You know that song that came out at the beginning of this century, Let the Bodies hit the Floor? Well I've been thinking about that song a few times over the past few weeks and as I see the covid death count stays firmly in the 3,500 to 5,000 per day range, I can't think of a song more fitting of death's theme song. But let's not think of sad things right now, even though this year has firmly taken the worst year award from 2016 and bludgeoned it to death, we need to think of more positive things. Like, have you heard that the NBA and NHL have official startup dates to finish the season? Yeah, the NBA is going to let their 22 best current teams play out the rest of the regular season starting on July 30th before doing their playoff run. And speaking of playoffs, the NHL is about to present us the best playoff series it has ever had. 24 teams, five rounds, 1 introductory best of five series between the lower 16 teams that made the playoffs before four rounds of best of seven, and it all starts on August 1st. This is going to be amazing. Now you may be wondering why I'm mentioning this and well it's because Hockey is my favorite sport, more than lacrosse (which I played for eight years) and football, and I'm a big Indianapolis Colts fan. I am so excited about this, I mean you have to be when an entire division (the Central Division) and all but one team in another (the Metropolitan Division) made the playoffs in this unique situation. I really hope either my team (the Las Vegas Golden Knights) or my hometown team (the Philadelphia Flyers) win the Cup this year. But you didn't come here to read about me gushing about the greatest sport ever invented, you came here to read and/or make fun of my work. I should let you know right now that I'm not a big fan of Christmas. In fact it is my least favorite holiday. I'll probably end up making comments about my dislike of Christmas through the characters that I write at some point, so fair warning about that. I won't do that here in this story series, mainly because my feelings on Christmas do not matter for this story, because none of the characters have that feeling unless they have a very specific circumstance that causes them to have this belief. If I put my feelings on Christmas in the story, it will be because a character will have that feeling while keeping that character in character in terms of canon work (for example in the Total Drama/Spiderman crossover I'm going to write after I'm done my first part of the Sailor Moon/Dragonball crossover I'm currently working on, Gwen will not like Christmas because I feel that based on the character that was shown to me in the four seasons of Total Drama she was on, she would not like Christmas, therefore I would write her with my thoughts on Christmas in the story because I'd feel that it would be in character) or based on situations that I put them in. None of the characters here, whether in the books or in the two Ed, Edd & Eddy Christmas specials, have ever showed a dislike of Christmas (in fact in the second Christmas special, the Kanker sisters practically played the role of the three wisemen), nor have I put them in a situation that would cause them to change that opinion, so I will not write them as disliking Christmas because I believe that it would be out of character as they now are. So now I have to write a more upbeat Christmas chapter….yay. I do not own Harry Potter or Ed, Edd & Eddy. Those are owned by J.K. Rowling, Warner Media and AT&T.
A Very Wizardly Christmas
The dull glow of a flickering candle illuminated a small desk in the corner of the Gryffindor common room. On it was a large book with slightly faded writing on the tan yellow parchment. Marie was slowly flipping through it, trying to find something on Flamel. She turned a page, lazily scanning through the many sentences that described yet another boring old wizard who was long dead just to see if there was some vague relation with Flamel. 'This is such a waste of time.' she thought as she flipped another page. She would've stopped searching the book and given up on the whole enterprise all together if she wasn't just trying to kill time at this point.
After she broke down in the library, the rest of Gryffindor had spent a few days walking on eggshells around her while Hermione tried to keep her emotionally stable. It didn't really work. Sure she was able to keep on top of her work and she still showered but there were things that showed that she wasn't getting any better. Things such as not eating as much, not combing her hair, leaving her clothes scattered on the floor rather than putting it in the hamper not smiling, something that Fred and George were disgruntled about when they found that the most they could get from her was a few slight upward flicks of her mouth. Things came to a head when Hermione woke up at 1 in the morning the day before break began to use the restroom and found Marie laying down in a full bath tub with the window open, apparently having been there since midnight. After forcefully taking her down to Madam Pomfrey to get a pepper up potion and having her stay there to make sure she didn't get hypothermia, she assigned her the task to spend three hours a day looking for something on Nicolas Flamel just so that she could focus on something other than her own misery. When she left she even gave her a note with a list of book suggestions that sang when the time came for her to do research and wouldn't shut up until she actually did it. She then found out that it would start up again if she tried to end the session early. It was effective, but she wished she picked a better song than My Humps.
