Lily Potter
Drunk
"Yes! Sign right here! No--no, here--or, hahah Merlin, um--aaah forget it, you look like a smart guy, just--just sign somewhere!"
Bottom of her shirt pulled out in front of her and forming one blurry mess of black-and-white in front of her vision, Lily couldn't help but giggle as the finger she was trying to point with found nowhere to set itself. The man in front of her with marker in hand looked just as amused as she was, but probably for other reasons than her wavering vision. He was forgotten, however, as another shot glass was set in front of her by an equally giggling Elizabeth Fortescue, and all Lily's attention was on the drink in question (which she downed just as quickly as she had the last five... ten... sixteen? Ahahahha, well, anyway, it'd been a long night!).
She smacked it down on the bar in victory, feeling the potent liquid rush through her and straight to her brain. For the first few there had been that weird buzz feeling in her head, but now that was gone and each one was more like a punch to her already failing awareness. But it was okay, it was her hen party, she could drink as much as she wanted and--ahahah, but they'd all been drinking a lot and haaa they were going to have to get a room to collapse in, there was no way anyone was going to Apparate and--
---"WHAT THE--aahaha, MARLIE, don't SCARE ME LIKE--SHIT!"
Lily wasn't sure what happened between spinning around to see Marlie and Gillian showing the next guy towards her shirt and being dumped unceremoniously on the floor, but it didn't matter because it was so fucking hilarious. Everyone in the bar was staring at her and there was probably a loooong black mark across her back, but Lily didn't mind.
She wouldn't remember in the morning anyway.
Maternal Love
"Sssh, baby, come on--Harry, sssh..."
Lily's soft coo's and rocking of the tiny boy did nothing to quell the loud cries that filled the nursery, and the whole house. Her eyes were rimmed with red and bloodshot and she was ready to collapse, but none of that right now had anything to do with the fact that she'd been sitting in the same position for three hours straight, now at four in the morning, trying to calm down her very loud and fussing baby. She just--she wanted to cry, to see him flailing around like this in her arms restlessly and screaming because each shrill note reminded her that he was in pain and every degree of heat that his little body transferred into her's was killing her just a little.
It had just been a stupid little cold, they had been taking him for a walk in Godric's Hollow to see the Christmas lights--he loved to stare at the twinkling colors watch the designs they made for hours on end--and it had gotten later than they had realized and... He had a sneeze the next day, but they had decided to let it pass, but all of a sudden tonight that little sneeze had exploded into a fever of 102 and Mungo's was so backed up this time of year, the earliest they could get him for a real appointment was at least a week away and with James there, they had just gotten him some potions and...
"Harry, Harry, Harry..."
It was like a mantra for Lily more than anything by now, she had been sitting here with so long. Merlin, they thought they had been doing so well, he had never had a problem, never gotten a bug--but now Christmas, and he had a fever and it wasn't as bad as it could be, but he was in pain and she was so fucking scared and she felt a worse guilt than she ever imagined possible. How had they not realized how late it was? What kind of parents didn't think about how maybe their five-month-old probably couldn't handle a full half-hour, even as bundled up as he had been? What parents put his having fun above his health?
She knew that was nothing like what it had been like, but each question was another stab of guilt in her gut and Lily had to take a deep breath, possibly the millionth of the night, to stop herself. Harry didn't need her to start sobbing too, he needed her to be there and to be Mummy and take care of him even though she only had to now because she hadn't taken care of him. That was what this was this parenting thing was about, taking care of your child, and Lily was determined to sit here and take care of Harry for days if she had to.
"Harry, Harry... Sssh..."
Flustered
Frigid hail and snow or not, to Lily Evans it was the prefect day to be out in Diagon Alley. The Gryffindor rocked back and forth on her heels in uncharacteristic anticipation as she stood in the line outside of Flourish and Blott's along with what must have been five hundred other girls and women of all ages and social classes. All had one thing in common, a book tucked tightly under their arm like a precious treasure--and to most of them, there could not possibly be a treasure moreso.
The line jerked forward a few feet and Lily hadn't realized how cold she actually had been until the warming spells overcame her past the threshold. She was quite hot now, actually, and thought for a second of shedding her coat, until she was distracted by a series of flashes up ahead.Cursing her short stature, she rose up to her tiptoes and attempted to see past the heads of the tall set of chatty women in front of her and--oh Merlin! It was--!
