A/N: Wow, it's been awhile. Sorry to keep you all waiting for... ten months, yeesh. Wow. If you still even remember this story...
Also, I'm thinking of renaming this story "The Potter Paradox". So keep an eye out for that if you don't have an account.

Okay, so when I'm rich and famous as a record-breaking, title-winning Quidditch star, people are going to be clamoring for information about my personal life, and no doubt willing to pay generous sums for such information. But since I'm so generous already I'll give you a fun fact about myself for free.

FUN FACT ABOUT EILEEN SCHNEIDER: I met Dom Weasley when we were eleven on the Hogwarts Express, and we've been best friends ever since.

This wouldn't be an odd occurrence, normally, considering that most people meet the friends they'll have throughout their school years (and probably longer) on the train when they're eleven. It's the same sort of story, really, for all of them. There's no empty compartment, so you (lowly first year) find one that miraculously holds another first year, looking as out of place and gormless as you, and voila, instant best friend!

Dom and I were never like that.

In a way, it was that first meeting that shaped the rest of our friendship, the way the odds stacked against the two of us becoming friends that day, and the way we both decided that we'd do what we like, thanks, odds or no.

For starters, Dom's family had sent her along on her merry way as a Packaged Deal with two of her cousins, James (Potter, bleh) and Freddy, as some sort of they're the same age, so automatic friends! ploy that parents like to pull with kids. She was seated in a compartment towards the front of the train, where Dom's older sister Victoire and long-time family friend Teddy Lupin could keep an eye on them. I think their Rules-Are-My-Crack cousin Molly might have been there, too, giving them lectures on broomstick regulations and the finer details of the House points system that nobody ever needs to know.

It was a good plan, in theory, lumping Dom with James and Freddy, considering the shit those idiots get up to and the snits Dom can get in when she's feeling any sort of emotion whatsoever. It'd be so much easier if they all could be the best of friends, bond in their inevitable Weasley-Cousins-vs.-the-World way.

In theory.

In actuality, Dom Weasley has never in her life made anything easier for anyone.

(This includes herself.)

So, Dom escaped from the Terrible Two and The Ted and Vic Show amidst a lecture about the thread-count of school ties, and made her way down the train without notice. (She probably nicked some sweets off the trolley on her way, but that's neither here nor there.)

I was, unfortunately, in pretty much the exact same situation, only I'd been saddled with not only Kyrie (shudder), but also Piama, who my eleven-year-old self found clingy and annoying. We'd been turned over to my "responsible" older sister, Jenny, who left almost immediately for the Prefect's carriage and never came back, and Piama's perfect older sister, Priya. And if Priya was there, then my other sister, Jessie, no doubt fluttered in and out a few times.

You might be wondering, like, where the hell was Eliza? I thought she was your cousin? And I'd say, first off, she's my second cousin, and secondly: my mother was having a feud with Eliza's family at the time that still somewhat stands (even if I elect to ignore her). It's bit complicated and entirely stupid and is just going to piss me off and by the way it's really none of your business, is it? But the point is, Eliza and her super-awesome Quidditch-prodigy older siblings, Liam and Julianne, were not in our compartment.

Which was unfortunate, because they're awesome. I mean, Jules and Liam. Not Eliza. Eliza is just Eliza.

But Mum paired me and the Evil Twin (who was only half-evil at the time, considering she hadn't been sorted into the House of Evil yet) with Piama Thomas in the hope that we'd become instant BFFLs with the daughter of her own BFF for life, like my sister Jessie had with Priya. It'd be so much easier for her if we decided to be best friends with the daughter of someone she'd known since her own time at Hogwarts (you know, back when dinosaurs ruled the earth and all).

Of course, I've never made anything easier for anyone, least of all my mother, so I ditched them almost as quickly as my sister Jenny had, although with much more fanfare than Dom allegedly had.

I guess I stomped down the train in a huff, and I probably deserved to get hexed for being such an uppity little first year, but frankly I didn't care and since people had seen me with people like Jessie Schneider and Priya Thomas, nobody messed with me.

I ended up barging into an apparently empty compartment (a rare occurrence, which was only due to the fact that that particular compartment smelled like old cabbage) and was on the verge of throwing myself down on the seat when I saw her. Dom was leaning against the window looking fairly green and somehow still very pretty; looking back, I'm guessing she was sort of regretting leaving the only people she knew, and getting angry at her regret, and being too much of a prideful snit to go crawling back there. She whirled around when I slammed open the door, her eyes widening in surprise before narrowing in the classic Dom Weasley glare.

