CHAPTER FOURTEEN
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THE SNOW FELL freely upon the ground as December greeted them with open arms. As per their tradition, Louise and Winnie made their way down to Hogsmeade for the first weekend of the month, feet trudging through the powder accumulating on the ground.

Lily, Marlene, and Dorcas were huddled together at the end of the path, perking up when they saw Louise and Winnie in the distance. "Finally! I refuse to be out here a moment longer!" Marlene called out, turning on her heel and starting off toward the village.

"Zonko's, Marlene! I refuse to leave without going to Zonko's!" Louise called out, scowling when she saw her heading into a different shop in the distance. "Why is she so difficult?"

Lily laughed brightly at the two and shook her head. "I think you're both the same bit difficult," she told her playfully. Louise's mouth opened wide to respond, but Winnie very quickly interrupted her by pointing something out in the window that was completely irrelevant to the conversation.

The distraction worked like a charm and Winnie and Lily shared a quick satisfied look as Louise launched into a very detailed tangent on bludgers. They trailed through each shop at a peaceful pace, Louise finally getting to Zonko's like she wanted and spending an irresponsible amount of money on it.

"What? My parents haven't cut me off yet," she joked as she threw a few more items into her shopping bag. "James and Sirius will absolutely love these. I'll get something more tame for Remus and Peter, though."

Winnie had absolutely no idea what she was grabbing although she knew it was safe to assume that they had already made quite a few trips to Zonko's this year and probably didn't need one bit of it. But by no means did that stop Louise.

Finally came Winnie's favorite part of the trip, no question. The warmth of the Three Broomsticks welcomed her immediately when they stepped inside. She took a deep breath, the smell of warm food and butter beer filling her nose and loud and whispered conversations filling her ears.

"Speak of the devil," Louise murmured with a grin, staring off to a very specific spot in the tavern. "Come on." She grabbed both Lily and Winnie's arms while Lily seemed very displeased the minute she saw they were headed to a table where James, Sirius, Peter, and Remus sat. Marlene and Dorcas looked absolutely delighted. Louise held up her Zonko's bag triumphantly and grinned at the Gryffindors, interrupting them mid conversation.

"Apologizes for the interruption. Got room for more?" she announced herself loudly. James and Sirius shouted loudly in excitement at the sight of the bag in her hands and moved aside so that she could sit down near them. Eventually they had crammed all nine of them at a table that wasn't particularly large enough to do so.

"Of course we can make room for our favorite people," James grinned as they all took a seat. He gave Lily a warm smile and she made a bit of progress by not shooting him a terribly horrible look.

"Oh, I know I'm your favorite, James," Louise embellished dramatically with a wide smile. "No need to flaunt it in front of everyone like this." Everyone laughed at that while Winnie stood up to grab everyone some drinks. If she didn't get some butterbeer in her system soon, she was going to absolutely lose it.

"Five butterbeers, please," she told the bartender when she made it to the front, paying for the drinks and waiting patiently as they were poured.

"Need some help?" a voice asked from behind her, making her jump slightly. Sirius was glancing at her with raised brows and a smirk, holding his hands up defensively. "It's okay, Winnie. No ulterior motives here."

She raised her brows for a moment, thinking before nodding and handing him three of the glasses. "Thank you, Sirius."

He bowed exaggeratedly, nearly spilling over all of the drinks in the process. "I'm always here to be a gentleman."

"Now be a proper gentleman and not spill those drinks," Winnie hissed in caution, gesturing her own full hands to his in a hurry. On the way back to the table he pretended as though he was going to trip and spill everything a few more times and Winnie shot him a glare.

They set down the glasses and James looked directly at her, smiling as if he knew something she didn't. "Oh, Winnie, I found out something great the other day." Winnie took a sip of her butterbeer, relishing the taste while she nodded along to whatever it was James was on about. "Now before you get so excited you start demanding to hear what it's about, I have a word for you: tarot card readings."

"That's three words, James," Remus interjected amusedly, leaning back in his seat with his own butterbeer glass in his hands. Winnie went absolutely red, however, at the mention. When she was joking about it was Amias, that was quite different since he was there for it but now her fourteen year old self was a topic of discussion which was less than preferable.

"I would love to know what you were doing in fourth year, James," Winnie replied, trying to steer the conversation elsewhere. Sirius was not about to let that happen.

"Tarot cards? Are you a Divination prodigy, Atkinson?" he pressed on, leaning forward on the table in interest.

Louise snorted while taking a sip of butterbeer. "She definitely thought she was," she laughed while she wiped away the stray butterbeer from her nose. James and Sirius found this enormously hilarious and Winnie shot Louise a warning look. Louise simply shrugged and mouthed, "It's true."

"Please do a reading for me, Winnie, please," James begged with a huge smile on his face, looking at her expectantly. Winnie's face snapped from stern to a sudden smirk in a matter of seconds.

"Okay, James. Give me your hand, I'll do a palm reading," she told him, gesturing for him to lay his hand across the table while she sipped the last of her butterbeer, leaving an empty glass. James did as she requested and she took his hand in hers and pretended to stare at his hand intently for a moment. "Ah, I see. Here, do you see it?"

James nodded, faltering now that she actually appeared to be good at Divination. "Here, this line tells us something extremely important. You're a massive idiot," she concluded concisely, shoving his hand up into his face and effectively making him hit himself with his own hand.

The whole table erupted into laughter and Sirius even gave her a high five for her efforts.

"I respect that, I respect that a lot," Louise giggled as she mocked James, who looked at first mildly shocked and then smiled reluctantly at her.

"Now, I actually have to go, my parents' gifts won't buy themselves," she announced to the table, putting down her empty butterbeer glass and gathering her things.

Lily stood up as well, explaining, "I want to buy my parents' Christmas gifts while we were here, too." Winnie nodded and the two of them bid goodbye to the others and stepped into the white glow of the winter afternoon, cold biting at their faces.

Shop after shop, Winnie had finally decided on a necklace for her mother and a rather interesting book for her father. Lily had picked out her own gifts and they had begun their trek back up to the castle.

"I don't hate them," Winnie said suddenly after slightly slipping on some snow on the path and Lily helping her up a little bit. It was a sudden thought, no reason for it, no need for announcements. But she was sure now.

"Hate who?"

"You know who I'm talking about," she replied, shooting Lily a glance with raised eyebrows. Lily looked confused and Winnie rolled my eyes. "I'm not going to be hell bent on hating Sirius Black. Or James Potter. I don't hate them. I don't mind their company — I'm starting to quite like it."

Lily paused for a moment and shrugged. "I suppose James is more bearable than he used to be," she admitted, staring off into the distance absently for a moment like she was thinking about something. "And I would never tell you who to be friends with."

Winnie smiled at her and nodded, at both parts of her comment. As the castle neared in the distance, Winnie's heart felt a little lighter.