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Harry’s First Christmas
A Marauders Christmas Story
by G. Norman Lippert
Dedicated to Tom Grey and
supportstacie.net
“Y
ou have to admit,” the young man said, raising his chin approvingly and looking out over the
busy street, “the city is nice at the holidays.”
“You can admit it all you want,” the auburn-haired woman next to him sniffed,
stepping over an oily puddle on the footpath. “It won’t make it true. Give me a Christmas in the Berkshire
hill country any day. I’ll never be able to feel festive about a Styrofoam snowman impaled on a taxi antenna.”
“The lights are nice,” the man commented, unperturbed. “And the sense of hustle and bustle. It’s
like we’re at the North Pole and all the people around are Santa’s elves.”
“I’ve known too many elves to think
that’s
very festive either, James.” She pulled her wool hat down
on her brow and shivered. “And how can it be this cold without snowing?”
The man smiled and bumped her playfully with his hip. “Buck up, Lil. It’s the first time we’ve been
out of the house alone in months. It might not be an enchanted sleigh ride through a winter wonderland, but
it’s still Christmas. And somebody I know is going to absolutely adore what’s in this sack here.” The man
held up a small white bag with the words
Shugarwhim’s, Diagon Alley
printed on it in dark red letters. The
woman smiled a little crookedly and snatched the sack from his hands.
“He’s too young to even know what footie pyjamas are. All he’ll know is that they keep his little toes
warm at night.”
“I wasn’t talking about
him,”
the man, James, replied quietly, putting his arm around the woman,
Lily, and snugging her close as they walked. She gave a small sigh and settled next to him.
“I adore him no matter what he wears. But the green will bring out his eyes, don’t you think?”
James rolled his eyes theatrically. “I thought so the last three times you asked, back in the shop. I
haven’t changed my mind yet, but I might if you ask once more.”
“It doesn’t hurt you to indulge me, at least while we only have one. Wait until we have a houseful.”
“Like that family back in the sale corner at Shugarwhim’s?” James replied archly. “Don’t even joke
about such things. I’ve never seen so much red hair in my life. And I’m pretty sure one of those ‘charming
children’ tried to sneak a Zonko’s stink bomb into my coat pocket. Little blighter couldn’t have been more
than eight years old.”
“Oh, but did you see the twins? Now that really would be lovely, don’t you think?”
“Now you’re just teasing me. Let’s practice with one baby for a while,
then
we’ll talk about having a
baker’s dozen. Fair enough?”
Lily didn’t answer. She allowed the small sack to dangle at her side as she walked, her eyes pensive.
James glanced aside at her.
“You’re not still worried, are you?” he asked in a low voice.
Lily shook her head slightly, not exactly in negation, and shrugged. She sighed shallowly and said,
“How can I not be?”
James drew a deep breath as they stopped at a busy intersection. A grime covered bus burred by,
pulling a plume of exhaust behind it. James turned to look at his wife. “You heard the headmaster, Lil. Even
if this prophecy is real, we’re perfectly safe. Like he said, if it ever becomes necessary, we can hide the house,
choose a Secret Keeper and lay low until the danger passes. If you can’t trust old Dumbledore to know what
he’s talking about, well…”
Lily looked up into James’ eyes, searching them, her brow furrowed very slightly. After a moment,
she looked away. “Come on,” she said, pulling him by the hand and stepping off the curb.
They crossed the street and walked awhile in silence. The muggle crowd moved around them like a
river around a rock, tense and scowling, lugging packages and hailing taxis. Lily looked up at the windows of
the apartments over the busy street. She knew this area relatively well, despite her profession of distaste for
the city. One of her best friends from school, Anastacia Troika, now lived in a third floor walk-up on the
opposite side of the street. Lily scanned the building and easily found the window of Stacia’s flat; colored
light flickered behind the lace curtains. Muggle passersby on the street would have assumed the lights were a
telly, but Lily knew better. Stacia liked to decorate her Christmas tree with live Russian flickerbirds, their tiny
flashing wings lighting the tree as they built their immaculate little nests in its branches. Lily had helped her
erect just such a tree in the Gryffindor girls’ dorm during their third year, until Dumbledore had suggested
that the flickerbirds’ colorful flashing wings and tinkling birdsong were proving rather a nuisance to the girls
attempting to sleep nearby. Lily had always suspected it had been Christiana Corsica who’d complained to
Dumbledore, and not because the tiny birds were keeping her awake at night. Christiana was simply nasty
and vain, and she tended to dislike anything that might be considered more beautiful than herself. This, at
least, was Lily’s strong conviction, if not an admitted fact. Strangely enough, Christiana now lived in a
penthouse on the next corner, along with her creepy twin brother, Chrystophan. Neither of them worked, as
far as the old school network of Lily’s friends knew, but the Corsica family was wealthy, and everyone
assumed that the penthouse was provided for the twins by their reclusive father.
As she walked alongside James, Lily wondered how many other windows above belonged to
wizarding families, or how many of the shops along the busy street were secretly run by witches and wizards.
Diagon Alley and its secret surroundings were quite large, and yet Lily knew that many of the shops
technically outside of the hidden magical district also kept secret back rooms and upstairs offices, catering to
the thousands of magical folk who travelled through the area each day; the “Diagon Alley run-off”, her father
had always affectionately called them. Some of the secret wizarding shops merely sold cheap magical cookery
and trinkets, like the dreadful cuckoo clock James had gotten her last year, but some of them dealt in much
darker services. For no reason, Lily thought again of the Corsicas and their mysterious penthouse. Was it
possible that they were, in fact, engaged in some sort of business, using their conveniently located home as
their meeting place? Lily shook her head, smiling a little crookedly.
