They greeted you with hugs, first your mother's tight embrace that nearly squeezed all the air out of your lungs, then Eliana's hug, followed by a warm kiss on your forehead. Even Charles gave you one. It felt like having a full family, something you never had but didn't know you needed.
After saying goodbye to the twins and lee, you hugged Angelina and introduced yourself to her parents, not to cause an impression but because you had come to genuinely really like Angelina.
Whenever you weren't with the boys, you always had Angelina by your side. You two would talk until midnight in your beds, making fun of Alicia's snoring, and whenever you needed to talk about the world outside of the wizarding one, she'd always understand you.
Especially when it came to music, you were very glad that at least someone knew all the artists you loved to hear. Somehow, wizards had their own radio with music specifically made by wizards, they did not know what they were missing.
You asked Angelina's parents if it was okay if you two could visit Diagon alley before Christmas to buy presents together, which after a quick talk with Eliana and your mother, they agreed. They looked very proud of their daughter, it probably had been a shock to them to know she was a witch, and you hoped they knew she was a good one too, especially in charms and Transfiguration, she had been the first one who had managed to turn a simple match into a needle in class.
And so, after planning to meet in front of Flourish and Blots on the 23rd of December, you said goodbye and had a quick drive back to Eliana's house. You were so excited to share everything, you barely took a breath between each story.
Eliana couldn't stop laughing at the fact that you nearly set the train on fire thanks to your Walkman, but your mother didn't enjoy the story at all, that Walkman had been a very pricey gift a couple of years back, not to mention all the music tapes too. You were still sad that you had wrecked it, you felt surprised you hadn't missed it too much since life in Hogwarts had been a bit chaotic due to learning magic, doing homework and occasionally doing misdeeds.
Back inside the warm house, you sat down in the kitchen while your mother and Eliana prepared a nice dinner, Charles was invited to stay too and even though he had never been given the opportunity to go to Hogwarts, he knew quite a lot about it too.
"I might be a squib little lady, but somehow I was blessed with a magical child" he told you. "I think genetics just skipped by generation. My son Adam went to Hogwarts. He ended up becoming a healer and moved to Ireland."
"What's a Healer?" you asked, looking up to Eliana. She always seemed to have an answer.
"A Healer is like a wizard doctor," she replied while waving her wand. The potato peeler started moving by itself. "They use healer magic to tend to the ill"
"So, a doctor, but for wizards?" you asked
"It's sort of the equivalent, yes." Replied Eliana, still cooking. "But they deal with magical illnesses only"
You knew little about wizarding jobs so you enquired about them during the rest of the night, Eliana told you about specific jobs in the ministry of magic, they had just about everything that could concern about muggles and their interactions, from law enforcement to control of magical creatures, to transportation. The ministry fully covered anything that would deal with magic. The wizarding world took great care in dealing with many issues, just to be concealed from the muggles at all costs.
You asked Eliana what she did for a living. After all, she had a really pleasant house and her own driver, but you haven't seen her ever talking about working.
"I don't work. My husband..." you could hear the pain in her voice "He left quite a lot of money after passing away"
You were curious to know, but you knew it was not a topic Eliana would like to talk about. Her expression had gone from joy to sadness, so you changed the topic.
"Mom, what language am I speaking?" you had just noticed that not only the four of you had been having a normal conversation, but your mother had actually spoken to Charles, who by all accounts only knew English. "How...?" you asked
"I've been learning!" she was beaming. "I can't believe you just noticed" she crossed her arms, looking at you but still smiling.
"But what language do you hear me speaking?" you still weren't sure how your peculiar power worked. Just like Eliana, you could understand all languages as if they were simply all the same.
"English." She replied, "You're speaking in English. Probably because that's the language you assumed you should speak right now." She looked towards Eliana. "When she came out of the train though, when she called for me and spoke to me, it was fully in Portuguese"
"You know, even I still don't know how our power works." Eliana started setting the table for dinner. "I don't realize when I'm speaking another language, kind of like the first time we met. It just happens naturally."
"But you've been learning, mom! You can understand me!" you said excitedly
"Yes, but I can still hear Eliana speaking in our language, which helps. You seem to be the only one who isn't speaking it" she replied
"That's weird... I should be speaking what comes naturally to me, right?" you asked
"Honey, you just spent months living in a castle filled with people who speak English. It might just be a habit," replied Eliana after placing a bowl of mashed potatoes on the table.
