Home for Holidays
Christmas break arrived much faster than Phedra was prepared for. Nearly everyone was going home for the holidays, but there were a surprisingly large number of students who planned to stay at Hogwarts, or simply really wished that they were. Phedra herself had mixed feelings about seeing her family. She wondered what Susan had told the neighbors about her absence, and if things would be different since she left home for school.
School itself was going well. She was happy to admit that there were no further confrontations with Slytherins, thanks to her well-honed ability to slip into the crowd. The Gryffindor girls remained reasonably friendly with each other throughout the year, while the Gryffindor boys remained reasonably friendly with each other. When the groups were put together the situation was volatile, but manageably so.
This was, of course, with the exception of the time James Potter set Lily Evans’ hair on fire, an incident that nobody, students and staff alike, was about to forget anytime soon. Neither party had directly spoken to the other since the incident (which occurred in mid-November). Lily (and entourage) refused to speak to James out of the coals of bitterness that they enjoyed to stir up late on Saturday evenings over chocolate. James would not speak to Lily out of fear of another well-aimed Jelly Legs jinx (Lily was good with jinxes, and charms, and…). Little resentment was aimed at the other Gryffindor boys…mostly because Remus was far too nice, Peter too forgettable, and Sirius (the other topic of late night Saturday chocolate-fests) too attractive.
The entire train ride into London was spent with Peter scurrying back and forth carrying messages between the two groups, each of which had considered (for dramatic purposes) sitting on the opposite end of the train from the other. The temptation of a good dispute was simply too much for the girls, however, and they ended up sitting only one compartment down from the boys, who were becoming bored with the whole ordeal. Whenever the guys became too apathetic to send Peter back, Michelle would make her way over with a new comment to irk them.
The day went by pleasantly that way. The food trolley went around at noon and the girls piled up on Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans and Chocolate Frogs until they were all on quite a sugar-high. Around two, the sudden burst of energy was fading. Ailis and Michelle headed, giggling, up to the front of the train to see if the woman with the cart would sell them any more Cauldron Cakes, leaving Phedra and Lily in the compartment.
It was quiet. All Phedra could hear was the rumbling of the train, the shrieks of some students down on the other end, and the frantic hooting of an escaped owl a few cars down. It was very quiet…compared to the noise level when Michelle had been inside.
“Well, are you excited for Christmas?” Lily began. Phedra was very glad that Lily had initiated the conversation, because she wouldn’t have known how to begin. Lily was reliable like that.
“Yeah, well sort-of. My family is weird. They’re, well, your family is Muggles too, but my sister is crazy. Maeve, she’s seven.”
“Right. She sent the Halloween card. That doesn’t make her crazy, if that’s what you’re talking about,” said Lily reasonably. “She’s probably really excited to see you, right?”
“Yeah. My mom says so, anyways. In her letters,” Phedra added as an explanation. Indeed, according to Susan (and the Halloween card) Maeve was back to her usually bubbly self.
“So your mum’s excited to see you too. I know mine is. She’ll ask me a thousand questions.”
“Hmm.”
In reality, Susan sounded just as uncomfortable in the letters as she had on the platform back in September. Maybe she just wasn’t a good letter writer. They were quiet for a while as Phedra pondered this, and then Lily burst out.
“I don’t know what do say to Petunia!”
“What?”
“Petunia! She’s been an absolute horror ever since I got my letter in July! And I just know that she’s going to be horrible to me now and I don’t know what to say to her!”
Lily never had been opposed to speaking her mind before, but had been rather tight-lipped about her family. Phedra hadn’t exactly been a fountain of personal information either, and she didn’t pry, but she had picked up that Lily had a sister named Petunia. The last thing in the world she was expecting was an outburst from calm, collected, talented-in-every-class Lily, and she did not know what to say.
“Maybe,” she told Lily, “saying nothing would, um, be best.”
“I’ve already thought about that. I doubt it’ll work,” Lily sighed.
Phedra had told her not to worry too much, because Maeve had sort of been the same way, and was now very excited to see her.
“Petunia isn’t the same,” mused Lily, who had regained composure very quickly. “She’s a lot older than Maeve. Too old for a tantrum. Well, most of the time. Besides, Maeve’s a little sister. She looks up to you. That’s what little sisters do, even if they won’t admit it.”
“Do you look up to Petunia, then?”
“Are you kidding? No!” Lily snorted and shook her head vehemently.
***
When the train pulled into London, Maeve could be seen jumping up and down and waving. Although there were about twenty other young children there doing the exact same thing, Phedra felt as though the entire platform was staring at her and her family. She quickly wished Lily good luck with Petunia, looked around for Ailis and Michelle, didn’t see them, decided she didn’t want to wander around the train looking for them, and hurried off with her trunk to her family.
