A/N: I wrote this while listening to Potter Waltz from the GOF soundtrack, as well as Harry in Winter. I'm also sorry for how behind I got with my fics and things like responding to reviews this month — the moving process took more out of me than I expected. But I *have* now moved, so everything should be business as usual now, and I'll do a proper update at the end so people can skip it if they want!
Maybe it was a show of glaring ingratitude, or maybe it was just what experience had taught her to expect when it came to Draco sodding Malfoy, but Marilyn's head was well and truly scrambled. Right when she had to be at her most focused, too. If she hadn't known better, she might have wondered whether that hadn't been his intention all along - but Draco's cruelty was not half so subtle when it surfaced, as she knew well enough. Whatever this was, it wasn't that. Of course, that just left her with the question of what it actually was, and that was a lot more difficult to sit and think about. So she didn't. Or…she tried not to. And she didn't do a very good job of that. Most of all, she took comfort in the fact that she suspected Draco was just as confused as to his motives as she was.
In the end, she made a big show in front of her Gryffindor friends of coming to the conclusion that it must've been her ballet mistress who had sent it - but that she'd done so anonymously so as not to fuel resentment among the other girls. They'd bought it with varying degrees of suspicion, but she didn't for a moment fear that they'd suspect anything close to the truth. That would necessitate believing that Draco had either a conscience or a heart, and she still struggled to believe that herself.
Avoiding him for the rest of the day was easy. The most nerve-wracking part was the walk to the dungeons so that she might join her sisters in preparing, and even then George and Fred had opted to walk with her so they could peek in and offer heartfelt words of encouragement before Madam Garnier ordered them to piss off and leave them be. To her fellow ballerinas she spun yet another tale - although one that was a bit closer to the truth. That the broom had been sent by a secret admirer, likely one who had witnessed her recent difficulties and felt the need to offer a show of support, even if it was anonymous. When one of them suggested with a giggle that perhaps it had been Viktor Krum, she didn't argue.
The broom…the broom was perfect. Sleek and elegant, the handle was wide enough for her to dance on, and smooth enough not to inhibit her without being polished to such a ridiculous shine that it made slipping a sure-fire thing. He'd absolutely nailed it, and she hated how much that brought a fierce blush to her face, even as they all went about their preparations. Her powerlessness against that blush came back to haunt her every time she met Madame Garnier's eye, her lips pressed thinly together while her eyes were knowing and disapproving all at once. Marilyn, very maturely, responded by playing dumb.
What she'd always found most difficult before a show was not practising. There was a happy medium to be found with it the day of - yes, they needed to do a hell of a lot of stretching and warming up, but the last thing they needed was to find themselves fatigued when the actual performance was upon them, so she needed to do something that she'd never been particularly good at, almost as a rule. She had to refrain from pushing herself - doing what it took to get warmed up and familiarising herself with her new broom, and then leaving it at that.
Once all that had been done, she took up a space in one of the corners of her room, sitting beside her costume, with the broom propped up against the wall beside her. She would return it after the dance. That way it wouldn't quite be a slap in the face, but nor would it look like she could forget all of the bad with one fancy gift. And anyway, who was to say it wasn't enchanted to buck of her off of the broom? No matter how much she tried to entertain such thoughts - mostly so then she couldn't be completely caught off-guard if it really did happen - it just didn't ring true. Draco was intelligent, and he could be a right nasty bastard, but he wasn't that scheming and manipulative. When he was angry he was really angry, and he couldn't hide it by being something close to nice in private just to pull off being terrible again in public. That, she suspected, had been why she hadn't seen him the night before his first big display. He wouldn't have been able to hide his hatred.
So where was that hatred now? Where did they stand? Where did she want them to stand? All questions she refused to ponder as she scraped her hair back into a bun, then dusted glitter over it - a subtle amount, if there was such a thing where glitter was concerned, because it wasn't like she was going to a rave. The make-up came next, and that was almost as much muscle-memory as the bun was. For the most part she zoned out for it, absent-mindedly dabbing dewy foundation over her face, followed by a coat of mascara, a soft pink lipstick, and then more glitter. The idea was to look ethereal and fresh-faced, they weren't taking part in a pantomime.
