In Winter, It's a Marshmallow World (Xanthippe)

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The flour that she had used to make the gingerbread most definitely wasn’t gluten-free—Winnie hadn’t wanted to waste the stuff that she could actually eat, and it would be a good deterrent from trying to eat something that was meant to be decorative—but it certainly looked pretty to her. With a few precise Severing Charms, she cut the large slabs of hardened gingerbread into the proper shapes for building the gingerbread house’s walls and roof, gathered up the assortment of sweets that she had purchased from Honeydukes to act as decoration, and floated the tray so that it followed her out of the kitchens and up to the Hospital Wing. It was easier to go to Xanthippe than it was to make her sister come to her.

It was a Sunday afternoon, which meant that they would have plenty of time to spend with one another. With its being close to the Christmas holidays, Winnie wasn’t too concerned with the remaining schoolwork that she had left to do. If this was her last Christmas with Xanthippe, she wanted to make it memorable. She had put on a red hat like the one that Father Christmas wore, the white puff at the end of it bobbing along as she walked.

Taking a moment to rearrange her supplies so that she could carry the parts for the gingerbread house into the Hospital Wing itself rather than use her wand, Winnie grabbed a passerby to hold the door for her so that she wouldn’t risk dropping any of what she was holding so precariously. “Surprise!” She hadn’t bothered to check with her sister beforehand to make sure that she was even in the mood to construct a gingerbread house, but they would cross that bridge shortly.

@xanthippe

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The hospital wing wasn’t the most fun place to be during the holidays, but Xan was learning to cope. She had come to terms with the fact that she wasn’t going to get to go to the Yule Ball, and was working on a schedule to fold as many paper cranes as possible while still keeping up with her schoolwork, which was even sparser than usual now that the holidays were approaching. She had also scheduled in some time for sitting and staring out the window, which some might argue was unhealthy. Xan enjoyed it immensely, though, especially since everything in her field of view looked like it was dusted with powdered sugar. The best part about not being able to see the entire world from the hospital wing window was that she couldn’t see the ugly parts – the places where snow was mixed into mud or where someone had slipped and fallen and gotten a bloody nose. It was a strange thing to be thankful for, but when being thankful was hard sometimes, Xan wasn’t going to let people argue just because she was thankful for something bizarre.

Xan was in one of her world-watching periods when the door to the hospital wing opened, and her sister came through with a tray of gingerbread. Xan’s eyes widened slightly as she saw everything that Winnie had brought with her, and her face broke into a smile. “Surprise indeed.” Xan said wryly. “We’re making gingerbread houses?” Unless Winnie had some other intention for the gingerbread and candy, that seemed to bet eh safest bet, though Xan would definitely not disagree with her sister if Winnie just wanted to eat everything on the tray instead.

@winifred

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“Surprise indeed.” At first, it was difficult for Winnie to tell if her sister really was excited, though she recognized for what purpose the supplies were intended. “We're making gingerbread houses?”

“Well, a gingerbread house.” Winnie nodded, moving cautiously closer to Xanthippe's bed until she could set the confections down without worrying that they might break. “A combined effort,” she added—not that anything that they had ever done together was anything but.

She began to sort through everything that she had brought with her, separating the various items according to type. There were the walls and two additional pieces of gingerbread for the house's roof—the basics—plus the icing. “It's not gluten-free,” she noted. Although she set aside the haul that she had bought from Honeydukes, she picked up the individual packages as she spoke. “I've got Liquorice Wands, loads of chocolate, crystallized pineapple, pink coconut ice…” Anything and everything that they might have needed, she had gone ahead and bought it, even if it was something that she wouldn't have eaten ordinarily.

There must have been a better surface that they could use than Xanthippe's bed. If they grabbed two or three of the tray tables that the nurses used for serving meals, that would be sufficient, Winnie thought. “Have I got enough, Xan?” she joked, giggling, as she looked around to figure out how best to set up their work area.

