Year 5: Out of Sync

Chapter 41: September 2017

It was September the first and Dominique was ready to take Hogwarts by storm. She was a fifth year now, which meant that she was officially an upperclassman. She had her friends back, she was feeling happier than she'd felt in a long time, and she was completely over Adrian Carter. In fact, she was so over Adrian that she was ready to get back out there. She'd spent all of last year obsessing over a guy that was never going to give her the time of day. But things were going to be different now. Dominique wasn't going to waste her time anymore. She was going to put herself out there and make things happen.

"Hey guys," Dominique said, flying into the compartment her friends were occupying and throwing her trunk up into one of the luggage racks with a quick flick of her wand. "Good summer?"

"Whoa Domi," Brooke said, ignoring the question and instead staring at Dominique's chest. "That is… a very tight sweater."

"Isn't it cute?" Dominique smiled, looking down at it to make sure it was still sitting where it was supposed to be. It was a little small, and she'd spent a good part of the morning arguing with it about the optimal position for it to settle in, but she'd been quite happy with the result. "I found it at the bottom of Victoire's closet. Must have been from when she was younger."

"A lot younger," Brooke muttered, making a face.

Dominique frowned. "Do you not like it?" she asked her friend.

Brooke shrugged. "I just think you're showing a lot more than you need to," she said. "I mean, I can basically see your belly button, and the buttons are straining over your chest."

"Well I like it," Dominique sniffed. "What do you think, Tom?" she turned to her other friend, who also happened to be Brooke's boyfriend.

"Oh, well I, uh…" Tom stammered.

"Don't you dare answer that," Brooke ordered him strictly.

Tom shrugged apologetically and Dominique rolled her eyes. What was the big deal? So the shirt was a size or two too small, so what? She was showing her body off in a good way. She wasn't ashamed of it, and there was no reason Brooke should disapprove. And if Tom's reaction was any indication, the guys were sure going to like her new look.

"Hey everyone!" a familiar voice called out from the doorway. "What's going – Domi!"

As soon as Miles caught sight of Dominique, he froze, staring at her outfit with an expression that told Dominique it was doing exactly what she'd meant it to do.

"See Brooke?" she declared. "Miles likes my sweater."

Brooke got up and snapped her fingers in front of Miles' face to get his attention. "Hey, focus," she said. "Earth to Miles. Stop being gross and get yourself in here."

Miles shook his head as if to clear it and pulled his trunk in after him, which Dominique promptly levitated up into the remaining spot on the luggage rack.

"Sorry, I was just… surprised by Dominique's new look," Miles said, his eyes drifting over to Dominique again.

"Well stop drooling, it's disturbing," Brooke rolled her eyes.

Miles blushed a bright red and turned to look out the window as he tried to cover it up. Meanwhile, Dominique fixed her hair, and pulled a mirror out of her pocket to check her makeup.

"Well, I'm going to go see how the rest of the school likes my new look," she declared, going for the door.

"Hold on," Brooke insisted, blocking Dominique's exit. "Domi, what are you doing? Just sit and spend some time with us so that we can understand what's going on here."

Dominique made an annoyed face. "What's going on is I wasted my entire fourth year chasing after a guy that was never going to give me the time of day. So this year, I'm going to do things a little differently."

"Oh no you don't," Miles cried, jumping up to join Brooke in blocking Dominique's path.

Dominique frowned. "But I thought you liked my sweater?"

"Oh, well sure," Miles muttered, looking momentarily embarrassed. "But that doesn't mean I think you should be parading around like that in front of the whole school. Guys are going to get the wrong idea."

"Or the right idea," Dominique said, pushing her way past her friends and opening the door. "I'll be back later."

And with that, she shut the door behind her, leaving her friends to their own opinions and judgements, and began to strut down the hall.

Dominique had woken up extra early that morning to prepare. She'd made sure she got to the shower first, and then spent hours fixing her hair just so, and making sure that she looked her absolute best. She'd used a bunch of her sister's makeup to make herself look older – she could probably pass for a sixth or seventh year if she tried – and she was wearing clothes that she knew the guys at Hogwarts wouldn't be able to resist.

And as she walked down the train corridor, she knew that her efforts had paid off. Heads were turning in almost every compartment. Whistles and cat calls even came from a few. Dominique held her head high and allowed the praise to wash over her. It was nice – really nice – to be noticed for once.

"Hey Dominique. Where are you going?"

Dominique turned around and found Joey Roper leaning out of a compartment she'd just passed, looking at her with a strange intensity.

Dominique shrugged. "Nowhere in particular. Unless you had an offer for me?"

"You should join us in here," Joey suggested, gesturing to his compartment.

Dominique smiled. "I'd be happy to," she declared, walking towards him as seductively as possible.

