"Mondays: What Sunday Threw Up."- PWOP Productions
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
In which Ron swaps rhymes with a boy band and Hermione realizes that Jeanie may just have a soul…
September 29, 2003
Hermione wondered if every couple had so much trouble getting to a reliable altar; and, if so, why anyone bothered with marriage at all.
The afternoon air was crisp, clear, untouched. It carried the promise of an adventure and a life reclaimed. She gulped it in like divine ambrosia. It smelled faintly of chips.
Promptly getting down to business, she held her wand flat on her palm and cast the four-points spell. It spun for a moment, an impromptu compass, and then froze, pointing north through her stomach. Knowing that she was somewhere around Diagon Alley she made some rough guesses about the proximity of her flat to her immediate location and pointed her wand at a south-ish angle. "Accio Magi-chat"
Some miles in the distance she imagined her dresser draw flying open and a small, red, walkie-talkie like object jumping out and flying across muggle London towards her.
A minute passed. She imagined an old woman doing her wash in Chelsea looking up as it zoomed over her head… a little boy flying kites in St. James's… she could almost here it zooming through the air. She opened her eyes. She could hear it zooming through the air!
Woosh!
She ducked as a blur of red flew towards her head and fell, clattering to the ground. She frowned, hoping against hope that she'd not broken it.
It buzzed softly in her hand, a crimson, rectangular box with an antenna-like protuberance on its top and three golden Ws on its front. It did not appear broken, which was good, it would have been off-putting if her adventure was forced to end before it was even allowed to begin. She tapped her wand against the "antenna". "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
Fred and George had borrowed the marauder's phrase for many of their newer inventions. The MagiChat was no exception.
"Hermione J. Granger speaking" said a voice that was unmistakably hers, though she'd said nothing. She breathed. When the twins had given her their prototype as a late Christmas present, she'd argued that she had no purpose for a box that talked with her voice. How very very wrong she had been. She leaned back through the window, placing the Magi-Chat on the floor near The Dress, which was crumpled and thrown into a corner, just waiting for her to get as far away from it as she possibly could.
She waited a moment and then:
Knock! Knock! Knock!
"Harmony, dear, are you absolutely certain you don't need any help?" Narcissa asked from behind the door.
"No," the box called back. "I'm just admiring how wonderful this looks!"
"Come show us sometime, won't you?" That was Jeanie, teenage snark dripping from her less-than-dulcet tones.
The Magi-chat giggled in a very un-Hermione-ish way. "Don't be silly, Jeanie! I'll only be a minute!"
Satisfied that she wouldn't be missed, Hermione stood and started walking down the alley, freedom filling her lungs. Suddenly, walking wasn't enough; she started to run, leaping out onto the street into a throng of mid-day shoppers. She'd never, she mused, fully appreciated the beauty of the unplanned hour until she tried it herself.
She stopped at a mostly-clean-looking hole-in-the-wall to buy lunch, as she was a bit overdue. "That's four seventy-one," the burly man behind the counter informed her, handing over the foil-wrapped package of warm fish and chips. Hermione took it and handed him the necessary pounds, silently thanking whatever deity was watching over her that she'd thought to bring muggle money (she'd been planning to go grocery shopping after she'd talked to Draco, but that plan had clearly been shot down.) He handed over her change. She started to laugh. There was just something so funny about her, Hermione Granger, clutching fish and chips to her chest like a warm puppy curled in her hand and accepting pounds from a man who smelled like fried potatoes. She hastily stuffed the coins into an unassuming pocket and opened the package. It was beautiful. The little golden chips were piled on top of the fried and battered fish like hay around the baby Jesus. Hermione had a sudden mental image of a fish and chips nativity set and her giggles crescendoed into a torrent of unbidden hilarity.
The burly man watched her with the keen eyes of someone who had dealt with quite a few crazies in his day.
"Eh…" He wiped his brow with a graying washcloth. "What are you on about?"
Hermione grinned in a way that only served to confirm his suspicions. "D'you know...I think I'm feeling a bit...rebellious."
A toned, tan, curly-haired man-boy was standing in Timber Justinlake's mirror. This is was because Timber was, at noon on this fine Monday to trump all Mondays, just finishing up his morning regimen.