"I don't want company," she snarled, and turned back around to face the window. It was clearly both a dismissal and a rejection, from a person who was used to scaring people away.

I, being Eileen Schneider, was not afraid of anything, least of all a stupid little blonde brat who thought she could order me out of a compartment.

"Neither do I," I snapped back, and I dropped down onto the seat with my arms crossed in challenge.

Dom turned back to look at me. The green was mostly gone from her face, but her ears were rapidly turning red. "So go away."

I tossed back my hair and glared at her down my nose as best I could. The effect to any normal person probably would have been quite comical, but that was not how I'd intended it and since Dom Weasley is nowhere near normal she took it exactly as it was: a challenge.

"I don't want you here," she snarled. "I don't need any company and I don't want to be your friend!"

"Good!" I shouted at her, thoroughly offended. "I wouldn't want to be your friend if you were the last person on Earth!"

Dom leapt to her feet. "So get out! I don't want any company!"

I followed suit. "Neither do I!"

"So leave!"

"I don't want company less than you don't want company, so if you want to be alone, you leave," I told her loudly, and pointedly sat down on the seat.

Dom's mouth flapped open and closed. "That-that doesn't make any sense!"

"It does so!"

"No, it doesn't!"

"Does too!"

"Does not!"

"...can I sit here? Everywhere else is full," asked some random kid (he's in our year, but I still don't know his name).

"NO! WE'RE SITTING HERE!"

He ran for his life, and Dom and I turned to look at each other for a moment, probably reassessing whether it was better to be friends or enemies; it was broken when we went into laughter that lasted a good while, and by the end of it, we were best friends.

We actually made it all the way to Hogwarts without putting on our robes and nearly ended up getting sorted in muggle clothes which would have been pretty ballsy for even Dom and I as first years, so we ended up haphazardly throwing on our robes and skirts, getting sorted in our trainers and jumpers.

We were both sorted into Gryffindor. And that was that.


Upon my return to the flat (or sardine can, whichever you prefer, they're about the same size), I pondered Dom's weird actions for a solid ten minutes before I grew bored and began to plot ways to off James Potter and make it look like an accident. I'd actually gotten out books (shudder) and was keeping the company of Dom's moronic owl who didn't seem to understand that I was not going to feed him.

I was skimming Heinous Hexes for Your Enemies when: "James Potter's too good a player for you to off him, you know. You Lions will tank faster than one of Mum's dates if he's not playing," interrupted my plotting.

Ah. The dulcet tones of the Evil Twin.

"For your information, Kyrie," I snapped, shutting the book I'd been perusing to glare across the kitchen table. "I wasn't plotting that at all. And you're disturbing the bird." Meaning Twinkle, whom I hate much less than I hate her.

"Oh, really?"smirked Kyrie (or her alter ego, Dr. Evil), ignoring my jab about the owl. She was leaning against the doorframe and regarding me with a smug sort of amusement. Like I was a television program she watched simply because it was so stupid that it was funny. "You weren't thinking about feeding him to the Blast-Ended Screwts."

"Don't be stupid," I shoved aside my secondhand copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them and ignored the heat rushing to the back of my neck. "Hagrid's not allowed to keep the screwts on school grounds ever since that Salamander-what's-his-face kid got third-degree burns."

"Scamander, love, Lysander Scamander. His great-grandfather wrote that bloody book."

"That's what I said."

"Of course you did."

"I'm glad we agree."

"So you ruled out death-by-screwt, then? I suppose you think you'll shut him in the Chamber of Secrets now, won't you."

"You need to speak Parseltongue to get in there, moron."

"Oh! You can read, can't you! Oh, isn't this spectacular, Gryffindors defying stereotypes all around! You're a hero! You've brought the Written Word to the land of scarlet and gold! Hallelujah!"

"Gryffindors can read. We just choose not to, because it's lame and you end up with useless facts—" that don't help you off someone and make it look like an accident. But I didn't say that.

"Oh. You were reading Hogwarts: A History, Revised Edition for fun, then?" She held up the aforementioned book between her thumb and forefinger like she was holding up a slug or something.

One of the flesh-eating sorts.

"Oi, careful with that!" I snatched the book from her hands and placed it delicately on the table, careful not to dispel any of the loose papers stuck between its pages.

"You'd only trot that old thing out from its spellproof casing to actually read if it were a matter of life or death," the Wicked Witch of the Dungeons observed with a sneering air.

