The Slytherin Transfer

25: "I think we ruined the mood."

Christmas morning I wake up on the couch in the common room, again lying next to Sirius and again having his arm wrapped tightly around me. I pluck it off and stand up, leaving him to sleep in order to shower and change. When I get back down, he's sitting up, yawning hugely as he rubs his eyes. Before he can even process anything, I've chucked a pillow in his face.

"Happy Christmas, jerk off."

He focuses on me and swiftly pelts the pillow back my way, hitting me square in the head as he grins.

"Right back at you, dipshit," he says as he stands up, yawning hugely while I plop down on the arm chair, using my wand to dry my hair.

I look up as Mariah comes down the stairs, dressed in her pyjamas with a wide grin on her face as she holds a small parcel in her hands.

"Happy Christmas!" She says in her high pitched voice, and I tug her into a hug, her stumbling over me and working to not fall onto my lap. Sirius ruffles her hair as she sits down on the floor.

"Happy Christmas, kiddo," he says as I lean forward in my seat.

"Is that the only gift you got?" I ask, frowning as I remember the small pile of presents that were at the foot of my bed when I went up to my dorm.

She just nods happily, tearing open the wrapping paper as I share a look with Sirius. We watch as she tugs out a colourful scarf, striped with blues and yellows and oranges. She slings it over her neck, looking a little sad as she reads the card her mother sent her.

"Be right back," I mumble, rushing up the stairs and heading to my bunch of gifts. I take the one from Dorcas, which is a box of chocolates (I know because she told me), and head back to the common room. After tearing off the tag that says who it's from, I hand it to Mariah, and she looks up at me, a grin breaking out on her face before she pouts.

"I didn't get you anything," she says, and I wave her off.

"Just promise me you'll help Sirius and I prank Filch again later," I say as I sit next to her, Sirius smiling at the scene as he too takes a seat. She nods eagerly, opening her gift and thanking me before heading upstairs to shower. We watch her go, me sighing and feeling a little bad that she only got one measly gift from her mother. She's a Muggleborn, and I think she's having trouble making friends, as well as being terribly homesick. I'm sure her mother misses her greatly as well, but because she's on a business trip, Mariah can't go home.

I pull out Sirius's gift from my pocket, chucking it at him as he tosses me mine.

"You go first," I say, shuffling over to sit next to him as he eagerly tears the carefully wrapped paper, pulling out the dog tags that are inside and examining them closely. I nervously fiddle with my hands as he goes quiet, just staring at the two metal plates engraved with different words.

The first one reads SIRIUS 'PADFOOT' BLACK, and the second one reads WE'RE THE SHIT. I wanted to do something that would be special to our friendship, and I thought that the amount of times we've laughed about Hocks and Gardner saying this would be perfect. He chuckles as he reads it, and I feel slightly less anxious, watching him put them on.

"Do you like them?" I ask uncertainly, and he scoffs.

"Are you kidding? This is the best gift I've ever gotten," he mumbles, almost in a sad tone. He hugs me to his side briefly before just continuing to stare at the tags. I watch him, a twinge of sorrow in my heart as he goes quiet once more. Soon, he snaps out of his daze and nods at the parcel in front of me, wrapped in the issue of the Daily Prophet where I'm on the front page.

"Go on then," he says, and I laugh at the cover.

"Very clever," I say, rolling my eyes as he grins. I carefully open the wrapping, frowning when I see my hat inside. The same hat that Sirius stole from me on the train. I'm about to tell him it's a lame gift, when I see that instead of the Muggle baseball team logo that used to be on the front, he's replaced it with his own slightly messy but still quite legible embroidery. It says ASSHOLE'S CODE in large letters across the front, and I grin, laughing slightly.