Hello! This little plot bunny has been going around in my head for a few months, so I finally sat down and committed to writing it. I'm unsure when this would occur as it essentially ignores Emelius signing up for the army. You can decide if Emelius is back home from the war or set it a few months after the end of the movie. It's just a piece of pure fluff (which we all love, don't we?).
Also, I'm considering doing a little advent calendar this year of drabbles. I'm traveling for a few weeks and will have a lot of time to kill between sitting in airports and jumping on trains. I'm considering doing an advent calendar of Christmas-themed drabbles, which may be linked or individual stand-alone pieces. I've always wanted to do one and I thought Bedknobs would be the perfect fandom to do it for.
Each would likely be fairly short (maybe 500 words?). I'm still debating between 12 and 25. It'll depend on how many prompts I can come up with. If you've always wanted a Christmas-themed Bedknobs and Broomsticks drabble or fic, now's your time to shine! Leave me a prompt and I'll add it to my list. I'll either start publishing them on the 1st of December or 14th, depending on whether I go with 12 or 25 drabbles.
Anywho, onward to the fluff!
NURSERY RHYMES
They had quickly fallen into a routine with evening meals.
Emelius would entertain the children while Eglantine would cook. Fridays were marked with the children's fried food, while the rest of the week was a healthy blend of seasonal vegetables and whatever meat caught Eglantine's eye at the local butchers.
After saying prayers and catching up on each other's day over dinner, the children would take turns washing and drying the dishes while Eglantine and Emelius shared a glass of red wine or a hot toddy on colder nights.
Emelius was filling their glasses in the kitchen while Carrie washed the dishes and her brothers dried and put them away.
"Do you remember the train set in that nursery?" Paul said, balancing a stack of plates in his arms. "I wish I had a train set," He added with a sigh, picturing the train set with its black wheels and red paint. If he closed his eyes tight enough, he could remember the noise it made as it steamed around the track, crawling upwards before sloping down.
Carrie smiled brightly, reaching into the sink to wash another pot. "Oh, I remember all the shelves of books and dolls, it was so cosy looking," she said, staring longingly out the kitchen window towards the vegetable garden.
"Oi, we aren't some silver spooners, our room here is like a palace compared to London," Charlie said, hitting his brother on the back with his dishcloth. The eldest of the brothers had become more gracious in the weeks since he arrived in Pepperinge Eye.
As though he had finally come to accept that they were staying with Miss Price. That this wasn't something temporary. That it wasn't another home that would be taken from them.
Emelius slipped out of the kitchen, side-stepping Cosmic Creepers as he felt a plan start to form in his mind. It was time to their house a home - and every home with children in it had a nursery.
The children's conversation had been replaying itself in Emelius' mind throughout the evening. He found himself looking around the children's rooms with new eyes as he tucked Paul into bed while telling Carrie to finish one more chapter of her book before lights out.
The room had hardly changed since the children moved in. The portrait of Eglantine's father was still hanging over the dresser.
Yet, it had clearly become a children's room. The same way the house had transformed into a family home – slowly then suddenly all at once there were signs of the children everywhere.
From the school shoes that he would trip over in the evening to the books and comics that seemed to appear in every room. Yes, this had become a family home before their very eyes – but it wasn't complete.
Not without a proper nursery.
The children weren't guests in this house anymore. It was their home.
That's how Emelius found himself coming up with his latest plot when he re-joined Eglantine in the living room.
"Eglantine," He announced as he reached the bottom of the staircase, narrowly avoiding Cosmic Creepers as the cat lay waiting for him at the bottom. Emelius eyed the cat as it trotted up the stairs toward the nursery. The cat had a habit of sneaking into the children's room to sleep on Paul's bed.
Eglantine looked up from her book, her glasses perched on the end of her nose. "Yes, dear?" She asked, setting down her book as she picked up her glass of wine. Her eyes followed Emelius as he walked towards the sofa, sitting himself down on the other side, their knees touching as he reached over for his glass.
She knew that look in his eyes all too well.
Her husband was up to something – but what?
"Have you thought about what we're going to do with the nursery?" Emelius pondered, as though asking about the weather. After all, the nursery had hardly been at the top of their agenda.
Between repairing the shed and getting used to married life, there hadn't been much time for anything else.
"What about the nursery?" She asked, tilting her head as she looked perplexedly at her husband. The vision of the nursery in the London house came back to her once again. If she was truthful, it was the first time she had been in such a room.
Her own nursery had been plain, looking just as much like a guest room as the children's room did now. While Eglantine had loved her father, he was hardly the sort to spend his time furnishing a nursery with wooden horses and trainsets.
"Well, we can hardly leave it as it is, it's still more your father's room than the children's nursery," Emelius reminded her, sipping on his wine as though seeking to conceal the twinkle in his eye.