"I don't keep it in spellpr—Bloody hell, I'm doing homework!" Kyrie looked skeptical—my defense was obviously too defensive. Reverse tactics! The best defense is offense, after all, and Quidditch principles always apply to real life.

"You know, the work that teachers want us to do by September?" I baited her with raised eyebrows and Kyrie-esque scorn. "Required stuff? You should try it sometime. Studying soothes the soul and all." I gave her a weird laugh thing to sound convincing.

I think I just frightened her.

"I did take a wild stab at it this morning, but someone went a little Bruce Banner on me and, well, Hulk smashed." Kyrie snorted, and Twinkle hooted in hate at her. Good bird.

"I don't understand that reference," I snapped.

"Good thing, too, considering your favorite motto that I have heard quoted to poor Piama Thomas more times than I can count is that 'homework is for Ravenclaws', and that is why I know you wouldn't touch Hogwarts: A History with a ten-foot pole unless it was to try and scheme the demise of someone you truly despise."

"How poetic," I snorted, turning back to my copy of Horrible Hexes and Conniving Curses for People You Hate. "You rhymed."

There were several beats of time in which I pretended to read about hexes and she just stood there until—

"What, Kyrie?"

"You know…" Evil Incarnate proceeded towards the table cautiously, almost like she was approaching a wild animal. "I'd be willing to help you—for a price, that is. Scheming is, after all, what we Slytherins do best."

I narrowed my eyes at her.

"I'm aware of that, funnily enough."

"Well. Consider it." The Evil Twin's sneering gaze lingered on me before she moved out of the kitchen. "Oh, hold on, I almost forgot." She paused in the doorway, her back to me, and pulled something from the pocket of her jacket. "This came for you." She lazily brandished a rumpled green envelope between her thumb and forefinger.

I stood up so fast the chair clattered backwards and Horrible Hexes ended up flung across the room. "Give it to me."

"Geez, eager beaver much?" Kyrie turned around to smirk at me and no doubt do something evil, but I was across the room and snatching it from her greasy little fingers before she could even think 'maybe I should keep this for blackmail'.

"Mine." I snapped, clutching the letter tightly in my hand. I felt the paper begin to crumple. We regarded each other venomously for a while, me glaring and her sneering, and again I was reminded how annoyingly identical we truly are. We'd probably be indistinguishable if I weren't a good two and a half inches taller and more muscular than her (I am a Beater, after all): we've the same wild blonde hair, same eyebrows in a straight-line (gives the appearance of always being somewhat annoyed), same high cheekbones, same blue eyes.

Kyrie wavered first. "Alright, nitwit," she snapped. "Yours."

"Thank you," insert Gryffindor Smirk, to rub in victory.

Her eyes narrowed. Win.

Stomping back over the table, I gathered up all my Defense books and half-formed plans, with Hogwarts: A History, the Revised Edition placed on top. I shouldered past Kyrie and went to stomp towards our room, when I stopped.

"And, for your information, Kyrie, we wouldn't tank without Potter—why, I'd say we don't need him at all, really," I kept my tone sickly sweet, imitating her own taunting jeer. "Oh, wait, sorry, don't mean to be over-informing the expert—after all, you are the resident authority on being superfluous, aren't you?"

I left her standing in the kitchen looking a bit surprised that I'd somehow managed to out-word her—is that a word? Out-word? Out-speak?

Psh. Whatever. Words are lame.


Okay, so before we do anything else, there's something you have to understand about Dom's family.

First: she's a Weasley. As such, they are all off their rockers, out of their trees, lost their marbles, any and all clichés you can think of that mean crazy.

Her mother, Fleur, is French and part-veela, meaning she's incredibly attractive and borderline psychotic. She's the only person I've ever seen Dom lose to in a head-to-head fight, which is pretty impressive. Like, if Dom were Voldemort, Fleur would be Dumbledore, i.e. the only person that was that Dom was ever known to fear. And like Dumbledore, Fleur is pretty tame-seeming until the situation demands it. And then she's scary as hell.

Dom has two siblings, Victoire and Louis. Louis is pretty tame, considering, but he's probably got a whole host of psychological problems that will manifest in later life that stem from a borderline-horrific childhood in a house of three French, part-veela Weasley women. And, also the fact that he's been mistaken for a girl almost every day of his life, poor bloke.

Dom's relationship with her older sister Victoire is a landmine, even by Dom standards. There is some deep emotional shit going on there, and I'm sure Piama has presented me with her theories on the subject but even I'm not stupid enough to go prancing around on landmines with psychobabble.

