The Newtons
Alohomora
✒Someone must walk into something, or trip over something
✒Someone asks “Do you remember that one time we found that crop circle?
✒Someone gets caught picking their nose

A Newton Gathering was always an event to remember. The fact that the clan, when together in full, was 37. Hanna always looked forward to seeing her family, but particularly her Great-Uncle Art, and the cousins she had around her age. Being the older sister was hard sometimes, and she liked being around people her own age. The problem was, there were many of the Newtons that were much older than she was, but also many that were young. Like, baby young. Luckily this year was being thrown at her grandparents home, Mara and Walter. The whole clan weren’t getting together in full this year, which meant they didn’t need to expand on the dining area. Not that her Farmor would have minded. She loved there being a lot of people around her table.

“Hanna, are you nearly ready? We need to be there in ten minutes!” her mother, Elyde, called up the stairs.
Baby Oliver was screaming in Elyde’s arms, as she tried to pat and rock her baby into some sort of calm. It was uselss, the young babe was colicy. She and Adrian had somehow evaded this with their four daughters. Was it just a baby boy thing? The experienced mother was struggling now, dealing with five children, and one of them only being a few weeks old. Perhaps her mother-in-law would be able to use her Grandmotherly touch to settle the boy.
Hanna ran down the stairs, “I’ll take him Mama! I’ll ta- WHOAAA!”

Plunk.

“Hanna!” Elyde exclaimed, jumping significantly enough to let loose a fresh bundle of wailing from the baby. “Adrian!”
Adrian came into the hallway, saw his wife trying to contain a screaming Olly, and Hanna on the ground trying to suppress tears. “What happened?” he asked, as he extended his arms and plucked Oliver out of Elyde’s arms. He propped the baby over his shoulder and commenced the routine of patting him on the back, his ears now used to the high-pitched scream.
“She tripped. Oh, darling, are you alright?” With her arms now baby-free, Elyde went to her oldest baby and soothed her hair back from her face.
Hanna nodded, a wince passing over her face as she slowly pulled herself up.
“Where does it hurt?”
“My knees.” Hanna bent them up to inspect them, but needn’t bother. The blood, seeping through her yellow tights, was visible.
“Dear… well let’s get you cleaned up.”
Elyde helped her up, and walked her upstairs to the bedroom where she used her wand to heal the grazes, and syphon away the blood stains.
With her tights and knees blemish free, Hanna was ready.

Oliver, however, had just succeeded in vomiting all down his father’s back. It was exactly a moment after when Elyde and Hanna walked down the stairs.
“Adrian! Oh, Adrian, you’ve got vomit all down your back.” Elyde took the baby, who was now quiet, and Adrian went up to change his top.
“Merlin’s beard, can’t we just get somewhere on time for once?” He muttered.
Walking down the corridor to the bedroom, the wet vomit seeping through the fabric and sticking to his back, he took a double-take. Mikaela, all of 8-years, was almost third-knuckle deep up her nose.
“Mikaela! Get that finger out of there.”
Mikaela ripped it out, her face burning with embarrassment.
“Your brain will cave in if you’re not careful.”
“Daddy, I was trying to find the popcorn.”
Adrian paused. “T-the what?”
“The popcorn, daddy.”
“What is popcorn doing up your nose?”
“I put it there.” So matter of factly.
Adrian shook his head. He wasn’t going to ask. The moisture was getting a bit cold and he needed to change. “Well get yourself downstairs, we’re going in a minute.”
He continued his journey down the corridor to the bedroom.

Mikaela hadn’t meant to lose the piece of popcorn up her nose. She’d just put it up there to see how far she could blow it out. But it just kept falling out, so she put it further up but then when she blew it wouldn’t come out and then when she tried to pull it out it kept getting in more and more until she couldn’t even reach it. There was a small fear that it would go into her brain and then she’d have a piece of popcorn in her brain forever. Would that make her not good enough for Hogwarts? Well, she needed to do something about it but she couldn’t pull it out with magic. Not yet anyway but she didn’t want to wait three WHOLE years to get a wand and learn a spell to get it out. Her father didn’t seem too worried, but she was starting to get more worried. She really couldn’t reach it anymore, and there wasn’t any finger left to push up. The only thing left to do was tell her mum.