@xanthippe

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Xan nodded when Winnie corrected her, saying that they were going to be working on a single gingerbread house together. That was sure to lead to some stylistic disagreements, but Xan didn’t much mind – they were doing this more for the fun of it than for any aesthetic pleasure, she hoped. When Winnie said it wasn’t gluten free, Xan shook her head a little. “So you’re not allowed to eat it.” She stated, raising an eyebrow. She was going to be really surprised if Winnie actually stuck to that goal, especially since it was so easy just to break off a corner of the gingerbread to nibble on while they worked. When Winnie began naming all the candies she had, Xan’s eyes widened a little. “Can I have some pineapple?” She asked, batting her eyelashes. Since Winnie probably wasn’t going to say no, Xan reached over and grabbed a morsel of the candy, popping it into her mouth and chewing happily.

Winnie appeared to be trying to figure out how to set the house up, so Xan leaned over and pulled one of her art canvases out from underneath her bed. “We could use this?” She suggested. “And then I can have someone clean it when we’re done or something, so I can still use it for a painting.” That way they’d have a large enough surface for their gingerbread house while also not wasting anything.

@winifred

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“So you're not allowed to eat it.”

Winnie knew that she could have eaten it; whether that was wise of her, considering that consuming gluten would make her quite ill afterwards, was another story. As long as she took the necessary precautions not to cross-contaminate any of the food that she could eat—by failing to wash her hands after this project, for example—she would be fine, though.

Before they had even gotten started on putting the gingerbread together, Xanthippe requested a piece of pineapple. Winnie—who wasn't about to deprive her sister of anything that she wanted, if she could help it—was prepared to hand some over to her, but Xan beat her to it.

As she thought of what would work as a steady surface, Xanthippe pulled out a canvas from beneath her bed. “We could use this?” That was a thought. “And then I can have someone clean it when we’re done or something, so I can still use it for a painting.”

“Brilliant!” Winnie agreed. “Here.” She took the canvas from her sister. “Mind that your legs don't knock it over,” she noted, setting it towards the end of the bed.

Frowning slightly, she tried to think of how to make it easiest for Xanthippe. Having to reach over to assemble and decorate would get tiring, Winnie was sure. “Actually…” Hands free, she grabbed a chair and placed it so that it was facing Xanthippe's bed. If she sat there and Xanthippe sat so that her legs were dangling off of the bed, they could balance the canvas between their laps without using a spell to hold it in place. “Let's do it this way,” Winnie suggested, dragging the supplies over to the chair. “Like a table.”

Before she grabbed the canvas, she looked at her sister. “You're not dizzy, are you, Xan? That was a terrible idea, wasn't it? Do you want some cushions or something?” More than anything, Winnie wanted to ensure that Xanthippe was comfortable.

@xanthippe

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Winnie was setting up the gingerbread creation area, and Xan sat up easily, turning so that she could face the faux table that her sister had created. It was like a table, as Winnie had said. Xan crunched down on another piece of crystallized pineapple. She knew she probably wasn’t supposed to be eating all of it before they even began creating their gingerbread house, but again, Winnie wasn’t going to reprimand her for it. Pineapple didn’t even make that great of a decoration anyways.

“I’m not dizzy, Winnie.” Xan said as she popped another sweet into her mouth. “I’m actually feeling very well today.” Xan wasn’t going to hope too much, but she thought that the days where she was feeling good were coming more frequently than not. It could just be bias, of course, or the idea of a Christmas miracle coming into fruition, but Xan was…hopeful. “Are you going to start with the icing, or shall I?” She asked her sister brightly.

@winifred

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Winnie was happy to hear that her sister was, in her own words, “feeling very well”. With Xanthippe's health, it always seemed to be a gamble, though Winnie had no problem with walking on eggshells, considering that she would have jumped through flaming hoops for her, too.

Smiling, she watched Xanthippe for a moment to make sure that she wasn't fibbing, then she got everything that they would need initially—the pieces for the gingerbread house and its icing—set up onto the canvas. Xan asked which one of them would start with the icing, and Winnie motioned towards her.