And they say Piama's the smart one. Really.

Dom also has a dad. Bill. He's a chill dude, as in, nothing really throws him off. Ever. Which is really kind of a miracle considering the psychos he lives with.

As I stumbled out onto the hearth of Dom's house, I was kind of bracing myself for nuclear war. I wasn't wrong: I ended up being bombarded the second I arrived by ash in my nose and screaming in my ear.

"Eeks! Eeks! Eileen, you're here, I've been waiting for ages!" It was Dom, who was obviously in some 'you're my best friend and did I tell you I love you' sort of mood.

And don't ask about the nickname.

[FUN FACT: Dom calls me 'Eeks' because my initials are EKS, for Eileen Katharine Schneider, and sounded out they are Eeks. How clever.]

God, what I do for the fans.

"Hey, Dom, just saw you yesterday, um…hey…" I (most certainly did not) squeak out as she constricted my windpipe. Sweet Merlin, this woman was part boa constrictor or something.

"I know, just yesterday," Dom released me, stepping back with furrowed eyebrows. "But Louis has all his friends over and they've been driving me fucking mental, I swear…" she trailed off with a scowl and began mumbling something about 'brats' and 'can't bloody shut up', which is ironic considering Dom is a brat who can't bloody shut up, which I can totally say because we're best fr—

Hang on. "Friends?"

"I know, I was surprised, too—" Dom rolled her eyes.

"No, no, you idiot," I waved off her words. "I meant which friends? Is Roxy here?"

Dom shot me a fiery glare, but after years of overexposure to her angry looks I might as well be wearing a fireproof suit. "Why do you even like Roxy so much? She's my cousin and even I think she's fucking obnoxious."

"…'Even you think your own cousin is annoying'? What an anomaly. I don't understand why you think that statement supports your point at all. And don't knock Roxy, Dom, she's like my protégé. The other Beater, y'know. She's my blind-sider. And she's cool." I defended. Dom added a skeptical eyebrow-raise to her withering glare. "For a fourteen-year-old," I conceded.

"Cool," Dom echoed, turning towards the stairs. "For a fourteen-year-old," she smirked.

"Shut up, okay, she's a Beater," I explained.

Dom raised her eyebrows. "It's funny as hell when you say that like it explains everything."

"It does!"

"No, it doesn't, and, god, you're such a Quidditch freak like the rest of them, Eeks."

My stomach twisted. Quidditch freak. A badge I wear with honor. (The only fucking badge I wear with honor because of stupid fucking Potter and nepotism).

"Stop thinking so hard," Dom elbowed my side, swiping an apple from a fruit bowl and hopping up onto the counter in her usual breezy grace. She regarded me with narrowed eyes for a moment before jumping down, snatching a second apple and tossing it to me, all in one fluid motion.

I caught my apple with a frown at Dom's somewhat out of character thoughtfulness as she leaned back against the counter, exuding her usual air of confidence and grace. If I were a lesser being, I might be jealous of the almost dance-like fluidity of Dom's movements, but I am Eileen Schneider, and I am nobody's lesser being.

Except for James P—fuck, no. So he gets one up on me. One. Unfairly, too. Well, he can shove that stupid badge up his arse for all I care, stupid git.

"That's the spirit," Dom gave a lazy nod of approval before taking a violent bite out of her apple.


"Wait," Roxy held up her hand, her dark brows pinched together. "So you're saying that you're not the captain?"

Roxy had found us lounging about in Dom's room maybe fifteen minutes after I'd shown up in Dom's kitchen. Dom, of course, automatically accused her of "stalking" us, but Roxy and I knew better: it was Beater telepathy. Before you go on all skeptical about it and call me a nutter, let me tell you: it's a real thing, or else everyone on the pitch would get clobbered within five minutes of the startup whistle. All Beaters need to be in sync with each other, more so than any other player on the pitch.

Just Reason Number #767 why Beating is the hardest and most underrated position in Quidditch.

I had barely opened my mouth to reply when Dom interrupted. "Yeah, loser, that's what she's been saying for the past fifteen minutes," snarled Dom, voice muffled from her position sprawled out, face down on her purple comforter.

Roxy sent a Weasley-glare at Dom's back before turning back to me. She was perched on top of Dom's dresser, having knocked over several never-been-opened books and unused perfumes; all we're-sisters-let's-be-friends gifts from Victoire. Despite Dom's frosty sentiment towards both the items and her sister, she objected vehemently to the former's abuse at Roxy's lack of consideration for Dom's possessions and overall disregard for conventional seating.

