The Boy With Black Eyes

The Baths

The Slytherin bathrooms had a certain... atmosphere to them. They were white and black, with silver and green accents everywhere. Someone had been inspired by a Roman bathhouse, as the ceilings were supported by marble pillars and pointed arches, carved to look like trees, the ceiling painted to resemble the night sky. A large bath was set in the center of the room, water cloudy and swirling like a Jacuzzi, good for smoothing skin and conditioning hair.

Since she was young, Nox set aside considerable time for bathing. It was an important facet of her character to be clean - to have her hair done up nicely, her face washed, and her body scrubbed within an inch of it's life.

 Since school had started up and there were periods of time where not just magic-related dust could settle and make her soft skin itch, but there was just more sweat, more grime, more ink that somehow managed to slide up her wrist to her elbow without damaging her white shirt...

But there was something... Off about the Slytherin Baths. The water was always the wrong temperature, no matter what time of day she did her routine, either too hot or just a smidgen too cold to be completely comfortable. There was always someone else in there, meaning she couldn't relax at all.

She was not ashamed of her body, not by a long shot, years of riding horses and swimming the Mediterranean gifted her with long legs and a gentle curves, and her hair was long and dark and had slight curl.

Being unashamed did not mean she did not notice when people stared. 

So, when voicing her concerns to Narcissa, she shared a piece of information that the collection of seventh-year Slytherins knew: the password to the prefect's bathroom. Pine-fresh. There was only one problem with the wonderfully huge, Roman Bath, with the ability to lock the doors and the tiles kept almost spotlessly clean: there was an unwritten schedule. 

Anybody who had the password used the room to get to know their partners underneath the bubbles. It was a veritable free-for-all of  touching, groping, grabbing, smacking, shagging, snogging. And with Nox's track-record of stumbling into places where she embarrassed herself, such as the disaster at Madam Pudifoot's, she had stuck clear of the place until she knew when it was empty. 

There was a window of time after the house-elves cleaned on Fridays and again on Tuesdays, about an hour long, just before Potter and Evans barged in, Evans all giggles and her face flushed, shirt half-undone. Showers were taken in the Slytherin bathroom, but the long-soaks, where she completely and totally unwound, shoulders lifted out on the edge of the tub to read the newest Stephen King she'd grabbed on her trips into Muggle London, had been severely lacking. So, armed with her newest book, a towel, her housecoat and toiletries, Nox set out for her bath. 

She took the back way up the stairs, so the entirety of the school didn't see her wandering about in her silken carnation pink pajamas. A shortcut was available between the third and fifth floor, so she took it, the stairs floating up rather politely, grinding to a stop, allowing her to get off, and then spinning around to float uselessly in mid-air. Perhaps the fancy had struck it to just float there. Nox tended to rely on the long way, as she didn't trust the nearly-sentient steps. And half of them had stairs missing to begin with, ones she always missed, and her bookbag always ended up on the floor beneath her, spilled everywhere. 

Regardless. Bath was more important. 

Speaking to the statue, and opening the door behind him, Nox slipped in, and sighed with relief. Nobody here. She could make the water as hot as she wanted, and concoct the very specific smell that reminded her of home. 

Much to her surprise, the dials turned to reveal different types of bubbles in colours and textures that bounced and shifted all over the surface of the water, a few of them dispensing her more recognizable bathing oils, which softened the water and put the shine in her hair. Argon was the colour of champagne and disappeared into the water along with lemon and a very few drops of amber. The bubbles she chose smelled of cedarwood, lemon zest, lavender, and hung in a frothy clouds of pastel purple and daffodil yellow two inches thick on the surface.