A Wonderful Christmastime

“Sunny, Saint Nick can’t come if you don’t go to sleep.”

Sunny shook her head. “Lies. He has to come. And this is the year I see him. Almost saw him one year, but it was just Mom’s boyfriend at the time. I gave him a good kick though – he should’ve known better than to mess with me on Christmas Eve.”

Jack sighed and lolled her head to look over at Max, smiling despite the struggle. Sunny was currently sitting criss-cross applesauce in front of the fireplace, a platter of cookies in one hand and a large net in the other. She had been staring at the fireplace since they had finished dinner (and the pasta had scarcely touched the little girl’s tongue she had wolfed it down so quickly) and she seemed to have no intentions of leaving. Elliot and Fred were curled up next to her, patiently waiting next to their friend, and Mongo the sock-eating ottoman was providing the little girl with all the back support she could need.

“They’ve mutinied,” Jack pointed out, glancing at Max. She smiled, though, because she was home. The master of Eis Estate had been sad to see Jack leave (he had hitched the price of it when she had come looking for a vacation) but it seemed worth it after the reports the house elves had given him. Apparently, though she had been a kind tenant, she had been a strange one, and the elves had been losing their steam to fulfill all of her strange requests. All in all, it had been best for everyone for the Dyllan females to move out of Eis Estate and back into their home.

And speaking of Dyllan females…

Jack would be the first to admit that she did not feel super connected to Charlie, but she was glad to have the teenager back in the house. She had apologized profusely (and awkwardly) about her absence from the home. Luckily, where Jack lacked in relatability, Sunny made up, and the six-year-old had been coming up with activity after activity for her second cousin to enjoy. Now, however, the house was at a standstill as their orchestrator patiently awaited the arrival of a jolly old saint.

“I bet he uses Floo,” Sunny suddenly said, sounding incredibly expert on the subject. “It only makes sense. And to think – silly muggles just assuming he can squeeze down the chimney. Bah!”

Jack rolled her eyes. “Sunny, why don’t you have some cocoa and then head to bed. Even Charlie is turning in early so Santa Claus can get here!” She shot Charlie a quick plea to confirm.

“Nope,” Sunny said, firmly. “Cocoa makes me warm and sleepy, and I can’t sleep. Not tonight.”

Jack sighed. While everyone was up, she supposed she had better make her little announcement. “Well, um, Sunny’s parents did want to see her sometime tomorrow. I’m still trying to convince them to ride out here rather than drag us all out to them, but… you know. Anyway, that’d mean you’d get to meet your cousins, Charlie. And your… debtors, Max. They owe you a bit in babysitting money.” She smirked. “But, if that’s alright with all of you.”

And just like that, the house was full again.

Upon the Dyllan girls triumphant return to Layabout Lane they had subjected to house to a similar treatment to that of Eis Estate, though Jack had done so in a slightly different spirit. Max had taken Jack's request to give Sunny a good Christmas to heart and had spent the majority of his weekend locked up with the six-year-old as they constructed wreaths, paper snowflakes, and streamers for the house. A tree had been purchased and decorated and lights had been strung on the outside. Perhaps Max was overcompensating for the lack of Christmas cheer when he had been alone but whatever the reason the house had been transformed into quite the sight.

Charlie had come back from Hogwarts not too long ago and Max had to re-adjust to having another teenage werewolf in the house with them. She had been staying in their extra room (which was more of a broom closet) and often locked herself away for hours at a time, reading, sewing, or writing to her friends. There was a tangible disconnect between the redheaded cousins but for the sake of their family name they seemed to be trying to get along. And while they didn't quite understand each other, Max saw signs of their shared blood every day. Both girls took their coffee the same way, made similar expressions when frustrated, laughed at the same things in movies, and had a similar intensity.

The middle Dyllan girl nodded at Jack's prompt and stood up, walking down the hall and calling over her shoulder "Sunny come to bed!" While Charlie could get somewhat impatient with her cousins games, Max could see the fondness growing in her eyes the longer she stayed at the house. It was impossible not to fall in love with Sunny Dyllan once you got to know her. But it appeared that no newly forming bond could drag the young girl away from her post. Luckily it hadn't gotten too late yet and the Dyllan-Morrison parents had many more hours to fight the battle before they needed to get Sunny into bed.

