Chapter Twenty-Six - What Christmas Should Be
There was one Wizengamot meeting in December, and Harry had the rest of the month up until Christmas to spend with his family and friends, and with the children at the Residence. Susan had reported to him that every single one of their students at Hogwarts were doing much better in school than they had been doing before coming to the residence. He worked on plans with her for Christmas with the kids. She worked with her staff to get wish lists from each child, and Harry worked with Marauders Institute to make those wish lists come true by getting individuals or teams to sponsor the children, and help with filling their wish lists.
Harry and Ginny already had their three kids, and were taking care of their wish lists, plus a little extra. Harry thought that one of the best things this holiday was going to be that all of these kids that were normally left at Hogwarts would be coming to the residence for the holidays. They would be putting on a big Christmas dinner and party, and there would be special outings for all of the children and teens.
The Weasleys were going to be getting together on the Sunday before Christmas this year. Normally this was a Christmas with the family year, but Harry and Ginny weren't the only ones to commit to helping with the festivities at the Residence on Christmas day, so Grandma and Grandpa offered to take most of the grandchildren on Christmas afternoon while their parents helped out at the Residence.
Kreacher and Winky would normally have Christmas Day off too, but had volunteered to help Molly and Arthur out at the Burrow taking care of the kids. On Sunday afternoon, the clan gathered at the Burrow. Harry and Ginny got there with the boys somewhere in the middle of the pack, and they arrived to a celebration - Hermione and Ron just found out that they were expecting their second child - another well planned, off-season due date. Considering the timing this year, and the coincidence to when Albus was born, there was a lot of joking that maybe the researchers at Marauders Institute ought to do a study on the impact of 'bonus day' on the late August, early September birth rate.
Hermione was sitting on one of the sofas later in the afternoon, watching as Ron and Nathalie were having another one of their endless line of Wizard's Chess matches. Harry sat down beside her and put his arm around her.
"So, you just had to come up with an even bigger surprise present for the family this year, didn't you?" he asked, and she laughed at him.
"I don't think we'll come up with a bigger surprise than last year for a while," she suggested. "That was a pretty outstanding little miracle, if I do say so myself."
Harry smiled. "I hate to hazard disagreeing with someone who is usually so much smarter than I am, but if Rose is any indication, your new arrival will be a much better miracle." Hermione looked over at her daughter, happily sitting with Grandpa.
"They are all pretty amazing little gifts, that's for sure," she agreed.
Ron was having a good-natured argument with Nathalie over who was ahead of whom in their nine years and running competition. He was sure that he was way ahead by now. Nathalie was telling him he was dreaming. Ginny had heard their discussion, and was happy to provide the answer for them.
"You've played ninety-seven matches, including the one in progress," she told them. "Nathalie has won thirty-six. Ron, you've won twenty-eight, and you've played to thirty-two stalemates." She waited a moment, looked at the board, and added - "and if you don't start playing a bit better soon, you're going to lose number thirty-seven."
Ron looked at her in disbelief. "You just made that whole thing up, didn't you?" he accused, and Ginny laughed.
"Nope, I can promise you that is exactly the standings in your matches. But if it's really such a big deal to you, just start writing it down from now on. I'm sure Nathalie won't mind having her ongoing defeat of the world's greatest professional Quidditch keeper recorded on parchment for the sake of history." Nathalie laughed, and Ron just grumbled and let the whole thing drop.
Ginny sat down beside Harry, and he leaned over and kissed her. "Nice use of the remembrall," he whispered into her ear. She smiled at him impishly.
"It's a sister's obligation to help her brothers out. I just didn't want him having to worry about whether he was winning or not. Now he knows for sure. I'm positive he feels much better now."
Harry laughed, squeezing her hand. "I love you, Ginny."
She put a hand on her stomach. "I noticed that" she said, grinning at him. "Good thing I love you too."
Dinner was served, and so the normal frenzy that was part of life in a large family began. Harry and Ginny were busy with both of their kids throughout the meal. He was sitting beside Marietta and George, and it suddenly occurred to him that they'd been at the Burrow all afternoon, and had actually been there before he'd gotten there with his family. He put a hand on George's arm to get his attention.
"It just dawned on me that you guys have been here all day," he told his brother. "Did the store burn down, and I missed it on the news?"
George laughed. "No, we just decided that we're working too hard, so we hired a manager for the store - for Lee and Cho's store too." He was smiling. "Lee and I are mostly going to develop new products now, and Marietta and Cho are going to take care of keeping an eye on all of the stores and our interests in GamePortal."
"When we leave here, we're going with Lee and Cho for a week on the island," Marietta added. Harry smiled at them.
"We might see you there next weekend after Ron's game," he told them.
