Nothing for Christmas
Chapter Two: In Which a Lot Happens on Tuesday
Tuesday, 20 December, 1983, The Burrow kitchen
Five days until Christmas
“Wake up, Charlie!” Percy yelled. His voice rung throughout the house. Not an unusual occurrence, but not particularly welcome, considering that it was first thing in the morning. Molly groaned.
“Wake up, Charlie!” Ron’s voice rung throughout the house too, copying Percy. She waited in silence, and felt that Arthur was too… any moment now…
“Wahhh!” Ginny was unimpressed. With a tired sigh, Molly got up and reached for her dressing gown.
“Stay in bed, Arthur, you worked late, I’ll sort it out…”
“Come on, Charlie, hurry up!”
She considered yelling right back at Percy, but didn’t. He would find the need to loudly answer her from across the house.
“No, I don’t think I could back to sleep now,” said Arthur, his voice slightly cracked, having just woken up. He coughed.
“Wake up, Charlie!”
Ron screamed the same thing again, and Arthur jerked up.
“Right. Here we go,” he yawned, and Molly grinned.
“Indee“”
“WAAAHH!”
Ginny was still awake and still upset, it seemed.
“I’m up, alright!? Just wait a bloody moment!”
“Percy! Charlie! Will-You-Please-Be-Quiet?” bellowed Molly. There was a short, stunned silence, before Ginny started screaming in anguish again.
With the mounting chaos and noise, a scream omitted from Ron’s room, too. Excellent. Molly and Arthur both exited the bedroom, Arthur heading up to Ron (which was a necessity as he tended to stumble out of his room and vaguely toward his parents when he was upset and had, more than once, fallen down the stairs in doing so) and Molly heading toward her daughter’s bedroom.
Ginny screamed out her misery. With the speed of a needed mother, Molly hurried in and picked her up. Her face was pink and wet from exertion and tears.
“Charlie, We’re“” There was a bang from downstairs like the front door opening.
“Shut it, Percy!” scolded Bill’s voice. Even though he didn’t shout at all and Percy stopped doing so, their loud conversation was audible all over the house.
“But I want to go now!”
“Yeah, me too. But be just a little bit patient, will you?”
Ginny’s crying finally stopped, and Molly stormed out of the room and downstairs to the kitchen cradling her. Percy glared daggers at Bill, who returned them, looking very irritated.
“What is the meaning of this?!” Bill opened his mouth to speak, but wasn’t given a chance.
“Charlie wouldn’t wake up, Mum! We want to go to play Quidditch, and we can’t do it without him.”
“What about the twins? Where are they?” she snapped, rocking Ginny slightly.
“I don’t know. They’re not coming.”
“Percy, you did not need to yell up the stairs! How long would it have taken to just walk to your brother’s bedroom?” Percy grumbled something under his breath, and there was a sound from behind Molly. Charlie was loping down the stairs, yawning, his hair everywhere, and still wearing his red pajamas.
“I just…”
“And why aren’t the twins coming? Did you ask them?”
“Yes, we did!” said Percy.
“And they didn’t want to come?
“Nope. They wanted to stay here.” Molly looked at him suspiciously.
“Is that what they’ll say if I ask them?”
“N “ I don’t know. You can’t really take everything Fred and George say seriously.”
“Percy!”
“What? You can’t!” Molly sighed, and frowned at Percy.
“Well, you ask them now, and see if they’ve changed their minds.” Percy frowned right back.
“But, Mum!” Molly raised an eyebrow at him. “Oh, fine… Fre-ed! Geo-orge! Do you“”
“Percy!” snapped Bill and Molly at the same time. Ginny buried her little head in Molly’s dressing gown.
“Fre-ed! Geor-eorge!” copied Ron, sounding much better. Cheerful even. But very loud, nonetheless. Poor, dear, Arthur. Thankfully, without the usual twinnish ruckus, Fred and George both thundered down the stairs.
“Wha-at?!” shouted Fred, right in Percy’s face.
“Fred! Please!” scolded Molly, rubbing Ginny’s little back and preying her agitation was not rekindled. Amazingly, Fred didn’t answer back, and just looked expectantly at Percy.
“Percival, Did you have something to say?” asked George, and Percy scowled at the two of them.
“Yes… Georgina.” He sighed, and gave his message very quickly and reluctantly, “do-you-want-to-come-with-us-to-play-Quidditch?” They didn’t really play Quidditch. Molly wouldn’t let the younger ones play real Quidditch. But they all called it that. The twins looked at each other for a moment.