“Why don't you start?” She passed the tube of icing across the canvas to her sister and then held the canvas steady. “We'll need icing for the base, and then we'll need some more to hold the walls and roof together.” They would have to take it one piece at a time, since rushing on the building process would only lead to a collapsed mess of gingerbread. For sealing the gaps between the walls, though, the both of them would need to keep their hands free to keep the pieces from falling.

@xanthippe

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Winnie suggested that Xan be the one to start, which the Ravenclaw was amiable to. She suspected that it might be because Winnie was worried she’d be too tired to do anything later, but even if that was her sister’s motivation, she would gladly be the one to build the foundation for the gingerbread house. She was certain that she was a better architect than Winnie, at least. The understanding of anatomy that she had from her paintings applied, oddly, to architecture as well. You needed good bones in order to make a good product. And Winnie was sometimes too hasty to make the good bones. Xan took a bag of icing and began arranging the four walls of the gingerbread house, working slowly but methodically to ensure that everything was going to turn out well. “Is there something you want to talk about?” Xan asked. She was used to people only coming to visit her in the hospital wing if they had something on their minds (even if they didn’t know that was why they were visiting in the first place), and perhaps Winnie would be more willing to admit that was when they were both only half-focused on the conversation.

@winifred

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Xanthippe got to work on constructing the gingerbread house and required less help than Winnie anticipated her to need. She wasn't hasty about it, which was a necessity, since the gingerbread wouldn't end up breaking apart that way. For someone who was dying, Winnie thought as she watched her sister, she was still so patient, so methodical about everything that she did.

“Is there something you want to talk about?”

Blinking, Winnie shook her head, and the white end of her Santa hat swung back and forth. No, there wasn't anything. “It's nearly Christmas.” That was about it. She tried to sound perky and hoped that she could skirt around Xan's illness, but it wasn't possible. “And I like spending time with you.” Popping a piece of crystallized pineapple in her mouth and sucking on it for a moment, she looked down. She had had sixteen years with Xanthippe and Isaac. It wasn't fair that the decades that they had ahead of them might be cut short because one of them was terminally ill.

Once she had finished the bite of pineapple in her mouth, she looked back up. “And I want this Christmas to be really special, Xan. For us.”

@xanthippe

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Winnie shook her head to indicate that there was nothing that she wanted to talk about, which Xan didn’t quite believe, but she wasn’t going to push. She just wanted to make a beautiful gingerbread house and let the conversation take whatever turns it may. Winnie said that it was nearly Christmas, and Xan raised her eyebrows. “Yes, I realized.” Even if she was stuck in the hospital wing, Xan kept meticulous track of the passage of time. It was easier to remember what day it was now that it was December and everyone was counting down to Christmas. Xan wasn’t sure how she would keep track of the days after the New Year, but that was a problem for the future version of her.

When her sister said that she wanted Christmas to be special for the two of them, Xan finally put two and two together. “You’re worried this might be the last Christmas we spend together.” She said flatly. The Ravenclaw tried to keep any accusation out of her voice, but it was hard. She was trying so desperately to be positive, and that was much harder to do when her own sister thought that she was a dead person walking.

@winifred

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Winnie wasn't going to let her sister forget that it was so close to Christmas, though Xanthippe told her that she was aware of it, too. It must have been awful to know that it was almost time for such a wonderful occasion and to be unable to do much about being stuck in a hospital bed all day.

She wasn't expecting anything from Xanthippe this year, though she didn't even mention the subject in case it would make her feel worse. Just having her around was enough of a gift, Winnie thought, just in time for Xanthippe to voice, “You're worried this might be the last Christmas we spent together.

Her expression fell. “I don't want it to be,” Winnie told her sister earnestly, “but what if it is?” She would sorely regret it if she hadn't taken Christmas seriously, only to lose Xanthippe before the next one. “I want us to have loads of happy memories together.” Maybe it was wishful thinking, but Winnie still believed that there was a small chance that—with enough happiness built up inside of her—Xanthippe's illness might just go away. “And there are always Christmas miracles, Xan! Don't you believe in those?”