Marie flipped another page as she read about the meaningless life of Alfred Spear, a potioneer that created a potion that allowed people to dye their hair in rainbow colors. 'Hermione, you're a brilliant student when it comes to facts, but you can't understand emotional issues for shit.' Not that she didn't appreciate Hermione trying to get her to not focus on her m0ther, or her homesickness or the increasing realization that this would be her first Christmas without her siblings, but distracting herself with busy work still didn't take her mind off of it, it just made her bored and focus on her depressing thoughts all the more.
It made her appreciate Harry and the Weasley's all the more. Harry stayed because no sane person would want to spend more than ten minutes with the bland a-holes known as the Dursleys and Mr. and Mrs. Weasley decided to visit Charlie Weasley in Romania for the holidays. With them here, they spent a lot of time taking her out of the castle, trying to get her to have fun in the snow, having snowball fights, putting snow down Percy's pants, playing hide and seek on the edge of the Forbidden Forest, they had even started to teach her how to ice skate. They had even extended their efforts to when they were inside, playing gobblestones and teaching her how to play exploding snap, getting her in on ways they could get Malfoy expelled, even telling stories of past christmases they had back home (well the Weasley's did, all Harry said was "They sucked, they all sucked and less I can remember of them the happier I'll be."), but as Christmas got closer and closer, even those were starting to ring hollow.
'Wonder if this is how Scrooge felt in his younger years.' She wondered as she squinted at a few faded lines that talked about charmcaster Hannibal Traven, a powerful wizard responsible for creating a spell that could separate fecal matter from water, helped establish indoor plumbing in more than 100 magic schools and finally defeating the dark wizard Mannimarco in 1813 during the Battle of Nations, a battle that cost him his own life. A shiver went up her spine, causing her to blow into her hands. She looked around the room and saw that the fire was dying. She got up and put made kindling and a large log in the fire. As she stoked the flames, the Hogwarts clock tower rang twice. She looked up at an ornate spring clock. It was 2 in the morning. 'Huh, didn't realize that it was Christmas day.' she thought dully. She walked over to the book and closed it, the ruby red letters of the title Great Wizard's of the 19th century shining faintly in the candle light. After going through Hermione's list of 20th century figures, she had started looking through 19th century history to see if Flamel had a partner or a teacher that could point her in the right direction, but she had so far found zilch and she was currently on her 16th book. 'Ovenmitt you gotta get back to me, I don't know if I could stand to read another tome about a long dead guy from who gives a shitsville who did I don't care, created I don't care or defeated who's that guy, wait I don't care.'
She grabbed the candlestick from the table and started to ascend the stairs towards her dorm room. She arrived at the landing and grasped the door handle. She hesitated outside for a minute, maybe two minutes before opening the door and entering the room. The room was dark as it normally was around this time of night, but it wasn't normal. The curtains weren't drawn, Lavender wasn't snoring, a book hadn't fallen from Hermione's bed onto the floor, even Sally-Anne's soft coes weren't there. She was the only one there, the only one in the whole tower. She went to her bed as she tried to fight off the urge to go down and sleep on the couch. She pulled off her sweater and got an undershirt from her trunk, sniffing it to see if it was dirty. She looked over at Lavender and Pavarti's bed as she finished undressing, feeling an unusual pang in her chest. "Really?" she muttered as she got under the covers. "I'm even missing them? I don't even like them."
She flopped down onto her bed, trying to get herself comfortable as she tried to get what little sleep she could. She looked over at the window and watched the snow fall past the window. She didn't know if she started dreaming or if she was hallucinating, but a memory started to form, crawling timidly out of the depths before emerging shyly into the light.
Christmas Day, 2002, Burnham Park, Chicago
Marie was running through the snowy ground, laughing heartily as thick flakes as big as pennies fell on her long, black hair, which was pulled back over her ears and flowed down to her lower back. She was wearing a tattered purple jacket and frayed black gloves as she flew through the snow, laughing. She then heard a voice coming from behind her. "I'm gonna get you Marie, nobody escapes the snuggle monster!" Her mother ran in after her, wearing a patched and faded red sweater with a faux fur lined hood. She looked different to how she is now, she doesn't have any crows feet under her eyes, her hair is shorter and styled into a bob cut. Marie dodged her lung, running around and between her mother's legs, trying to trip her up, but her mother wasn't deterred. She rapped Marie up in her arms and lifted her into the air laughing, causing Marie to let out a squeal of surprised delight. She brings her to her chest and smiles at her.
