vernon Dursley behind the trees spying. Vernon was lucky that Clarice seemed to know what James was up to and asked him and the other two to come in again and help her.
"So what are you planning to do with poor Vernon this holidays?"Clarice asled her two children who where smirkinh at her. "Nothing mom. You know we never do anything to Vernon." Cahtrina said. "Maybe you're not doing something rather that standing beside your brother while he does something. Howeverm you never bothered telling him to stop did you?" "She did mom, various times, she just wasn't able to stop me. After all she always began to laugh about the pranks I played to Vernon or his Margy." James told his mother. Sirius started laughing. This would turn out to be a really good first christmas holiday.
Clarice had managed to keep the three children inside the house for about three days, but then she didn't have any tasks left for them, so she allowed them to get outside.
"Vernon, I know you're out there, come out come out wherever you are!" James said sounding a bit too friendly. Vernon didn't come out, though he knew Cathrina already saw him. She didn't say something. She just loved James searching for Vernon everytime. Suddenly a girl yelled. "Vernon! Come in! You're not spying on these ugly Potters again, are you?" That was Vernons sister Marge. Cathrina disliked Marge more than she disliked Vernon and Marge didn't like Cathrina either. Everytime they accidently met they started to fight. All because some of Marges former friends were now friends of Cathrina and began to dislike Marge. Marge thought it was because Cathrina told them odd stories, and not because of her harsh behaviour.
"Dammit Marge! Shut up! I'm coming!" Cathrina could hear Vernon's voice. Then They could see Vernon climbing down one of the trees. Sirius caught a glimbse of Vernon and started to laugh. "You know that boy remembers me of a pig!" he said laughing wildly. "Yeah I thought that so many times. And when I hear him laughing he even sounds like a pig." James said laughing as well imitating Vernons laugh. The strange noise James made caused Cathrina to laugh as well and Mrs. Potter to realize the kids were out at the fence. "Kids, could you help me cleaning the dishes?" Mrs. Potter asked. "Oh mom Frasy, Klimber and Trubin could do that for us. Why should we do that?" James asked. "James! Mom is right! I mean Frasy, Klimber and Trubin have enough to do to clean up our rooms." Cathrina said.
She did not like the way James treated the House elfes sometimes. He always wanted to do them all the work he had to do. The rest of the Potter Family treated the house elfes like they were human. There were other Wizarding Families that treated House elfes like shit. Mrs. Potter disliked those people totally and she tought her two children to treat the family house elfes equally. Sirius only knew one house elf, Kreacher, and that one wasn't nice and friendly to him, although he was a part of his family. Frasy, Klimber and Trubin were diffrent, very diffrent. They were friendly to Sirius and brought him everything he wanted. This made Sirius willing to help the house elfes with their work as good as he could. He always cleaned his bed up, helped Mrs. Potter when she asked the Kids to help her so that the elfes wouldn't have to.
Although he helped very much in the Potter household, just to thank James Family, that they allowed him to stay with them, he didn't give up his mischievous side at all. He still loved to prank others. Mostly he pranked Vernon and Marge, but with common Muggle pranks. For example he filled balloons with meal or Water and threw it to the places he could see Vernon or Marge. At Chrismas he James and Cathrina had a big snowball fight and build a large snowman without magic. "I can't believe we had that much fun by playing completly without magic." Sirius said in the evening when the three kids all sat in James room talking.
"Well we do that all the time we are here. We can't use magic that often, because of Vernon. He should never see we are a wizarding family at first hand. He already is very suspicious about somehting strange going on in our house, thats the reason he's spying on us. When Cathrina was young he teased her and she got very angry and accidently lept him onto the top of that tree. Since then he believes tha something abnormal is going on in our family." James explained. Sirius couldn't stop laughing. "Well, he got really nasty you know. He said Loly, the cat I used to have at that time, is an ugly fuzzball and that I'm just as ugly as her. I got very angry and in the age of three I still had some problems controlling my magic. So he flew onto the top of the tree. His family naturally didn't believe him, that I jinxed him up there. They all said he climbed too high. Marge had to get him down. From that day on he swore to prove somehting wicked goign on here. Until now he didn't manage to prove it.
If he saw something or shot a photo Mom jinxed the camera so there would only be a picture of me and James playing with a ball or other things." Cathrina told Sirius laughing. He couldn't blieve it. The rest of the wizarding community would freak out if they would know what he just heared: A wizarding family so close to a Muggle that suspects them beeing wizards. "Kids get in here!" Clarice shouted. When Cathrina heared the voice of her aunt she yelled happily and ran inside.
