Marriage is Murder

Steven lead the others into the room and started to give each their gifts including John which he smiled at Cassidy smiled sitting close to them both each child gigging with glee as they found a toy they wanted Steven smiled and moved to Cassidy her gift in his hand " don't worry its no got a curse on it " he said and she chuckled taking it finding a gold ring with an amethyst in the center. Cassidy gave Steven a silver hip flask engraved with his name and he smiled placing it in his hip pocket.

" I'll fill that later" he said and Cassidy laughed softly , all the children ripped the wrapping off their presents.

" shame we take hours to wrap they take minuets to rip through" Jess said and smiled seeing Andrew playing with a car she had bought for him while Jaylen played with a toy pony and rider.

Khaat and Brian had both toys and clothes for the kids. The toys got a lot of attention and the kids flung the clothes onto the pile of discarded wrapping paper. Fi laughed and accio'd the clothes before they got lost. Khaat and Brian didn't move to open their gifts until the kids were finished demolishing the wrappings on their toys and had begun playing with all the new toys around them.

Kate had bought Robert some lovely new wines and some books he'd wanted, and some clothes. Robert had bought her jewelry, a new winter cloak, some art supplies she'd wanted, and some beautiful stained glass pieces by an artist she admired.

Brian had bought Khaat some exquisite jewelry and another very large photo album of pictures from her past with well detailed captions. Khaat had had help in buying Brian some southwest art pieces that he had wanted for decades and had not been able to obtain. Michael had been her shopper. And Michael received antique books and imported tobacco and cigarettes. Angus had a stack of clothes, a new wand, and a collection of autographed recipe books by celebrity chefs.

Brian and Robert had gone together for their family gifts to Jess and Jack and Steven and Cassidy and had paid for 2 week vacations to a destination of each family's choice, for them to take their whole families.

Jack , Jess , Steven and Cassidy all thanked them and smiled " we will use these when al, has settled " Steven said and every one agreed.

" Bahama's" Jack said and Jess chuckled " ok, ok you decide but some place warm ok?" he saw Jess laugh and smiled as he moved to hold her giving her another gift of a new fob watch to wear at work and she smiled as she saw the inscription 'To the one I love, Jack' she moved and kissed him gently. Cassidy smiled as Steven gave her a large box and she laughed as she found it to be a coffee maker.

" you saying my coffee's not good?" she said smiling Steven shook his head.

" no just you could use some help" he said Cassidy smacked his leg but laughed

"maybe your right" she said and placed it next to her.

Brian got a mug of tea for himself and Khaat and sat with her looking at the very large photo album with her. She had a vague feeling that some of the images were somehow familiar but she didn't know how. Brian saw that as progress. She did question Brian about a memory flash of a black labrador, asking him if she'd owned one.

"No," Brian said. "You married one." She looked at him frowning.

"Your first husband was an animagus. He was a black lab. Where do you think Abbey gets it?" he laughed.

"Doesn't it bother you?" she signed.

"No," he kissed her forehead. "He's not here anymore. You don't go home to him. You come home to me. I do wish you would start remembering something besides Rob, though." He laughed.

"I'm thinking that she's remembering him because her wedding anniversary to him would have been coming up soon," Robert said.

"Oh, thats right," Brian said. He looked back at her. "You're excused then."

"I want to remember you," she signed.

"I know you do," he said, "And its getting better. I'm a patient man. I'll wait."

"Do you have another choice?" Robert teased.

"If I do, its not come into my thinking," Brian said.

"Honestly, your head injury does seem to be getting better," Robert told her. "You may start to remember more fragments fairly soon now."

"I'd rather have whole memories," she signed.

"One thing at a time," Robert said. "Be grateful for the fragments for now."

Steven smiled and nodded " baby steps Khaat its what you told me " he said still smiling " you do remember it was you who told me that when I first woke from my coma" he gave Cassidy a gift for Fallon a lovely white dress with light pink ribbons " I thought she would look good in it " he said and Cassidy smiled as she took out matching shoes.

" come the summer she will" she said and showed Fallon who was more interested in the wrapping paper than the dress.

