Because it's Christmas you're getting the second chapter today instead of Friday. Chapter three will be posted in January.

Merry Christmas everyone!

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They had a brilliant time in town and Hope had a lot of fun showing him the various shops; taking him into the thrift shop she had mentioned before when he expressed the desire to pick up a coat for a friend.

He was a pure delight to shop with as he found everything interesting and was beyond curious to everything displayed while maintaining a fairly decent air of appearing entirely non-magical to everyone around them.

And she had even accidentally struck gold when he'd been distracted by the book shelves, finding a copy of both Alice' Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass that were both in very good condition without him noticing.

She had covertly signalling the store clerk to hide them away, something the man had done with clear amusement and had even found paper to wrap them up in while she innocently picked up a book she thought Remus would like as well to cover up her purchase; claiming it to be an extra little Christmas gift.

Having given her a thoughtful look, Sirius asked if there happened to be a candy store in town so he could pick up something purely Muggle for all three of his friends as an additional little Christmas present and as she'd led him there, she wasn't entirely surprised when he also picked up something for James' parents.

She enjoyed watching him explore and point out the various candy he recognised from what either Remus had brought along after holidays or she herself had sent over during the school year, biting back an amused laugh as he subtly tried to find out what type of sweet she and her husband enjoyed the most.

Playing along she pointed out a few more sweets that the three boys might like so he could add them to his bag while filling up a small bag with butterscotch toffees and picking up two pieces of Lyall's preferred licorice; quietly mentioning how much they loved those.

Having her purchases ready she made a show of going to ask the shop assistant what was new; pretending not to notice to see the boy subtly fill up two bags behind her back while she was supposedly distracted.

The shop assistant smiled as she made sure to stay with her back towards Sirius and kindly aided him by pretending to point out a candy that was supposedly newly in stock; coincidentally on the other side of the store from the register and she gratefully followed her while Sirius subtly made his way there to pay for his purchases.

"Thank you," she whispered softly to the assistant as it was clear the man had heard most of their conversation and was helping out.

"Any time," the man smiled. "It's really sweet, usually teenagers only think of themselves."

"He's a really sweet boy. Hey, do you happen to have something that is sour instead of sweet? He doesn't like sweets."

"How sour?"

A devilish idea formed in her mind. "Something small that's incredibly sour and something average."

Laughing, the shop assistant pointed out a bowl filled with very yellow roundish candy. "That is Barnett's Mega Sour Lemon, the sourest candy I know and I do mean sour. And we've got lemonheads, they are also sour but more average."

"Thank you," filling a small bag with the lemonheads before picking out two of the supposedly very sour ones and putting them on the top, she saw Sirius had put his purchases away so thanked the shop assistant again before making her way over to pay her own purchases.

"Vacuum cleaner?" He asked as she joined him.

"We can make our way there but first I'd like to get your opinion on this candy," picking out one of the two Barnett's from the top of the bag, she made sure to keep a pleasant smile as he popped it into his mouth without hesitation.

But apparently the shop owner had lied to her about its sourness as he gave an appreciative hum while he sucked on the candy and a little let down, she popped her own into her mouth, only to almost immediately choke on a coughing fit as the incredibly sour taste hit her.

"You all right?" He gave her a gentle thumping on her back, but didn't panic as she'd half expected he would at her severe reaction and instead held out a piece of paper to drop the candy in.

"I'm all right," accepting it to spit the candy out into, she managed to catch her breath again. "Holy crap, that's sour."

"Didn't you know that when you bought it?" There was a slight tremble to his voice and suspiciously she looked at him to see a smile twitch and she realised what had happened.

"You pranked me!" Scandalised she watched him burst into laughter. "How did you know?!"

"Did you honestly think Remus wouldn't have told us all about you? I know you like pranks and it was really obvious what your intention was when you handed the piece of candy over instead of doing the normal thing and that is holding the bag out to me," he laughed at her. "They were about as sour as I expected but not overly so that I couldn't keep my expression straight."

"Not overly so? Jeez," pulling her handkerchief out of her pocket, she dried the tears that had sprung in her eyes. "I can't believe you saw through my prank, that is so mean!"

"If it helps, you do have a good poker face, but you forget that I live in a dorm with James and your son. I've seen the kind of pranks Remus thinks are funny."

"I should have remembered that," bumping into him, she accepted the toffee held out to her so she could get rid of the awful aftertaste. "Let's pretend this never happened, shall we?"

"Oh no, I'm going to tell Remus all about this when we get back," the mischievousness in his eyes made her groan. "He deserves to know all about how his mother got her own prank turned against her."

"He'll never let me live it down."

"Nope," he sounded way too cheerful about that so she tried to mock-glare at him, blinking as she realised he was still sucking on the candy.

"You didn't spit it out."

"It's honestly not that bad once you've gotten past the first twenty seconds or so," he admitted distractedly and she turned to him questioningly.

But she never got to open her mouth to ask her question as Sirius suddenly dashed from her side and she blinked stupidly, not realising what was happening until the shrieking sound of brakes registered in her ears and she froze as she realised he had run straight into the busy traffic; in front of the truck desperately hitting his brakes even as Sirius already dashed between the parked cars on the other side.