Lily had limited vision with all of the fans crowded into the tiny bookstore, but that golden hair meters up ahead of her and that pristine smile and--it was Gilderoy Lockhart, in person and right up there and ohgodtheywereinthesameroomthiswasthemostamazingthingever! Really, to think that she was just meters away from meeting her favorite author and, beyond that, absolute standard of perfection in a man, it was mind-blowing really, and she was so blushing, oh gosh, that was the extra warmth that she was feeling now, uggh but he was so gorgeous and the line was moving up further now and he was definitely going to laugh at her for acting like such a silly little girl, but she couldn't help it because it was--
--"I--I--sorry, I--Hi, Mister Lockhart."
Baby
"AAAAAAAUGH WHERE THE HELL IS HE, WHERE IS MY HUSBAND, HE--SHIT, FUCK, MERLIN'S BALLS, AAAAH--okay, okay, I--WHERE IS JAMES, WHY IS HE STILL NOT HERE!?"
The group of eight or so Healers that were crowded around Lily's bed jumped back simultaneously at her last sentence, except for one. Naija Patil stood calm as calm could be beside the laboring mother and continued to run the tests she was in the middle of, speaking in a serene voice to Lily, who was growing more and more angry and frantic by the second. "Mrs. Potter, if you'll just calm down, I'm sure Healer Potter is around here somewhere, he's on call tonight," she said, before turning and motioning angrily at the interns standing around her. Her look (private and only for them) was fierce and clearly sent a message of their impending deaths if they didn't rush off and find James right away.
Naija had no more idea where Potter was than his wife, to tell the truth, but she hardly thought Lily needed any more stress than she already had put on her. Oi, she really might kill those interns if they didn't find him, though, she never liked having a baby when the father was absent. Especially when the mother was acting as batshit insane as Lily Potter was about it.
Lily screamed out in pain once more, causing a healer passing by to jump nearly out of their skin and--aaaahhahah this was not even funny, the first thing--FIRST THING--she had thought upon going into labor was that it was great timing because James was at work and they could just get him, but she'd been here for like, two freaking hours and he was nowhere to be seen and she was going to kill him for that and for how fucking much this hurt and AAAAAH SHE WAS GOING TO CASTRATE HIM TOO. NEVER. AGAIN.
Just as that thought ended and Lily had about begun to make plans to wrestle her wand from her Healer (oh, she would. She would.), a messy-haired figure came sliding into the room, looking even more tossled than usual (if it was possible) and wearing a shocked and slightly dazed look on his face.
...what had she been saying again?
First Crush
WORKING ON IT!
Happy
WORKING ON IT!
Violating Secrecy Statutes
WORKING ON IT!
Bitchy
WORKING ON IT!
Realization
WORKING ON IT!
Traumatized
WORKING ON IT!
Joy Diserafino
First Year
"Miss Diserafino, if you are under the impression that my classroom is of better use as a social arena and hair salon rather than a place of learning, you may excuse yourself now!"
A stab of fear striking her and a tiny 'meep!' escaping the eleven-year-old Gryffindor's lips at Professor Sprout's exclamation, Joy immediately jumped back around to proper position in her seat, leaving her back to Giada Vance. Her hands folded themselves in her lap and she stared down at the dingy, rusty tabletop that was her workspace in Greenhouse Three with a deep blush on her face as the rest of the class laughed quietly at the professor's chastisement of the small blonde.
Maybe it was stupid, but Joy was scared of getting in trouble with her professors, despite doing it often. All the prefects went around warning all the time about how if the teachers got too fed up with some troublesome little firstie, they liked to throw you in the Lake and give you to the Giant Squid--or worse, they would expel you and then you wouldn't be able to use your magic because there would be no more Hogwarts and there would be no more anything magical and for her that meant that there would be no more Rosalie and she had just gotten to know her sister and she didn't want to not have her anymore and what if they decided she wasn't fit out for this school at all since she had grown up as a Muggle and maybe they'd take away her magic and she didn't even know if they could do that, but she didn't really know anything yet, all of this was so new and--
--"Miss Diserafino, I told you to stop making noi--" The professor's voice paused at seeing that the noise that was coming from the Gryffindor was not this time due to whispering to a friend, but to tears. Oi, first years. They were a load of trouble, especially the ones like this. "Miss Diserafino, are you quite alright?"
Joy shook her head quickly back and forth and Professor Sprout sighed in a very thinly veiled annoyance. "Would you like to step outside for a--?"
Before her question was even finished, the tiny girl was out of her chair (knocking it over in the process), and racing out of the greenhouses and down the corridors, pigtails flying behind her. She wanted Rosalie.
First Crush
As a rule, Joy didn't go around having crushes on people.