Roxy, being a Weasley, had just marched in and jumped up anyway. She really doesn't look like the quintessential Weasley—that is to say, red hair and freckles, but then again, neither did Dom or any of the other Delacour-Weasleys. Roxy has dark brown skin and wiry curls that she kept tied in a tight bun-thing at the back of her head; she's also stocky, which sets her apart from the willowy Delacour-Weasleys, beanpole Rose Weasley, and petite little Lily Potter, but means that she can kick their arses on the pitch any day, and that's what really matters.

"I figured you had a real shot at it," Roxy said solemnly, like it was of utmost importance that she impart that piece of information to me. "Eliza's nice and Fred's—well, my brother—but nobody else stood a chance against James—"

"Potter," I corrected irritably under my breath, instantly in a bad mood. Dom snorted into her pillow and I had to fight the urge to smother her with it.

"—except you. Wait, what'd you say?" Roxy gave me an accusing look.

"Nothing," I mumbled. Dom snorted again.

Note to self: do not kill best friend. Will be lonely in Azkaban.

Roxy still looked suspicious, but seemed willing to move on. "It really blows," she added pointlessly, like I was intimately fucking aware that James fucking Potter being the fucking captain fucking blew. "I hoped it'd be you," and her dark eyes were kind of earnest, like a puppy-dog mixed with a bird of prey or something because Roxy is always too fierce in her looks and mannerisms to ever have anything so tame as a puppy used as a metaphor.

"You hoped, but you didn't think. Not actually," a boy's guffaws broke any solemnity of the atmosphere. Leaning in the doorway inelegantly and sloppily was Roger Jackson, Louis's best friend. Where Louis himself happened to be was a mystery to me, because it seemed that the entirety of his company that had been so persistently bothering Dom all day had deserted him.

We all shot Roger annoyed looks, with Dom even raising her disheveled bedhead to glare at him. Such a display of Weasley women/Eileen Schneider glaring might have sent a different bloke shaking in his scuffed trainers, but not Roger Jackson. Not because he was brave or anything; Roger either didn't care or never noticed tense atmospheres. Or any atmospheres at all. It was kind of like he had a shield charm hidden in his mop of brown hair where all social discomfort and potential embarrassment bounced off.

I don't really understand how Roxy doesn't kill him; they're best friends, and yet she's rigid and disciplined and alert while he's laidback and sloppy and oblivious. (Piama might call him 'obtuse' but that's a bit unkind.)

"I mean, everybody knew it'd be James—"

"Potter." I hissed. Come on, people, he has a fucking surname. Dom snickered into the palm of her hand when Roxy sent me another suspicious look.

Roger, of course, barreled on. "I mean, Roxy here was nice enough to hope for your sake an' all, Schneider, but she was the only one. Everyone knew it'd be James, 'cept you an' nobody had the heart to tell you."

"Roger—" Roxy hissed, her dark eyes flashing from me to him nervously.

Roger paid her no attention, the stupid git. "Sorry, Schneider, you're a great girl and all and you're the best bloody Beater I ever saw—sorry, Rox, you know it's true—but, come on. He's James Potter, isn't he? There's not any way he wouldn't be captain, honestly, he's too good."

My eye twitched. "Just because he's got Longbottom in his pocket—"

"Everybody loves Potter, anyway, he's cool and he's the best player on the team! Maybe in the whole school! It was just inevitable—"

Picking up a glittery blue bottle of Essence d'Sirene and chucking it at Roger's head wasn't something I put much thought into. It was a bit of knee-jerk reaction, to be honest, and I'm not afraid to admit that watching the bottle of perfume shatter gloriously in a cascade of glittery, strong-scented mess over Roger's moronic skull was deeply satisfying.

"Flamin' Nora, Schneider!" he sputtered, a rare look of annoyance on his face as the pungent scent of artificial ocean spray permeated the room.

Dom was too busy laughing to do anything else, but Roxy jumped into action. "Roger, you're so goddamned stupid sometimes," Roxy snarled, sending me a concerned look before leaping off the dresser with the coiled agility of a puma or something. She grabbed his arm and dragged him from the room. I glared at them as they departed.

Hopefully to the washroom, because that kid reeked.

Dom was still doubled over in raucous giggles when Louis popped his shaved head into the doorway, his shirt collar pulled over his nose and mouth.

"The hell is that smell?" he coughed, eyes watering.