"You're going to have to do better than that if you want to avoid the grasps of the snuggle monster." she said as she bopped Marie on the nose. Maire tried to squirm away from her as she protected her nose with her hand. "No, I don't want to be with the snuggle monster!" she exclaimed, causing her mom to laugh. "Ahh, but the snuggle monster wants to be with you very much." she stated as she ruffled her daughter's hair, causing her to squeal again. Her mother laughed heartily at the sound, causing Marie to pout. "God, you're so cute when you make that face." She continued to laugh, not noticing her daughter grow a mischievous grin across her face. So she was surprised when her daughter threw her arms around her neck in a big hug. Barbara looked down at Marie, seeing her give a soft smile as she cradled into her neck. Barbara gave a similar smile as she returned it.
Marie slowly awoke, noticing that dry and crusty lines of skin that had been appearing on her face for the last few days. "Again?" she muttered, peeking over at the window. It had stopped snowing sometime during the night and the sun was peeking through the clouds. She slowly rose, groaning as she did so. She looked over at the clock that was on her night stand. 7:15. She rubbed her eyes, forcefully resisting the urge to weep bitterly. "It's too early, why would you betray me you stupid biological clock?" She crawled to the edge of the bed, her vision squinted as she lazily rubbed her neck and started the trek to the girls shower room. She never got there however as she stubbed her toe and then tripped over a large box, causing her to fall and smash her head into the bedpost of Runcorn's bed. "Mother &$%# %# &$%# heel, what the #%$& tripped me?!" she exclaimed angrily as she stumbled up onto the bed she bashed into, clutching her head in pain. She looked over at what tripped her and what anger she had disappeared, replaced with stunned disbelief.
The box wasn't just one box, there were several of them. Some wide and thin, others as small as a box of contact fluid, and others as big as if she had gotten an entire crate of 12 types of coffee, complete with her own brewing machine, all of which rested near or at the foot of her bed. "No way." she stated as she got up from her friend's bed and grabbed a medium sized rectangular box. On it was a tag that read To: Marie, From: Dean. "No way." She uttered, disbelief rising as she threw the box onto the bed and grabbed a smaller, thinner package. To: Marie, From: Eliza. "No way!" she exclaimed as hints of joys started to slip out of her voice for the first time in weeks. She grabbed another package that was blocky and heavy. To: Marie, From: Ron. "Oh my god." she laughed out, her first honest laugh in days as she grabbed each gift off from the floor and stacked them together onto the bed. She stepped back so that she could look at her pile, unable to believe that she had gotten so many gifts. Due to her previous financial situation (and lack of friends), her family would do group presents, polling their cash together so that they all got one gift each. She wasn't used to having this many presents, or that so many people card about her.
With a sense of jubilation that she hadn't felt in months she grabbed her haul and hurried down the stairs towards the common room. She didn't notice the huge grin that she sported on her face as she stumbled into the common room and sprinted towards the Christmas tree in the corner of the room. She then tripped again, this time on an ottoman, causing her to spill her presents all over the room and to slam face first into the carpet. She peeled herself off the floor, noticing that she left an indent of her face on the carpet. She looked up and was relieved to see that none of her presents had landed in the fireplace, which had a roaring pale yellow blaze.
"Somebody seems excitable today." "Yes, it is a rather fortuitous thing that Miss Kanker is energetic nowadays." "Yes, it was rather concerning when she was walking around with a frown on her face." "Too true Forge, too true." Marie turned her head towards the couch and saw two identical impish grins beaming at her. Each of the Weasley twins were wearing deep blue homemade sweaters, each of which were embossed with gold letters, one G and one F, along with two pairs of khakis. "Yeah yeah yeah." she stated as she pulled herself up off the floor. "I know I haven't been myself lately, I don't need you two commenting on it like Statler and Waldorf." Fred and George looked at each other and then back at her in confusion. "Who?" they asked. Marie pinched the bridge between her eyes as she fought against letting out a soft groan. "I'll show you some other time, just know that they're a pair of cantankerous and opinionated puppets."
