Neville / Open #1 (I might do a couple)
Neville was stunned. Perhaps it was naive, but he'd never even considered the possibility that the innocent-seeming gathering at the beach - to which he hadn't even wanted to intrude himself until Ginny insisted - might be for his benefit in the least.
He'd been expecting another quiet, unobtrusive birthday like all the others. Occasionally he got one or two cards, but he hadn't really realised that people even knew when his birthday was, let alone considered it worth celebrating.
He couldn't even remember ever having a party before, unless the family gatherings when he was little counted; when his great aunts and uncles would come to fuss over him for an hour, and then start testing him for magic like it was a disease. His Gran rather disliked the day, he thought, as it probably reminded her of his father, and while she always gave him a few presents, they were usually practical things he would have had to get for school anyway - robes, books, a new wand after he broke the old one. This year she'd simply given him a bag of Galleons and let him choose his own presents, since apparently he was now capable of making such decisions, and he'd been perfectly happy with that. But then his friends had started sending him things, and now this.
He hadn't been able to speak for all of five minutes after he arrived and realised what was going on, and after that a big smile had come onto his face and refused to go away. He was incredibly moved, though all the attention was overwhelming, and he had to force himself to man up and accept everyone's good wishes, when all he wanted to do was shrug it off as though it didn't matter, when they'd gone to all this effort for him and Harry.
Eventually he managed to find a quiet-ish corner with a few chairs and fall into one. Someone had put a glass and a plate in his hand and at some point he'd had them both filled. He wasn't sure what was in the glass, but when he tried it it made his mouth burn and his head swim oddly. He quickly put the glass down firmly on a nearby sidetable. He'd never been drunk, and he wasn't sure now was the best time to start; even with things apparently perfectly safe, he wanted to be alert.