A week had passed since Dominique's incident. She had finally told Roxanne, Rose, and Victoire what had actually happened, which earned her another scolding from Victoire.
Roxanne thought the whole situation was somewhat comical. Leave it to Dom to get snatched on the first day of You-Know-Who's control of them ministry, and still come out virtually unharmed.
Fleur hadn't let any of them leave the house, and everyone was starting to go stir crazy. Finally after a morning filled with begging and pleading, Fleur succumbed to the group and allowed them to walk into the village nearby. She had also given them a list of items she needed from the market and gave Victoire some money to pay for the groceries.
Roxanne was at the front of the group on their walk into town. They weren't racing, but Roxanne knew she would have won if they had been. She always won races.
As they approached the village, Roxanne noticed a few people here-and-there, but the town was mostly empty. Shortly thereafter, Roxanne realised why no one was walking through the cobblestoned streets after a flash of lightning blazed through the sky, and it started pouring rain.
The bunch ducked into the nearest shop, which happened to be a clothing boutique. All of the girls broke away and started browsing through clothes, jewellery, and purses, while Louis tried to avoid the salesgirl who had given him her number the prior week.
Roxanne laughed to herself. The poor girl looked so desperate, the least she could do was throw herself at one of Roxanne's straight cousins.
Louis had told Roxanne, their friend Jackie, Dominique, Rory, and Victoire that he was gay, but had avoided telling the rest of the family for fear that they would take the mickey out of him for the rest of his life.
He of course was being dramatic, Roxanne knew that everyone would be perfectly fine with him and act as nothing had changed.
Roxanne noticed Louis looking around for help, and she swooped in to rescue him.
"Hey Louis," she said as she approached the two, "I found this magenta dress, and I wasn't sure if it suited me, care to give an opinion?"
Roxanne dragged him to a clothes rack with dresses and Louis said, "So which dress is it?"
Roxanne laughed out loud, sure her cousin could be sarcastic and cynical, but sometimes he was so clueless it was obvious that he and Dominique shared a womb.
"There was no dress, I was just trying to get you away from Desperately Needs-A-Fuck over there," Roxanne said while gesturing to the salesgirl.
Louis nodded and thanked her before he put his arm around Roxanne's shoulder and whispered, "Pretend we're dating, and maybe she'll leave me alone."
It oddly enough wasn't the strangest request Roxanne had gotten from one of her cousins. There was always the dreadful night when Dominique's diaphragm got stuck, and Roxanne being the best person ever, helped her get it out.
Roxanne put her hand in Louis's back pocket and started giggling like a giddy schoolgirl.
When the rain had subsided, and Victoire called for them, Roxanne jumped on Louis's back and had him give her a piggy-back-ride to the market. Roxanne saw the salesgirl scowling at the two and laughed again because a. he was her cousin, b. he was gay, and c. Roxanne preferred brunettes.
Once they had reached the market, Victoire gave each person a thing to get, and lashed out after James said, "Jeez, you seem to be forgetting that we aren't six, and no one put you in charge."
After Victoire was finished yelling at him, Teddy slapped him on the back of the head. Roxanne decided to tread lightly around Vic, the stress was obviously starting to get to her, and wondered why she had put so much energy into a lashing when James's comment wasn't even the slightest bit witty. Roxanne pushed the thought into the back of her mind, and set off to find two loaves of bread.
She walked down the aisles, reading the markers above containing a list of each rows' items but stopped before she got to the 'bread' aisle. She heard crying coming from the frozen food section and decided to head over and see who had lost it. She peeked down the aisle and saw Victoire crying, again, and Teddy holding her, again. To any other bystander it would have looked sweet to see the two, but Roxanne knew something was wrong, Victoire never cried.
The last time Roxanne had seen her cry was when she was seven and Victoire was thirteen. The bunch had been playing a game of quidditch at The Burrow, and Victoire hadn't pulled up in time after a particularly sharp dive and ended up breaking her arm in three places.
That was nearly ten years ago, but Roxanne had witnessed Victoire cry over so many stupid things in the past week, she had lost count.
Roxanne allowed the crying after Dominique's return, but the crying when she accidentally burned scrambled eggs one morning, crying when she got a hole in one of her t-shirts, and crying when Fred tracked sand into the house after she'd swept were all inexcusable.
She tried to listen to their conversation, while wishing she'd had an extendable ear. Teddy tried to soothe her the best he could, but he only had so many shirts that weren't covered in tears and mascara and his patience was starting to waiver.
"Shhh, I know Vic. It isn't fair for you to be in this situation, it isn't fair for any of us to be in the situation, but you have to get a grip," Teddy said, Victoire sobbing harder after the "get a grip comment."
"It will be fine, we'll get back home and everything will be fine," Teddy started, "but babe you need to think clearly. We all need you to keep the peace, not fall apart the second James says something stupid."
