The next to last day of fall term FitzSimmons joined everyone else in the Great Hall at 20:00 for the inaugural meeting of the Hogwarts Dueling Club.
As the bell in the clocktower rang out the turning of the hour, resplendent in deep plum robes and a matching wizards hat with little yellow stars all over it, Gilderoy Lockhart walked out onto the golden stage that had been erected along one wall, dragging a scowling Snape with him who looked like he would rather be anywhere other than there, even at a 'Harry Potter Appreciation' banquet.
Silencing the crowd that was busy talking amongst itself, Lockhart greeted everyone with a bright and cheery, "Gather round, gather round! Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent! Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I myself have done on countless occasions — for full details, see my published works. Now let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape. He tells me he knows a tiny little bit about dueling himself and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Now, I don't want any of you youngsters to worry — you'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him, never fear!"
And with that introduction, the two adults went to opposite sides of the stage and took their positions, before swinging their wands over their head, Snape casting "Expelliarmus!" while Lockhart was still wiggling his wand above his head in overly complicated motions, Snape's spell surprisingly sending Lockhart flying backwards off of the stage and smashing hard into the stone wall behind him.
Simmons couldn't help herself. She sprinted over to where Lockhart was struggling to sit up, and began checking him over for a concussion. But Lockhart didn't seem to be too interested in making sure that he was okay, and probably had nothing in his skull to concuss anyway, as he pushed her away before unsteadily getting back up on his feet, tottering as he climbed back onto the platform, making Simmons think that he probably had suffered at least a minor concussion. Fitz, meanwhile, was contemplating the result of Snape's spell, as he knew that the library books' descriptions of the spell only said that it forced whatever the person was holding to fly out of their hand when the target was hit with the spell, and their own practice of the spell the previous year had never sent either of them flying into the stone wall of their private dorm.
But Lockhart was talking to everyone again informing them all that Snape had used the Disarming Charm, and that now it was time for everyone to practice on their own. Both adults stepped off of the platform and began making their way through the assembled crowd, pairing everyone up in order to start practicing. FitzSimmons hung together waiting for enough space to open up around them for them to spread apart to face one another, but before that happened Snape walked up.
"Time to split up the dream team, I think," he sneered, cold and ominous. "Mr. Malfoy, come over here. Let's see what you make of the famous Potter. And you, Miss Granger — you can partner with Miss Bulstrode."
"Or — and just a suggestion here — you can shove it up your arse," Fitz countered, pointing his wand directly at the child abuser's heart, as Malfoy strutted over smirking, mistakenly thinking that he was going to get to duel his self-proclaimed mortal enemy, Harry Potter. "Hermione and I are practicing together, and we aren't afraid to curse you, because we can't be expelled. McGonagall tried it last year, and look who won."
By this point Malfoy and Bulstrode had made it up to them, just to find Potter and the mudblood both pointing wands straight at Malfoy's hero's heart, as Simmons had followed her husband's lead in order to make sure that Snape got the point loud and clear.
Snape, meanwhile, glowered down at FitzSimmons, but apparently knew the truth of their inability to be expelled, or else could see in their eyes and body language that they weren't bluffing about cursing him, as he finally growled out, "Malfoy, Bulstrode, pair up."
Malfoy stared in shock at his hero, unable to believe that such a strong, amazing, caring man would bow to the whims of a pint-sized celebrity and a mudblood.
"No!" he exclaimed. "I'm fighting Potter!"
As FitzSimmons whipped their wands around to aim point-blank at the bully, Fitz at his head and Simmons at his heart, Snape growled, "No you're not. Now get in position," before stalking back up to the stage where Lockhart had already returned.
Smart enough to expect Malfoy to still curse Harry if they were across from each other, FitzSimmons turned and walked away from where Malfoy and Millicent were still standing unmoved, Malfoy glaring daggers at Fitz, all the way across the Great Hall to an open spot amongst the seventh years where there was absolutely no way that Malfoy would have a shot at Fitz unless he tried to send a curse through dozens of people, which they doubted even he would be stupid enough to try, would almost guaranteedly fail if he did, and would probably get him pummeled into Malfoy Pulp by everyone who had his curse come flying past them or hit them.