Susan was as eager to get off of the crowded platform as her eldest daughter was. While Maeve squealed, “PHEDRA!” and attached herself to her sister like an exceptionally large leach, her mother was already headed towards the Muggle part of the station with Phedra close behind and dragging Maeve along. Mark, who did not seem surprised at all over everyone’s behavior, followed along with the trunk.
The snow along the roadsides on the car ride home was gray and dirty, heaped in slushy piles. Hogwarts snow was clean and white. Phedra hoped her yard would be the same. It was, sort of.
“Look at the fort Karen and I built!” Maeve, who had been talking a mile-a-minute since she first saw her sister, tugged on Phedra’s sleeve. “And the snowmen, and snowwomen, and snow dogs, and snow caterpillars, and snow velociraptors, and-”
The yard looked like a rest home for albino animals. All the snow had been rolled into figures which were sitting motionless on dead grass avenues, as Muggle snow people tended to do.
“At school, we made a HUGE snowball that was higher than even your head!” Maeve went on. “D’you like the velociraptor? We learned all about them in school. It’s sometimes a hard word.”
“That’s cool Maeve.” Phedra was comforted a little by the yards of evergreen garland hung over the porch. There had been evergreen garlands last Christmas, and the Christmas before. Christmas this year would not be much different, which was a reassuring thought.
The sun was setting by this time. Maeve led Phedra up to her room, as though she didn’t know where it was, and showed off the new curtains that their mother had put up in there. Then it was downstairs for dinner.
“So, Phedra, how has school been?” started Susan after she had finished dishing up the broccoli and stopping Maeve from blowing bubbles in her milk. The overhead light shone yellow on the kitchen. Phedra ran her finger along the circle of perspiration that her glass had left on the wooden tabletop.
“It was good.”
There was a pause while everyone waited for more.
“We picked that up from your letters,” said Mark. “I think your mother is looking for a little more information than that. For example, what do you do for fun? How are classes? What are your friends like?”
“My friends are nice.”
“We sent you off to a school we know more-or-less nothing about Phedra, and I don’t like not knowing what is going on in my own daughter’s life!” Susan said as she went to refill Maeve’s glass.
“I wan’ ‘o know ‘oo!” said Maeve through a mouthful of pork.
“Um, well, I’ve got seven classes a week. Astronomy, Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, History, Herbology,” Phedra counted them off on her fingers, “and Defense against the Dark Arts.”
“Dark Arts?” Mark looked concerned. “I’ll get it myself, dear,” he added as Susan, looking tense, tried to refill his plate. It was not difficult to note that the plate did not need topping off.
“Yeah, it’s like a self-defense class, but for wizards, because we attack people with wands instead of guns.”
Phedra really did not want to stress her mother out more, but it seemed too late for that.
“But…Dark Arts ? It sounds like it’s respected!” Susan exclaimed, setting down her fork. And she had just started to eat, too, Phedra noticed.
“Mom, don’t worry about it. I don’t think people actually use them a lot, and there hasn’t been a big dark wizard since Grindewald in the forties. I learned that in History of Magic. Magic isn’t bad. Charms is fun! We make stuff fly, like feathers and stuff,” said Phedra quickly. She really didn’t want her mother to panic and pull her from school, and the tone in Susan’s voice suggested that she just might. Feathers were harmless. Phedra went on, “It actually might be a safer place than normal school. Like, this one kid fell off of a broom””
“Like, a flying broomstick for witches?” asked Maeve.
“Yeah, and he broke his arm. If he broke his arm at a normal school then they’d have to send him to the hospital and all. At Hogwarts, there is a Hospital Wing run by Madam Pomfrey. She fixed his arm in a minute, I heard. Like, bam! All better! He was in classes the next day and writing with that arm and everything! Hogwarts is great, it really is.”
“Oh,” said Susan. It seemed that she really did not know what to say anymore. Maeve looked entirely nonplussed. Her brown eyes were as big as the olives her grandmother used to set out when they visited her in Chicago. Phedra didn’t remember anything about Chicago, except for those olives.
With a sudden craving for olives, Phedra returned to her food. She used to be relatively talkative at home, but her “Hogwarts is a wonderful place” speech was over for the moment, and she did not have anything to say to her family that they would be able to follow. If the arm story had thrown them, then she would hate to see how they would react to the tale of the re-growth of Lily’s burned hair. As Phedra silently chewed her broccoli, Susan pulled the conversation around to holiday plans. Susan’s mood relaxed as she decided what to make for Christmas dinner and recalled the good time that she had helping out at Maeve’s class Christmas party. Phedra faded out of the chatter.
There was a good view of the front yard from her seat at the kitchen table. Through the glare of yellow light against the window, she could see a snow wildebeest illuminated against the dark street by the houselights on the porch. It reminded her of the weird snow animals that some sixth years had transfigured alive only a few days ago. The misshapen beasts had run, bellowing, around the school grounds for a good hour until they were blasted apart by some overzealous prefects. It had been fun to watch, although Ailis had almost gotten trampled.
