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bri-cheeses · 4 months

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Christmas Post!!

Okay so I just had this idea so sorry if it’s a little sloppy, but anyways here we go.

The Hufflepuff six and seventh years organize a huge Christmas party the night before everyone goes home. They leave the fifth years out of it because they’re way too stressed about school and homework and O.W.L.s, but the rest of the “upperclassmen” want to party. So they get to work inviting six and seventh years from all of the other houses, which is easy because they’re Hufflepuffs who have countless friends that they can invite.

But anyways, this is the Marauders’ seventh year and the Skittles’ sixth year, so both groups are invited. The day before they have to leave for Christmas break, almost every six and seventh year in the castle heads to the seventh floor, to this one very specific hallway where there’s a tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy and a couple of pacing Hufflepuffs directing people to a door that is, quite simply, just suddenly there. (James and Sirius recommended it to the Hufflepuffs when they were looking for a place to host the party, but they conveniently forgot to correct the Hufflepuffs when they assumed that it was a very specific and odd room that only appeared the day before Christmas break).

When the students walk in, they realize that they were right to dress up in fancy outfits like the invitation card said, because it is decked out in there. Where exactly “there” is, no one is quite sure, but it seems to be a giant ballroom that no one knew about until today. There’s a large section a floor that’s been left open for dancing, and one side of it is ringed with a wide range of different styles of tables and chairs. There are low, rectangle tables that sit twenty or so, along with high, round tables that sit only two or three. The overall effect should be chaotic, but somehow the tables are arranged in a way that makes it look purposeful and aesthetic. There are also centerpieces at each table, poinsettias and candy cane towers and miniature figurines of reindeer and Santa’s sleigh, and it makes the whole place feel extremely festive.

In addition to this, there’s a long table that’s near the other tables (for convenience) that holds heaps of food. Since the Hufflepuff common room is so close to the kitchens, they’re quite good friends with the house elves and convinced them to cook a feast for tonight. Some of the Hufflepuffs even helped the house elves to make the food, and they had a blast hanging out and cooking with the elves.

Hung from the ceiling are garlands and strands of pearls, and mistletoe that grows in random places. There are also little fairies hovering up there, and it makes for quite a beautiful overhead scene. And, opposite of the side of the room with the tables, one wall is made completely of glass. It looks out over the dark lake, which adds to the beauty of the room because of the light of hundreds of stars in the night sky reflecting off of the black water.

It’s so beautiful that the Slytherin Skittles almost forget to breathe when they walk in, wearing their finest because Evan, their resident fashion expert, insisted on following the directions on the card they were given. They all look absolutely stunning, and certain Gryffindors ( *ahem* James *ahem* Marlene) are certainly not staring as they make their entrance. (For reference, the outfits I’m imaging the Skittles in are based on this post by @melemart ).

Pandora drags Evan off to go find Xenophilius, and Barty follows them because he’s a weak man who follows Evan everywhere like a lost puppy. Especially when Evan is looking like that.

This leaves Regulus and Dorcas with the task of finding a table for them, but since Evan insisted on arriving at a “fashionably late” time, most of the tables are already full. The only table with enough room for the six of them (5 Skittles, 1 Xenophilius), is one of the low tables that seats a ridiculous amount. And there’s already plates there, but they’ve been temporarily abandoned. Besides, the plates are all on one toward one end of the table, and there’s plenty of room for the Skittles to sit.

So they do, waiting for Pandora, Evan, and Barty to return with Xeno. When they do, they get up to go to the table with all the food, picking up delicate china plates that have swirling, moving paintings of winter scenes on them. They load up with all the food they can muster, and Barty gets particularly excited when he sees that they have arancini that look (somewhat surprisingly, he mutters) like they’re traditionally supposed to.

After the Skittles have filled up their plates with soups and salad and stir fry and pizza and steak and chicken and tacos and pasta and dumplings and everything else you can imagine, they return to their table. However, they return to find it filled with the owners of the plates of food—the so called “Marauders” and their friends.

Dorcas ends up next to Marlene, across from Regulus, who shoots them a worried glance. It’s no secret that Dorcas and Marlene are bitter rivals on the Quidditch pitch, and he, along with everyone else, is worried that they’re going to get into some sort of fight. It is a secret, however, that Marlene and Dorcas have been meeting up for the past month or so, and are no longer rivals—if they ever really were. In fact, Dorcas has been planning for a while now to ask Marlene to be her girlfriend once they get back from Christmas break. It’s hard keeping something as wonderful as her growing relationship with Marlene a secret from anyone—especially her closest friends. She’s not sure that she’s done the best job at hiding it, either, typically leaving whatever room she’s in when she realizes that Marlene has a free period, poorly made excuses flying out her mouth as she leaves in a hurry.

But Dorcas gets lucky tonight, because if she tenses up from sitting next to Marlene, her friends simply chalk it up to that old Quidditch rivalry.

Marlene smirks when she notices how rigid Dorcas has gone beside her. Then she simply starts digging in to her food, that infuriating smirk still on her face, and Dorcas wants to kill her. Not really though. But almost.

Across from them, Regulus has long since stopped eyeing them with a worried look. He has taken to staring intently down the table at a diagonal angle. For all their obliviousness when it comes to Dorcas, however, the rest of the Skittles know exactly who Regulus is staring at, and why. Barty huffs a laugh when he sees what Regulus is doing, and shakes his head. Regulus shoots him a glare before going back to what he was doing, this time managing to be slightly more discreet as he eats.

