Chapter 20

A/N: Hello lovelies! Thank you so much for reviews follows and favourites. Those are like Christmas presents before Christmas! ALSO, you may have noticed, I changed the cover of the fic. I quite like it. Disclaimer: I don't own.

Happy reading!

However, Christmas was far from over at the Burrow, as presents were generally considered quite unimportant compared to what was coming next: Christmas dinner. After forcing the whole family to slave around the kitchen for the last couple of days, Grandma Weasley was proud to present her descendants with three kilos of baked potatoes; two bowlfuls of Brussels sprouts, three stuffed turkeys, cranberry sauce no one ever ate, six different kinds of pie, gravy galore, kernels of golden buttery corn, a plateful of sausages and other delicious if not slightly unhealthy foods.

Now that was all very nice and all, but unfortunately, the whole family had come this year, so that meant that 28, (well 29 unfortunately if you counted git supreme) had to be seated. For that occasion, the adults widened the door frames between the kitchen, the entrance and the living room and then proceeded to extend the kitchen's wooden table. In earlier years, the main rule for seating had been to leave the adults on one side and the children on the other, but as they grew up the limit between the two was growing more and more blurry, which meant that the seating plan was reduced to nil.

Grandpa Weasley sat at the end of the table with Grandma Weasley to his right while the other's grappled for empty seats, hopefully without knocking over a dish or two on the way (because otherwise the legion of pygmy puffs Aunt Ginny had been curating for the past ten years would devour whatever fell on the floor. Seriously, they were worse than dogs). The result was a table even more crowded than the House tables at Hogwarts at the beginning of the year feast.

Rose had spent a lot of time trying to force out a couple of sentences for Thomas so when she came down, all of the more spacious seats had already been taken. She squeezed just between Aunt Ginny and James who were squashed on a wooden bench. She surveyed her position on the table. She was quite close to the front of the table, in the kitchen. Directly in front of her was unfortunately Malfoy, but he seemed to be totally engrossed in his conversation with Albus and Casper Wood, Molly's boyfriend. Albus was to his left and to his right Victoire was smiling with Teddy.

Uncle George got up from his seat and uncorked a bottle of champagne. He started to fill up glasses as they were passed to him (not quite paying attention as to what was happening and Aunt Ginny had to scold Lily for trying to sneak some into her own cup).

"Rose, pass me your glass!" he called jovially.

"Not quite uncle George, not quite," she laughed, "Come and see me again in May."

"Come on, I'm sure your mother won't mind!"

The glare from her mother seemed to indicate the contrary but then again, maybe Rose was reading the signs wrong.

"Scorpius then!"

"Sorry sir, but try me again in January," he replied politely as Rose raised her eyebrows, his name was Scorpius but he wasn't a Scorpio? Wow. Already that it was a difficult name to have everyday, it didn't even have an astrological significance apparently. Or maybe it did… She would have to ask Thomas. OR NOT actually. Asking one's boyfriend about another boy's astrological sign was perhaps not the best thing, especially if said-boyfriend already had their doubts about said-boy's and girl's relationship (even if it was completely and undeniably unlikely to EVER be a problem, no matter what a pesky unreliable potion such as Amortentia suggested).

"Seriously, you kids are no fun. When I was your age, you should have seen what I was do-"

"Excuse me?" said a startled Grandma Weasley, "And what exactly did you do young man?"

"Uuuhhh, nothing at all Mum, actually, I was thinking of someone else…" he stuttered.

"That's what I thought."

James, Ron and Fred were laughing rather loudly. "Anyway. Victoire?" George continued.

"No thanks," was the curly blonde's reply.

"Don't tell me you're underage too! Otherwise I'm seriously confused as to how old everyone is right now."

"No, no," she gave him a small smile.

"But why not then? It's Christmas!"

There was a mischievous twinkle in Victoire's eyes, something quite distinctly Weasley actually. "Well, you see… umm."

Rose raised her eyebrows even higher, guessing what was coming next. Victoire exchanged a look with Teddy who nodded her on.

"Well, if you must know, I'm… I'm pregnant!"

"QUOI!" was the singularly loud shriek that came from Aunt Fleur, "SINCE WHEN?"

Victoire gave a small smile. "I'm three months along, due in June!"

"ET COMMENT CE FAIT-IL QUE JE L'APPRENDS SEULEMENT MAINTENANT?" Aunt Fleur shouted even louder and then proceeded to rant rather angrily (but still exuberantly happy) in French, which Rose promptly decided to ignore, seeing a she could not speak French.

A choir of voice's arose from around the table after hearing the news.

