Christmas with the Henandezes There were a great many people in the world that Sullivan Quincy did not know. As a general rule and custom - one of the rules and customs that Sully was in full approval of - he did not spend his Christmas holidays with the great many people of the world that he did not know. While it was true that he did know some of the people here - his mom, his sister, Simon, and to a lesser degree, Sonora's Head Boy Jose Hernandez - the vast majority of the worlds' unknown population was also here in, of all places, the Head Boy's grandparents' house. Why exactly Sully was there was less than clear. Okay, yes, he'd been told Jose and Simon were some kind of distant cousins who both belonged to a weirdo wizarding family called the California Pierces (even though neither Jose nor Simon had Pierce as a last name), but that did not explain what they were all doing just north of the Mexican border in a house owned by people where were, as far as Sully could determine, not California Pierces. Half the people here didn't even speak the only language Sullivan knew.
All of these factors combined made Sully especially confused about what he, his mom, and Karen were doing there. They were not California Pierces or Hernandezes, and while he shared a House with Jose, so did a quarter of the school and none of them had gotten invitations. It almost had to be Simon's doing, but why mom had agreed to the insanity was baffling.
In all of his twelve years, Sully could only remember quiet Christmases in their living room, opening presents with Karen, having a nice breakfast, and then, if Mom didn't have to work, they'd all do something together - a board game or a movie usually, sometimes a walk to see how the Casinos had all decorated for the holiday if it wasn't too cold. It was a good tradition and Sully wasn't too keen on changing it. Especially not to . . . this.
People were everywhere, talking in at least two languages and four accents. There were a handful of owls in the air, a couple of dogs underfoot, and he'd spotted one cat spying on them all from the top of a bookcase. There were kids running around, old people trying not to get trampled, a ghost sitting in a wheelchair and snapping at people not to walk through her, and teens, young adults, and grown-ups chatting in pairs and groups. There was food of all varieties, with an odd emphasis toward vegetarianism, but spanning multiple ethnicities. There were muggle bikes lined up next to broomsticks and a wizarding clock with too many hands hung on the wall right over the microwave. Fashion ranged from medieval to modern times and not always on different people. It was loud, it was bright and colorful, it was fragrant, it was constantly moving and shifting, and it was crowded.
If Sully had ever wanted to create a scene of complete chaos, he might have attempted something like this.
He stood in the midst of it, arms crossed and a scowl on his face, as Mom and Simon introduced him to his seven millionth stranger of the day. He frowned at the person in question and was about to ask Mom again when they could go home when he saw her. The most beautiful girl in the world.