When everyone was getting close to being finished eating, it got harder to keep the children under control, since they all knew what was coming next, so they all pitched in for a quick clean-up, and then allowed the kids to lead them into the sitting room for an entertaining evening.
The first Christmas Eve at the Lily Evans Memorial Residence was, according to nearly every child there, the best one ever. Harry and Ginny were there with their sons and Teddy. The boys were soon off playing - Teddy with his friend Stewart. Ginny was swept away by Lisa, Megan, and some of the other girls. Harry spent the evening going around to the different activities that the children were involved in.
He lost a game of 3D World Cup Quidditch to a group of teenage boys who had decided that seven against one should be fair odds against the most famous Seeker in Hogwarts history. He watched part of A Christmas Carol with a group of children in one of the Common Rooms. Susan had him spend some time with one of the younger boys who was having trouble dealing with his first Christmas without his parents. When they went home for the night, Harry and Ginny both knew that this is what they'd be doing every Christmas Eve from now on.
James woke Albus up before dawn, and they went downstairs to peek under the tree at the presents waiting for them there before running back upstairs to pounce on their parents. Harry was laughing as he captured a wriggling James and Ginny had Albus giggling.
"Do you think there's any chance they get this excitement about presents from your side of the family?" he asked her. Ginny laughed as she jumped out of bed.
"I don't have time to answer that right now - if I don't hurry, these two little rascals will beat me to the tree!"
With that, she took off running, the boys both chasing after her. When Harry got down to the sitting room, there were three little kids waiting for him expectantly.
"Don't let me hold you up. Dig in," he told them.
Ginny loved the toy dragon that James had picked out for her 'so you'll have one of your own when we play dragons', and the gold hair bands that Albus got her. James got the 'real flying dragon' toy he'd been wishing for, and Albus was more interested in the picture books he got than in the toys that included some dragons of his own (so he'll stop taking mine).
Harry got a dragon too, and a giant book of children's stories. He and Ginny exchanged their gifts too - a girl's weekend away, complete with babysitter for her, and a new, wonderfully warm winter cloak for him. The kiss exchange at the end had two parents laughing and two little boys squealing and chanting 'Yuck, Yuck, Yuck!'
Teddy was nine years old, going on ten. He was hanging out with his friend Stewart in the dining hall of the Residence where Stewart lived. He'd come with Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny for the Christmas party they were having today. James and Albus were at the Burrow with most of their other young cousins.
Stewart was Teddy's age, and they liked a lot of the same things, but they'd become best friends, Teddy thought, because they'd both lost their parents in the war. He hadn't really realized how lucky he was to have Grandma Andromeda and Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny until Stewart had told him about what his life had been like before coming to the Residence.
His friend's orphanage had twelve children to a bedroom, and it always seemed cold, and he never had a single new thing in his entire life - nothing but old clothes and other kid's discarded, used toys. He hadn't believed there was a single person in the whole Wizarding World that loved him. Teddy was very proud of his Godfather for making this place for Stewart and the other kids. He didn't know what he wanted to do when he grew up, but he thought that working somewhere like this must be a pretty great job.
Uncle Bill and Aunt Fleur were here too, and Victoire had come with them. Teddy looked over to where she was playing with some other girls that were around her age. He'd never admit it to anyone - not even to Uncle Harry - but he really thought she was the prettiest girl he knew, and that she really wasn't nearly as bad as he pretended she was. If only she wasn't a girl and carried those nasty girl germs, he thought they could even be friends.
Stewart was telling him about his morning, and Teddy looked around the room, picking out his other 'aunts and uncles' who had come for the afternoon as he listened to his friend. Ron and Hermione were there, and so were Percy and Penelope. He saw Mandy and Natalie from the Institute, along with their husbands.
"When I woke up, there was a present on the end of my bed, and there were sweets, and new clothes, and a toy dragon just like one of the ones you have," Stewart was telling him. "Then we all came in here and had a huge breakfast." Teddy smiled at his friend.
"Me and Grandma had breakfast in the Great Hall at school. Now that this place is here, the only kids staying over the holidays are the ones with parents who have gone away over Christmas." Stewart looked at him in surprise.
"There are parents out there that don't even spend Christmas with their own kids?" he asked incredulously, and Teddy nodded.
"I don't get it either, but orphans like you and me aren't the only kids that have problems." Stewart nodded.
"Maybe if you ask, your Uncle Harry would help them too," he suggested. Teddy looked into his friend's shining eyes – even with everything he'd been through, he cared about a bunch of kids he didn't even know who were stuck spending Christmas at Hogwarts.
"That's a very good idea, mate," he told his friend. "I'll make sure I do that."
