Disclaimer: In case you didn't get it before, I'm just a kid trying to be a writer. Please don't sue me. I've only got a few dollars to my name. Thanks:)

Chapter 9: Christmas with the Potters, Easter with the Weasleys?

When they reached the correct corridor, Hermione had given a squeal of delight and begun to pace in front of the wall. The four teens that belonged in the time stared at her as if she'd lost her marbles. Ginny just smiled secretively.

A polished oak door appeared in the wall. Hermione opened it and ushered them in, Ginny last.

"What did you imagine?" she whispered. Hermione just smiled mysteriously and pushed Ginny into the room.

Ginny entered the living room of the Burrow.

"Oh, Hermione," she sighed happily. "Thank you so much!"

"Couldn't think of any place better!"

"So where are we?"

"We're in the living room of my home," Ginny said, astonishment creeping onto her features as she noticed the tiny picture of her family askew on the wall. "Merlin, Hermione, you have a mind like a steel trap," she admonished her friend. "Thanks," she relented. Hermione smiled at the girl she thought of as her younger sister.

"Ginny?" Remus asked. "Your home?"

"In the future, you silly idiot," Lily explained.

"Lily, leave him alone," Ginny teased her surrogate brother's teenaged mother. Hermione sniggered. Lily frowned at her, a little annoyed.

"Yes, ma'am," she said mock-penitently. "I was hoping that I could invite you over for the Christmas season," Lily began, "but then James invited me to his house and my mother told me to go."

"And so," James said with a flourish, "I was hoping that you, Hermione, Ron and Harry would also care to join us this holiday season at the Potter residence. Well, Harry has no choice if he's going to keep the brother charade up and running, but you and Ron and Hermione are welcome to join us."

"I'd like that," Hermione and Ginny chorused.

"Good," James said finally. "Because Moony and Padfoot are coming too. Peter's got prior plans this year." Ginny's hands unconsciously clenched into fists.

"Well, since we're spending Christmas with you, why don't we spend Easter in my home?" Ginny joked, sweeping her arm around her.

"Sounds good," Hermione smiled at her exuberant surrogate little sister, who proceeded to dance around the room.

"Oh, wonderful," Ginny grinned, twirling Hermione around as the rest of the group chuckled at her antics.

Ginny sat on her bed with a huge Ancient Runes textbook on her lap. Lily and Hermione were talking about the good and bad things of time travel. She was trying to translate her homework; it wasn't going very well. The constantly raising voices of the two young women were proving damaging to her ears and concentration.

"You could muck up the whole future!" Hermione argued.

"But what if it saves lives? Then it's for the better, isn't it?" Lily countered. "Or is it better for everyone to die when it's not your funeral? Would you rather James, Sirius, and I died?"

"Of course not!" Hermione exclaimed. "Did I say that?"

"No. It was implied."

"Well, don't take things out of context!" Hermione yelled. "I never said I wanted everyone to die, did I?"

"Would you two shut up!" Ginny exclaimed. "I'm trying to translate here, and your yelling isn't making it any easier."

"Sorry, Ginny. But we're having an argument. Go downstairs if you want quiet." Lily turned back to Hermione.

"Fine!" she exclaimed, and retreated downstairs.

"They throw you out?" Remus asked once she got down there. She nodded, frowning. She sat down and resumed translations. "Ancient Runes?" he asked. She nodded again. He showed her that he was also working on it.

"What did you get for ehwaz?" Ginny asked.

"Partnership," Remus supplied. "It comes up in OWLs, remember?"

"Oh, right," she said suddenly. "I remember that. Sorry."

"We should have an ehwaz," Remus said. "We take all the same classes. We can work on homework together."

"Good idea," Ginny said with a blush. "Sounds doable!" And from then on, whenever their dorm-mates threw them out—and even when they didn't—Remus and Ginny always got together in the common room to do their homework in various subjects.

It was one day before Christmas Break, when the train left. Peter had packed days ago and was now waiting by the Great Hall doors. Ginny was there with him, blue-green scarf wrapped around her neck and a matching angora sweater underneath her Muggle parka and cloak. Hermione stood beside her, Hogwarts, A History wide open as she scanned the earlier version for evidence of house-elves. Lily was playing with the ends of her emerald-green scarf. Ginny edged a little further away from Peter.

