The First Family Christmas
Chapter One: Meet The Family
Draco had made sure that the house elves were on hand should Ginny need their assistance in preparing the meal. Not that she would ask for help, being as stubborn as she was, but he would have them handy, just in case.
Ginny had made sure that all the alcohol was locked away, with the key hung on a chain around her neck so that Draco wouldn't feel the need to start celebrating early.
Lucius had made sure that Narcissa was occupied during the morning, so that she wouldn't try to 'help'.
Molly had made sure that all the presents were ready to be transported to the Malfoy Manor, and ensured no one was able to steal one away to open early.
Hermione had made sure that her parents were okay with her spending the day with her friends, and acted the dutiful daughter the entire morning.
Harry had made sure that his date understood that she had to try to be nice.
Snape had made sure that he had potions to combat Ms Weasley's cooking, a sobering potion to battle any excess drinking, and his emergency Portkey–just in case.
"I'm telling you, go away!" Ginny ordered the house elf standing in front her.
Unfortunately, Ginny's presence in the Malfoy home had the curious effect of making the house elves more like her: stubborn, in other words.
"We is sorry Mistress Ginny, but Master Draco said to ignore you." The house elf didn't look very sorry; in fact, looked downright smug.
"No, no he can't do that! I live here too. Don't I get a say? And stop smiling!" Ginny didn't need the house elves hovering over her, watching her every move, but they had their 'orders' to stay.
"Sorry Miss, but youse is not married to Master Draco yet, so your orders don't matter so much."
Ginny groaned. "Look, he told you to be here if I needed your help. Well, I don't need your help, so you should go away, and leave me to it!"
The elf looked doubtful and voiced his concerns, "But what if youse is needing us? We won't be being here, and all the food wills be ruined!"
Ginny fought of the urge to be offended. "I can assure you that I know how to cook. If I need your help, I'll call for you. Okay?"
The look of doubt didn't leave the elf's face, but he nodded his head anyway and silently trooped out of the kitchen, along with four other elves.
Why was that so hard? Ginny thought. I'm going to have to have a word with Narcissa. She should be able to over-rule Draco's orders. I don't have the time to find loopholes whenever I want to get something done.
Ginny busied herself with preparing the turkeys. There were three of them altogether, all monster-sized birds that had to be readied for cooking. As she stuffed and basted, Ginny finally realised what a large task she had before her, and this was just the turkeys. There were still the vegetables, the potatoes, those little sausages wrapped in bacon, the...
Ginny's mouth dropped in horror as she grasped the magnitude of preparing a Christmas meal for seventeen people.
"What have I done?"
"This is my house. I was here first! Who does she think she is? I only wanted a glass of wine, but noooo, I can't even have that! Are you sure there's nothing you can do?" Draco's tirade stopped as he directed his question to the house elf, who had been dutifully listening to his rant since it started, ten minutes ago.
"There's being nothing we's can be doing, Sir. The cabinet is being locked by Miss Weasley, and it's being resistant to magics by your father."
"I know that. I know all of that! I had to watch him do it, remember? I don't know why he was so extreme. It was only a little party and people weren't really drunk. You would have thought he'd have removed them by now. That party was years ago! There is nothing, nothing whatsoever you can do?"
"Nothings, Sir."
Draco sighed and admitted defeat, for now. "Very well. Go and do something." Draco dismissed the elf with a wave of his hand and turned away. "There has to be some way I can get in. If I can't break it open, and the elves can't do anything, then maybe the only way is to get the key," he puzzled aloud, and the house elf shook his head in pity before disappearing to 'go and do something'.
"Oh, Lucius it just won't go in!" Narcissa complained.
They were both lying on the floor in their bedroom, occupying themselves so that they wouldn't get in the way of the preparations.
"Nonsense!" Lucius cried. "It's gone in before; it'll go in again." Lucius tried to put it in harder, but it still wouldn't go.
"Why don't you try and move it about a bit?" Narcissa suggested, beginning to get bored.
"I don't know why it won't just go straight in. Have you done anything?" Lucius accused, refusing to have the blame put on him.
"No I haven't! Look, try and put it somewhere else. You never know, it might work better elsewhere."
Lucius tried one last time before giving up. "Why did we even try this? We never get anywhere," he complained.
"I told you I'd rather have sex, but no, you wanted to do a puzzle," Narcissa said with pale blonde eyebrows raised.
"Fine!" Lucius snapped and stood up, abandoning the puzzle and his wife on the floor.
He strode over to their bed and climbed onto it. Narcissa lazily watched him but became more interested when he began to undress.
"Well? What are you waiting for? Get over here, you tiresome wench."
Narcissa had started towards bed before he even finished his sentence.
"George! Fred! Whichever one of you it is, get away from that pile!" Molly Weasley had been standing protectively over the heap of presents all morning, but even she couldn't ignore nature, so she had run to the bathroom.
Having waited all morning for this, the twins began dismantling the various wards and traps that surrounded the pile. They were working as fast as they could, but there were just so many to get through. As it was, they still had another minutes worth of work left when Molly finally returned.
"I can't believe you two! This is your sister's first Christmas in her new home, and she's trying to make it perfect. Not for herself, but for us! And here I find you, trying to ruin it! I'm in two minds to send you back to your flat. You could wait there, you know! You don't have to be here!" Molly started raging at the two men, oblivious to the other Weasleys gathering around her.
