A/N: I spent a lot of time on this, and while I think I could've developed the idea a bit more, I still like it, and I hope you do too! Please leave a review, I would love to hear what you think!

WC: 4,450

~~ shoelaces and tiaras ~~

Victoire had planned her wedding out from the tender age of five. It had started when she had taken a moment to look at the family photo albums. The very first picture was one of Maman and Dad, dancing together on their wedding. The dress was magnificent, the decorations lovely, and their smiles so bright. But what really caught her eye was the splendid tiara on Maman's head. She'd spent to next couple hours after this discovery planning out her very own wedding, in as much detail as possible.

Over the next couple of years, she kept adding and adding to this wedding that would be the event of her life, despite the fact she hadn't quite found just exactly who she was marrying yet, but that was a minor detail as far as she was concerned. Uncle Ron's and Uncle Percy's weddings both were great influence, even if they were nowhere as grand as what she wanted for herself. She spent countless hours pouring over bridal magazines, and even tried her hand at drawing one or two when at fashion school, later on.

And, after years of meticulous planning, her dream was finally coming true. She had found who she was going to marry—as it turned out, she didn't have to look very far, as her fiancé was her very own best friend, Teddy Lupin—and the wedding was in six months. While it had only been a pastime before, she was now eating, sleeping, breathing wedding. Everything had to go parfaitement.

However, things could never be that simple.

The problems started in the bridal boutique. She'd found the dress. It was absolutely gorgeous, and was exactly like those dresses she'd spent hours looking at on Aunt Audrey's phone. A fitted bodice, a large, but not poofy skirt; she looked like a perfect princess. A small part of her wondered if it wouldn't have been better if she'd designed it herself, but this needed to be parfait, and the dress was better in the hands of experienced professionals.

"And do you want to try it with a veil?" the consultant asked her.

"No, thank you," Victoire shook her head.

"Oh, are you going for a tiara, then?" the consultant continued.

"Yes, some family heirloom." She smiled, and that's when Maman, who had come dress shopping with her frowned.

"Family heirloom? How nice!" the consultant exclaimed, and continued to fuss with the back on the dress while Maman looked at Victoire disapprovingly.

"You want to wear Aunt Muriel's tiara?" she asked, her arms crossed. "Does she know that?"

Fleur looked away, and fiddled with a bit of tulle. "Well, I was hoping you would ask her."

"Quoi? Non. Hors de question!" Maman exclaimed. "I love her dearly, but I am never talking to that woman again."

"But Maman," Victoire whined.

"Non, ma chérie. I'll pay for the dress and the venue, but I will not talk to your Aunt Muriel."

Victoire huffed and crossed her arms. This was not parfait at all. She didn't want to go talk to Aunt Muriel. Her memories of her from family gatherings were those of a grumpy old woman who would shout at you if she thought you were getting up to no good.

As it so happened, Teddy and herself were constantly getting into trouble. And it didn't help that Victoire was French, and that Teddy's hair was constantly electric blue.

Oh, well. Maman might have said no, but there was still hope. Grandma Weasley got along with her great-aunt, didn't she? Besides, Grandma Weasely could get anyone to do what she wanted, it would be easy for her to persuade Aunt Muriel to let her borrow the tiara.

Victoire was now at the front desk of the retirement home, doing her best not to grumble too loudly while the receptionist at the desk refused to believe she was related to Muriel Prewett. Victoire's mood already wasn't great and this wasn't helping. Grandma Weasely had obviously refused to go and talk to Aunt Muriel.

"I asked her once, I'm not asking her twice," was what Grandma had said.

"But Grandma—" Victoire had complained.

"No, no, no. You're going to go ask her yourself."

And that had been Grandma Weasley's final words, which was why she was having to now having to deal with the personification of human incompetence. Clearly, she had better things to be doing, but that tiara was essential for her wedding to be parfait.

"Okay, you can go, she should be in room 102," the receptionist finally said once Victoire had spent a good fifteen minutes drawing out her family tree for her.

"Thank you, I hope you have a nice day," Victoire said as graciously as possible and made her way out of the room and through the corridors.

Victoire did not like this place at all. She wasn't a fan of old people in general, and especially not of her Aunt Muriel. When she finally reached room 102, after what seemed like miles and miles of corridor, she steeled herself. Remember Victoire, you're doing this for the tiara.

Suddenly, she wished Teddy was here with her. He was so much better with older people than her, he had been raised by the sweetest old woman in the world, after all. But in general, Teddy was generally better than her at everything, whenever it came to being kind, or nice. Victoire was blunt and mean, but Teddy somehow managed to softened her out.

