HOGWARTS GRAND OPENING BALL
Date: Saturday, 26 August
Time: 6:00 p.m. to Midnight
Place: Hogwarts Great Hall and Grounds
Characters Involved: Everyone! Don't forget to add your character's tag if you join the thread!
Rating: Hopefully not more than PG-13 - this is a public location, folks! Take your libidos 'home' for higher-rated stuff please! *grin*
( But first, before the dancing could begin, the Headmistress would address the crowd. )
Time: 6:00 p.m. to Midnight
Place: Hogwarts Great Hall and Grounds
Characters Involved: Everyone! Don't forget to add your character's tag if you join the thread!
Rating: Hopefully not more than PG-13 - this is a public location, folks! Take your libidos 'home' for higher-rated stuff please! *grin*
( But first, before the dancing could begin, the Headmistress would address the crowd. )
Well, there didn't seem to be a second reason.
So, it was for Hogwarts and Hogwarts alone that she attended, because really, Luna was in no mood for a party. Still, she'd found a nice dress and accompanied on her father's arm... which felt like quite a change. There should have been someone else there.
In truth, she was hoping to see Seamus. He'd said that they would still be friends, and she was holding him to it. She still wanted to be friends... if that was all they could have. It would be childish to expect more, and to run from him simply because she was hurt. Friendship was enough, she'd decided, and they would be okay.
She was vapid and dreamy as she listened to McGonagall's speech, but very much intrigued. This was definitely a new approach and would no doubt change the culture at Hogwarts, but perhaps change was good. Besides, the adventurous side of Luna wanted to see how it would work out. She was among the ones clapping at the end of the speech; softly, but still very long. In fact, she was one of the last to stop.
And now... to mingle. Luna parted from her father with hopes of finding someone she knew, but to her surprise, her heart wasn't really in it. She sort of wanted to just get a drink and find a place to herself for a while.
That is, until she noticed Seamus. And he was with someone. A girl. Luna thought she looked familiar, but she couldn't place the name. She almost turned and walked off right then... but she reminded herself how childish that would be.
It's Seamus... your friend, Seamus.
"Hello Seamus," she said as she approached, smiling in the old vapid, dreamy way.
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There was certainly a air of discomfort around, but Lavender had no idea why. She unconciously let her hand rest on Seamus' arm while sipping her drink. "What have you been up to?"
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The sudden feminine voices drew him out of this reverie, and as he looked away from the fountain he was surprised to see Lavender Brown standing quite close to him, reaching down to run her hand over his dress robes. He sprang out of his seat, to greet her more properly, then retreated a step, placing him just out of reach of the hand she’d extended towards his arm. Beyond her stood the object of his affection, stunning in a dress he’d not seen. It was one that suited her perfectly, yet appeared to be much more revealing than any she’d ever worn in his presence. It made his palms itch to look at her, knowing he could not touch her, that she did not want him to touch her; knowing that she was entirely out of his reach.
He managed a small smile in greeting to them both, “Cheers Lavender.” He nodded, returning his focus to the woman he loved. “Howya, Luna, luv lass?” If his eyes bared the pain and the heart-wrenching love that he still held for her, he was powerless to stop it. He was loathe to give Lavender a reason to taunt him, so he avoided her eyes and kept his gaze on Luna, all the while attempting and failing to harden his heart against the slings of her arrows as he had hardened his mind against a Legilimens. It was clear that he needed more practice.
“Well then, lasses, ‘twas too deep in thought o’er Headmistress McGonagall’s pronouncement to notice two such beautiful lasses approaching. Right, this Seamus must be working too hard if I’m after thinking when there’s such beauty as this to be admiring!” His voice was light and convivial, as was his wont, but his eyes never left Luna’s.
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So, maybe that's why she was so friendly with Seamus? Because, despite the distance he had put between the two of them, Luna had noticed how fondly she ran her hand over his robes. She was naive, yes, and probably didn't read as far into the gesture as another girl would have. But she did know a familiar touch when she saw one.
Still, she kept up a brave smile. "Thank you, yours as well. We went to Hogwarts together, yes? I don't remember your name." Blunt honesty, as always, but she did look genuinely interested in knowing.
The smile broadened when Seamus addressed her. "I'm doing all right. And you, Seamus?"
He was still very Seamus, which warmed and reassured her, though why she should think he would be any different was anyone's guess. Nor could she comprehend why it felt like a hand had gripped her heart and was squeezing it quite cruelly. This was more painful than she'd expected. He was watching her, and her eyes stayed with his, though the smile gave a bit. She felt suspended, held in place by some invisible force; something that wouldn't let her go, even though she was suddenly overcome with the desire to get far away from here.