When Sirius got in he stood there frozen. Right in front of him stood his transfiguration teacher Professor Minerva McGonagall. "I see you went with James then Black." She said smiling at him. It was the first time Sirius saw Professor McGonagall smile for the whole time he knew her. " Aunt Minerva ... can you show me some new spells?" Cathrina asked and Minerva laughed softly. "Not now. Perhaps later. I want to talk to your mother about something really serious." She said. Sirius looked up. He always had that problem. Everytime someone said "serious" he looked up thinking he was called and sometimes when he was called he thought they meaned "serious" instead of "Sirius".
"They do it everytime when she comes here from Hogwarts you know. They always need to talk about something serious. I belive it's only sister stuff and they don't want us to hear it, because we could tell others." James said Cathrina looked at him with wide eyes. "I don't think so. Didn't you see how Professor McGonagalls face went colder when she said that she needed to discuss something serious with your mother. I saw it." Sirius said. Now Cathrina looked at him with wide eyes. "I don't think you three should speculate about what the two are talking about. It's their buissness and theirs alone. If they want to tell you they will." Erik said and al three kids frightened, because they didn't hear Erik coming.
Cathrina ran up to her room while James and Sirius went into their room. "So do you have any idea of a good prank?" Sirius asked with anticipation. "Not at the moment you?" "Well, it's not really a good prank, but we could give that nosy Vernon guy a few really nasty Berty Bots every flavoured beans. I got a trick how to see which are the ugly ones." Sirius said. "No ... did that two years ago. He knows he shouldn't get sweets from anyone in league with me or Cathrina." James said. "We could prepare something for school I mean. I wanna come back with a few pranks."
"What about a singin feather. It sings whenever you try to write with it. And it forces the owner to sing as well. If you want to do this, please waint till I'm at school I wanna see you pulling it off. " Cathrina said standing in the door. "We could smuggle Radios into the school Filch would get really angry." Sirius said. We could also let Pixies into the school. We would definitly get some time off, till they get the Pixies out." James said. "That could be dangerous James. Don't that." Cathrina said and went outside again.
"What was that. First she helps us and then she tells us not to let the Pixies in." Sirius said a bit confused. "She likes pranks and jokes, as long as they're not against any rules." James said. "But most pranks are againt the rules." Sirius said. None of the three kids new that Clarice was crying downstairs. She just got told that her mother and her other sister got killed by the still very unknown Voldemort. This Christman wouldn't be like the others for her and Professor McGonagall.
In the evening Erik called the kids down for dinner. All sat together. Clarice and Professor McGonagall tried to look normal but sometimes all could see there was something wrong. "Mom, Aunt Minerva what's wrong with you two?" Cathrina asked sounding worried. "Nothing darling, nothings wrong. I'm not feeling very good today." Clarice said. However, all on the table knew that was only half the truth. Even Sirius, who didn't know Clarice Potter as good as James and Cathrina did realized something was wrong. "Come on, it's Christmas won't you sing something for us Randy?" Clarice asked Cathrina, whos secound name was Randiana. " No mom, I don't know what to sing and my voice is sounding bad at the moment." Cathrina said blushing madly. She knew that was a lie, but she didn't want to sing in front of one of James's new friends. Clarice nodded and switched her wand around.
Suddelny music started out of no where. The whole evening everyone was listening to Christmas carols and talking about Hogwarts. "We have a little house problem between Gryffindor and Slytherin, but this is was not unexpected. It's like every year. Slytherins beating Gryffindors down and the other way round. And I'm not glad to say that James is a member of one of the worst groups of Gryffindor first years againt the Slytherins. He's accompanied by Black here, Remus Lupin, Peter Pettigrew, Patricia Phillips and Johanna Longbottom." Professor said looking at James. "I hope Cathrina here will find better company that understands the very important bonding of the four houses."
She said looking down to Cathrina who stad next to James. "I don't think I'm in bad company. They are wonderful. The problem are McNare, Malfoy, Sirius's cousins Bellatrix and Narcissa, and Snape." James said looking at his aunt. Sirius looked at her too, he expected her to explode right now. "James, I know that they're not as nice as they should be, but try not to get into a big fight with them. First it's againt the rules. Secound, its not good for the bonding between the houses and thrid I don't want you to get hurt. Those Slytherins are stronger than you." She said and laid her hand on James's shoulder. "Now you three go to bed. Tomorrow you'll have to get up early." Clarice said and all three went up. Clarice followed them to say goodnight.
