Thursday December 17th
Weasley house, living room
4:01 pm
- - -
"Up here?"
"No, a bit higher."
Pause.
"Here?"
"Yes. Perfect!"
Rose Weasley beamed as her younger brother climbed down the small ladder, from which he had just used to hang the last of the ornaments on the tree. They usually hanged the ornaments by magic –well, Mum and Dad hanged them by magic and Rose and Hugo just watched. But this year Hugo had really wanted to decorate the tree and Mum and Dad agreed on the condition that Rose help him. Rose didn't mind, she often bossed Hugo around but today was the first time she was actually allowed to do it. And Rose was thrilled about it.
"How 'bout this?" asked Hugo as lifted up an armful of tinsel from the bin. "Where's this supposed to go?"
"Um, just throw it on the tree all pretty and such."
Hugo threw it.
"Hu-go!" yelled Rose with a stomp of her feet. "I said pretty. That's not pretty!"
Hugo groaned but wandered over to the tree and tried to spread around the tinsel, which had settled on the bottom right hand side. "That better?" he asked after a moment of fiddling.
"I guess," replied Rose. "Now, do we need anything else?"
Rose leaned back and observed the tree. The tree was huge, for some reason her Dad loved to get the biggest tree he could find. This was fine except for the fact that Rose and Hugo were too small to reach most of the tree so a lot of the ornaments and decorations had wound up on the bottom half of the tree this year, living the top half bare. But other then that and the huge gaping holes spread throughout the tree, for Hugo insisted that all the ornaments were friends and they all wanted to be hung in the same area, the tree looked great. At least, in Rose and Hugo's humble opinion.
"I think we're done Hugo," observed Rose, "I think we are done."
"All right!" said Hugo happily as he stepped back from the tree and yelled, loudly, "Hey Mum! Dad! Weeee're done!"
Footsteps sounded in the hall as their parents entered the room. Ron Weasley saw the tree first.
"Holy shite," said their dad as his eyes grew big, "the tree looks-"
"Lovely," interrupted their mother as she poked her elbow into their father's stomach. "It looks lovely dears," she added with a smile in Rose and Hugo's direction.
Rose beamed. "Really, you think so? Hugo helped loads. I just gave him directions," she added as Hugo nodded in agreement and tugged at their mother's arm, leading her over to tree to show off what he did. Rose turned to her father. "What do you think Dad?" she asked.
Rose watched as her father stopped gaping at the tree and peered down to look at her. "I, um.." he stammered.
"Hugo wanted to add glittering snow ball cubes," interrupted Rose. "And those light up wands that jingle Christmas songs for ten hours straight. But I told him it would make the tree look ugly. And we don't want an ugly tree do we Dad?"
For a minute Rose thought her father was going to say something else, but he merely continued to watch her and his expression softened. Wrapping his arm around Rose's shoulder's, he squeezed her shoulder's affectionately and said, "Of course not Rosie. And this tree…this tree looks beautifully. By far the best tree we've ever had."
"Really?" preened Rose.
"Really," replied Ron, "It's quite an original."
"Is original good?"
Ron leaned down and gave his daughter a fond smile. "When it's made by you and Hugo love, original is nothing short of spectacular."
At that moment, little Rose Weasley felt ten feet tall.