It was odd to be at a Christmas Eve gathering that was not her own family's. In some ways it distracted her entirely from the fact that her mother was gone and that her father was absent and that nothing had been right since the September of last year. And yet in other ways it only served to show her how much had changed. Her mother would never have allowed her to attend. Instead the only reason her father had been home today was that work was not open, had it not been a weekend he might have been in the office. Sisse had half expected him to be anyway. Matthew had gone to see some friends, somehow relingishing his continious quest to make up for their father. Father hadn't even objected when Sisse had asked to attend the Potts' gathering. So here she was, amid a large and boisterious family, feeling entirely out of place, wearing a white and green striped dress she had sewn herself.

She had found a seat by the fireplace and was sitting demurely on the couch, a mug of hot chocolate (rumored to have been made by Mr. Honeyduke) clasped between her hands trying not to look as uncomfortable as she felt in a room full of family that was not her own.