All of the girls around her were going through similar processes, all in similar states of quiet. It was always this way before a proper performance. No chatter, no gossip, no giggling. Just quiet. Originally it was because their ballet mistress insisted it be so, but after a while they began to understand and they no longer needed to be reminded of it, especially in a room like this free of little first years who hadn't been taught properly yet. This was the time for getting their minds right, nothing else. Everything else could wait. Maybe the way in which this had all been drilled into her was why she finally managed to shove Draco out of her mind.
Sure, with their (apparently alarmingly short-lived) hatred for one another cooling, and with those who had been the most openly hate-filled not even present for the ball, it might've been tempting to think that she somehow now had less to prove, but it didn't take very long with her to come up with a list of grievances to refute that. There were undoubtedly those who found the little stunt to be absolutely hysterical, but were smart enough to keep their mouths shut about it. Draco was still attending, wasn't he? He was the one damn well responsible for it. Then there was the fact that if she did well enough, no doubt it would reach the ears of those who hadn't been quite so clever.
Most of all, everybody in Hogwarts had witnessed her humiliation. The few who had not would at least have heard all about it. She would make sure that the same could be said for this. It was only right.
The others were garbed in pastel costumes ranging from hues of lilac to periwinkle, all designed to glimmer under the bright white light that the stage would be lit up in. Marilyn's own costume was similar, albeit in a very light shade of silver, with an identical bodice with various white gems affixed, but rather than a romantic tutu with layers of tulle that flowed with her every move, her costume boasted a pancake tutu instead - one that jutted out at her hips, exposing her legs almost in their entirety. All the better to show off her upcoming feat.
Decked out in her silver costume, white pointe shoes and white tights, she topped it all off by adding a layer of yet more glitter-laden body lotion, and then joined the others in placing a silver circlet atop her head. By the time they were done and she glanced around the room, she was sure they looked every bit the famous Beauxbatons ballerinas that the students from the other schools seemed so laughably fascinated by.
And she needed to buy into the hype to combat the nerves - for the nerves were there. Marilyn talked a big game almost as a rule at this point, but she was only human, and she was having very human doubts at that point. Ones that involved an unending slew of mental images of herself flubbing it in any and every way possible until the only way that she could calm her mind was to walk back and forth on the broom with her eyes shut, just to prove that she could.
The beginning of the ball came too quickly and too slowly, but Marilyn held her nerve. If there was any way that she was ever going to be able to prove a point to every fucker in that hall and succeed, it was this way. It wasn't like she was going in there and trying to sing or duel - this was dancing. This was her wheelhouse. It would be fine. Madame Garnier took the broom from her as the champions' waltz drew to an end, the music inside so loud that she could feel the vibrations through her shoes.
"It'll be there when you need it," she promised, turning it over in her hands "It's a fine broom."
It was the most in the way of a 'good luck' that she was going to get - but she was used to that. Offering little more than a bashful nod, she let the other girls bypass her until she was the very last in the line. It was time for her payback.
Draco watched the opening waltz with poorly concealed impatience. He had little interest in watching Potter fumble his way through the simplest of steps, nor Granger turning the colour of a cherry tomato every time Krum so much as smiled at her. What he was interested in, however, was when Baxter might make her appearance. She wasn't here - none of the Beauxbatons ballet girls were - but the teachers had been harping on and on about some special surprise for after the champions opened the ball, so it didn't take a genius to work out that they'd be appearing next.
Would his present be accepted? He supposed he'd soon find out - although he expected so. The look of wide-eyed surprise on her face as she'd opened the gift had been well worth the questions from his mother regarding it, and he'd watched with no small amount of satisfaction as she'd visibly put the pieces together and then been entirely unable to look at him for the rest of the meal thereafter. Maybe she'd be stubborn and use an old practise broom. Maybe her pride would force her to do so. But he was curious to see all the same…and a part of him that he refused to address hoped not.
The champions were ushered to the sides of the dancefloor with the rest of them, and then the double doors to the hall opened and the dancers entered. Elbowing his way to the front of the audience, Draco searched the line as they entered for Marilyn, but she wasn't near the front and he couldn't do much more to try and catch a glimpse of her without craning his neck, and that would be the very opposite of subtle. His patience was rewarded, however, when the dancers all fanned out in the middle of the dance floor one by one, until the last of their number was revealed in the centre - Marilyn Baxter. Damn her, she was beautiful. Were he less aware of who he was and his own value, he might've been awestruck at the fact that he'd kissed her.