Her heart stopped as it fully registered what had happened; before she could move more than two shaky steps he had already made his way back over; this time much more carefully and she only managed to whimper as she desperately grabbed him in a hug. "Oh my god, what the hell were you thinking?!"

"Sorry, he was going to hit it," he returned her embrace even as he apologised.

"It?" She was faintly aware there was a hint of hysteria in her voice as she ran her hands over his face and arms, desperate to check for herself he was truly all right.

"I'm fine, I knew I could make it without a problem or I'd have just used magic to pull us both out of the way," he tried to reassure her even as he looked down at the hand he was cradling carefully against his stomach much like he'd done with her doll and she blinked stupidly as he revealed a kitten in his hand.

"You…..you dashed into traffic to...to save a kitten?" Fighting to get her heartbeat back to normal, she could only stare at him as he gave her a wary look, unzipping his coat enough to carefully stick the kitten in before pulling a bar of chocolate out of his bag and snapping a piece off; startling her with the loud sound penetrating the brakes she could still hear in her mind.

"Here, eat this. It will help," he promised and blindly she accepted it, automatically biting a piece off and surprisingly she found that it indeed did help as she calmed down.

"You dashed into traffic to save a kitten," repeating it to herself didn't really help make it less insane, but she could admit to herself that it was undeniably something he would do and the reminder that he had magic helped squash down the remainder of her panic.

"Don't take this the wrong way, but I really, really want to throttle you for scaring me," swallowing thickly she pushed against his shoulder a little harder than she'd intended before pulling him back into a hug. "Don't you ever scare me like that again."

It belatedly occurred to her that she really, really shouldn't have pushed him like that, not with what she knew about him, but her rough action didn't seem to scare him as he simply hugged her back with another apology.

"Is he all right?" The unfamiliar voice was enough to make Hope pull back to see a vaguely familiar woman stand beside her with wide, worried eyes, though she couldn't bring herself to completely let go of him and grabbed his hand.

"He's fine, you're fine, right?" she turned back to Sirius.

"I'm fine," he confirmed. "I'm sorry for worrying you."

"I saw what you did, thank you," the woman held a hand to her heart. "Aditi got out and I was looking for her. But when I finally spotted her and the danger she was in, you were already there and you saved her."

"Oh, she's your kitten," carefully pulling the kitten out of his coat, he held it out to the woman. "She's really cute."

"She is, but you should never risk your life for an animal," although the woman's words were stern, her relief was plain to hear as she pulled the kitten into her hands. "I'm sorry Mrs. Lupin, for having endangered your son."

"He's not….," wetting her lips she finally registered it was actually Mrs. Acharya living down the street standing beside her. "Sirius is my son's friend."

"Oh, I honestly thought you had a second son that I'd somehow missed the existence of," Mrs. Acharya placed a hand on her heart in relief. "It's nice to meet you Sirius and thank you, again for saving Aditi."

"She's a beautiful kitten," reaching out to pet the little thing for a moment, Sirius smiled and his natural charm immediately thoroughly charmed her neighbour as she smiled in return.

"You must let me do something to thank you, what do you like?"

"Oh no, you really don't have to thank me, I'm just glad she's safe," it appeared that Sirius was aware of how her heart was still hammering in her throat as he hadn't pulled his hand back yet.

"I insist, do you like sweets?" the woman shook her head even as she held the kitten securely in her arms.

"Not really and you really don't have to do anything," he tried to brush her off but it was clear the woman wasn't going to take no for an answer.

"He likes sour candy better," Hope offered. "If you really insist on wanting to do something for him."

"I'll think of something," Mrs Acharya nodded. "Will you be here long?"

"Just the weekend, but my son can take it along for him when they return to boarding school," she swallowed and really wished the woman would leave already and it seemed Sirius picked up on her discomfort as he gave the woman a disarming smile.

"Would you please excuse us? It was nice to meet you but we really do need to get on with our shopping before my brother and her son get worried about what's keeping us."

"Oh of course dear, we wouldn't want to worry them. Thank you once more for saving Aditi," thoroughly charmed, the woman walked off and Sirius squeezed her hand worriedly.

"I'll let go of you in a minute, I promise," the prolonged contact couldn't be comfortable for him, but she couldn't bring herself to let go just yet.

"It's all right, I know I scared you….oh," half turning to her, he murmured something that sounded like a spell before he reached into his pocket with his free hand and pulled out a hand mirror of all things.

Tapping it with his thump it shimmered before to her utter surprise James' face appeared in it.

"Hey, where in town are you?"

"On our way to the household supply store now, had a little detour," it was surreal to see James' face nod.

"We've just entered town so will make our way to the house….the what?," amusement tickled her as James frowned over the unfamiliar word, looking over his shoulder as Remus murmured something in the background and his expression cleared. "Household supply store."

"Right, see you there," thumbing the mirror again the image disappeared and he pocketed it again before looking up to her. "Any chance I can prevent you from telling James about what I've done?"