Instead of worrying about the situation with the six-year-old, Max relaxed into the couch as Jack talked. "Her parents?" Max responded without thinking. All too often he chose to forget that Jack was not the girls real mother. Their resemblance was uncanny and their relationship was better than that between your average mother and daughter. "Yeah, sure, I would love to meet them." He offered a smile for her joke but was slightly unsettled by the idea. At this rate they were going to be hosting every Dyllan in the country.

"Well, I'm getting cocoa even if you aren't." He eyed Sunny in almost a challenging way. Max stood and went to the kitchen, putting a kettle of milk on the stove before returning to the living room. He stood in the doorway, admiring the scene before him. The lights were low and most light came from the twinkling tree lights and glowing fireplace. It was a picture perfect scene and anyone looking in the windows could never have guessed how unconventional their family really was.

Though Sunny did not immediately follow Charlie, Jack knew that the elder girl’s retirement to bed would help coax Sunny too. Jack had discovered when Charlie first began living with them that Sunny would go to “bed” but spend most of the night in the hallway, listening to the conversations that the “grown-ups” were having in the living room. It wasn’t until Jack found Sunny asleep and sprawled out on the cold, hallway floor that she realized how much Sunny hated being excluded. So, on this festive night, it was hard for her to be too harsh on the little girl. Especially considering how guilty she felt about the whole Eis Estate ordeal.

Still, Jack still had to go fetch Sunny’s big present from the guy she had bought it from, and she could not be doing that at three in the morning when Sunny passed out from exhaustion. An evil, little thought crept into her mind and she said, “I’ll get some cocoa too, actually, if you’ll excuse me.” Her foot had hardly crossed into the kitchen when she heard Sunny’s voice call, “Okay, fine, I’ll have one cup of cocoa! No more!” Jack smiled and quickly made the two mugs, before rifling through the medicine cabinet. She found her gentlest Sleep Potion and emptied some of it into one of the mugs, before topping that one with whipped cream.

Perfect-o.

She entered the living room, smiling up at Max as she moved past him, and handed Sunny the mug with whipped cream, before settling back onto the couch to watch the fire twist and crack in the fireplace. She sighed and picked up the thread of conversation where she had left it. “Yes. Riley and Skye seem to be doing better, so it should be nice. They know they’re not getting any gifts or anything, they just wanted to see Sunny. You excited to see them, Sunny?”

“Mmm,” Sunny said indifferently, sucking down cocoa at a rapid pace. Jack smirked and glanced up at Max. “Any minute now.”


Jack gingerly slid the empty cocoa mug from Sunny’s grip, and the little girl mumbled and rolled over. Jack smiled and brushed the girl’s hair back. “I guess I’d better put her in her room. I’d like to let her stay out here, but I still have wrapping to do.” She sighed and scooped the sleeping form up and walked down the hall, holding her tight. She delivered Sunny to her bed, and gave her a kiss on the forehead, feeling the immense desire to cry. It was not a bad cry though, she didn’t think. She let out a sigh and carefully closed the girl’s door.

A quick stop to her office to grab some bags, and she was back in the living room. She pulled out some of the candies and trinkets for the stockings and began filling Charlie and Sunny’s stockings with all the junk she knew would please them. Jack had never enjoyed Christmas shopping so much before this year. Buying for young’uns who would appreciate the gifts made the debt all the more welcome. She glanced over at Max. “What about you? What are your plans for the rest of the night? Finished all your wrapping?”

Despite its moral questionability, Max couldn't help but grin over at Jack as Sunny's eyelids drooped. The little girl fell asleep quickly and deeply, leaving Max to admire his flatmates creativity as she carried her niece to bed. When she returned he was busy drinking his own (hopefully unspiked) cocoa. Max nodded, "I finished yesterday. One second." He set his cup down and walked down the hall to the broom closet, pulling from its depths a large bag full of neatly wrapped gifts.

"Ta-Da!"

He had been surprised at the ease which he had shopped for the Dyllan girls. It was only their first Christmas together but he already seemed to know exactly what he wanted to give them. Carefully, Max unloaded his gifts and scattered them artfully around the base of the tree. "Mind if I watch a movie while you wrap?" he addressed Jack. "I don't want to go to bed and miss Santa." he added with a slight grin.

((Wow this is pathetic but I'm too tired to care. Apologies.))

Jack grinned, plopping one little toy after the other into the younger girls' stockings, looking over her shoulder at Max. "Glad one of us was responsible. I got most of them done, but I have a few more to go." She dropped the last of the gifts into the stockings - she could fill Max's in the morning when she sentenced him to breakfast-making duties. Sunny had picked out Max's stocking stuffers, so he would be enjoying lots of crayons and toffees. Somehow, Jack doubted he would mind much.

