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There was a time Andromeda hated Christmas.
She remembers the Black Christmases, before she was burned from the tree. Weeks of preparation and, ultimately, disappointment. Nothing could impress mother, and there was no present on this green Earth to make their father love her. They lavished the girls, instead. It became a competition, of sorts. Who could pick the better present, who understood which child, whose money was paying for the lavishness of the season.
She hated Christmas, but she loved her sisters. The three girls never wanted for anything. Any presents one didn't want, they could exchange for one of the others. It didn't matter that neither parent knew them, at all. They knew each other.
Bellatrix had a beautiful voice. The oldest sister would sing to cover the noise of their parents arguing. When the fighting stopped, Narcissa would make them all hot chocolate and Andromeda would talk. Softly, at first, small stories of family and Christmases they'd never know; then, epic tales of mystery and romance. The men they would meet, the places they would go.
Nymphadora crawls into Andromeda's lap, starring up at the Christmas tree, the lights reflected in bright, brown eyes. A normal Christmas, a loving family with the man she's met and the daughter she loves.
And she still hates Christmas.
All of her beautiful memories of Christmas' past, the ones she reflects on each winter, are of her sisters. It's all she can do not to think of them, now.
They aren't her sisters anymore.
Bella, mad and rotting in a cell. Cissa, in a tower of wealth and estrangement. Andromeda holds her daughter to her chest and whispers love into her hair.