The morning seemed to fly with everyone opening gifts and enjoying them. The kitchen had decided to do a bit of late lunch and served Christmas dinner near 1:30 pm. Khaat had noticed Michael had disappeared to go help Angus in the kitchen with a great deal of the rest of the staff.

When they called everyone to the dining room, Brian offered Khaat his arm, and the staff took the little ones for them. Khaat could barely believe what she saw. The enormous dining room had one continuous buffet table that completely encircled the room, against all four walls of the dining room, starting at one side of the doors and wrapping all the way around the room to the other side of the entry doors. Endless feet upon feet of tables that were loaded with every feasible dish, all gourmet magazine perfect. It was the most stunning thing Brian had ever seen.

"I don't think I even have words for this," Brian said. "You have all outdone yourselves. You did get pictures of this, right?"

"Pictures?" Angus frowned, not thinking of that.

"Nobody eats until you get a few pictures," Brian said.

Jess followed Khaat and Brian into the dining room when she heard Brian talk of pictures she accioed her wizard camera and began snapping " sorted Brian not that I'll get it all in mind you" she said and smiled " there's just so much of it " he said and chuckled as she walked around taking photos.

" never mind the photos it smells wonderful very like full of Christmas cheer " he said and smiled " well done you two" Jim walked in behind them.

" sorry I'm late had to spend at least and hour with the family, merry Christmas every one" he said and smiled handing each a small gift. Jack had a silver pocket watch , Jess and silver chain with a wolf pendant on with jade eyes, Cassidy a brooch Steven a leather wand holder with a small silver badge on it in the emblem of the organization. he oped the others would like theirs, Brian and Khaat he gave them riding gloves embossed with their initials , Michael was a book of locks and how they were made ,for Angus he had found an old cook book with magical and non magical . For Robert and Kate , Kate a magic book on painters so she could get advice from the artists them selves, for Robert a small black book Jim spoke as he watched him open it.

"It belonged to Remus, I found it in an old back street book store I think its his potion journal unfortunately its in his code so I can't tell you exactly what it says." he said

Everyone thanked Jim for his gifts. They were well thought out. Robert looked at the book Jim had found.

"God, I haven't seen that book in years," Robert laughed. "You do realize what this is, don't you? You remember that James and Sirius and Remus had a habit of inventing all sorts of little practical jokes in Hogwarts, including the Marauders' map. This is Remus's notebook on what all those little bits of weirdness were and how they did it. At least as best as he understood it at the time. The code was Remus's own little system of documenting things. The last thing he needed was Slughorn figuring out what the hell they were doing. Or Dumbledore for that matter. So, he put it in code. Not sure I even remember it now."

"If you get bored trying to reason it out, hand it over, "Michael said. Robert laughed. Michael was good with any sort of subterfuge. It was an occupational hazard for him.

Robert gave Jim the same holiday package for him and his family that he and Brian had given to the others. "Maybe someday you'll get a chance to use it to actually spend a couple of weeks with them," Robert said.

Jim smiled and nodded " ah I wondered " he said and took the holiday pakage " well our aniversarys soon so I will use it then Margaret will be pleased" she told them and thanked them before he sat down and accioed himself a drink to warm himself up " you do know its bitterly cold out there might even snow" he aid hukalingknowing full well it already had . Steven and Jac chuckled as they sat with the boys playing with a set of toy cars they had bought them. Jess st with Cassidy while the young girls played with th soft toys though catlin had hold of oneof the cars Jess placed her down so she could play with it knowing it would do her no harm she ran off and started to play with the boys.

"Jim," Brian shook his head. "I normally trust your judgement, but if you take your kids with you on your anniversary, you are out of your mind."

"We took you and Khaat once," Robert said.

"You did?" Brian frowned.

"Yes. We did. You remember that trip to Zurich we made when you and Khaat were about 10?"

"That was an anniversary trip? You told us it was to celebrate that we'd gotten our letters," Brian frowned.

"He lied," Kate laughed. "But we did only take you once on our anniversary."