Notes & Stuff (That Probably Won't Amount to Anything)

Maryrose (AU/Nonmagical Backstory)

Author Note: The following came from some notes I found that had a bunch of out takes and backstory snippets. This one was labeled "Maryrose AU/Nonmagical Backstory Martin". I re-read it and thought it was really interesting... especially the timing of it resurfacing in my notes being with the current storyline in Marauders. I did have a note to have it as a flashback for Emmaline, where Emmaline would replace the character of Lizzie in this version. I thought some of the Maryrose stans might enjoy this, given the notes.

I stood up and paced around the room, looking at the pictures and concert tickets thumb-tacked on the wall around her desk. She'd been to so many impressive places - there were pictures of her in all sorts of foreign cities like Paris and London, and others I didn't recognize. I'd never been much of anywhere. I wondered what it was about a nobody like me that interested Lizzie, and worried that maybe she didn't really know I was a nobody yet and that she would find out and ditch me the first chance she got.

It was then I saw it. Just under her bed.

I got up and walked over, kneeling down and picked it up. It was a bra. Soft and pink, with little tiny flowers on the cups. I ran my fingers over the cloth and stared at it. It was as foreign as any of the cities in her photos to me. I turned it over in my hands, looking at the stitching, feeling the stiffness of the underwire... I don't know what made me do it, honestly. I hadn't even really consciously had the idea before I'd shrugged my jacket onto the floor and pulled my shirt off over my head.

It took me a second of struggle as I undid the hook in the front, right between the cups, but I got it finally.

I glanced at the door and listened carefully a moment. There wasn't anyone coming it didn't sound like, so I slung the bra around me, sliding the straps up my shoulders, and tugged the fabric around my torso, biting my lip as I rehinged the hook. It took some adjusting, wiggling my shoulders and pulling the cups down. I felt the strap digging into the soft spot under my arms. It was too small, but it was on, and I stared down at the empty cups a moment. I stepped over to her bathroom and reached for the roll of toilet paper, unfurling two handfuls of tissue and stuffing them into the cups to fill them up. My hands shook as I did it.

Don't think about it, I told myself. You're just messing around. It doesn't mean anything.

Except it did. It did mean something, I just didn't quite know what and there wasn't really any words for what I was feeling as I brought my palms up to cup the now full bra.

I turned around and faced the mirror over the sink. There he was - the stranger I always saw - staring back at me... but not as completely strange as he sometimes looked because now he had boobs. Perky little things that stuck out from where his pecs would normally be, covered in soft pink fabric and little rose buds. They weren't symmetrical - I mean, they were made of tissue so of course not - but they were there.

I shivered and met the eyes of the stranger in the mirror and for the first time there was a flicker of recognition.

It was overwhelming. I lost my breath and I stood there holding onto those tissue boobs like if I let go of them they'd disappear. I could feel tears in my eyes and I blinked twice as hard to keep them from falling, but they snuck out of my eyes anyways - the bastards - and rolled down my cheeks.

What the hell is wrong with me? I thought, Am I some kind of sick pervert? I thought of all the jokes out on the internet about guys saying if they had boobs they'd just stand in the mirror all day touching them. Was I literally a male cliche? Was that who I was, after all this time trying to figure it out and I was really just something as basic as all that?