AN: This is the start of my A-Z collection of characters for Bex's competition. For now there'll only be one character for each letter, but when it's been judged and everything I'll probably add more characters in :)

Hopefully these will all be okay, a lot of the characters I haven't written before so I'm not sure how in character they'll be but I'll try.

Astoria Greengrass

Astoria sighed, she didn't particularly enjoy going out with a large group of girls. She'd much rather have gone out with the guys tonight, but it was her sister's hen party so there was no way to get out of being here. What made it worse was that Pansy, the maid of honour, had decided to take the muggle tradition of going 'clubbing'. Apparently when muggles get married they go out to crowded places, get really drunk and dance until early in the morning. Astoria didn't like the sound of it; she'd much prefer to be sat in a pub with Theo, Blaise, Draco, Greg and the rest of the boys.

Hearing the fireplace in the other room, she got up to see who'd arrived. Everyone had arranged to meet at the Greengrass Manor prior to going out since Pansy had decided against telling them where they would be going.

"Astoria, well don't you just look beautiful!" she heard Pansy say to her as she entered the room, "Now where's your sister? I've got a few things to give her before we go out."

"She's in her room getting dressed," Astoria told the other witch lazily before grabbing a book off the nearest shelf and settling down in the couch in front of the fire while she waited for the rest of the girls.

One by one the girls all appeared; somehow all of them managing to come through just as she was at an interesting part of her book. Millicent arrived first, followed by Tracey, and then her friend Viola. The only person missing was Megan, but that wasn't unusual – she was almost always late. About five minutes later Megan came through the fireplace, looking a little frazzled and apologising for being late. Astoria laughed this off and the girls made their way through to the Drawing Room where she promptly called their house elf, Minty, to get them some drinks and let Pansy and Daphne know everyone was there.

As they sat and waited for the bride and maid of honour, they reminisced about their days at school. Astoria more pleased than most to be out of there. Her last two years at Hogwarts after the war had been horrendous. Being a Slytherin she didn't go a single day in her sixth year without being hexed by someone in the corridors. By her seventh year the hexes had calmed down, but the whole house was still shunned and she couldn't go anywhere without someone saying something derogatory to her.

The worst thing for Astoria, though, was that even before war and especially after she didn't think like most of the Slytherins had. Sure she had been brought up to hate muggles, muggleborns and 'blood traitors', but that didn't mean she necessarily agreed with the rest of her family. The way Astoria saw it, as long as you were able to cast good magic then you should be allowed to attend Hogwarts and have a place in the Wizarding World.

Shaking herself out of her thoughts, Astoria realised that the conversation had shifted from Hogwarts to the upcoming wedding and everyone's relationships. This was a conversation that Astoria could join in with. With a smirk on her face, Astoria slipped the engagement ring she'd hidden in her pocket onto her finger. Just a week ago Draco had proposed to her, the only people that knew were Pansy, Daphne, Theo and Blaise. She hated to take away from her sister's night, but Astoria decided that sharing the news would make everyone more excited and in a better mood for tonight. Well, talking about it would certainly put her in a better mood and quite frankly that was all that mattered to Astoria.

Just then she heard Viola ask how she and Draco were doing, so Astoria just pulled her left hand out of her pocket with a smirk on her face. Everyone looked at her blankly before Tracey noticed the engagement ring and everyone started squealing. It wasn't long before she was hit with a barrage of questions.

"When did that happen?"

"Draco proposed?"

"What happened? Tell me everything!"

"Did he take you out?"

"Was it romantic?"

"What did he say?"

"Did he get down on one knee?"

"Where were you?"

"Was. It. Romantic?"

"Why aren't you telling us?"

Astoria laughed, "Girls, girls. I'd tell you everything if you let me get a word in!"

"Sorry!" they all chorused before sitting quietly.

She smiled, it was nice having all this attention on her – especially since everyone's attention had been on Daphne and Theo's wedding for so long.

"Yes, it was romantic!" she told them, hearing some giggles and relieved sighs as she did, "it was last week. Draco came and met me after work; he had a present for me which turned out to be a beautiful dress. He told me to go and put it on and then apparated us to this remote location, I'm still not sure where it was – he won't tell me. We had to walk up this country lane for about five minutes which was beautiful, the trees were covered in lights and it created a beautiful image. After walking up we arrived at this beautiful and very exclusive Italian restaurant. We had a beautiful meal and afterwards there was a fireworks display out the back for everyone in the restaurant to watch, there was only about 5 couples including us in there. I stood watching the fireworks and when they'd finished I turned around and there he was, down on one knee with the most beautiful engagement ring I've ever see. It was perfect!"

As she told the girls all about how Draco had proposed to her, she couldn't help but imagine what her hen party would be like. She certainly wouldn't be doing this 'clubbing' thing, she still wasn't sure what it entailed other than dressing like muggles, but maybe a girl's night out where she could catch up with old friends would be nice.

Words: 1,002.

This is for:

This Means War Competition;

Round One - Girls Night Out.

A-Z Competition;

Characters - A.

If You Dare Challenge;

339 - Marriage.

Open Category Competition 2;

Trio Era.