Meanwhile back up on the platform, Lockhart was saying to everyone, "Face your partners! And bow! Wands at the ready! When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents — only to disarm them — we don't want any accidents — one...two...three —"
FitzSimmons assumed that this meant they were supposed to practice 'Expelliarmus', as that was the only spell they had seen since arriving that evening, and the only spell that they had ran across so far to 'disarm' an opponent (any spell would if it was powerful enough, but disarming someone by killing them wasn't usually what instructors meant when they said to 'disarm your opponent'), but it seemed like this wasn't an opinion shared by everyone else in the Great Hall, as every spell under the velvety black sky was haphazardly cast, turning the Great Hall into the aftermath of a war zone. So while FitzSimmons both shouted "Expelliarmus!", immediately followed by "Protego!" to block the other's disarming charm, resulting in both of their wands trying to wriggle out of their hands but both being able to hold on as their shield charms came out of their tips just in time to deflect most of the other's disarming charm, everyone else cast whatever charm popped into their minds that they thought might enable them to win, resulting in many people lying on the ground, while others suffered the effects of everything from tickling charms and dancing feet jinxes, to having boils and tentacles pop out on their faces, or bloody noses that didn't want to stop bleeding. As Snape moved through the crowd countering all of the curses, Lockhart surveyed the damage as he skittered through the crowd, noticeably only helping people where magic wasn't necessary, like helping them back on their feet or telling them to pinch their noses, the bleeding would stop eventually.
Finally coming to a flustered halt in the middle of the Great Hall, Lockhart said, "I think I'd better teach you how to block unfriendly spells. Let's have a volunteer pair — Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you —?"
But unable to stop himself from being a cunt, Snape interrupted, "A bad idea, Professor Lockhart. Longbottom causes devastation with the simplest spells. We'll be sending what's left of Finch-Fletchley up to the hospital wing in a matchbox. How about Malfoy and Potter?" he finished with a cruel, twisted smile, clearly having some nefarious plan up his sleeve, and unwilling to leave the evening without forcing Potter into a doubtlessly unfair fight against his favorite, Malfoy.
"Excellent idea!" Lockhart exclaimed, waving Fitz and Malfoy up onto the platform that he himself headed towards as well, the crowd parting to let them all through.
But while Malfoy eagerly followed Snape up onto the stage, Fitz refused to move from his wife's side. And so when Snape, Malfoy, and Lockhart were all up on the stage and ready to go, they realized that he wasn't up there with them.
"Harry, up here if you don't mind," Lockhart said cheerfully, beckoning Fitz again.
"But I do mind," Fitz answered, plenty loud enough for the entire hall to hear. "We're here to learn, not to be put in a spotlight, on a literal pedestal. So allow me to put this as politely as he deserves" — here Fitz turned to glare Snape dead in the eyes and pointed directly at the Slytherin Head of House, so that no one could be confused as to whom he was talking — "Go fuck yourself. You're clearly planning on giving Malfoy some secret spell you don't think I'll be able to defend against in order to try to either scare me, or make me look bad in front of the entire castle, because you have some personal vendetta against me for some reason that I still have absolutely no clue what is. So no thank you, I'm not going to be a pawn in your pathetic, lowly, cowardly game. We don't cower before tyrants, we stand up to them — with deadly force, when necessary."
As Lockhart stared at him not comprehending how anyone could not want the limelighted pedestal, or think that an unfair fight could possibly occur under the watchful eyes of two professors — despite it being the other of those two adults who was going to make sure that it was as unfair as possible — Snape did get Fitz's message loud and clear even if he didn't like it, and he began looking around for someone else to embarrass.
But before his eyes lighted on any Gryffindor whom he particularly hated but hadn't had the chance to abuse yet that evening, Ronald Weasley shouted out imperiously, "I'll do it! I'll fight Malfoy!"
As Fitz buried his head in his hand and Simmons chuckled in a 'what an idiot' kind of way as she rubbed her husband's back, Lockhart exclaimed jovially, "Of course it would be you! You two just can't seem to get enough of each other, can you!", referencing Ron and Malfoy, and what would now be their third fight in his presence. "Well, come on up here, then!"
