InsaneJournal

30 August 1979
Who: Edgar, Cally and the kiddos.
What: Family Game Night at the Bones Residence (TM)
When: Early evening, Sunday 30 August
Where: Ed and Calypso's house in Dover
Rating: PG for impertinent teenagers :D
Status: Completed log!



Edgar Bones had a night off. As of late, that had felt like a ridiculous rarity. He was missing the end of the summer with his children, and as much as that bothered him, what could be done? The wizarding world was on the brink of chaos and all fingers were pointed at the Ministry, in particular at the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Despite everything they were doing, Ed couldn't help but feel as though they weren't doing enough. They weren't succeeding anymore. It made Edgar feel tired and useless and overworked, and on top of that, despite how much he knew that Calypso understood why he couldn't be at home as much as he wanted to be, he felt like a bad husband and father. And the kids didn't always help. He wasn't an auror to them. He was just Dad. Dad who hadn't been home for the better part of August.

"Penelope!" he called from the bottom of the stairs. "Please come down and set the table! Supper will be ready shortly!"

"No, thanks!" Penelope called back after a moment. "I'll be fine right here!"

Edgar rolled his eyes. He and Calypso were trying to have a family night before the kids left for Hogwarts. It was the first school year since Evander had started that Ed and Cally would be left with no children at home. They were leaving in two days, and Ed wanted to spend some good, honest time with them, not just 'I love yous' in passing.

"Come down here now or I'll pack up every new dress you've gotten for school and send them right back where they came from, young lady!" he threatened, and not emptily.

She came then, stomping her way down each and every stair, giving her father the dirtiest look she could muster as she passed him, huffing and sighing. "You are so mean!" she accused dramatically as she went into the dining room and collected the cutlery, slamming each piece down onto the table.

In the kitchen, her mother overheard and laughed. "Ooooooh, the drama!" Calypso wailed with great gusto. "Oh, the agony! The woe and the pain!" She seemed rather more concerned with taking the rolls from the oven than with the horrible injustice being perpetrated against her daughter.

"Really, Edgar, it's terrible the way we require such strenuous labour from the poor girl," she sighed mournfully. "I for one am amazed that the Department of Children and Families has not come to our door to take her from this Hell and toss us both in prison for life."

"Ah, but I'm a tyrant darling, weren't you aware?" Edgar asked, walking back into the kitchen and heading for the back door to call their sons in, stopping short beside the icebox. "Only tyrants ask their daughters to set the table for the food she didn't work or pay for."

"Neither did you!" Penelope snapped, throwing the rest of the forks onto the table with force and coming into the kitchen glaring at both of her parents. "You inherited it! And since I'm a Bones, I deserve it just as much as you do!"

"You have a skewed perception of what you're entitled to if you think that being a particular surname is a contributing factor in any capacity," Edgar said, raising his eyebrows and crossing his arms. "Now march right back in the dining room and finish setting the table."

Whether for love of new dresses or unwillingness to engage in real war over the issue, Penelope growled and grumbled her way back into the dining room. Her father's use of the verb "march" made for an excellent excuse to stomp the whole path from one place to the other. Back in the kitchen, Calypso sighed as she swirled her wand around to float the rolls into a basket.

"I surely hope that a happier daughter than the one I have been managing this summer returns at Christmas," she said, her voice quiet enough that Penelope wouldn't overhear from the dining room. "I feel like we're living with a werewolf - sweet, cheerful girl one minute, ravening beast the next."

Edgar made for the back door again, stepping out on the porch before responding. "Evander! Noah! Come in and wash up!" he called out, happy to see that two of his three children were willing to following simple direction without throwing tantrums as they came inside and headed for the downstairs loo. After they traipsed laughing through the kitchen, Edgar slid up behind Calypso and wrapped his arms around her waist. "I think she's looking for an opportunity to be angry with me, really."

For being gone so much, Calypso reluctantly supposed. While she understood why Edgar was so often out of the house, she knew that was a lot harder for a twelve year old who hardly understood the forces at work in the world at the moment. To Penelope, it was simply that Daddy wasn't around.

Cally leaned back against her husband for a long few seconds, her arms folding over his as she enjoyed this rare moment of peace. She understood, yes, but it didn't mean that she really liked it a lot better than Penny did. Being married was a lot more fun when she actually saw the man for longer than a kiss good morning or goodnight.