Joey Roper was a Slytherin in her year, and when Dominique entered his compartment, she found the rest of her year's Slytherin boys waiting for her as well.

"Well isn't this quite the party," Dominique commented, squeezing herself in between Sean Weston, a chaser on the Slytherin Quidditch team, and Brandon Thurkell, who had a shiny new prefect's badge pinned to the front of his robes.

"It is now that you're here," Joey responded, taking his seat across from her with Emmett Hall and Dylan Becker.

"So I see Brandon here's been made prefect," Dominique said, reaching out to touch the badge and taking the opportunity to feel his chest while she was at it. Brandon was fit – really all the Slytherins in the compartment were.

"Yeah," Brandon nodded. "What about you?"

"Oh no," Dominique shook her head. "I could never be prefect. I'm much too interested in breaking the rules." She winked suggestively and could practically feel all five boys in the compartment drooling at her feet.

"Yeah, Brandon's just a little goody-two-shoes," Sean said, trying to pull Dominique's focus away from Brandon and towards him. "Don't waste your time with him."

"Hey!" Brandon exclaimed. Dominique could sense an argument coming, and she diffused it as quickly as possible.

"Now, now boys," she cried. "There's plenty of me to go around. Go ahead Sean, why don't you tell me something about yourself."

"Well I was on the Quidditch team last year," Sean announced proudly, puffing up his chest. "Chaser. You like Quidditch, don't you Dominique? Didn't I see you at a bunch of games last year?"

Dominique shrugged and her interest slid away from Sean and towards the three boys sitting across from her.

"What about you three?" Dominique asked. She shifted so that her chest was better on display, and folded her arm absentmindedly over Brandon's shoulder, as though he were an armrest. "What makes you guys interesting?"

"I've got a pet cat!" Emmett said excitedly. "His name is Claw."

"Riiight," Dominique said, trying and failing to pretend that this was interesting.

Emmett immediately realized that this random fact had not been the kind of thing Dominique was looking for, and buried his head in his hands in humiliation.

Dominique, for her part, just shifted so that she was facing Dylan and Joey and gave them an expectant look. As she did, she found herself partially facing the compartment door and through the window saw that Summer Snow was standing just outside the compartment, frozen in the middle of the corridor, staring at Dominique and the boys with a furious expression on her face.

Smirking, Dominique lifted a hand and waved at Summer, knowing that it must be torture for Summer to see her monopolizing all five Slytherin boys. Then, just to make Summer even angrier, Dominique dropped her hand from Brandon's shoulder to his thigh. She could see the blood boil beneath Summer's skin as she stalked away, and she could feel Brandon stiffening up at her touch. The whole thing was rather amusing.

"Uh, Dominique?" Brandon whispered in her ear. "Do you maybe want to… find a compartment of our own?"

Dominique paused for a moment as she considered the offer. On the one hand, when she'd woken up that morning, her only plan had been to draw attention to herself, make all the guys drool over her. She hadn't intended to actually do anything with anyone. But on the other hand, she'd already decided she wasn't going to waste this year like she had the last. And Brandon's offer was awfully tempting.

"You bet," Dominique declared, standing up, and pulling Brandon behind her as she did. "Sorry boys, it's been fun. Maybe we can continue this chat another time."

She dragged Brandon out of the compartment and the two of them continued down the corridor hurriedly, looking for an empty compartment.

It didn't take long to find one, and as soon as the door was shut and the blind was pulled down over the window, Dominique found herself being pushed down onto one of the benches, and Brandon was climbing on top of her, crushing his mouth to hers in a bruising kiss, and shoving his tongue into her mouth forcefully.

For her first kiss, it wasn't exactly what Dominique had imagined, but it would do. It felt nice enough, once Dominique got used to it, and Brandon was considerate enough not to push further right away. She knew she wasn't ready to sleep with Brandon quite yet, but she'd never really considered the fuzzier lines. So when Brandon ripped off his robes and pulled off his shirt, Dominique removed her sweater as well. And when Brandon started rubbing himself against Dominique through their pants, Dominique wrapped her legs around him tighter, because it felt good.

When it was over, there was an awkward moment where Dominique didn't really know what to say. Though technically she'd known Brandon for years, they'd never really talked before and had only properly met today. She barely knew the guy.

"I guess I'll be seeing you around then," Brandon finally said, breaking the silence. He pulled his shirt and robes back on and got up to leave.

"Yeah," Dominique nodded, grabbing her sweater off the ground and throwing it over her head before he opened the compartment door and some random passing student accidentally saw her sitting on the floor topless. "Yeah, I'll be seeing you."

Brandon left, and the compartment door slid shut again, leaving Dominique alone. There were a lot of thoughts running through her head, but Dominique had no idea how she felt about any of them. So much had happened that she hadn't expected to happen.