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“Aye, Luna me love luv. Your This Seamus is doing as best as he can now.” Without you.
He stood there, feeling the tension between them strung tighter than the strings on his harp, the heart on his sleeve dripping blood on the floor, and said the only thing he could think of in that moment to break up the tension.
“Will you dance with me, Luna?”
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"Well, I'll be around, Seamus," she said. "Whenever you get a chance to dance. And, the name is Lavender, Luna. We were in the DA together." Apparently she was rather Loony -- how many meetings had they had? Oh, well.
She gave a half-hearted smile and walked over to the punch bowl. There was something going on between Seamus and Luna. Whatever it was she had no idea. But she made herself scarce, edging her way back into the crowd.
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She managed to gain enough control of her locomotion skills to nod. "Yes."
Ah hah! Lavender Brown; the moment she said her first name, the second fell into place in Luna's head. Now it made sense.
"Oh, were we?" The DA seemed so long ago, and Luna had been very detached to those members with whom she wasn't familiar... which was most of them, actually. She had been much younger, and even now she couldn't recall the image of a 15-year-old Lavender. Whoever Lavender was then, she seemed almost a completely new person to Luna now. A woman... and not a happy one, by the looks of it. "Loony" she may be, but she hadn't missed Lavender's quiet sigh and less than enthused smile.
"I think I upset her," Luna said, watching the woman's progression to the punch bowl. She then turned her head to Seamus... slowly, her eyes gray and shy and fragile.
But, trusting. She held out her hand.
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It felt very natural, very familiar, very safe. He led her around the floor with fluid grace. They had danced together before, and he’d enjoyed the way she felt next to him, the way her body snugged next to his as they moved smoothly through the dance. There was no awkwardness or need for expression. He simply held her and danced as he’d done before.
It was only when he noticed the tendrils of her hair intertwined in his fingers that he realized just how fecking screwed he really was. Dancing with this woman, this woman he loved and could not have because she would not have him was not only unbelievably stupid, it was a guarantee of more lasting pain on several levels.
First he tortured himself with the scent of her, inhaling it deeply and knowing it soon would be gone. Then he tortured himself with the feel of her skin. It was not overt or at all inappropriate. Her gown, more revealing than anything he’d seen her wear before, left too much room for touch in the embrace of the dance. Her hair, loose in a swirl of motion, had always fascinated him and this night was no different. He reluctantly let loose of the tendrils, hoping against hope that she’d made nothing of it. It was a familiarity he was no longer entitled to take.
It was too easy to hold her, too easy to fall back into his ignorant bliss. She’d already awakened him, and not with a kiss. He’d be more bereft now when she left him again, opening up wounds that were not fully closed, and pouring in salt for good measure. Still, he couldn’t stop himself from wanting to hold her and enjoy the dance, even knowing that it could be the last time he held her.
Finally, his feelings drove him to speak, leaning close to her ear to be heard over the music. The dance was half done, and himself fully finished.
“Well then, I’ve missed you Luna, love.”
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And when he leaned close and whispered into her ear, and invisible fingers danced down her spine, all these thoughts and emotions collided so that for a moment, Luna could not even speak.
"I've missed you too," she eventually managed, in not much more than a simple breath. It was sincere and fond, but in the wake of that confession her throat burned, because her mind was yet again telling her, It's over, and you will never have this again. She hadn't noticed till now how her arms held him just as close as he held her, and they were both desperately clinging to something that, in hindsight, seemed to be thrown so carelessly away.
Then why?
Luna lifted her head, putting enough distance between herself and Seamus so she could look him in the eyes. Perhaps she truly was the cause of all this. Perhaps she was only holding him back; an immature, under-developed girl of a woman who did not yet have the means to give him what he was looking for.
She tried to smile but found that she couldn't, so she hoped her expression was reassuring enough without it. "But I haven't gone anywhere. Nowhere far, anyway. I'm here. Whenever you need me."
Her voice dropped in volume and her eyes became a bit more imploring. "We're still friends... yes?"
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“Aye, Luna love, would that ‘twas the right of it. Then thy Seamus would have heard of thy parting from thy lips not Tom’s.” He had taken a great deal of grumbling over Luna’s leaving The Leaky Cauldron. He hid the fact that he had not even known she was going to quit and accepted full blame for her leaving. He was not entirely certain that Cook would ever forgive him, and Odette, the ganky bint, seemed to be making it her life’s work to make him out a heartless ladies man with her incessant snide remarks. He hoped she would cease and desist soon; it had already been several weeks since their parting and a week exactly since she’d quit working at The Leaky.