Just because you don’t like her,
she
thought to herself,
doesn’t give you an excuse to imagine her as the spearhead of some dark conspiracy.
She decided not even to mention her musings to James. He had outright hated Christiana’s
Hufflepuff brother, Chrystophan, and would probably have the poor twit mentally convicted and sentenced
to Azkaban before they even got back to their front door in Godric’s Hollow.
As the two of them approached the next corner, a rather thin, unhappy-looking Santa was ringing a
bell and extolling anyone who’d listen about the breathtaking deals to be had in the shop behind him. As
James and Lily passed him, James hooked Lily’s elbow and pulled her sharply around the corner, heading into
a narrow side street.
“Where are we going?” Lily asked, frowning at her husband.
“I don’t mean to cause you alarm, love, so let’s just walk a bit faster and keep a sharp eye out.”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“I can’t know for sure, but I’ve been a sneak long enough to recognize sneaking. I think someone is
following us.”
Lily drew a sharp breath, but James spoke before she could voice her fear. “Don’t worry, Lil,
whoever it is, they’re no older than we are, and not anywhere as good at tailing people as me and Padfoot. I
noticed him when we stopped at the corner a block back. He turned and stared into the window of the shoe
shop like he was trying to count the boots.”
“So we should just disapparate back home,” Lily breathed urgently. “Why are we leading him into a
dark street?”
“Because,” James replied evenly, glancing aside to watch their reflections in a shop window. “I want
to see who he is.”
“James, no!” Lily whispered, glancing up at him. “That’s daft!”
“Stay behind me,” James said, and Lily was annoyed to realize that her husband was rather enjoying
himself. He turned again, suddenly, pulling Lily into a very narrow, dead-end alley. Instantly, he pushed her
to the side, up a series of steps and into a dark doorway. He stood in front of her, his wand suddenly
protruding from his hand. Deftly, he twirled it in his fingers – a trick he and Sirius had practiced for nearly
the entirety of their fifth school term, believing it made them appear dashing and roguish. Lily rolled her
eyes.
Footsteps clattered along the footpath outside the alley and a shadow appeared. A moment later, a
shape ran around the corner and into the alley. The figure was thin, draped in a long black cloak. The hood
had come down, revealing black hair and a long nose. Lily immediately recognized the figure and drew a
breath to call out, but James was faster. He leapt down the steps, blocking the mouth of the alley and raising
his wand.
“Levicorpus,” he commanded, but his voice was drowned out by the voice of the newcomer, who was
a split second faster with his disarming spell. There was a flash and James’ wand spun out of his hand,
clattering into a stack of trash cans at the rear of the alley.
“Really, Potter,” the voice of the newcomer drawled, “You should try to learn some new spells.”
“Severus!” Lily cried, moving past James, getting between them. “What are you doing?”
“Not what you are probably thinking, Evans. That ship has sailed. Other than that, I have no need
to explain myself.”
“You were following us,” James declared, stepping next to his wife. “Not exactly the sort of behavior
one would expect from the next Hogwarts Potions Master.”
“And walking unprotected along busy city streets is not exactly what one might expect of two people
who’ve been warned of possible attack.”
James narrowed his eyes. “How would you know about that?”
Snape sighed dramatically. “For a Gryffindor, you are a remarkably suspicious man, Potter. Indeed,
as the next Potions Master, I have been invited into certain
confidences.
Let us leave it at that.”
Lily studied Snape’s eyes. “But Severus, why
were
you following us?”
Snape met Lily’s gaze for a moment, and then looked away, lowering his wand. He seemed to
struggle with himself for a moment, and then gestured at James, glaring at him. “Because, Evans, this
man
you have attached yourself to is too arrogant and foolish to believe that anyone can touch him. He cannot
protect you. And if he won’t fulfill that duty, then
someone
must.”
“That’s it,” James said quietly. “I’ve heard enough. Come on, Lil,”
“Severus,” Lily said quietly, taking a step closer to the dark figure. “What do you know about this?
You know more than you are letting on, don’t you? I can tell.”
“Lil, you can’t trust him,” James said, tugging on her elbow. “For all we know, he’s in it waist deep
with those who are against us.”
Snape looked away again. “Go,” he said hollowly. “The longer you stand here, the more dangerous
it is.”
James turned to Lily, meeting her eyes. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.” She nodded slightly, her
brow furrowed. James looked up at Snape, but the dark-haired man was still looking away, refusing to meet
James’ eyes. James shook his head in disgust and stalked past him, heading toward the trash cans at the back
of the alley. As he looked for his wand, he could hear Lily and Snape talking in low voices. Snape was
certainly a greasy git, but in spite of everything, James was quite certain he was harmless. He swore as he
bent, searching between the rusty cans for his wand among the rubbish. He finally found it wedged into a
corner atop a moldy newspaper. He grabbed it and wiped it on his jeans as he walked back toward the mouth
of the alley. He stopped suddenly and looked up, examining the buildings on either side of him. Slowly, he
turned and looked back toward the dead end. A smile came over his face.
“I knew this alley looked familiar,” he said to himself. He’d have to tell Sirius about it when he got
back to the house. How long ago had it been since that fateful night? Four, five years? Impossible. Sirius
would likely laugh and ask if his motorbike tracks were still burnt onto the pavement. Remus wouldn’t be
amused, though. He was the superstitious sort; probably, it was part of what he called his “curse”. Being

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