A Mediwitch came out of the room, and seemed startled to see her.

"You are…?" she started.

"Oh, I'm here to see Muriel Prewett," Victoire quickly explained.

"You're here to see Muriel?" the Mediwitch asked, disbelieving.

"Yes. Is there a problem?"

The Mediwtich quickly shook her head, getting a hold of herself. "No, no. No, problem at all." She hesitated then added, "Though I should warn you that this is probably not the best hour, she's not in the best of moods."

Well, neither was Victoire. She thanked the woman anyway and stepped in. She had an uncanny feeling she was probably about to meet her doom, but that was ridiculous. How much harm could an old woman do?

A lot. Apparently.

The moment Victoire walked into the room, she knew it was going to be horrible. The room was quite nice in itself. She was surprised. The walls were a nice pastel blue colour, the curtains had flowery patterns that reminded her of home, and it was brightly lit, with a view on the garden.

However, the woman sat on the chair was not.

"Samantha?" she snapped, not even bothering to look at who had just come in. "Is that you again? You forgot to tie my shoelaces."

Victoire noticed that Muriel was wearing a very old-fashioned dress, maybe something that had been popular in the 1920s? The colour wasn't too bad, but it clashed with her surroundings. Finally, Victoire saw she had ankle-boots, shoelaces undone, which no hundred-something woman should be wearing, just for safety precautions.

"No, Aunt Muriel, it's me," Victoire said as kindly as possible.

This had her aunt detach herself from the window and stare at her, looking her up and down disdainfully. "And you are?" she asked.

"Victoire Weasley. My parents are Bill and Fleur Weasley," she explained.

"Oh, yes. The French girl." Muriel sniffed. "What do you want?"

Victoire reached into her bag. She had a plan for this. It would do no good to ask her outright, so she'd brought a couple of things to convince her to lend it to her. She delicately took out her first weapon and presented to her aunt.

"I wanted to invite you to my wedding," she said sweetly, handing her an invitation.

Aunt Muriel snatched it out of her hand, and read it quickly. Victoire stood awkwardly as she waited for the older woman to finish. She was doing her best to be agreeable as possible, but Aunt Muriel clearly wasn't making any effort. It was as if she didn't want her to be visiting. But that was absurd. She didn't think Muriel received a lot of visit, so why wasn't she happy to have some?

"Teddy Lupin?" she asked. "The child with the funny hair?"

Victoire nodded. Her aunt just made a noise, something like disapproval.

"You're here for my tiara, aren't you?" Muriel suddenly said, and Victoire stilled.

She hadn't planned for her to be on her tail this quickly. "Well…"

"I knew it. There was no other reason for you to come."

"That's not true!" Victoire protested. "I wanted to see you, it's been a long time."

Muriel glared at her. "Don't lie to me girl. I won't tolerate it. And, you won't be getting my tiara." And with those harsh words, she turned herself back to the window, as if the conversation was over, and she was now going to ignore her.

Victoire felt completely deflated. She hadn't expected it to go easily, but maybe better than this. But the other woman was completely over her, and didn't care about her wedding. Disappointment and anger flooded through her. "But… Aunt Muriel."

"Don't 'Aunt Muriel' me. And if you see Samantha, tell her to come back and do my shoelaces," she ordered.

"Can't you do them yourself?" Victoire huffed, any trace of politeness gone. She was sure the Mediwitch was just as sick of her aunt as Victoire was.

"Does it look like I can reach down?" Muriel bit back.

"Aren't you a witch?"

Muriel looked at her as if she was crazy. "I'm not using one of those ridiculous new spells on my shoes! Who knows what their unbalanced magic would do to them?"

Now, Muriel was the one being ridiculous. The new spells were perfectly safe. They'd studied them extensively in Fashion School; charms for lacing shoes, sewing, zipping…. But it was pointless arguing with her. So, almost out of pure spite, just because she felt it would annoy the woman even more, Victoire knelt to the floor and quickly did the laces up.

"There. Samantha won't have to come now," she declared victoriously.

Muriel simply stared placidly out of her window, not even bothering to look at Victoire. There was no thanks for her, no reaction at all. Victoire tried not the shout in frustration, and stomp her foot. The woman was clearly incredibly stubborn!

She didn't even say goodbye when she left.

But the thing was that Victoire had clearly inherited some of Aunt Muriel's stubbornness, because wasn't getting married until she had that tiara. She didn't care about the old bat, but she would come back everyday until she had her hands on those precious diamonds and moonstones.