As it was, it just seemed terribly correct - that a girl so beautiful and poised should end up in his company. And if he hadn't been so busy waiting for the dance to begin, he would have noticed his lack of consideration for her blood status in that thought. There should have at least been some form of acknowledgement of it in there - a mudblood or no, or even a more tame despite her being a Muggleborn. Instead, he simply watched and fought back a smirk as she stood at attention, one leg tucked slightly behind the other, her chin in the air, utterly poised as she waited for the music to begin. She didn't so much as glance at him - nor at the stupid Weasley git when he let out a whistle that was quickly silenced by a stern look from McGonagall.
Then the music started and there was silence. The ballerinas all moved in perfect unison, twirling and kicking in perfect mirror images of one another…with the exception of Marilyn. Her choreography was fairly uncomplicated and not particularly flashy (for her standards, anyway) - yet - serving mainly to emphasise the seamless unison with which the others danced by twirling and weaving between them, giving the others their time to shine before the finale. It was generous of her.
Draco had attended a few different ballets - mainly having been given little choice by his parents in the matter. Usually he spent the duration of them zoning out, maybe raising an eyebrow at the most impressive parts but that was the extent of it. It had just never really interested him. Until now. The ones he'd seen in the past - the prima ballerinas - all tended to have one of two expressions on their face, those either being some melodramatic look of yearning-slash-sadness, or a wide borderline manic grin that surely must have made their faces hurt as much as their feet did by the end of the night.
Baxter went for neither extreme. Instead, she floated across the dancefloor with the barest traces of a smirk playing on her lips - a warm smirk, with mirth sparkling in her eyes as though she was sharing an inside joke with the entirety of the audience. It was utterly lovely, distracting him even from the borderline sinful expanse of strong and slender leg which she displayed compared to the rest of them, and he had to keep on reminding himself that to the outside observer he wasn't supposed to show any level of joy towards her existence at all.
The older girls being the focal point of the performance went on just long enough for him to begin growing restless, even wondering if she'd nixed her little solo venture entirely, but when Marilyn disappeared behind them and they all converged in a circle to entirely block her from view, he perked up, his back straightening as though the extra inch of height might let him peek over them to see her. He hadn't seen the broom yet - had she taken it out entirely? Or would she use a different one? Maybe it would be for the best if she rejected the gift - then he could cut all ties entirely without any regret and move on. And yet he still couldn't quite hope for that outcome.
The top of her head appeared first, rising up slowly and poking up above the tightly scraped back buns of the other girls. A few head-tilts and muttered questions arose from that, but it made sense that nobody had clicked on yet. It could've always been a levitating spell. Not that any of the Beauxbatons girls needed that to look like they were weightless - because even he had to hand it to them, they were very good. The hours they put in and the way that severe professor of theirs worked them more than showed.
Only once her forehead was visible above the heads of the rest of the girls did they part, teetering back and forth on the tips of their toes to reveal her, and that was when the reactions surfaced. Draco had to bite down on the inside of his cheek to stop himself from smiling - mostly kidding himself that it was because of the stupid looks of surprise on the faces of those gathered, and not because of the dazzling white broom she balanced on, standing on on the ball of one foot.
It was little more than a foot off of the ground so far, but that was no less impressive for how she jumped on it, albeit not en pointe yet - small little backwards hops that matched the way the plucking of the strings that she danced along to, one leg stretched out behind her, her left hand raised high in the air while her right was extended forward to help her maintain her balance. Well, that was what he'd assumed - but then she turned her wrist so that her palm faced upwards and the broom rose in turn another foot in the air, then another on top of that. Much higher and they'd all be staring up her skirt. Draco didn't much like the idea of that - all those gathered gawking and nudging one another and snickering.