Uncle Harry was sitting with a younger boy on the other side of the hall, and Teddy asked Stewart about the little boy that he'd seen Harry spend time with last night too.
"That's Michael," Stewart told him. "His Mum and Dad died in an accident earlier this year, so this is his first Christmas without them. He's been crying a lot the last couple of days. I heard Susan ask your uncle to help him last night."
Teddy stood up. "Why don't you and I go over and see if we can help too," he suggested, and Stewart thought that was a good idea too, so the two boys went and invited Michael to go play with them. Teddy felt really good when Uncle Harry hugged him, and told him he 'did good'.
He and Stewart played with Michael for maybe an hour when the grown-ups called them all together. There were nearly two hundred kids, so when the presents started flying through the air, two or three of them for each child, it was like watching some strange swirling, colourful snowstorm. Teddy watched in delight as his friend got his very own GameWizard, complete with all of the games that he and Teddy liked to play together.
"Now we can play together even when you're at school, and I'm here," Stewart had said happily. Stewart also had a package with more new clothes, and finally the one that Teddy had asked Uncle Harry to help him with. When Stewart saw that his last present was from Teddy, he quickly opened it up, and found his very own WiComm inside. Teddy pulled his out of his pocket.
"Aunt Hermione helped make these especially for us," he told Stewart. "We can talk to each other, or send QuillMessages, and we can also talk with Uncle Harry on his, but that's all. They're just for us, and if anyone else tries to read our messages, they won't be able to." Stewart gave his friend a hug, and then quickly remembered they were cool and let him go.
"Thanks, mate," he said happily. "This is my best Christmas ever!" Teddy looked up to see Uncle Harry watching them, and they both smiled.
Lisa and Megan spent the whole afternoon with Ginny. They loved the dresses and jewellery that they had been given for presents, but the pair of 3D GameWitches had sent both of them flying into Ginny's arms. Michael had opened his presents, and he really did appreciate and like them, but he just couldn't bring himself to be happy.
Harry had sat with him while he opened them, his green eyes soft and understanding. Michael knew he really understood too, since he was also an orphan. That helped a little, but it didn't make it better - he really wished he could have his mommy and daddy back. When he started crying again, Harry picked him up, and held him close, tears in his own eyes. Well, if Ginny could take care of both Lisa and Megan, he could handle Stewart and Michael.
The dinner late that afternoon reminded Teddy of the banquets in the Great Hall at Hogwarts, only a little smaller. The tables were loaded down with food, and he and Stewart stuffed themselves until they couldn't eat a single bite without taking the chance of blowing up. The two boys had a little time to play after dinner, and then it was time for Teddy to go back to Hogwarts.
Uncle Harry took him there, and when he was ready to go after talking with Andromeda for a few minutes, gave Teddy a big hug, and told him just how proud he was of his Godson, leaving Teddy happy and pleased like he always was when Uncle Harry told him things like that, and that he loved him. It was even okay to hug him - Uncle Harry was the coolest person Teddy knew, so if hugging was ok with him, then it must be cool too.
When Harry got back to the Burrow, everyone that had gone to the residence for the afternoon was there, either picking up their kids, or had come for the short meeting that Harry and Ginny had asked them to stop in for. Ginny got their attention once Harry was there, and started by thanking them all for going to spend their Christmas with the kids. They had all been moved, spending the day there, and no thanks were really needed.
"Harry and I are going to make this an annual event, and you all have open invitations any time you can come. We've got another project for this coming summer, though, and we'd like you to work on it for us." She looked around the kitchen where they were all sitting or standing.
"We've booked about one hundred suites for the last week of July at Marauders Paradise. There will be two children per suite, and we need to find one hundred volunteer couples to give up a week of their time and chaperone two of the children each. I know it's over six months away, but there's going to be a lot of planning involved. We aren't going to use any of the staff at the residence so that most of them can have a week off."
Natalie offered to work with Harry on this, and get the now ninety-four people or couples they'd need (Mum, Dad, Bill, Fleur, Percy, Penelope, Mandy, Terry, Natalie, and Owen would all be going for sure). With that taken care of, they wished each other a Merry Christmas, exchanged hugs and kisses, thanked Mum, Dad, Kreacher, and Winky for watching the children, then gathered their kids and left for their homes.
Through the rest of the Christmas and New Year holiday season, Harry and Ginny took the kids to see Uncle Ron's game, had the rest of that weekend on the island, and went to a New Year's Eve dance at the Residence, where Harry and Ginny not only got 'Yucks!' from James and Albus, but from quite a few of the other little kids, along with a large number of giggles from the teenage girls for kissing once when they were dancing together. In January, they got back into their routines, and they were soon off to a great start to the New Year.