"And she's also twelve," Cally pointed out. "I was locked in constant battle with my mother at twelve, absolutely convinced that she could not possibly understand my pain. Don't blame yourself for it all."

Edgar sighed. "Oh, I know," he said, smothering his face in his wife's curly red hair. "It's just pointless, ineffective circles. For work, for you, for them. I don't know what I must have expected when I applied to auror training, but it certainly wasn't 12 hour days that seemingly accomplish nothing. I don't blame her for being upset with me, though. I'd rather be home than there."

"I know you would, darling," Cally replied, and she turned around to go up on her toes and kiss him. "And deep down, so does Penny. It's just hard to be reasonable about anything at twelve."

Since she was there, Cally took advantage of the opportunity to slip her arms around Edgar as she looked up at him with a little smile. "And as for tonight, I'm sure she'll be happier once Game Night gets going. We'll just make sure to play one she likes first to set the mood properly."

Edgar nodded, smiling slightly. He was a lucky, lucky man. He had a beautiful wife, three fantastic children, and a good life. Even Death Eaters couldn't take away from that reality. There weren't many men on the planet who had marriages like his. Whatever God that had smiled down on him when he was a kid and helped him catch Calypso... he owed them one serious sacrificial lamb or something. "Have I told you today that you're the most beautiful woman in the world?"

"Not in precisely those words," his wife answered, giving him a cheeky grin. "I certainly wouldn't complain if you did, though."

When he looked at her like that, Calypso felt absolutely as lucky as he did. With a devastatingly handsome husband who adored her and three children who (current difficulties aside) were beginning to grow up into good, intelligent, interesting people, she would gladly place her life up against anyone's in a Who Has The Best Life contest. She even had a fun and entertaining career, good friends, and plenty of other things to keep her busy. Yes, the world had brought plenty of troubles to their door and to those of all the wizarding world...but it was still a good place to be for Calypso Bones.

"You are--" Edgar started, but was interrupted by Evander and Noah re-entering the kitchen.

"Eww," Noah said, scrunching up his nose at the sight of his parents being anything resembling romantic with one another. He was only eleven, and thought that kissing should only be applied to his mother's cheek on request. Evander merely raised his eyebrows. His mannerisms were very similar to his father's.

That was the one thing Ed and Cally had discovered about having a full house--intimate moments that weren't had behind closed bedroom doors were often few and far between. From the time they were babies (and almost even moreso these days), one of their three children managed to slip in on their parents private moments and turn them around.

"Are we eating yet?" Evander asked. "I'm starving."

"Yes, yes..." Cally laughed, stepping away from Edgar to pick up her basket of rolls and hand it to Evander. "Take those into the dining room and seat your sister."

Because while Calypso and Edgar might have in some ways strayed from the rest of Proper Pureblood Society, there were other ways in which they very much stuck with Tradition. Even for an informal family dinner, certain standards of civilization were maintained. When the children were off at school, she and Edgar would probably tone it down a little, but for now it was proper napkins and silverware.

When they decided to start having children, he and Calypso had had a talk about how they wanted to raise them. There was, as far as Ed was concerned, a difference between being a purist and being a part of society. He wasn't necessarily fussed on ascot on ball gowns, but he still dressed and carried himself like a proper pureblood gentlemen. In fact, having children and teaching them the same manners and values had served to make Ed more aware of what he'd learned himself as a child. They swung in social circles after their marriage and became a fairly prominent couple. Their daughter would have her debut, and their sons would be escorts, when that time came. Really, they had just applied a 'pick and choose' method to what of the rules of social order they would follow.

In a testament to this, as Evander obliged his mother and took the rolls, and he and Noah went to join their sister in the dining room, Edgar gave Calypso a light smack on her arse and leaned in, grinning, to kiss her neck lightly. "You're the most beautiful woman in the world," he whispered as he pulled away. "And the sexiest, as well, but that rather goes without saying."

"Just wait 'til Tuesday night," Cally murmured in reply, a cat-in-the-creampot grin taking over her face. While Calypso loved her children more than life itself and would miss them while they were gone to school, she also had some grand plans for the house with all of them out of it. She tilted her head up to brush her lips over the edge of his jaw, wanting just one more little hint of things to come before they went into the dining room for Family Time.

"I have to wait until Tuesday?" Edgar said with a mock pout, pulling out his wand to levitate the bowl of mashed potatoes on the counter, and the roast tray followed by the gravy boat.