Have Yourself A Foxy Little Christmas

[Lorna Van Patten]

• She'd never had a pet of her own! Well, she'd caught a moth once in the workhouse, but she'd had nothing to put it in, and besides the last thing she'd felt like doing was keeping something cooped up with her, even something as small as a moth. And she'd never got to choose a name of her own!
  
  Her mother advised against a name or two - and they were a little silly - but Lorna made a thoughtful face, peering at the fox. She wanted to give it a real name, a person name, but there weren't many people to pick from to name it after. Well... "He can be Bertie, then." She decided as though she had plucked the name out of thin air, and not because every-flavour beans were a magical sweet she'd taken a liking to - well, most of the time, but she did like the surprise of it!- since she'd come to Hogsmeade. Lorna might've awaited a judgement from her mother (although even if it was a disapproving opinion, Lorna had already decided that the fox was Bertie, so there) but once she managed to take her eyes off the foxcub, she remembered just how delighted she was.
  
  "But thaaaaank youuuuu for finding him," she squealed - a little obnoxiously - the wariness she occasionally had in her mother's presence having disappeared completely in her glee at getting a christmas gift, a pet. She approached her mother unthinkingly, hoping to engulf her in an enthusiastic hug before Tessa could protest. After all, she'd managed it before, and even if her mother didn't much enjoy it, Lorna - much like a small, affectionate creature - got some satisfaction from it.