He'd washed and blow-dried his hair, applied a quick sheen of Lockhart's Hydro-Magic Moisturizing Spray to his face, mussed a handful of Sleakeasy's through his curls (Most international superstars would recommend Lockhart's stuff, but Timber was addicted to the old-school smell of bottle-fresh Sleakeasy's. It smelled liked sensation, oomph, and petrol.), and run a finger-tip-sized dab of Easy Smile Whitening Balm over his teeth. All that remained was to put on his favorite super-cool medallion. He pulled open a non-descript cabinet, which was charmed to hold roughly the space of a large closet. Inside, the walls were covered with gold and silver dangly things which he affectionately called his "bling". He reached in and pulled out a gold chain with a large, diamond-encrusted TJ dangling on it. It sparkled with the white-hot intensity of one thousand galleons. He threw it over his neck (quite a feat as it weighed three times his right arm) and pouted at his reflection.
"Go get 'em, Tiger." The mirror said.
He was about to respond with a misleading wink when somewhere in the deep bowels of The Mansion a bell started to ring. Timber jumped excitedly and promised the mirror he'd wink at her later.
Someone was at the door.
"I got it!" he shouted, tumbling over chintz settees and through marble doorways. He pushed himself up and over a third-story railing, landing with practiced ease on a long oak banister that wound in loops and curves down through The Mansion's six stories. He started to slide, leaning into carefully polished curves, the banister's magical momentum building behind him as he picked up speed.
Already, shouts of "I'll get it!" were coming from every wing of the building. Timber could hear someone (probably Nick) sliding down the banister after him, and a loud "Ding" as he passed the third floor indicated that CJ was taking the lift. He passed a towel-clad Jimmy running out of a shower on the second floor, gaping as Timber whizzed by, willing himself forward. He turned just in time to see the banister's ski-jump finale before he was thrown up and off of it, landing in a clean crouch on the entry hall's hardwood flooring. He cheekily conjured up a hand-mirror to check his reflection, and in that instant something whizzed past him and towards the door. Orlando was on his Firebolt 3000, and he already had his hand on the doorknob.
"Ah, Merlin's knickers, Ocean!" Timber stomped after him.
"Snooze you loose, TJ," Orlando Ocean quipped, smoothing back his dark hair and throwing Timber his most dimpled smile.
Timber pouted and let Orlando open the door, smugly watching Nick, CJ, and Jimmy (who was still dripping water everywhere) as they ran in. At least he'd beat them downstairs, even if his banister riding skills were no match for a Firebolt.
"Cheater..." Jimmy muttered, hiking up his towel and glaring through his famous eyelashes (He'd had them insured for ten thousand galleons only a week earlier. Witch Weekly called it a "…brilliant career move…"). Timber stuck his tongue out and was about to tell Jimmy that if he'd bother getting a proper amount of beauty rest every evening he wouldn't be stuck leaping through shower curtains, but before he could Orlando had flung the door wide open and they could all see exactly who was standing there.
"Hey! You're Draco Malfoy!" Orlando had said before any of them could stop him. It was a well-known superstition among the wizarding entertainment community that Malfoys of the younger, male variety could not enter your home unless you recognized who they were, and once they'd entered your home they were likely to suck your pockets dry, Celestina Warbeck was a point in case. She'd not made a single cent since she had tea with Draco Malfoy, and she had yet to tell anyone what they'd done at that meeting.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Ocean," said Draco Malfoy, crossing easily over the threshold, already treating The Mansion as if he'd owned it all his life. He'd changed out of his all-black ensemble and into unbuttoned Pride of Portree robes (the Malfoy family had owned the Prides since 1372) over a dusky, business-type suit and a pair of dark, rimless sunglasses that floated in front of his eyes. The effect of the flowing purple robes over the sharp silver trouser suit was, surprisingly, one of immense wealth and power. "I see you're doing well."
The boys sent collective glares at Orlando, who shrugged and continued with his initiative. "Our latest album's sold loads."
"A new collection of odes." Jimmy cut in. They smiled conspiratorially.
"It sold worldwide, from Vegas to Rhodes." CJ rhymed back, taking up the slack where Nick was yawning sleepily.
Timber smirked. "Now we wait 'til the next one explodes."
They all turned expectantly to Nick, who blinked back at them. "Word."
Draco Malfoy nodded as though he understood perfectly. "So I've heard. Must be great making galleons on a musical word."
The boys threw him sidelong looks. Had he? Could he have possibly? Had he done it on purpose?
Their questions were answered as another man, a red-haired beanpole in comparison to Malfoy's somewhat diminutive stature, strolled through the open doorway. "Your album took off like a bird," he said, though without any of the enthusiasm that they might have expected. He looked like the sort of man who'd rather regurgitate invertebrates than spend any length of time rhyming with a boy band.