After a long dinner, you felt completely exhausted. After all, you had woken up early to catch the train back to London and it was nearly midnight when Charles left.
Eliana and your mother stayed on the kitchen talking, they both kissed you good night and you went upstairs back to the room Eliana had prepared for you, you had missed that bed so much, the fourposter bed in Hogwarts was not as comfortable as this one.
But before you went to bed you stopped by Eliana's library, it was a small room but the bookshelves were filled with all sorts of books from top to bottom. You hadn't forgotten your promise to the boys, you were planning to spend your vacation days reading all sort of books to find out what that piece of parchment was and what it did, hoping to come across something about the people who enchanted it, and it was also the perfect opportunity to learn some charms and jinxes.
It was nearly 10 pm on the 22nd of December and so far you had found no leads towards your goal. No book had any records of someone called Prongs, Wormtail, Moony or Padfoot.
You searched through books about charms, potions even transfiguration and nothing of sort came out of it, you came around to find a book about enchanted objects, some of them being books or journals but nothing about insulting pieces of paper, so you turned the pages to find any type of spells that could impersonate a person talking through paper.
Then it hit you. People talking through paper? Maybe, just like the portraits in Hogwarts?
The portraits depicted real people who had once lived but were now dead, and their legacy and likeness had been taken and inserted inside paper. They could speak and they would act like real people, so could the old parchment simply be a portrait with no image? But then that would mean that four different people were inside a blank parchment.
You weren't sure about your theory, but none the less you wrote to the twins and share your ideas with them.
You had been writing to your friends regularly, specially the twins, so far they hadn't been able to figure out the parchment, but had gotten a couple more clues from it, in their last letter they mentioned they would ask the riddle to everyone they know and see if their answers were compatible with it.
You didn't want to ask Eliana about it, you were afraid she would get suspicious, after all it was a piece of paper that seemed to have a conscience, it could very well be something more than just an insult paper, especially if your theory was right, it could have at least 4 people inside. So you kept quiet and keep reading some books.
Eliana supported your curiosity for magic books, but reminded you to not use any magic when outside of Hogwarts, and asked you to not try out any type of spells or charms you weren't sure you could do. After she found you reading books the first time, she went through her collection and take some books away from their shelves, claiming that it's best that you don't read them until you're older.
You took the book you were currently reading, "Common housework spells" by Ellar McCallum, which had nothing remotely interesting in it and placed it back on its shelf and went back to your room.
On your way through the corridor you heard Eliana and your mother talking inside one room. You couldn't hear their words but you also didn't feel like spying on their conversation, so you knocked on the door and waited for a response.
"Come in sweetie" you heard your mother call, and you opened the door "Going to bed? You have to wake up early remember? You're meeting Angelina tomorrow."
"Yeah, I'm off to sleep now. I'm pretty tired," you replied.
"Well, you've been reading the whole time, no wonder," Eliana said, looking at you with a slight frown. "What have you been reading about?" she asked
"Oh... you know... just, stuff" you tried to make up a better excuse in your head "I'm reading about Potions!" the two women looked at you with a confused look
"You blew up a cauldron and have awful grades in Potions" your mother remarked
"Exactly, that's why I'm reading about them... to be better at it, obviously." You gave them a charming smile, hoping that they would take the bait. They stared at you for a couple of seconds and exchanged looks between them.
"Well alright, I'm glad you want to become better, just don't try advanced stuff just yet." Eliana replied.
"Sure. Well, good night!" you quickly left the room and closed the door, but before you fully closed it you heard a soft mumble coming from your mother that sounded like "She's lying" but you didn't pay any mind to it.
She knew you better than anyone and had taught you not to lie to her because she could always tell, but you hoped just this one time she wouldn't try to force the truth out of you.
"Mila!" you heard Angelina's voice from a distance. You liked the nickname she had given you. It sounded cute and innocent like the total opposite of you but it would certainly help you get out of trouble. "Mila? A bad kid? Never!"