Her mixed message became clear with her request for his friendship. What could he do? He could deny her nothing.
“Aye, Luna love. Well then, if it’s friendship you’re after thy Seamus will serve.” Then he took their joined hands and held them over his heart. “Right, this heart’s full of love for thee, sweetheart, and will be for ages, but we started as friends and friends we shall stay then.” He doubted very much that he’d see this woman as only a friend any time soon. She might not be his last true love, but she was certainly his first and he knew there would always be some love left for her, no matter how hard he tried to be rid of these feelings. Just as he held a soft spot for Lavender, his first “date” and first snog.
Then he moved their joined hands over her heart. “Well then, what thy Seamus needs is thy love, but if thee have none to give, then thy heart shall school this one to friendship.” He moved their hands back to cover his heart. It wouldn’t be easy, but he would try for her sake.
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"I'm sorry," she replied in similar low tones, with just a small touch of frost. "I wasn't aware I owed anyone an explanation of business decisions between myself and my employer." Her resignation was sudden, she knew, but she'd never held it from Tom that her employment at the Leaky was permanent, and only because she needed extra money.
Luna's eyes followed their hands as they traveled to Seamus's heart, then her own, and back. She looked back up to him, and it was a moment before she realized why his words bothered her. Slowly she planted one foot to the floor and then the other, stopping their slow dance.
"I don't want your 'service,' Seamus." That wasn't really how he viewed their friendship, was it? In those gray eyes was a mixture of hurt and confusion, but they soon cleared with resigned understanding.
"Please, don't feel obligated to me." It wasn't as simple as that, but the sincerity was there. It disappointed her to hear that Seamus thought she didn't love him... but she was realizing, now, that their ideas of love were completely different. He was right, though; what he needed, she couldn't give.
So, she pulled her hands away and smiled in her vacant way. "Thank you for the dance, Seamus." She'd already made this very hard on him... she shouldn't make it even worse by lingering. She left it at that and turned, long hair fluttering behind her as she left the dance floor.
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It was not a fond memory she’d invoked, this one of pain and personal sorrow.
Nearly against his will, he extended his hand, an attempt to reach her that turned into a gesture of magic as a poof of silver green iridescent shimmering smoke extended in an outline of where she had stood and then dissipated into nothingness as he stood watching her retreating figure as she receded into the crowd of other dancers on the floor from the spot where she’d stranded him.
Her name died aborning on his lips, and he could not keep his countenance from reflecting the intensity of the pain in his heart, his soul, his mind and above all his feelings. He seemed suspended in time as he stood in the middle of the Hogwarts Ball, abandoned and bereft where she’d left him, in the middle of a dance, in front of all of their mutual friends.
His mind reeled from the affront of it, for it would have been hard for her to conduct a more public display of intentional slight, disrespect and lack of the friendship she’d just said she wanted. He went painstakingly back over her words.
First, she’d come unexpected when he’d been waiting and watching for Lavender. She’d greeted him simply enough, with a familiar, “Hello”; following that with an easy reciprocal response to his “Howya” and asking after his own broken-hearted self. Then he’d asked her to dance and she’d taken his hand.
When he’d admitted to missing her, which was quite an understatement considering the depth of his feelings, her response had puzzled him. She’d said she missed him, too. Why should that be? He’d been hers all along for the asking. Then she’d continued to say she hadn’t gone anywhere, that she’d not been far, that she was there if he needed her. How could that be? He’d needed her badly. As he stood there alone in the wake of her leaving, he again marveled that such phrases could roll off her tongue as though they were true and factual when his heart stood in tatters.
She’d added her piece de resistance as she’d done in Bodmin, “We’re still friends ...Yes?" He’d not understood why she wanted only friendship, but she’d made the fact that it was all that she wanted quite clear to him then. He wondered that she'd felt the need to say it again now, but perhaps there had been a small hope in his heart for a reconciliation - one he’d not even known was there. He was forced to accept that she’d not changed her mind.
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Her final words, as she’d embarrassed and shunned him by leaving him stranded and deeply pained in public were spoken as if by another person, not the Luna he’d known, dated, and come to love with such deep affection.
"I'm sorry, I wasn't aware I owed anyone an explanation of business decisions between myself and my employer."
The words were cold in and of themselves, but the frosty manner in which she delivered them could leave no doubt that she did not consider her employment or lack thereof a topic of their friendship. If something as impersonal as that was not a proper subject of conversation, he had no idea whatsoever she might consider that would be a sufficient topic for “friends”.
