Island Getaways


The game had been a constant in their dorm, a way to pass the time that the girls would play whenever boredom would strike. (Except Hermione. Hermione had always been much more skilled at keeping herself busy, cramming for exams and helping save the world.) It started innocently enough, a mild "if you were stuck on a desert island and could only bring three things with you, what would they be?" (her 4REELZ album, Michael J. Fox, and her blue bikini- the one that ties on the side, had been Lav's answers). Once they got older, the old way growing boring, the game got meaner: "If you could strand anyone on a desert island that had no trees and was surrounded by hungry sharks, who would it be?" ("RON. AND HIS STUPID FACE. AND WITHOUT SUNSCREEN, the stupid gingerkid," Lavender sobbed at the end of her sixth year).

The girls grew out of the game, and it was soon forgotten for other things. Sara had her photography, and later had the tabloids, which she'd gone and sold Lavender's school-aged game responses to. Eliza was just gone. Parvati had her job, and her boyfriend, and Lav had learned long ago to be careful about what she said, as words had a way of coming back to haunt her. It had been a dumb game anyway. They were witches. They could just Apparate off the island if somehow stranded there.

But then there she was, not trapped by any means, but on an island nonetheless. There were women in tacky synthetic grass skirts, brightly coloured drinks with tiny neon umbrellas on top, and coconuts, coconuts everywhere, in trees, on the ground, stitched into purses and jewelry and bras. And there was Merton, playing the fiddle and frolicking around their hotel room, prancing about like... like Rudolph in that old claymation Christmas film after the girl reindeer told him he was cute.

He must not have heard her come in, and Lavender was more than okay with that. It was a private and vulnerable moment that Lav was probably never meant to see, but one that she wouldn't have traded for the world. She knew that if he saw her watching him that he'd stop playing, that he'd get all flustered and embarrassed and would hide away Lavinia the fiddle until he was somewhere at which he had the only key to the room. He looked so happy (not like he had when they'd met Britney Spears, a more peaceful, less hyperventilative sort of happy), and, although Lavender had tried to stifle the ever-growing and ever-pointless crush on her best guy friend, felt those old, annoying, girly feelings bubbling up again, watching him skip around like he'd had ten drinks too many. It didn't matter to her anymore that nothing was going to come of the ridiculous infatuation.

She did know, though, that if she'd known back in school that one day she'd be on an island with Merton Graves, his fiddle, and a bathing suit that made her look even better than her blue bikini had, she would've given a different answer when playing the game.