Title: Interoffice Stereotypes
Author: Jmaria
Rating: Pg-13 to R
Spoilers: Set three years after AU book seven, cannon from OotP
Disclaimer: JK owns all, I am a broke college student. Correction: I own C. More Skeeter and assorted others.
Summary: Do you know what you're setting yourself up for?
A/N: okay, last chappie had a mind of its own. Seriously. And apparently it collapsed in on itself nearly three years ago. gah. A big hunk of this (up to the first pov break) was written over the course of those three years. Still know where I'm goin' with it though.
A/N2: Also? Totally pimping the requests for prompts for this year's B.I.C. Challenge (Birthday Insanity Collection Challenge). All I need is reader participation. Check out my profile for more details.
Miss Manners She Ain't
It felt odd, returning to this room so soon after her angry departure hours earlier. Millicent sighed, plopping down into the welcoming mattress. She rolled over on her side, facing the crowded wall she'd failed to notice in her exhaustion the night before. Pictures and posters and bits of memorabilia literally shoved at each other for more space. Millicent found herself smiling at a cluttered mess of a wall that reminded her so much of her flat up in Falmouth. She remembered the looks of duel disgust her parents had had in her family portrait every time she added a new scrap to the heap.
She'd relished every new addition. That feeling hadn't lasted long. Within a year and a half of her new life of freedom as a professional athlete this stupid strike over tiny payment, perks, and obligations to team and to the players families had risen up. She missed that flat and her roommate, Portia.
Apart from Katie Bell, Portia was one of her few female friends. The half-blood witch had been born in Falmouth, but her family had moved away during the first war. When her parents split up, she'd gone off with her frightened Muggle mother to America. In the moment of her mothers defection, Portia's name had been removed from Hogwarts lists and placed firmly on the Salem Academy enrollment lists.
Suffice it to say, when Portia had returned to England after the second war, she'd known very little about the social stigma that Millicent had been carrying around since before her birth. It had been a most welcome relief. It was one of her most cherished friendships that did not involve a male. Bell half-counted, because she and Flint were hardly ever separated. There was one other female she was even remotely conversational with and that would be Luna Lovegood, and at best that was stressed by the Ginny Malfoy connection.
Still, it was times like this that she wished she'd befriended more females besides Katie Bell-Flint. She desperately needed to know how to fend off unwanted blind dates, without the use of props. And that was all Fred Weasley, former Gryffindor, current employer was to be this evening. A prop to ward off her sole ex-Gryffindor friend. The damned pushy lot that they were. She needed to make friends with some former Hufflepuffs, and fast.
Of course, the problem with former Hufflepuffs was that they were all a bit scared of her. Damn. Millicent shook her head and quickly fell back asleep, more exhausted than she'd realized shed been.
Fred quietly flipped the sign back to Open and spent the rest of the afternoon mostly trying to wrap his head around this latest development surrounding his employee. The end of the workday came about far more quickly than he'd realized, and soon he found himself half-way up the steps to his flat. Poking his head in the half-open doorway of his brother's room, he noticed that the bed was empty and still made, which meant that Millicent had slept in his bed. Again.
He wasn't sure why that thought made him smile. It wasn't as if he was joining her in his bed. Or that he even wanted to join her at that. She was his employee. They barely even tolerated each other. He shook his head and knocked softly on his bedroom door. There was a small squeak of the mattress and a groan of protest from inside.
"Millicent? You up?" He called, opening the door slowly.
"Oi, don't you knock," Millicent had her back to the door, dark damp hair falling down her very bare shoulders.
It wasn't as if she was naked. Some slinky little dress in deep crimson - one of Bell's impulse buys, he was sure - lay unzipped against her pale flesh, the view only marred slightly by the black band of her bra. Fred's mouth was a lot drier than it had been before coming into his bedroom to find her partially dressed...again. Millicent didn't seem to notice his lack of response.
"Since you already barged in, you mind doing up my back?" Millicent glanced at him over her shoulder, her brow crinkling. "Weasley?"
"Right, yeah," Fred cleared his throat and took a step forward. "You always get so fancy for dinner at the Bell-Flints?"
"No, normally just jeans and a jumper or tee," Millicent reached up to pull her long dark hair over her shoulder and out of his way, exposing more of her bare back to him.
"What's with the dress then?" Fred's hands were not shaking as he pulled the zipper up.
"Bell said she'd put a twenty-four hour hex on all of the other clothes that would make them shrink if I tried to wear anything else," Millicent shook her head. "Girl ought to have been a Slytherin."
"As devious as all that is, I meant why does she want you to wear a dress?" Fred smiled as she turned around to face him.
"To make this," Millicent gestured to her chest, "Eye candy to whatever poor sap she's chosen to be my latest set-up."
"But you're with Zabini," Fred frowned.
"Yeah, but Bell's got it in her head that we both deserve better," Millicent cleared her throat and turned away from him again. "I'm gonna go primp."
"Wait - if you don't like all the spectacle, why do you bother to go?"
"Cause I don't trust your cooking," Millicent said over her shoulder as she breezed into the bathroom, closing the door firmly behind her.
