Disclaimer, you understand at this point.
Christmas Eve.
Dorothy awoke in her room in Diggs manor to find Madeline standing over her. at this point she was beginning to get irritated by her.
"Oh, don't look at me with that tone of voice." Madeline said.
"I didn't say any…oh right, thoughts…Maddie, is there a reason you have to always invade my privacy?" dorothy asked.
"its not really private when it's me, since, as has been often established, I basically am you." Madeline said.
Dorothy sighed and got up. A few moments later there was a knock on the bedroom door. Dorothy sighed again and picked up the scepter, waving it in the direction of the door, it swung open revealing alex, carrying a tray of food.
"Oh, Madeline, I guess I shouldn't be surprised you're here, Jack is looking for you." Alex said handing the tray to dorothy.
Madeline sighed and walked out of the room. Dorothy shook her head and set the tray of food down on the side table.
"so, you ready for tonight?" dorothy asked.
"are you?" Alex asked.
"as I'll ever be." Dorothy said.
"Brianna's providing her service, making all the food, the orchestra will be here later, everyone is running about doing something." Alex said sitting down on the bed.
"That's nice, has Glinda let Ozma come here?" Dorothy asked grabbing an apple from the tray.
"actually, yes, to my surprise." Alex replied.
Dorothy smiled and started on the apple. Alex sighed and walked out of the room. As Dorothy ate the food on the tray she sighed. She hoped alex would still be fit enough to dance. It had been a while since they had danced together, and tonight would be their time to do it again. assuming no one interrupted them with mistletoe. Every year since the first Christmas party that they had with Aislynn, she and Ellie seemed very determined to try and get them under the mistletoe again. she shook her head at the thought of this. However as she changed out of her night gown and into a red shirt and a green dress to go over it, she smiled. she loved the holidays.
"dorothy? Oh, good, so you are awake." came Ellie's voice as she walked in.
"Good morning to you too." Dorothy said giggling.
"sorry, good morning." Ellie said.
"Did you need something?" Dorothy asked.
"Not really, I saw Madeline and alex and wondered I if you were awake." Ellie said.
"alright, actually Ellie, can you go into that bag over there and grab some of my hair ribbons?" dorothy said pointing to a bag
Ellie nodded and walked over to the bag.
"Any particular color choices?" Ellie asked.
"not really." Dorothy replied.
"where'd you get the candy cane striped ones?" Ellie asked pulling them from the bag.
"Auntie Em bought them earlier this week." Dorothy replied.
"I think they're very fitting for the holidays." Ellie said bringing them over to her.
"hey, have Betsy and trot been enjoying themselves?" Dorothy asked taking them and using them to tie up her hair.
"I think so, ace has spent the last hour showing them around the manor." Ellie said.
"oh." Dorothy said.
"Yea." She replied.
"hey, is your sister coming?" Dorothy asked curiously.
"she said it was a possibility, but someone really needs to keep things in order while Ozma is here." Ellie said.
"She's let the other girls come, she needs to allow herself some time to have some fun." Dorothy said.
"Dorothy, my sisters view of fun, actually, I don't know if my sister has a view of fun, and I'm going to get yelled at later for saying that." Ellie said.
"Why, is she watching?" Dorothy asked.
"She's always watching." Ellie said.
"now you know why I requested that my room have no mirrors in it." Dorothy said.
"yep." Ellie said walking over to the wardrobe.
"ah-ah-ah! Stay out! No one is seeing my dress until tonight!" dorothy said sternly.
Ellie immediately backed away. Dorothy sighed and picked up the scepter again, walking over to the wardrobe, she set the scepter in between the handles so that it floated in between them.
"Dorothy, don't do that, now the only people who will be able to get in there are you and alex." Ellie said.
"That's the point." Dorothy said.
"oh, right." Ellie said sighing
"Ellie, it's a surprise to everyone except Maddie." Dorothy said.
"But she picked it out." Ellie replied.
"Out of my wardrobe in the city." Dorothy said.
"Yes, because I've obviously memorized everything in that now maze of a closet." Ellie said.
They both stood there in silence for several moments before laughing hysterically.
"Come on Ellie, let's go to the sitting room." Dorothy said grabbing the tray.
Ellie smiled and followed dorothy out of the room. When they got to the living room they found Aislynn, Betsy, Trot, alex, and Eliza sitting there, playing what appeared to be a card game. While Ozma was sitting on the couch with both toto and pockets asleep on her lap.
"Go fish." She heard alex say.
"so, finished with the tour then ace?" Ellie asked.
"Yep." Aislynn said.
"Oh, don't you look pretty." Came the voice of auntie Em from behind her.
"Thanks auntie Em." Dorothy said smiling.
"you know, I look at you and I see so much of your mother she would be so proud of you." Em said sighing.