Her next words only deepened his amazement and awe that she had kept this cruel side of herself hidden for so long. He’d had no idea she was even capable of such cruelty, nor that she’d be so cavalier as to direct it at someone she considered a friend.
"I don't want your 'service,' Seamus."
He had no idea what she meant by this. He’d not offered her any, nor had he mentioned it in any way shape or form. But the fact that she’d stopped dancing, and her face maintained the same hardened stare of coldness that she’d used to discuss her employment made it clear that this was some kind of deep criticism of his actions or deeds against her.
It pained him to think that he’d insulted or hurt her in some way, so he examined his own words. Had they been insensitive in their precarious situation and somehow severed the friendship she felt? He had not meant to do so, but had he somehow been at fault in his phrasing or choosing?
He’d expressed his wish that she’d told him she was leaving the Leaky. Was that something so personal that it went beyond friendship? They’d been co-workers for nearly six months. He had wished she’d told him of her decision to leave. It would have let him accept and grieve it in private rather than having to hear it in public from Tom in front of the other staff and suffer their questioning without preparation.
Her criticism implied he had no right to the knowledge, that it was something only to be discussed betwixt her and Tom. Would that it were so in this world peopled with curious beings. Still, it certainly outlined the parameters of her offer of friendship. Clearly she would be “there if he needed her” as long as he did not ask her any questions about her activities, including ones as impersonal as employment. Could he ask after her father in passing? Would that also be an insult? Could he inquire as to the Periodic Inquiry? What would her response be to that?
Her final words were stated flatly. She might as well have been speaking to a customer of The Leaky Cauldron about the daily specials.
"Please, don't feel obligated to me.”
It was a conundrum. Again, he had not one shred of an idea what she meant by this. He was not obligated to her. Obligated to do what? Obligated how? How did this fit with her concept of friendship. It certainly didn’t fit with his.
Friends cared about each other. Friends were open with each other about many personal things as well as impersonal ones. They might or might not be “obligated” to each other, depending upon whatever promises they might have made against that friendship. He recognized in that moment that he did feel obligations to some of his friends, particularly to Harry. But that was a very small part of their friendship, not something that defined it. For him, to be obligated was a burden not a benefit and friendship was a benefit not a burden.
Then the suspension in the moment evaporated and he was just a man standing alone on a dance floor, embarrassed by an inconsiderate partner who had left him.
How had she hidden the mask of her true feelings so long behind a visage of love and affection? He’d suffered before at the hands of those in masks, masks to hide their true evil, their allegiance, their cruelty. For now he could only hope that her cruelty was all she had hidden.
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He found it where he least expected, at the sight of a white tomb by the lake that held the remains of the wizard he’d most admired. He sat amidst the flowers decorating the monument and leaned against it for support. He’d admired and respected Albus Dumbledore as a wizardly father figure since his own Da could not fill that role. Dumbledore had been kind, considerate, and a truly gifted wizard who gave freely of his time and his talents to his students.
Seamus sat there and reined in his emotions, thinking about what kind of advice his Da or Dumbledore might give him tonight.
A brief smile touched his lips. He could not actually imagine Professor Dumbledore with a wife or giving advice to the lovelorn. Yet, he was a man as well as a wizard, so there must have been a time in his youth when he, too, had felt the deep tremors of a lost first love.
There was nothing for it. No remedy either his own Da or Dumbledore could offer. They’d done their best for him when they’d shown him how to live a strong full life as a man and a wizard. It was no coincidence that he and Dumbledore were both Gryffindor. No matter what the current Headmistress did, there would be no destroying the bonds he felt with other Gryffindors, bonds of hope, strength and friendship; bonds of courage.
He stood, adjusted his own mask of a face to become the smiling and happy barman that he shared with the world. It was like unto his true face, or had been until recently. For now he would act the part of the happy barman, dancing with his friends and enjoying the evening. If his Da and Dumbledore had taught him well enough, he’d learn to truly enjoy such happy moments as life offered with the courage to endure the rest without it destroying his ultimate happiness. He thought he’d learnt it during the war, when he’d feared for his own demise, but now he knew that cruelty came not only from those he considered enemies. It was a powerful lesson, and one that required him to summon the courage to continue; the courage of his own convictions and emotions.
He could hear his mother’s voice as he walked towards the entrance to return to the dance.
”If God sends you down a stony path, may he give you strong shoes.”
He smiled and looked down.
“Strong enough.”
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