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Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry:
Fantastic Beasts and How to Collect Them: Coco Rumsey Catcher (scenario) Write about a character courting someone.
DIY and Home Repairs: Building Breakdown: Task 4 Cosmetic - Write about making something/someone look good.
Cocktails: Strawberry Daiquiri White Rum (character) Daphne Greengrass
Leap Frog: (character) Astoria Greengrass
Paint a Rainbow: Brown (genre) Family
Teddy Bear's Picnic: Mini Pizza (genre) Family
Spring Petting Zoo: Sheep (genre) Family
Egg Hunt: (rare pairing) Daphne/George
Spring Parade: Winnie-the-Pooh Piglet (emotion) anxious
Written in the Stars: (character) George Weasley
Showtime: Somewhere (word) forgive
Hobby Hole: (character) Astoria Greengrass
Children's Book Day: The Cheshire Cat (action) smiling
World Autism Day: Write about someone feeling anxious.
Zoo Lover's Day: Chimpanzee - Write about someone being playful
Siblings Day: Astoria & Daphne Greengrass
Spring Colors: Teal
Crystals and Gemstones: Carnelian (word) forgiveness
Monthly Challenges For All:
Link Maker: Same fandom 2,066 words
Harry Potter Fanfiction Challenges:
Potions Class: Blood-Replenishing Potion - Write about replacing something.
Warning for fluff and use of rare pair and a slight bit out of character due to the use of the rare pair. Word count is 2,066 words. I hope you all enjoy A Sharp Dressed Man.
"You aren't wearing that to meet my family, are you, George?" I asked, looking over the outfit that my fiancee of a few weeks was wearing. I shook my head as he tried to us his charming smile on me. It certainly wasn't going to work this time. After all, the Greengrass were rather formal/casual in their dinner attire. Which meant that jeans and tee-shirts were not dinner table attire.
"What's wrong with my clothes?" George asked, looking down at what he was wearing. His family much more laid back than mine. Astoria would have been more likely to accept George's choice of clothes but Mother and Father would throw a fit. I was sure of that. "They're clean."
"Didn't I tell you last week to pick something formal/casual?" I asked, putting my hands on my hips in exasperation.
"I thought that was just something you made up to make me feel nervous about meeting your family," he said, said emotion now entirely present in his voice. "What is formal/casual anyway? In my family, there is only formal or casual."
"Formal/casual is a mixture of the two things. Like a nice dress shirt that isn't button-down and a nice pair of slack," I told him.
"I don't think I've got anything that could be construed as that," he said, putting his head in his hands as he sank against the wall. "I wish I would have taken you more seriously when you spoke about the dress code."
"Me too! Now come on. I'm sure you've got something that will fit the bill in your closet. We just have to search it out and find it. That's all."
"Now I'm sure there are things that I have to know before we get to your parents' house, right?" George asked, sounding like he was being led to his execution and not meeting his wife-to-be's parents.
"Aren't your parents Purebloods too?" I asked, looking over my shoulder at him in disbelief that he didn't know anything about Pureblood culture.
"Don't you remember what your father called me when I picked you up for our first date, love?"
A sense of dawning fell upon me. My father had opened the door and upon seeing that person standing upon the step was a Weasley, he had muttered Blood Traitor before walking off.
"My family and I don't hold to the same tradition as your family and you do," George said, seeing the look upon my face in the mirror that I was just passing. "Your family probably still thinks that I'm some filthy blood traitor and not worth your time."
I wanted to argue the point but both my father and mother did think this way about George. My brother-in-law Draco too to a small extent. Astoria was open-minded in regards to my relationship with George which is why Draco didn't see him as much of a blood traitor as my parents did.
"Astoria and Draco don't see you as blood traitor," I pointed out, seeing the doubtful look on his face as I turned my head to look over my shoulder. "They actually are trying to get to know you. They only want us to be happy."
Before George could say anything, we had reached our bedroom in the house we'd just bought a few days before we got engaged. I opened the door and entered, not giving him a chance to argue against the point that I had just made.
"Let's see if we can find anything in here," I said, opening the closet door. I was met with some Quidditch robes from that short-lived foray into the world of major league Quidditch. A funeral suit which had worn only once to his brother Fred's funeral. I sighed and pushed through these articles of clothing. The thing that was needed was a nice polo shirt as the Muggles called them or something like that.
"What are you looking for, Daph?" George asked, leaning against the door of the closet and watching me rifle through his clothes.
"Do you hang up your nice shirts that aren't button-downs?" I asked, looking at his smirking face as he watched me.
"No. I usually put them in my dresser."
"You could have told me that before I started messing with this," I said, motioning towards the mix match of clothes that were hanging in there. There was even an old Halloween costume that he'd kept from our first Halloween together. "That would have made finding something wearable much easier and faster."
"Why didn't you think of asking before just assuming that I hung up those kinds of shirts?"
"I just figured that…."
"I would hang them up. That's more Percy's style than my own. I'm more of an if it can be folded I'll fold it, type person."
"That does make sense. Purebloods hang their formal and formal/casual shirts up."
I crossed the plush teal carpet to reach George's set of draws. "Which draw is the one you keep your formal/casual shirts in?" I asked, motioning towards the dresser.
"I keep them all together in the same drawer," George said, indicating the second drawer down from the top. "Right underneath the underwear and socks drawer."