Choking on a laugh, Hope rubbed her free hand over her face as his hopeful tone finally settled the last bit of the unrest in her. "Give me another piece of that chocolate, never mention I tried to prank you and we've got a deal."

"Okay," grinning, he handed her the rest of the bar.

"What was that thing?" She asked as she finally let go of his hand.

"A Two-Way mirror. James and I developed them last year so that we could talk to each other when we are in separate detentions," he pulled it back out of his pocket to show it to her. "It's come in really handy in other situations as well."

"You can write messages on it?"

"No, but as you saw we can talk to each other through it. But being able to pass messages that way would be really handy, too," she could almost see him make a mental note to himself as he pocketed it again.

"What is the range of it?"

"We haven't really been able to test that yet, I know James is hoping it will have a long enough range that he can contact me from his home when I'm stuck in Grimmauld Place," and if she didn't know exactly why he'd be hoping that, she'd eat her shoe as she assumed Grimmauld Place was the house Sirius had grown up in.

"And you actually made that yourself? That is very impressive," she praised him and he flushed a little embarrassed.

She didn't even need to see the store to know they'd arrived as Sirius absolutely lit up as James and Remus came running to them, the former immediately pulling Sirius into a hug like they'd not seen each other for months instead of maybe three hours.

"Did you have fun in town?" He asked his brother as Remus came to stand beside her.

"Yeah, we went to a thrift shop and a Muggle candy store, they have even more choices than Honeydukes does," Sirius eagerly said. "I picked something up for you both with the help of Auntie Hope and I have to figure out a way to apologise to her as I gave her a heart attack when trying to save a kitten."

"What did you do?"

So much for asking not to tell James what had happened, she thought bemused as Sirius told him exactly what he'd done, including of what he'd done that morning to her vacuum cleaner; like he had no filter at all when it came to the other dark-haired boy as he hugged him wide-eyed and from the way Remus facepalmed she figured it wasn't a one time occurrence.

"You blew up Mum's vacuum cleaner, really?"

"I'm getting her a new one, no worries," as if Remus needed reassurance of that as he rolled his eyes and turned to her.

"Are you all right, Mum?"

"I'm fine, Sirius protected me from the evil thing without a problem," grinning as he rolled his eyes at her now, she wrapped an arm around him. "But let's finally get a new one before the stores close."

Fifteen minutes late she was the proud new owner of a brand new Hoover 427, having picked a red one to represent the House all three boys belonged to; much to their amusement and Remus had been tasked with carrying it as neither boy seemed entirely sure if it would be safe to shrink it and didn't want to risk it.

It had been a delight to see the two boys look around the household supply store and she had to stifle a laugh more than once as Sirius had relayed everything she had told him about electricity to the other while Remus shook his head fondly.

Although both boys were excited to look around in the store, they had enough sense to do so without drawing attention to themselves; calling one of them over if they wanted to ask questions instead of loudly proclaiming about weird Muggle things the way her Lyall had done the first time he had come with her.

But the household supply store had nothing, absolutely nothing on the pure hilarity of seeing the two in the supermarket after she'd asked them if they'd like to join her in getting groceries.

She gleefully followed them around as they explored to their heart's content, discussing what they were seeing and freely asking questions about various brands and differences in taste that she tried to answer to the best of her abilities while making sure not to lose sight of her cart as Remus had deposited her new vacuum cleaner in it.

To her surprise Sirius picked up several non-perishables that were ready to eat but when he caught her questioning gaze he glanced at Remus a little nervously and she realised they were meant for the people he'd talked about that morning and giving a small nod she grabbed a bag of Christmas candies to add to his pile.

It might not be the most healthy or useful of foods in the long run, but a little Christmas spirit couldn't hurt and from the considering look he gave the bag before adding a few of his own she figured he didn't mind.

Maybe she could even make some of her grandmother's famous ginger cookies tonight so he could take them along when they left Monday morning.

Humming to herself, she mentally added the ingredients for that to her existing list; localising the ingredients needed to make pizza as the boys had been asking her for it since they'd arrived. Might as well teach them how to make their own since Sirius had ensured her afternoon was free of chores to do.

The whole pizza making turned out to be a small disaster she probably should have seen coming considering Remus and apparently James, too, were nightmares in the kitchen, but it was a lot of fun; though she wasn't even going to attempt to clean up the mash of questionable dough James had somehow managed to end up with despite using the exact same ingredients the other two had.

Instead she'd asked him to get rid of it and a single sweep of his wand had the thing removed so she could help him start over before assigning Sirius to assist him as it turned out the other Pure-Blood was surprisingly good at the whole making food thing; though he shyly admitted he had learned how to cook and bake alongside a House-elf in training at Hogwarts so already knew the basics.

In the end they did end up with decent enough pizzas that weren't completely inedible if she cut the edges off of Remus' and James' creations so she would consider it a win either way as the boys had had fun.

After dinner where she'd normally be left alone as Remus went to do his homework in his own room, he now settled at the kitchen table with James to help him while Sirius helped her make her ginger cookies and as they chatted she wondered if perhaps she could tempt her son to join her like this more often.

She might know little to nothing about magic, but that didn't mean she couldn't learn while enjoying her child's company.