Once Ron was up on the stage next to Lockhart, both adults leaned down to give last minute instructions to their duelist. From where FitzSimmons were standing near the back of the crowd that had recongregated around the stage, they saw Lockhart raise his wand, make a complicated wiggling action, and drop his wand on the ground — definitely not the motions of any spell that they had run across yet in all of their studying. Meanwhile on the other side of the stage, Snape and Malfoy gave matching leers at Ron, before Snape and Lockhart both stepped back.
Lockhart counted to three, and as Ron stood there dumbly not knowing how to replicate the wand wiggle and drop, Malfoy shouted, "Serpensortia!" — definitely not the unfriendly spell blocking charm that they were presumably supposed to be demonstrating for the crowd, given that's the entire reason that Lockhart had picked a 'volunteer' pair in the first place.
A long black snake shot out of Malfoy's wand, falling heavily onto the stage floor between him and Ron, facing towards Ron. After quickly collecting its bearings from suddenly appearing out of a wand and falling several feet onto a platform, the snake raised itself, ready to strike at Ron. The front of the crowd right up against the platform screamed and backed swiftly away, clearing a ten foot gap between them and the edge of the stage.
"Don't move, Weasley," Snape said lazily as he just stood there, clearly enjoying the sight of Ron standing motionless, eye to eye with the angry snake. "I'll get rid of it…."
But same as he had at the quidditch match, Lockhart couldn't help but jump in trying to be the Big Damn Hero.
"Allow me!" he shouted, waving his wand at the snake.
A loud bang sounded as his spell hit the snake, and the reptile flew ten feet into the air before falling back to the floor with a loud smack that almost matched the sound that Lockhart's head had made when it collided with the stone wall near the beginning of the meeting, when he'd had his arse handed to him by Snape. The snake was understandably enraged from this impromptu, nonconsensual being tossed into the air, and hissing furiously slithered straight towards the nearest person whom it was now facing, which happened to be a Hufflepuff named Justin Finch-Fletchley. Off of the platform it slithered and thumped, before raising itself again, fangs exposed, poised to strike.
Apparently minorly concerned that if a snake of his doing killed a student, that he might get a minor slap on the wrist, Snape finally stepped forward, pointed his wand at the snake, cast some silent spell at it with a casual flick of his wand, and the next moment the snake vanished in a small puff of black smoke. Of course, this was of little consolation to Justin, and he turned and stormed out of the Great Hall, no longer having any interest in learning how to duel if he was going to have snakes thrown at him.
A couple of his friends left with him as well, so Lockhart quickly shouted out, "Everyone, everyone! No need to panic, the situation is taken care of!" Quickly looking around, he spotted the girl whom everyone said was the smartest girl in the school, and said, "Granger, how about you?! You can show everyone how this is done!"
Leaning up to whisper into her husband's ear, Simmons asked him, "Together? It's not like we aren't the spotlight at this school anyway, regardless of whether we go up there tonight or not."
Fitz sighed deeply, before answering, "If you want to. I will go up there if you're really sure that you want to."
"They need someone to take this disaster into hand," Simmons replied, before looking back up at Lockhart and saying, "We will be your pair, on the condition that Snape fucks off and stays out of our way."
Noticeably not looking over at Snape at all, Lockhart quickly said, "Come on up, then!"
FitzSimmons walked to the opposite side of the stage from where Snape and Malfoy still were, glaring the Slytherin duo off of the stage as they themselves climbed up the stairs onto the stage.
Once on top and everyone's attention was on them, before Lockhart could continue to mess things up, Simmons walked out to the middle of the stage and shouted, "Listen up, all of you! We're going to show you the Disarming Charm and the Shield Charm. Next meeting" — here she quickly glanced over at Lockhart — "the professors will bring in a couple of new spells after everyone has mastered these two tonight."
Walking to the far side of the stage, she turned to face her husband. Looking back out at the crowd, she continued, "First up is the Disarming Charm, Expelliarmus." Turning back to Fitz, she pointed her wand at where he had his wand pointed towards her, and said, "Expelliarmus!"