“No thanks, Pertunia,” said Fred.
“We have other plans,” added George. Oh dear. When the twins had plans, it was rarely a good sign.
“Plans?” asked Molly. The twins nodded earnestly.
“Yeah,” said George.
“Plans,” said Fred. And they both promptly turned and walked up the stairs. Molly, Percy, Bill, Charlie, and even, she fancied, Ginny, froze for a moment, stunned.
“You know, they’re really weird,” said Percy.
“Right then,” said Bill. “Gentlemen, shall we away?” Charlie yawned.
“Charlie needs to change out of his pajamas,” Molly reminded them. “And none of you have had breakfast yet.”
“But Mum“”
“Charlie, you are not riding a broom in your pajamas.” Her second-eldest opened his mouth to object, but closed it when she headed him off. “You’ll have had a shower and put on appropriate clothes before you leave this house. Understood?” With a grumble and another wide yawn, Charlie stumped back upstairs. Percy grumbled.
“Now, what would you like for breakfast?” Bill huffed.
“Mum, come on. We don’t care, it doesn’t stay early for long.”
“It stays early long enough for you to have breakfast.” At the look on Bill and Percy’s faces, she smiled slightly. “How about this, we make something quick up now while Charlie’s getting changed, and you can take it down and have a bit of a picnic.”
“Really?!” exclaimed Percy. Molly nodded, and he beamed cheerfully.
“Softy,” said Bill, smirking.
“Watch it,” she warned him. “I might just change my mind.” She went and put Ginny in the little play-pen at the other side of the kitchen- entrance room area.
Thanks to her wand and many years’ practice cooking, Molly (with minimal help from the boys) had almost finished tossing together some bacon sandwiches for Bill, Charlie and Percy’s Quidditch-pitch picnic when Charlie bounded down the stairs, now fully awake, showered, and wearing the mock-Quidditch uniform (Molly couldn’t remember the name of the team it belonged to) they had bought him for his birthday last year. Remarkably, it still fit. She wrapped the last of the sandwiches and packed it into the picnic basket, along with a large flask of pumpkin juice.
Arthur came down the stairs slowly, holding Ron’s hand so he didn’t trip on the stairs and looking faintly amused and sleepy.
“Going out are we, boys?”
“We are,” said Percy. “Me and Charlie and Percy and the twins don’t want to come “ I really did asked them and they said so.” Arthur chuckled.
“Right, I think this is done with,” said Molly, and handed the picnic basket carefully to Bill. “Now be careful, we don’t want any Quidditch-related injuries just before Christmas, do we Charlie?” The only time when Charlie left his common sense at home was generally on a broomstick, which he seemed to deem a decent place to try ridiculous stunts.
“Ok, Mum,” he said, sounding a little embarrassed.
She herded the three of them out the door (although none seemed to need herding), and waved them away.
“Breakfast?” asked Molly after a moment. She still had five mouths to feed, not including herself.
“Eggs, Molly-Mum,” said Ron, who liked eggs, and occasionally called her Molly-Mum after having copied his father in calling her ‘Molly’, and then being corrected with ‘Mum’.
“Please,” said Arthur. Molly summoned eggs from the chickens outside, and they cracked themselves over an already hot pan, sizzling over the stove. “The twins are acting funny this morning,” he said. Ron, tired of waiting, wandered away to the play-pen and little Ginny.
“The twins? Acting funny? What is the world coming to?” Molly replied wryly. “How so?”
“I was kicked out of Ron’s bedroom because they said they had ‘business to discuss’.”
“With Ron?” asked Molly, surprised.
“I would assume so, yes. I thought it may be dangerous “ well, not dangerous, but the ‘Fred and George’ kind of business, but Ron won’t tell me what it was, and swears it’s not anything bad.”
“That is funny,” said Molly. “And we didn’t hear a peep until very late this morning. And they didn’t want to go and play Quidditch.”
The cooked eggs were now distributed with sausages and toast onto plates, ranging from her and Arthur’s normal plates to Ron’s little tray and Ginny’s bowl. “Arthur, could you get Ginny?” asked Molly, setting the table. “FRED! GEORGE! RONALD! BREAKFAST!” After a moment, the thundering of the stairs returned again, and the twins appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
“Isn’t it nice when Percy’s not here?” asked Fred, taking a seat to the head of the table.
“Lovely,” said George, taking the seat on the opposite end. “We should kick him out more often.”
“Fred! George!” snapped Molly. “Attitude… Besides, we didn’t kick him out; he went of entirely his own accord.”