He could see the wheels starting to turn in Eglantine's head. His wife sighed as she nodded, "I supposed you're right, I hadn't even thought about it," Eglantine confessed, once again kicking herself for not thinking.
She was still adjusting to the idea of being a mother. Most women had at least a few months' notice. They all had plenty of time to plan out nurseries. None of them would be leaving their children in a room that hadn't been slept in for twenty years.
Yet, Eglantine loved those children as though she had grown them under her own heart. Though, she couldn't help but feel that she wasn't good enough.
That was until she thought of the alternative – of the night Mrs. Hobday appeared on her doorstep to announce that she had found a new home for the children.
By that stage, they had firmly become her children.
No, she was becoming the mother that they deserved. Realising her mistake with the nursery was a step in the right direction.
"I don't know why I didn't think about it earlier," Eglantine uttered and Emelius watched the guilt start to play out across her father. Reaching out, he took his wife's hand and beamed at her.
"Let me speak to the children, I'm sure we can come up with some ideas," Emelius assured her, "I'm fairly handy with a pot of paint, you know," He added, clinching his wine glass with Eglantine's as the woman glared at him.
"Don't you get a drop of paint on my antique furniture, Emelius," She warned in the tone that the children had nicknamed her 'Miss Price voice'. It was typically reserved for when Charlie would come back from school covered in dirt from football practice or when Paul would get a little too enthusiastic with his juggling.
Emelius leaned back on the sofa as he sipped his wine. Their children would get the nursery they had always wanted – even if it did involve a trip to Portobello Road.
Emelius needed to get Eglantine out of the house. While he loved the woman, she was a little too much of a perfectionist. He wanted to get at least the painting and wallpapering done without making her stressed. Ideally, she wouldn't know that he had started on the nursery until it was virtually finished.
He had already taken a trip to Portobello Road on the enhanced bed while Eglantine had been out ordering new fabrics from the shop in town.
The perfect opportunity came a week later when Mrs. Hobday needed help at the parish bake sale.
Eglantine had become more involved in the community since the children arrived. Of course, it was partly expected. All the mothers of Pepperinge Eye's schoolchildren felt the need to 'show their faces' at community events – even Eglantine.
The bake sale was no exception.
"I'll go with you, mum,' Carrie offered, already plotting how she could bring back a chocolate cake from the sale. She was hovering over the lemon cake that Eglantine was drizzling icing over.
While Eglantine had moved on from her diet of stewed nettles and elm bark to incorporate a little fried food, she had always maintained a mild sweet tooth.
Once the cake had set, Carrie put it into her basket and went in search of her brothers. "Are you coming with us to the bake sale?" She asked, taking in the sight of Charlie with his maths textbook and Paul sitting on the floor with Cosmic Creepers in his lap.
"Naw, you go on ahead Carrie, get enough of those teachers during the week," Charlie said, before burying his head back in his textbook. Paul looked up at his brother, a mysterious grin on his face as he stroked the black cat's fur.
Carrie thought nothing of it as she shrugged her shoulders and picked up the basket as Eglantine called her name. "Coming mum," She shouted, slipping into her jacket as she headed out the door, saying goodbye to Emelius as he kissed Eglantine's cheek on the doorstep.
Emelius watched the pair head off in Eglantine's bike and sidecar before he shut the front door.
They had at least two hours before the girls would return. Three if they were lucky.
"Right, off we go!" Emelius announced, waving for both boys to follow him into the yard. The shed that once housed Eglantine's supplies was still being repaired, although the roof had been finished the week earlier. He had stored the bits and bobs he had gotten in London, including the paint, in the shed for safekeeping.
The promise of a train set and somewhere to store their football boots was enough to entice the boys to keep Emelius' secret.
Emelius was glad the room had been kept relatively plain. It made it easy for them to move the furniture away from the wall while giving them space to bring up his treasures from Portobello Market.
It helped to have friends who owed you a favour or two after all.
While this nursery wouldn't be as grand as the one in London, it would be the finest in Pepperinge Eye – enchanted bed knob notwithstanding.
"Did you get a bed for Cosmic Creepers, da?" Paul called over his shoulder as he carried a box back through the house. "Yes, Paul, even a bed for Cosmic Creepers," Emelius replied, a paint bucket in each hand as Charlie came behind him with the brushes and coverings for the floor.
"I still want a rabbit, you know, can we get a rabbit?" His youngest asked and Emelius chuckled as he thought of the inquiry Eglantine had made in town for a rabbit for Paul only the week before.
The painting of the nursery was going like a military operation. Paul was working on painting the skirting boards while Emelius was at the top of the ladder painting the wall. "Where do you want this to go, da?" Charlie asked, appearing at the door with a chair, narrowly avoiding stepping on Cosmic Creeper.
