De Die In Diem: From Day To Day

The Gift of the Magi-cian

On December 15, a cold and snowy day, Lucius returned to Adriana's house, ready for Christmas cheer. Since he had to spend the actual holiday with his family, he wanted to spend some time with Adriana when he could, before Draco came home. He was laden with elegantly wrapped gifts in his arms for Adriana. Adriana opened the door for Lucius and took some of the presents so he could come inside.

Lucius looked around the house. A large, dark green tree stood in the middle of the living room. The smell of delicious things baking in the oven wafted through the hallway. Green garlands trimmed the walls and Christmas carols played in the background. Adriana was dressed in a festive red blouse and matching skirt and had a white apron tied around her waist. She carried the gifts to the tree and put them on the floor under it.

"I left the decorations off, I thought we could do it together if you wanted to," Adriana told Lucius as he gazed at the tree. He hadn't ever decorated a Christmas tree before; usually the house elves did that at the manor. Lucius put the rest of the gifts under the tree, next to hers, and nodded his head. Adriana handed him an armful of something green and plastic with little glass things attached to it. She told him he needed to untangle the lights for her and sat down to watch him. He stood looking at her, to see if she had been serious or not. It took Lucius an entire hour to untangle those damn lights and he was clearly frustrated when he was done. Adriana had run back and forth between taking biscuits out of the oven and watching Lucius untangle the lights. It had been quite an amusing show. She took the lights and strung them on the tree.

There were two boxes on the couch filled with ornaments and other decorations. Adriana handed them to Lucius who placed them on the tree, in a rigid, geometrical pattern. Adriana told him that they needed to be placed randomly, and made him start over. Lucius sighed and looked at the work he had done. It was perfectly aligned, a true work of art, and she wanted him to willingly ruin it. Shaking his head, he silently picked up an ornament and set it on a branch off-set from the other ones. Taking the other ornaments, he moved them around to more varied places until he was finished. Standing back to survey his work, Adriana put her arm around him and leaned her head against his chest. "It's beautiful, don't you think?" She asked.

Lucius looked down at her, smiled and answered, "Yes, very." He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. Adriana went to the tree, found the end of the light string, and plugged it into the socket in the wall. Turning the lights off in the room, she moved back to Lucius and they surveyed the work "they" had done.

"I need to make more biscuits, you want to help me?" Adriana asked.

"Are you going to actually be working or just watching me again?" Lucius asked, smiling at her.

"Of course I'll help; baking is the best thing to do at Christmas!"

Together they walked into the kitchen and Adriana found her recipe for gingerbread men. They gathered the ingredients and cooking equipment, and placed them on the table. Adriana read off the amounts of each ingredient and Lucius measured them out and put them in a large mixing bowl. He'd never used an electric mixer before, so she explained how it worked and he tried it, with not much success. She had forgotten to tell him to start on a very low speed until the flour had been incorporated, and Lucius turned it on high speed, sending flour in every direction, including right to his nose, causing him to sneeze in the dough. Adriana wrinkled her nose and said slowly, "I'm sure that'll bake right out."

Adriana took on the messy task of rolling out and cutting the dough. Laying each man on the cookie sheet, she placed them in the oven and set the timer. Lucius insisted on cleaning up before moving on to the next activity, even though Adriana had been perfectly content to leave the mess for later. Adriana watched him clean the dishes, but soon grew bored. Taking a handful of flour, she tossed it on Lucius's clothes, then stood back and laughed.

Lucius stopped with the dishes, and quickly wiped his hands off. Walking up to the flour tin, he grabbed a handful and threw it on her. Adriana kept laughing, and then started coughing as she inhaled the flour. Lucius walked over to her to see if she was all right. Adriana lunged at him, throwing him off balance, toppling him to the floor. Sitting across his chest, she tried to hold him down, but he was too strong and was soon on top of her. They rolled around on the floor together, laughing and gasping for air. After a couple of minutes, they sat on the floor, side by side, catching their breath and dusting themselves off. Lucius stood up, held his hand out for Adriana and pulled her up.

Adriana sighed and brushed the flour out of her hair. Holding onto his hand, she dragged Lucius back to the living room and pushed him onto the couch. Adriana walked to the television, turned it on, and put a tape in the VCR before lying down next to Lucius, resting her head on his leg. "What are we going to watch?" He asked her as the movie started.

"It's a Christmas movie, it's one of my very favourites," Adriana explained. She wrapped her arms around Lucius's leg and watched as the credits began to roll. "White Christmas," Lucius listened to the music and wondered what kind of movie this was. It began with two men standing on a make-shift stage in the middle of a war zone. War! Lucius was excited. He watched enthusiastically, until the two men began to sing and dance on the stage. What was that? Lucius looked at the screen in disgust until a general entered the scene and whipped all the men into shape. And when an explosion rocked the screen and a wall fell on one of the singing men, Lucius felt like cheering. The movie progressed and more songs ensued. Two blonde women entered the scene. He thought the older one looked like a blonde version of Adriana. The movie was more enjoyable after she was in it.

After the movie finally ended, Adriana sighed again. "Myrna Loy died yesterday," She said.

Lucius frowned as he looked down at her. "Was she a friend of yours?"