Dominique walked down the aisle and Victoire immediately pulled her into a hug, still crying.
"What did you say to her?" Dominique snapped at Teddy while she wrapped an arm around Victoire. Dominique was keeping the other hand free incase she needed to hex, slap, or flip off Teddy.
"Nothing! She's just having a moment, I tried to help," Teddy responded quietly.
Dominique may have been a bimbo, but you did not want to have her targeting you.
"Oh, you "tried to help," look at what good that did!" Dominique shouted.
Everyone must have heard Dominique yelling, and shortly Louis, Albus, Molly, Lily, and James had walked in on the scene. Victoire was still crying, and even though she was one of her favourite cousins, Roxanne felt an overwhelming need to slap her across the face. Dominique, like always, had accused someone before finding out what happened, and poor Teddy was still on the receiving end of Dominique's lashing.
Teddy always fumbled over his words and never seemed to be able to say what he actually wanted to say when it came to his feelings for Victoire. Roxanne felt bad for the bloke, she felt bad for anyone who got on the wrong side of Dominique.
Eventually Dom would tire herself out or start to lose her voice and her temper would finally subdue, but it didn't seem like it was going to happen anytime soon.
Rose came down the aisle with Fred, both carrying sacks of groceries, and James and Albus stepped in to get ahold of Dom. When James had gotten kicked in the face, Scorpius, after having a good laugh, stepped in and helped Albus and James carry Dominique outside. Victoire, who had finally settled down was led outside by Louis, who probably knew exactly how to calm her down, and Teddy was still in shock from how long Dominique's screaming had lasted.
Roxanne walked down the aisle and clapped a hand on Teddy's shoulder, "Gotta love that veela temper."
Teddy made no acknowledgment of Roxanne and shrugged her hand off before walking out of the market. Everyone else followed, and once Roxanne had gotten outside, she could barely see James, Albus, and Scorpius struggling to carry Dominique back to Shell Cottage. Louis and Victoire were close behind them, Louis's arm was over Victoire's shoulder protectively.
When they had finally reached Shell Cottage, Dominique had started settling down and was being quarantined in the kitchen until she was completely back to normal. Victoire had locked herself in a bedroom, and Teddy was sitting outside of the door, pleading with her to let him in.
Everyone in Roxanne's family had to make a scene out of every little moment. She didn't even understand why Victoire was mad at Teddy, until Dom stuck her big nose into everything, it seemed like he was trying to be sincere and calm Victoire down.
Roxanne had gone into the kitchen later in the afternoon to help with dinner, like she had every night. Roxanne was peeling corn cobs out of husks and placing this husks in a compost bucket. After she had shucked ten ears of corn, she cut each of them in half and chucked some into a pot of boiling water. Fleur was nearby cutting up potatoes while Dominique breaded pieces of fish. Lily was cutting vegetables for a salad, and Lucy was mixing pitchers of lemonade.
Rose, Molly, and Scorpius were reading copies of the only book on time travel Bill could find, each annotating as they went. Victoire was still in the bedroom, only opening the door to let Louis inside. Teddy was still sitting outside of the door but had given up begging her to let him inside.
Once the fish and potatoes were finished cooking, Fleur set everything up buffet-style on the island in the kitchen. After the smell of food had wafted through the house, everyone rushed into the kitchen, except for Victoire. Louis informed everyone that she was still fragile and had just come down to get food for the two of them. Teddy had since gone into the living room and started reading another copy of the time traveling book.
Rose, Scorpius, and Molly took their food into the living room and started reading again, Louis vanished up the stairs with two plates of food, James, Fred, Albus, Oliver, and Hugo ate in a corner of the living room while playing poker, and Roxanne, Margot, Lucy, Lily, Dominique, Fleur, and Bill all ate at a table in the kitchen. Bill soon felt out of place with all the estrogen freely flowing and went to join the poker game.
Sometime after all of the dinner plates were cleared, Victoire finally made an appearance. Teddy immediately stood up, book forgotten, when she entered the room. He walked up to her and said, "Vic, we have to talk about this, you can't just barricade yourself in a room when something unexpected happens."
"I have a lot more on my plate than you do, Lupin. Don't tell me what I can and can't do," Victoire huffed.
"You have to consider me too, Vic. It's as much my problem as it is yours!" Teddy said, while increasing his volume.
Victoire huffed again and ran up the stairs, Dominique following closely behind. Victoire made a point of slamming the door loudly and Roxanne said, "Well, I guess we'll be sleeping in here tonight."
A/N Oh my god, so my mom took my computer and found this story and it was so embarrassing, I wanted to die. At least it doesn't have any smut. I will be logging off of my account from now on. I don't think I can stress this enough, but please review because I love seeing people's comments because even one makes me happy. I think this is the longest fanfic I've ever written because I usually don't stick with them. But thanks for reading... and hopefully reviewing!