"Over the world it was preferred." Malfoy added.
The redheaded man sighed. "The line between talent and galleons was blurred…?"
The boys considered a moment longer, then simultaneously nodded their approval. Malfoy and co.'s rhyming skills were a bit wanting, but the men were clearly like-minded individuals.
"I'm Orlando Ocean, as you know." Orlando paused to let them admire his dimples. "These are my mates, Jimmy Angel…" Jimmy nodded, hiking up his towel again. "Nick leMoyen…" Nick nodded and all of his carefully brushed blonde hair fell into his face. CJ snickered. Nick was a distantly descended part-veela (a remote relative of the Delacour family, actually), and the youngest of the group. Thus, he was known as The Cute One among the masses, and The Vain One among the boys themselves (though in relation to any normal males they were all quite vain.) "CJ Jones…" CJ bowed dramatically. He was The Silly One, carrying on a long, illustrious tradition of silly musical sidekicks who lived hard and fell harder. Malfoy nodded his approval. The redhead rolled his eyes. "And—"
"Timber Justinlake, of course." Malfoy was watching Timber like a chimaera watches a particularly tasty quidditch player. Timber wasn't sure whether to feel flattered or frightened.
Orlando looked a bit put out that Malfoy had not bothered to recognize any of the other boys, but such was "The Biz". He ploughed on. "What brings you to Casa del Splenda, Mr. Malfoy?"
Malfoy turned back to Orlando, who was often called The Talented One (but that was only because he was.) "I've been meaning to come talk to you for quite some time now and there is no time like the present… wouldn't you agree Mr. Justinlake?"
Timber jumped. He'd been staring, engrossed, at the impossibly large ring on Mr. Malfoy's right hand, wondering exactly how it would look hung on a thick, silver chain. "Yeah, er, that's right." He nodded vigorously, forcefully wrenching his eyes away from the unfeasibly large emerald badly hidden underneath the cuff of Malfoy's robes.
"Yes." Malfoy clucked his tongue and withdrew a hefty black briefcase from beneath his cloak. "Anyway, I've not got a lot of time set aside to stay and chat, so I'm going to lay it down straight." He gestured to his red-haired friend. "This is Ronald Weasley. He's here because, well, he's honestly not got anything better to do."
Ronald Weasley looked like he might have said something but Malfoy was just an instant faster than him. "This…" He gestured at the briefcase, which rattled ominously. "...is a briefcase full of galleons."
Jimmy inhaled sharply. He was often called The Rebellious One (though no-one, not even Jimmy, seemed to know precisely what he was rebelling against) but it would be more apt to call him The Greedy One. Jimmy was the one who'd insisted on having one floor per boy, even if they still shared a bedroom on the top floor (five bunks stacked one on top of the other, just like when they were kids) and so having four extra bedrooms was beyond pointless, and even if they subsequently only used one-sixth of the mansion's prodigious space. A briefcase filled with galleons was one of Jimmy Angel's wet dreams (all the others involved barbeque sauce and a foam pit).
"So, it's business then?" Orlando surmised after a long moment in which the boys seemed too spellbound to speak. There was almost certainly some sort of Enticement on Mr. Malfoy's briefcase, because none of them appeared capable of looking away.
"Yes." He smiled venomously. "Yes, it is."
"Well then." Jimmy looked as though Christmas had come early. "…we are NCHANTED at your service."
"N…N…N…N…N…" the boys harmonized, sweeping around from Orlando's (relatively) low tenor to Timber's impossibly high falsetto. "N-Chaaaaan-ted"
"That's charming." Malfoy said. "But I've got a better idea…"
Luna Lovegood was just settling down to lunch when Hermione Granger apparated onto her front porch.
She was just settling down to lunch because the midday meal at the Lovegood-Longbottom household was quite a job, and even if she started getting it together at noon, she'd likely not get to eat until well after one.
She knew it was Hermione on her porch because she could see her through the open window.
"Hello, Hermione," she called, crossing to the front door.
"Hello, Luna."
Hermione looked, Luna decided, no worse for wear than she had the last time Luna had seen her, which was at Ginny's for the wedding shower. She wasn't dripping water everywhere anymore, Luna noted, but she still looked as though she'd spent far too many of her evenings having her soul sucked out by a gang of gluttonous dementors. "Alright?"
