𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚎𝚗 𝚍𝚊𝚗𝚌𝚎. fred weasley

𝚡𝚡𝚒. 𝚗𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝚛𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚖𝚋𝚎𝚛

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     Cress spends the first three days of her break wrapping presents. She locks herself up in her dormitory, away from any distractions (i.e., Axel, Hamlin, Cedric George, Fred, Lee) and sits down at the edge of her bed and perfectly wraps each and every present that she got her family and friends. Amos gets a pair of socks wrapped in hippogriff paper; her mum gets a nice new robe in a deep violet color for work tightly secured in a bow-themed paper; Cedric gets a pocket watch that he's been wanting since he's been ten or so wrapped in Batman paper; Hamlin gets a crisp new black trench coat that would look lovely on him (wrapped in Sonic paper for reasons); Mallory gets a new sweater and ring with an alexandrite gemstone forced in there wrapped in paper that showed moving dragons on them; Axel gets a new journal (shopping for him is hard but he mentioned the journal long ago so Cress is counting it as a win) and a matching ring (like Cress's and Mallory's) with a tanzanite birthstone in it wrapped in paper that tiny Viktor picked out (flying Snitches).

     She even buys her new companions gifts because they deserve it and Cress loves gift hunting. Ginny gets two Muggle books (To Kill a Mockingbird and Fahrenheit 451 because they're the best) and a charm necklace; George gets a nice book filled with some of the spells that Cress thinks might help him and Fred with their new products and a sweater that her mum knitted for him (it's dark blue and a little large with stars dotted all over it but she thinks he'll like it anyway); Lee is getting a nice little pouch that is charmed to cake him in murky puddle water when he opens it. Cress got it because she is still a little bitter about the whole incident and Lee bloody deserves it, the git. (However, she also buys him some new ink and a book on Quidditch that she thinks he may enjoy.)

     Getting Fred a gift, however, was the real trouble. Throughout the past months, Cress has wracked her brain for idea after idea, but she's come up short-handed each time. She got her mum to knit him a nice, maroon sweater that would go magnificently with his beautiful structure, but the generosity stopped there because her mind went dead and she couldn't scrounge up any other ideas. She thought about getting him chocolate, then decided against that because it was too juvenile, seemed too much like she wanted him to be her Valentine more than anything. Then, the idea of jewelry came to mind and, whilst Cress believes it to be a cheesy gift, that's exactly what she got him. It isn't anything fancy since Cress had a budget — just a nice leather bracelet the color of mahogany wood that she hoped he'd like. (And she added in some nice hot cocoa kits because she couldn't stop herself.) (It's all wrapped in sunflower paper.)

     She finishes on the third night with tiny Viktor (who is getting his own customized broomstick for Christmas) and he gives her a small thumb up. Cress beams.

     "Wasn't too bad, was it?" she says to him.

     He shakes his head and crawls up onto her leg, plopping down. Uma, Viktor's dragon that her and Axel named earlier on in the week because she was making these weird noises that sounded a lot like, "UUU—MAA!" and it just seemed like fate, is settled on Cress's pillow, soft snores coming out of her snout with billows of smoke. Cress pats her head and then uses her wand to levitate Fred's present under her bed.