Fitz's wand flew out of his hand and through the air to Simmons, where she deftly caught it with her non-wand hand. Throwing it back to him, she said to the crowd, "Now, Harry will block my Disarming Charm with the Shield Charm, Protego." Turning once again to her husband, she said, "One — two — three — Expelliarmus!"
Only this time, Fitz said, "Protego!", and Simmons' Disarming Charm bounced harmlessly off of the silvery shield that had burst forth from the tip of his wand, leaving his wand firmly grasped in his hand.
Walking back to the middle of the stage, Simmons faced the crowd again. "Get back in your pairs, and whoever's closest to where the staff table normally is will cast the Disarming Charm, while the other person tries to block it with the Shield Charm, and then in ten minutes we will tell you to switch. I will count one, two, three to start us off, and from then on count together in each of your pairs. So everyone get in position!" Once they had, she counted, "One! — Two! — Three!"
Spells flew across the Great Hall again but this time in a much more controlled chaos, and only a few people ended up lying on the ground, and none had broken noses or the odd tentacle growing out of their ear or nose. For the next ten minutes, half of the crowd cast Disarming Charms while the other half tried to block them, wands frequently flying across the room as Disarming Charms successfully landed against failed Shield Charms, but no injuries occurred, making Doctor Simmons, not-quite-Md very happy where she watched with her husband from the stage, not wanting to put her life in danger by trying to wander through the crowd giving any help — anyway, it was two pretty simple spells to learn by trial and error.
After ten minutes she whistled loudly and shouted back out at everyone, having them switch who was casting what, giving them another one, two, three count to start them off. When another ten minutes of injuryless practice had passed, she called everyone's attention back to her again.
"Alright! Now for the real deal — real duel time. You are all both going to cast Disarming Charms and Shield Charms. For the first ten minutes, you will each only cast one Disarming Charm, but if everyone seems to have it down pretty well at the end of that, we will spread you all out a little more into two groups and let you repeatedly cast Disarming Charms at each other until someone wins, or you both lose your wands. And this time, all duels will be on our count so that disarmed wands can be collected safely, as there should be a fair few more of them. But before you go, Harry and I will show you what we mean."
Taking their positions at either end of the stage again, FitzSimmons counted down together, "One — Two — Three!", before both shouting, "Expelliarmus!" immediately followed by "Protego!" Fitz got the slightest of upper hands, and Simmons' Shield Charm wasn't able to make it out enough in time, and her wand slipped out of her fingertips and landed on the floor a few feet in front of her, enough Shield Charm to keep it from flying through the air to Fitz like an undefended Disarming Charm would, but not enough for her to manage to hold on to her wand.
"Good job, Harry," she told Fitz with a small smile as she picked up her wand on her way to the middle of the stage again, before saying to the crowd, "And that's what you're going to be doing! Now line up and get ready!"
The next ten minutes were much more hectic than the first twenty had been, and they were actually fifteen minutes as Simmons kept them going after ten since they had only had four duels, what with everyone having to chase down their wands. But it was still much better than the war zone that Lockhart had created at the beginning of the meeting by having everyone cast whatever the hell they wanted to at each other, and there were no injuries, though a few minor bumps and bruises from more powerful spellcasting knocking people on their bums or faces, especially if they were errant spells from behind them or someone who wasn't their partner across from them.
Finally after six duels, Simmons called everyone's attention back to her at the front. "All right, everyone, now for the final thing we will do tonight — extended duels until someone wins, or you both lose your wand. Many times over the past few duels both partners held onto their wands through one Disarming Charm, whether through misses or successful Shield Charms. Well, now you're going to be able to keep casting Disarming Charms, all while still trying to block your opponent's Disarming Charm with your Shield Charm. Once again, Harry and I will demonstrate."
She beckoned Fitz to her and whispered into his ear, "Aim low, I'll hold back a second so you can get your shield up before my charm comes in, and as soon as you block mine for real send your next one actually at me, and we can get a back and forth rhythm going to show them without it looking too set up."
Fitz nodded and they took their spots on opposite sides of the stage, counting together, "One—two—three!"