I shook my head and the thought that at least his chaos was organized crossed my mind before I opened the gestured to draw. I was surprised to find that it wasn't a mess like I thought it would be. With casual, formal, and formal/casual shirts all mixed together. It was then that I spotted the perfect shirt for him to wear. It was one of the ones that I had gotten him for his birthday last year. A nice teal pullover shirt with a white stripe in the middle of it. I felt that it brought out his eyes perfectly. I held it out to him.
"This shirt will work perfectly," I said, smiling and closing the oak wooden drawer. "Now which drawer do you keep your slacks in?"
"Slacks?"
"Like Khakis or dress pants."
"The second drawer from the bottom, love."
"What's in the bottom drawer? Jeans?"
"No."
I opened the second drawer from the bottom and rifled through the khaki pants until I found the right pair and held it out. I couldn't help the curiosity that built up around what was in this last drawer.
"Are you sure it's not jeans? You do know that I can see a tiny bit of what's in the bottom drawer and looks like jeans, right?"
"It's not jeans. They're in the third drawer up from the bottom, right underneath the pajamas."
I reach for the brass handle of the drawer to pull it open but George stops me before I can. I look over at him and raise an eyebrow.
"You don't want to ruin the surprise, do you?" he asks, sweat dripping from his forehead like he was hiding something huge in there.
"What surprise?" I asked him, folding my arms over my chest and leaning against the oak surface of the drawers as I stood there.
"The surprise that I bought you for your birthday this year," he said, looking at the bottom drawer. "I really think you're going to like but it's not time for you to see what it is yet. Do you think you can wait a few more weeks, darling?" He batted his eyelashes at me in that way that usually makes me crack up laughing and forgive him whatever grievance there was to forgive.
"Alright," I said, rolling my eyes playfully. I would more than likely try and see what was in there when he went to work tomorrow. I could always make sure that everything was back in place before George got home. "Get dressed and let's go."
"Alright," he said, quickly changing into the outfit that I'd given him.
"Are you sure this outfit is alright?" George asked, fidgeting nervously with the front of his shirt and doing a nervous dance. "I know your parents aren't exactly fans of our relationship, love, and I don't want to give them any more reason to not like me."
"George, you look fine," I said, smoothing a piece of hair that was standing up down. "They're going to love you because I love." I could hear the approach of feet from the other side of the door and turned smiling as it opened to reveal our house-elf Aqua.
"Mistress Allura is waiting for Daphne and that man in the drawing-room," Aqua said, standing back from the door. "Master Alluicius is the library finishing up a letter. Mistress Astoria and Master Draco have just arrived before Mistress Daphne and…."
"We'll take it from here, Aqua," Astoria said, walking over and giving both myself and George a huge hug. "I'm sorry about Aqua. She's quite used to our parents' ways of thinking."
"Your mother and father see me as that man?" George asked, giving me a look that screamed how he felt about this.
"They haven't gotten to know you that well," Astoria said, motioning for us to follow her. "I'm sure they'll love you as much Daph when they do though. You have such a marvelous sense of humor and are always making us all laugh."
"I don't think that actually helped matters much, love," Draco said, motioning to my face which must have gone very pale because they all seemed very concerned for me. "Look Tori and Daph won't let their parents…."
"Is that the sounds of my children and their partners?" Allura Greengrass asked, walking into the hallways. She was much like both of her daughters with her long dark curls going down to her waist. Her grey eyes seemed to search to the heart of most men and find them wanting. That is except for her dear husband Alluicius. "Astoria, you're looking much better than the last time you were here. How are you fairing all the way out there at Malfoy Manor? You do know you can move closer to home, right?"
"I'm fine," she said, looking at Draco who was shaking his head. Mother had been trying to get Draco and Astoria to move closer to home since they'd married. But she always got the same reply for her efforts. That Astoria was good where she was and happy to live in Malfoy Manor with her husband and his family. It most times was a lie in regards to how she was feeling physically. She would say that she was feeling fine but her grey eyes usually betrayed her. Hers or Draco's.
"Daphne," mother turned her piercing eyes on me and George now, "who is this? Did you meet a new man? I'm so pr…"
"No, Mrs. Greengrass," George said, shuffling from foot to foot. "It's still me, George Weasley."
She blinked in shock and walked closer to him to get a better look. She blinked in confusion as she realized that it was George. "When did you start to wear such mature clothes, Mr. Weasley?" she asked, losing the friendly tone to her voice that she'd had when addressing Tori.
"Always had them," George said, looking at me for help, "just decided to break them out tonight for this lovely dinner with the future in-laws."
"Well you should have broken them out sooner rather than later," she said, turning on her heel and marching back into the drawing-room.
"I'm sorry about that," I said, looking up at George a pink of embarrassment crossing my cheeks. "I don't understand why she can't just accept you as you are."
"Well, I guess that what just happened was a tiny bit closer to acceptance than we got before, right?" he asked, looking between Draco and Astoria who were smiling and nodding. "We'll get to totally acceptance eventually. But until then let's enjoy the little victories, right?"
"I guess so," I said, slipping my arm through his as we joined my sister and brother-in-law on our way into the drawing-room.
The rest of the night would more than likely not pass as pleasantly as the short conversation in the hallway had. But at that moment I realized that George was right. We couldn't do anything else besides looking as good as we could and accept the little victories as we got them. That would eventually lead us to what we truly wanted. Acceptance.
I hope you all enjoyed A Sharp Dressed Man as much as I enjoyed writing it.