Disclaimer: 
Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K Rowling.
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
 
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
$Parseltongue$
 
Chapter 36: Presents

24 December

The Potters were sitting at the table and enjoying their Christmas dinner while chatting.

Harry looked over at his 'new' family and smiled. This was a scene he had dreamed about many times during his lonely childhood years. Just having a family and spending time with them…he had wanted that for so long and now that he has it, he was willing to do anything to protect it.

Lily looked at her son with her bright green eyes.
"Harry, dear. Is everything okay? you have been very quiet."

He nodded at his mother.
"Everything is great, mom. I was just thinking about some stuff."

"Were you perhaps thinking about how many classes are you going to fail in your first year?" Said Lyra with a mischievous smile.

"Lyra, don't say those things. Harry is not going to fail any classes…you are studying properly, right son?" Asked James.

"Of course Dad. I'm doing fine at school." He made sure to not stand up too much during his classes, but he wasn't going to fail either. All of his grades were at least decent, even in potions, much to the professor's displeasure.

"What about potions?" It was like his father had just read his mind.
"Snivelus is not giving you trouble, I hope. Or else, I will have t-"

"James!, you have to stop calling him that, even more so in front of the children. That being said…" Lily's eyes turned to look at Harry.
"Is he giving you a hard time? you can tell me if he does."

"He is a tough teacher, but I don't think he is harsher with me than with the rest of the students." Harry decided to lie a bit. He didn't want his parents to go complain to Snape, that would just make things worse. He already knew the man quite well.

Lily looked slightly upset.
"He shouldn't be tough with his students at all, and especially with the first years. The process of potion making is very delicate and being able to keep calm is extremely important for good results…Severus was always strict with himself when we were students. He was the type of person who would not tolerate even a small mistake. If he is putting his students to the same standard…"

"Or, maybe he is just a twat." Added James.

"James, language!." Lily spoke with rising fury.

"Was this professor a friend of yours, Mom?" Asked Lyra, who had been wanting to get into the conversation for a while.

Lily calmed herself down and addressed her daughter.
"He was…we grew up in the same neighborhood and attended Hogwarts together. But we were sorted into different houses and talked less and less over the years. Eventually, we had a big disagreement, and…we haven't really talked after our graduation."

"Can we talk about something happier than that gloomy man? I mean, is almost Christmas already!" James pointed at the clock hanging from the wall. The needles were only ten minutes away from midnight.
"We have presents to open!"

The mere mention of the word 'presents' seemed to have awakened Holly from her slumbering state.
"Presents, yes!" She started to yell.

The family moved to the main living room of the house where the presents had been stored under a big tree.
The room had been decorated by Lily and Mipsy and it even had fake magical snow falling from a cloud that was moving around the place.

Holly did not care much about all of this and just sprinted towards the tree.
"Presents!"

"Holly, wait! Don't open them yet!." Lily ran after her daughter.

Lyra pretended to be more composed but she walked relatively fast towards the tree and started to look for the boxes with her name on them.

Harry felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up to his father.
"Go on, son. I think there are a few with your name." James gave Harry a wink and tapped him on the back.

He felt a bit akward by celebrating the holidays in such a manner. It reminded him of the ones he spent with the Weasleys. 

But he never grew acostumed to them, always feeling like a bit of a outcast in them.

This was suposed to be his real family but he could not help but still feel like that.

Pushing the negative thought aside, Harry found two boxes with his name written on it.

His two sisters were already busy opening their presents so he decided to do the same.

 Inside the small box, were two books. One looked new while the other one was a fairly worn out note book.
"This is?..."

"Oh, thats mine." Said his mother as she moved to his side.

The cover of the new book said "One hundred tips and tricks for young potioners".

"That book contains a lot of incredible usefull information to make your potion class much easier. I always lamented that I only found out about that one when I was in my fourth year, so I told myself that I would get one for my children when they were old enough."
She pointed at the other one.
"I figured that Severus could give you a hard time...that notebook is from my own first three years. It has a lot of useful guidance on how to perform the potions from Howarts curriculum. It was written by both me and Severus. But dont let him see it!, he may get mad..."

Harry opened the notebook. It was filled with notes handwritten by his mother. 

'I would have given anything to have a memento like this in the past...'

Lily gave him an apologetic smile.
"I know that books are not a great present for children. So I put a lot of candy at the bottom of the box."

"No...this is great, thank you...mom." Harry smiled softly, doing his best to contain his emotions. 

"Open mine now, come on!" James approached them. 
"You are going to love it!"

Harry nodded and opened the box. There was some sort of clothes inside.
'No...these are not clothes...this is!-'

"James!, is that what I think it is?" Questioned Lily.

"Hehe!, this is my good old cloak of invisibility!" James proclaimed proudly.