"How could my love for her be wrong? Sure, it was odd to some people, but it was love just the same."
Since your first day at Hogwarts, there have been rumors about that strange Lovegood girl who wears mismatched clothes and talks about creatures th...
More time passed, and a few days later was another Romeo and Juliet rehearsal. This time, though, it was only the leads that needed to come. I decided to wear a simple denim skirt with a lavender zip-up jumper, and some mango-flavored lip gloss that I was given for Christmas.
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We only had about six or seven weeks until we started running the show all the way through with proper costumes and lighting and sound, and Rory and I were getting better and better at acting like "star-crossed lovers". Rory was honestly just doing his best, considering Paris controlled him like a puppet and threw a borderline tantrum whenever he wasn't meeting her requirements of attention. Still, he was a firm believer that she was the bee's knees no matter how poorly she treated him.
In rehearsal we ran the ballroom scene, where Rory and I were talking about pilgrim's hands (I had long since begun to think that Shakespeare fellow was one sandwich away from a picnic). Couples were dancing around us, and Luna stood off to the side with Evie while Ced sat in the audience.
"Saints do not move," I say, reciting my lines. "though grant for prayers' sake."
"Then move not, while prayers' effect I take," Rory replies, taking my hands in his. "Thus from my lips by yours, my sin is purged." We awkwardly stand there and Flitwick shouts at us from the audience.
"Well?" Rory and I turn to face him.
"Uhm...yes professor?" Rory says. Professor Flitwick waves his arm around, as he does when he's frustrated.
"Don't look at me," he said. "Kiss her." The both of us looked at him wide-eyed, and he shrugged. "What? You're Romeo and Juliet, might as well get used to doing it." Rory nodded and turned back to me. Oh, Gods, here we go.
"So should I just..." he trails off. I shrug my shoulders.
"Yeah, go for it," I say as casually as I can. He holds me by the shoulders and presses his lips to mine. It wasn't the kind I was used to receiving from Luna; there was no emotion behind it, and it was over in the blink of an eye. Rory makes a face and wipes his mouth with his sleeve.
"I hate mangoes," he declares, and I double over laughing remembering the mango gloss I'd applied not long ago. Luna, Ced, Evie, and everyone else notices and starts laughing along with me.
"Why is it sticky?" Rory asked again, and I lean on him while I try to catch my breath.
"Lip gloss," I manage to wheeze out. He starts laughing too, and it takes another several minutes for us to calm down enough to continue the scene. Hours later we leave the auditorium and walk side by side down the hallway.
"I didn't know you didn't like mangoes, Rory," Luna teases, and he gently shoves her.
"Not the nurse talking," he laughs and turns to me. "No more mango lipstick, you hear?"
"I'll make sure to cake it on next time," I reply. He flashes that crooked grin of his and shrugs.
"That's fine. I'll make sure to eat plenty of pickles beforehand," he says with a mischievous look in his eyes.
"You wouldn't dare," I sneer. Suddenly I see Paris storming towards us and Rory's face lights up.
"Paris," he said. She grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him over to the wall, and the rest of us stopped walking.
"Babe, what's wrong?" Rory asked, doubt beginning to replace the joy on his face. Paris points to me.
"Her, that's what's wrong," she hissed. I look between them, and Rory is just as confused as I am. I slowly walk over to them.
"Is there a problem?" I ask. If looks could kill, I would have dropped dead right then and there.
"Did you kiss her?" she asks, turning to Rory. He uncomfortably looks back and forth between her and I.
"What? I...well, yeah, but-" Paris cuts him off by slapping him across the face, hard. I was suddenly overcome with white-hot rage, and I grabbed her by the front of the shirt and slammed her up against the wall. The back of her head made a morbidly satisfying smack when it knocked into the stone. I could tell it hurt her; she was working hard to hide her tears behind a bratty smirk. Good, I thought. That just serves her right.
"Listen here, you little bitch," I mutter through my teeth. "He kissed me because it was part of a play. Maybe if you let him bloody finish, you'd know that." She'd got her tears under control, and she gave me another dirty look.
"Is that all y've got to say?" she jeers. I tighten my grip on her shirt and pin her harder. To my delight, Paris flinches away from me. In hindsight, I felt dirty for taking such pleasure in her pain and fear, but I had waited so long to give her a piece of my mind that I hardly cared.
"Don't test me," I growl. "It's been said before, and I'll say it again. Rory Campbell deserves someone several hundred thousand times better than a spoiled, cruel, obnoxious little girl like yourself. And if you ever, I mean ever, come anywhere near him again, I will see to it that hell rains down on you and everything you hold dear, and I promise you that by the time I'm through you'll be begging me to make it stop." I let go of her shirt and shove her down the hallway.
"Run along now," I say sweetly. When she looks back at me, I saw fear in her eyes for the first time since I'd met her. Real, raw, uncensored fear, and I relish it as she runs away down the hallway. I turn back to Rory, and he's holding his face with one hand and Luna's hand with the other, trying not to cry. We walk up the tower stairs and we meet up with Cora, who is surprised to see us all with solemn looks on our faces.
"What happened?" she asked.
"Paris," Rory answered, his voice breaking as we all sit on the couch. As I sit between Ced and Rory I notice there was a flash of joy in Cora's eyes, but she quickly replaced it with sympathy.
"Aw, that's too bad," she said, sitting on the floor and leaning against his legs.
"She struck him, too. All because he and Y/n had to kiss for the stupid rehearsal today," Cedric adds, shaking his head.
"She did WHAT?" Cora demanded, balling her hands into fists. "Oh, if I could just..."
"Way ahead of you there," I reply. "Don't worry, she knows to stay away from now on." Luna gently pries Rory's hand away from his face to reveal four very red and very clearly defined finger marks across his cheek.
"You've got to tell McGonagall, it looks like she got you good," Luna says, but he shook his head.
"I don't wanna," he said. We sat in each other's company for a while longer until it got dark and the rest of our friends went to their rooms for the night. I got up to go but Rory grabbed my wrist and gently pulled me back down, and when I looked up at him he looked as if he was trying to contain his tears.
"You're allowed to cry, you know," I whisper, taking his hand. The tears started to roll over the finger marks on his face and he leaned into me, his chest shuddering with uneven gasps. I wrap my arms around him and let him break down, burying my face in the hair on the back of his head. I could feel my heart breaking for him; Paris didn't deserve such a place in his heart that losing her would upset him like this. Everyone knew that his feelings for Paris were real, but it killed me to think that she was probably somewhere in the dungeons acting as if this had never happened. As I held my best friend in my arms, I wondered how much of a toll her cruelty had taken on him, or if he'd ever be the same after today. Not knowing only made me hate her even more.
Dear Reader,
ok first of all I was VERY tempted to kill Paris but I just couldn't come up with a semi-realistic line of context that made sense, so instead we just made her a nasty lil piss baby lmao anywayyy I've been thinking about what kind of character x reader fanfic I should do next. I think I'm gonna do either Ced or Rory (go check the "conversations" tab in my profile to vote on which one I should do) and that's really it for now tbh so until next time!
