A Bottle of Possibilities.
One-shot to start with, maybe two at some point. Seems to be a reoccurring thing lately.
A stony-faced Draco stood opposite her; his hands folded behind his back. He looks down at her as she rolls the spherical bottle back and forth between long jewelled fingers across the desk. The liquid inside glimmered with possibility. She knew that he'd grudgingly brewed it for her; his oldest friend. It was as much of an obligation than anything else.
The potion wasn't even for work either; her desk job didn't require that. This was purely personal. "Pans, do you really have to do this?" he raises a single pale brow, lips pursed. "As your friend, and as the brewer of the potion, I have to advise against you taking it." Pansy matches his grey gaze with chocolate tones of her own, staying silent. He already knew this argument. She knew of the risks, had researched it countless times over. It was, at current point, her only chance. This potion, Pansy knew, was borderline illegal. It wasn't actually against the law, but it was highly frowned upon.
In the not so distance past she, along with Daphne and Astoria, Blaise and Theo, had gone through the wall at The Leaky Cauldron and into muggle London for a wandless evening out. The group had joined the throngs of fellow twenty-something year olds, weaving in and out of writhing bodies in clubs and bars. No pressure. No judgments. No one knew who they were, or cared. Just strangers having a good time.
She'd met Dexter around eleven-ish, had spent the night being showered with compliments. He was cute, not ordinary or plain, or the opposite end of the scale like Blaise. Haughty and high maintenance would describe her fellow Slytherin, no offence to him, of course. Dex's light brown hair swept lightly over one side, the opposite side shaved, tickling under her finger tips. His eyes read into hers, so darkly blue and inky they were nearly as black as her soul. A smirky mouth and a shit eating grin. He threw his head back in laughter when she snarked. A bright spark.
As clock hands rotated they grew closer. Heads touching. Fingers twining. Knees brushing. Closer. Her red lips staining his. They'd hitched a taxi back to his flat, it wasn't far. She bypassed all the details she normally would have noticed. The bed didn't creak and his sheets were navy; the only thing she managed to take in. Athletic, is what Daph would define him as; toned and firm, long and lean. A jigsaw that seemed to fit with hers.
He made her see stars that night.
She left in the morning with an unusually heavy heart, smirking at the crescent shaped marks upon his chest, biceps and back while he was fast asleep. "Aim for the moon and even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." her mother used to say when she was a child. Astrological ambition.
On her way back to Charing Cross Road, she scrubbed her face with a tissue. Her make up from last night semi-caked and crumbly. She should have used his bathroom. Blast Daph's idea to leave their wands. Double blast to them all for agreeing. A cleansing charm would have been nice about now.
At the Leaky, Hannah hands her back her wand. The Hufflepuff staying wisely silent as Pansy slips into the bathroom. A quick flick of her wand cleans the sleep from her eyes, tames the eyeliner and desmudges the lipstick. Wizarding make up was still better at staying put than the muggle stuff though neither were brilliant enough to last all night. She instantly felt refreshed.
She meets the rest in Fortescue's sipping milkshakes and recovering from a hangover. She was unusually late, her friends looking up as she joins them in a booth with a choc shake. Daph stares her down until she talks. She divulged the more personal details to her best friend later.
She'd been careless that night, two weeks since she realised that it had been six weeks since that blissful evening. Draco, after everything that he had been through, was still minorly judgemental. He reaches to stop the rattling of the bottle his fingers clasping her own, irritated. If she was to take the potion she would need supervision for three days straight. The side effects to it more risky and bothersome than the thing it would cure.
Pansy knew him well enough to tell he was torn. Conflicted on the inside to what the potion would do. She'd had that mental argument countless times over. It was a no-win situation. Either way she'd face the usual scorn. The story of her life; always making bad choices to protect herself. She had to think of herself. No one else did. She was her own before she was eve anyone else's.
Fingering the stopper, she holds the purple bottle up to the light. The metallic liquid inside swirls.
She had to do what was right for herself. Her future.
She wasn't the smartest. Or the prettiest. The loudest or the quietest. She wasn't funny; her humour more dry and witty rather than fluffy and giggly. She wasn't the skinniest or the curviest. Nor was she the shortest or the tallest. She was simply in the middle. Plain and neutral. Nothing special, her father had sneered countless times over. Worthless; he'd admitted while intoxicated. He'd have preferred a boy. Her pureblood status had meant nothing. This world was against everything that she had been lectured. She wasn't any better than the halfbloods, the muggleborns or the blood traitors. The Sacred Twenty-Eight were witches and wizards who were hung up on social status on an extreme scale. It meant nothing. Especially now.
Yet to someone, just for a night, she'd been that girl. He'd found her and made her feel like all the positive traits that she associated with others. The Grangers, The Greengrasses and the Delacours of the world. He'd given her a chance. An open door. An escape to be someone who wasn't just the girl who made Bad Choices.
Scraping the wooden chair back on the stone floor, Pansy stands, straightening her clingy leopard print skirt and balancing on her narrow stilettoes. She once again meets her friends gaze, the bottle cold in her shaking hands. Taking a deep breath, she passes him the bottle back. The relief visible, his shoulders relaxing and smile just about forming at the edges. His eyes were once again a calm sea instead of concrete.
She couldn't do this.
To someone she would be everything, even if they didn't know it yet. The tiny heart beat within her would be her world.