"Congratulations!"

"I'm going to be a grand…. god-father? Does that exist?"

"Boy or girl!"

"I'm far too young to be a great-grandmother!"

"What will you name the baby?"

"Maman, calme-toi, on voulait que ce soit une surprise!"

"Congrats."

"Did you know?"

"Can I be godfather? You know I would be a fabulous godfather!"

"Well done Teddy!"

The buzz started to die down and food was starting to be served around the table, though the conversation still seemed to be centred around the couple (which Louis had decided to badger to death this Christmas). Grandma Weasley was now crying slightly profusely.

"And to think that just a couple of years ago I was tottling two little babies on my lap and next year it will be those babies' baby I will be tottling on my lap! I remember when I would give you baths together"

"I don't remember that…" added Teddy, slightly uncomfortable.

"Yeah, it would kinda be weird if you did," commented Fred.

"And then you would run around naked in the garden," continued Grandma Weasley, blowing her nose. Merlin, this was even worse (or funnier, depending on your position in the whole affair) than when Victoire and Teddy had gotten married.

"Yes, thank you Grandma," Victoire stared at her, trying to tell her that reliving moments from her childhood was probably not the best idea.

"And then you grew up and you were never together any more, even though both of you liked to eat grass!"

"Grandma!"

"Thank goodness you met up later at the Slug something party?" More nose blowing. "Oh I remember that, how you sent me a letter asking-"

"GRANDMOTHER!"

Aunt Ginny quickly steered the conversation away. "Oh, you'll never guess who went to the Slug club party this year, mother!" Victoire shot her Aunt a grateful look, only to discover that her own mother had taken the opportunity to squeeze herself between Victoire and Teddy to start giving some apparent maternity tips to her daughter.

Rose's mother picked up on the diversion. "Oh really, who?"

"Harry!"

Hermione looked at him incredulously. "He managed to convince you?"

"More like he cornered me."

Grandma Weasley seemed interested enough in the subject, so the mission was accomplished. Rose hoped talk of the Slug Club Chirstmas Party would end soon because she had a strange sense that something embarrassing was going to happen. This premeditating thought was accompanied with a bite of turkey.

"Well, was it interesting? I know it wasn't much when we went."

Ron scoffed, "Maybe it's fun depending on who you go with."

"Ron." Her mother's voice was kinda dangerous. Oooh. This was going to be good.

"What?"

Uncle Harry seemed to be keen to avoid a crisis and interjected before anyone could say anything, much to Rose's disappointment as her interest was now piqued. "Well, Ron! You'll never guess who your daughter went with!"

Ah. Rose deadpanned and looked her godfather in the eyes. Seriously? Seriously! Why hadn't he told her father before? This was not crisis avoided, this was just another crisis, an even worse one! She engaged in an eye-battle with Uncle Harry, trying to persuade him to easily converse his way out of the subject, but seemed to be losing the battle. Rose brought her glass to her lips in the most murderous fashion (which is actually a lot harder than you might think, because drinking water is not generally considered a murderous action).

"WHAT!" shrieked her father. "WHAT IS THIS? WHO?"

"Scorpius Malfoy," he stated.

Rose spat out all of the water in her mouth in shock, spraying the named person in front of her.

"WHAT!" Rose and her father simultaneously shrieked.

"You've got some explaining to do, young lady!" bellowed her father. Her mother only looked slightly amused.

"I am NOT dating Malfoy!" Rose shouted, "and I never will!"

Uncle Harry looked slightly confused. How could he even be confused at a time like this! She had even introduced him to her goddamn boyfriend when they had seen one another! How could he had forgotten. "But… But I saw you dancing together?"

Rose face-palmed and watched the Jerk Supreme finish wiping off his face and stupid hair from the splatter of water he had received. "WOW! If two people are dancing together, that totally means they are dating!"

"You danced with Malfoy! You've got some explaining to do young lady!" shrieked her father. There seemed to be a lot of shrieking this evening. Well, come to think of it, there was always a lot of shrieking at Weasley family reunions, but most of the time Rose was neither the person shrieking or the cause of the shrieking, and it had been a lot nicer when it was like that.

"Seriously Dad! I was only dancing with him to prove that I am the better dancer of the two. Which I am!" Rose was now furiously blushing.

Malfoy coughed. Rose kicked him under the table.

"Rose, darling, you know we would accept whoever you wanted to date," her mother added encouragingly.

"No we wouldn't!" her father said. It then seemed like he had been kicked under the table.

"As I was saying," her mother glared at her father, "you don't need excuses to hide it from us."

"But I am NOT dating Malfoy!"

