MARVEL [draco malfoy]

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen: All Ye, of Little Faith.

~*~

Christmas morning dawned bright and beautiful on Marvel Manor, and Emma awoke to pure, unfiltered golden sunlight falling in through the large windows, like cracks in marble, instead of the usual sea-green light that she had rapidly grown accustomed to. Instead of the scent of her lavender bed-spray, the scent of coffee and vanilla wafted through the house, and came in through the wide open door of her bedroom.

She sat up in bed, a wide grin overtaking her features, simply at the thought of it being Christmas day, and that she was happy and safe in her own bedroom. She looked around herself, and exhaled through her mouth, and then she closed her eyes. As she did so, she counted down all the things that she was genuinely thankful for that year. It was a little ritual of hers; every Christmas morning, as soon as she found herself awake, she would remind herself of the things she had in her life that she was thankful for. It was her way of saying 'thank you' to the God that sat above, watching over her: because Emma was one of those few people in the world who had virtually everything possible, yet not the thing that was most important to her; her parents. Despite that obvious, gaping hole in her life, she had many, many, many other things that so many unfortunate others could only dream of. And for that, she was, and forever would be, grateful.

Fifteen minutes later, her footsteps coming down the wooden staircase sounded, and before she'd even properly reached the bottom of the staircase, she heard Alexandrine singing along to Muggle Christmas tunes. In the corner of the lounge of the West Wing of the manor, where their bedrooms were, a spectacularly decorated Christmas tree stood tall and proud, with a few dozen wrapped up boxes sitting under it— they were not all for Emma, only two of those were for her, the rest were to be given to one of the offices of Comic Relief in central London. Emma did not cast a second glance at the gifts, and rather made her way towards the kitchen. Inside, she found Alexandrine, dressed in a red turtleneck and gray bell-bottom jeans, standing at the stove and flipping a pancake.

"Good morning, and Merry Christmas, Nellie." said Emma, as she made her way towards Alexandrine, who turned just in time, and gave her a hug.

"Merry Christmas to you too, my love." replied Alexandrine, as she pressed her lips into Emma's hair in a quick kiss. At a height of five feet and eight inches, she was only a couple inches taller than Emma herself, who was already quite tall for a twelve-years-old at five feet and five inches, and only seemed to grow taller each day— well, to Alexandrine, at least, who still saw her as the couple of hours old baby with milky white skin and the brightest blue eyes she'd ever seen, who was handed to Alexandrine by a tearful Caspian. "Sleep well?"

"Oh, like the dead." replied Emma, as she backed away a couple steps and then hopped up on top of the marble aisle. "Have you seen Coco anywhere? I can't find her."

"I reckon she must still be in the library, where I left her sleeping just an hour before."

"Alright. I'll go check on her and then I'll start up the television, we can start watching the movies once breakfast is made, yeah?" asked Emma, hopping down from the aisle and already beginning to walk towards the door.

"Sure, darling. I've already laid out the home movies in front of the videocassette recorder. Just put in the one you want to start with."

"Yes, Nelly, I know."

Christmas was the day people usually gathered around with their loved ones; families and friends, and pets. Alexandrine and Emma also did something of the sort. Since Emma's parents were dead, and she had no other siblings, and Alexandrine's siblings lived in different countries; they spent most of their Christmases together, in the warm lounge of Marvel Manor. They plugged in their videocassette recorder in to the television, and simply watched home movies, over and over again; movies of Giselle and Caspian when they were teenagers in love, movies of their wedding, movies of Emma's childhood, and just home movies that brought the memories of precious times back to them. Emma loved it, loved seeing her parents smiling and laughing— something that, in real life, was unfairly ripped away from her, something that she never got to have. Days like this, Emma wondered if Harry Potter was really worth her parents' sacrifice. But then Alexandrine would remind her, that at the time, he was just a child, the same age as she was, and he too had lost his parents. And that unlike Emma, he had never gotten the love and care, and nourishment every child deserves.