Aki- Here is Victoire. I kinda really like the last 'fact' in this one. Hope you enjoy too.
1
Victoire is beautiful. Sometimes she really didn't like that she was beautiful. When she was little she hadn't minded, because she hadn't noticed her affect on people, and it was okay when little children were undeniably adorable. However, then she became a pre-teen and then a teenager, and suddenly all the boys noticed, and the girls noticed all the boys noticing. Victoire knew that she was different (she doesn't say better, that's not how she thinks).
And it wouldn't be so bad, she could deal with fawning boys alright. What gets to her are the assumptions people make about her just because she's very attractive (a fact she couldn't control, she had an eighth of Veela in her). Suddenly, people who haven't spared the chance to have a conversation with her had an opinion. She was a now a snob, a prude, a slut, a jerk, a dumb blonde…a whole mix of jarring insults that have no real ground in reality (she hopes).
So Victoire stops wearing much make up. She plaits her blonde hair over her shoulder. And when she feels particularly self conscious (which, when in moments of clarity, she realizes she had nothing she should be self conscious about) she wears the thick framed reading glasses she barely needs, because they give her a little something to hide behind.
2
Victiore is bilingual. That really is not that interesting, except for what it implies: two very different families. There were the Weasleys, her dad's family, a bunch of mostly gingers with a scattering of blondes (like her) and brunettes in there. The bunch she spoke English with, played pick up Quidditch games in the backyard, ate gigantic family dinners at an endless row of mismatched tables out on the lawn, chased little gnomes out of the garden with, or received Christmas jumpers from Grandma along with.
And then there is her family in France, her mum's family, which was not quite as numerous as the Weasleys, but not any less loving. There was Grand-mere and Grand-pere, Tante Gabrielle and Oncle Pierre, and her cousins too. Victoire and her siblings visit for a month during summer break and a week during Christmas, because they spend all their other time in close proximity with the Weasleys. There they drink wine with dinner, eat fine foods, go shopping in Paris, and have long conversations in the evenings in front of the fireplace about their lives since they had been apart.
And neither one is better or worse than the other. In fact, Victoire loves the hand knit jumper from Grandma just the same as the fine satin blouse she received from a shopping venture with her Grand-mere just the same.
3
When she was little, she would sit on her daddy's lap, and trace the scars on his face with tiny, soft fingertips. He would say nothing, just close his eyes and let her, even though her actions were a reminder of an attack, of pain, of disfiguration, of a darker, meaner, courser time. The scars didn't scare little Victoire, though, they were just part of her daddy.
4
Victoire greatly admired her Grandma. It must have been such a feat, wrangling all of her uncles and Aunt Ginny and her dad when they were younger (or wrangling them now, for that matter, plus the children-in-laws and the grandkids). The women had never had a career beyond being a stay at home mom and a housewife, and honestly, Victoire sees nothing wrong with that. In fact, she thinks that would a very cozy future herself, a nice cottage like her parents, a few children, maybe a dog or cat, and a husband coming home at the end of the dad (a husband who, in her imagination, always has green or blue or purple hair), kissing her on the top of her head as she waves her wand to get the soup stirred. Life isn't that easy, simple, or perfect, of course, but she could dream.
5
It saddened her, but Victoire often felt greatly separated from Dominique and Louis. The age difference wasn't that great between them, only a handful of years, but somehow she felt ages older them, an adult while they were children, concerned with things much more mature than they. She had only been born a year after the war's conclusion and she could still taste the remnants of it on her earliest memories, the time of reconstruction, things her two little siblings could not comprehend.
Maybe it has to be with being the oldest, the oldest silbing, the oldest cousin, she was the first one to learn where her father's scars came from, where Uncle Harry's came from, what happened to Uncle George's ear, and what happened to the never-known-Uncle Fred. She knew a lot of things before the rest of them, had to keep secrets, until there were old enough to know and understand. That ages you, having to carry some things silently like that.
6
Hogsmead trips become very precious to Victoire in her final year of schooling. Because Teddy would always make sure to take off work to come up and visit her in the little town. Some people thought it was silly, it wasn't worth it, that long distance relationships never work. Victoire doesn't listen to those people. Because those days (not even days, more like half of days) she gets to spend with Teddy in what would otherwise be months apart reaffirm every feeling she ever had towards him.
7
Everything about her own existence felt tainted to Victoire. She had been born on May 2nd, the anniversary of what had been come to be called in the history books "The Final Battle." Her name quite literally meant "Victory." It was supposed to be a happy thing, born on the day of a victory that had been needed for decades: the end of Voldemort. But it was hardly a happy day, and hardly a day that could be stood to be celebrated by some, either over the defeat of the Dark Lord or her birthday. Uncle Fred had died that day, so had Teddy's parents, and so had so many more she didn't know. She lived in a generation that was happy most days, having no part in the war that came before their time, but connected totally and silently by the unspoken deaths that came before them to preserve them a place in this world.
8
Victoire was both very like and very unlike her mother. Mum was a lot more, well, French, than Victoire could even dream of being, having grown up primarily in England. Mum also put a little too much weight, unintentionally, on appearances. They looked a lot alike, except for the inevitable sprinkle of Weasley freckles across her nose. Their first impression personailites clashed (Victoire was more laid back, soft spoken, polite while her mother tended to rub people the wrong way with outspoken and sometimes rude opinions). But Victoire thinks she shares all the good qualities with her: devotedly loving, intuitively clever, strong, and helpful.
9
There was a whole entire tradition of the Weasleys being sorted into the Gryffindor house. Victoire didn't really care either way where she went: into Gryffindor or not. Her mum hadn't gone to Hogwarts and had no opinion on it and her dad, the oldest of his sibling, the most distant from his schooling, seemed unconcerned with pressing the issue onto his oldest daughter. When she finally got to Hogwarts, she was sorted into Ravenclaw and was glad. She had broken the tradition, and it really wasn't too much of a big deal. She thought, maybe, she was making a difference for her cousins and siblings coming after her.
10
Victoire had sort of always had a crush she both ignored and acknowledged on Teddy. And her aunts and uncles, mother and father, even Grandma and Grandpa would exchange little looks over family meals, even when Victoire and Teddy were just little kids, saying, 'Someday…someday those two are going to get married…'
They are fake cousins, and friends, and the oldest, apart in age by a year. When they get older they flirt without really knowing it, and kiss other classmates as they explore the meanings of their hormonal urges and romance and dating. She is halfway through her fifth year and he through sixth. He is sitting with her, on an empty bench, in an empty corridor, studying, because it was before midterm exams and the library was too packed to be any good. And Teddy is looking at her. A moment later, a hand of his is tugging at the bow that keeps her braid together. She doesn't tell him to stop. And the bow comes out and her silky hair becomes unwound, especially when he brushes it absently over her shoulder with the back of his hand. She is staring at him now, as he reaches up, and with both hands, gently slides her black framed glasses from her face.
"You need to stop hiding," he whispers and he is so close she can feel the heat of his breath on her ear and neck. Any other guy would have done the same thing because she was "prettier" without a braid and glasses, but Teddy did it because he knows that's what she need. And that's when she realizes she's in love, love, love with Teddy R. Lupin.
Aki- Review, please...
Don't know who is next. I've started on Lily's, but I don't have ten ideas for her and I got a request for Freddie... hmmm...