Angelina came running towards you, her mother walking at a fast pace behind her. After a tight hug, you both set out on a shopping spree, your mother, Eliana and Angelina's mom following closely behind, talking among themselves.
"I've already got your gift, Mila" she said beaming. "I think you will like it!"
You had also bought her gift a couple of days before, after asking Eliana's opinion on it and talked about all the things Angelina enjoyed in Hogwarts, Quidditch being one of them. The two of you looked through the Flourish and Blotts catalogue about Quidditch books and had found a couple of interesting ones, since you heard her once talking with the twins about also trying to join the Quidditch team next year, you bought "Quidditch through the ages" and "Advanced Flying tactics for Quidditch", along with those you had baked cupcakes for all your friends.
"I've already got yours too, you'll love them," you replied
"Them? Over one gift?" she looked overjoyed. "I honestly can't wait" you both held hands and started discussing what you should gift to your friends.
"I think we should pass by the candy shop first!" you pointed to sugarplum's sweet shop. "Candy is a decent gift, isn't?" you asked
"Candy is always an excellent gift." Angelina laughed and pulled you inside the store.
You bought a bit of everything, planning to make a small pouch of candy to send to each of your friends. After that you walked inside Gambol and Japes Wizarding Joke Shop and picked a couple of joke items for the twins and Lee. You picked a couple of stink pellets for yourself because they didn't have as much as a disgusting smell as the dung bombs did.
For Alicia you got her a couple of school supplies, specially ink because she ended up wasting a whole bottle of ink when she mistook it for potion supplies, thankfully she didn't blow up a cauldron but her ink made the wiggenweld potion thick and slimy, it almost moved as if it had life.
In one store you found a small moving statue of a dragon, you weren't sure what kind of dragon but Charlie would definitely appreciate it. The statue moved slowly as if hovering in the air. It was a bit more expensive than you thought, it was worth a galleon but you had found nothing else that would be a perfect gift for him.
"A whole Galleon? You really like Charlie, don't you?" she said, smirking.
"I think Charlie is brilliant, he definitely deserves a gift" you replied "Especially because so far he hasn't punished us for the bad things we have done" Angelina shook her head in a disapproving way, but she was still smiling.
"He's also amazing in Quidditch. I really hope I make it into the team next year," Angelina said.
"Seems everyone wants to play Quidditch," you remarked while scrunching your nose.
You enjoyed watching people playing Quidditch, but you soon realized playing it would be horrible for you.
Back in October you started flying classes, it only lasted a month, but it you had it twice every week, and you had the worse experience ever, you quickly figured out that you were afraid of heights and not only that but that sitting on a broom was extremely hard. You had no balance and kept falling off your broom whenever you tried to hover higher than someone's head, which lead to several accidents.
You had fallen so many times on top of people, one time you nearly hit Madam Hooch in the head. You had been mocked by nearly everyone in class, as no one else seemed to be so bad at flying like you were.
The twins were very good at it, but later they admitted it wasn't their first time flying, they were used to stealing their brother's brooms and flying them in secret, Angelina seemed to have a natural talent for flying, as soon as she had gotten the hang of it she proudly announced that she too would try out for Quidditch next year.
"Just imagine me flying and scoring for Gryffindor!" she started moving her body around, pretending to fly and throw a quaffle. "I know I'll be a good chaser!"
You bent down to grab some of the snow on the floor and made a small snowball and threw it at her. She moved her hands in front of her just in hit before the snowball hit her face.
"Maybe you should try for keeper!" you both laughed while throwing each other small snow balls, although your fight didn't last because you soon realized you were bothering other witches and wizards passing by.
Diagon Alley was filled with people, probably on their way to buy gifts for their families too. There was snow everywhere and some shops were decorated with Christmas trees.
"Do you think wizards believe in Santa Claus?" you asked Angelina while she wiped snow out of her black braided hair
"Maybe? How else would they celebrate Christmas?" she replied.
"Perhaps they believe in wizard Santa? Some big fat man who flies in a broom and drops those gifts?" you said jokingly
"He could be! He has elves and everything!" she laughed. "We might be on to something!"
You spent the whole day with Angelina, going through the whole of Diagon alley hand in hand and saw many new things that you hadn't seen when you were there for the first time, you two were so excited you almost got inside knockturn alley and Eliana had to run after you and pull you back. She warned you that such a place was not meant for children, that it had many stores dedicated to the dark arts.
