Light and Dark
by Erin Griffin
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: Trying my hand at Luna/Pansy
Summary: "Opposites attract. Us. Light and Dark. Gryffindor and Slytherin..."
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. They belong to JK Rowling.
Note: The prompt from zagury this time was "Toes". Hope I did it justice this time, buddy.
"This little piggy went to Hogwarts. This little piggy stayed home. This little piggy had rice pudding. This little piggy had none. This little pig Disapperated, going whee whee whee... All the way home..." Luna stayed quiet as she contemplated said toes and the rhyme.
"Look, I didn't come up with it, some Muggle did. Of course they did, they're mad," I said to her. She looked at me and smiled, her white blonde hair falling over her face in the way I once thought was a sign of shyness, but later learned was a hint of her carelessness of trivial things such as the placement of those strands.
"I find it oddly fun."
"So do children," I replied.
"We were children once, so we must still find it fun," Luna reasoned. I didn't want to admit to her that I sort of did. I was a Slytherin once, too, but I didn't want to remember that part of my life. Still, I couldn't help but to smile as she held onto my pinky toe, freshly painted by the wave of my wand. Luna had taken a liking to the way the polish sparkled and changed color at my will, holding each toe between her index finger and thumb as we lay together in bed. Not knowing why, except perhaps because it was the first thing that came to mind, I told her about the odd thing that Muggle parents did for their children and how it always made the little ones giggle. Luna tried it out on me, and I hid my smile the best I could. In a way, either because it was so rediculous or because it did tickle somewhat, it was quite momentarily amusing.
Luna shifted her body, sitting up so that she offered her right foot to me. I knew what she wanted, but instead, I took her toes much in the same way she had, repeating the small rhyme. She laughed, pulling her foot away, but I held on tighter. I left a kiss on the large toe, and then I waved my wand so that her polish matched mine. Immediately, her toenails turned a shade of pinkish-orange only found in sunsets, and I smiled. "That suits you. It matches your outfit," I told her, which was a lie. It didn't match neccisarily, but it didn't clash horrendously, either. It was as if clothes didn't like the thought of making Luna look bad.
"It is funny, some of the things Muggles come up with, but some things, like fashionable fingernail and toe polish is interesting to me. They also have strange sayings, but there is one thing I like about Muggle sayings," Luna rambled.
"And what's that, Love?"
" 'Opposites attract'. " I looked away from her at that. Though I would change nothing about the day that changed me for good, I try to forget all of the wrong my family had done to get me there. I had stood before the Ministy of Magic many times, confessing the crimes of my friends and family, ratting them all out in return for a life lived relatively in peace with a few exceptions. I was ordered to attend a meeting, then to correct as many wrongs as I could in the course of a year. The meeting was for people like me. Affiliated, but not criminal. Most of them were in my house at Hogwarts, Slytherins with family ties to You Know Who, but had been otherwise innocent of their families' doing. All of them also told the Ministry everything to reduce or eliminate any punishment they might receive after the war. My first wrong I tried to fix was to make ammends for the pranks and stunts I pulled while in Hogwarts, and to apologise to those I hurt, which was anyone not in the House of Slytherin, and even a few within, those I felt were sent into the House as a fluke. The first few people I went to wouldn't allow me to speak, as it was the famous trio of our school, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger and the Weasleys. I didn't blame them at all.
The next person I had gone to was also the most fun to make fun of, mainly because she always made it so easy: Luna Lovegood. When I saw her, she was bent over a small patch of her garden, talking to the lawn gnomes and offering them tea. When she saw me, she didn't know who I was at first, or at least, that is what the look she gave me implied. I reintroduced myself, and she only nodded, so I went on, explaining why I was there. She only said, "Forgiven. Tea?" So thrown back was I, I accepted. After only a sip, Luna stood up and lead me to her fireplace, where she brought it to life and took out familiar powder from a pouch. Before I can ask her why not Apperate, she had taken my hand and shouted our destination, and I was thankful that I hadn't drinken more than that sip of tea. As it turned out, she had taken me to the Weasley's residence, and I was as suprised as they were that we ended up there. But as soon as Luna began talking, everyone listened. Even I listened. She sounded different. Though the same air was there in her voice and that dream was still in her eye, she was confident in the words she said. The famous trio, as well as Ginny Weasley, allowed me to say what I needed to say. With a hesitant glance at Luna, they at least pretended to forgive me, and that was good enough.
We had visited many other homes unannounced that day, each time with much the same result. Luna had taken me to every wizard home she knew from Dumbledore's Army, and by the end of that day, I looked forward to holding her hand as we went through the Floo Network. When finally we got back, she began to make plans for getting ahold of everyone else I had told her about, determined to help me on this little quest of mine. I told her that she needn't do this, that it felt like cheating to have help, but at the same time, I felt glad that I wasn't doing this alone. She even came with me to the meeting at one point, but was told she had to leave because she made the other participants mad. In both ways.
As my quest for redemption sort of ended, I thought Luna and I wouldn't see eachother anymore. When I nearly shattered my water glass upon seeing her suddenly appear in my fireplace, I knew I was wrong. Though I knew I should have been mad, I wasn't. Somewhere throughout the following months, that journey together became a strange friendship, and that friendhip somehow became more than that. All I knew was that with her hand in mine, I would have gone anywhere, and I often did, even that first day. I don't remember who kissed who, just that it was snowing outside and we were warm together inside, one of us still clutching the Christmas gift she was given. I don't remember who had first joked about how odd we were together, the light clashing with the dark, but it wasn't the first time I had thought the same exact thing. With my black hair, dark eyes and clothing, I stood out next to Luna, with her white/blonde hair, glittery blue eyes and sunny colored dresses, often water-colory designs in yellows and blues.
" 'Opposites attract.' Us. Light and Dark. Slytherin and Gryffindor," I murmured. "I was feeling a little mad in the place I had been mentally after the war, and you, who saw things just a little bit differently. You saw just enough to understand me," I said. I sighed, wanting to get away from the sappiness of it all, but I just couldn't help it sometimes. She just does that to me. Luna and I stayed in silence until my girlfriend raised her arms out, faced away from me for a second, and let her self sort of freefall the short distance from her sitting position to where she was laying across my hip. The look on her face suggested that she had jumped from a high building and landed on clouds, and couldn't be happier. When I felt her lean further to grab my big toe, I wiggled my toes to get her to let go with no avail. "Hey-"
"You like it," she insisted. True or not, it was a little strange, this new fixation with my toes, or maybe it was the polish more than the toes themselves that she liked so much. Then again, that's Luna for you.
"Umph," I grunted playfully, knowing that Luna would pay me no mind.
"This little piggy went to Hogwarts. This little piggy stayed home..."
END