Fred and George still looked confused, but shrugged off their questions. It didn't seem to be that important to know. They returned to giving a pair of sly grins. "Well, I have to say that it's good to see you come down like that. We have seen someone that excited to open presents since our little sister Ginny was eight." George commented, Marie noticing that he was wearing the sweater with the F on it. "Well, it's just that I didn't expect to get this many. Merlin's sakes I wasn't even expecting to get two presents." she said as she moved around the common room and placed her scattered presents next to an armchair. Fred and George looked at her in confused shock. "What, you thought that we," Fred said, gesturing to both himself and George. "Wouldn't have gotten you anything for Christmas?" "Or Harry." "Or Neville." "Or Hermione." "Or icky Ronnikins." "Okay, okay I get it!" Marie exclaimed irritably. She took a deep breath as she slumped into the chair. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to snap at you, I'm just used to only getting one gift per year."
Fred and George were now looking at her with disbelief. "One gift? Why only one gift, don't you have two sisters?" Fred asked. Marie then started to chuckle bitterly, the twins noticing that her fingers were tightly clenching the armrests. "You know how even though you guys have to live off of hand me downs, you live in a house, have your own beds, and have three meals per day?" Fred and George nodded. "Well, I'm the kid that would be looking at you in envy." Fred and George were stunned. It was well known amongst the wizarding world that the Weasley's were while an old family were a notoriously poor one. To hear someone say that they wish they had as much money as them was as if someone had told them that they wished that they ended up being head of a ministry department like their father. It was possible, but that department was so bare bones that it wasn't even worth the effort to envy.
"I live in a trailer, which is little more than a five room metal shack with a rusted heating unit and half working ac. With so little room I have to share a bed with both of my siblings. And then there's my mother, who has to work three jobs just to afford the rent and very little else. If we use the money to pay the electric bill, we don't have enough money to keep the hot water on. We pay that, then we only have enough money to afford cereal and school lunch. It's a constant juggling act of barely scraping by. So at Christmas what we do is pool our money into four group gifts, one for each person. That is all we get." Fred and George were stunned. "But, but, surely you had friends that sent you gifts." "Hahahaha." A harsh, angry laugh ripped out of her throat, chilling the twins to the bone. "Oh sure, be friends with the redneck trailer trash who's best hopes for the future selling their body for drug money or spending the next few years in juvenile hall for gang activity. Yeah, I had so many friends back home let me tell ya." she snarked, her grin looking more like a snarl.
She then sighed and looked down, her eyes obscured in darkness. "Not that I gave them any reason to give me the benefit of the doubt." She looked up, seeing a sense of concern and curiosity in the twins eyes. "I was not a good person. Malfoy and his boyfriends at their worst weren't as bad as I or my sisters were. We stole other kids' lunch money, shoved them in lockers, damaged public property, inflicted physical violence on others, Christ, my sisters even broke into other people's houses. We were awful, just awful children. The world didn't like us and the feeling was mutual." She then leaned back and looked up, trying to keep herself from looking at the stunned faces of two people that she hoped she could still call friends. "I don't know about my siblings, but when I ended up destroying the school in a fit of jealous rage, I saw a glimpse of what I could be and I didn't like it. Honestly, the fact that I'm here is probably the one thing that has caused me to actually change my attitude." She looked back down, only moving her eyes. "And that's why I didn't have any friends and only got one gift per year."
She expected that Fred and George wouldn't be very forgiving with her confession, she did not expect them to be looking at her with a bit of awe. "You tore down a school?" George asked. Marie blinked. "Yeah, did it with my own two hands. I think they're still repairing it." The twins grinned. "Wicked." they said. Marie chuckled wearily. "Of course, that would get you excited." She leaned back up, a small grin on her face. "I'm not recommending it. I only did it because a guy I like was dancing with the most popular girl in the class. I don't think Dumbledore or McGonagall would appreciate you destroying an entire castle." Fred grabs a present from a pile that he had placed on the coffee table, chuckling lightly. "True, but I'd be more concerned about what mum would do to us." "Yeah, there probably wouldn't even be bones left for them to find after she's through with us." Marie returned their grins. "Yeah," she conveyed, grabbing her package from Neville from off the floor. "When my mom found out what I did, she hired me out to the neighbors as a yard and house cleaner for the next month afterward. I had a fun time cleaning up my diabetic neighbor's insulin needles."