Fitz yelled "Expelliarmus!" as he pointed his wand to the side of his wife's legs, before throwing up the Shield Charm, as Simmons yelled "Expelliarmus!" on the unspoken count of 'four'. His charm whooshed harmlessly past her, and her charm bounced harmlessly off of his shield a second later. Fitz immediately shouted "Expelliarmus!" again, only actually aiming at Simmons this time, as at the same moment Simmons yelled "Protego!" As soon as Fitz's spell had bounced off, Simmons yelled "Expelliarmus!" while Fitz yelled "Protego!", attacking spell once again successfully being deflected. They continued back and forth for ten spells apiece, before Simmons finally cast two Disarming Charms back to back, the first bouncing off of his Shield Charm like normal, but the second landing perfectly as Fitz dropped his shield and began his own Disarming Charm, causing his wand to leap out of his hand and go sailing through the air to Simmons, who deftly caught it in her waiting, outstretched non-wand hand.
Tossing his wand back to him and mouthing, 'Sorry, babe, love you,' as she walked back to the middle of the stage, she turned to address the crowd again. "Now it's your turn! Now, most of your duels probably won't last that long. In fact, most will probably still end on the first cast. But, if your first cast doesn't disarm your opponent, keep casting until you either no longer have a wand to cast with, or your opponent is wandless. That being said — when your opponent has lost their wand, STOP CASTING DISARMING CHARMS AT THEM IMMEDIATELY! Harry and I will be reporting any abuse to Professor McGonagall and Professor Flitwick, and I'm sure Snape lurking in the corner over there would be more than happy to give detentions to and take points away from any non-Slytherin who abuses this. Also, don't forget that you still have to throw up Shield Charms to defend yourself from your opponents spells. Yes, it is going to be hectic. Yes, I know that none of you really know what you're doing, but neither does your opponent, and that's why we're here, to learn through practice. Both of these spells are safe enough that no one will get seriously injured doing this, and you will also be split into two groups, each of which will get three duels since we're already out of time, to spread you out more so that there will be fewer errant spells and less chance of minor injuries. And like last time, ONLY START ON MY COMMAND! Now, everyone on your right of me stay on the floor, everyone on your left of me spread out against the walls. You'll get your three duels after the first group."
Very few duels made it more than two spells from a single dueler in all six rounds, but there were quite a few duels in which someone did get to cast a second Disarming Spell, usually catching their opponent quite off guard as they forgot that they were supposed to keep dueling when the first spell didn't work. Fortunately Malfoy was still paired up with Millicent, a fellow Slytherin and a large, square, heavy-jawed girl at that, so he wasn't willing to do anything unsportsmanlike against her, especially as she could have very easily beat him into a pulp if he had, as she was substantially bigger than he was, nearly bordering on Crabbe and Goyle size. Who were also paired against each other, and therefore not a threat to anyone else, though they weren't exactly tactically smart enough to think of being unsportsmanlike even if they had been paired against other people, Malfoy being the smarts of their small gang. But all in all it went pretty well for a castle full of students who had no experience in dueling, especially for a first meeting that had started out being led by Lockhart and Snape.
Duels over, Simmons dismissed everyone, telling them all, "Great job tonight, you all made a lot of progress. I will assume that if there were any professors here they would tell you that any dueling outside of Dueling Club meetings is strictly forbidden, so don't do anything stupid, and of course abide by the school rules. But again, great job, think about everything you did and learned here today, and I assume the time of the next meeting will be posted on the notice boards again, and probably be sometime in January since tomorrow's the last day of school. Goodnight all, and don't hang around here too long and safe journeys back to your common rooms since it's already after curfew, and Filch is still a right grouch these days without his cat — not that he wouldn't be a right grouch even if Mrs Norris was still awake helping him. But goodnight, and those of you we'll see tomorrow, see you tomorrow."
And with that she walked off of the stage with Fitz right behind her, and they headed out of the Great Hall towards Gryffindor tower.
The castle talked of nothing but Simmons' Dueling Club meeting for all of the final day of school, and at breakfast the day of the Hogwarts Express back to Kings Cross Station, London.
