Pining for Evergreen | Sebastian Sallow x MC |

7 - Halloween in Hogsmeade

Everybody knew that Hogsmeade had a magic like no other, but on October 31st it was something else entirely. It nearly overflowed with the magic and merriment of the residence from nearby hamlets that came to participate in a variety of festivities.

Pumpkins of every shape and size lined the streets, while garland hung from the eaves above them. Wreaths hung on every lamp post, and each shop window was decorated accordingly. Safe to say that every inch of the little town had some sort of decoration.

A few of the shops even opted to host some form of entertainment too. J. Pippin's Potions was hosting apple bobbing out of the largest cauldron I think I'd ever seen, Madam Puddifoot's brought Professor Onai in to read tea leaves, and Zonko's collaborated with Honeydukes to set up games in the town square.

I even arranged a deal with Fastidio allowing him to run a haunted house through the back of my shop. With the caveat that no actual harm come to those who entered, and that he let them leave after about five minutes. Given his holiday spirit, and the fact that Halloween did not fall on his normally allotted two days of chaos, he happily agreed.

I had originally hoped that my friends and I could go together, and voiced as much at my birthday party. Unfortunately, everyone seemed to have prior engagements. Natty had been roped into helping her mother at Madam Puddifoot, Ominis had less than zero interest in attending, and Garreth already had a detention for blowing something up in Potions. When I asked Anne she said she didn't want to make plans without Sebastian, and seeing as he was not in attendance at my party, she opted out.

Poppy however was more than happy to attend the festivities with me. It was something her nan would normally do with her, but seeing as she was getting on in years, Poppy let her off the hook this time. Honestly, I wasn't sure I had the kind of get-up-and-go that Poppy needed for such an occasion, but I would try.

The moment we got to Hogsmeade Poppy was like a kid in a candy store. We stopped at every window display on our way through town, 'oohing' and 'aahing' with the small crowds around them.

We had planned to stop into The Three Broomsticks before checking in on Fastidio, but as we got closer the joyful cheers of a large group of people caught our attention.

We silently exchanged excited looks, and wordlessly agreed to find the source of the sound. We made our way towards the noise and quickly found ourselves in the town square. When we arrived we could see that a large part of the square had been sectioned off by a tall shimmering magical barrier, the happy sounds emanating from within. Though the barrier obscured the figures behind it, we could see that a variety of people, seemingly of all ages, were playing a wide game*. The current game being some variation of tag.

"Oh, come play with me, please?" Poppy begged eagerly and I knew better than to tell her no when she got this excited about something.

"I suppose a few rounds couldn't hurt." I said with a reluctant smile, and she quickly explained the rules before pulling me towards the play area.

The rules were simple enough. The person that was 'it' wore a blind fold, and their objective was to catch someone. Once they had caught someone, they had to guess who it was. They could touch their clothes, hair and face to help them with the guess. If they guessed correctly, the person caught was now 'it'.

We pushed through the water-like semi-translucent barrier, meant to help keep the blindfolded person from going out of bounds, and Poppy took off running into play.

The barrier had partially obscured the faces of those beyond it, but once inside I noticed a few familiar faces from school, and a few people from town. Everyone ran around, dodging Nellie Oggspire as she waved her hands about in front of her, attempting to tag someone. It wasn't long before the blindfold moved to another person, then another, and then another. I took a moment to look for Poppy with the intention of suggesting we move on, when I felt a hand on my back.