Luna turned back into the kitchen, indicating with a vague wave that Hermione should follow.
"Yeah, I'm just…" Hermione's voice trailed off. She'd apparently never been into Luna's kitchen, which had that effect on a lot of people.
It was, at its core, an ordinary kitchen. There was nothing so extraordinary about Luna's kitchen except for the things on it.
She'd not had time to do the dishes in quite a few days, so a stack of primary-coloured plates and cups was piling up in the sink. The cabinets were painted a neutral off-white, but they were all covered in crayon-markings that Luna simply refused to remove. They were, she said, "art." The walls were likewise covered with "art." The kitchen was plastered from floor to ceiling with little bits of paper covered in unrecognisable doodles and shakily written alphabets. The table in the centre of all this "art" was covered in little bits of food and unidentified liquid, as though a small breakfast-shaped tornado had only just blown through. On the centre of the table, a pot of soup was bubbling and steaming. As Hermione stood frozen in the doorway, Luna began ladling it into three small bowls. "Soup?" she asked, mistaking Hermione's shocked expression for hunger.
"No, thanks." Hermione nodded vaguely and tentatively stepped into the kitchen. "I ate before I came."
Luna shrugged. "LUNCH!" she yelled at the ceiling. "ANATUS! ANOBIA!" For a moment they could hear a small scuffle above their heads, and then there was an explosion of ingenuous giggles as two small children tumbled into the room.
Anatus was the boy, smaller than his sister and with wild, sometimes-brown, sometimes-blonde hair. Anobia was the girl, less than a year older than her brother, her dark hair put up into three lopsided pigtails. They were both covered in finger-paint.
"Mummy!" Anobia whined, crawling up the side of her high-chair and strapping herself in. "Anatus stoled my Sally."
"My Sally!" Anatus giggled, jumping up and down at Luna's feet. "Up! Up!" She deftly obliged, lifting him up and fitting him into his restraint with practiced ease.
"Mummy!" Anobia whined again, once her brother was comfortable. "I hate soup!"
"You'll like this soup." Luna placed a small, red bowl on her daughter's tray. "It's magic."
Hermione thought this an odd statement, as pretty much everything in the wizarding world was magic, but it seemed to work. The little girl excitedly accepted Luna's proffered spoon and began eating with such zeal that most of the soup ended up on her jumper (not that anyone would have noticed with all the finger paint that was already there.)
"They're getting big." Hermione noted as Luna placed Anatus's Feed-So-Easy spoon in his bowl. In an instant, it had begun lifting spoonfuls of brothy soup up and into his open mouth, completely of its own accord.
The last time she'd seen Anatus or Anobia had been—
She tried to remember. Had it been Christmas? She'd spent Christmas with Draco, so that wouldn't have been it. It would have been before then, probably at Anatus's first birthday party, which seemed ages and ages before. But then, everything before The Proposal seemed a world away, and it hadn't even been ten days since!
"What, do you think someone's slipped a swelling solution into the soup?" Luna asked, her eyes widening. She bent down to examine her daughter's nose, which was steadily remaining its original size.
Hermione tried not to laugh. "No, I just mean, they've grown since last I saw them."
"Oh. Well, I have heard that small children grow very fast at this age." Luna nodded and affectionately tugged one of Anobia's pigtails. "But they could also be affected by a swelling solution in this soup, so who knows. I hear you're having one sometime soon."
"What? A swelling solution?" Hermione asked.
Luna laughed. "No, of course not!" She grinned. "A baby!"
"Oh!" Hermione laughed shakily. "Right, that."
"Do you know if it's a boy or a girl yet?" Luna asked.
"Oh." Hermione sat down in the chair beside Anatus, holding her stomach as she imagined any real pregnant woman might. "No, Draco and I…we want to be surprised."
"Oh." Luna sat as well. "Neville and I found out immediately with Anobia. We were so excited, you know? But I guess, since you're not married yet it might be different. I wouldn't know."
Hermione patted her stomach appreciatively. "Yes," she responded lamely.
"But you must have some kind of an instinct." Luna pressed. Not only would the Quibbler love to know how Hermione felt about her kind-of-legitimate-but-not-really love-child, Luna herself was rather curious.
"Well, um…" Hermione's brow bent double in a kind of super-furrow. "I think it's… a girl?" She laughed nervously. "I honestly have no idea."
Luna sighed. "Have you thought of any names yet?"
