Harry Potter and the Year of Surprises by erinpotter

Christmas

Belongs to erinpotter on HPFF

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The next morning Harry woke to find a large pile of presents at the foot of his bed. He chucked his pillow at Ron's head.

‘Good haul this year, Ron! Get up!’

Ron rolled over, groaning, but as soon as he saw his presents, he brightened up a great deal.

Harry began opening his presents.

A new broom servicing kit from Hermione – he had asked for it.

A book entitled ‘Extreme Dark Arts and how to Repel them’ from Remus and Tonks.

A new jumper and a plug from Mr and Mrs Weasley.

He got a large packet of chocolate frogs and a ten galleon credit note for Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes from Ron.

From Fred and George, he got the brand new stock – not out in the shop yet. There was a large variety of fireworks and sweets and lots of new pranks. There was even one of the portable swamps!

He didn’t know what he was expecting, probably something sickly romantic, from Ginny – he had been preparing his ‘Oh my God, I love it!’ speech. But instead – he was rather pleased with his gift from Ginny. It wasn’t an unusual gift – just a nice one. It was lots of clothes. Muggle clothes. There were jeans, t-shirts, jackets and a nice pair of trainers.

He got out of bed and pulled his dressing robe around his bare torso.

‘Happy?’ he asked Ron.

‘Yeah, they are pretty good. You?’

‘Yep! Mine’s are great! And thanks for the credit note. Should come in handy! Coming down to breakfast?’

‘Yeah, I'm starving.’

******

That day at dinner, absolutely everyone enjoyed themselves.

Fred and George were the usual entertainment. They joked and laughed and did impressions.

Dumbledore almost fell off his seat laughing, as did Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny. Snape sat silently through the dinner, eating like it was his last ever meal. Harry glanced at him a few times, to see him stealing looks and Fred and George and smiling a little, but not for too long. Harry guessed that he was afraid of his ‘evil and menacing’ reputation being flushed down the toilet.

Hermione leaned over to talk to Harry in the middle of the third desert.

‘Look at Snape. He looks almost happy!’

‘I know. He’s almost smiling.’

Hermione beamed and Harry and returned to her pudding. Harry didn’t know why she was so happy about Snape being happy. 

After dinner, everyone got a little drunk on ale and Firewhiskey. Dumbledore had several glasses of Firewhiskey and was up for some more before Molly vanished the bottle, pretending Ron smashed it.

‘Ronald Weasley!’ Dumbledore bellowed.

Ron, who was also rather tipsy, stood up and saluted Dumbledore, like an army cadet. ‘Yes, sir.’

Everyone giggled.

‘I believe you have smashed the Firewhiskey.’

‘I don’t.’

‘You don’t what?’ Dumbledore asked, confused.

‘I don’t believe I did.’

‘But your mother says you did. I do believe that I would believe her before I would believe you. You’re not a very believable person.’

‘You like saying that word. Believe.’

‘Why yes I do. What have you done with the Firewhiskey?’

Dumbledore looked around the room, as if he was waiting for someone to produce another bottle. He spotted Snape in the corner with a small glass of Firewhiskey.

‘Severus, my friend!’ he said, grabbing a large jug of ale from George’s hand. ‘We shall swap.’ He held out the ale, obviously waiting for Snape’s Firewhiskey.

Snape threw the contents of the glass into his mouth and swallowed. ‘No we won't!’ he laughed. 

Dumbledore began to laugh and pretty soon the whole room was shaking with laughter. Neither Remus nor Tonks were drinking because of the children, but they laughed all the same. It wasn’t until Ron piped up; ‘I know it's hilarious, but what exactly are we laughing at?’ did anyone stop.

Arthur stood up and proclaimed that everyone must go to bed, and as minister for magic, he was in charge of the situation.

‘We must all go to our beds now because as minister – hic – for magic, I must – hic – set a good example by – hic – sleeping.’ 

He counted everyone going up the stairs. ‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, yes George of course you have been counted, eight, nine, ten, eleven and…where’s number twelve?’ 

Arthur began his search for the twelfth person but he couldn’t find anyone. He looked for about half an hour until Molly came down the stairs asking what he was doing.

‘Molly, dear. We are missing a person. I know it. I counted twelve of us but only eleven went upstairs. I can't find the little bugger wherever they are!’

Molly sighed. ‘Arthur, did you count yourself?’

He thought for a moment and then a large grin spread across his face. ‘No I don’t think I did! I am number twelve! Come along me!’ he chuckled as he ascended the stairs after his wife. 

*****

The next morning everyone had an awfully sore head, except Remus and Tonks. Also, everyone in the whole house was woken at five o’clock the next morning with the screams of the Lupin twins. Their parents tried everything to get them to stop, but nothing worked.

Harry got up, outraged that someone had woken him from his dream about defeating Voldemort and winning the quidditch cup on the same day. He stormed into Remus’ room and demanded to know why they were crying.

‘I don’t know, Harry. They won't stop. Here, will you hold them a moment while I go and help Tonks, please?’

Harry reluctantly agreed as he took both squealing babies from their fathers’ arms. Once Remus was out of the room and halfway down the landing, Harry started talking to them.

‘What do you think you are doing, waking me at this hour of the morning?’ he smiled. ‘Well? Did you think it would be funny to wake Uncle Harry? Did you? Huh?’

Both mouths closed and the horrifying noise ceased.

‘Hmmm. Maybe you just want someone to talk to you. Honestly, you would think that your silly mum and dad would know that? Wouldn’t you?’ 

Rhiannon and Sirius’s small eyes looked straight at Harry and blinked. Then, Rhiannon's eyes changed from blue to brown and Sirius’ eyes changed from grey to green. 

‘Wow.’ Harry whispered. ‘How the hell can you do that?’

Tonks came running into the room. Her bright pink hair was extremely untidy and her shoes were on the wrong feet.

‘How did you make them stop? Tell me Harry!’ Tonks pleaded as Harry handed them over.

‘Just talk to them, Tonks. For goodness sake. I thought everyone knew that!’ he laughed as he walked out the door.