The gifts that she got were rather enjoyable, showing that she had more of a positive impact on others than she thought. Neville got her a book of European wizard horticulture, showing rather detailed drawings and paintings of various flowers, plants and trees. Dean got her an equipment tool box so that she could carry her art supplies more easily. Eliza Runcorn and Hermione got her books, with Eliza getting her a copy of Famous Wizard Painters of the Renaissance by Alicia Whitworth while Hermione had gotten her a copy of The Greatest Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Ron had gotten her her own wizard's chess set (which was good, as she had gotten to the point where she had gotten so sick of Neville's pieces criticizing and mocking her choices that she had started to take petty revenge out on them by deliberately losing as badly as possible), and Lee Jordan had gotten her a box of caramel cobwebs. But she most appreciated the art supplies. Sally-Anne had sent her a film camera with a few rolls of film and two cylinders and four spolls along with instructions on how to preserve the film so that it's not damaged by sunlight. Harry got her some water color paints and paper, which was nice, but not as impressive to her as Seamus getting her 24 tubes of oil paint.
She opened up Fred and George's gift from the now nearly disappeared pile. It was a few bags of dungbombs. "Oh yeah, I can't wait to use these with some paper bags." "Why would you need paper bags for these?" George asked, opening up his gift from his brother Charlie (a pair of dragonhide boots). Marie smirks. "Oh come on, don't tell me that such legendary pranksters like yourselves have never heard of the flaming bag gag." She leaned forward, a devious grin spread across her face, the twins joining her with eager glee. "What you do is that you fill a bag with animal dung and place it outside someone's door. You then set the top of the bag on fire and knock on the door and run. The person comes to the door, sees the bag and stamps on it in panic, getting his foot covered in poo." Fred and George laugh loudly, with Fred clutching his gut in pain. "Oh man, you muggles are amazing sometimes you know that. Who would've thought you would come up with a prank that amazing." "You want to know more about comedy, wait until I introduce you to the Seven Words You Can't Say On TV."
Apparently their noise had gotten someone's attention, because Percy came groggily down the stairs, his horn rim glasses perched clumsily on his nose. He was wearing a set of pinstriped pajamas and carrying a jade green sweater with a gold embossed P on it. "Why are you two so loud? There are still students trying to sleep." Percy grumbled, adjusting his glasses so that they were properly arranged. "Oh come on Perce." Fred said, getting up off the couch and giving Percy his most innocent grin (which wasn't saying much). "We were just getting into the christmas spirit. You were even able to get Marie to have some enjoyment today." He gestured to Marie, who Percy saw had a small smile on her face as she waved at him. George then went up to him and draped his arm over his shoulder. "Come and join us Perce, Christmas is a time for family after all." "And don't think that we're taking no for an answer, we're not letting send the day with the other prefects big brother." Fred said, a threatening gleam in his eyes. Percy's eyes flickered around the room, looking for some escape route. He notices Marie, who gives him a mischievous smirk. "Hey guys, I'm going to get Harry and Ron down here." She conveys as she leaves the chair and starts to walk towards the boys staircase. "After all, if this is supposed to be a family Christmas, then you need the entire family don't ya?" The twins sent her identical grins before grabbing Percy's arms. "Come one Perce, let's get that sweater on ya and get your presents." "No, wait. I can do it myself. Stop!" Percy's protests were ignored as the twins frog marched him up the stairs towards his room, a chuckling Marie following behind them.
As the twins lead Percy towards his yuletide torture, Marie slipped from behind them and entered the first year male dorm, where Harry and Ron were. "Merry Christmas dweebs! The party has arrived!" She declared, her left index finger pointed high in the air. Harry and Ron look over at her in surprise. "Marie, what are you doing here?! Girls aren't allowed in the boys dorms!" Ron exclaims. "Really?" Marie states as she looks around. "Cause nothing is keeping me from being here other than a rule and well," she smirks as she flops down on one of the empty beds facing the two. "I'm not really one for following the rules." Harry and Ron stare at her with surprise. "Marie." Harry comments. "You're smiling." Marie grabs her mouth, touching the edges of her lips that were creasing upwards. "I know, kind of weird right now. And uh, it kind of hurts." She stops smiling and rubs her cheeks, letting out a small pained gasp. "God that's smarts." Harry went over to her in concern. "Why were trying to smile if you knew you were in pain." Marie, now with her face resting in a tired, melancholy state, looked over to her him. "Because, it's Christmas." she said softly. "And as much as I am struggling right now, I want today to be a happy one. I don't want you guys to be worried about me because I'm not happy right now, because you deserve to have a happy memory of today."