"Hey, Louis," I greeted, my voice a bit croaky from perfume.

"Hi, Eileen," Louis gasped between coughs. Even choked up in a perfume cloud, he had a downright lovely soprano voice. The curse of the veela, eh? "You people do an impromptu performance of The Little Mermaid in here or something?

"It smells like Poseidon's asshole," Dom remarked, wrinkling her nose in distaste.

Rolling his eyes at her characteristic lack of help, Louis looked to me for answers. I frowned. "I threw perfume at Roger," I explained, and Louis let out a short bark of laughter before he started coughing and spluttering again.

"Essence de Sirene?" Louis guessed with another coughing chuckle.

"You actually know the perfume? Merlin, Lou, you're such a girl," Dom muttered. Louis froze, his muscles tensing and a red blush staining his cheeks.

"I'm not a girl," Louis snapped, trying to look threatening even as his blush crept down his neck.

"Sure, Lulu," Dom smirked.

Louis stomped his foot. "I hope your stupid room reeks of seawater until you die, Dom!" And he marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Dom looked over at me. Her eyebrows scrunched together for a quick second before she schooled her expression into a teasing smirk. "You know, if he didn't want people to think he's not a female, he should really stop acting like a Toddlers & Tiaras contestant." Dom grinned smugly to herself.

"Stop smiling like that," I ordered, before walking cautiously to examine the puddle of foul-smelling fragrance.

"Smiling like what?" Dom asked. I heard her move off the bed behind me.

"You look too pleased with yourself. It's troubling," I muttered, and with a wrinkled nose, I pulled out my wand. "Tergeo," I said, siphoning away the perfume. The smell and glittery faded away.

"Underage magic, Schneider," Dom knocked my shoulder. "You are a naughty one."

"Shut up," I snapped, shoving my wand back into my pocket. A niggling heaviness seemed to have settled itself on the edges of my mind. My frown deepened.

"You're lucky I'm not Piama," Dom continued, a forced lightness to her tone. "She'd probably report you to the Ministry herself. 'Rules are here for a reason, Eileen, and if you want to break them you have to be prepared for the consequences! Oh, they're snapping your wand? Should have thought of that first, you degenerate heathen!'" I couldn't help but crack a smile at that. Dom's Piama impression never gets old. "And why shouldn't I be pleased? I can smile all I want—I made a relevant muggle reference! To their TB!"

"TV, Dom. TV."

"I—oh, shut up, why don't you?" said Dom without any real bite.


"So, Eileen, what're you guys planning to do about Merecio?" Louis posed the next day as he fixed himself his cornflakes. He'd mostly retreated into his room once Roxy and Roger had left, which had been very soon after the perfume incident, so Dom and I hadn't really seen him.

Dom gagged over her omelette at the sight of his breakfast. Dom might kill you if you ever said it, but she was a right prissy little girl when it came to Piama called a 'hearty English breakfast'. It was the French in her—she tended to lean towards the more extravagant delicacies in regard to her diet.

"Hopefully never see her again," I answered, buttering my toast with a shrug.

Louis rolled his eyes and took a slurp of cornflakes. Dom turned green. "About replacing her," he elaborated, although it came out: "Uhbumm wepwacing 'er."

"Everyone'll have to try out again, anyway, so I'll just try out the new Seekers then," I shrugged, like I hadn't planned out start-of-term tryouts intensively.

Louis frowned. "Don't captains run tryouts, though?"

"'course. Why are you ask—"

Dom raised her eyebrows at me.

My stomach clenched uncomfortably, and any appetite I'd had for my toast and eggs went away. "Oh," I said, intently watching the yoke of the egg run yellow across my plate when I stabbed it with my knife. "Right. Because I'm not the captain."

Stab. "Because James Potter is the captain."

Stab. "Which means I am not."

Stab. "So I don't run tryouts."

Stab. "Because Potter is the captain."

Stab. Stab. "And I'm not."

Stab. Stab. Stab.

"I'm just gonna take that…" Dom reached over cautiously to take the knife away. I adjusted my hold on it and leveled a glare at her. "I'm not afraid of you, mucker," and she plucked the cutlery from my grip with lithe movement. "And your poor eggs didn't deserve to have you take a fucking machete to them, either."

"Quit with the lecture, Weasley, your Piama is showing."

"My Piama is not—fuck you! Stop being such a git, Eileen!"

"You're the git, you git!"

"Tosser!"

"Bitch!"

