Disclaimer: I don't own anything except for the story!

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Chapter 1 – Preparations

'Hey what do you think of this dress, Ginny?'

Ginny sighed as she turned around to take another look at her best friend. Tonight's ball, her friends hadn't talked about anything else today. It was Christmas and Dumbledore had decided that there would be another Yule Ball this year.

'That's like the tenth dress you've tried on tonight,' she said. 'Exactly how many dresses do you have?'
'But they're not all mine!' Melissa defended herself. 'This one's from Dacia and the one I had on before this is Keali's!'
Ginny smiled.
'It looks lovely.'

Ginny sighed again and turned around. She focused her attention on her own clothes. She hated this formal occassions, especially the dressing up part. She didn't feel comfortable in a dress, absolutely not. She had never liked wearing them, not even when she was little and right now she had only one dress in her closet. It wasn't a ballroom dress. It was a short red dress, strapless, with a purple clothe around her waist. Her arms would be covered with red sleeves which reached to the half of her hand and she would wear matching red boots.

'Don't you have anything else to wear?' Melissa joked.
'You know me, Melis, I don't like formal clothing,' Ginny answered. 'You should be glad I'm not coming in my jeans.'
Laughter sounded from all the girls in the room.
'That'd be very funny!' Keali said.
'Maybe I'll try it, then.' Ginny winked at Melissa, she knew she would hate that idea.
'No way, you're so not going to wear jeans tonight!'

Ginny just smiled, got behind a screen and started to change into her dress. She had just taken of her sweater when she was called again.

'Hey Gin,' Dacia called. 'You should wear this with it.'
Ginny looked around the screen and saw that Dacia held up a pair of white thights.
'Yeah, those will look lovely with that dress,' Melissa said.
'I don't know girls...' Ginny started, but she didn't have an opportunity to finish her sentence.
'No "I don't knows" right now, you're going to wear them,' Melissa said and she grabbed the tights from Dacia's hand ('Hey'), walked over to Ginny, put it in her hands, turned her around and pushed her behind the screen again.

After a few moments Ginny was ready and she stepped from behind the screen and saw that she had attracted quite the audience (it was just her roommates watching, but Ginny never felt comfortable when being watched).

'Lovely,' Melissa said and she walked around Ginny.
'We just have to do something about the hair and the make-up and then you'll be perfect,' Dacia said, following Melissa's example.
'Leave the hair to me!' Keali came walking towards Ginny with her wand in one hand and a brush in the other.
'What are you going to do to my hair?' Ginny asked.
'Don't worry, sweetheart, I've got everything under control.' She started to brush her hair.
'Tonight, we're gonna make sure you look absolutely splendid!'

Ginny knew that nothing would work on her friends tonight, nothing what she'd say would make any difference, so she just sat down and let them do what they wanted.

'Ooooh, you'll definitely pick up a cutie, tonight!'

She didn't want to. She just couldn't understand that her friends seemed to just care about two things in life: boys and fashion. She didn't care about either of those things. It was her fifth year now and she hadn't even had one boyfriend. Not that she cared, on the contrary, but her friends seemed to have a different boyfriend every single month, she had lost track of it.

'Done! Now let me see you!'
Ginny stood up and turned around a few times.
'You look absolutely wonderful,' Keali said and the other girls nodded in agreement.
'Shouldn't you get ready yourselfs?' Ginny asked.
'We'll be done in no time, we've been experimenting for weeks and we know exactly what we want.'

Ginny wasn't surprised, she knew them too well to be. She walked over to her drawer and pulled out a mask. That was the only thing that was good about the ball. It was a masked ball and Dumbledore had assured them that they wouldn't be able to recognise each other, no one would be able to recognise anyone. As soon as they put on their masks the enchantment would begin to work and it'd just stop when you pulled it off again.
Ginny looked at the white mask in her hands. It had belonged to her grandmother and it was very useful mask. When you put it on it would change into a mask that'd match the outfit you were currently wearing.
It had seemed just a few seconds to Ginny that she stood there, mask in her hand, sunken into thoughts, but apperently it were at least a couple of minutes. When she turned around she saw that her friends were ready too. She checked the time: 7.45PM. Good, the ball would start in fifteen minutes.

'Everyone ready?' Melissa asked.
Everyone nodded.
'On three, one, two, three.' Everyone put on their mask.
Ginny felt light in her head once she had put her mask on, but that feeling disappeared as sudden as it had appeared. She looked around the dormitory which was now filled with girls she didn't recognise. They seemed familiair, but she couldn't tell the names of the girls.

She walked slowly to the door, went down the stairs to the common room, which was filled with yet more people she didn't recognise. She couldn't even tell which one was her brother. Very weird, she thought, but then again it was Dumbledore who had put the enchantment over them.

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