Even the Slytherins, who had to hate Simmons on the principle brainwashed into them by the Hogwarts House system and the professors who did nothing to bring the Houses together and get rid of the millennium of enmity and bigotry, couldn't help but acknowledge that she had led an efficient and effective lesson, and certainly much better than Lockhart had been doing even with their hero Snape being there with him. And the other three Houses were much less hesitant to come up to her and tell her how amazing they thought her class had been, many even begging her to continue leading all future Dueling Club meetings, even if competent adults did start coming to them, as opposed to Lockhart and Snape.
FitzSimmons, meanwhile, after their last class of the day and term, went by Professor McGonagall's office to tell her flat out to get her act together as deputy headmistress, and make sure that there was someone useful there at the next Dueling Club meeting, at least to wander through the crowds making sure that everyone was doing what they were supposed to and to hand out detentions and take away points from anyone who wasn't, even if she and Fitz still had to lead the actual lesson.
When as expected McGonagall brushed off Lockhart and Snape being in charge as, "I'm sure it wasn't as bad as you remember," Simmons went into excruciating detail of just how bad it really had been, including Finch-Fletchley leaving because of Snape's 'prank', her own hour of having to lead the class just so that something productive would happen, and how much better everything had gone after she, a second year, had taken over.
Finally, McGonagall agreed to 'look into it' before the next meeting just to make this annoying second year whom she couldn't expel shut the bloody hell up and leave, to which Simmons told her that she'd better look into it a little better than she had the rogue bludger, before leaving McGonagall to contemplate her failings as deputy headmistress to make sure that a school-hosted event didn't become a complete clusterfuck and shitshow like it had been on the verge of doing before Madam Shield, temporary Director of Shield in Coulson, Daisy, and Mack's absence, had stepped up and taken control of the situation herself and saved it.
But that had all been a week earlier, and now term was over and Christmas had finally arrived. And early Christmas morning, FitzSimmons were startled awake by scuffling noises and the crinkling of wrapping paper at the foot of their bed. Jerking upright, they both grabbed their wands off of their bedside tables and pointed them at the intruder, as no one should have been able to make it into their secret dorm except for the castle house elves. An intruder who turned out to be none other than Dobby the house elf.
"Dobby? What are you doing here?" Simmons asked, lowering her wand. "And how did we end up with presents again, when we don't know anyone here?"
The house-elf stared up at them mournfully out of his goggling tennis ball eyes, before saying miserably, "Harry Potter came back to school. Dobby warned and warned Harry Potter, and Harry Potter promised not to come back to Hogwarts. Ah sir, why didn't you heed Dobby? Dobby was so shocked when he heard Harry Potter was back at Hogwarts, he let his master's dinner burn! Such a flogging Dobby never had, sir. And why didn't Harry Potter go back home when the bludger attacked him?"
"Bludger? You're not a Hogwarts house elf, are you? How could you have heard about that?" Simmons asked suspiciously.
Dobby's lip trembled before his entire body began following its lead, and Simmons had her guess. "You tampered with the bludger, didn't you?"
"Indeed yes, ma'am," Dobby answered, ears flapping wildly as he nodded vigorously. "Dobby had to iron his hands afterward, but Dobby didn't care, ma'am, for he thought Harry Potter would finally go home."
"First off, let's be very clear about one thing — Hermione never told you that we weren't coming back, only that we wouldn't come by the train," Fitz said, speaking up for the first time. "But secondly, you told us that you didn't want us coming back because there was a plot to make bad things happen at Hogwarts this year — that wouldn't happen to be opening the Chamber of Secrets using a cursed item, would it?"
Dobby stared at them in shock, giving them all the answer they needed.
So Simmons gently said to the house elf, "Dobby, the Chamber has been closed, the basilisk within slain, and the cursed item destroyed, all by Dumbledore himself. The plot's over, it failed — well, other than an annoying cat that will be unpetrified by the end of the year."
For the longest time Dobby continued to stare at them in disbelief, before finally managing to choke out, "Harry Potter and his friend are sure?"
