A/N: Thank you so much for all the reviews – I would love to thank you all personally, but a lot of you are anonymous. I'm glad you're all enjoying it. I apologise for being slow at updating, but I had a ton of work to do and I had my Grade 8 Cello exam to attempt to pass. So I hope this extract lives up to your expectations and apologies for the long author note… Enjoy!
"Lily was a very pretty woman with thick, dark red hair that fell to her shoulders and startlingly green almond-shaped eyes…Apparently, her bright green eyes were extremely distinctive, because every person who knew Lily would always see them in Harry."
"Remus was very intelligent, calm, tolerant, gentle, and good-natured. Despite having suffered a great deal of prejudice in his life due to his lycanthropy, he managed to retain an ability to see the good in almost everybody and was extremely forgiving."
"Lily?"
"Yes, Dora?"
"I don't understand why you can stand Snape –"
"Don't say that, he's just misunderstood sometimes!"
"If you say so Lily."
"Well, I do say so."
Remus wanders past the arch with his head in a book, completely unaware of the girl watching from the shadows. It's only when she takes a step forward and trips, falling sprawled on the floor that he realises the mousy girl.
"Oh, are you okay?" He offers her a hand, pulling her up. She is half his height, remaining vulnerable and extremely child like.
"I remember seeing you with Lily the other day?" She still doesn't respond, but continues to stare up at his face.
"It's Nymphadora Tonks, isn't it?" She nods.
"I'm Remus."
"I know," she replies timidly. He smiles gently and hands her the wand that had flown across the dirt ground as she tripped.
"I believe this is yours."
"Thank you," she whispers.
"You're welcome Nymphadora."
"It's Dora," she stutters.
"Dora, then." A crowd of first years bursts out of the front doors, racing each other towards the Quiddich pitch and their waiting flying lesson. He gently tugs her closer, preventing the porcelain doll from being crushed in the crowd that is nearly the same height as her. She trembles as his arms tighten around her protectively. All too soon he releases her and collects his advanced charms book from the floor.
"Well Dora, I suppose I will see you around some time. Say hello to Lily for me," he says politely. She nods slowly as he hurries off towards the main hall.
Lily is gossiping with a group of Ravenclaw girls when Dora bursts through the classroom door almost tripping over the step. The girls all titter, but Lily welcomes her.
"Dora!" The elation in her voice confuses her, but she shuffles over to her best-friend and settles on a chair, pulled out from the desk.
"So, I got asked on a date by none other than James Potter." The speaker could easily pass off as a muggle model with blond hair, long legs and a perfect figure. Each girl in the room is a vision of beauty, but only to the eye.
"Well I'd much rather Lockhart."
"He's a seventh year and clearly not going to ask you! He'd much rather me."
"Well I've always fancied that Black to be honest." Lily grins cruelly at this comment.
"Well," she laughs, "Apparently arrogance is now an attractive trait. Dora here fancies the pants off him."
"I do not!"
"Ooh, thinking about it I've seen her staring longingly at him," laughs a Ravenclaw.
"I've no idea why he'd go for her though, what is attractive about Tonks?"
"Don't be mean Sierra!" Lily says strictly.
"We all know it's the truth," Sierra hisses in reply. Dora remains in her chair, her body language becoming closer each second.
"Dora is pretty –"
"No she's not! You'd have to be blind to be attracted to that."
"Come on Dora, we're leaving." The beauty storms off, leading her complete opposite towards the grounds.
"It's just a simple matter of a makeover. I promise we can make you look beautiful. We've got a great base – we just need to adjust your features to be more prominent. So what do you want to go for?"
"I don't know," Dora mumbles. Two days have passed since the episode and the already self-conscious girl now doubts the way she looks.
"Well pick a colour!"
"Lily, I watched you in charms and I don't particularly want bubblegum pink eyebrows…"
"We're dying your hair silly! And anyway, pink is too rebellious – the teachers would kill you. So what colour? Blond? Brunette –"
"Red head." The request is quiet and quickly dismissed.
"We can't both have red hair Dora."
"I guess so."
"So what do you want?" The timid girl shrugs again.
"Let's just go with blond. This is only going to last a couple of days, a sort of tryout. Ready?"
"No."
"Multicorfors."
"Have you seen Tonks? She's gone blond – now she just looks like a tiny blond bumbling bimbo!"
"It looks like Wragspurt attacked her hair!" The laughs follow her as she passes down the corridor, trying to avoid the stares. The teasing increases as the news spreads and by the end of the day she is in floods of tears.
As the salty tears drip down her cheeks, she tries to hold back the anguish and hurt, but she knows that eventually she has to burst. She squeezes her eyes shut and tries to focus only on one face. He hadn't laughed at her when she had tripped over the carpet on the fourth floor in front of Black and Potter. He didn't make fun of her hair. It's everyone else in the world that seems convinced that she should just melt into the wall. Her fists tighten on the china sink, holding up her trembling body. She hates them all. She hates her mother, her stupid name, what she has become, what she can't do what she –
She screams out, but there's no one to hear. When her fingers finally uncurl she opens her eyes and looks straight into the mirror. The limp hair she detests has tangled across her too small nose and soaked into the tears. She closes her eyes again, brushing back yet another tear. She never could grow her hair long; she was constantly pulling it out, furious at her mother's patronising tones. If she had hair like Lily's. Lovely Lily. Lily whom everybody loved. She reaches up a hand and curls the dry straw into her fist. Wishes never came true as a child. She never believed in a god – wizard or muggle, but she wants this now, more than she ever did.
"Let me be beautiful," she whispers, "Let me forget all this hatred and become confident. Let me be Lily." She opens her eyes, but her reflection is still the same. Her aunt was a Metamorphmagus and she cannot count the number of times she has wished to have the same ability. Once when she was younger, before her mother became the agitated witch she is now she managed to change the colour of her hair. Her parents believed it to be nothing more than a non-verbal colour-change charm. Sometimes she concentrates on that memory so hard it hurts. She closes her eyes again blinking back a tear, untangling her fingers from her hair. She breathes in sharply as a knot catches. Her eyes snap open, angry again, but before she can pull out another handful she freezes, her mouth dropping into a small 'o'. The girl in the mirror copies her hair. The girl with dark chocolate hair that falls into cascades down to her shoulders. She doesn't know how she's going to explain this one, but it doesn't matter. She knows the truth now. She can be whatever she wants to be.
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