After an hour or two of negotiating and bargaining, Grace was finally able to relocate the branch of Bowtruckles to their new home in an old Wiggentree in the middle of the Forbidden Forest. Bowtruckles are typically extremely protective of their home tree, but after all of the poking, prodding and insults that they had been subject to, they were more than happy to finally leave Professor Eischeid's office.
As was Grace, once she had finished her job and was able to retreat to her nearly empty dorm for the night. Both Ella and Catherine had gone home for the holidays, much to Grace's delight, leaving her alone with Teresa, whom, Grace had discovered, wasn't actually all that bad. Yes, she was quite negative about a number of things, but she still knew how to laugh and was incredibly intelligent. She had also recently finished reading Enchanted Encounters by Fifi LaFolle, claiming that she "actually didn't mind it, I mean, it wasn't that bad" which gave them some common ground.
The rest of the week practically flew by for Grace as she followed her parents around the school, cleaning out magical creature enclosures, checking on her new Bowtruckle friends, setting up enclosures for the new shipment of Flobberworm larvae and even helping to mark some of the first years' work.
She didn't return home – or rather, to her Grandparents' cottage – until the late afternoon on Christmas Eve, and even then she was set to work, preparing food for the next day. Her grandmother had invited the Coopers - the elderly couple that lived next door – to join them for Christmas lunch.
They had also invited the Lupins as well, however they had to decline as they had already arranged to go up to Cardiff where Hope's muggle father still lived to spend a few days with him.
Without Remus, Christmas day came and went extremely slowly. The day had been lovely, however being the only person under forty years old wasn't exactly ideal. She'd already heard a large majority of the stories her parents and grandparents were telling.
Once Boxing Day arrived, Grace's spirits were instantly lifted. She was finally going to see all of her friends again.
At around ten in the morning, her father apparated with her to the Potter's Mansion, briefly coming inside as well to have a chat to his old friend, Fleamont Potter. Grace instead headed straight for the lounge room, where she found James, Sirius, Peter and an angry looking Lily seating on the couches.
"Hi Grace," a few of them greeted in unison.
Grace, noticing Lily's expression, asked "What did he do?"
"Why does everyone assume it's me she's angry at!?" James exclaimed.
"Because you're the one who annoys her the most," Peter replied before turning to Grace. "He asked if she was still hanging around that greasy-"
Lily shot a glare his way, causing him to rethink his words.
"If she was still hanging around Snape, except, he used a few other words to describe him..." Peter corrected himself.
Grace snorted. "Ever the charmer, James Potter. You do realise there are ways to get a girl's attention other than bully her best friend."
Ely and Sam were the next to arrive, one earning a grin from Sirius and the other a glare.
"Oh, cut it out, will you?" Sam sneered, placing his bag of gifts under the tree that had been set up in the corner before plonking himself down on the floor to join in on the circle that was beginning to form in the living room. Ely took the empty spot next Sirius on the couch.
Remus entered the room subsequently, and having not seen him for nearly a week, Grace immediately launched up from her seat on the floor to engulf him in a hug, pressing her lips to the side of his head.
It then occurred to her that no one else in the room actually knew about it yet, this new phase in their relationship, whatever it was. They hadn't really discussed it at all yet, just as they hadn't discussed telling the others.
Unless Remus had already told them and they already knew, although Grace highly doubted it. There is no way that James and Sirius could've kept their mouths shut for this long without teasing her about it.
The only person that Grace had told was Abbey, but even then she only mentioned in her last letter to her that they might've kissed, and even then she tried to down play it as much as possible so that Abbey wouldn't freak out over letter. Her attempts were fruitless, however, as the next letter she received from her friend was written in frantic hand writing, congratulating Grace and asking for more details.
When Abbey entered the Potter's living room and saw the two sitting next to one another, she smirked at Grace, mouthing something along the lines of 'you need to tell me everything later'.
Now that they were all present and seated around the room, James stood up from the couch, wading his way through the various gifts scattered across the floor and standing next to the tree.
He cleared his throat, and with all the attention on him, he announced "Now, we're going to do this in a nice and orderly fashion."
"Yeah right," Sirius snorted.
"What are you talking about, Pads? We're very civilized young wizards and witches," Peter chuckled.
"Oh, Merlin's beard, will the two of you shut up for a bit?" Lily snapped, turning to face them. "Thank you."
"Hm, which one should we have first..." James began pretending to intensely search through the presents, although it was clear her already had one picked out. He held up a box shaped one wrapped in an awful shade of pink with love hearts patterned across it, gripped the tag and read out "To my dearest Lilypad, from the most handsome guy in all of Hogwarts."
Lily just groaned and held her hands to her face. Why had she agreed to come along to this?
---
The next few chapters are probably just going to be fillers idk bc I planned this christmas thing so now we've got to do that but I have something ((hopefully)) exciting after it and then they'll be back at school and I have more semi-exciting things planned.
Also I think I just need to stop promising to update at certain times bc I can never keep on track with the writing I plan to do and uugggggghhhhhh. Or maybe just be more vague.
There should be another update by the end of the week. We'll leave it at that.
- Grace
YOU ARE READING
The Forest - R.L.
Fanfiction(Remus Lupin - Marauder's Era ) She was wandering through the forest when she saw it. A wolfish being, about as tall as herself, with scruffy grey-brown fur and a snarl forming on its lips. But she wasn't afraid. --- Grace Thorne is an eleven year o...
