Disclaimer: Owned by the lovely and talented JK Rowling. I'm just taking her characters on a romp.
(AU, as I've left many alive to torment for this fic. Except Cedric. Sorry, Cho.)
(O)
MINISTER WEASLEY ABOLISHES MARRIAGE LAW
After three years of being forced into marriages that many would not have chosen for themselves, our new Minister has seen fit to turn society arse-over-teakettle and allow No Questions No Wait No Fee Annulments to any witch or wizard seeking to erase their Ministry sponsored (we wanted to write forced but were told that we were being bad sports) nuptials.
The NQNWNFA Office will begin operations on next Wednesday. That's right, you have less than a week to try to win over the spouse you've been neglecting. You have less than a week to prove to everyone that your marriage wasn't a sham and that you would now choose your current spouse if you had to do it all again. Less than a week before you can whip off that stupid wedding ring and loOoOoOove the one you love. Less than one week before you can finally marry the witch or wizard you would have chosen had the previous administration respected free will in any form.
Good job, Minister Percy Weasley! You've come a long way from being a boot-licking prat!
-G&G
(O)
The news went over about as well as veggie burgers at biker rally in some homes. In others, it was juicy steak in a lion's den.
The home of Severus Snape and his wife was feasting on steak tonight.
Severus wasn't a cruel man once he had been forced to marry, at least, not to his "beloved" wife. He was merely neglectful and cold. He never could stomach the idea of consummating this charade with a woman he still saw as a child. He wanted to work on his potions and teach his students, not play house. He suspected that he was largely asexual. He had seen her nude, and it aroused naught but indifference. Maybe it was just that his wife was so damn annoying that he had no desire for her.
Not that she had done anything in the past three years to encourage the older man. She had merely spent the moderate allowance he gave her on petty trifles and spent her time internally bemoaning the Anti-Infidelity Wedding Ring that she had been forced to wear during her whole marriage. Snape didn't need to be a mind reader to know why she looked at her left hand forlornly so often.
Probably still lusting after that idiotic red-head.
No, he was not at all upset to be rid of his weasel-obsessed fool of a wife.
(O)
Lavender Snape was staring at her wedding band again as she wondered how to convince her husband of three years that he should take her to the NQNWNFA Office RIGHT NOW so that they would be at the front of the line.
That's the problem, isn't it? He'll want to throw me on the streets. Too bad I'm not the idiot he thinks I am.
She fingered her Gringotts vault key. She was a Pureblood witch with a dowry that had been given to her husband promptly upon marriage. In the case of annulment, the money and goods in her dowry would revert back to her father. It was common for a husband to wait a thirty day grace period before spending that money, as they would be safe from an annulment. Thirty one days on was divorce territory, and while it may look reckless and create some tut-tutting among high society witches, a man could not be legally faulted for using every last knut his bride brought to the proverbial family table. Some more ruthless men had gone through thirty one days of marriage to wealthy witches, spent everything in the vault or merely transferred the funds, and then Imperius'd their blushing bride into infidelity. No court denied divorce for bridal infidelity in the wizarding world.
What was it Hermione called it? Slut shaming?
Either way, Snape would be flabbergasted when she showed how much money she had managed to hide away right under his nose in a mere three years. She didn't know how much, if any, of her dowry had been spent by Snape. She secretly hoped that it was everything and that the bastard would spend his life in debt to her father.
Lavender Snape, soon to gloriously regain her standing as a Brown, was nobodies fool. A large portion of her "vapid little letters" were star charts and predictions she would send to clients. While she wasn't a full-fledged Seer, she had a knack for Divination that many did not, and she knew to capitalize on it.
Her pitiful allowance (was she twelve?) went mainly into savings. Snape had a house elf that did most of the shopping for the basics needed for the home. Snape knew the cost of every potions ingredient in every market around the world, but had no clue what a loaf of bread cost at the local bakery. So when Lavender came home with small trinkets to try and put her mark on the home, (a fifteen sickle statue here, a ten galleon painting there) he grossly over-estimated the amount she spent and rolled his eyes like a condescending arse. He seemed to think that she spent everything on shoes, clothes, and stupid useless crap.
