Summery: Christmas time comes around again and Charlie wants to get Willy a present he'd never forget. But has trouble on his search for 'the perfect gift'.

Note: Please ignore any possible spelling mistakes or errors.

Chapter 3

Once Charlie returned home, he dropped his book bag on the floor and closed the door, swinging it shut. But as soon as he did, a loud thump and an 'Ouch' came from just outside it, opening the door again; he was greeted by a taller man with a funny haircut, top hat and forest green velvet coat.

"Mr. Wonka?" Charlie asked, almost amazed by his sudden appearance. Willy didn't answer, he scurried his way inside and looked around the slightly empty shack, Grandpa Joe and Mr. Bucket seemed absent. Charlie closed the door behind him and ran over to his book bag and hung it just under where Willy had placed his hat, then raced over to ask if his mentor wanted anything to eat or drink; who simply declined and took a seat.

Mrs. Bucket popped her head out from behind the sink she was cleaning and smiled sweetly in Willy's direction, stepping up, she grabbed a tea-towel from the rack on the stove and cleaned her slightly oily hands.

"Good day, Willy." She said in an almost sing-song voice. "Good to see you're here. Is that a new coat?"

Willy pulled his arms up and looked at each one twice, and then behind him, at his legs and then up at Mrs. Bucket.

"Why yeah!" Then he started to ramble on. "I was in my room the other day, thinking to myself when I looked over at my coat rack. I had maroon, blue, red, purple, black, even khaki! But no green."

Mrs. Bucket nodded as if she were taking everything thing he said to heart, but he spoke so fast she didn't understand a word he said; then turned her attention to Charlie. "Did you have a good day at school, dear?"

Willy quickly swung his head over in Charlie's direction, listening and ready for an answer. Charlie shook his head and turned a little red in the face from what had happened earlier.

"Not really," He told them, shaking his head. "I accidentally started choking in class and it caught almost the whole schools attention."

"Are you O-Kay now, Squirt?" Willy asked in a very unusual concerned and frightened tone of voice, his latex covered hands pulled slowly onto his lap and clasped together. Charlie nodded and went to get himself a drink, what he needed right now was a cold glass of water. Once the whole thing was gulped down, Willy called him over.

Charlie calmly placed his glass in the sink and walked over to his mentor's side, waiting patiently for him to begin.

"Those advent calendars you designed." Willy told him with a large grin. "Are selling by the pound full, I also want you to have this."

Willy reached into his left pocket, eyebrows concentrating on what he was looking for. Once he found what it was looking for, he raised his index finger and pulled out a piece of paper, passing it to Charlie, who examined it carefully.

"It's the time and place I want you to be afterwards." Willy told him, tenting his fingers in an excited manner, obviously it was some surprise he wasn't going to tell now but wanted Charlie to wait for the right time, maybe something not quite finished yet. Charlie folded the paper into the pocket of his pants and thanked him for it, besides Christmas Day he had something else to look forward to. As soon as that was taken care of, Grandpa Joe and Mr. Bucket crawled through the door, plastic white bags in the hands of Grandpa Joe and a large white rectangle box lay in Mr. Bucket's arms.

Willy was dumbstruck but everyone around him seemed excited, turning around he found one of the largest smile printed on his little apprentices face. The two men placed everything they bought on the table and started sorting everything out on color and object. Willy picked up a shiny red ball with gold glitter glued on small lines spelling out the word 'Charlie'; he pulled it up to his face and examined it, sniffing it and then pulling it back again.

"What's the occasion?" He asked shyly, placing the ball back with the others and poking a long bit of silver and green tinsel.

"He's two cards short from a deck." Mumbled Grandpa George, Willy's eyebrows furrowed but pretended not to hear and continued poking the tinsel.

"Dad bought a Christmas Tree!" Charlie walked over to his father's side and watched him slowly unfold the box showing plastic white branches. "Can I help?"

"Of course, Charlie." Mr. Bucket looked up at Willy, who sank in his chair. "Willy? You want to help?"

The (at the moment) shy Chocolatier exchanged looks between Charlie, Mr. Bucket, the so called 'Christmas Tree' and the tinsel he was poking.

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"Sooo…what do I do with these?" Willy asked, picking up a colorful ball and placing it up near his ear.

"Just thread them through the branch, like this." Charlie instructed, grabbing a ball of his own and threading it above his head. Willy watched and copied Charlie's every move, stringing the ball onto the branch. Charlie picked up three different colored balls and walked over to the other side of the tree, strung them on and came back for some more.

Willy watched before grabbing three of his own and standing up, he strung one on and it fell on the floor. He knelt down on his knees and picked it up, but stumbled the two other colorful balls in the other hand; then a thought occurred to him. He placed two balls in his left hand and the other one in his, balanced them for a while before throwing the ball in his right hand up and passing it to his left. He did this slowly, then started to speed up, before Charlie realized what he was doing and became highly interested. The rest of the family caught the end of the act once Willy threw one of the balls a little too high, it came falling down and knocked him on the top of the head, bouncing off and landing between Grandma Georgina and Grandpa George.

"I didn't know you could juggle." Charlie commented as he went to collect some silver tinsel.

"Neither did I." Willy commented back, ending with a tiny giggle.

Charlie strung the silver tinsel around from the top of the tree to the bottom, and then went to get the silver and green tinsel of which Willy was playing with earlier. But just before Charlie could start it, Willy jumped to his feel and claimed he'd do it, and strung the tinsel in the opposite direction Charlie had. Once that was taken care of, Charlie searched through the bag, but couldn't find what he was looking for.

"Where's the star?"

"We must have forgotten it." Grandpa Joe said in a raspy voice. He was about to say something when Willy asked for a pen and that piece of paper he had handed Charlie much earlier, he leaned the paper on the floor and began of mutter what he was writing:

"Remind…Mr. Wonka to…remind him to make…star for tree." Willy smiled and clicked the pen shut, handing it back to whoever had passed it to him in the first place and folding the paper and handed it to Charlie, who once again placed it in the pocket of his pants.

Both Willy and Charlie stood back and examined their work, the chocolatier clasped his hands together and grinned wildly. "I think we did a good job, didn't we?"

Charlie returned the smile and nodded, agreeing.

"It's very beautiful." Grandma Josephine smiled.

"Magnificent." Grandpa Joe said looking up and down the white tree covered in green, silver, red and purple ornaments. Mrs. Bucket nodded and picked up the coffee cup her husband had been drinking out of and placed it in the sink.

"Are you sure you don't want to stay for dinner, Willy?" Mrs. Bucket asked. Willy turned around and walked over to the door, grabbing his hat and placing it on his head then grasping his cane before opening the door.

"I'd really love to Mrs. B, but it's that time of the year again and I'm terribly busy with that horrible end-of-year paperwork." Willy tipped his hat to Mr. and Mrs. Bucket then smiled over at Charlie. "See you tomorrow, Squirt!"

Willy shut the door and made his way back to his study where piles and piles of paperwork were waiting to be written and mailed out, but as usual; someone stopped him.

"Oh and by the way Mr. Wonka," Charlie called over to him. "Happy Birthday!"

Willy stopped in his tracks, it had been his Birthday? Since when? He skidded around on the heels of his shoes and headed straight for the Bucket house again, the paperwork was going to have to wait till tomorrow; he had a dinner to makeup for.

A/N: I'm trying to imagine Willy Wonka with a khaki velvet coat. But then again it's the color he wears when finds the Oompa Loompas, so I'm going to put that thought behind me. I just finished putting up the Xmas tree; three days before I normally do, and I also bought a Wonka advent calendar (Can't wait to start eating).