Of course there were, like, all the hot Quidditch player types of guys that she read about in the mags and stared at and giggled over with her friends, or the random seventh year she passed in the hallway with the really nice arse every once in a while... but she didn't really consider either of those things 'having a crush'. To have a crush you had to at least know them a little bit, she figured, or else how did you know you actually liked them?
It wasn't like she wouldn't jump at the chance to shag a Quidditch player if such a crazy, unlikely situation happened to present itself. Just... that was lust, and you couldn't have a real crush because of lust. Crushes were supposed to involve some kind of emotional feelings for that other person, which was why she had never had a crush on anyone that she had 'dated' (in other words, slept with, but that just sounded so bad of her). That was why her 'relationships' never worked out, because it was all physical and no emotional because it was so much easier to attach yourself physically to a person than it was to try to go on really caring about them.
So. Joy didn't go around having crushes on people.
It was a surprise that she recognized it when did finally have one, but despite not being the brightest bulb in the box, she knew right away. Or, well, kinda. It had been somewhere, she decided, in between all the jokes he made that made her laugh out loud, and all the times he treated her with respect, and all the times he made her feel like a princess, and all the little silly things he used as excuses to give her flowers, and all the nights that he would sit around and listen to her talk for hours on end, and all the times that she kissed him and she only cared that they were kissing, and not at all about how good or bad it was.
But mostly it was all the times that she hurt when they fought, and the way that she never stopped coming back to him a day, or a week, or a month--but always coming back--later that told her.
She had a crush on Graeme Dorny.
Drunk
Joy wasn't particularly good at knowing how to handle stressful and life-changing situations. In the past, whenever something too much came up for her to handle, she would run to Daddy or Rosalie and have her more responsible relations fix everything for her. She wasn't sure that she could remember one single time in her life akin to this, where she was completely and utterly alone in her mistake--this wasn't just any mistake, Joy already knew that Daddy wouldn't find this mistake amusing in the least, and her sister had already made it clear that if she had made it, she wanted nothing to do with it.
A part of her wanted to blame Rosalie more than anything for this, because she was the one that had suspected in the first place, she was the one who bought her the test and forced her to take it and the irrational part of her brain was yelling that her sister had somehow magically caused this baby to appear and it was all some jealous plan to overtake their father's good favor. Joy knew that she couldn't keep such an insane idea in her mind for long... but it sure as hell felt good for tonight.
Throwing back the remainder of the amber liquid in her glass, she flopped down on the couch in their living room. Their living room, it was funny, because there wouldn't be a 'their' living room once Rosie came home tonight--that's right, what time was it? Okay, only three, fine, she had hours to sober up and hide the firewhiskey before she came home. Rosalie wouldn't like it if she saw that her baby sister, who was carrying a baby, was laying around and drowning her woes.
Pfft, Joy didn't know why she cared about what her sister thought. It was just ridiculous, obviously she didn't care about Joy, so why should Joy care about her? It was ridiculous--ridiculous like how the bottle was already empty and when had the finished all of that? Ugh, it didn't matter, she was so drowsy, she should just go to sleep, maybe when she woke up it'd all turn out to be a bad dream...
Innocent
"I want you to get out--GET OUT! I'm sending you back home to your father, he can deal with you, but I won't stand for you to ruin the holiday, you brat!"
An eleven-year-old Joy Diserafino sat in the bed she shared with her sister, Rosalie, absolutely cowering against the headboard because this was a nightmare, this was not how she wanted Easter to turn out and--she just had a cold, she had a cold and wanted some medicine and they didn't have any so Rosalie had volunteered to go and get her some at the local apothecary and now her mother was mad that Joy had made her sister leave during Easter dinner and this was not how it was supposed to happen.
"I didn't mean for her to, I need it, it's going to--"
"I told you already tonight that I didn't want to hear your bloody whining, now pack up your shit and get to the floo--why--WHY ARE YOU STILL SITTING THERE, YOU WORTHLESS CHILD!?"
These words finally compelled the girl to move, pushing herself off the bed and throwing her things into her overnight bag with an astounding pace as Adaleen muttered things like 'ruined my life and now you ruin my holiday too' and 'so glad I don't have to take care of you'. Now Joy just wanted to get out of here too, agreeing to come and see her mother had been a mistake in the first place and she was never going back, she was never listening to a thing Rosalie said again. Just on cue, there her sister appeared in the doorway with a small bag in her hands, but just as quickly as she arrived, she had to sidestep their mother dragging a young blonde and her half-packed bag out by the back of her shirt. The look Joy gave her sister in that split second that they passed was nothing but pure hurt and confusion.