"Oh, for the love of Merlin, I'm sorry I ever asked!" Louis tossed his half-finished cornflakes aside, sloshing soggy flakes and milk onto the tabletop with an air of defeat. He tossed his head sassily like he was tossing a (nonexistent) head of hair, and stomped away.

"What happened to my owl?" Dom asked, spearing a bit of her omelette. "I sent him to yours two days ago about the school letters and—"

"We had owl kebabs for supper."

"That's sick."

"It was delicious."

"Eileen."

"Kyrie even boiled the feet. Nothing like owl talons to wash down with your pumpkin juice."

"You're deplorable." Dom stopped suddenly, her fork suspended midway between plate and mouth with a bit of egg dangling off the end. "God, my Piama is showing. Deplorable? What kind of word is that?"

"You knew she was contagious," I poked my own dilapidated eggs and toast with my fork absentmindedly. I could sense her studying me as she ate her omelette, but I just moved my breakfast around some more and ignored her and her thoughtful silence. She was searching for something to say.

"Mum thinks my hair looks like a whorish pygmy puff vomited all over it!" Dom blurted out. She's mulling over conversation topics for minutes and that's the best she can do?

"What?"

"I told her she didn't understand the delicate intricacies of anti-fashion."

"A pygmy puff?"

"She said I looked ridiculous."

"A whorish pygmy puff?"

"She said I was 'shaming ze family' or some bullshit. I told her mes affaires font mal au cul."

"That's very rude, Dom."

"Since when do you know French?"

"I don't need to know French to know you, prat, and that definitely wasn't a nice thing to say."

"She didn't like being told to mind her own fucking business."

"I…imagine she did not."

"Nail on the head there, Eeks. Nail on the head."

"How are you still alive?"

"Louis showed up, unlucky for him. Mummy dearest and I are against the senseless slaughter of the innocents."

"You are so thoughtful."

"Shut the fuck up, okay, you don't understand what it's like—my mother is a psychopath!"

I do fucking know what it's like to have a psychopathic family, thank you very much. Evil Twin, anyone? But it was like her offhanded hyperbole was a challenge or something, because I blurted out against my will: "Mum wants me to join the frog choir."

Dom's head snapped towards me so quickly she put herself at risk for whiplash and looked at me like I had told her I was considering house-elfery as a future career and danced about wearing naught but a pillowcase. Or, you know, proclaimed a desire to join the frog choir.

They're pretty much on the same level, anyway.

"Tell me you're joking," Dom looked me square in the eyes, her voice deadly serious. "Tell me your psychopathic mother does not want you to join Flitwick's flipping frog fuckers. Tell me this is a practical joke—and if it is, Eileen Schneider, I am not fucking amused."

I glared at her, but nonetheless dug my hand into my jean pocket, pulling out a rumpled piece of paper. I tossed it at her glumly. The note had been waiting for me on my bed upon my return home from Dom's two days ago—once Mum had seen my scores.

Straightening out the paper, Dom began to read aloud. "'Eileen,' Oh, look, she spelled your name right this time!" Dom gave me a sarcastic thumbs up.

"Just keep reading," I grumbled. She rolled her eyes, but complied. "'Eileen, fix this. An A in Charms? You're joining the frog choir if that's what it takes. Any trouble at school and you're dead. From mum'—oh, I love how she balances out threats of murder with maternal affection. You know, Eileen, did it ever occur to you that your mother is a bigger bitch than mine?"

"There's more on the back."

"More on the back—oh, a post script! Your mother is a lovely woman. So proud of you…blah, blah…O in Divination? You got an O in Divination? Is that even possible?"

"Yes," I snarled, snatching the paper back. "It's genetic, okay? The Inner Eye runs in the family."

"Bullshit. The whole fucking subject's bullshit. The Inner fucking Eye is bullshit. And Trelawney is almost as batshit as your mum—I mean, frog choir? Seriously? I mean, this combined with you not getting captain; well, your stock is plummeting, my good friend. In fact—we probably shouldn't hang out in public anymore. Bad public image, you know."

I glared at her. "Says the girl with the hair like a whorish pygmy puff."

"Frog choir trumps slaggy pygmy puffs."

"Does not."

"Does too."

"Does not."

"Does so—fucking frog choir, oh man." Dom chortled. "How does the song go? Oh, yeah. 'Dou-ble, dou-ble, toil and trou-ble—'"

I slammed my hand over her mouth to shut her up. "You are awful—and gross! Did you just lick my hand?"