"For heavens' sake, where are those blasted boys!" Lily sighed impatiently. "They're probably still packing—"

"I'm ashamed of you, Lily," Sirius said with a wicked smile as Remus, followed closely by Sirius, James, Harry, and Ron, descended the stairs. A few of their trunks looked as though the owners had had to sit on them to close them. "Remus and Harry, at least, were all packed—neatly, can you imagine?—by the time Monday rolled around."

"Like Hermione and Lily," Ginny grumbled. "I wasn't packed until three days ago."

"I wasn't packed until four minutes ago," Sirius countered.

"For heavens' sake, Padfoot!" Ginny exclaimed. "Talk about immature!"

"Right," Sirius said. "This from the sixteen-year-old in the group."

"Padfoot!" Remus chided, pushing his friend good-naturedly. "Leave Ginny alone, she's got a very valid point!"

"Are you also implying that I am immature?" Sirius said with dignity. Ginny's snort of ill-concealed laughter destroyed the mood.

"I was under the impression that he meant exactly that," Hermione said with a straight face. Sirius poked her viciously. "Oww!"

"Hermione! You're supposed to take my side!"

"And why is that?" she asked with an eyebrow raised.

"Because no one else is," Sirius said as if it were obvious.

"Oh, right, I'm supposed to rush to poor little Sirius's defense," Hermione said as if it were a simple forgotten arrangement.

"Precisely," Sirius said crisply, raising an eyebrow at Hermione.

"Where is that damned train?" Ginny said in annoyance. "McGonagall will only show up when it's there!"

As if on cue, stiff, straight-backed Minerva McGonagall came into the hall, looking as stern as ever. Ginny smiled tentatively at her Head of House, who, astonishingly, smiled back at the sixteen-year-old girl.

"The train has arrived. Get in a carriage and make sure you are on the train before it leaves," she said, voice crisp. "You may go." The ensemble—meaning half the school—rushed out the huge doors that slowly creaked open. McGonagall sighed and put a hand up to hold her hat to her head, a gesture that the nine did not miss.

The Marauders-minus-one, Harry, Ron, and the three Gryffindor girls found a carriage without much trouble. Harry smiled and patted a thestral lightly. Hermione smiled tentatively at it—or where she presumed the head to be, and entered the carriage, followed by Harry, and Ron, who just shook his head at the thestral. Ginny looked at it sadly, remembering her recently (soon-to-be?) deceased paternal grandfather, before Remus ushered her into the carriage (he himself pausing to pat one on the head A/N: remember Jason, everyone? Hope you haven't forgotten yet as he pushed her carefully in), climbing in after her and closing the door. The others were looking at them oddly, apparently not realizing the presence of the thestrals and their own inability to see the animals, they having not seen death nor attended one of Hagrid's wilder Care of Magical Creatures classes.

"Okay, so, a run-down on Christmas procedure at my house," James began. "We've got a huge house—okay, so it's a little more like a mansion—Sirius would know, too, just ask him, I'm really not kidding any of you—" Sirius nodded emphatically. "My parents like to entertain during the Christmas hols, you know, like a ball on Christmas Eve and a party on Christmas—" The three girls looked at him, seemingly upset. "What?"

"A ball? James Andrew Potter! You invited three females to your house for Christmas and failed to mention a ball?" Lily exclaimed.

"I have absolutely nothing to wear!" Ginny cried. "There had better damn well be a dress clothes shop in Godric's Hollow, or I will—"

"Relax, there is," James said calmly. "My mum goes every year, usually my sister—she's already married and has a three-year-old daughter named Katie—pardon me, Katherine. Her name's Eileen. She's really not that bad, for a girl. And her husband, Dave—David Arthurson, I mean—he plays a mean game of chess. He might get you, Ron. He's really good—he beats Remus like nobody's business—and Remus plays the best chess game of the Marauders. Didn't he beat you already?"

"No way. Nobody beats me," Ron said with confidence, forgetting that Remus had, indeed, beaten him at his own game.

"Just wait."

"Want to keep that silver shield up, fair knight?" Hermione joked. "Oh, look, it's rusting already. Better drop it now."

"Hermione!"

Ah, Ron torture in the winter. Doesn't that make you so happy? Sorry, but Ron was made for torture. And if you were wondering why there's no ship for him in the writing,his pairing is in the sequel. The Second Chance: ANew Life. Work in progress. Luv, LysPotter