Down the stairs she hopped, two feet at once. Bounce, bounce, bounce, all the way down.
“MUMMA!” she yelled, running towards her. “Can you get the popcorn from my nose?”
“What?” she asked.
Hanna even looked a bit puzzled, but she wouldn’t approve of Mikaela putting it up there anyway. She was too old to understand Mikaela’s experiments. Besides, she’d spent much of the holidays practicing her flying for Quidditch.
Mikaela frowned. Why couldn’t anyone hear her? “Can. You. Get. The. Popcorn. From. My. Nose?”
Elyde sighed, not bothering to ask, and pointed her wand towards Mikaela’s nasal entrance. With a spell that Mikaela had heard plenty of times, she felt the popcorn wiggle from somewhere deep in her head before shooting out like a sneeze. It was all slimy so Mikaela went to put it into the bin rather than eat it, taking care not to look at the disgust on her mother and sister’s faces.

That reminded Lena, who was ready to leave. She had been ready for almost half an hour, sitting patiently in the living room, reading her book. She was used to it by now, sitting quietly. Her parents were too busy with Oliver and her other younger siblings to notice her. Now that Hanna was at Hogwarts, Lena was the oldest of the kids. Yep, she was the one that had to stay out of trouble, out of the way, and out of sight. She didn’t want to add to her parent’s worries. So she mostly just stayed quiet, made sure Mikaela and Elsie behaved themselves, and tried to fix any of the things they had done. Unless it required magic, which she didn’t know yet. But she was ready to go to Hogwarts! She was lucky that she would have her entire schooling with her family. Poor Hanna had nobody, besides Gaston anyway. But he wasn’t there anymore, but it was okay for Hanna because she would be coming this year. And then when Hanna left, in four years, when Lena would be in her fourth year, with Mikaela. But Hanna didn’t seem to mind being there alone, which made Lena not worry so much about it.
As she was listening to the conversation, with Mikaela putting the popcorn up her nose, which Lena knew all about, she remembered the conversation she was having with her mum. Turning around, her knees on the couch so that she could face her mum, she said “Do you remember that one time we found that crop circle?”
“Lena, there you are! Are you ready to go?”
“Yes,” she said. She didn’t mention that she had been ready for ALMOST half an hour. And in that time, Mikaela had got popcorn stuck up her nose, Hanna had fallen and needed to be patched up, Oliver had vomited all over their father’s back, and he needed to change shirts. “But do you remember mum?”
“What honey?”
“When we found that crop circle!”
“Oh yes that was fun,” she said, but she was distracted with Oliver. Lena knew that, because it hadn’t been fun.
“But it wasn’t.”
Her mother stopped fussing with Oliver and looked up, finally paying attention to her. Even though she was now the second oldest of five, Lena felt like the middle child. Finally she passed Hanna the baby and came to sit down with her.
“Uuughhhh,” she let out as she flopped next to Lena, putting her arm around her.
“No, it wasn’t fun actually. Why did that remind you of the crop circles?”
Lena snuggled up next to her mother to make the most of the precious time she was giving up.
“Well they were corn crops, weren’t they?”
Her mother thought for a moment. “Yes, you’re right. They were. And there were spiders all through the cob you tried to open.”
Lena shuddered remembering the horrible sight.
“I don’t like corn anymore.”
“I know darling.”
“Do you think Farmor would make me eat it?”
Elyde laughed. “No, of course not! She will make you eat three servings, but you don’t have to have everything.”
Lena nodded, feeling more relaxed.

With a fresh shirt on, and the smell of baby vomit removed, he looked at the clock. They were late. Ten minutes so far. Adrian sighed. He hoped his parents understood why they were late. Kids were a lot of work, not that he minded. But it was much quicker when it was just the two of them. Feeling guilty at thinking such things, he checked the upstairs bedrooms to make sure none of his Newtons were in their rooms still. Hanna’s, Lena’s, and Mikaela’s bedrooms were all clear. Oliver was down with Elyde. But Elsie was in her room, curled up in a ball on the low bed. Her thumb was in her mouth, and her toy rabbit curled into her chest. The previous thoughts vanished as he looked down at his three-year-old girl. The last of his daughters. Now that they had five children, he was done. Elyde, he thought, was too. He carefully picked her up, holding her sleeping body, and walked down the stairs. Hanna and Mikaela were fighting over who got to hold the baby, Hanna thankfully holding him securely and not letting the eight-year-old take him, and Elyde was sitting on the lounge with Lena. They all seemed ready, at last.