“Well then we should make him leave of his entirely own accord more often,” said George, and took a huge bite of sausage.
“Percy later?” asked Ron, who sat beside Molly on one side of the table; Arthur was on the other side with Ginny.
“Yes,” said Molly.
“Sad, isn’t it, Ron?” asked Fred. They weren’t really serious when it came down to it “ she knew that. Siblings were warrant to pick on each other a bit.
“Ron’s sausages. You’re Fred and George.”
“Absolutely. I like your attitude, Ron,” said George. “Now, say ‘Percy is a git’“”
“George, really!”
“Git,” said Ronny smugly. Fred smirked.
“He called you a git, George,” he said. George glared.
“Did not. He probably meant you.”
“Did not!”
“Did so!”
“Did not!”
“Did so!”
“Did not!”
“Did so!”
“Not at the breakfast table, please!” scolded Molly. “We’re eating. Not to mention, your eggs are getting cold.”
With renewed vigor, Fred and George dived back into their breakfast, and did not talk again until they were done, when they started throwing significant looks over the table, apparently not thinking anyone noticed, despite the fact that they were at opposite sides.
“One more spoon, Ginny. Come on, and then you can have some more sausage,” coaxed Arthur.
Ginny shook her head.
“Just one, you’re almost done!”
Ginny shook her head, all the more haughtily.
“One more spoonful and I will give you this whole sausage. Come-on.” He held out a sausage, which Ginny grabbed. Molly could have sworn she saw a flicker of a smirk. Arthur sighed, and put down the spoon of egg. Ron giggled.
“You had better not act like that at Christmas,” said Molly. “We have people coming, you know.” That was quite an understatement, of course. Family members were coming from far and wide, from Molly’s Aunt Laura to Arthur’s cousin, Albert, and nothing would be more embarrassing than a sausage-stealing baby. Well, technically the twins, but she gave everyone advanced warning about them.
“We’re having eggs for Christmas dinner?” asked George.
“Don’t be silly,” said Molly, realizing how redundant it was to tell one of the twins to not be silly. However, he didn’t say anything ridiculous.
“Why?”
“Because we don’t eat eggs for any dinner, let alone Christmas dinner, and I’m sure your Aunty“”
“No, why do we have people coming?”
“That’s what Christmas is all about, George. You know that,” said Arthur, having given up. Ginny continued to ravage her sausage… well, sausage pieces.
“Mum,” said Fred.
“Dad,” added George.
“We have something we want to…” began Fred.
“We have something to tell you,” said George. There was a pause while they both looked nervously at each other, as if internally debating who would speak.
“We don’t want anything for Christmas,” said Fred, looking from his empty plate to George, to his parents, Ginny and Ron, and apparently meaning to look somewhat dignified at the same time.
“Like presents,” said George. “We don’t need them.” Arthur was totally stunned. Molly hadn’t told him about Charlie’s unusual request, but then, perhaps that would have made him more so anyway.
“What“” she began uncertainly.
“Don’t need them,” said Fred confidently.
“Don’t want them,” said George, looking much the same as his twin brother.
“Neither does Ron,” said Fred.
“But how“”
“He said so, didn’t you Ron?” asked George. “You said that “ you agreed we didn’t want anything this Christmas?”
“We didn’t want anything,” said Ron with his mouth full.
Molly and Arthur looked at each other quizzically.
“Boys, you don’t“”
“Ginny said,” said Ron.
“Won, snossage,” said Ginny (‘Ron’ still came out as ‘Won’ sometimes).
“See? Ginny too,” said Fred. “Right, Ginny?”
“No box,” said Ginny, nodding.
“Yeah, so don’t worry about it,” said George.
“Don’t bother with the presents this year,” added Fred wisely.
“We’ve got everything anyway. We don’t need any,” finished George impressively. He rose. Fred rose also.
“Now, if you’ll excuse us,” said Fred.
“We have a Quidditch game to crash,” said George.
“Not really,” added Fred hastily, although Molly was really too surprised by what they had said to be worried about them crashing the Quidditch game.
“Boys“” she said, as they reached the door.
"We’ll be careful, Mum!” called one as they ran out.