Taking a deep breath, Dominique shoved away all the confusing thoughts and pulled herself to her feet. She took out her mirror and fixed her hair and makeup as best she could, straightened her sweater, and stepped back out into the corridor to return to her friends' compartment.

She'd made a decision not to waste her year the way she had last year, and if what had happened with Brandon just now was any indication, she was on the right path. She hadn't wasted any time, and while it had been a little weird, it had also been fun. Dominique needed more fun in her life. Merlin knows she didn't have any fun last year.

She arrived back to her friends' compartment and let herself in. The three of them had been in the middle of a conversation about Quidditch, but they paused when Dominique arrived.

"Where have you been?" Miles immediately demanded, seeming angry.

Dominique shrugged. "Around," she replied. "I ran into some of the boys from Slytherin."

"So you were just – hanging around with the Slytherins instead of spending time with your friends?" Miles demanded.

Dominique shrugged. "Look, it's no big deal," she muttered, taking her seat. "Why are you getting so worked up over this?"

"I'm not – " Miles started to protest and then just fell silent. He shook his head and looked out the window and Dominique wondered whether she'd accidentally hit some nerve, and if so what nerve that could have been.

She turned her attention to Brooke and Tom and suddenly noticed something pinned to Brooke's robes that she didn't remember being there before.

"Brooke, you've been made prefect!" Dominique exclaimed in surprise. "Congratulations!"

"Took you long enough," Brooke muttered.

Dominique frowned. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"I was wearing this when we talked before. But you didn't even give me a second glance."

"Oh," Dominique said, deflating a little. "I'm sorry. But it's not like you pointed it out or anything."

"Right," Brooke said, leaning back into her seat non-responsively. "Sure."

Dominique sighed. Why were her friends so grumpy with her all of a sudden? What was so wrong with wanting to try new things, be a different person, a better person who had more fun? And what was the big deal if Dominique hadn't noticed Brooke's badge before. Brooke hadn't said anything, and it was a tiny little badge anyway.

They just needed some time to adjust, Dominique decided. They just needed to get used to Dominique's new approach to life, and then everything would be like normal again. Only better. Better than normal. A new and better normal. That was the goal.

DdDdDdDdDdD

That evening, Dominique got to attend the Gryffindor upperclassman end-of-summer party for the first time. While it was a little painful to watch Adrian and Caitlin together, and really strange to watch Brooke and Tom together, Dominique remained determined to have fun.

Dominique had no interest in any of the Gryffindor boys in her own year. After all, two of them were Miles and Tom, who were more like brothers to her than anything else. And she'd spent too much time with Zeke, Grant, and Timothy as an underclassman that they were kind of like brothers to her too.

So Dominique set her sights on the sixth year boys. Specifically, Owen Janson. She didn't know much about him, but he was attractive, and most importantly, he was on his own.

Dominique sidled up to him as a slower song started to play and asked if he wanted to dance. There were a few couples dancing, so it wasn't completely out of the blue, and to Dominique's delight, Owen accepted.

They went out to the middle of the room where the dancing was happening, and Dominique wrapped her arms around Owen's neck, like the other girls had done. Owen wrapped his arms around Dominique's waist, and the two started to sway to the music.

At some point, Owen's hands drifted south, and Dominique realized that they were now cupping her ass. She didn't mind though, and took it as a compliment, figuring that he wouldn't be doing it unless she had a nice ass.

She pressed herself against him more, since that seemed the thing to do, and the two continued to rotate slowly around the room. As the song came to an end, Owen leaned down and kissed Dominique. It was a little sloppy. Dominique found herself comparing it to the kisses she'd received earlier from Brandon and decided that Brandon was better at it. Then again, Owen had had a few drinks, and that could be impairing his kissing ability, so she wouldn't judge him too harshly.

She kissed him back, because even if it was a little sloppy it still felt nice. When she eventually pulled away, she caught sight of Miles sitting in the corner of the room, glaring daggers at her. She ignored him, not having the time or the inclination to sort out why he was so affected by her new behavior.

Owen leaned down to whisper in Dominique's ear.

"My dormmates are all down at the party," he said.

"That's nice," Dominique responded, unsure what his point was.

"My dorm is completely empty," he added, clarifying his meaning.

Dominique understood. And while she'd said yes to Brandon earlier, that had been on a train, in the middle of the day, and with a fifth year who was a prefect. Owen was a sixth year, he wasn't a prefect, it was late, and he wanted her to go up to his dorm. While some lines had been fuzzy that day, this one was clear.

"No thanks," Dominique said, stepping away. "Maybe another time."

And with that said, she took her leave, heading up to her own dorm, where no boy could follow her, and to bed.