A/N: I should be doing research, but this popped up.
~Naralanis
"Oh, I am really looking forward to the explanation for this one. What were you two thinking?! You could have killed someone!" The stern voice had quite the frantic edge to it, as its owner was doing her very best not to screech.
"How on Earth could you have possibly thought this was acceptable behaviour?" The second voice was softer, almost like velvet, but was spoken in a low, menacing murmur that had its own disapproving quality.
"There are no excuses. Charlotte could have really injured herself, and the house is a mess. Look at all this flour! And the glue! And feathers! It's everywhere!"
"I hope you two realise you are to be grounded until further notice. Possibly until college, or even after. I did not raise my daughter's to behave in such a manner. This is simply appalling."
The disapproving tones were directed at the two redheads sitting on the couch, who did have the grace to look at least mildly chastised under the stern gaze of their parents.
"We didn't want to hurt anyone. It was just a bit of fun" Cassidy began, wincing when her mother's eye began to twitch lightly. That was never a good sign.
"A bit of fun? If that's your idea of fun, I seem to have raised two psychopaths." Miranda retorted, furious with her daughters' behaviour. Sure, they were notorious for pranking assistants— her own wife had fallen victim to their mischief once upon a time— but this seriously took the cake.
"Honestly, when you think about it, it isn't really our fault." Caroline mumbled quietly, earning a horrified expression from her sister and two face-melting glares from her mother and stepmother.
"Really?! Not your fault? Please enlighten us, Caroline, whose fault is it then?" Andy uttered venomously. Miranda also looked at her devilish spawn with a chastising glare, her eyebrow quirked as if daring the redhead to answer. To their surprise, Caroline put on her best nonchalant expression before answering.
"The media, of course."
Andrea and Miranda shared a disbelieving glance before glaring at the two girls once more.
"Let me get this straight. You rigged the entire house in some nightmarish Rube Goldberg deal that almost killed an assistant in the process, and it's the media's fault? Boy, I heard some in my time, but this… Honestly." Andy retorted angrily. Caroline had always had an attitude problem, very reminiscent of a certain silver-haired media mogul. Not that she ever said that out loud.
"Please enlighten me on how the media prompted you to attempt to elicit a heart attack and almost lethal injury on my unsuspecting assistant." Miranda drawled, her voice laden with warning.
"It's the media's portrayal of twins as devilish prank machines. Particularly redheaded twins." Caroline answered with confidence before marching to the bookshelf and pulling what looked like a Japanese comic book.
"Exhibit A" she drawled, much like her mother. "The Hitachiin Brothers from Ouran High School Host Club. Mischievous redheaded twins that get up to all kinds of shenanigans. They prank the other members of the club, and even trick people into guessing which one is which. Their whole identity revolves around their hilarious devilment."
Another disbelieving, yet impressed look was shared between the two older women.
"Are you really trying to use that as an excuse, Caroline? A Japanese comic?"
"It's manga, and, no, that's not all!" Cassidy intervened, a gleeful look on her face. She ran to the shelf were they stored a variety of DVDs, searching frantically until she pulled one out in triumph.
"Exhibit B!" she shouted "Annie and Hallie from The Parent Trap. Here the parallels run deeper. Twin, redheaded girls who, even when they don't know they are sisters, raise all kinds of hell at Camp Walden."
"If you pay close attention, you can see that their pranks and general antics are methodically calculated. First, they were directed toward each other until they realise they're twins, which honestly took way too freaking long in my opinion… But then they use their prankster abilities to trick their own parents, and then to get rid of that gold-digger their dad was about to marry.
"Yeah, the sugar-water repellent and the floating mattress are absolute, absolute classics." Caroline added, nodding emphatically.
"I am really having a hard time believing you guys would even think such a thing would he-" Andy began, only to be interrupted by Caroline and Cassidy simultaneously.
"EXHIBIT C!" they yelled, pulling two hard covers from the bookshelf.
"Oh, don't tell me" Andy said, her hand resting on her forehead.
"Yes. The Harry Potter books. More specifically, the Weasley twins." Cassidy said.
"Gred and Forge" added Caroline
"You mean Fred and George." Corrected Andy.
"Precisely. That is just one of their many shenanigans." Caroline responded cheekily.
"Quite, quite, Caroline. In fact, their pranks run the gamut from as simple as switching their names around to setting fireworks loose in their school, and much, much more."
"Yes, in fact, their mischievousness even made them good business; they created a joke shop that rivalled Zonko's!"
"What on Earth is a 'zoinko'?" Miranda couldn't help but ask, confused.
"Zonko's. It's a magical joke shop in the wizard village of Hogsmeade." Cassidy clarified.
"Wasn't that the big bearded man?"
"That's Hagrid, Miranda." Andy corrected instinctively.
"Correct. The point is, we are not entirely guilty of out prankster nature." Caroline began, getting serious.
"Yes. Societal expectations shaped by the mischievous portrayal of red-headed twins in the media has led us to conform to a pre-conceived notion of how we should behave." Cassidy pointed out, her hands behind her back as she paced back and forth with a serious expression.
"Indeed. Social pressures and environmental factors have contributed to the formation of our identity. The media stereotype of the redheaded twins is as much a factor of our development as our biological construct." Caroline added.
"And thus, we move that we not be held entirely accountable for playing a prank on Charlotte…"
"…as its inception is merely the result of years spent within the social expectations and environmental factors…"
"…that have, quite literally, made us who we are." Cassidy finalised.
The two women looked at the twins in utter astonishment for a few moments. Miranda spoke first.
"We find the defendants guilty of grave misbehaviour and the reckless endangerment of human life."
"Go to your rooms." Andy said finally.
The girls mumbled of the injustices they had just been submitted to, stomping their way upstairs and subsequently banging their doors. Miranda and Andrea stood in silence, contemplating the glittery, gooey, feathery mess that was the house.
"Andrea" Miranda called to her wife after their heavy silence.
"Yes?"
The silver haired woman flopped onto the sofa with a heavy sigh of exasperation, making tufts of glitter and clouds of feathers rise and fall.
"If either of them ever, ever become lawyers, I want you to smother me with those goose-feather pillows."