A/N: Hi! This is my first story (more of a drabble, really) written for a challenge: The Valentine-Making Station, to be exact. Luna was never my favorite, but I've always liked her; when this popped into my head, it intrigued me. I tried to explore what Luna would be like after the war. There's no way she'd be the same; nobody was.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Everything belongs to JKR. Do you think I'd be able to dream up Harry Potter?
The porch steps creaked. They didn't use to. But when the Death Eaters had stormed their house, someone had fired a curse at the entryway, and it had wrecked part of the foundation. The creaking wasn't the only sign of the damage that had been wrought, but it was one of the more obvious. Another example of the damage inflicted by the war was Luna Lovegood herself, who noted the creaking as she stepped down her rickety porch steps into her hilly front yard.
It was a fresh summer's day, the type the old Luna would have loved. The Drigible Plums were abandoning their blossoms in favor of juicy fruits, and the stream by her home flowed clear and azure. The brown patches in the grass (Xenophilius hadn't bothered watering the lawn with the usual plum juice; it hadn't been a good season, and he had reverted to plain water) were starting to turn green again, to match the rest of the hilly lawn around their home.
But the new Luna only saw imperfections. The leaves of the plums were a little bit more shriveled than they used to be; the banks of the river seemed drier. And Luna herself...well, she was imperfect in so many ways.
"Tell us! Where. Is. Potter!"
"I really don't know! I've told you-"
"Lies! Crucio!"
Her screams filled the air until they were mercifully cut short.
The old Luna would have sniffed the air for the scent of the Wrackspurts. They had a very subtle scent. If she smelled anything, she would quietly retreat back into the house, shutting the door quickly so as to not let any in. The new Luna looked for imperfections everywhere; her greatest source was herself.
Her mother used to tell her that she was perfect, that she was beautiful the way she was.
"Well, you aren't here anymore, are you Mum?" she thought bitterly. You'd messed up a spell, and boom! You're gone, and I'm alone…
Dad was nice company and all, but nobody could really get a girl like her mother. But Pandora Lovegood would never be there for Luna again. And Xenophilius...he wasn't the same. There were shadows in his pale blue eyes that Luna knew would never fade away.
Luna walked over to her porch, and reached up for the little decoration that hung in front of their door. She had made it when she was eight, using poppies that her father had enchanted so they'd never wilt, bits of twine dipped in stream water, some blades of grass, a small shard of glass, and a pretty little stone she'd found washed up on the bank of the stream. She lightly pulled it off the hook it hung on, and tilted it slightly so the little glass shard showed her reflection. There was a wide gash stretching across her left cheek that had never quite healed (probably because her skittish father had refused to take her to St. Mungo's, and had attempted healing it himself), and her hair seemed flaxen and pale compared to the vivid blonde it had once been.
Her eyes had changed the most. What were once her mother's vivid blue eyes were now her father's pale, sunken blue-grey eyes. Shadows seemed to dance beneath her irises, and she winced at how they had changed.
But then again, what hadn't? Luna wasn't the same; three years of war and months in captivity had seen to that. Her optimistic, whimsical nature was gone, replaced by a cynical, sarcastic outlook. She was basically a different person.
She was a different person, and she couldn't be Luna Lovegood anymore.
She pulled out her wand from her jacket pocket. It was a beautiful thing: pear with a unicorn hair core. It had been taken from her during her stint in Malfoy Manor, though, and had seemed somewhat tainted ever since.
Luna murmured a charm that she remembered her mother using quite often. Clumps of her tangled blonde hair fell to the wooden porch. She Vanished the mess, and repeated the charm until her hair reached her chin. Then, with a wave of her wand, her hair turned a dull brown. She'd been going for a nice auburn, but it would do. After a few minutes, her eyes had turned brown (they still looked haunted), her features were sharper (they still retained some vestiges of softness), and she looked a little bit chubbier.
Good, she thought. I don't look anything like myself. Brilliant.
Over the coming years, Luna changed even more. She grew reckless and cynical. The eccentric notions were gone from her head, replaced by a bleak realism. Some part of her was broken.
The mirror still reflected Luna Lovegood, though. The different appearance couldn't change that. Somewhere, inherently, she was Luna Lovegood, and would always be.
War always leaves scars, and you can't change yourself.
Moon - Write about Luna.
Butterfly - Write about someone emotionally, mentally, and/or physically fragile.
Blue - Write about a Ravenclaw.
Wax Lips - These make you look like you have major lip injections. Write about a character who changes his/her appearance.