"Well, for a girl, I was thinking Clare." She latched onto the name she'd told Ron. Hermione had learned quite a bit about lying during her first engagement. Rule number one about the Art of Fabrication was to give everyone the same story, if that was possible.
"Clare?" Luna made a face as though Hermione had just uttered a really foul swear. "That's terribly normal, don't you think? One second, I'll be right back." She stood and walked into the living room, leaving Hermione to watch Anatus and Anobia happily guzzling their lunches.
"Here." She returned a moment later, a terribly thick volume clutched to her chest. The words Names: Alphabetised, Visualised, and Thoroughly Organised Since A.D. 712 were set in peeling gold letters on its spine. Luna flipped it open with a glorious THUNK! on the table.
"Let's see…" she said, "You'll want something that applies to both you and Draco. How about 'Unexpected'." She tapped the book with her fingertips as said 'Unexpected.' The pages began flipping as though in a high wind and then, suddenly, stopped. Luna bent low in order to better examine the page. "Oh! How about 'Nenad'?" she suggested. "It means 'unexpected' in Serbian and Croatian!"
"I don't think—" Hermione began, but Luna cut her off.
"You're right, it's awful. What about…" She tapped the book again. This time she said "Illegitimate."
Hermione was about to tell Luna just how "Legitimate" her baby was (non-existent or no), but the pages had already stopped flipping and Luna was carefully examining a new page.
"Oh! What about Spurius?" she asked. "It means 'of illegitimate birth' in Latin! No? 'Fitzroy', then. 'Son of the King' in Old French. 'Originally given to illegitimate sons'. But you're right, those are a bit silly, aren't they?"
Hermione nodded. Luna once again failed to notice the world-weary look on her face.
"Let's try again. You know it took me months to name Anatus." She flipped back to the front cover. "Let's try something more general." She cleared her throat. "The first daughter of Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger."
The book began flipping again. When it had stopped, Luna was beaming. "'Your daughter's name'," she read, "'should be Cymbeline Arista Constitia Malfoy'. Oh, that's almost as good as Anobia!"
Hermione was wearing a look as though Luna had just force-fed her a petrol-flavoured Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Bean. "Um, yes. It is."
"Cymbeline Arista Constitia Malfoy," Luna repeated. "I like that."
"Hm…" Hermione tapped her fingers irritably on the tabletop. Anobia decided that she'd had quite enough of her soup.
"Mummy! I'm done!" She pounded her fists on her less-than empty bowl. "Milkshake! Milkshake!"
Luna snapped her fingers and a beautiful chocolate shake appeared across the table from Anobia. "You can have that when you've finished your soup," she declared.
"But mummy!" Anobia pouted and began half-heartedly pushing around the last bits of broth in the bottom of her bowl.
"Eat!" Luna commanded. She turned back to Hermione. "Why were you here, again?"
"Oh, well," Hermione tried to remember. "The short answer is that I'm hiding from my in-laws."
"And the long answer…?" Luna skilfully lifted the milkshake from the table. It had been slowly but surely moving towards Anobia's outstretched hands.
"I'm shopping for a wedding dress with my in-laws." The milkshake started sliding back on its original path.
Luna frowned. "I never had that problem with Neville," she said. "His parents were really nice when I met them."
Hermione wanted to say that Neville's parents were impartially insane, and so comparing them to Draco's parents, who were more the criminal-mastermind sort of mad, was a fruitless and disappointingly dull exercise, but she felt that doing so might be less than what was considered tactful, so did not. Instead she said: "Well then, I guess I'll be going."
"Yeah, alright. Lovely seeing you."
"Alright, see you at the wedding."
The milkshake fell over.
Johnson and Smith Muggle Adaptations was really more of a closet than a business. It was, truly, a large closet, but the amount of money made inside of it was comparable to the amount of money made inside of your average-sized walk-in closet.
Every surface in the place was covered in half-repaired television sets, computers split open straight down the middle, post-boxes that were falling apart at the hinges, film projectors dated from the early 1920s, and stereos. There were loads of stereos.
It was run by a man named Basil, whose last name was neither Smith nor Johnson, but who thought "Johnson and Smith" sounded much more muggle than "Tasse."
Basil lived in the loft above the "store," and when business was worse than usual (meaning no-one had even come in looking for directions to the icecream shop down the street) he would often play solitaire in his kitchen-area, or tinker with a particularly interesting piece of electricity in his bedroom.
When Basil's Moment came he was playing solitaire on the "store's" dusty front desk. It came in the form of two men and a briefcase.
