"This is stupid." stated Lucia as Bernice began charming her hair into curls.
"What is stupid?" Katherine asked, as she finished getting her stockings on.
"This whole looking-nice deal that Bernice is doing." Lucia replied.
"I am right here and I am not that oblivious." Bernice snapped. "Besides, you looked terrible this morning."
"Why does that even matter? I am not up for the most shaggable Hogwarts female, and even if I am, Meg would have me beat faster than you can say Draco Malfoy."
"Now he is the most shaggable male at Hogwarts, by a landslide." Bernice muttered, finishing up Lucia's hair and moving on to makeup.
"Oh come off it, I don't want to have that shit on my face." Lucia pushed the blush away from her already flushed cheeks.
"Speaking of Malfoy, I don't suppose you are going to have another rendezvous?" Katherine slipped in slily.
"Oh you did not!" Lucia gasped, pushing herself off her seat in front of the vanity mirror before Bernice shoved her back down.
"Well I just-" Katherine started.
"What happened to friendship and not telling about these things?" Lucia asked, eyes wide.
"Wait, you and Malfoy canoodling together. My goodness Lu, I thought you may have had a soft spot for him but not an entire cushion and a cup of tea too!" Bernice exclaimed, blush abandoned.
"You are so odd Berni." Katherine shook her head.
"Well I don't but... you see... well I needed help in potions and he just offered and it's really been helping, or I think it has. I mean I successfully made a Love Potion yesterday and I can't help but think that that is some progress." Lucia managed to sputter.
"Well, if I did believe that the only reason you see him is for potions that would be fine, but blimey Lu, you honestly like him. I can see it." Bernice exclaimed.
"Of course I don't. Goodness, do we have to have this conversation every time the damned albino is brought up?" Lucia pouted.
"You know, perhaps you should let Bernice do your makeup. Just for laughs. Maybe, just maybe, Malfoy will like it. Not that it matters, since he is such a damned albino." Katherine interjected.
"Well, I suppose it could never hurt to look nice for once. You are what you wear, as my mother would say." Lucia said, giving in to her friends demands.
"No you aren't, you foolish girl." Katherine said, bitterly.
After an extensive makeover involving loose curls, torture devices known as eyelash curlers, lipstick lessons, skirt shortenings, blouse tightening and numerous disgusted looks from Lucia, she was finally deemed attractive enough to go to breakfast.
Upon entering the Great Hall, Meghan rushed to Lucia and said, in a rather loud voice "Lucia you look so much better! You look... good?"
Lucia looked up with a disgruntled expression and asked "Are you saying I normally don't look good?"
"No, that isn't it at all. I was just acknowledging that there is some serious improvements. When did you get breasts again?" Meghan asked.
"Oh my goodness, there are people around. And for your information, I've had them since this summer." Lucia replied, coldly.
"Well at least you bloomed, even if it was a tad late." Meghan commented, sympathetically.
"I hate all three of you right now." Lucia muttered, grabbing a pastry from the center of the table.
Meghan reached over and grasped the delightful treat before it came even close to gracing Lucia's lips.
"Ah-ah-ah, no no. If you want to look good, you best start Meghan's Magnificent Fat Melting diet." Meghan stated
"If you do not give the pastry back I will personally ensure that you will never, and I mean ever, be able to snog in the broom cupboards without filch knowing about it. And don't even think I don't know when you are, because I do." Lucia threatened.
"I haven't the foggiest of what you are talking about." Meghan said, poshly. But she set the pastry back on Lucia's plate before grabbing herself a bowl of gruel.
"You know, I think Meghan should be clued in to our conversation earlier, pertaining to a certain albino." Bernice said, slily.
"Oh you mean Draco, yes well I already know. You were 'studying potions' with him. Katherine told me." Meghan said dryly, spooning a mouthful of grey mush into her mouth.
"You stupid bitch!" Lucia said to Katherine, shocked.
"I figured she should know as well." Katherine said calmly.