It piqued your interest, but you decided to leave it for another time. Surely it couldn't be such a dangerous place.
By the time you had finished running around through almost all stores, the sun was setting and it started snowing again, which meant that soon you'd have to say goodbye to Angelina.
The three women had so far been walking and talking while you and Angelina did your business, and they had gotten to know a lot about each other so you proposed that you all could have a nice dinner out before saying farewell, something that made Angelina thrilled, she quickly whispered in your ear the idea of going to MacDonald's.
They accepted the idea, and you were overjoyed because you could spend at least a bit more time with Angelina.
"It's been so long since I've had a hamburger" you remarked "Food is good at Hogwarts but nothing beats MacDonald's"
Angelina agreed with you. On your long walk on the London streets you two talked about your favorite foods both in Hogwarts and outside. You ended up talking about the food you usually ate in your island which surprised her.
"So, you're not from here?" she looked confused
"Oh, right. I have told no one yet" you looked to Eliana as if asking for permission to talk about it. She gave you a small nod.
And so you explained about your circumstances, about your birth and your powers. She was silent, listening to all your words. Her facial expressions went from curiosity to confusion, then back to curious, and then her smiled faded away when you explained you had no father. She held your hand through the entire way to the restaurant and only spoke when you finally finished. By then you were already sitting and had a Big Mac in front of you.
"You are quite amazing, you know, Mila?" she gave you a warm smile and started eating her French fries. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"Well, I didn't think about it honestly, it's nothing big" you shrugged "You're the first one to know"
"I think it's fantastic that you can understand all languages!" she sipped on her soda. "What about animals? Can you talk to animals?" she asked with enthusiasm
"No... I don't think animals actually speak." You looked at Eliana who was sitting next to you. "Can you understand animals?"
Eliana snorted and almost choked on her hamburger.
"No sweetie, I don't" she kept laughing "I don't think we can do that..." she looked away, and it seemed like something had just crossed her mind but she didn't speak.
"What about magical languages?" Angelina asked with interest. Eliana seemed to snap away from her thoughts.
"We understand those! When I was at Hogwarts, I actually made friends with a merperson" Angelina's eyes opened wide
"There's merpeople in Hogwarts?" she looked astonished. "Are they in the lake?"
"Yes, there are quite a lot of them down there. But they usually aren't friendly" she replied.
Eliana started explaining about other magical languages that we could fully understand and speak. The conversation lasted at least an hour, and you felt happy about sharing this piece of yourself with Angelina. You didn't think of it as a big deal given that you weren't a special case, you even mentioned that the headmaster Dumbledore had the same power, and you never thought about sharing it with your friends in case they thought it was weird.
After a long day, you finally had to say goodbye to Angelina. She gave you a big hug and promised to write and send your gift on Christmas day. You felt very grateful for having someone like Angelina as a friend.
You jumped out of bed as soon as your alarm rang and ran to your boom box. You had grown used to waking up with music now. You would definitely miss it when you went back to Hogwarts. You couldn't believe you had survived so long without it.
You clicked the button and popped your currently favorite cassette, "Like a virgin" from Madonna, you didn't know what a virgin was, but they probably had fun with music because this album was the best thing you had ever heard. You turn the sound all the way to max, just to make sure everyone else in the house could hear it, and Material girl plays.
Some boys kiss me
Some boys hug me
I think they're ok
It was finally Christmas day, and you had been waiting excitedly to open up your gifts, especially because you were used to opening them on the night of the 24th, but apparently that's now how people do it in Britain.
Cause we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You quickly put your clothes on and grabbed the boom box and danced through the corridor, belting.
"Come on mom, I'm a material girl!" you yelled while knocking on the bedroom door.
"You're a pain in the ass, that's what you are!" she shouted from inside.
You kept singing while going down the stairs and nearly slipped. You grabbed the handrail just in time but the boom box flew from your hands. You watched it fall as if it was in slow motion, but then it just stopped mid air and you raised your eyebrows.
"That boom box is expensive, Camila!" Eliana stood at the top of the stairs with her wand out, she gave you a disapproving look and then moved her wand and the box flew back to your hands, you grinned "Turn down the volume, or no gifts for you" she gave you a smirk.