The idea of Max watched a movie while she wrapped gifts was somehow incredibly comforting. She loved the idea of it. She had not seen a Christmas movie since she had returned from Eis, and even there she hadn't watched any. Christmas music had filled the air but watching cheesy specials would have been much too sincere for her little fantasy. She collected her wrapping paper and said, "That sounds absolutely marvelous, actually." She sat and spread out the paper, withdrawing a large book and holding it up for him. "What do you think? For Charlie." It was titled Beaumont Marjoribanks : The Man and His Plants. "He's a big name in Herbology. Apparently. I owled the Longobottoms for suggestions. Herbology was never my strong suit."

As Jack stuffed the stockings, Max pulled a DVD of White Christmas out of the cabinet. While he was not as obsessed with muggle technology as some of his department coworkers, the television and it's videos did have a special appeal. Over the years he had put together quite a large collection of tapes, all of which had accompanied him to Layabout Lane and which the group had taken to watching on quiet nights.

Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye had started singing on the screen as Jack held up her gift. Max nodded the instant she held the book up. "Perfect." Although he hadn't known Charlie for very long it didn't take much conversation to get a sense for the young girls obsession sounding plants. Max couldn't pretend to understand it - he was with Jack when it came to Herbology skills - but he wasn't one to judge about passions, especially when he had spent the whole of his seventh year curled up with muggle encyclopedias.

Max hadn't thought about Charlie's return to Layabout until the day after she had arrived and at that point had taken a last minute trip into London in search of suitable gifts. "I found some seeds from India and Singapore. I figured we could give her a corner of the garden and see what she comes up with." It wasn't like she was going to ruin their landscaping. During the summer and fall the lawn had begun to overgrow like a jungle, despite Max's best efforts to keep it contained. He was not a gardener by trade and had discussed with Charlie at length about plans to improve the space.

Charlie had helped him with his gift to Jack enough that he felt bad for even claiming credit. Though it was his idea, it was mostly her work. The two had bonded over the project and there was a surprising amount of respect that had developed between the two Hufflepuffs.

"What about Sunny?" Max asked, curious about what Jack had ended up with. They had tossed ideas back and forth earlier but he had never heard the final word on her present. From Max's pile of presents most of them were for his favorite little girl. He had no large gift for her, but many small presents that he hadn't been able to stop himself from picking up for her.

He put in a DVD and Jack glanced up, her hands moving mechanically as her eyes remained on the screen. Very little of her childhood resembled anything close to a normal, happy one, but even they had watched Christmas movies. Sure, it had not been as amicable and pleasant as this - mostly, it had been Jack listening from the other room while her mother cleaned, her father read the newspaper, and Riley wrestled with their dog Scottie. Not because that was how their family had defined their interactions but because that was just the way it always worked out. The Dyllans had never been an emotionally connected family. Come to think of it, that probably said a lot into Charlie and Jack's relationship.

She glanced back down, realizing she had begun cutting at a slant. She was already bad at anything crafty, getting distracted was not going to do her any favors.

She was glad to hear he approved of the gift for Charlie. Jack had worried it would be too obvious, or that perhaps Charlie had outgrown it. She knew that Max and Charlie had interacted during her Eis recovery (which consisted mostly of repacking a lot of Christmas decorations) and his approval was definitely a vote of confidence for her. Jack already knew she had purchased much too much for Sunny.

Jack smirked at Max. "I don't want to spoil the surprise." Still, she rifled through one of the bags and withdrew an envelope. She held it out to him. "That's one of the gifts. A friend of mine told me about this illegal farm where they put spells on the animals. It was closed down and all the creatures were shipped off to rehabilitation centers, and I managed to strike a deal with one of the owners to let Sunny come in every month and work with the ostriches. Made her a little certificate saying so."

Jack was only half way through explaining her gift to Sunny when Max knew it was probably all the young girl would ever dream of. Ostriches? Illegal Animals? Illegal Ostriches? That was just about the perfect present. Max suddenly felt slightly self-conscious about his own gifts - among them a lumpy hand-knit sweater, candies, Falcons paraphernalia, and enchanted coloring books. Jack's coupon for the time of her life would no doubt be the centerpiece of Christmas and he had to remind himself that this was not a bad thing.