"Next thing you know there will be posters put up saying 'Lucia Sometimes shags Malfoy.' in large print, and below it 'expect the unexpected.'" Lucia held up her hands, making a square.
"You shagged Malfoy? How was he? Big?" Bernice asked, quite loudly in fact.
"No, I didn't. Oh my goodness this day is terrible."
"Well I'm sorry but you sure made it sound like you did." Bernice defended, putting her hands up.
"I don't suppose any of you could make me feel more uncomfortable?" Lucia asked.
And leave it to Berni "I'm fairly sure I have an ingrown toenail. It happened after I accidentally cast a spell to polish my toes but really made the nails fall off. The healing spell didn't go quite right either."
"You really just said that?" Meghan asked.
"I suddenly feel as if arriving early to potions sounds wonderful." Lucia muttered, standing up and rushing off.
"She seems to run off like that a lot lately." Meghan commented.
"She always has." Bernice muttered, darkly.
Katherine looked at Bernice for a moment with a look of contemplation before turning back to wear Lucia had run off. Draco Malfoy was in her wake and he looked as if he were in a hurry.
In the hallway, Lucia was making her way towards Slughorn's classroom when she heard her name from somewhere behind her. She turned to see Malfoy, his eyes wide and stride quick.
"Yes?" She inquired, secretly relishing the attention.
"You look..." he trailed off before finishing "different."
"You don't like it?"
"No no no, don't get me wrong, I do. It's just, the hair and makeup, and that skirt. It's just... it's not you." Lucia's heart melted like hot wax.
"Well I just thought maybe I should look nice for once." Lucia muttered, looking down at her skirt.
"You always look nice, today is no different. I just don't think you need the well... I like the shirt anyways. None of your other shirts fit you right at all."
"Draco, that is the nicest thing I have ever heard you say." Lucia said, stepping forward.
"Well I don't think it will be a common occurrence. I can walk you to class, if you'd like." Draco offered.
Draco and Lucia began heading down the corridor, both stealing glances at each other. Once they had reached the classroom, they stood outside for a moment and shyly gazed at each other, unabashed.
Lucia caught herself and muttered a quick apology before pushing the door, only to realize that you were, in fact, supposed to pull it.
"Here, let me." Draco offered, opening the door and letting her walk in.
There was no one in the classroom. Lucia and Draco took their normal seats on opposite sides of the room. Lucia held a prim posture as she could feel Draco eying her overly done head. They did not say a word for the rest of the period, and after it, they both went to their separate classes.
"So how did Draco like the new, improved Lu-Lu?" Meghan teased in Herbology.
"He was, in fact, displeased." Lucia stated, before slapping a Venus flytrap promptly on the head for trying to take a bite out of her arm. "Why is everything so dangerous out here? Why can't everything be harmless like charms. I do love charms."
"How could he be displeased with you?" Meghan asked, shocked.
Lucia looked at her as if she was an idiot and pointed at her filth covered face. "Because makeup is like dirt that people intentionally put on their face. He said it was unnatural and he liked me better when I was just myself."
"Your self has no figure."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, it has been duly noted and discarded."
"Not that it really maters since you don't like him, but I heard he has been asking around about you again."
"The fucker." Lucia seethed, even though she secretly relished in his attention.
"Darling, he can't help but find you to be an unchallenged conquest."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Well, he likes what he can't have. And no one can have you."
"You're right about one thing then."
Herbology finished and Lucia had the pleasure of only having to endure one more class that afternoon, Defense Against the Dark Arts, before dinner and ultimately, her private lesson with Draco Malfoy.
DADA was, as always, exceedingly difficult for Lucia. In the theory end of things, she was brilliant, but when it came to actually defending herself, she could hardly stand it.
"Ms. Sometimes," the new professor started, "would you care to show us a corporeal patronus?"
Lucia muttered a quick "shit" under her breathe before standing up in front of the class. She lifted her wand and began thinking of the happiest thought she could remember, only to be reminded that her only good memories were now laced with cynicism and bitterness. After mustering an image of a vacation to Florence in which her mothers boyfriend, at the time, became possessed by a wandering spirit and began dancing on the tables of the dining hall to Stevie Nicks.
