The magic of a childhood Christmas

[Jacob King]

 "My husband left a few moments ago, we live right across the street," a woman replied. "He's probably calling it right now, so I think it should be here in two or three minutes," she reckoned, as the nearest general hospital was four or five minutes drive away in a non-emergency vehicle. Jacob moved away from the crowd, still carrying his boy on his hip, who still looked unhappy and worried.
"Don't worry, Stephen, the doctors will check him up and fix whatever needs fixing. He's conscious which is a very good sign. I think he'll be fine. And it wasn't your fault, darling, Sam chose to do it all by himself," the man consoled, thinking the boy might feel bad if the climbing indeed was his idea. Of course there could be serious internal injuries not obvious right now. Some level of concussion would be certain after that hard fall. But still, the boy was lucky to have witnesses to the fall and thus medical attention available very soon. He had faith that the child would be fine.
"Do you think he would have been saved if he was a wizard?" Stephen pondered, at ease now, peeking at the scene from behind Jacob's arm.
"No," Jacob replied somewhat sternly and looked down at the child in his arms, "And don't you ever, ever try that."
"I won't," the boy promised quickly but sincerely. Actually, Jacob wasn't sure if accidental magic would help at all, but he didn't want to encourage the idea by even an I-don't-know answer. He thought it was likelier it wouldn't help, because though the fall was long it wasn't quite long enough for the person to realize what was happening and therefore not enough time to trigger a spell. Unless of course the person was constantly fearing that they might fall but children this young usually didn't concern themselves with such matters.
"How about you and I go do some Christmas shopping?" Jacob suggested, gently now, wishing to distract his son from the scary situation as they walked towards the main gate leading to Benhill Road.
"Yeah! Can we go to Diagon Alley?" Stephen responded with sparkling eyes and all the excitement of a little boy and a chance to get new toys.
"I was thinking we'd stay here in Sutton. But sure, why not," he stated, considering for a moment more and then--after turning left from the gate and making sure no muggles were in line of sight--he apparated away, a second later standing with his son on Charing Cross Road, in a small alley next to the Leaky Cauldron. It was always risky, of course, but the best possible option seeing to that one could not apparate directly on to either the Leaky Cauldron or Diagon Alley. And well, muggles who hung out in alley ways were usually not paying attention, or were drunk and people in such state seeing people popping up out of thin air wasn't such a big deal. He carried Stephen still, but put him down when finally stepping into the inn through the front door. There were some magical stuff he had been meaning to get for some of his friends and family, anyway. They were meaning to visit Diagon Alley on Christmas Eve, but better to do most of the shopping before that.