She should have never tried.
Best Friend
WORKING ON IT!
Felt the Prettiest
WORKING ON IT!
Traumatized
WORKING ON IT!
Juliet Dearborn
Maternal Love
The slamming of the door to the nursery resonated throughout the whole huge house, but the baby laying in her crib did not startle in the least. If anything, even at a mere four months old, Aemelia Nott was used to the sound of doors slamming. With parents like she had, slammed doors, raised voices, and thundering footsteps were a normal occurance around the house. Juliet swore that the infant had accquired the ability to ignore when her parents were arguing, because there was no other way that the kid could get as much sleep as she did around this place.
Or maybe she was just content in the knowledge that whatever it was would be forgiven (rather, pretended to be forgotten so that apologies wouldn't have to be suffered through) within the next day or two.
Right now, however, it was time for ranting and not forgetting, although the look on Aemelia's face as she blurrily looked up into her mother's aggravated features said that she didn't understand at all why Juliet was there bothering her over it. Juliet rolled her eyes as she reached into the crib and lifted the tiny child off of her blankets. "Don't give me that look," she told her. "I still haven't forgiven you for spitting up on me last night, you're lucky I'm even talking to you."
Even after four months of having this child in her life, Juliet hadn't really gotten that whole feeling of being maternal in her. She'd learned how to change the diapers and feed her and dress her and all that stuff quickly enough, she just didn't feel... well, mummyish. The Healers said it wasn't post-partem depression, and Juliet knew that it wasn't some horrible ramification of her less-than-parentally-influenced childhood, because of all things, that was what drove her to pay attention to her. It was... maybe it was that she really hadn't connected at all with this sentient being that she was supposed to have created.
A tight tug on her hair brought Juliet out of her reverie and she looked down to see a still-puzzled baby in her arms. She sighed. "Fine, since you're so nosy--if you really must know, your father decided to be late from work tonight, as he has been the last week and I really am fed up with it because I shouldn't have to be the only one to wrestle you through a bath and bedtime and--yes, don't act innocent, young lady, you know how difficult you are in the evening."
Aemelia pulled a face, but was obviously still listening... sometimes Juliet reckoned that the little girl could understand everything that she was saying and that she was a brilliant linguist somewhere in there. "So, when I told your father that he owed me a whole week of changing diapers for this, he said that we should have the house elf do that, but then I said that that was who I was raised by, and so the conclusion is that Daddy is being a dirty bastard and that you should spit up on him at every chance you get in utter spite and retribution."
Had she not been looking into the infant's face, Juliet might have missed the short giggle that emanated from Aemelia's lips, but--no, that had definitely happened, the baby had definitely just laughed at something she had said, and she suddenly couldn't help the twitch on the side of her lips that indicated that she wanted to smile. Juliet was not one to be made to smile if she was determined not to, and so she at first felt a bit alarmed by whatever weird happiness was making her do it, but... but the alarm wore away quickly at realizing how nice this sudden warmth felt. It was a warmth that made her want to just... holy crap, hug someone, specifically this child she had and she did and--
--oi, Aemelia was never going to let her hear the end of this.
Baby
"Well, I don't see why she won't! It's ever-so-frustrating, really. I mean, when I was a newlywed I wasn't given a week before my parents and I were telling me to get on with this heir business and--I suppose she doesn't have parents now to tell her that, though, so I've just had to lay it on twice as thickly. It is my grandson we're talking about, anyway, so I suppose I should have more say than most--ah! Juliet, dear, I didn't see you over there... come in, come in!"
Juliet had, in fact, been standing in the doorway to Victoria Nott's salon for a few minutes, and she was quite certain that the other woman had known she was there and had, in fact, intended for her to overhear her and her friends' conversation. This was why Juliet hated coming here, she hated her tactless, pushy, nosy, stupid mother-in-law and it was hardly pleasant to have to sit through tea with a sore tongue from all the biting.
But she went anwyay, because she was supposed to, even if Juliet got a great kick out of defying the stereotypes and being a rebel and, quite frankly, a pain in people's arses. Yet she had only been married to Rhys for under two months and, well... if she was truly unlucky (as was her current idea), she would have to deal with this woman for as long as she would have to deal with her son--the rest of her life. That was a long time to be glaring daggers at one another, even if Juliet did so enjoy the feeling of knives at her back. So she sat down across the small table from Victoria and her friends (she didn't even remember their bloody names, they were just a couple gossip hounds anyway) with what she tried to make into a smile, but turned out completely indifferent.
