After a night of eating, drinking, and breathless laughter, Rose had managed to steal upstairs to Sam's room and take up most of his bed the entire night.

When Christmas day dawned, and Rose had considerably overslept, she awoke bleary-eyed and tired, but knowing there was no way she could get out of the Weasley-Potter family Christmas.

As she tried to get out of bed, Sam's arms snaked around her and pulled her back in.

"Sam, I have to get to Nanna Molly's and it's already 10am! If I miss helping to prepare lunch I'll never hear the end of it."

But even as she protested, she snuggled back under the warm covers and gave Sam a showering of kisses all over his face.

.

"Okay fine," Sam un-cuddled her, "Away with you. But I'll see you tomorrow for the leftovers."

Rose scooted off the bed and attempted to put her dress robes back on before giving up, putting on one of Sam's t-shirts and shorts, and sneaking out to the nearest fireplace to floo home.

However just as she reached the end of the hall and the entrance to the living room, she came face to face with Astoria, carrying a cup of coffee back to her room from the kitchen.

Rose's face immediately turned crimson, how on Earth was her timing always this fucking abominable?

"Good morning Astoria, Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas Rose, off to your parents for the day?"

"My Nanna Molly's, I'm just heading home to get changed."

"Ah yes, you have a woolen jumper to don, I believe."

Rose chuckled, "Yes, I do," she laughed again.

"Well have a good day Rose."

.

And with that Astoria went on her way, gracefully carrying her cup of coffee (which probably had an anti-spill spell on it anyway so she could have been skipping down the hallway, but that obviously just wasn't Astoria's style).

'I guess that could have gone worse', Rose thought to herself as she made it to the fireplace and grabbed a fistful of floo powder.

"45 Butt Close, Puddletown."

As the emerald green flames licked around her, Rose managed to hear Draco Malfoy's voice as she spiralled away.

"Butt Close? What a bizarre place to be going."

If she could have slapped her forehead with her palm as she flooed, she would have.

.

.

By the time Rose made it to the Burrow it was almost midday and preparations for an astounding Christmas lunch was well-underway.

Fred immediately tried to make fun of her late arrival but she hushed him swiftly with sly comment on his flirtation skills regarding Jen.

Torn between denying the allegation and defending his flirting skills, Fred was stumped at Rose's proclamation that Jen would never know he was interested unless he stopped pranking her in front of all their colleagues.

"I work at a joke shop Rose, I'm supposed to prank everyone in front of everyone…" Fred replied weakley, but even he knew it was not a strong come-back.

Everyone was sufficiently warned off any more attempts to comment on her tardiness.

.

Rose popped into the living room to quickly wish her parents and endless aunts and uncles Merry Christmas.

Hermione was the only one bothered to get up off her very comfortable seat on the couch and give Rose a hug, "Merry Christmas darling."

Rose leaned down to give her father a kiss, and after exchanging a round of Merry Christmases with everyone, she went back into the kitchen to grab some silverware to set the table.

"Merry Christmas Nanna!"

Nanna Molly was waving her wand over numerous simmering dishes and roasting oven trays while Bee chopped a salad.

"Merry Christmas dear!" Nanna Molly replied distractedly.

Bee chuckled as she finished up with her salad and leaned over to give Rose a quick hug.

Bee's family didn't celebrate Christmas, so as usual Rose had invited her along to the Burrow where she could compliment Nanna Molly's cooking in all the right ways and assist in Grandad Weasley's latest fascination with a muggle gadget.

.

As Rose and Bee both grabbed fistfuls of cutlery and made their way to the dining room, they got to chatting about the ball.

"It was totally ridiculous, as usual, but we kind of made it our own. I finally got Lily back for that ridiculous truth or dare dance she set on me back in 7th year - she had to dance with her colleague but seeing as she's even later than me, I think it ended up going rather well."

Bee laughed, "Well I see you rather enjoy playing matchmaker, but my parents have been driving me mental with it. Every other word out of their mouth is marriage this, marriage that, it's enough to drive a witch to stunning them, honestly."

"So I guess you're glad to be out of there then."

"Absolutely, one more second of them yammering on about arranging a husband…"

"Do you have a lot of suitors then? You're a catch, you must."

.

Bee rolled her eyes, "Oh there are plenty of them until they see a photo - apparently being bigger than a matchstick and having dark skin causes a rather steep drop in suitors, it's disgusting and misogynistic, and I honestly can't bear seeing my parents at the moment."

"They just don't want you to be alone, I mean you've never dated or brought anyone home to them, I'm sure they're just worried-"

"Yeah, because if I brought anyone home because if I did they'd expect a wedding in the next 5 minutes. They're only worried about their reputation of having a Witch in the family who's unmarried over the age of 25, they don't care about what I want at all"

Rose laid a hand on Bee's shoulder and gave it a squeeze, "Well at least you've got your own flat in London right? Living with them would be even worse."

"Yeah… Besides right now I've got a shit tonne of food to eat and Fred to make fun of, that attack on his flirting was just superb."

Chuckling they both took their seats at the magically overly-extended table as the room filled with noise.

.

Crying babies (Victoire and Teddy had two kids now), laughter and the clang of knives and forks against plates buzzed through the dining room at the Burrow as everyone dug into the Christmas day feast.

They had long ago stopped trying to have any talk of Merry Christmases or family thanks before everyone had eaten - it just never ended well.

Al came in from the garden, snow lightly sprinkled across his black hair and knitted woollen jumper like practically everyone else in the whole family (Rose's had arrived under her tree that morning in Puddletown and she'd donned it before coming to the Burrow).

"Well look who decided to show up!" He grinned and gave Rose a side-hug as he sat down next to her to dig into lunch.

.

"You didn't have to dress up and try and repair the absolutely awful impression your boyfriend's parents have of you, so I would appreciate a little bit of a sleep-in after a hard night's work," Rose fired back.

"Look, they don't have to like you, they have to tolerate you - that's what in-laws are all about!"

Rose raised an eyebrow, "Who said anything about in-laws."

Al snorted as he reached out to piled his plate high with turkey, roast potatoes, pastries, pies and bread, "All right, all right, 'eventual in-laws'."

Rose flicked half a cherry-tomato at Al with her fork and it hit him wetly on the check with a little slap.

He took a deep breath, "Rose, I want you to think very carefully about how you could ruin this excellent lunch Nan has spent all morning preparing without your help. Let's keep the food fight under wraps and have a snowball fight later, like civilised people."

Rose snickered but turned her attention to the food. Al was right, food fights were an incredible waste and the snow packed a harder punch.

.

As the Weasley-Potter clan settled into their Christmas feast and the extended table groaned more than a few times from the sheer weight of food and plates of dozens and dozens of family members Rose revelled in the mayhem.

The peace and quiet of her house in Puddletown was all very well and good, but on Christmas it warmed the cockles of her heart to be surrounded by good food, endless family members and a new year, peeking around the corner.