She wasn't about to tell him that her weight was a constant battle. That thanks to her aversion to the long term effects of weight potions she had to watch what she ate and maintain her physical strength the muggle way: exercise. After the DA, she had grown to respect her body. She worked hard to be able to dodge spells of ill intent, and she couldn't do that nearly as effectively if she wasn't at a healthy weight. Her body, however, LIKED being plump. When depressed (like, say, the first months of her marriage) she had gained weight more than she ever had before. Sure, she could cast a glamour to make herself LOOK thinner, but she wouldn't BE thinner.
She had needed clothing that fit her larger proportions. Ready-to-wear garments had spells woven in that prevented any truly effective charms or transfigurations from taking hold. If you weren't handy with a needle and thread, your clothing would stay just as it was when purchased. She understood the point (why buy new clothes if all you had to do was transfigure your old ones, or turn Aunt Wildernere's sweater into a gorgeous chic outfit?) but that didn't mean she liked it. So she had gone on a bit of a shopping spree (three pairs of pants, seven blouses, a dress, and two skirts) and from that point on, Snape had his mind made up about Lavender.
She was a proud young woman and she decided that he could go to his grave thinking her a shallow fool rather than informing him that their marriage had made her lose the will to live for months. She wasn't so cruel as to tell him that marrying him was a fate worse than fighting Voldemort. Fighting Voldemort had galvanized her while marrying Snape had broken her.
But that didn't mean she liked the git, just that she wasn't a vindictive little girl willing to shatter a man over something that he had no say in.
So she held her key in her hand like a talisman as she walked to his study. She was more than ready to tell her husband where to shove it.
(O)
"...up your arse!"
Lavender was finished. In her three years of marriage to the greasy bastard, she had never thrown a tantrum. For her to lay her rage on the table for him was a shock. He had fully expected for them to quietly go to the NQNWNFA Office on Wednesday, patiently continuing on with his six remaining days of captivity, and then never speak to his "wife" again. His eyebrows raised nearer to his hairline than Lavender had thought possible.
"I take it that this has not been a happy marriage." Snape's mouth twitched slightly. She had surprised him, and after three years with the girl, he had thought her nothing more than an empty-headed fool. But to have saved twenty thousand galleons right under his nose with her own business... He had been wrong about her. "I was wrong about you."
"Damn right you were, you slimy old bat. You- wait. Did you just admit that you were wrong?"
Snape drawled slowly, "Do I need to take you to St. Mungo's to get your hearing checked, wife? You are still my responsibility for six days, it wouldn't do to neglect you now." He wasn't smiling, but he seemed entertained.
Lavender scrunched her nose at him slightly, her head tilting a few degrees. This was one of the longest back and forth conversations they had ever had, once they had laid down the ground rules for their marriage. And he wasn't treating her like a leperous house elf. "I am sure that I will be fine, almost-ex-husband. A temporary flaw in cognition, not in my physical being." She bobbed a sarcastic curtesy, pocketed her key, and smiled victoriously. She turned on her heel to leave the study when she felt a hand on her shoulder.
"Madam, I have a proposition for you." At her cringe of disgust, Snape realized what she must have assumed he meant. "Not that kind. You have been safe from that nonsense for three years, now is no time to begin harassing you or making demands upon you."
She relaxed and nodded. "Continue?"
"I would like to spend the next six days doing what we should have done the first six days of our marriage. Getting to know one another, spending time together, and finding common ground. At the end of the week, we can decide to part ways with no hard feelin-"
"Or we can wait a few more days to decide, as the office will likely be up and running for a few weeks to accommodate the load. Or we can take a chance and not annul if we decide that we should take a leap of faith, leaving ourselves open to merely divorcing later."
"Or growing old together," Snape said. And in that moment, Lavender held more affection for him than she had in their previous three years combined.
"That would be acceptable, if it turns out we can stand one another."
They nodded resolutely at the same time, and Lavender turned to face him. He motioned to a soft looking leather sofa near a roaring fireplace and they sat together.
Throughout the night, they spoke of everything. They aired their grievances. They spoke of their dreams. And as the sun began easing it's soft rays to welcome the dawn, Severus lifted his sleeping wife and carried her to bed. He didn't kiss her, though. After all, it wouldn't be polite to rush things with the woman he had been married to for three years.