“Yeah, see you later!” called the other. Everyone sat in silence for a moment, until Ginny casually flicked sausage all over Arthur’s face.
o0oOo0o
Tuesday, 20 December, 1983, The Burrow main bedroom
Four-and-a-half days until Christmas
Ginny waddled out of the room quickly, led by Charlie, and Molly watched after them both, a smile playing on her face. Little Ginny was wearing an amber dress with a pattern of autumn leaves on it that was, as they had discovered, far too long (though was just the right size around the chest). The hand-me-down from Arthur’s widowed sister-in-law hung from her shoulders and dragged on the floor, and yet she had refused to take it off or change into something else; the material was too thin and fine to simply use a shrinking spell “ it would become too delicate and rip within minutes. Not to mention, much tighter around the chest and stomach and it would probably snap.
Giving up on trying to remove the dress, Molly had folded the straps that went over Ginny’s shoulders and stuck them like that magically, and bunched up the long skirt at the back and delicately tucked it into the behind of Ginny’s blue shorts. When she then waddled around with a funny lump in addition to the extra volume that was a nappy, the result was one of the most hilarious things Molly had ever seen, and Ginny had no idea what anyone was laughing at.
Ginny and the sniggering Charlie disappeared out the bedroom door and down the hallway, and Arthur sighed. “I think I may have realized why that dress was never worn very much,” he said.
“You would have to have a very tall baby to have them wear that dress. Or a large sausage.”
“Exactly,” said Arthur, with a small, weary little chuckle, followed by a sigh. “I’m so glad I got the day off work.” Molly nodded, returning to mending another item of clothing they had deemed ‘too delicate for magic’. It was a little black dress robe, which had belonged to her brother, Fabian. There was a matching one that had belonged to Gideon, and another much smaller one that had belonged to their other brother, Solum, who had been seven years younger than Molly, who was three years younger than Fabian, who had been two years younger than Gideon, the oldest. Fabian’s robe would fit Charlie perfectly for Christmas (although he’d been twelve when he wore it), Gideon’s would go to Bill (he’d been fourteen “ both brothers had been very skinny, though Gideon was much taller), and maybe (although she wasn’t sure whether she trusted him with it) Ron would get Solum’s baby-sized robe… robelet.
Molly nodded.
“Why did you get the day off work?” she asked, surprised she hadn’t thought about this earlier.
“Ironically, because they figured I had a big family and would need the time for Christmas shopping,” he said. “What do you suppose all that was about?”
“I don’t know,” said Molly truthfully. “It’s just so unusual for such young children.”
They both paused for a moment.
“How are we going to do Christmas?” asked Arthur. “There just doesn’t seem enough for everything “ with the dinner with everyone coming, presents and Charlie starting school, where’s the money going to come from?”
“I don’t know,” said Molly again. Arthur sighed, frustrated.
“Usually it’s not easy, but we manage in the end. It’s just for so much… and our budget’s practically non-existent.”
“Oh, don’t say that. We’ll manage. I’m sure we can explain to them if the presents are a little“” Footsteps sounded in the hall, prominently, and they stopped talking automatically, listening.
Percy strode confidently and a little pompously into the room, followed by Bill, who was far beyond feeling embarrassed on any of his brothers’ behalf, especially when Molly and Arthur were the only audience. Though, in all honesty, this could easily change when Charlie and, especially, Percy started school.
“Hi,” said Bill.
“Hello,” said Molly.
“Hi,” said Arthur.
“Good day,” said Percy. He faltered slightly at the silence. “Err…”
“What are you doing?” asked Bill, sitting on the corner of the bed.
“Finally getting around to mending these robes,” said Molly. “This is Charlie’s one.”
“Can I have one?” asked Percy.
“Not one like this, but I think I have something for you.” Instead of a dress robe, it was a little tailcoat that had belonged to Solum at six.
“Will it be ready for Christmas?” asked Percy. “Where is it? Should I try it on first?” Arthur grinned.
“Of course. At the moment, it’s put away somewhere in the shed, but it should be ready for Christmas.” Molly finished the last stitch in the collar. The left sleeve still needed to be repaired, but that could wait.
“Bill, can you come and try yours on?” she asked. Hopefully, it would fit and not hang off him too badly. She rummaged around in the small heap beside her bed and withdrew the other black robe, which Bill took carefully. Every one of the children knew how important these clothes were. They had, after all, spent a lot of their early childhood with Uncle Gideon and Uncle Fabian (Solum, who now lived overseas somewhere, had generally only come for the big events, and was very formal when he had).
Percy watched with jealously as Bill put on the robe. They were all made of a light, silky fabric, so dark the shadows and lowlights seemed not to exist, yet the lights created patterns with the creasing of the slightly reflective fabrics. Percy just sat there, slightly open mouthed, and Molly smiled at the image of Bill in the robe.