Basil looked up from his cards when the front door's bell rang.
"Hello, Mr. Tasse," said the first man, the shorter one, as they entered.
"Hello, Mr. …?"
"Malfoy, Draco Malfoy," said the man. Basil smiled. As a wizard who'd spent his life infatuated with muggles, he could appreciate a James Bond allusion when he saw one.
"And what can I do for you, Mr. Malfoy?" he asked.
Basil's card game leapt aside as Malfoy swung his briefcase up and onto the counter. "This, Mr. Tasse," he said, "is a briefcase full of Galleons."
Basil swallowed. Hard.
"And what exactly did you have in mind, Mr. Malfoy?" Basil had seen enough films to know that no one with good intentions travelled around with money-filled briefcases.
"Adaptations," he stated plainly. "I need a few muggle things magically adapted in less than two days time."
Basil considered, but not for long. Clearly, his Moment had come. "Your wish," he stated plainly, "is my command."
Hermione had been away from Madam Malkin's, according to her watch, for a grand total of "too long." What that meant in terms of actual hours, minutes, and seconds, it refused to tell her; but she knew it wouldn't be good.
She was sitting on a seat in the back of her shop, where she'd spent the time following her visit with Luna Lovegood shifting boxes around and generally getting ready for Tamryn's Late-Fall Fashion Spectacular, which was (predictably) annually attended by Dobby and no one else.
She sighed. The whole hour-long adventure had been grievously under-planned, she decided. For sure, fish-and-chip buying, friend visiting, and box shifting were all well and good, but they weren't quite what one thought of when faced with a responsibility-free hour.
Now, she felt rejuvenated, alive, and ready for a bit of subterfuge.
She pondered.
Hermione could only hope that her in-laws, mother, and Jeanie were still at Madam Malkin's being out-reasoned by a MagiChat. If they'd figured her out… or gone in against the box's urging… She could only hope.
She blew a few strands of wayward hair out of her eyes.
Perhaps she was a little bit tired, and perhaps she also was feeling more a bit rebellious than she gave herself credit for, but she suddenly had one of those ideas, and she knew that, although it was almost certainly stupid, it was, at least, a guaranteed adventure, so she made an executive decision to step aside and let it run its ill-fated course.
At least, that's how she thought about it later in life.
At the time it felt a bit like being someone else… a spy, perhaps… or a bond girl.
Hermione smirked in a very un-Hermione (but very Bond-Girl) way. Pussy Galore, indeed.
Without taking another moment of consideration she stood and strode out of the store, progressing down the street as though she weren't on a suicide mission.
She stopped a few storefronts later, at a large picture window decorated with rolls of purple fabric and an endless supply of lilac petals that fell from the ceiling. Showcased in the centre was a mass of fabric and bows that appeared to be a close, lavender-coloured cousin of what the Malfoy women might loosely term a "wedding dress". She scowled at it. Her reflection scowled back… she sighed, examining the distinct way that her hair fell in thick, frizzy brown ringlets. She'd certainly be recognized anywhere she went. She couldn't just waltz into Madam Malkin's looking like a woman who was supposedly changing in a back room. That might, she reasoned, be difficult to explain.
She looked up and down the street to make sure no one was watching, then retraced her steps to a thin enclave behind Madam Malkin's junk-shop neighbour.
She'd learned, during the war, a few key tricks to easy disguising.
In the shadows, she waved her wand in a long figure eight over herself. "Cinderella" she whispered.
Two minutes later a woman in a sleek white pantsuit, her straight, black hair hidden underneath a cream-coloured scarf, blew up to Madam Malkin's front desk. The scarf flew behind her like a banner: I Am Important.
"Je suis l'aide d'un mannequin qui veut rester anonyme," she rolled off in her fastest and most presumptuous French.
"Uh…" the poor girl on desk duty stammered, her face trying to show far too many expressions at once. "English?"
The Frenchwoman scoffed in her best Narcissa impression and looked to the ceiling as if to say "These English, ils ont les nerfs!" She turned back to the girl and slowly removed her oversized sunglasses. "Eh… Je ne sais… 'ow you say… eh…." She clucked her tongue a few times.
Desk-girl was regretting now that she'd taken German in school.
"I am zee… eh… I don' know… eh… I am zee aide of a… model? Oui, a model, I theenk… a model 'oo wants for zat you do not know 'er name." She dragged out in an overly-dramatic French accent, rolling the words around on her tongue as though they were the world's most foul chewing tobacco. "You understand?"
