Authors Note: I've been working on this forever (actually bit by bit by bit over the past week) but the chapter is done. I own: the Nickel family and the plot nothing else ok then.

Over the next month, not many events happened, the quartet went to classes and did homework, became closer to each other, corresponded with their families, and Carter's relapses became less frequent. One day when it was bucketing down with rain so hard that herbology had been relocated to an unused classroom, Professor Longbottom decided to get them to write all the people that were related to them that they had met who had died, and their cause of death next to it, to show that although some had lost more than others, they are not alone. Carter looked over at her friends who wrote no one, but as her entire family was dead she wrote quickly:

Mum-Death Eater Attack 2017
Dad-Death Eater Attack 2017
Ariel-Death Eater Attack 2010
Kayla-Death Eater Attack 2010
Grandma Estelle-Old Age 2012
Grandpa Noah-Pneumonia 2009
Aunt Mikayla-Death Eater Attack 2011

At the end of the lesson Professor Longbottom asked for them all to be put on his desk anonymously, and then they made their way to Transfiguration before lunch. Carter thought that she was more alone than ever after that lesson as her friends had not written anything but she had written practically her whole family that she had met, and subconsciously touched her wounds, then another relapse occurred, they got down to the bottom of the stairs, and she fainted and started frantically screaming out in pain and for her parents. Fortunately this relapse was only short, and she awoke soon, with her friends sitting next to her in the Common Room.

"You okay?" asked Al.

"I'll be fine, you know me I fall all the time, and I just hit my head again." Carter replied.

"Carter, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you're bleeding from your arms and legs" said Scorpius.

"Chiz, I'll meet you at DADA, I may a little late" yelled Carter running to Gryffindor Tower, while Al stared at her in amazement, Rose in shock and Scorpius in confusion.

Carter ran up the stairs as quickly as possible, cleaned the blood up, changed her robes, and looked through the photo album crying silently for all she had lost, when she got to the end of the album she was surprised to find a picture of her, Rose, Al and Scorpius, when she wasn't aware she had a copy of the photo, she spent five minutes looking at the photo until the bell rang and she ran to DADA.

When she entered before looking she said "Sorry Professor Bedson, I had to…" she looked around and found Al's father in front of her looking at her questioningly.

"That's fine Miss Nickel, take a seat" said Professor Bedson and she sat as told "As I was saying this is Harry Potter, he is here to tell us about the Second Wizarding War, not in full detail just about how little jinxes and hexes can get you out of danger." He finished.

Then there was a very long awkward silence until Carter fell off her chair, and started laughing and so did everyone else, she sat back down. During the lesson Harry spoke about simple spells like shields, and the bat bogey hex, which Al and Rose laughed at, Carter and Scorp looked at each other in a knowing look saying family thing. Before long the bell went and they were free for the rest of the day.

Al and Rose beckoned them forward, and so they went forward with them and talked to Mr. Harry Potter himself:

"So you're Draco Malfoy's son" Harry said to Scorp

"Yep" he replied popping the 'P'

"You're the girl who was unconscious in the hospital wing in Al's first letter home, and you said your guardian went to go snog his girlfriend senseless?" asked Harry.

"Yeah" Carter replied

"Has James blown up a toilet yet?" Harry asked

"No not yet but it can't be that long can it Dad?" answered Al

"No" he answered "So who's going home for Christmas?" Harry asked, and was replied from three yeses from Al, Rose and Scorp.

"No, my parents are away on holiday and I want to see the castle at Christmas, I've heard it's amazing." Carter replied

They then said their goodbyes and moved down to dinner; however Al had stayed behind for a few minutes to talk to his father about something. They dug in to the feast, barely bothering to breathe in between mouthfuls. The dinner consisted of many Italian dishes as it was Italian food night, there was; assorted pasta dishes, assorted pizzas, calzones, risotto and for dessert an assortment of different pastries and various flavours of gelato.