Barty and Evan sit next to each other, Barty gesturing animatedly about something while Evan watches with an amused expression. Barty is sitting next to Dorcas, and Evan is at the end of the table, which suits him just fine. It means that he can keep his full attention on Barty without feeling like he’s ignoring the person next to him.

He wonders distantly about what’s in the eggnog that Barty swiped a few glasses of as Barty’s gestures get bigger and bigger, and his words starts to get tinged with a hint of a Sicilian accent. It’s cute, and Evan sits there with an absentminded smile on his face as he nods along to Barty’s rant about he and his grandma make the perfect arancini.

Across from them, next to Regulus, is Pandora and Xeno. They’re currently in a debate about which would be more interesting to see—an octopus made up of jello, or a caterpillar made of a cheese puff. Pandora argues for the octopus, because one, jello is her favorite food (and let’s be honest, who doesn’t like jello?) and two, octopi are fascinating creatures. (“Seriously, Xeno, just imagine what it would be like to see a jello octopus juggling eight different things at the same time!”) But Xeno argues for the caterpillar, because what would it be like when it changed into a butterfly? Would it have a chrysalis that’s made of cheese? Or would it be made of puff? Or would it be made out of Cheez-It Puffs? And would the butterfly be a cheese puff too, or would it just be orange? Eventually Dorcas and Marlene get pulled into their conversation, despite being several seats down, and Marlene argues vehemently for the octopus while Dorcas sides with Xeno, because really, what would its chrysalis be made out of?

And Evan and Barty get up to go get more eggnog and to see what the new, sudden fuss about the food table is, and they see that it’s turned into a dessert table now. And Barty once again gets extremely excited because look, Evan, they have gelato! And so while Barty piles up on that, Evan grabs some cheesecake and a brownie.

They return to their table bringing the good news, and it causes a small stampede as those who are finished with their meals get up to go get dessert. Barty and Evan enlist Regulus to help them bring back eggnog, and they come back with a tray of glasses that they set in the middle of the table.

And eventually everyone returns, and most people snag a glass, and there is definitely something in that eggnog, Evan decides, because the conversation starts flowing so easily between both sides of the table that it starts to feel like they’ve all been good friends for a long while.

And then there’s mistletoe growing over Marlene and Dorcas’ heads and they don’t notice until it’s almost in their faces, and suddenly Regulus is laughing his head off because their faces are so red. He just doesn’t understand what the real reason why they’re blushing so hard is until Marlene says “Fuck it” and leans in to kiss Dorcas on the mouth. And then everyone is hooping and hollering and it’s chaos, but it dies down after a while.

And so Barty and Evan sneak off to go to the dance floor, and Pandora and Xeno leave to go find some of Xeno’s friends, and Sirius drags Remus off to go show him some of the constellations that you can see out the window.

And it’s a good thing that Sirius leaves, because maybe Regulus has finally had enough of waiting, or maybe there truly is something in that eggnog, because suddenly Regulus stands up abruptly, scraping his chair on the floor, and goes around to the other side of the table. No one knows what he’s doing until he grabs James’s face in his hands and kisses him hard, and then James is reaching up to grab Regulus’s face too and they’re practically making out in front of everyone.

And when Barty and Evan hear about it, they’re furious. Because what do you mean Regulus finally made a move, and they weren’t there to see it? After putting up with his whining and pining for years, they don’t even get to see the fruits of their labor?

And so Evan has to go running off in search of some more gelato for his boyfriend in an attempt to cool him down, and then they go over to the window to where there are some high tables that sit two, and they have a good time sharing gelato and looking out at the castle grounds.

Further down from them, Sirius is still pointing out constellations, oblivious to the uproar that just happened at their table, while Remus watches him with a fond look in his eyes.

Marlene and Dorcas take to the dance floor, and Dorcas has just worked up the courage to ask when Marlene blurts out “Do-you-wanna-go-on-a-date—I-mean-like-a-real-date—it’s-okay-if-you-don’t-but-I-just-thought-that-I’d-ask-please-say-yes.” And Dorcas stands shocked for minute, trying to process what Marlene just said. Marlene has just started to get truly worried when Dorcas smiles and leans in to kiss her for a good long minute, before she pulls back and grins and says “I would love that.”

And Pandora and Xeno have also started to dance, but they aren’t dancing in the typical sense of the word. They’re twirling around with their arms up, laughing and having a great time confusing everyone with what they’re doing.

James and Regulus are still at the table, talking to each other, and Regulus actually looks really, really happy for once.

Lily and Mary are standing by the desert table, having what looks like a very deep conversation, and Marlene and Dorcas start to bet on when they’ll get together. Marlene has fifty bucks on January, but Dorcas doesn’t think that it will be until at least Valentine’s Day.

Peter and his date, Benjy Fenwick, have struck up a conversation with some Hufflepuffs, who just brought out a game of Apples to Apples, and they couldn’t be having a better time.

When they all leave several hours later, they all agree that it’s the best Christmas party they’ve ever been to, and the Hufflepuffs start talking about making it a yearly tradition.

Leaving Hogwarts the next day is harder than it’s ever been, but spending Christmas with their families is a nice trade off. Barty gets to spend his Christmas with his grandma this year, since his father is away on a business trip, and he couldn’t be happier about it. Evan and Pandora spend their break in Switzerland, on their yearly skiing trip, and Regulus finally accepts the Potter’s invitation to spend Christmas with them. Dorcas and Marlene promise to send owls to each other, and the constant rapping of owls at their windows never fails to bring a smile to their faces.

All in all, it’s the best Christmas any of them have ever had, and they couldn’t be happier.

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