Harry gives her a disapproving look, his eyes filled with worry. Luckily for her Ron came to the rescue. "Oh come on Harry. You've never had a good Christmas you can remember. You deserve this." Harry sighed, clearly disagreeing, but he didn't voice it as he reluctantly nodded. Marie then looked around the room and saw that they had already opened almost all of their presents. "How rude. You two didn't even come downstairs to open up your gifts with the rest of us. Even Percy only opened one present before he came downstairs." She remarked cooly. She noticed a dark maroon wool sweater embossed with a golden R lying unworn on Ron's bed. She walked over to it and held it up to her chest in front of Ron. "Why aren't you wearing this?" Ron scrowled. "I hate maroon, yet my mum always makes me maroon sweaters for Christmas." Marie querked her eyebrow. "Did you tell her that you don't like maroon?" Ron descended into unintelligible grumbles which caused her to roll her eyes. "If you're not going to tell her then this," she stated before shaking the sweater. "Is on you." She then tossed the sweater into Ron's head. "Now suck it up and put it on before Fred and George get here and force it on."
While Ron was putting on his sweater, Harry was picking up his last present. It was baggy and light weight, wrapped in deep purple wrapping paper with tiny gold stars. He unwrapped it, revealing a silver blanket that fell to a disorganized heap to the floor. "I've heard of those." Ron gasped as he finished putting his arms in the sleeves. "If that's what I think it is-they're really rare and really valuable." "Really Ron?" Marie snarked as Harry picked it up and held it in his hands. "It just looks like a glossy blanket. I can get one of those from JCPenny for about 60 bucks." Ron gave her an excited grin before turning to Harry. "Go on, put it on." Harry, a look of skepticism on his face, swung the blanket around his shoulders and wrapped it around him. Marie's eyes widened to the size of dinner plates. 'Wha?' Ron's grin widened as he started gesturing wildly to Harry's body, or rather the place where Harry's body used to be. "Haha! I knew it! I knew it! I knew it!" he exclaimed. He then turned to Marie. "That there is an invisibility cloak!" he stated it awe. Harry's disembodied head, after looking down in shock at now longer having any feet, sprinted to the mirror to look at himself in the mirror. After looking at his reflection in amazement for a few seconds, he threw the cloak over his head, causing him to completely disappear. "Well," Marie squeaked out, her eyes flickering around the room to avoid looking at the empty void of space in front of the mirror. "Least you can pull being invisibile off better than Jessica Alba."
As Harry was taking the cloak off, Marie noticed a piece of parchment on the floor. She picked it up and noticed some writing on it written in flowing cursive that had a bit of a bounce to it.
Your father left this in my possession before he dead,
It is time is was returned to you,
Use it well.
A Merry Christmas to You.
She handed the letter over to Harry. "Who do you think sent this? Cause this guy sounds way too familiar with you." "No idea," Harry stated as he read the note. "I don't recognize the handwriting." He handed the note to Ron. "Why did my dad give this away if it's so valuable?" "More importantly," Marie questioned. "Why give it back now? Most of the wizarding world doesn't know you lived with magic hating scum, why didn't he just send it there?" Both of the boys shrugged.
At that moment, Fred hurried into the room, Percy walking down the stairs carrying his presents while George held him at wand point. "What're you all standing around for? We're about to continue opening up the presents." Marie turned to them with a big realistic smile on her face. "Oh I was just chastising them." she stated while Harry hid the cloak. "They were just too impatient to wait. They opened all of their presents by the time I got here." "Oh how rude." Fred stated faux critically. "How on earth did they forget that they were supposed to open their gifts with their family." George stated as he slipped into the room. "Was it something we did Forge? Did we not raise little icky Ronnikins right?" Fred asked as he placed his hands on his brother's shoulders. "Oh where did we go wrong?" George cried before collapsing overdramatically into Fred's arms wailing. Marie stuffed her hand into her mouth to muffle her laughter while Harry fell into giggles and Percy rolled his eyes. "There, there Forge." Fred said as he patted his twins back. "We can't blame ourselves for the actions of others." "Your right Gred." George said as he leaped back up. "But we can give them retribution." The twins turned their heads to Ron, evil grins on their faces and their eyes glowing white. Ron backed up on the bed as the duo approached. "What are you guys doing? Wait. NO!" The two of them lifted Ron over their heads and paraded him towards the door. "Hey, let me go!" "No can do mate!" "We need to spread Christmas cheer!" "All the way to the Great Hall!" The two of them carried Ron down the stairs towards the portrait hole, the twins singing For he's a Jolly Good Fellow intercut with Ron's cursing, leaving the other three forgot on the landing. Percy, confused and still carrying his presents in his hands, turned to the two first years. "Does that mean we're not opening presents right now?" He asked hopefully.
