Disclaimer: It's all JKR's I swear. Nothing to do with me.
The only things that are mine are the plot and the names of people that shall appear later on in the story.
AN: A few of the characters are OCC but that's the way I like it so if you don't like it don't read it. Simple. Also, I have always imagined Severus as more attractive than movie Snape. Think Richard Armitage in Robin Hood and you'll get my Snape. Although Alan Rickman is still HOT!
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It was a cold and snowy winter's day in December, and it is in the large and spacious lounge of number 12 Grimmauld Place that we start our story.
2 weeks until Christmas, and the occupants of the house were trying to clean up the place. All the work was an attempt to make the once derelict and unforgiving house into a home, not a hovel. The group of people as a collective were somewhat eclectic and what would be called 'an odd bunch of characters'. Some dark, some light. However, to all intents and purposes they were a family none the less, trying to look forward to a good Christmas.
Harry Potter was in the living room of the house, trying to scrub 100's of years of grime and mistreatment off of the walls. His efforts after 2 hours were beginning to show in the large room, and the colour was coming back to the walls and the ceiling. It was white, but it was still a colour more resembling that of a home not a torture chamber.
The portraits in the room had been taken down and stored in the attic along with the others from most of the walls. The portrait of Mrs Black was finally gone from the hall. It took the combined effort of Harry and 3 others to finally blast the screeching woman off of the wall. Harry had been sorely tempted to burn it; however, out of respect for portraits in general she had gone to the Black family vault at Gringotts.
The goblins had not been impressed when a group of wizards and witches had tramped into the large expanse of the entrance hall of the bank carrying a portrait that was screaming obscenities about werewolves, half breeds, mudbloods and traitors. Now that the house was his own, Harry was determined to make it into a proper home. The Order of the Phoenix had no need for it now, and he finally had the chance to live here, away from the Dursley's and the publicity surrounding his recent defeat of Voldemort. Without the weight of the Wizarding world on his shoulders, he was finally beginning to think of a future for himself.
Unfortunately, that future no longer included his best friend Ron. After assisting in the defeat of the monster, the same fame that his best friend Harry had told him had ruined his life for so long, had gone to his head. The relationship with Hermione that had been mutual and loving had turned into his little private joke. His numerous affairs had, very publicly caught up with him on the front cover of the daily prophet one day. The picture of him in a very compromising and revealing position with 3 witches had effectively ended the relationship faster than any of their very fiery arguments had done. Even though Ron was his best friend, Harry was thanking the gods that Hermione had finally found out what he was up to. Ron's attitude had turned very ugly very quickly, and the house and its occupants were much happier now that the air was clear and the atmosphere was calm and relaxed.