Disclaimer: Anything you recognize belongs to J.K. Rowling.
Serenity
Sunrays started to slowly creep into the room. A girl the age of nine with blonde hair yawned loudly as she opened her grey eyes slowly. She almost jumped out of bed as her tired eyes landed on her mother who was sitting at the foot of her bed, as if she had been watching her sleep the entire night.
"Mum?" she questioned, rubbing the crust from her eyes with her fists.
"Little Luna," she said with a warm smile, reaching a white hand out to pinch her daughter's nose. Her voice sounded like a sweet lullaby to Luna who grinned. "A day for just you and I."
Luna Lovegood frowned, a rare expression on her normally content face, as she tore her sky blue duvet off of her skinny body. "But what about Daddy—"
Serenity Lovegood sighed and placed her finger to her daughter's lips, silencing her softly. "He has a surprise for you for later. Why don't you help me with breakfast?" she asked gently.
Serenity couldn't actually cook so Luna's stomach growled from hunger and misery. The last time her mum made breakfast she somehow not only managed to burn the toast but the butter as well.
Luna nodded in agreement and she met her mum downstairs only ten minutes later once she was done washing up. She was still in her pajamas and hadn't brushed her messy hair but her teeth sparkled as she hopped into the kitchen and watched her mum in wonder as she danced around the room with a carefree expression on her face.
Her blonde hair was in a messy bun, secured tightly with a fork and a quill. The radish earrings Luna's father had given her mum as a gift when Luna was born swayed back and forth on her ears, making a jingling noise as she moved around the kitchen.
"What shall we do today?" Serenity asked, placing a bowl in front of Luna's place at the kitchen table. Luna stared at the contents of the bowl with worry, jabbing the porridge that seemed to be as hard as cement.
"We can bake a cake!" she shouted, pushing the bowl away from her. Her mum might not have been able to cook but she could thankfully bake. "Or search for unicorns and become friends with all the creatures in the woods. We can…"
The two Lovegood women silently stared out the window that revealed the outside world to them. They imagined woodland creatures rushing over to meet them, butterflies kissing their noses and dancing around in the warm summer air.
"Daydreaming again?" A voice asked, pulling the two from their thoughts. Serenity's blue eyes sparkled as she eyed her husband, a grin on her face. He smiled back as he pecked his wife on the cheek and then walked over to Luna and ruffled her hair, making it look messier. "I'm going to miss so much today, aren't I?"
Luna nodded her head. "Don't go," she whispered, trying to guilt him to stay. She didn't need a present or a surprise. Spending time with both her parents was enough.
"Oh Lunebug, I'll be back before you know it. I'm off family," he said, giving the two a wave.
"Sweet travels, Xeno. Don't be late for lunch."
Xenophilius arched a blonde eyebrow as a playful smirk fell on his lips.
"So my two favorite girls can starve?" he asked in shock. Serenity huffed, mumbling something about her food not being that bad. Luna stared forlornly at the cement like porridge that was forgotten in her bowl and shook her head in agreement with her father. "I'll be back quicker than you can say—"
"Unicorn!" shouted Luna, hoping she had gotten the word that would make her father stay for just a bit longer. She tugged on his cloak waiting for him to sit down next to her and join them for a very unappetizing breakfast.
"Nargles," Serenity said with a wink.
Xenophilius clapped his hands and then rubbed them together, shrugging his shoulders. "Ah, decide on the magic word and that's when I'll be back!"
He disappeared with a wave and a loud 'crack,' leaving the two Lovegood women to themselves.
Serenity smiled at her daughter and then pursed her lips together in thought. "How about…pumpkin pasties for breakfast?" she suggested, eyeing the breakfast she had cooked with distaste. "Or mud enchanted pies?"
Luna giggled and shook her head 'no.' It was an ongoing joke in the Lovegood house. When she was four Luna tried to eat a mixture of mud, twigs, leaves and worms because she thought mud pies were the same as apple pie.
"Mummy!" she exclaimed. "You're being silly."
"Fine," Serenity huffed. "We'll have a boring breakfast of porridge with ants."
She placed her hand over Luna's bowl quickly and dropped whatever she had been hiding in the palm of her hand in the food.
Luna gasped, squinting to see if the little different colored ants that were moving in her porridge were actually real.
"Are they real?" Luna questioned worriedly.
"No, dear! We don't eat insects. They're sweets," Serenity assured her as Luna anxiously poked a bright orange one. "I won't tell your father if you don't."
She nodded and plopped an ant in her mouth, the sugar instantly shocking her. Her father was convinced that sugar was bad for you and didn't want his daughter to have any, or the rest of them, but Serenity had her secret stashes around the house because she said, sometimes you needed something sweet in your life.
"Let's braid your hair," Serenity suggested, combing her fingers through her daughters scraggly blonde hair, smoothing it out gently. "Or twirl around the room all day. What game shall we play? What is it today?" she pressed.
Luna bit her bottom lip in thought. She plopped another candy ant in her mouth as she pondered. "I'd like to grow," she said slowly. She played the words in her head again and deciding she liked the way they sounded, she continued, "So I can reach the cookie jar."
Xeno's biggest weakness and only snack in the house were cookies. He rationed them off like they were never going to be made or found again.
Serenity grinned as she twisted Luna's hair with her fingers, expertly transforming her hair into a long braid. "So, how shall we grow?"
