Harry awoke on Christmas morning to find a stack of presents at the foot of his bed and Ron already halfway through opening his own, rather larger, pile.
“Good haul this year,” he informed Harry through a cloud of paper. “Thanks for the Broom Compass, it’s excellent; beats Hermione’s—she got me a homework planner—”
Harry sorted through his presents and found one with Hermione’s handwriting on it. She had given him, too, a book that resembled a diary except that every time he opened a page it said aloud things like: “Do it today or later you’ll pay!”
Sirius and Lupin had given Harry a set of excellent books entitled Practical Defensive Magic and its Use Against the Dark Arts, which had superb, moving colour illustrations of all the counter-jinxes and hexes it described. Harry flicked through the first volume eagerly; he could see it was going to be highly useful in his plans for the D.A. Hagrid had sent a furry brown wallet that had fangs, which were presumably supposed to be an anti-theft device, but unfortunately prevented Harry putting any money in without getting his fingers ripped off. Tonks’s present was a small, working model of a Firebolt, which Harry watched fly around the room, wishing he still had his full-size version; Ron had given him an enormous box of Every-Flavour Beans, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley the usual hand-knitted jumper and some mince pies, and Dobby a truly dreadful painting that Harry suspected had been done by the elf himself. He had just turned it upside-down to see whether it looked better that way when, with a loud crack, Fred and George Apparated at the foot of his bed.
“Merry Christmas,” said George. “Don’t go downstairs for a bit.”
“Why not?” said Ron.
“Mum’s crying again,” said Fred heavily. “Percy sent back his Christmas jumper.”
“Without a note,” added George. “Hasn’t asked how Dad is or visited him or anything.”
“We tried to comfort her,” said Fred, moving around the bed to look at Harry’s portrait. “Told her Percy’s nothing more than a humungous pile of rat droppings.”
“Didn’t work,” said George, helping himself to a Chocolate Frog. “So Lupin took over. Best let him cheer her up before we go down for breakfast, I reckon.”
“What’s that supposed to be, anyway?” asked Fred, squinting at Dobby’s painting. “Looks like a gibbon with two black eyes.”
“It’s Harry!” said George, pointing at the back of the picture, “says so on the back!”
“Good likeness,” said Fred, grinning. Harry threw his new homework diary at him; it hit the wall opposite and fell to the floor where it said happily: “If you’ve dotted the ‘i’s’ and crossed the ‘t’s’ then you may do whatever you please!”