Disclaimer: I own no one and nothing.
This was written for Mystii's Prompts, oh, Prompts challenge on Next-Gen Fanatics with the prompts 'coral', 'opal', 'photography', and 'smoking'.
The unspoken rule for any girl attending a wedding is no one is allowed to outshine the bride.
You're not allowed to wear white unless you're a bridesmaid and she asks you to. You're not allowed to wear the same dress as her. And you're certainly not allowed to be a million times more beautiful than the bride could ever hope to be.
Maybe I'm exaggerating a bit. Because, yeah, Victoire looks drop-dead gorgeous in her flowing white dress as she glides down the aisle on her father's arm. That's a given, of course. Victoire is beautiful, the sky is blue, and grass is green. Facts of life and whatnot, aren't they?
By all rights, I should be transfixed by the hopelessly romantic ceremony, perhaps even crying as my besotted cousin takes his bride into his arms and kisses her like there's no tomorrow. They're like some sort of picture-perfect, happily-ever-after fairytale couple, and honestly, I couldn't be happier for them.
But my gaze wanders anyway, because I'm not a hopeless romantic and I don't believe in that silly rule about nobody outshining the bride.
She's sitting outside in the clean, spring air, a glass of ginger lemonade in her hands and a book in her lap, when I finally catch up to her. Being on the groom's side means sitting on the opposite side of the hall from the bride's sister, and I suppose I should have thought of that when I decided I wanted to talk to her today.
"Hey, beautiful," I greet, offering her a smile when she looks up. "How are you?"
Dominique returns my smile and my heart skips a beat. Merlin, she looks gorgeous today. Her hair's curled, which is quite a dramatic change, but it looks lovely, falling in loose, honey ringlets all around her pretty face and aquamarine eyes and brilliant smile.
(All right, maybe I am a bit of a hopeless romantic. Just a bit, though!)
"I'm fine, Scorp," she says, her voice warm with friendship. "Enjoying the wedding?" She blinks up at me with those dazzling eyes of hers, and someone shoot a Killing Curse at me, now, because I think I'm in love with a Weasley.
"Very," I grin at her, and then gesture to her book. "What're you reading?"
She holds it up for me to examine the gold lettering on top of the blue velvet cover. "The Prince's Crown, by Adalina Warbeck."
I raise an eyebrow, curious. "Adalina? Wasn't she the Head Girl, our first year at Hogwarts? I didn't know she was an author."
"I didn't either," Dominique admits, tracing the title with one half-manicured nail. She doesn't really like sitting still; I would have thought Victoire had given up on trying to manicure her. "She's quite good, even if all her books are cheesy and romantic."
I smirk. "It must run in the family," I point out and begin humming Celestina Warbeck's most famous, most addicting, and most irritating song, Would Any Other Rose Smell As Sweet?
Dominique giggles. "Oh, stop it. You're going to get it stuck in my head, and it's such an annoying song!" she says. "She completely missed the point of Juliet's speech, anyway."
"Somehow, I doubt she actually read the play," I say, sitting down next to her less gracefully than I would have liked. She doesn't scoot over, leaving a butterfly-inducing lack of space between her coral silk-covered leg and mine.
"Yeah," she adds, carefully bookmarking her page and closing the book so she can look up at me. "Probably just heard the speech quoted somewhere and decided it sounded romantic."
I grin, about to respond, when I notice something shimmering on her throat. It's a silver chain, looped lightly around her neck, adorned with a flower-shaped opal that glitters a thousand different colors under the light of the sun.
It was my birthday present to her last year. I haven't ever seen her wear it before tonight.
Gently, I reach out and lift up the shimmering opal, admiring the shine. "You're wearing it," I say softly, hardly daring to believe it. I don't miss the blush on her cheeks, though, despite my amazement.
"Well, it's gorgeous," she murmurs, twirling a honey-gold curl around her finger. It's a nervous habit of hers, and it's rather adorable, if I do say so myself. "And it goes well with the dress."
I glance down at said dress; it is, naturally, something that is all the rage in France, though I couldn't tell you the style to save my life. I'm not very fashionable, but it's made of coral pink silk and shows off her body to a degree of perfection that her usual sundresses and Hogwarts robes cannot.
"You look beautiful," I tell her honestly, unable to keep from smiling. She's wearing the necklace I gave her, after all. That says a lot, and so, for that matter, does the still-lingering blush on her cheeks, painting her fair skin bright red. She looks a hell of a lot prettier than just beautiful, but I'm not articulate enough to describe her fully.
(Merlin's beard, what have I been smoking that's turned me into such a sap?)
"Thank you," she whispers, turning her blue eyes on me, unknowingly-or perhaps not, she is part-Veela-making me melt under her gaze. There's a light smile on her face, and I can feel the curves of her body pressing warmly against mine.
I sigh, and decide to go for it. This is a wedding, after all, and there are less romantic ways to be doing this.
Without giving myself a chance to chicken out of it, I lean forward and press my lips against hers.
To my surprise, she only takes a few seconds to respond, tangling her fingers in my previously-neatly-combed hair and tilting her head so I have better access to her lips. One of my arms finds its way around her waist, and there's a feeling like all the butterflies that have been darting around in my stomach just exploded in a burst of happiness.
Somewhere in the distance, I hear a camera snap a photo of us. Dominique whirls around and makes a face at her brother, who's doubled up laughing; his telltale camera on the ground.
"Victoire should have spent money on some real photographers instead of paying my idiot brother ten galleons," she huffs.
"Probably," I agree, aiming a hex at Louis out of the line of sight of any other guests. The jet of fuchsia light collides with his chest and turns his skin a delightful shade of neon pink.
"Oh, Vicka's not going to be happy about that," Dominique warns, trying to hold back giggles.
"Who cares?" I murmur, drawing her back towards me so I can steal some more kisses.
Dominique laughs and lets me kiss her senseless—or maybe it's the other way around. Well, either way, I hope you've all learned something from this.
Sometimes, outshining the bride does pay off. But that's coming from me, so don't pay too much attention to it.
Author's Notes: If this seems familiar to you, it's because I posted this a while ago but then deleted because it was a rush job XD Hopefully, now that I've cleaned it up and edited a bit, more people will like it enough to review =D
It was also written for my friend Kat who long ago gave the prompts 'dress' and 'crystal' to work with, though I sort of changed 'crystal' to 'opal' because I used crystal in another story =P
Please don't favorite without reviewing, and please review with more than 'so cute' or 'loved it'. Thank so much in advance!