"What, you want me to pull a Piama about it?" Dom snarled, swiping her hand across her mouth and glaring. "Sure, I can do that: 'Oh, Eileen,'" Dom simpered in a high-pitched voice that really sounded nothing like Piama. "'I think Frog Choir is a perfect way to distract you from your shortcomings on the Quidditch pitch! It'll keep your mind off your social ostracism and lack of leadership qualities!'"

"Shortcomings? Me? Are you serious? Longbottom was obviously high when he chose fucking Potter—"

"James is my cousin, you bint, and even if he wasn't I'd still say he's talented. He is. You've just got an anti-James stick shoved up your—"

"What is so effing great about James Potter, anyway? He's just some prat! No better than anyone else!"

"Some people might say the draw is in his overall personality, good looks, and Quidditch skills—but not everyone's into that sort of thing," Dom rolled her eyes.

"—he just has a name that people respect, and not because of anything he did—just because his dad's a hero and all, he gets special treatment. Like, 'Oh, James dear, you want an O on your OWL? Here, you don't even have to take the test!' 'Want me to lick your shoes, Mr. Potter?' 'Can I have an autograph, Mr. Potter?' 'What's it like being Harry Potter's son?' 'Could your Mum get me scouted by the Harpies, Potter?' It's all bullshit, Dom, bullshit! It's favoritism!"

Dom snorted. "Like you wouldn't be jumping for joy if you good old Uncle Neville had shown some nepotism instead."

"Well, I—" can't deny it, is what I don't say.

"And besides, he is my cousin. He's a chill bloke, you know, when he's not

landing coveted Quidditch captaincies."

I didn't even dignify that with a response, although I did wish she hadn't confiscated my knife. 'Chill bloke', indeed. The glare I was sending to my poor eggs turned positively poisonous.

"He might wanna try out or something," Dom said randomly after a minute or so of silence. I looked up at her, my irritation momentarily forgotten.

"Who?"

"Louis. He might wanna try out. He and Roxy and Roger—they've been scheming together all summer. I figured they had to be up to something."

"He wants to try out for Seeker?" I frowned at my glass of pumpkin juice. Dom's kid brother? Playing Quidditch?

"Yeah. He's being all weird and secretive about it, though. I haven't actually seen him fly, but Roxy probably has, so I'd ask her if I were you."

I shoved my plate away. "What does it matter what I say about it? Potter is the captain, after all," I snarled, making sure to twist the name into something ugly.

Dom let out a huff and rolled her eyes. "Because you're Eileen, and you know everything about Quidditch. If you think he can do it, he can do it. Dunno why he couldn't just ask you, but he's a right pansy sometimes."

I tried not to preen at her praise. I really, really did, but a smirk was creeping its way onto my face and, well, she's right. I do know everything about Quidditch. "We should go see Roxy, then," I jumped up, rubbing my hands together with zeal.

Dom eyed me for a moment before setting down her fork with a grin. "I couldn't eat after those damn cornflakes, anyway." She pushed out her chair, and together we made our way to Dom's fireplace.

"Should we tell your mum we're leaving?" I asked as Dom rummaged on the mantle for the box of floo powder.

"Why? Afraid she'll put you in time-out?" Dom smirked at me, clutching a fistful of powder in her hand.

"Dom."

"Some Gryffie you are. Let me dash off and get my stationary kit before Mummy notices I'm gone!"

"She might get angry if she finds out," I pointed out. Dom scoffed, although it came off a little forced.

"If she finds out," Dom emphasized with a roguish smirk. "If she were to find out, she might be angry. But she won't find out, Eeksie poo, so there's no reason to be afraid of the big bad veela."

I glowered at her, crossing my arms. "Only an idiot isn't afraid of your mum."

Dom actually considered this for a moment, and even cast a tempted glance at a forgotten notepad on a table before she straightened her shoulders and fixed her steely blue-grey eyes on me. The end of her mouth and corresponding eyebrow twitched upwards in a half-smirk. It said I dare you. "I won't interrupt her beauty sleep, Schneider. I might be an idiot, but I'm not afraid."

My glare increased, but my lips quirked up slightly. Challenge accepted. "Then I guess we don't have an issue."

Dom tossed the powder into the embers, allowing emerald green flames to burst from the grate.

"And where are you two going, hm? Zink you can just sneak away?"

Dom and I froze midstep, our feet suspended comically over the grate. We shared identical wide-eyed, pale-faced look of terror.

Fleur. And she sounded pissed.

A/N: Hey... it's been awhile. Um. Hi. Review, I guess? Thank you!