"Completely," Fitz answered. "We found the entrance to the Chamber, told the professors about it, and a week later they were able to go down there and take care of everything. We talked to Dumbledore about it the following day. It's all over, for good. No need to keep trying to kill me to make me go home."
Dobby nodded his head, making his ears flop about again. "Harry Potter is even greater than Dobby knew. Farewell, Harry Potter and friend!"
And with that he cracked out of existence, leaving FitzSimmons alone once more.
Looking down at the small pile of presents stacked at the foot of their bed, Simmons said, "Well, we're awake. Guess we should see who thinks they're close enough to us to be sending us presents."
"Think Ron's mum sent us one again?" Fitz asked as he shifted up behind his wife and started peppering her neck with light kisses.
"None of that, dear!" Simmons exclaimed, wriggling out of his grasp. "Or we won't get to these presents until lunch."
"And that's a problem?" Fitz grumbled, but he let her move down to the presents anyhow without trying to keep her in his arms.
Simmons looked over the labels quickly before saying, "All for Harry, and only four this year — though that makes sense assuming that whoever had Harry's dad's invisibility cloak didn't have anything else of yours still in their possession that they failed to hand over last year or the ten years before, and the other four are the same as last year."
"Nothing from Hermione's parents for you, though?" Fitz asked as he took the envelope that Simmons was handing him.
"Well, I hate to be so cynical, but do you think that whoever's in charge of such things here never told the Grangers when I returned to Hogwarts in September?" Simmons answered slowly. "I mean, Hermione's parents would have obviously started a search for me when I didn't come back on the train in June, though I don't know whether that was just through the police, whether it was both the police and they met some wizards who helped them from the wizarding world side, or even if some wizards managed to get to them before they could go to the police and hoodwink them into trusting entirely in the magical world finding me. But they certainly would have done something. And if the wizarding world did get involved, you would hope that whoever it was or Hogwarts would have alerted the Grangers when I reappeared, but even if they only went to the muggle police, you would still think Hogwarts would send out letters letting all of the parents know that their children had safely arrived from an all-day train ride, in which case the Grangers would have discovered that I'd returned. But if they had been told, you would've thought they'd've sent me a worried letter once they heard I was alive and safe, which we never got. So I'm under the bad suspicion that no one in the appropriate positions of authority here at Hogwarts ever told them. Although to be honest, that is actually a positive for us, as it means we don't have to worry about them when we never go to their house during the summers. Now what's your first present?"
So Fitz opened the envelope that she had handed him, to find a toothpick and a note from the Dursleys telling him not to come home the upcoming summer, either. Next, Hermione opened Harry's present from Hagrid, a large tin of homemade treacle fudge that was too hard to eat. Then Fitz opened Ron's gift, Flying with the Cannons, a book of facts about Ron's favorite quidditch team, the Chudley Cannons, before Simmons finally opened the last present. As expected, it was from Ron's mum, and contained another hand-knitted sweater and a large plum cake.
"Sixteen months minimum, we've never once spoken to this woman, sent her a letter, received a letter from her, or spent any significant amount of time with any of her children, and yet both years she sends Harry a Christmas package," Fitz said. "Is anyone else's spy senses tingling that something odd is going on here?"
"Once was odd, twice is suspicious — if it occurs for a third time next year, we start looking for a conspiracy," Simmons answered. "That, or a serial gift-giver. Maybe if it happens again next year we should ask around the rest of the Gryffindors in our year if they've also received a package from her every year. Maybe she sends Christmas packages to everyone in each of her children's years."
"Hmm — never thought about that," Fitz replied. "Though with four different years currently attending, that's a lot of packages. Though it has been all homemade stuff both years, so maybe she's just bored and has nothing better to do with her time with no children at home, if she doesn't work."
The mystery of Mrs Weasley's Christmas presents as thought through as it could be for the year, FitzSimmons set about enjoying the rest of their Christmas Day, starting with the kiss that Simmons had denied her husband earlier so that they wouldn't be distracted from the unexpected set of presents lying at the foot of their bed, and ending with escapades that your parents wouldn't like me explaining in graphic detail, all before they even left their dorm to go get some breakfast, quite hungry from aforementioned not safe for work activities.