Uncle Harry still looked confused. "But then who are you dating?"

"Uncle Harry, I seriously can't believe you forgot! Well, let it be known that I am not dating Malfoy, but rather Thomas Vance!"

"Ooooooh. So that's who he was!" said Uncle Harry. Rose thought that he was very lucky to be too far from her in the seating plan for her to be able to kick him under the table. "Is he blond too?"

Is he blond too? Is he blond too! Oh. That. Was. It. The book was going to get burnt. She hoped it thought it was very funny. How could one possibly confuse the two? Really? That couldn't even be possible! Malfoy ridiculous hair was literally his signature mark, no one else in the country had hair like that.

And, seriously? Thomas had black hair! It was really difficult to confuse the two! Trust Uncle Harry to be the one to complete the stupid step in the book. And she couldn't even check if the book considered the step to be properly completed (if it had been, there would be another step written down) and if she had to suffer more anger and embarrassment as prescribed by the book because she had left it buried deep beneath a pile of (hopefully not green any more) clothes.

She had initially planned to show the stupid, possibly Dark book to her grandfather, who had always been very keen on misuse of magic, but then ruled against it at the last moment. That was for multiple reasons a) someone else might find it, and she couldn't bear the mortification, b) if she did tell Grandpa Weasley, he might help her but he was also far more prone to talking in his sleep with his old age, and Grandma Weasley was a VERY light sleeper; needless to say, the combination of the two was not a good idea; and c) maybe if she forgot about its existence, it would eventually disappear. Yeah, unlikely, but a girl could hope.

Lucy, bless her soul, started to ask her good-natured questions about Thomas while her father still foamed in the mouth and threatened to go and 'kidnap him and sell his organs on the black market if ever he did something to his sweet little girl' (which seemed oddly specific, but… okay?). The conversation slowly turned away from the subjects of Rose's latest love conquests (which was what Fred named them, thinking he was hilarious). The rest of the lunch went quite pleasantly, except that her father did not seem to be able to get over the whole incident, that her cousins kept making snide remarks and mocking her, and that Rose was actively planning on killing the boy-who-lived.

Oh well, at least she was sure that this embarrassing and angering event was never ever going to make her appreciate Malfoy's ridiculous hair, thank you very much. She had no wish to do so, and her father's reaction as to what had happened made it clear that if it had actually been the truth, he would have probably murdered the stupid jerk. And while Rose did have a couple of murderous tendencies, the stupid idiot (which is not a pleonasm, by the way) did not deserve to die. After all, she still didn't entirely know how she felt about him. There was the whole business with Amortentia, and the fact that maybe he wasn't just a jerk… URGH! Curse being a stupid hormonal teenager and owning a stupid cursed -possibly dark- book that was inflicting emotional confusion upon her! She couldn't wait to be back at school, where the two of them could begin their prank war again, without having to act with a minimum of decorum for the sake of familial presence.

She eagerly tried to avoid the stupid prat (she seemed to be insisting a lot upon the word stupid lately, hmm. Maybe it was time to upgrade her vocabulary) during the whole affair, but every so often would check on him in the corner of her eye. She hadn't quite caught what his reaction was when Uncle Harry had so tactlessly announced that they were dating, but she was sure he was just as shocked and disgusted as her.

Oh, you're lying, said the little voice at the back of her head (which she had recently christened Rational, which was not weird at all thank you very much), you know exactly what his reaction was, wasn't it? Rose quickly ignored the thought. Her logic was, if you stop thinking about the thing, the thing will disappear (hopefully the book agreed with her. But then again, when had it ever). In the meantime, she made small talk with her family, avoided looking at Malfoy (much less speaking to him) and tried to enjoy the rest of her Christmas lunch.

Et comment ce fait-il que je l'apprends seulement maintent: and why am I only learning of this now?

Maman, calme-toi, on voulait que ce soit une surprise: Mum, calm down. We wanted it to be a surprise.

A/N: Haha! Bet you weren't expecting that! Well, neither was Rose (but when is she ever expecting anything?)

This chapter marks the end of Christmas at the Burrow but (shameless self-promo time) if you would like to read some fluffy scorose one shots, I would recommend checking out 'a rose by any other name' from chapters 17 onwards. And I've also started another MC (though of course, updates every 14 days here will continue) called 'lovely and shattered' it's about the Black family at Christmas and is a completely different style from this one (read: it's angst. Very angsty angst. But I love it).

Special dedicate to Pilarofdoom and toastingcheese who always write the loveliest reviews.

See you in two weeks time, and until then, take care!

Butterflies765