@xanthippe

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Winnie insisted that she didn’t want this to be the last Christmas the two of them had together, but it didn’t make Xan feel any better. Of course no one was hoping for her to die, but that didn’t make it any more likely for her to get well. Winnie then insisted that Xan had to think about what was going to happen if this was her last Christmas, and to Xan, the answer seemed simple: it would just be her last Christmas. It was easiest to think about things in that sense. It wasn’t dying – it was just dying. Just made everything seem less scary. “We already have loads of happy memories together, Winnie.” Xan argued. “And I don’t want happy memories forced upon me just because it will make you feel better.” She was the one who was dying (maybe dying, Xan reminded herself), and being dragged around to fulfill someone else’s bucket list was just a waste of her time. She would much rather sit in the hospital wing and just talk to someone than to be forced into doing something grand for the sake of the memory it would create. “I believe in plenty of things, but I’m not at liberty to believe in miracles.” Keeping her expectations realistic was keeping Xan sane at the moment, and Winnie’s heart would just be broken even more if she kept holding out hope for a miracle that might never come.

@winifred

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Xanthippe's point was that they already had happy memories spent together. It wasn't as though they hadn't been by each other's sides since birth—even before that, technically—but everything just felt so different now. If she lost Xanthippe, it would only be her and Isaac; her entire identity would be changed. There were three of them together; there had always been the three of them. If memories would be the only way to keep Xan alive, Winnie needed those to make up for what she wouldn't have.

“And I don’t want happy memories forced upon me just because it will make you feel better.”

“I want you to feel better, too, Xan!” She changed her tone quickly, making it encouraging. “We're sisters. That's what we're supposed to do.” If their places were reversed, Winnie was certain that Xanthippe would be doing everything that she could to make her feel better.

“I believe in plenty of things, but I’m not at liberty to believe in miracles.”

“This isn't a gingerbread Hospital Wing,” Winnie pointed out, grabbing a piece of crystallized pineapple and eating it. “It's a gingerbread house.” Pausing, she began to fill in the icing on the structure where Xanthippe had left off. “Because you're going to see the outside world again,” she promised, remaining upbeat, “and not just from this window.”

@xanthippe

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Xan almost rolled her eyes when Winnie said that she wanted Xan to feel better too. That might have been the truth, but that definitely wasn’t the original motivation behind the whole thing, and it didn’t take a Ravenclaw to see that. Xan shook her head a little when Winnie said that sisters were supposed to do whatever it was that they were doing. She didn’t want Winnie to feel obligated to help her just because she was ill and they were related. This entire endeavor was going downhill fast, but Xan knew that there was nothing to blame for that except for her own foul mood, so she was going to push on.

“I’m aware of that.” Xan said when Winnie pointed out it wasn’t the hospital wing that they were creating. “I’ve seen plenty of the world, Winnie.” And not all of it had been through this window – there had been the window in the room where she painted Hugo, too, and the time they had gone outside to see the snow together. In all actuality, Hugo was the one who was doing most of the things that Xan enjoyed, because he didn’t pity her. He knew – or at least thought he knew – that she would live, and he treated her accordingly. Xan placed a few chocolate candies at the base of the gingerbread house, stabbing them down with more force than was necessary so she wouldn’t accidentally snap at Winnie.

@winifred

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“I’ve seen plenty of the world, Winnie.”

“I know.” Winnie hadn't denied that; all of the world that Xanthippe had seen, she had seen it, too. There was still so much of the world that she hadn't seen—that they hadn't seen. “And there's still so much to explore.” Most importantly, they could still see it together.

Noticing how intensely Xan had begun to place the chocolates, Winnie tried to think of something else to say. She wasn't trying to be critical of her sister in the slightest; she wanted her to be happy, but, with everything that she said, Xanthippe seemed to be taking it in the wrong way.

“I bet there are loads and loads of hidden passageways in this castle that we don't know about,” Winnie guessed, continuing to piece together the gingerbread house around Xan's decorating. Hogwarts was centuries old; it must have been filled with all sorts of things. “Maybe, after Christmas, we could go looking for them?” she proposed. There must have been a few that wouldn't require too much exertion on Xan's part.

@xanthippe