"Yes, my lady," you replied, giving a slight bow and turned the sound down. She chuckled and moved down the stairs and walked to the kitchen.
"Merry Christmas Camila" you heard your mom come down the stairs, she gave you a big hug and a kiss on your forehead "I'm surprised you have gifts, you haven't exactly been good" you gave her a smug grin.
"I don't know what you mean, I'm always good" you shrugged
"Yeah, good at doing bad things and getting into fights!" she flicked her middle finger into your forehead. It didn't hurt, but you moaned in pain and acted like she had just given you a beat down. "Don't be dramatic, or no gifts for you" she put her arm around you and you both walked through the living room into the kitchen.
The kitchen table was filled with gifts and every single one of them came with a letter, you looked to the kitchen window to see Gorl the eagle owl sleeping peacefully, he must have flown a lot through the night delivering your gifts to your friends and coming back with even more gifts for you. You gently petted the top of his head, he opened his eyes and hooted and then went back to sleep.
You too felt somewhat tired after writing so many letters the day prior, plus baking cupcakes to each one of your friends. You hoped they tasted just right.
"Can I open them now?" you asked eagerly with your most innocent smile. Eliana already had a cup of coffee in her hands, and your mother was making waffles. They both said yes, so you sat on a chair and got to business.
Your mother gave you her present first. It was a small box wrapped in bright blue paper. You tear it apart to reveal a brand new Walkman. your eyes filled up with tears of joy and you let out a yell of happiness, getting up immediately and hugging your mother.
"Try not to break this one" she asked while stroking your hair "You can't take it to Hogwarts though"
"Thank you so much, Mom." you wiped your tears and sat back in the chair.
"Okay, open mine now, it will go well with that one" Eliana winked at you.
You reached your hand towards a small blue bag. It was closed shut with some tape, which you had a hard time trying to tear apart. Inside you found two new and shiny cassettes. One of them was the newest album from Cher, and the other was from Tina Turner. You hadn't heard many songs from these two artists, but it thrilled you to have more songs to add to your collection. You immediately got up and placed Cher's songs on your boom box. "If I could turn back time" started playing in the kitchen.
"Thank you so much... Tia!" you said while hugging her. You heard her chuckle and sigh. "It means Aunt," you added
"I can't tell you how much you and your mother have brightened my life" she held you tight and then pulled your mother over for a group hug. "I have a family again" she sounded like she was about to sob.
When you first saw Eliana you thought little her, her smile was warm but her eyes looked sad and tired. She spoke little and seemed insecure, but now it seemed like she was beaming with love.
You still didn't know everything about her life, you were interested but it never seemed like the right time to ask, you were sure there would be a time where she would tell you about it, you were just happy that you had improved her life.
All your life it had been just you and your mother, but you felt richer now that you had someone else you could lean on, and your mother seemed much happier too. She had more patience and looked more relaxed. She probably already knew everything there was to know about Eliana since they had bonded really quickly since day one.
After a nice tight hug, you went back to opening your gifts.
The twins had sent you lots of candy and homemade fudge that their mother had made, they sent a letter talking about their progress on the magic parchment but still hadn't figured it out although they had gotten a load of clues and were excited to share them with you.
Angelina had sent you two mix tapes she had made with her father's help, it contained her favorite songs, she wrote in her letter that she wanted to share these songs with you because she loved them beyond everything and hoped that you enjoyed them too because some of them reminded her of you, she ended her letter with "Miss you lots Mila! See you in Hogwarts!" You still had Cher playing in the boom box, so you let it finish and then you'd put on Angelina's songs.
Lee had sent even more sweets than the twins, many of them you had never tasted before. He wrote that these were his mother's special recipes and that he hoped you liked them. You had never received so much candy in your life and you had to store a lot to eat later, but tried a bit of everything.