After dinner they returned to the Gryffindor Common Room, and started their homework that they had been given including the essay given to them by Professor Longbottom about the impacts of death on the living remainders of the family, they were all having trouble with this except Carter who continuously wrote until she ran out of parchment.

"How'd you get through that so fast?" asked Rose, as it was the first time she had ever struggled with an assignment and the library was not helpful at all.

"Like this" she replied mimicking writing on parchment, while Al and Scorp burst out laughing Rose just glared at all three of them.

"That's not what I meant Carter." Said Rose while Al and Scorp were rolling around on the floor laughing, "I meant how do you know so much about the effects on the impacts of death on the living remainders of the family?" she asked as if it were obvious

"People in my family have died, my grandfather and grandmother, I was there, and we were close, I don't want to talk anymore." Retorted Carter, then she packed away her things and went to bed after saying "Goodnight" in harsh voice showing her emotions of sadness, and anger.

Up in the dormitory Carter took out the photo album; she looked at the photos of her family crying, read the letter that she had sent back to her dorm, from the Great Hall. Suddenly she had a streak of inspiration; she would write another letter despite the fact no-one other than her would read it, and that thought loomed in her head as she fell asleep, not even noticing Rose coming up to apologise for upsetting her, or her friends taking her essay and reading it, just to get a brief idea of what it felt like to lose a loved one.

When she awoke she found her essay gone and felt relieved that she hadn't said how many or who in her family was dead just in case someone found the essay, although she was peeved off with her friends she couldn't help but be happy that so far there had been no relapses or memories of torture or murder. She wrote to her family;

Mum, Dad, Ariel and Kayla,
Honestly I still hear your last words and your screams, I can still see your dead bodies' and I don't think I'll ever get to the point where I won't.
Some of the pain is new and some of the pain has resurfaced, but either way I'm trying to deal with it, but I still experience it.
Sometimes I wish I had been taken in your place, so that I would not suffer, but what's done is done, you can't change the past. (Well actually you can but I need a time turner for that, but Al and Rose's parents along with Prof. Longbottom and Mrs. Scamander destroyed them all, and the prototypes haven't been released yet, so I can't change the past.)
If one thing about all your deaths' makes me happy, it is that you are all together, and that when I get there I will have my family waiting for me.
I like having friends, and I sort of want to tell them about who you really are and that you are no longer with me physically, but I don't want the sympathy, I've had too much of that in my life.

I miss you, and I always will, but someday we will be together again
Carter Elisabeth Nickel
(Daughter, Sister and Last living Nickel family member)

She then put it with the other letter in the photo album and went to take her essay back from Rose, Scorpius and Albus.

"ALBUS SEVERUS POTTER, SCORPIUS HYPERION MALFOY AND ROSE HERMIONE WEASLEY…" Carter yelled coming down the stairs

"CARTER ELISABETH NICKEL!" yelled Al and the other two laughed while Al glared at Carter, the same way she was glaring at him.

"We shouldn't have told her our full names" Scorpius whispered to Rose who giggled

"I WAS DEFINITELY CLEAR THAT I DIDN'T WANT ANYONE TO KNOW ABOUT HOW I KNEW SO MUCH ABOUT HOW THE IMPACTS OF DEATH ON THE LIVING REMAINDERS OF THE FAMILY" she yelled and added a whispered side note of "I think".

"Carter, you weren't that clear" said Al

"ANYWAY, I DIDN'T WANT YOU TO READ THAT, ESPECIALLY WITHOUT MY PERMISSION, AND I AM NOT GOING TO ELABORATE ON THAT FACT. NOW I AM FINISHED YELLING AND I AM HUNGRY!" Yelled Carter

"We are very sorry for levitating your assignment out of your dorm and reading it so that we could understand what we had to write about" said Al.

They both looked around and noticed that besides them it was completely deserted and so they made their way to breakfast, and Carter accepted their apology on the condition that she got to steal their bacon. Rose wasn't happy that Carter had the right to their bacon and grudgingly gave it to her.

Authors Note: YOU LIKE IT? YOU LOVE IT? YOU REVIEW IT!