Which was why on the following Saturday, the receptionist raised an eyebrow when she saw Victoire march in. Victoire ignored her and found her way easily to the room, before knocking on the door. When there was no answer after a few seconds, she pushed it open.

"Good afternoon, Aunt Muriel," she announced cheerily.

The older woman was still on the same chair as usual, still looking out of the window. Victoire wondered if she didn't get bored, spending her days looking out of the window. Didn't she ever move?

"You again?" Muriel's tone was surprised but also completely over her.

"How was your week?" Victoire continued, and brought a chair next to her aunt, near the window.

"Getting worse and worse," she grumbled. "And I am not giving you my tiara."

Victoire got out a piece of embroidery she was working on. She had already magicked the simple parts, but now she'd have to spell the next couple of parts, and it would be a lot more complicated, and required more attention. Once it was done, it would go on a beautiful jacket she was hoping to present at a fashion show.

"What's that you're doing?" Muriel asked, glaring at the embroidery hoop in her hands.

"Embroidery," Victoire replied calmly. She was hoping Muriel wasn't going to kick her out. Maman had told her to give up, telling her that it was pointless trying to change the older woman's mind, but Victoire had figured that if she was nice enough, she might still lend her that Tiara.

Muriel snorted. "I can see that, child."

Victoire bristled at the condescending name. She was twenty-five, she wasn't a child anymore. "It's for a jacket."

"Give it to me."

Victoire sighed and but the needle down, handing her work to Muriel. She brought it closer to the light and looked at it front and back. Victoire didn't like the way she was nit-picking the whole thing, as if she could see every single mistake she had made.

"You did this with magic, didn't you?"

Still that disdainful. "Yes, I did."

"Those bits are ugly," Muriel declared, and handed the hoop back to her. Victoire deflated a little at the criticism. But she had to remind herself that she didn't care about her aunt's opinion. What did she know about embroidering anyway? "You should do everything by hand."

"By hand?" Victoire exclaimed. "But that would take forever!"

Muriel simply snorted. "At least your design is pretty, if it wasn't ruined by the spells."

Victoire was thoroughly confused by this woman. Did she have an aversion to magic, or what? But that was ridiculous. From what she had heard, Muriel was rather old-fashioned, to put it lightly. Rather, she still thought all things Muggle were inferior, so why did she insist on having things done by hand?

But, Muriel didn't seem to want to talk anymore, so Victoire shut her mouth and worked on her embroidery for half-an-hour or so., and with a wand, just because she was spiteful. When she had had enough of working in tense silence, she began to pack her things up.

"Leaving already?" Muriel demanded.

"Well, I'm afraid I've got other things to do." This was a half-lie, because Victoire had things to do, but they could definitely wait. She didn't really feel like spending a minute more with this woman.

My mother wouldn't let me leave the room 'till I was done with what I was doing," Muriel muttered. "Tell Samantha to come back, she forgot my shoelaces again."

Victoire rolled her eyes. "You know, you can just ask me."

She bent down and quickly did the laces up once again, just like last week. The same shoes were on her feet: ankle boots, a nice red colour, made out of leather. The lacing was a little complicated, so the fact she had other people do it was a testament to Muriel's character; she liked to annoyed others.

Once again, Victoire got not thank you, but this time, she did say goodbye.

"Next time, bring magazines," Muriel told her just as she was walking out of the door. Victoire couldn't help but smile, just a little bit. Magazines? What was she going to do with them?

"And who is she?" Muriel asked, pointing at one of the pictures.

"Ruby and the Love Potion, she's a singer," Victoire explained. "Her songs are often on the radio."Turned out Muriel loved magazines, and the only thing they had at the retirement home were gardening magazines—Victoire didn't even know there were Wizarding gardening magazines—and a few very old copies of the Daily Prophet. What Muriel liked the most was the gossip.

"This you?" she asked, turning the page.

Victoire looked at the page she was talking about, and was delighted to find that there was half a page on one of her new collections. 'Victoire Weasley: upcoming fashion star?' the title read, and she blushed. There was a picture of a dress she'd spent some time working on.

"Yes," Victoire told her, wondering what her comment would be.

Muriel nodded. "The finish is horrible. I can tell even from this picture."

Victoire's smile deflated just a little, but she should have expected it. Muriel never had anything nice to say about anyone. On the contrary, she probably was most happy when she was criticising others. Muriel turned the page and smiled. Also, Victoire had to admit she hadn't spent as much time as she should've on the finish."

But the subject of Victoire's dress was quickly over, as Muriel turned the page. "Ah, celebrity drama, my favourite. Who is this Weasley and why is she dating a Malfoy?"

