magpie; terry boot

two

ᴛᴡᴏ ғᴏʀ ᴊᴏʏ

EVERYONE WAS WEARING PAPER CROWNS. It just sort of happened. One minute all eight adults were sat around the table, laughing at a blushing Hannah Longbottom for bringing Christmas crackers to their Boxing Day get-together, and the next they were all enjoying the jokes provided in the small packages more than whatever 'adult' conversations they were having before.

"Wait, guys, listen to this one," Parvati croaked out between loud chuckles, "Who hides in a bakery during Christmas?"

Gazing at each other, the rest of the ensemble shook their heads, signifying that they didn't know the answer.

"Probably Cho, Merlin knows if that's actually a baby in her stomach or just too many bakewell tarts." muttered Zacharias, his poor attempt at being quiet resulting in more laughter than the actual answer to the joke itself, which was 'a mince spy!'.

"Oh go do one, Smith." said Cho, her giggles proving that she was indeed joking and not actually upset at her friend.

The laughter eventually died out as everyone busied themselves with more food that was provided for them at the Boot-Williams apartment. There were pies, little cakes and plenty other sugary treats to ease Cho's ever-growing cravings.

Terry had always wanted to host a house-warming party. But with they way the war played out, putting together a celebration party didn't seem like a good thing to do, not when so many people were in mourning anyway. So although Christmas rolled around only six-or-so months after the war, Terry, along with his supporting girlfriend, decided that a small get-together with his closest friends wouldn't hurt.

The happy atmosphere that surrounded the teenagers was a needed sight for sore eyes. Having Hannah, Padma and Cho discussing pregnancy myths, Michael and Zach rolling their eyes at the girls while secretly listening in on their conversation, Parvati swallowing every treat in-sight in seconds and Kimberly sat next to him, with her hand lovingly intertwined with his, felt so distant yet so familliar to him. During the whole night, the smile on Terry's, and everyone's, face was impossible to contain.

His train of thoughts got interrupted as a shaking round of giggles to his right caught his attention.

"What's funny, love?" he asked Kim.

"It's just," she paused for another giggle, a sound annoyingly high to others but sounded like music to Terry's ears, "the color of all your paper crowns match your Hogwarts houses."

"Really? Who would've though, what an amazing coincidence!" Terry exclaimed overly sarcastically.

The sniggering was once again set off, taking everyone's focus away from their previous conversations. Kim was, of course, right. Cho, Michael, Padma and Terry were all rocking different shades of blue, Zacharias and Hannah's crowns were a matching yellow and Parvati had her red crown loose around her neck in an almost chocker-style.

Kimberly pouted at the laughing gang, "Why didn't anybody tell me we were doing house colors?"

"Because you don't have a Hogwarts house, mate." Michael replied, the rest nodded.

Terry watched as Kim only huffed in response and reached over the table to look for any crackers that weren't emptied of the crowns. Sighing in satisfaction once she found what she was looking for, she placed the green paper-crown on top of her red, bun, "Now we're all stylish."

As if on cue, as soon as those words left his girlfriend's mouth Terry's crown teared all down the left side, causing it to flow down onto the table they were sat at.

Pouting, he turned towards Kimberly and glared, "I blame you. My crown was all good before you put yours on."

"As much as that makes absolute sense, babe," she teased in return "We all knew that the crown would break from your big head sooner or later."

"I mean, Kim's right." sighed Cho, playing along with the act.

"Okay I get it, fuck the person you spent your entire education with. Siding with Kim is obviously more fun."

"Obviously." agreed Kim, putting on a very bad, English accent as she did so.

The table cringed at her imitation and began trying to mock her accent instead, saying different words and phrases that were common to leave the ginger's mouth on a daily basis.

Still pouting, Terry glanced over to where his girlfriend was sat as everyone else busied themselves with laughing at what they thought the American girl sounded like in the bedroom, mature.

His brown eyes followed her pale hands as they removed the green crown from the top of her head and moved it through her and Terry's joined hands.

"There," she muttered, moving to rest her head on Terry's shoulder, "now we can both be the queen."

The smile instantly returned itself to Terry's face.

2222.
writing about Christmas is so hard when you're so physically and mentally done with it for another eleven months.
also, do you know how it hurt me to write 'color' instead of 'colour' when Kim was speaking oH mY