Fred shook his head and quickly grabbed a change of clothes. Millicent shook her own head as she stared at her image in the mirror. The real reason she went to these set-ups mostly had to do with her mother's well-meaning but suffocating nature. That and she enjoyed Marcus and Katie's company - and Marcus could cook a decent meal, even if he often passed it off as Katie's handiwork. He never saw the faces that Katie pulled behind his back while he was serving.
Merlin, for all their interfering ways, she did love her stupid friends. And she had to begrudgingly admit that Fred Weasley was quickly becoming one of those included in the tiny circle.
"Katie know youre bringin me round?" Fred's voice called from the other room.
"Now why would I want to go and spoil the surprise?" Millicent chuckled quietly.
"Don't know. Reckon Flint might not make enough pasta?"
"Don't you mean Katie?" Millicent called innocently, finishing up the last of her basic cosmetics charms. Bit of rogue, hint of lip stain, and a stroke of shadow for her eyes. All in shades of red, because Katie had chosen damned Gryff colors for her to wear.
"George, Ally, Angie, Lee, Katie and myself all went on a holiday together once. Katie couldn't even boil water without singeing the pot."
"Don't let Flint know you know!" Millicent raced out of the bathroom, ignoring the mirror's wolf whistle and nearly plowed right into Fred.
"I've eaten the man's food, and since I haven't keeled over yet - I'm not going to tempt fate by insulting him now," Fred snorted.
"Why're you wearin' a tie?" Millicent took a deep breath, calmed a bit at that.
"You're wearin a dress. Seemed appropriate."
"Its the exact color of my dress."
"Would you look at that? Gryffindor crimson, who ever would have thought?" Fred grinned.
"You're gonna make tonight pure hell, aren't you?" Millicent narrowed her eyes.
"Depends on what idiot Bell's got waitin' on you."
He winked at her and turned to leave. She watched him go, a little perplexed on what had just happened. What the hell was wrong with this twin?
"What the hell is wrong with the Twin?" Ginny Malfoy nee Weasley huffed out, sitting across from George at Molly Weasley's kitchen table.
"Gred? What's he done now?"
"Bulstrode was completely out of line with Draco when we were in the shop today," Ginny frowned. "Whatever inspired you to hire her?"
"You can blame that entirely on the twin," George shook his head. "She does good work though, at least, that's what I've heard from Dennis and Ally."
"What are you two whispering about in here?" Molly smiled brightly as she slapped George's hand away from a platter of wrapped cookies. She pressed a kiss to the top of Ginnys head. "How is Draco doing today?"
"He'd have been better if that Bulstrode girl wasn't working for the twins -"
"Oi, Fred hired her. Not me. And Ally backed him!"
Both siblings noticed as Molly stiffened uncomfortably. She cleared her throat and turned away from them.
"I suppose Draco didn't say anything to upset her as well?"
"You know how he gets on the 23rd," Ginny bit her lip. "They were both out of line."
"And the Prophet's reporting all that stuff about her," George could not believe he was actually standing up for Malfoy in a fight.
"Yes, but it is C.M. Skeeter, and she's not exactly unbiased, is she George?" a dreamy voice said from the doorway. "Hello, Mrs. Weasley. Gin, did you know Draco's standing out in the rain?"
"No, damn it. Thanks, Lu!" Ginny pushed away from the table to go pull her idiot husband back inside.
"Hello, Luna. What's this about Skeeter publishing things about Millicent?" Molly asked, pulling the younger witch into a quick embrace.
"It's not real journalism," Luna Lovegood shook her head sadly. "Its spitefulness, Mrs. Weasley."
"Doesn't make it not true," George scoffed.
"And since when you are the judgmental type, George Weasley?" Luna said quite fiercely. "I've known her for the last two years, and she's been nothing but professional and private for all that time."
George lowered his head, avoiding his mother's and friend's eyes. He wasn't going to win this argument. All the women in his life - with the exception of Ginny and Hermione - seemed to be leaping to Millicent's defense.
"Here, Luna. The cookies you asked for are all ready to go," Molly plucked the platter off the table.
"Thank you, Mrs. Weasley. I'd love to stay longer, but I wouldn't wish to keep everyone waiting. Good-bye, George."
With platter in hand, Luna disapparated with a loud pop. Luna was like that these days - popping in for a few minutes and popping right out again.
"What'd she need cookies for?" George grumbled.
"She's going to a dinner party!" Molly shook her head at her son.
"And you just make cookies for her?"
"Have you not noticed the great big portrait she's been doing for your father and I?" Molly jerked her head to the wall behind him. "Between that and helping her father with the Quibbler, and her own research for exotic magical creatures, the girl's nearly worn to a nub. A few dozen cookies aren't going to tax me too much in return. And I want you to be understanding of Millicent, George. That girl's got enough on her platter without you and your other siblings casting aspersions on her character!"
"But, Mum, you don't even know her!"
Millicent and Fred were the last to arrive at the dinner party it would seem. And party it was. Katie opened the door to them with her mouth hung open, and they could hear laughing voices in the parlor behind her.
"Oh, thank God you brought the twin!" Katie cried, puffing out a breath shed been holding.
"What? The boy you meant to set me up with back out?" Millicent smirked.
"No. Marcus invited extras. And we were terribly uneven. Get inside, will you?"