“…but I’m sure you know better anyways…Are you listening to me, Phedra?”
“Huh?”
Only a little annoyed that Phedra wasn’t listening, Susan got up and once again offered some more broccoli to Mark. He declined. She gave him some more anyways.
“I said we’re having some friends over for a Christmas dinner. I told them you went to some private preparatory school back home, Saint Agnes.”
“Back home?”
“Ohio.”
“Oh.”
“So just stick to that story, please. I’m pretty sure you know that you aren’t supposed to let strangers know that you go to Hogwarts. It might be a good idea to prepare some answers ahead of time.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll help you, Phedra. If you need it,” offered Maeve.
“Thanks Maeve. I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
***
On Christmas morning, like she did every year, Maeve woke everyone up at seven to open presents. Yawning and putting back her hair, Phedra showed up in the living room a few minutes later. The family hadn’t had a lot of togetherness since that first night of break (Maeve had been at a lot of different friends’ houses, and Mark had to work late a few nights) and Phedra was really hoping that this Christmas morning would be like old times. It was.
They went through stockings first. Phedra was pleased to find candy. Pumpkin Pasties were great, but they could never match the perfection of a Milky Way bar. Then there were boxes and boxes under the tree. New clothes, mittens and a hat that her Grandma in Chicago had knitted, a desk lamp, and, best of all, a sketchbook from Maeve.
“Will you draw something for me that I can keep?”
“Sure.”
The rest of the morning, into the afternoon, was spent romping around the backyard and throwing snowballs at Maeve. The poor child took a rather large one in the face, and was about to burst into tears when suddenly she bounded back on her feet and waved at someone over Phedra’s shoulder.
“Karen! Come and help me! Phedra’s beating me but we could gang up on her!” Maeve yelled as she struggled through the snow towards a little girl in pink coat. Karen Wilbert lived down the street, and seemed to be one of Maeve’s best friends. She was also giving Phedra a very strange look, at the moment.
“I can’t! Mum wants me looking good for dinner!” Karen hollered back from the road where she had been standing.
“You’re having dinner at my house! I don’t care what you look like!” Maeve retorted.
“Well, Mum does!” Karen shot another look at Phedra, who wondered if she had something on her face. “I’ve gotta go! See you later!”
“Bye!”
Snow was melting into Phedra’s socks at this point, and she felt like it would be a good idea to go inside.
Six hours later, the Wilberts had arrived and everyone was sitting down to turkey. It was supposedly an informal affair; neither family had any relatives in the area so they decided to celebrate together. Still, Phedra felt distinctly uncomfortable. Karen was the only Wilbert child, and it seemed the two families had bonded quite well in Phedra’s absence. Not to mention that Karen and Mrs. Wilbert kept sending curious looks at Phedra, which was also unsettling. The adults were talking about a charity organization for survivors of the freak hurricane that had ravaged the coast in July. That hurricane had been a long time ago. Phedra thought for sure it would be old news by Christmas. There had been some sort of Wizarding disaster back in July as well, and although she had heard lot of people talking about it on the train and in the beginning of September, it had become forgotten to the students by Halloween. July must have been an unlucky month. She wondered if…
“Well, Phedra, you must be very proud!” said Mrs. Wilbert. Phedra came back to the table with a jerk.
“Who knew you had such special talents!” Mrs. Wilbert continued.
Phedra stared at Mrs. Wilbert, who was watching her curiously. Mrs. Wilbert knew about magic? It was probably best to play it safe.
“Erm, thank you.”
“How do you like…. What was the name of your new school again?”
“St. Agnes?”
“Oh, yes, that was the one. What’s it like?”
“It’s very difficult, but the teachers are nice,” Phedra fabricated. She was not a very good liar, and wished that she had spent more time preparing some answers.
“And do they use a weighted grading system there?” asked Mrs. Wilbert keenly.
“Nnn-yeah! Yes they do! Very weighted, actually!” Oh drat. What on earth had she gotten herself into?
“Would you like some more peas, Charlotte?” Mark intervened with a huge bowl, and Phedra relaxed.
“Oh, yes please! Phedra, I’d love to hear more about your school later, then!”
Phedra left the table for her bedroom as soon as she politely could. Much later, after the Wilberts had left, Maeve came up to see her.
“Mrs. Wilbert thinks you’re a delinquent.”
“Wow, thanks Maeve.”
“She thinks that Mom was lying about St. Agnes. I heard her tell Mr. Wilbert. She must be very smart, to figure that out on her own.”
“Not really.”
“What’s ‘delinquent’ anyway?”
“Go away, Maeve.”
Phedra sighed dramatically and flopped on her bed. Stupid Muggles.