"Ah, Carrie's chair, put it over there," Emelius said, pointing towards the fireplace. Emelius knew he had to get it for Carrie as soon as he had set sights on it in his friend's used furniture store. He had found the girl on more than one occasion fast asleep on Eglantine's chair downstairs, always curled up with a book.
Now she would have a chair of her own.
"It's going to be a proper nursery," Paul announced gleefully, his pearly white smile never faulting as he dipped his paintbrush back into the bucket.
"Let's just hope this is all done before the girls get back, otherwise your mother will be turning me back into a rabbit," Emelius thought aloud, stepping back on the ladder as he looked out the window, as though expecting the girls to be driving down the street at any moment.
"I can't wait to show the boys the chocolate cake, thank you so much, mum," Carrie said, clutching the basket in her arms as she got out of the sidecar. Eglantine took off her goggles as she looked around, her eyebrows drawn together as she shook her head. It was quiet - too quiet. Something was up.
"It's a little too quiet around here for my liking, sweetpea," Eglantine said, wrapping her arm around Carrie's shoulder as they headed to the front door. Usually, Paul would bolt out the door as soon as he heard the sidecar pull into the lane.
The Browne residence was rarely a quiet place – at least not until the children went to sleep. Silence always meant one thing.
Emelius – or their boys – were up to something.
The answer to her musing soon presented itself.
Eglantine was greeted by Paul at the door. He was covered in paint from head to toe, a Cheshire cat smile on his face as he carried the empty paint bucket. "You're back!' He chirped, rubbing his hand across his forehead, specks of paint peppering his fringe.
"Paul, dear, what on Earth…?" Eglantine asked, stopping in her tracks as she took in the appearance of her youngest son. Where had the boy gotten paint from? She took Paul by the hand and started guiding him through the living room toward the kitchen. How on earth was she going to get the paint out of his hair?
It was Carrie's enormous laugh that stopped Eglantine's train of thought. The girl was almost doubled over as she laughed at Charlie coming down the stairs, paint covering his overalls as he took off his gas mask. Clearly, he had thrown it on as a joke to avoid the paint fumes.
"I never wanna see another shelf or paint bucket again," Charlie declared, heading towards the sofa to drop himself down onto the cushions before Carrie grabbed her brother's arm, pausing him mid-step for fear of getting paint all over their mother's furniture.
Eglantine took a deep breath as she silently counted to ten. "Charlie, where's your father?" She asked, the pieces finally coming into place as Paul grabbed her hand and led her up the staircase.
"In the nursery, of course!" He cried happily, making Eglantine suddenly forget all about the mess the two boys had become.
The first thing that caught her eye was the soft blush pink of the walls. It reminded her of the wallpaper in the London nursery but without the intricate patterns.
There was a short sage green chair next to the fireplace that she could picture Carrie curling up in while reading a book.
Sat on Carrie's bed was a little doll with brunette hair and a periwinkle blue dress. As though a miniature of herself. Eglantine had already spotted a stack of children's books next to Paul's side of the bed – each one more brightly illustrated than the last. His worn copy of 'Isle of Naboombu' sat at the top of the pile.
Two teddy bears now sat at the foot of the bed, on the spot usually reserved for Cosmic Creepers.
Eglantine's eyes gleamed with tears as she spotted the train set on top of the dresser. She had heard the boys talking about the train set they had seen in London, how the whole set travelled around the room on a track. Their eyes lit up the same way they did when she performed magic.
And right in the corner of the nursery?
The infamous 'The Magnificent Emelius – Illusionist Extraodinary' poster hung from the wall behind a rocking chair that had clearly been given a fresh varnish.
"The trainset needs a lick of paint, but I told the boys we could do it up together," Emelius announced, shuffling from foot to foot as he waited impatiently for his wife's reaction, appearing from the side of the room with the white sheets folded in his arm.
It took a minute before Eglantine could compose herself to look at her husband.
"Emelius," she said, feeling a tear tickle at the corner of her eye. "Yes, my love?" Emelius breathed, moving closer to her. "You really are magnificent," She laughed, reaching out to step into his arms as he hugged her.
Her head was still nestled against his chest when she heard three familiar sets of footsteps break into the room. "Oh my!" Carrie cried, standing in the middle of the room as she marvelled at its sudden transformation.
Emelius and Eglantine stepped back as the three children each found a spot in the room. Charlie was taking the train set apart, examining its wheels as though mentally making a repairs list. Carrie had already made herself at home in the chair next to the fireplace, her book in one hand and the doll in the other.
Paul saved the teddy bear from Cosmic Creepers as the cat pounced on the bed, taking his usual spot at the boy's feet as Paul picked up his copy of the Isle of Naboombu.
Stepping out of the room, Eglantine clutched Emelius' hand as they slowly closed the door behind them.
Now, their house had become a home.