"Expecto Patronum." She said, trying to sound strong. A soft mist floated out of her wand and landed lamely on the floor.
The professor looked at her for a moment before turning back to the class. "That was not a patronus. I was told by one Harry Potter that the students who were members of the D.A can perform patronus' without trouble. May I see those who can produce one?"
Lucia's eyes scanned the room as nearly all of it's inhabitants suddenly produced prancing silver creatures. She grit her teeth and looked at Malfoy who simply stood there as well, looking equally put out.
The class was dismissed and Lucia instantly fused to Draco's side, her eyes wide with questions.
"No happy memories to pick from then? Or were you just too overwhelmed by the professors beauty?" Lucia asked, sarcastically.
"Growing up with dark magic looming over me didn't give me much of an opportunity to be happy. I was always irritated or scared. Things change you know, people do. My mum and dad, they love me, just in a rough sort of way. And I'm getting to be my own and that's alright too."
"I think I just made everything bad in my mind. You know, my life isn't so terrible. I certainly didn't live all honey and roses, but I lived well. My mother loves me, as well as any man who comes her way. I just... I just grew up knowing how unhappy she was. I always knew it was because of those men. So I decided I can't be like her, I won't. I can't sleep around like she does and pretend it's alright."
"You are not your mother you know. You hardly even look like her." Draco said, running his hand through a lock of her hair.
Lucia just looked at him for a moment, her eyes soft and dazed.
Draco seemed to snap out of whatever trance he was in. His face hardened immediately and he started rushing down the corridor without Lucia. After getting about twenty feet away from her he turned back and exclaimed "Don't forget, potions tutoring after dinner."
"I wouldn't for the world." she muttered, still slightly foggy from the encounter.
The Great Hall was already filled to the brim. Her friends were all seated and they saved Lucia a spot.
"Oh Lu, I did mean to remind you, we were going to talk about that very important transfiguration project tonight after dinner, weren't we." Katherine said.
"Oh Kat, shit. I have another study session with Draco."
"What are you going to do, study his anatomy?" Bernice added, laughing.
Lucia glared at her. "I'm so sorry, I can cancel it if you'd like but I feel like passing potions is more urgent. Can the transfiguration wait?"
"I suppose so." Katherine sighed. "I just hope this Draco-thing will only distract you for so long."
"There is no Draco-thing." Lucia defended.
"Whatever you say darling." Meghan concluded.
Lucia rolled her eyes and stared across the hall at the Slytherin table to see two cerulean eyes shimmer back at her. She unconsciously smiled and blushed before looking down at her meal, hoping he hadn't seen the pink in her cheeks spread across her face.
That night, while the two of them were making the Drought of the Living Dead, Draco had slily put his hand around Lucia's waist and was steadying her arm as she dropped in ingredients. He had a gentle voice that lulled her as the dark potion simmered underneath her.
"Draco," Lucia simpered, only to remember that she never simpers "I don't suppose you like me do you. I mean as a friend because I feel like I can trust you, and, you see, I just am not I can do this."
Draco's mind immediately jumped to conclusions as he felt like his heart was being crushed.
Lucia saw the look on his face and immediately made it more clear. "I mean I can't make this potion; these beetles, they won't let me cut them. And I am having such trouble Draco." She was simpering again.
"Here," Draco said, grasping the hand that held the knife. He crushed the beetle and squeezed the juice into the potion. "Just an old trick a friend taught me." His eyes were sad and Lucia could see that this old friend meant something to him.
"Thank you." she whispered, her eyes fixed on his and brow furrowed.
"You need to stir, Lucia. Or else it will burn."
"Oh fuck!" She yelled, before scrambling to stir the concoction.
"Here." Draco muttered, yet again grasping her hand and moving the spoon in a slow, steady, circular motion.
The potion was finally done and the two bid each other goodnight. Instead of shaking hands or waving, they shared an embrace, the first of many. They were both fixated on the feeling of unity.