Thankfully, she stopped rising then, the broom perfectly still in mid-air. But before the novelty of this grand reveal could wear off, she bent at the knee and leapt higher than before, twirling mid-jump in the air so that she could face in the other direction, landing en pointe on the other foot. The smirk on her face threatened to morph into a grin at the reaction that drew from the crowd. It was then that Draco realised he had no idea at all what the other dancers were doing, but he couldn't drag his eyes off of the blonde long enough to find out. He didn't really care enough to find out, worried about what he might miss if he looked away.
It shouldn't have impressed him. Not this much. How many times had he sat and idly watched her rehearse over and over again in that dungeon classroom? More often than not, really - back before everything had gone pear-shaped. But while there was something of a novelty to the rehearsals, they weren't usually particularly thrilling - just the same move over and over again ad nauseum, with small changes that probably mattered a great deal to the actual dancer but that a casual observer hardly noticed. He hadn't even seen the full thing practised entirely, and she'd made some changes since then. Had he had anything to do with that?
She was lifting her hand again now, but rather than the broom slowly lifting in its entirety, only one side did until it sloped at an angle and she danced backwards up it with perfect ease where anybody less skilled would have surely slipped by now. Then when she reached the bristles of the broom, which now pointed at such an angle that it was almost vertical, paused for the briefest of moments, and then began to dance to the other end of the broom. Rather than hopping this time, she brought both legs beneath her and dance across the broom in a series of quick little spins - any of which could have sent her hurtling to the floor if her placement had been at all off or ill-timed. Even more impressive was how the broom continued to move as she did so, tilting in the other direction now so that the tip of the broom rose upwards all while she spun towards it, the playful smile on her face never budging at all. It was growing into less of a dance and more of a feat of gymnastics, little giving away just how difficult this all was other than the tension in her legs that the dazzlingly white tights highlighted with every movement, along with the sweat that glinted across her brow almost as much as the glitter she was doused in.
Only when the broom was at such an extreme slant that it was almost pointing entirely upwards did she stop, and he knew what would come next - she'd slide down it, land on the floor, and strike some sort of elegant pose, content in having made her point. And he was wrong. Instead she bent at the knee again and jumped even higher than before. As she did so, the broom did point entirely upwards now, just in time for her to land on the very tip of the handle, on the tips of the toes of her right foot, her left pointing up towards the ceiling behind her while her arms met above her head. The music stopped, and she was entirely still. The audience was not.
Weasley - the one she was so bloody attached to - was the first to break the silence in his typical obnoxious and uncouth manner, letting loose a whistle and some sort of belligerent shout. But Marilyn must've been used to blocking out his stupidity by now, for she scarcely reacted at all, holding the pose until the leg holding her upright threatened to tremble. It was then that the broom finally began to slope at an angle again and she hopped down onto the length of it, sliding downwards and landing elegantly onto the floor with a pleased little smile, plucking the broom from the air afterwards.
All of the girls formed a line then - the dark-haired girl, Chloe, looking particularly displeased with the ongoing applause if the pursing of her lips was anything to go by - and sank into elegant curtseys. As they did so, the skirts of their costumes began to glimmer and lengthen, transforming with the work of but one spell into evening gowns. Despite her best efforts to appear unbothered, Marilyn's smile morphed into a grin…and Draco struggled not to return it when their eyes met, his arms firmly crossed so as not to be caught clapping. He had to hand it to her, she knew how to make a point.
A/N: I'm in the process of adjusting to my new city, and I'm *finally* no longer homeless, which feels amazing to say. What's even more amazing to say is how much I'm unexpectedly loving my new city. Like, I couldn't tell you the last time I was this happy and this non-stressed. It feels amazing to say, and I'm now actually so grateful that I didn't manage to get a place in my own city, because I don't think I'd have been half as happy there as I am here. It's funny how these things work out - three months ago I was feeling utterly hopeless and crying my eyes out over getting turned down for a place I'd fallen in love with, and now I'm thanking the universe that I didn't get it. Things worked out in the end!
I've said it again, I'll say it a final time, thank you guys so much for how kind and supportive and patient you've all been throughout this process. Working on these stories has kept me sane throughout it and really gave me a sense of consistency and community, and gave me something positive in a very difficult and stressful time, so I'll always be unendingly grateful for that. Thank you so much, you amazing human beings.
Tumblr - esta-elavaris
IG - miotasach