"It's fine, Mother," --what an offending name, but Victoria absolutely demanded it-- "I haven't been here long."
"Oh, what a relief!" Fucking liar. "You would not have wished to walk in on our previous conversat--well,actually, Juliet, now that I think of it, it really is something you should hear! I was just telling Druella about your--ah, persistence in the matter of bearing my son a child and then Eliza chimed in to say that she agreed with me completely with what we spoke of earlier and..."
"Oh yes, very much a duty! A privelage!" Eliza chirped, and she sounded near to a robot.
"Neither of us," Druella motioned between herself and Eliza, "were lucky enough to produce a son, but Victoria was absolutely blessed and--darling, well, it's just such a waste of poor Rhys to see you not carrying a child for him!"
Juliet felt sick at the talk. It wasn't that she really cared that they were still pushing this baby thing on her,because Circe knew that she had grown accustomed to tuning it out. It was something else much worse that was making her sick, and as she opened her mouth to speak, Juliet knew that it wasn't the morning sickness for once that was making her feel this way. "Actually..."
Betrayed
Caradoc,
Darling, you'll never believe it, but the Hookes have been so kind as to invite us to their villa in the south of France this weekend! We're leaving straightaway now and we'll be gone for the next four days. Filkes will take care of you and your sister in our absense, we've already told him all about it. We'll think of you both!
Love,
Mum
The swirly, neat writing of her mother was blotched and stained with wet spots, the already crumpled up paper sustaining even more damage than her brother had already done to it. Juliet Dearborn, five years old, sat quietly on the floor of Caradoc's room, the only noise soft, small sobs that she was, for once in her life, not trying to hold in.
He didn't know that she was there and he would probably be angry if he caught her there, but she had needed to find her stuffed centaur and Caradoc liked to hide her things when he was mad at her and he had seemed mad, but she hadn't really known why until she found the piece of balled up paper thrown on the floor.
By all means, it shouldn't matter to them that their parents, who barely paid attention to them anyway, were going to be gone for a few days and be out of their hair, but this time it was different. This time they weren't just abandoning their children to the house elf because they felt like getting away, this weekend was different, this Saturday was Juliet's birthday and--well, her parents had never paid attention to their birthdays before (or would shower them with presents months later on a date that they no more than guessed at), but this year wasn't supposed to be like that. She had reminded her father and he had promised he would be there and they would all go out and then he would buy her whatever she wanted and--
--"Juliet, what in the hell are you--oh."
Fighting to gain control of her tears because she reufsed to let Caradoc see her cry (she couldn't let him think she was soft and that he could just get his way all the time) and failing, Juliet didn't know what else to do. Throwing the letter--note, it was more like a note--to the floor, she raced past her brother and out of the room.
She hated her parents. She hated them.
Drunk
Juliet Dearborn hated drinking--in fact, she hated other people drinking too, because she hated idiots and that was exactly was drinking made you; a bloody idiot with a lack of sense of balance. She'd never even tasted alcohol apart from the wine that her parents served at family dinner, and even that she tried to avoid. She'd never thought that anyone could persuade her that it would be a good idea to go out and have a few drinks... and yet somehow, Ellie Bell, her friend that she was the least likely to take advice from and listen to, had done it.
It had seemed like a good enough reason; she had just dumped Rhys (he so had not dumped her) and Ellie had said that all the girls in the dorm should have a toast to new beginnings. She pulled out a bottle of firewhiskey from Merlin knows where, poured herself, Emmeline, and Anneliese glasses, then shoved one into Juliet's hands before she could refuse.
Why not just one? It wouldn't hurt, and just a little bit of celebration was never a bad thing.
The alcohol had burned its way down her throat and she remembered hating it but not much between that and the point that she had ended up giggling--giggling and rolling on the floor laughing at some stupid joke that Emmeline had made about hippogryffs (she didn't even get it, it was just hilarious) and Ellie was pouring out her third glass. And apparently it was also three in the morning, but as Juliet looked up at her clock she found even that to be absolutely side-splittingly hilarious even the drowsiness was taking over swiftly.
"Aaaaahahaha, fuck hippogryffs, fuck Rhys, he--he looks like one anyway, he---ahaha I don't even know what I'm saying, but I DO know that I'm soooo glad that I broke up with---ahaha nevermind, goodniiiiight--"
She never drank again.
First Crush
WORKING ON IT!
Humble
WORKING ON IT!
Traumatized
WORKING ON IT!
100 Words
Martin/Nicole
"Come onnnn, you'd be strung black and blue over one of those goalposts right now if it weren't for me!"