It was a surprisingly intimate and enjoyable day. Breakfast had been grand, with stacks of belgian waffles and maple sausages covered in powdered sugar. Afterward, they went outside for a snowball fight (Percy being dragged out against his will) and then tried to learn how to skate (lots of falling over and slamming into the ice occured). After they reentered the castle for lunch, they returned to the common room for Percy to open his presents (most of which were books and school supplies, though Marie got a giggle when Fred and George's gift was a t-shirt that said 'I'm a well practiced brown-noser.'). They then spent a good few hours drinking hot chocolate, telling Christmas stories and Marie introducing them to smores. And then, came the Christmas feast. Hundreds of massive turkeys, piles of roasted and baked potatoes filled with bacon bits, cheese and sour cream, turrets of buttered peas and silver boats filled with brown gravy and cranberry sauce.
"Marie, come on pull this." Marie looked up from her potato and saw Ron holding a Christmas cracker. Marie's eyes flickered from the cracker to Ron's grinning face. "That thing's not going to fart on me, is it?" "No, come on, I want to see what gifts are inside." Marie grabbed one end of the cracker and the two pulled. With a massive bang the cracker exploded, creating a massive cloud of smoke. When the smoke dissipated, the two faces were covered in soot. Ron let out a small cough, causing Harry and the twins to fall into a fit of laughter. Marie glared at them as she wiped soot out of her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, yuck it up." she said as she picked up a naval officers hat that looked like something Admiral Nelson wore at the battle of Copenhagen. "At least I'm the captain of the Pinafore." she stated snobbly as she placed it on her head. They then heard a sharp crunch. "Ow!" Percy exclaimed as he grabbed his mouth. "You okay?" Harry asked. "No, I think I nearly broke my tooth." He reached into his piece of flaming Christmas pudding and extracted a sickle. The twins grinned. "Hey Perce look on the bright side." "Even if you lose the tooth, at least you're going to make a lot of money this year." The rest of the table (besides Marie, who just looked confused at the sickle being in the cake to begin with) chuckled, even Percy, as the ceiling of the Great Hall started to snow.
So, uh, how's that baseball season huh? Not even a week in and already one team has been knocked out of commision. *Sigh* Look, I only really care about the Red Sox. My late grandfather used to sell ice cream at Fenway Park during the Great Depression and it's been my team since I was six and well, (looks to the side and sees abysmal 1-4 record and last place in the AL East)...yeah I think it's best if we cut the cord now. Now I'm not stating this to be selfish. The plan to bring back baseball and reopen it the way as it is was a terrible idea. The NHL and NBA plans focused on isolation and intense quarantining, the NBA by placing all their teams in a massive sports complex cut off from the rest of the world and the NHL by having their teams play in two stadiums in a country that has the outbreak contained. The MLB however had their teams still travel, even when one more than a third of the league (the Rangers, the Astros, the Diamondbacks, the Padres, the Giants, the Dodgers, the Athletics, the Braves, the Rays, the Royals, the Cardinals and the Marlins) all play in states where cases of Covid-19 are on the rise. The results are now obvious. More than twenty players on the Marlins have been confirmed to have contacted Covid, along with two coaches. They were also in contact with players from the Phillies and the Yankees, making it likely that they transported the virus with them back to Philadelphia and New York City. Now, I understand if people will be upset if the season is canceled. I was too when the new version of the XFL was torpedoed by the virus back in March. But I'm not going to put having sports over other people's lives. Given how quickly the pandemic tore through the Marlin's, it will likely happen to other teams. And I don't want that to happen. And to those that will complain about there not being a World Series, we've been here before, back in 1994. Baseball still survived, it still thrived, in fact it improved. A similar thing will happen here, if in a different way. And if you still want to watch sports, MLS is coming back. You can watch that if that appeals to you. The NBA and NHL are again returning so definitely watch that. Hell, watch golf and Nascar, or the European circuit if you need your live sports fix that much. And to be clear, I hate the latter three, so me recommending them is like if I recommended someone watch I Spit on Your Grave. Or read, I suggest you read or play video games, I've recently been Stardew Valley and it's really good. So, enjoy whatever sports you like and stay safe. See ya next time.