“What do you think?” she asked in a hushed voice. He looked lovely, and she could just imagine what Gideon had looked like in that robe; he had had rusty brown hair (but had been known to do all sorts of funny things with it), Fabian's had been red like Molly's and their father's, while Solum’s had been very dark like their mother's.
“It’s really light,” observed Bill, inspecting his black silk clad arms.
“It keeps out the cold though,” said Molly. Bill tugged the dress robe off as if it were made of tissue and laid it carefully on the bed.
“You’re all going to look amazing this Christmas,” said Molly, with a little sniff. She sighed for a moment, and then looked back down to Charlie’s/Fabian’s dress robe.
“It’s going to be big, isn’t it?” asked Bill, sitting back on the corner of the bed. Still looking a little jealous, Percy stood next to him.
“That it will,” said Arthur. “Are you looking forward to it?”
“Yeah!” said Percy, as if this were totally obvious. Which it probably was.
“It’s been so long since we’ve seen some of these people,” said Bill thoughtfully, with a sigh. “I don’t think we’ve seen Uncle Arman since Ron’s baby shower.” Arman was one of Arthur’s brothers. He had been, apparently, disabled in the same Death Eater attack that had killed their other brother, and Arman’s twin, Arnold.
“No, we haven’t, have we?” said Arthur. “I hear he’s been married since then.” They both reflected upon this thought for the moment.
“Anyway,” said Bill, “it’s going to really busy, so we wanted to tell you not to worry about presents for us this year. Right, Percy?”
“Well…”
“Right, Percy?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” muttered Percy.
“Just one less thing to bother with, alright?” said Bill, and stood up.
“Ok, that’s it, what’s going on?” asked Molly. “Why not?”
“What do you mean?” asked Bill.
“Nothing’s going on,” said Percy. “We just thought you already had enough going on.”
“Enough on your plates,” added Bill. “So we could all just not worry about presents this year.” Molly and Arthur exchanged significant looks.
“Are you sure?” asked Arthur. “You know, it’s not your“”
“We’re sure,” said Percy.
“Absolutely,” said Bill.
“So long as you boys don’t go out spending money on us,” warned Molly. Bill and Percy looked at each other.
“Deal,” said Bill, and held out his hand. Molly shook it. He rose from the end of the bed. “Look, we’ll see you later. The twins are being too quiet.” Both he and Percy walked out of the room.
“Bye… boys,” said Arthur, eyes slightly narrowed in confusion.
“Right, what was that about?” asked Molly. Arthur shook his head.
“I have absolutely no idea,” he said. “It’s just so…”
“Unusual for kids their age,” said Molly. “And Percy… that’s really very strange.”
“What?” asked Arthur, looking at her. “Why Percy?”
“Well… it’s nothing really. Just, Ginny and Ron are very young. I suppose they mightn’t really understand it all completely.”
“Yeah…”
“And Bill’s older, so I could understand why it might not be such a big deal for him. He’s a very mature boy.”
“And Charlie’s“”
“Charlie’s just so sensitive, I suppose he would ask to not get a present if he thought it was causing us problems,” said Molly, thinking it through in her head,
“But Fred and George“”
“They’re just…” she interrupted, but trailed off.
“Fred and George?” suggested Arthur. “They’ve been known to be… unusual. They busy themselves with all kinds of funny things. One minute they want everything they see, and the next they don’t second-glance an ice cream. I suppose it makes sense for them to not be too worried about Christmas presents.”
“But Percy,” said Molly. “Percy’s a relatively normal, occasionally responsible, selectively intuitive seven-year-old child. It just seems… strange.”
“Yes, I suppose you’re right,” said Arthur. They sat there in silence, each lost in their own thoughts.
“So what will we do for Christmas presents?” asked Molly eventually.
“We can’t just not give them,” said Arthur thoughtfully.
“I know. But “ what can we do without much money, which would be useful to them?” Arthur glanced at the dress robes on the floor for a moment, and a funny little smile appeared on his face.
“You know, I think I might just have an idea?”
The End (but only of this chapter...)!
Nothing for Christmas by Mind_Over_Matter
Chapter Notes: I apologise proficiently, for how horribly long this chapter took, and I promise the next will come faster. I’ve had huge and bountiful problems getting this update accepted, but, if you’re reading this, they must be over now (and if not, I think I’m going to cry xS). Thank you so much to my fabulous, fabulous beta, HermyRox12.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed “ you’re wonderful “ especially those who reviewed with update requests. I just can’t get over how grateful I am to HermyRox12! Yet again, thanks a million!