Nicole, arms crossed, rolled her eyes all through her stalk back to the locker room, attempting very hard to not acknowledge the presence of a certain blonde beater trailing behind her. This, however, seemed to be doing nothing but making him more persistent--she really should have known, by now.
"Admit it, admit it, admit it, admit it, admit it, admit---"
Martin might have gotten further if it weren't for the fact that somewhere in between all his annoying repetition, that loud mouth of his had found a better occupation for itself. While Nick was certain that he didn't know what was happening until she was half through spinning around on, grabbing, and kissing him, he really didn't seem to be protesting until she pulled away a good half-minute later. Nick took a step back and regarded him with a flat gaze.
"Yes, thank you. You saved my life and I've no idea what I'd do without you," she recited in a bored manner. A second later, however, her lips twitched up into a slight smirk. A hand went out to push him off in the other direction, towards the men's locker rooms. "Now go change, for the love of Merlin. You smell like arse."
Ian & Katie
"... love you and I just wanted to know, ah; Liz Fortescue, will you marry--FUCK, OW, I mean--shit, Katie, don't tell your mum that I--"
Ian Bell nursed the wound--wound, if that girl wasn't a fucking good chaser in the making then he didn't know what--to his forehead and picked his daughter's rejected bottle off the living room floor. Despite knowing that the two of them were the only people in the house, he glanced around in a paranoid manner to make absolutely sure Liz wasn't hiding behind some corner. The bad thing was, it wasn't even the proposal that he feared her overhearing, but the choice expletive that he had just used in front of the infant staring at him on the couch.
Finally satisfied that they were alone, Ian rose up off his knee and pushed the ring box back into his pocket. Scooping Katie up off the couch and into his arms, he presented her again with her bottle and flopped across the length of the furniture with her. He smiled down at the little blonde head nestled up against his body--couldn't help it, really. She was bloody gorgeous.
"So if you're anything like your Mum, I should probably give the restaurant a bell about clearing our table of possible projectile weapons before I do this."
Lily & Harry
Lily was quite certain that if her sixteen-year-old self could see her now, she would be slightly disgusted. The way that she hummed a nursery rhyme and bounced her one-year-old son on her hip while she walked around the kitchen, wand juggling in midair pots and pans of food and place settings to set the table for dinner--dinner she'd been working on for hours because that's what she did when she didn't have a job... yes, a younger Lily might have been shocked and appalled at that sight.
She gave her wand's previous burden a soft landing on the table just in time to levitate a sippy cup off the counter to place itself in Harry's tiny hands, very narrowly avoiding a full-out cry from him. She had felt the soft rumbling in his chest, heard the quickened breaths, just knew that he was going to choose that exact moment to be upset with the lack of attention she was paying to him.
Yep, she was an expert mum.
You know, Lily Potter honestly hadn't thought for the longest time that she would ever be able to live with just being a stay-at-home mum. She'd always been one of those women--not a feminist, per se, but one of those women that believed that a woman should go out and better herself and achieve and not let an antiquated stereotype push them into a life so centric around home and family. It wasn't as if she were unhappy where she was in life, but--
"Lily, I'm home!"
"Dinner's ready!"
--maybe she was a little worthy of that disgu--
"Daaaaa!" came a gurgled, excited squeal from in her arms.
Nah.
Lucy & Luna
"Maman, est-ce que je peux porter ceux-ci?"
Lucy reached out to receive the pair of earrings--some rather large, bright raddish earrings, as it were--that had just been presented to the forefront of her vision. She smiled widely, and then a little wider upon glancing down into the bright face of the little blonde girl sitting in between her legs. The toddler seemed to love looking through her mother's numerous boxes of odds and ends with her, usually finding several things to add to her own collection. Lucy didn't really regret losing her treasures at all, not when her daughter always seemed to find a better use for them. "Ah oui, ils sont mignon super!"
The girl stood up so that she was face-to-face with her mother and closed her eyes as if awaiting for some sort of magic to happen. That it did--Lucy carefully removed Luna's diamond studs and replaced them with the much more flashy pair of earrings. When she opened her eyes, she was glowing like the objects really had simply cast a spell on her.
"How are they!"
"Almost as beautiful as Luna Solaria Lovegood herself, I think!" Lucy exclaimed, eliciting a squeal from her daughter.
"I'm never ever taking them off!"
"And you should not, with something that is so perfect for you--now run off and show Papa, he will want to see you."
