Stirring the long spoon through her hot chocolate, Quincy sighed heavily. It was the third time in less than a minute she'd audibly huffed. The elderly couple sat two tables down from her were on the verge of asking if she was ok, for not only was she exhaling air with an alarming amount of gusto, she occasionally picked up a napkin and dabbed at the corner of her eyes. Being polite, however, they decided to let her get on with whatever personal turmoil had her sticking her forefinger in the whipped cream and licking it off miserably. For that, she was grateful.

Yesterday she had waved her eldest child off to Hogwarts for the second time. She had assumed that the second time would be much easier than the first, but it had actually been ten times harder. She had grown accustomed to having Noah round the house over the summer. Eddie even took more time off work (which was difficult as he was now Head Auror), and they had been spending more time as a family. Her family. Her perfectly imperfect little family.

"Chocate!" Quincy was disturbed from drowning in her sorrows by the screech. "Mummy! Chocate! Me chocate!" Squidgy little fingers were stretched out up to Quincy, the little hand pulsing closed and then open again, demanding a chocolate treat. Quincy smiled down at her youngest child. Not so much a baby anymore, but a toddling toddler. Her vocabulary wasn't quite fluent yet, but she did screech haphazard words that could be formed into sentences by filling in the gaps.

Quincy took the bar of chocolate, unwrapped it and broke off the third square. The pudgy hand grabbed the square and the girl squealed with delight, melted chocolate framing the corners of her mouth. Little Brooke had been created out of a love-hate relationship, and born into absolute turmoil. But she was perfect, like all of the Pratt children. She had seemed to inherit her father's looks when she was small, with blonde messy hair. But, as time went by, she had darkened like Natasha. The soft, brown hair fell into perfectly formed waves around her baby face, and her cheeks were coloured by the late summer sun.

Quincy sniffed once more and dabbed the corners of her eyes with her napkin. She was so emotional - how in [/I]Hogsmeade[/I] was she going to cope when her other three children flew the nest and went to Hogwarts? She'd be a wreck!