"That's Rose, my cousin, Aunt Muriel, and your great-great-great-great niece."

Muriel snorted. "How many of you are there? Your parents multiply like rabbits or what?"

Victoire sighed, this was going to be a long day. And, it was. Muriel spent over an hour pouring over ever detail of the single magazine she'd brought, being mean to literally everyone. Remember, the tiara, Victoire, the tiara, Victoire had to tell herself regularly. Victoire saw a chance of escape when Samantha walked in.

"Oh, you're here!" she exclaimed.

"I was about to leave," Victoire said quickly.

"You were?" Muriel asked, surprised too. "You haven't been here that long."

"Yes, but I need to go now, Aunt Muriel."

She brought out the other magazines for her aunt and put them on the small table in her room. Meanwhile, Samantha began to take care of her aunt.

"Oh, I'm sorry Muriel, I forgot your laces again," Samantha said, and Victoire turned around.

"Victoire will get them," Muriel declared.

"I—" Victoire started, but there was no use arguing with her glaring aunt.

Instead, she kneeled down and did the laces up once again. There was something strangely embarrassing about doing this in front of someone else. She hadn't thought too much of it before, but Victoire now realised how demeaning it was, to have to lower herself to her aunt's feet to obey her command.

"Oh, thank you, Victoire," the Mediwitch said. At least Samantha was grateful, because her aunt still didn't utter one word of thanks.

Victoire hated going to her aunt's.

But still, every Saturday morning, she went back to see her Aunt Muriel. The wedding was getting closer and closer, and every morning she wondered if it was really worth it. Did she really need that tiara? She had better things to do that spend a couple of hours listen to her aunt insult basically anything and everything.

What hurt the most was how Muriel was constantly downgrading everything Victoire did relating to fashion. Victoire had made her entire life about fashion. She'd dressed well her entire life, studied countless fashion magazines, went to fashion school, and now her job was just that, when her boss let her try her hand at something.

And there was the whole embarrassing shoelace affair. It had become something close to a ritual, now. Every time she came, Muriel's shoelaces were undone, and it was Victoire's duty to lace them up by hand. It seemed unlikely that Samantha truly forgot to do them every single time, so she suspected her aunt of purposely undoing them, just for her to do them up every time.

And she was so terribly stressed about the wedding, and there were still so many things to do...

But, still. For some absurd reason, every Saturday morning she managed to convince herself to go back to the retirement house. Maybe it was because she thought Muriel enjoyed having someone to talk to. Maybe it was because she pitied her. Maybe she'd even let herself grow close to this disagreeable aunt. After all, sometimes, the older woman gave her tips that were actually useful.

She'd had her start out her embroidery all over again, showed her a complicated stitch, and suggested colour associations that Victoire actually quite liked. Even reading the magazines with her was fun. Victoire couldn't help but snort at some of the comments her Aunt made.

This Saturday, though, Muriel had other things in mind. "Show me your dress," she demanded when Victoire walked in.

"My dress?" Victoire asked, surprised.

"Yes, the one you're working on." Muriel looked at her as if she was stupid. It was true that Victoire had been talking about this dress for some time now, but Muriel had never asked any questions up until now.

"I don't have any pictures…" Victoire admitted.

Muriel rolled her eyes. "Then, show me the sketches."

Thankfully, Victoire did have those, and she pulled them out for her. Muriel had a long look over them. Victoire was worried, what was she going to say?

"Are you using magic to make this?" she demanded.

"Of course, Aunt Muriel, I already told you—"

"Magic," she scoffed.

Victoire tried to reason her. "Aunt Muriel, it's fine."

"No, it isn't!" The older woman was getting oddly riled up.

"It's not as if it was mass-manufactured."

"Mass-manufactured?"

Muriel paled considerably when Victoire explained what mass-manufacturing was. "This is the state of clothing? Back in my day, each garment was hand-made, unique, and took months and months to make!"

"But Aunt Muriel, no one has time for that anymore," Victoire tried to explain.

"Clothes are an art!" Muriel exclaimed. "You wouldn't have a machine paint something, or compose a piece of music, or write a book!"

Victoire stilled when she heard this. Of course, she knew that clothes were an art, they were her art, the one she'd dedicated herself too. It felt like a punch to the stomach once she understood her aunt's point.

"That is why you don't use magic for clothes! It would ruin the whole thing!" she continued.

"So that's why you won't use magic for your shoelaces," Victoire whispered.

"Exactly, you idiot girl! Your hands are the best two things you can use to make something beautiful, and worth wearing."