Lily & Liz
"Boys suck," proclaimed Lily Potter matter-of-factly. As if to fortify this motion, her plastic spoon stabbed into the carton of ice cream that was currently nestled in her lap. She muttered a few choice words as said spoon snapped straight in half under the influence of her ferocity of statement. "Like spoons. Spoons and boys suck."
Liz Bell wanted to smirk, but hid it under a very serious frown and nod upon looking up from her maternity magazine. "Let's boycott them."
Groaning, Lily pushed the ice cream off to the side--Galatea gleefully took this chance to bury her whiskers in the rejected treat--and flopped back onto the pillows of her bed dramatically. At three months pregnant, morning sickness was abounding, fatigue was setting in hard, cravings were getting more disgusting by the day, she was starting to notice that she just wasn't fitting into clothes quite right anymore, and she was really, really not feeling men. Who better to call at three in the morning (James was on call that night) on a Wednesday night, begging for ice cream and an ear to complain to but her best friend in the world? Her best friend who was sympathetic enough, what with her own kid and all, to know exactly what she was going through.
"Unnngh, Liiiiiiz," she moaned, closing her eyes because from this plane of sight she could see perfectly the curve of her belly. When that little curve was something that you currently associated only with throwing up and feeling like shit, it was really not something she wanted to see. "Just tell me it gets better than this."
"Nope." Blunt. Liz was always so blunt, but the even louder moan this elicited from the redhead on the opposite end of the bed seemed to make her rethink her answer for a moment. Normal Lily would have probably appreciated her honesty, but everyone knew all too well that Pregnant Lily was a far (and rather frightening at times) cry from Normal Lily. "Well... okay, so I guess it has its moments. Sometimes. Not often, but--oi, no, I'm sorry, I can't lie. It sucks."
Lily made a sound of frustration and threw James' pillow over her head, muffling her speech. "Boys suck."
"Yep. Let's boycott them."
Davy/Ellie
"He doesn't hate you."
"Does too."
"Does not."
"Prove it."
"Fine," Ellie accepted, and she bit her bottom lip in a musing manner. Her hand in Davy's hair stopped as she thought hard about what to tell her boyfriend to convince him that her brother didn't---oi, this was tougher than she had anticipated. "Well... let's see... He hasn't... You're... --Oi, Davy, this is besides the point. He just doesn't, okay? Hasn't killed you yet, has he?"
"Only 'cause it's against the law." The look the Gryffindor gave her from the spot his head rested on her lap was nothing but pure disbelief. Elspeth scrunched her nose as if thinking hard on a good comeback, then sighed and put her head against the bark of the tree she sat against.
"Yeah, well... that's still something, isn't it? It's just family dinner, not like you're asking him for my hand or anything."
Davy smirked, a mischievous gesture that Ellie knew all too well by now. "And what if I did?"
"David Michael Gudgeon! Not funny!" she exclaimed, laughing against her will as she playfully hit him in the shoulder.
The light smack hadn't hurt, but he cringed for show as he laughed along with her. "Kidding, kidding..." he assured her, before his tone and visage went a little more serious. Davy rose his brow up at her. "Just family dinner?"
"Just family dinner. I'll even hide the key to the torture chamber, if you want."
"Okay, now that's not funny."
Dominic/Rhea
He hated her, Dominic did.
The way that she always had to wear the dresses that showed off her curves just right, the way that she smiled at him, just seductively enough to be noticed, from across the room, the way that she had to be so goddamn attractive--and the way she had the gall to be all of this, and his little sister too.
It made Dominic want to scream sometimes, because he was convinced that she was playing a cruel game with him. It had to be all her, because a 17-year-old boy didn't just randomly become attracted to his sibling. It was perverted, it was disgusting, it was wrong, it was--she was such a fucking slag.
Only slags had him staring at them the whole night, watching with such intent each lithe movement of their body, glaring daggers at each boy that dared approach them for a dance. Rhea was a slag alright, and that was why he hated her, even if at the same time he knew that this was completely untrue... Dominic liked the lie much better. The lie at least meant that he was still sane.
The soft feeling of Rhea's hand on his snapped Dominic out of his daze, and he did his best not to look too shocked at how close she had gotten without him noticing. He hid behind his glass for a moment, the remainder of the brandy leaving a trail of fire down his throat, much like her touch left a trail of fire on his skin. A long moment later, possibly too long a moment, he brought the glass down at looked at her, an eyebrow arched in feigned annoyance. "What?"
"If you want to dance, you only have to ask."
Otto/Lily
He made her so angry sometimes, he really did. He was just--no words, there were no words for how he had spoken to her the night before, and in front of all the prefects too! House elves? He thought she was treating them like house elves? Well, she'd show him bloody house elves--no idea how, but she would. Somehow. Stupid James, stupid Halloween, stupid--
"Excuse me?"