Eventually, Arthur realised that Molly was just repeating herself over and over again, so he stepped in.
"Hey, love. Come on. I think they know that they were wrong." Arthur looked at the Twins, and they took their cue to begin their apologies.
Overwhelmed, Molly burst into tears and had to be guided to the sofa to sit down. "It's her first Christmas, Arthur! This is the first time Ginny's doing all the work. She isn't coming home to us, and we have to go to her! She's all grown-up now!"
"Now, now. Ginny is just doing this because it is her first Christmas away from home. Next year, you'll be doing it again! She'll be coming to us, bringing Draco as her husband. She might also bring Narcissa and maybe even ..." Arthur's speech had been strong up until that point, but then he faltered on the last name. "And maybe Lucius will come too."
"Oh, Arthur, do you think so?" Molly looked up at her husband for reassurance.
"I know so, Dear."
Molly opened her mouth again but caught sight of two new arrivals. "Bill! Fleur! How long have you been here? How was the journey?
Molly left Arthur's arms and began to bombard her eldest son with questions.
The Twins subtly carried on working at the pile of presents and had just cracked it when they saw Arthur watching them. He raised an eyebrow and mouthed 'one' before pulling out his wand. George and Fred grabbed a present each and ran out of the room. Arthur then started to recreate the wards and traps.
When Hermione had woken up and gone downstairs for breakfast, she found both her parents seated at the table. Her father was reading a newspaper, and her mother had just finished cooking breakfast.
"Morning, Dear!" Mary Granger called from the hob.
"Morning, Mum," Hermione replied before opening the fridge and helping herself to some juice.
As she sat down at the table, she noticed that the paper her father was reading was out of date and proceeded to inform him of this fact.
"I know that, Hermione, but there isn't anything else available, and I need to read a newspaper to complete the stereotypical image of a family breakfast.
"Ahh, so that's why Mum is cooking?"
"Of course, do you think you would have survived into adulthood if we left your mother in charge of feeding us all the time?"
Hermione tried to smother her laughter, but Mary still saw the smile on her daughter's face as she brought over breakfast.
"Richard, you're poisoning your daughter against me."
"You're right, Dear," he replied with a nod of his head. "It was wrong for me to interject. You can handle poisoning her all by yourself."
Hermione didn't even try to stop her laughter this time.
"Listen, can you just try to be, well, nice? Just this once?"
"Excuse me? 'Just this once'? I am nice, Harry Potter!"
"Just not conventionally nice?"
Harry Potter and his girlfriend were currently wrapped up together bed. It was cold outside but warm under the covers. So although they had both been awake for a while now, they were still in bed.
"Why do we even have to go? Mother and Father said we are welcome to join them in France. Why didn't we go to France, Harry?"
"Do I have to go over it all again?" Harry asked tiredly.
"Yes, yes you do. I'm not fully convinced that it's not too late to bail to the continent."
"Pansy, you talk so funny sometimes."
"Oh, shut up, Potter and get to convincing." Pansy glared at Harry.
"The Weasley's are my family, and it's Christmas."
Pansy held a hand up to stop Harry. "No, I want a new excuse. You've used that one soooo many times now!"
"You wanted me to go over it all again. I'm doing what you wanted!"
"As you should. I hadn't realised that your arguments are so ingrained on my mind. Surely you have other ways of persuading me...?"
Pansy let her sentence trail off at the end and smirked as she saw the realisation dawn in Harry's eyes.
"Finally," she muttered as Harry began drawing her into his arms.
"Be nice to them, okay?" Harry pleaded more so than asked.
"Yes! I will be delightful! Now start persuading!"
Severus Snape had just returned from the Christmas breakfast where he was forced to sit between a Hufflepuff and a Gryffindor, opposite the Headmaster and Professor McGonagall. If there was any more cheer going around, he would have begun twitching.
It was a very happy affair, and everyone was cheerful, and happy and smiling and laughing and talking. Snape shuddered. Why couldn't everyone just sit still and be quiet, talking in low voices and allowing him to pretend that they weren't there? Instead, they tried to draw him into every conversation and joke. His glare didn't even seem to have its usual effect. Well, except the Hufflepuff. Really, if he had known that all he had to do to be asked to leave was to make someone cry then he would have done it almost straight-away.
Luckily, he had been invited to the Malfoy's for the Christmas dinner, so he would not have to endure all of that again. Snape looked once more at the invite, noticing for the first time it mentioned bringing 'a bottle', something Severus had not bought. Great, he would have to make a detour to Hogsmeade first before heading to the Malfoy's for dinner.
It would be just him, the Malfoys, and the Weasley girl. A nice, refined dinner. Oh wait, she was supposed to be cooking.
Snape paled slightly before heading towards his potions cupboard. There was a mild anti-food poisoning draught in there somewhere. Better yet, there were also some strong ones.
That was the first chapter, I'm expecting there to be around three or four.
This was written as a response to Cally's Christmas Challenge at the DG forum, I'll mention the things I included in the last A/N.
Anyway, how was it? Review if you liked it, or if you disliked it.
I will allow people who don't have a concrete opinion to review.
A big thank you to Ingonito3- I think it's 3... (Lia), for beta'ing this. Any mistakes you find are probably my changes after she beta'ed.
Thanks for reading.