"No, she was an actress. I saw all of her movies. They just don't make actors like they used to," Adriana looked sad at the loss of this person. Lucius drew her into a hug and held her for several minutes before loosening up on his hold.

"Are you all right?" He asked.

"Yes, I'm fine, I just hate losing all these great people," Adriana stood up. "I'm hungry, do you want to eat?"

Lucius stood up and walked with her to the kitchen to prepare a meal. They discussed family Christmas traditions while they ate. "Every Christmas, we throw a large party for my colleagues. Champagne, caviar, the works. Everybody gets horribly pissed. Then we spend Boxing Day hung over, it's great fun."

Adriana looked at him with raised eyebrows, and shook her head. "What the hell kind of tradition is that? That's the saddest thing I've ever heard of in my life."

"Well, what do you do on Christmas?" Lucius asked, sitting back in his chair and folding his arms.

Clearing her throat, she said, "When I lived at home with my parents, we went to Mass. That's church if you don't know what that is. We spent time together, enjoying one another's company."

"What do you do now?" Lucius leaned forward in his chair.

Mustering up what pride she could, Adriana replied, "I spend the day alone."

"We are really pathetic aren't we?" Lucius smiled and chuckled.

"Yep." Adriana joined him in laughing.

"Well, this has been fun, hasn't it? Let's exchange gifts, that might lift our spirits a bit," Lucius suggested.

Walking to the tree, the two sat down next to the presents. Lucius took the largest gift under the tree, and handed it to Adriana. He grinned as she tore the wrapping paper off of it. Adriana held up the object and looked at it with a look of amusement on her face. "It's a painting. Oh it's...you. You gave me a painting of yourself, how...thoughtful," She said. Looking at the painting, Adriana was startled when it talked to her.

"I knew you'd love it! I'm for your bedroom," the Lucius in the picture told her, grinning and winking his eye at Adriana.

Adriana looked back and forth between the two Lucius's.

"Well, that's just wonderful. Then you'll just love my gift!" She picked up her present and gave it to the real Lucius.

Lucius carefully peeled off the paper without ripping or tearing it. Two picture frames, hinged in the middle to connect them, contained one small painting and one photograph of Adriana. The photo showed Adriana in 1960's clothing. Lucius had seen clothing like that at Johnny Bravo's Retro Clothing Shoppe the day he'd gone shopping with her. She had long black hair that flowed freely, brightly-coloured clothing and had strange symbols painted on her face. There was a circle with symmetrically placed lines inside of it, drawn on her cheek. She was giving the viewer a signal of some type, holding her pointer and middle fingers of one hand up. It was obviously a Muggle photo for it remained still.

The painting showed Adriana in a stuffy, floor-length midnight blue dress. The collar was high-cut, the sleeves, wrist-length. Her dark hair was tied up in a bun. The hair style made her look like that McGonagall woman from Draco's school. Her whole ensemble was from a significantly older time period. The painting, like the photo, was Muggle-made.

Lucius looked curiously at Adriana. He saw her in a new light, as a girl who still liked to play dress-up. Smiling, he said, "Well, I guess great minds think alike, eh?" Adriana smiled and leaned in to kiss Lucius. "I got you another present," He ducked under the tree and fished out a small box tied with a bow, and placed it in her hands.

Adriana untied the bow and opened the box. Reaching into it, she took out a delicate silver chain with a small object attached to it. Looking carefully at it, she saw something that made her smile. A small metal top hat, the piece that Lucius had played with during their Monopoly marathon, hung from the necklace. She laughed as Lucius took it and placed it around her neck.

Adriana was in a great mood, she loved all the time she spent with Lucius. Picking up his painting and holding it close to her body, she told him they should find a good spot to put it. As they walked to her bedroom, a muffled voice called out to Lucius, "You should see the view from here, it's wonderful!"

When they reached the bedroom, Adriana set the painting down against the dresser and looked around for a good place to put it. They scanned the walls for a free space, but nothing stood out to either of them. Lucius took in his surroundings. It was the second time he'd been in here, but he hadn't looked around the first time. Soft butter yellow walls, a beige carpet, and large windows covered with red Roman shades met his eyes. A simple queen-sized bed with a forest green comforter stood before him.

They stared blankly at the bed, then slowly looked into one another's eyes and grinned. As one they jumped onto the bed. Holding each other in their arms, they kissed for several minutes. Lucius began to unbutton Adriana's top. Adriana slid down the bed and unbuckled Lucius' belt and slowly slid it out of the loops. She had unbuttoned his jeans and had her hands on the zipper while Lucius had his hands around her back, undoing her bra, when a voice emerged from the corner of the room, "Hey, what's going on? I can't see! I want to watch! I've always wanted to know what I look like in bed!"

Frozen in mid-action, the two turned to the painting on the ground. Lucius wondered if the Avada curse worked on objects, while Adriana spoke, "Well, that killed the mood!" Sighing, they did their clothes back up and stood up from the bed.

As they left the room, Lucius gave the painting a swift kick before shutting off the light and closing the door. There was nowhere to go after that let down, so Lucius prepared to leave. After a kiss under the mistletoe, they wished one another a Happy Christmas, and Lucius apparated back to Malfoy Manor.

That night he put the pictures of Adriana on the table by his bed and the last things he saw before falling asleep were her beautiful eyes looking back at him.