"Oh." That all Victoire could say. It all made sense, now. Why Muriel was so reticent to use magic on clothes. Using magic, or machines, for any other art was absurd, so why clothes? As usual, her criticism was just on point. She wouldn't want to ruin a garment by having anything else but hard-work and love in every stitch.

Suddenly, she thought back to her wedding gown, and tears started running down her cheeks. It was supposed to be parfaite, but clearly it wasn't.

"Why are you crying?" Muriel huffed.

"My—My wedding dress," Victoire sniffed. "It isn't hand-made."

Muriel sighed and watched Victoire fumble for a tissue to dry her eyes.

"It's—it's ruined, isn't it? You're going to say it's horrible. That I can't wear it," Victoire continued. "And I can't, I can't now."

She blew her nose and Muriel shook her head.

"You're such an idiot, girl," was what she said once Victoire's mascara had sufficiently run down her cheeks to make her look like a panda. An ugly panda with that, probably. She wasn't a very pretty crier.

"But—"

"Don't blubber." Muriel rolled her eyes. "Your dress isn't ruined."

"But, you said—"

"I know what I said, and it's the truth. But it's useless crying. You like the dress, don't you?"

Victoire nodded. The sun was now high in the sky. She'd never stayed this long, and Teddy was probably wondering where she was. A tiny part in the back of her mind was worrying about the fact she was probably going to be late for their dessert-tasting.

"Well, then. What is the problem?" Muriel glared at her, but Victoire could have almost mistaken it for affection, compassion even.

"It isn't hand-made, and you said—"

Muriel interrupted her. "Merlin, girl. If you listen to everything I say, you're going to drive yourself crazy."

Victoire looked up at her.

"You just need to understand that magic isn't just an easy way out of hard-work for you—I've seen some of your work, don't contradict me—but something different entirely. I prefer hand-made, but I know beautiful things can be made with magic."

Victoire took a moment to understand what she was saying, and bowed her head in embarrassment. She was right, as usual. The other woman handed her back her sketches carefully, and Victoire put them back in her bag, almost as if on auto-pilot.

"Now, enough with that crying and do my laces up," she ordered.

Victoire knelt to the floor once more, and took the shoelaces in her hands. They were delicate in her hands, and she knew they had probably been hand-made, now that Aunt Muriel had explained her way of reasoning to her. But, on closer inspection, she realised that maybe not everything had been done by hand. Muriel had inadvertently taught her to look for magic or hand-made, and she was pretty sure at least some of the seams had some sort of magic to help them.

Finally, she finished with the last lace, carefully tugging on it to perfect the bow.

But then, the unexpected happened. Muriel smiled—she wasn't sure she had seen her smile before—but it was terribly fleeting, and it was gone before Victoire could say something.

"Thank you," Muriel finally said.

"You're welcome," Victoire replied, truly grateful for the woman's harsh, but true advice, and for finally some recognition.

Muriel made a face, as if she was hesitating. She seemed to decide herself, and said, "You know, I think you can have my tiara after all. That way your outfit won't be ruined."

"What!" Victoire couldn't believe her ears—she steadily ignored the second part of Muriel's comment.

"Don't make me repeat myself, girl," Muriel grumbled.

Victoire just couldn't wrap her mind around it. An incredible emotion was filling her up "I-"

"Victoire, please stop with the gaping."

Victoire immediately closed her mouth, slightly embarrassed, but mostly overjoyed. Finally, the tiara was hers! She couldn't wait to try it with her beautiful—though magic-made—dress.

"Now, go, girl. Don't you have a fiancé to meet?" Muriel asked.

This sentimentality was apparently still too much for her, and Victoire smiled. "Thank you so much, Aunt Muriel."

"Yes, yes." Muriel huffed, as if sick with all of this already.

Victoire quickly packed all of her stuff up, and placed the newest magazines she'd brought on the table. She was making her way to the door, when she suddenly heard Muriel call her back. She turned around and looked at her aunt.

"Victoire," she said in a small voice, "You'll come back, won't you? Now that I've given you the tiara…"

Victoire smiled. "Don't worry, Aunt Muriel. I'll be there next Saturday."

The older woman sighed contentedly, and Victoire left the room. She'd gotten the prised tiara, but she'd also learned something about magic and haute couture. And, even more importantly, maybe she'd managed to make a friend out of her Aunt Muriel. Now that would be just parfait.

Parfait: perfect

Parfaitement: perfectly

Quoi? Non. Hors de question!: What? No. Absolutely no way!

For Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (Challenges and Assignments)

House: Ravenclaw

Assignment #8: Criminology: Task #2: Write about someone's motive for doing something