"Yes, I think so." The girl started breathing again, though she was still shaking very badly as she picked up a quill and a notepad and set them on the desk in front of her. "What is it that you want?"
"Eh… she wants a… how you say..? eh… a dress for weddings? Oui?"
"A wedding dress?"
"Oui, oui, une robe de mariée." The Frenchwoman nodded, slipping easily back into snappish, rapid French. The girl jumped as if she'd been hit.
"Come with me, please," she managed, still shaking, and beckoned her client to follow into the same back room where the Malfoy women were still watching a changing room door with bated breath.
Hermione heaved a sigh of relief once the shop girl was far enough ahead that the sigh could be misconstrued as impatience. She'd not had to speak so much French for many years, not since Bill's wedding. She hadn't thought that she could still do it.
The accent was easy, of course. Ginny and she had spent so many hours during the summer before her sixth year laying out by the Weasley's swimming hole, making fun of Fleur in outrageously dragged out French patois and getting terribly sunburned. Ron called it karma.
"White, of course." The girl said, automatically, but Hermione threw out a hand to stop her, suddenly snapped from her reverie.
"Rose vif, I theenk," she said. "'Ot pink."
"Right, of course…" her guide said, as though she'd been thinking the exact same thing, though Hermione sincerely hoped she hadn't been. "This way then." They turned sharply down a side aisle, towards that far corner where Hermione knew a display housing Creations by Muffin: Five for a Galleon was waiting for her.
And there it was, that menagerie of hideousness and fashion don'ts set down in an ignored corner. Desk-girl made to walk straight past it but Hermione made a show of being interested. "Attendez!" she snapped, swaggering over to it like a fly drawn to a bug zapper. "Stop 'ere!" She picked through the top few quickly, the ones she'd laughed at only an hour before, then dove her hand deep into the pile, also as she'd done before; but this time she was a woman on a mission… and a Frenchwoman, at that.
She found it quickly, now that she knew it was there. She pulled the buried dress to the surface and saw it for the first time.
It was beautiful, or maybe she only thought so because she'd forgotten what a pretty dress looked like. It was a soft yellow so pale that it was almost, but not quite, ivory. It was strapless, but so unassumingly so that one couldn't imagine it made any other way. The only adornment on its whole being was a single, large, fabric flower the same color as the dress attached over the right bosom… a corsage. It was natural, simple… perfect.
The most perfect part of it, though, was the skirt, which, by looking at it, she guessed would end just below the knee. The skirt swelled from the waist out into a flouncing, twirling, explosion of that fabric of dreams: tulle. She ran her hand lovingly over the many white underskirts, momentarily lost in the way the dress moved when she twisted it from side to side.
"Oh, that's pretty," said a voice beside her.
She couldn't help it, she jumped. She'd forgotten that there was anyone else in the world beside herself and The Dress, yet here was her very own sister, presumably wandering away from the Malfoys to stand beside her, not recognizing her, watching The Dress with a kind of primal fascination.
"Eh…" Hermione cleared her throat, fitting awkwardly back into spy-mode. "Oui… it is."
Then Jeanie said something that completely threw Hermione off guard, something that she had to have her repeat because it was so wildly unexpected that she went temporarily deaf.
"Excuse me?" Hermione asked before she could stop herself.
"I said, 'My sister would love that.'" Jeanie repeated.
"Oh… she eez engaged?"
"Yeah." Jeanie flashed her trillion-watt grin (a by-product of being the only full-time child of two dentists), her eyes never leaving The Dress. "Yeah, she is."
"Oh. She is 'ere?"
"Yeah." Jeanie repeated. "She's just back over there… changing for like, ever." She frowned and lowered her voice. "I personally think she's just nervous about showing us how she looks."
Hermione cleared her throat. "Eh… nervous?"
"Yeah. But I don't blame her…" That smile again. "Her in-laws are terrifying… though I couldn't say why. It's just… an air, I guess… not much substance to it. All mouth no trousers… you know."
Hermione nodded weakly, her over-prominent molars cutting into her bottom lip as she tried not to laugh.
"She'd love that, though." Jeanie mimicked Hermione's lip biting (it was a nervous habit they'd both developed as children with abnormally large front teeth.), her eyes still glued to The Dress.
"Eh… oui." Hermione managed.
"I mean, who wouldn't?" Jeanie laughed in that petulant way that only teenage girls can, "Do you… Would you mind if I bought that for her?"