Before you could grab more gifts, the loud sound of something hitting the kitchen window violently interrupted you. You jumped from your seat. Outside, you could see a couple of grey feathers slowly falling down. Eliana quickly opened the window, and a disheveled owl jumped inside carrying what seemed like a letter in its beak and a small box on its leg. The animal looked messy and tired so Eliana grabbed a cup of water and placed it next to it, letting it drink while she took the box and letter out, she seemed to recognize the owl and muttered "How in Merlin's beard are you still alive"
"It's addressed to you, Camila." she read the name of the sender "From Charlie Weasley" she passed you the letter and you opened it with excitement, you had sent him a gift but you didn't really expect him to send something back, after all you were just the first year troublemaker who joined in on the twins shenanigans.
"Dear Camila,
First, thank you so much for your gift! It's an amazing moving figure of a Chinese fireball dragon, and I'm going to treasure it dearly. I don't know how you found it but I will be honest, it was actually the best gift I've received.
Now I must apologize for not sending you a present. I wasn't expecting one from you but you certainly deserve one so I had to quickly use some floo powder to reach Diagon alley, surprisingly some stores are open on Christmas day!
Again, sorry for not thinking of you, but I hope you enjoy my gift!
A very merry Christmas to you
- Charlie Weasley
PS: I'm sorry for Errol, just give it some water and they'll be fine"
You had a wide smile on your face, you didn't take it to heart about him forgetting about you, you were just glad he had enjoyed the gift, and as you thought, he definitely knew what type of dragon it was. You opened the small box, not expecting anything too grand.
Inside you found a gold necklace with a snitch ornament, you picked up and noticed that the snitch could be opened so you carefully pried it open to reveal a clock ticking. The time was right too, and overall it was a beautiful gift. Inside the box was a minor note that read, "So you're never late for curfew".
"That's really pretty! What is he, your boyfriend?" said your mom, joking.
"No! He's sixteen!" you yelled in defense. "He's really cool, he's Quidditch captain for Gryffindor!"
You didn't want to admit that you might have a small little crush on the older Weasley. After all, he was smart, talented and a great Quidditch player, too bad he was older, but then again, you didn't really care about having boyfriends.
You opened the rest of your gifts in the kitchen while eating all your candy.
Adrian had sent you a book titled "Potion making for dummies" hoping you would improve your grades. Alicia had also sent you a book titled "The joke book of jokes" which would send sparks into the air every time you opened it and it would write jokes. You used it the whole day to share jokes with your mother and aunt.
After a big celebration on New Year, it was time to return to Hogwarts. You had spent an amazing time bonding with your family. You'd only see them again at Easter, which was still some months away, but still you packed your things and traveled to Kings Cross station on a cold Sunday.
You still had plenty of candy from Christmas, so you packed those too, along with your other gifts except your new Walkman. You had learned your lesson to not bring muggle technology near places that had too much magic in the air. Setting the train on fire again wasn't in your plans.
You wore Charlie's gift on your neck. It was indeed useful to check the time, although you were sure that it wouldn't stop you from staying out after curfew.
You met Lee after crossing the magical barrier that led to the Hogwarts Express, but no signs of the twins, then again they were always late so you worried little, after hugging and kissing your mom and aunt you and Lee found yourselves a compartment inside the train and settled in.
"So, how was Christmas?" you pulled an unopened box of Bertie Bott's every flavor beans off your bag and shared with him.
"It was okay. My parents gave me lots of spell books after they saw I was good at charms," he replied after taking a red bean. "It has some hexes and jinxes that we should definitely try," he smirked.
"I saw a couple of those in my aunt's books. I wrote some of them down" you grinned and took a green bean and immediately spat it out "Grass... ew..."
"Did you end up finding anything interesting in your aunt's books?" he dropped his voice just in case anyone would hear
"Not much. What did you think of my portrait theory though? It could be a portrait, it acts like one, doesn't it?" you whispered. You had invested yourself into finding out what was up with the old parchment.
"Can't be a portrait if doesn't have a picture, it must be something else," he responded.
The Hogwarts Express started slowly moving, and you heard voices saying goodbye to their families. Your family had already left because your mom had a flight to catch and couldn't be late, although she would try to come back for Easter break.
You told Lee all about the things you had found out in your aunt's books, from spells to potions, but nothing seemed to make sense when it came to the parchment. You were interrupted by someone suddenly opening the compartment door and two ginger boys with wide smiles entered and sat next to you two.
"Fox. Jordan." You knew this had to be Fred, because George would usually call you by your name. He looked at you two with a smug smirk.
"We've got it".