Luna paused; her grey eyes flitted to the kitchen window and stared at the outside world. The trees were swaying slightly and the grass was a nice soft inviting green while the yellow sun made the world shine brightly.
"Like a seed," she decided triumphantly.
Serenity nodded, letting her hands drop from the finished braid. "Then we shall be flowers. We will water and fertilize ourselves."
Her mum was getting ahead of herself but that's what she was always like, creative. Both of her parents were. If Luna said she wanted to be a flower for the rest of her life or travel with a baby unicorn around the world they would accept it, no questions asked.
"I think I'd like to be a nice white rose," Serenity said, puckering her pink lips and sucking in her pale cheeks. She let her long hair flow free from her bun and twirled around the kitchen in her best rose swaying in the wind impression.
"But roses have thorns, Mum. What if someone pricks you?" Luna questioned sadly.
"I could use a little color!" she said with a grin. Luna laughed as Serenity pinched her pale cheeks, making them pink and then started jogging in place, her bare feet thumping the ground loudly, trying to get some color to rise in her cheeks. "What type of flower," she huffed, in between deep breaths, "shall you be?"
Luna hadn't thought that far and she stared weakly at her mum for help.
Serenity stopped her jogging and then rushed towards her daughter, cupping her chin with her hands. "A sunflower," she whispered, "because you are my sunshine."
"You're mine too," Luna whispered, hugging her.
"Then we shall be sunflowers together. What do we need?"
Before Luna could answer, the warm embrace was broken by Serenity who started to rush around the kitchen in a blur. She searched drawer after drawer, pantry after pantry, opening and closing kitchen cabinets loudly as she rummaged through pots and pans trying to figure out what they needed to be beautiful blooming flowers.
She brought out two large bowls and dropped them on the floors, expanded them with a swift flick of her wand and then scooped up dirt from outside. The dirt was underneath their fingernails as they scooped more and more, filling the large bowls together. Neither noticed as they tried to think calm flower growing thoughts.
In a stroke of genius Serenity pulled off the sky blue drapes that hung on the windows and changed them to a nice light yellow, draping the two of them like a toga.
Without hesitation, Serenity jumped into the dirt, squishing her toes in it. Luna followed her lead, shaking her short chicken legs in anticipation of a sudden growth spurt.
"I don't feel any different," Luna whispered.
"Silly me!" Serenity shouted, smacking herself on the head. "How do we expect to grow if we have no water?" She pulled out her wand from her trouser pocket and pointed it at the dirt underneath her feet, whispering augamenti, a quick jet of water shot out, making the dirt moist underneath her toes. They began to sink into the dirt and Luna watched as Serenity repeated the action, turning the dirt into mud.
Serenity pressed her toes into the mixture and stood up straight, squaring her shoulders back. "Do you feel that?" she asked. "I think I just grew an inch."
Luna waited ten minutes before saying, "No."
Serenity hummed to herself, not worried about her daughters obvious let down by their game. "Then I'll make a potion," she declared, "the first ever growth one that'll make you so tall you'll be the tallest person in the world or a spell. Yes!"
Luna gulped from her spot. Her mum's spells were always going awry. Luna watched as her mum screeched out some random words in Latin, flapping her arms about like a lost bird. She squished her toes in the mud as her mum pointed her wand in the air. She got ready to tell her, with a bright smile on her face, that she did feel different now but the words caught in her throat as the spell she yelled hit the family portrait of the three smiling and waving Lovegood's in front of her, ricocheting off the frame and shooting into her chest.
For a moment Serenity Lovegood glowed brighter than the sun forcing Luna to shield her eyes with her arm and squint to stare at the silent, shocked face of her mum. Then the light quickly went out as if Serenity was a candle and a large gust of wind entered the room causing her body to crash loudly to the floor, shaking the house.
Tentatively, Luna walked over to her mother. Nervously, she crouched down, her hand hovering over her forehead. When her hand dropped she was shocked to find that her mum, always so full of warmth and life felt cold to her touch. There was no rosiness in her cheeks or loud thump of her heart.
Luna shook lightly and gasped, but no sound actually left her mouth. She felt numb as she brushed her mum's blonde hair out of her face and flicked the radish earrings that hung on her ears.
She had loved those earrings.
"Mum…mummy…no…mummy," she whispered, tears falling silently from her eyes.
Luna felt cold as she stared at the lifeless body of her mum. Who was she going to talk to? Who was she going to go on adventures with and talk about silly girl things her father would never understand?
"Luna!" She heard a voice yell, and for a second she jumped, certain her mum had been playing a joke on her and she was all right after all. She waited for the body that was next to her to move but it didn't. "Look what Daddy got just for you, darling. Jingling, jangling radish earrings just like mum—LUNA!"
She had never heard her father shout so loudly before. She turned her head to stare at him, her silvery grey eyes swimming with tears as they fell on the radish earrings that were identical to the pair her mum was wearing.
"Daddy—" she managed to cry out, gripping her mum's hand.
Xenophilius found himself falling to his knees next to his daughter and the body of his deceased wife. The house that had once been so full of life felt foreign and cold as the two Lovegoods held each other. The only sound that could be heard was the soft cries of the two and the soft tinkling of the radish earrings that dangled in Xenophilius's hand.
Author's Note: Thanks for reading. I really fell in love with Serenity as I started to write her. Thanks to Summer (GinveraMollyPotter) for the name, it really fit for who I think Luna's mum would have been. Don't forget to review and let me know what you think.