Lily looked up from the paper that she had been taking notes on (and simultaneously almost writing holes through) to see the tentative face of Otto Bagman hovering over her. Tentative, she figured, because the look on her face could have been nothing but frighteningly angry; with a deep breath, she turned her expression into a tight, painfully fake smile. "Hm?"
"Oh, well--I was just wanted to tell you that my team is done with the east wing of the maze."
"Oh... Thanks, Otto." To her surprise, the prefect's words made her smile just a little easier, more genuinely. Maybe it could have been put off to the fact that she was pleased that work was finally getting done, or maybe it could have just been the way that anything he said seemed to make her feel better. It was a slightly alarming feeling, the way that he could cheer her up like he did... almost like James used to be able to, before--stop, Lily, dangerous thoughts, she reprimanded herself.
"Is there anywhere else you want us to work on?" he asked after a moment of silence. "I know we're behind schedule, so--"
"--No. I--Don't worry about it, we'll be fine. Your team can go ahead and--" it felt like the hardest thing she'd ever said "--leave, if you want to." He looked stunned, but nodded and walked away quickly, as if she could change her mind at any moment.
It took all of her will not to watch him go.
Graeme/Joy
"Come on, Joy, it's only been a week," Erin Jugson sighed, patting the other girl on the back while she cried into her shoulder. "I'm sure it can't be over."
This didn't seem to help at all--in fact, it only made Joy wail louder, and Erin was rather certain that the neighbors didn't appreciate this at all. Awkardly, she pushed her friend, still permanently attatched, out of the hall (where she'd been attacked the second the door opened) and into her apartment. Erin and Joy fell rather haphazardly into some sort of sitting position on the couch, still no sign of the hysterics stopping.
"L--listen to you--yourself! A--A week! It n--never take--takes this long a--and i--it's over a--and he ha--hates me and I don't know--know what to d--do with--without h--him!" Joy was barely understandable with the way she was choking on tears, but Erin got the general idea. Still, she wasn't worried. Honestly, she'd cried harder than this when she and Graeme had called it quits for a whole four days, and even if it had been a week, she was fairly certain that there was no way the two of them wouldn't work out whatever stupid reason they'd broken up over eventually. That's just how Graeme and Joy worked--they argued and broke up at least once every month or so over some of the dumbest things, but they were way too crazy about each other to ever stay away for long.
Honestly, she wished they'd grow up, though. Erin did tend to get tired of this crying routine. "Look, let's... let's just calm down and we'll get some ice cream and--"
"---no! Ice--ice cream won't f--fix this! I--he--he hates me, E--Erin! It's all o--ver! I'm so stu--stupid, I--"
Erin's head turned away from Joy mid-sentence at the sound of a tapping on the window behind them. Graeme's owl. She looked back at the girl, raising an eyebrow in tired amusement.
"All over, huh?"
Grayson/Bella
"You know, when He said 'act as a couple', I don't think He meant this."
"And you're complaining?"
"Not for a second."
Not that there was any doubt about that, Bellatrix thought. If Grayson had any complaints, there would not be a pool of clothes at their feet. He would not be kissing her with the same violent fierceness with which she was kissing him. They would not be stumbling towards his bed, falling into it all wrapped up in each other, relishing the complete taboo of it all.
They were the sort of people that lived for the taboo.
Rodolphus aside, she had always known that Grayson was her kind of man. And what was the harm if she just happened to... forget to mention that, this to her darling husband? What did it matter anyway? Grayson was no different than Anthony, no different than any man where her relationship with Rodolphus was concerned. Were the worst to happen, were the truth about this mission of hers to get out... at least it would provide some amusement.
Apparently Bella had shown a bit of absence in her actions at these thoughts, because she felt a chill overcome her. Opening her eyes, she gave Grayson a curious, slightly annoyed look. "Yes, Wilkes?"
"Are you complaining?"
She couldn't help but feel her lips twitch up into the formings of a smirk, devious, seductive, full of lust. "Not for a second."
Joy/Caradoc
WORKING ON IT!
Caradoc & Juliet
WORKING ON IT!
Frank & Lily
WORKING ON IT!
Marlie/Lily
WORKING ON IT!
Dominic/Laura
WORKING ON IT!
Phoebe & Ellie
WORKING ON IT!
Jules/John
WORKING ON IT!
Ian & Griff
WORKING ON IT!
Nicole & Caden
WORKING ON IT! |