Max raised his eyebrows, impressed by Jack's apparent gift-giving abilities. "Good work. I mean, as long as they watch her and -" A bit of worry crept into his tone at the idea of Sunny working with genetically modified birds. He stopped himself before his concerns got too carried away and simply smiled at his flatmate. "She'll be thrilled."

Max put his feet up on the coffee table, unsuccessfully attempting to avoid covering any wrapping paper. Their living room had exploded in Christmas and there were no longer safe zones. Max dreaded the following weeks when he was sure the task of cleanup would be assigned to him. With all the tinsel, wrapping paper scraps, and candy bits scattered around the house he was sure Layabout would never be truly free of the holidays again. Max held his mug close to his chest as he turned his eyes to the TV and for another musical number, twirling and dancing across the screen.

Jack could tell that Max was pleased, if not a little worried, by her gift of choice for Sunny. It was funny, how the man had grown to be so protective. Jack might have been Sunny's legal guardian, but she could definitely be the more irresponsible of the two at times. Jack smiled a small smile, then shrugged. "It'll be fine, really. Most of the birds are just exhausted old ostriches that just happen to levitate or change color or whatever. By the time she gets out there, most of the spells will have been reversed and she'll just be in charge of shoveling ostrich excrement and cleaning pens. She's either going to prove her love or rethink it."

Jack smirked a little, before beginning to wrap the little envelope as well. "Besides... that's not even the best one." She looked up at Max, her eyes sparked with devious mischief. He would surely be at least slightly disapproving of her main gift for Sunny, though Jack would talk him into believing that there was surely no harm in it... sort of.

Besides, they had to survive meeting her family.

She yawned, placing the last of the gifts under the tree, before standing and stretching. She collapsed next to Max on the couch and stared at the screen for a few moments, before saying, "I really thought I'd make it, but I guess I'm pooped. Do me a favor and put out milk and cookies for Santa, will you?" She smiled, bumping his shoulder. Jack paused, looking at Max. The man who had promised to help her. "Good night, Max." And feeling very unlike herself, she leaned forward a and gave him a friendly peck on the cheek, standing. "Merry Christmas," she said, smiling. She walked down the hallway to her room.

The moment she laid down in bed was the moment she thought it. What the hell was that?


The minutest of beeping.

Jack had set her alarm, but turned it down and moved it as close to her head as possible. She knew Sunny would be keeping a careful ear out. Jack rose quietly, quickly managing her hair, brushing her teeth, donning acceptable clothes - as in, making sure she put a bra on before going out into the living room.

It was then that she set out the last of the gifts, the ones she was proud of. She stuffed Max's stocking quickly, certain she had only a few minutes before-

"MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

She cringed. Sunny was awake.

There was a pleasant moment when Jack joined him for the movie but before much time had passed she stood to go and Max felt the slightest twinge of disappointment. But before he knew what was happening she had kissed him on the cheek and left the room, barely giving him time to call a "Merry Christmas" in return. Max sat back into the couch slowly, unsure of what had just happened. Instead of pondering the boundaries that just been broken he focused on Danny Kaye singing his heart out on screen. He sat up watching the movie until his hot chocolate was gone at which point he dozed off only to be woken during the credits by a nudging nose of a dog.

Max made his way upstairs and safely into his room without waking anyone, slipping into bed without much trouble. It was only as he lay in the dark that his mind wandered again to Jack's brushing lips, which had unreasonably made his stomach plummet and sour simultaneously. Regardless, he was touched by the gesture and although he couldn't figure figure out its meaning he was sure it signaled one thing - progress.

- - -

"IT'S CHRISTMAS"

Quite literally the shouts rang through the house as Sunny did her Good Morning Layabout tour to signal the time she thought they should all rise. This morning, Christmas morning, the wakeup call was even earlier than usual and Max was jolted out of deep sleep by the cries of his ecstatic friend. The six year old had cut off the detour through his room in order to run downstairs to the gifts and Max felt he had little choice but he drag himself up, pull on decent clothes, and follow not too far behind.

In all of his slipper-wearing glory, Max stumbled down the stairs towards the living room and the beacon of Sunny's voice. He was sure he looked, well, like he had just gotten out of bed and he had every intent to start the coffee at the first possible moment. Reaching the living room, he spotted two out of the three Dyllan girls ready by the presents. "Merry Christmas" Max smiled, flopping into his favorite armchair from which he could observe the tree and it's cornucopia of gifts. He barely had time to register how much he resembled his own father on Christmas Day as Sunny moved about, alight with excitement.