Hermione's lower lip sagged lamely. It was one thing for Jeanie to think of her while shopping, but to actually buy her something? Such a Random Act of Kindness required a soul that she'd been sure her younger sister simply didn't possess.
She handed The Dress over, her mouth still gaping rather unpleasantly.
"Thank you." Jeanie giggled. "Well… bye." And she was gone in a fan of brown hair as she turned, her high-heeled steps quickly fading away between the aisles.
Hermione continued to stare at the spot where she'd been, simultaneously wondering when the pod people had found time to kidnap her sister and contemplating how she was going to get The Dress back.
"She's still not out?" The Younger Muggle— Loretta, was it?— said as she returned, a not-quite-ivory dress clutched under one arm.
"No." Narcissa was filing her nails into sharp points with a nail file that she'd attached to the end of her wand and frowning.
"Oh." The Younger Muggle said and flopped down onto the couch beside The Older Muggle (whose named was Rebecca, Narcissa knew at least that much.)
Mum rapped her bony knuckles on the door again. "Come on, Hermione. You can't get married in your bloomers!"
"One minute, I said!" The Bride called back.
"Just come out, Hermia!"
"Hermione." The Younger Muggle, whose face was now buried in a horrendously outdate Witch Weekly, corrected between smacks of horrendously muggle gum.
Narcissa grunted and started filing faster.
Silence again.
"Where did you get that dress, anyway?"
Hermione made her escape from Madame Malkin's with the air of one who's been defeated at something they never really could have won. She apparated back into the same slimy alley her adventure had started on, her dreams thoroughly crushed, and reversed the Cinderella Spell.
As her hair lightened and curled she climbed back through the window. The "dress" was still there, unfortunately, still crumbled into a spiteful pile in the corner. She shouldn't have been surprised. Any thief who might have thought about stealing it would have taken a good look and then set it on fire before running off with the mirror. No, she shouldn't have been surprised.
She picked up the MagiChat, which was still humming merrily, tapped it once with her wand so that it turned off, and then started the arduous task of getting herself back into the bastard-child of white satin and a sewing machine that was lying at her feet.
Yes, it had been an odd day, and it only looked to be getting worse.
Aemilia was just ready to put her foot through the door when it flew open and Hermione schlepped the whole elephantine skirt through the door.
She waddled (because that was all you could really do in such a skirt) into the centre of their impromptu sitting area and stopped, for once at an uncharacteristic loss for words.
Ginny surreptitiously scooted her chair back as though afraid the skirt would eat her.
Silence.
A circle of blonde women moved like lionesses around her, prowling counter-clockwise around the monstrosity, gauging it's suitability with their eyes.
"Waistline is…" one of them said.
"Good for growth." another finished.
"Hem is…"
"Middling…good for low shoes but too short if worn with heels."
"She will wear flats."
"Fair enough. Sleeves are…"
"Classic. The bow?"
"I like the bow."
"Me too. Neckline?"
"Perfect. Consensus?"
They stopped.
Hermione cleared her throat. "I know… it's…" She mulled over a more polite way to say 'Vomit-inducing.'
"Wonderful!" Narcissa squealed. "The form! The adornment! The fringe!"
"Eh…"
"The roses!"
"The sleeves!"
"The bow!"
"Eh…"
"Look at the way it shapes her hips!"
"Oh, and those tiers!"
"Like a cake!"
"And it's so white!"
"Eh… yes… about that…"
"The skirt! What hooping!"
"That neckline!"
Narcissa gushed nonsensically. "Oh, Harmony!" she squealed, soulless tears forming on the corners of her eyes. "Take it off and then let's go buy it!"
A/N: Wowee. That took forever to write. First, my apologies. I've been getting distracted left and right for about a month and a half, which is terrible form when all of you are waiting. First, it was band season. Then, my brother took the computer every opportunity he could and I couldn't write. Also, I've decided to stop writing such short chapters, which is why this is so long, and I wanted to fit in much more than, I realized, should actually be fit into a chapter. XD Anyways, here it is, I hope you're all happy. Next chapter: Hermione goes to the salon.
My challenge for you: Write me a new summary for this story. I like my old one, but I'm thinking maybe a replacement is in order?
As always, REVIEW. You know you want to. Come on... come to dark side, we have cookies!
P.S. Sorry if it seems a bit weak in places, I just really wanted to get it out so y'all could stop waiting. Love, Jo