"Dorothy, can I ask you a question?" Eliza asked curiously.
"Go ahead." Dorothy replied.
"do you ever get tired of people comparing you to your mother?" she asked.
"Eliza!" Alex exclaimed.
"It's alright alex, it's hard to think about my parents, but over the years I've been told that I have my father's energy, my mother's spirit, her looks, I'm used to it, or as used to it as I can be." Dorothy said.
"I see, got any threes alex?." Eliza said sighing
"go fish." Alex replied.
Dorothy sighed and walked over to the couch. Plopping down next to Ozma.
"These two have been in a deep sleep for the last hour or so." Ozma said.
Dorothy smiled and began scratching toto behind the ear. Immediately his tail began wagging and within minutes toto was awake and running around the room. Pockets, on the other hand, jumped from Ozma's lap, isolated herself to a corner, and fell back to sleep.
"Dorothy, can we got outside later?" Toto asked curiously
"Not today toto, I don't want to make a mess of myself before the party." Dorothy said.
"Hey ace, got any sevens?" Alex asked
Aislynn sighed and handed him a card from her hand. He then took the seven from his own hand and put it in a pile next to the deck.
"Madeline gave us the cards, we've been at this game for a couple of hours, at first it was Eliza and me, then Ace and the others showed up then I went to check on you, and here we are now." Alex said turning to dorothy.
"I didn't ask, but, alright." Dorothy said.
"Madeline told me to tell you, regardless." Alex said.
"how do you keep a game of go fish going for a couple of hours?" Em asked curiously.
"Well, assuming no one manages to get rid of their hand once you run out of cards, reshuffle all the cards in the pile of matches." Alex said.
"did you come up with that on your own?" Dorothy asked.
"it's his parents used to keep us from fighting when we were little." Eliza said.
"With card games?" Dorothy asked.
"don't look at us, we didn't come up with it." Alex said.
"so, dorothy, when will we get to see your dress?" Ozma asked.
"Tonight, when the party starts, not a moment before." Dorothy said.
"She even has the scepter in front of the closet so none of us can get near it." Ellie said.
"Dorothy, you could at least give ellie a peek, she is one of your best friends after all." Alex said.
"if I show one person I should show everyone, it's only fair." Dorothy said.
"well, we'll just have to wait then." Ellie said.
"well, I've got to go make sure the kids aren't driving henry insane, have fun." Em said.
"I'm still trying to think of a way to get dorothy and alex under the mistletoe again." Ellie said.
"Ellie, it's not going to work." Alex and dorothy said in unison.
"ellie, I think we should just give up, they've literally gotten out of every single attempt we had, even the jack in the box didn't work." Aislynn said.
"Alex sent me a photo of that, I thought it was clever, but you're gonna need to dig deeper to pull one on my cousin." Eliza said.
"Eliza, don't give them any ideas." Alex said groaning.
"hey, liven up, if I wanted them to get some ideas I would have dug up the old secret." Eliza said.
"What secret?" dorothy asked.
Alex sighed and set his cards down on the floor.
'When we were younger, back when I spent my time antagonizing people for the fun of it, I had a little notebook that I wrote ideas for pranks in, however with my uncle being the principal of the school, I found it rather difficult to pull things off, so, one day, when Eliza was over, she found it and told my parents about it, my dad didn't care, he went off to work in a bit of a huff, mom wasn't much for talking that day either, so I came up with the only logical solution at the time." Alex said trailing off.
"Which was?" Ellie asked curiously.
"we buried it in his backyard in a nice wooden box, it was several winters ago," Eliza said.
"I see, anyways, you aren't going to get us under the mistletoe again." Dorothy said.
"we'll see about that." Ellie replied chuckling.
Dorothy shook her head and sighed.
"Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, alex, where are your parents and Annabella?" dorothy asked curiously.
"they had to run home to get a few things?" alex replied picking up his cards
"Got any nines, alex?" Eliza asked.
"Go fish." Alex replied.
Eliza sighed and grabbed a card from the deck.
"Got any kings, Eliza?" Aislynn asked.
Eliza sighed and took the card out of her hand and handed it to Aislynn, who took her own and the one Eliza had given her and placed it in the pile. This went on without any further interruption for a couple of hours before Alex's parents and Annabella showed up. Though Annabella just sat on one of the many armchairs and had toto sitting on her lap. Every time dorothy tried to get pockets to get and be active she simply got the same response.
"Wake me up when it's time for food." She said.
"Pockets you need to be somewhat active, don't make me get your mother and your siblings." Dorothy said.
Pockets eventually did get up, but dorothy wasn't sure if it was because of her threat to get her mother Eve, and her siblings, Patch, Oddball, and Alexa, or if it was because toto began bugging her eventually. As the day suddenly crept through into the afternoon, after lunch, the group found themselves all scattered as the time for the party to begin, began closing in.