Ginny waved at her mother and disappeared into
the crowds of Diagon Alley. “I’ll meet you at Flourish and Blotts in an hour or
so!”
“Alright, dear,” Molly agreed absently. “Come
on, Ron. You need new dress robes. And Harry, dear, we’ll stop by Gringotts
first.. . .”Ginny listened to her mother’s voice fade away thankfully.
Hairdressers. She knew she’d seen one the last time she’d come into Diagon
Alley. . .there!
Ginny slipped into the small, brightly lit
shop. “Hello?” The woman cutting a girl’s hair looked up. “I was wondering of I
could get my hair cut and dyed today.”
“I’m nearly finished, and I don’t have any
clients until twelve. Sure thing, sweetie. Do you know what you want?” The
woman didn’t pause in her careful snipping.
“Yep, I found a picture of it. It’s from a
muggle magazine, but you can get the general gist.” The hairdresser finished
styling the other girl’s hair, took the photo from Ginny and studied it. “And I
want to dye my hair blood red, like a really deep red red.”
“I can do that. You’re done now, sweetie.” The
woman patted her previous client’s shoulder absently. The girl got up, gathered
her stuff and left.
“How much?”
“Mmm, dye and a haircut? 20 Galleons.”
“Fine. Have you got one of those new Gringotts
card readers?”
“Installed it the other day,” she was told
cheerfully. “Handy little things. You a student?”
“Sixth year at Hogwarts. Here’s my Gringotts
card.” Ginny handed it over.
“I can give you a student’s discount, which
makes it 18 Galleons, rather then 20.” The woman swiped Ginny’s card.
“Ok.” Ginny leant over and told the machine
her code. “Ginny.” The card swiper beeped happily and deducted 18 Galleons from
her account.
“Well, sit down and let’s get started.”
~*~*~*~
Ginny walked out of the shop, feeling
curiously naked without her long hair hanging down her back. The hairdresser
had shown her how to use the gel to spike her hair, saying ‘Muggles do know
best about somethings. Don’t trust your hair or make-up to your wand, unless
you’re really sure about what you’re doing!’ She had to admit the style suited
her better then she had thought it would. As her mum would say, her face had
acquired character, and the haircut made her now high and defined cheekbones
stand out. She picked up the pace and went quickly to Flourish and Blotts.
“Mum, I’m here,” she called out as she saw her
mother’s back. “Like my hair?” Her mother’s jaw dropped open in shock. “I think
it looks good, and since I paid for it, it’s staying. Right, textbooks.” Ginny
started to grab her books off the shelf.
“Ginny. . .”
“Yes, mum?” Ginny didn’t pause in her text
hunt.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You would have stopped me, and it’s my money
to do as I like with. New look for the new school year. Considering I haven’t
done anything any of the time I’ve been at school, a flicker of rebellion
strikes me as permissible.” Ginny ran her hand along the spines of the books,
and flicked out ‘Transfiguration- 6th year spells’, ‘Alchemy- the
ancient Art’, and ‘Herbology- Grow your own potion ingredients’. “Right. Now
all I’m missing is my DADA text, my Arithmancy and Divinations.” She bent back
down again to look.
“Harry!” A pleased female voice said, and
Ginny looked up to see Hermoine bounce up and hug Harry. Hermoine was looking
better this year, healthy light tan from her holidays. Brown frizzy hair and
thankfully tamed teeth, eyes sparkling with happiness at being rejoined with
her boyfriend, Ron, and her bestest best pal, Harry. Please excuse Ginny as she
throws up in the corner. “How were your holidays at the Weasleys?”
“Great, as usual. How were yours?”
“I went to the country for a bit, but the best
part was the course I did at the magical branch of Oxford. It was on Runes, and
it was just excellent.”
“Hey, Hermoine.” Ginny nodded at the taller
girl and grinned at her surprised look. “Do you like it? I got it done this
morning.”
“Wow, it really suits you. Brings out your
eyes and your cheekbones. C’mon Harry, where’s Ron?” Hermoine dragged Harry off
to look for Ron. Ginny smiled and gave her books to her mother.
“I found my textbooks, now I'm going to go try
on some robes. I’ll meet you at Madame Malkins.”
“Alright, Ginny dear. And now I’m over the
shock, I have to say your new hairstyle actually does suit you. I’ll just go
buy these.” Ginny watched her mother bustle off, arms full of books. Next
thing. Ginny quickly turned and made her way out of the crowded bookshop before
threading her way through Diagon Alley to look at new dress robes. Well, that
had been easier then she’d thought it would be. And she still had over a
hundred Galleons left. Having almost permanently hunched shoulders had been
worth it. A small black kitten skittered across her path and she barely missed
treading on it.
“Watch it, little one.” The kitten looked up
at her through golden eyes, and then clung to her robes desperately. “Hey,
don’t you have an owner somewhere?”
“Dammit!” Ginny knew her question had been
answered as a furious male voice shouted. She felt the kitten shiver and slip
under her robes. “Stupid cat.” The warm body on her feet cowered. Ginny looked
around for the owner of the voice and her eyes widened in surprise. Marcus
Flint. Still easily recognisable by the absolutely shocking mouthful of teeth.
Well, damn if she was letting the kitten go back to *him*. She stood still,
pretending to be looking in her purse as Flint pushed past her roughly and
continued to look for the kitten angrily.
Ginny crouched down and scooped the kitten
into her arms. “So, what do I do with you?” The kitten watched her wide eyed.
It had the potential to be quite a beautiful cat, plushy pure jet fur and the
most delightful tawny yellow eyes. Girl or boy? She checked under its tail as
it buzzed protestingly at the indignity. Boy. “C’mon kitten.” She put him in
her pocket, and he licked her fingers gratefully. She headed out to Madame
Malkins again. “I’ll wait until I know you better before I name you, kitten.”
The kitten purred in agreement as she absently stroked his head.
“Wait here, dear,” one of Madame Malkins
assistants fussed as she entered. Ginny did as she was told, sitting down at a
chair and getting the kitten out to check it over. She hissed disapprovingly as
her sensitive fingertips detected thicker areas of knitted together bones and
the general thinness of the poor thing. She was gladder then ever that she had
picked the poor thing up.
“Evil, cruel bastard. Grrrr. . .If I could,
pet, I’d hurt him for you.” She could have sworn the kitten got a distinctly
bloodthirsty and vengeful look in his golden eyes. “Ok, almost scary there.”
She tickled his stomach as he sprawled over her lap, buzzing happily. His black
fur blended in almost perfectly with her black robes, and a slender paw toyed
with the cuff of her sleeve. Definite cutie.
“Oi, kid, give ‘im back.” Ginny looked up
slowly, disdainfully, look of utter contempt frozen on her face. Flint. And she
hadn’t been seeing things; his teeth truly hadn’t improved since Hogwarts. If
anything, they were definitely yellower.
“Prove he’s yours.”
“Don’t have to, he’s *mine*. Hand him over,
little girl.” He loomed threateningly over her, probably thinking she would
gasp and hand the cat over without further protest. Oh, you are so wrong about
that, she thought angrily. Very, very wrong. He was trying to scare her with
his physical presence, eyes narrowed, fists clenched. Oh, yawn. How trite.
Ginny decided to make a fuss, very loudly.
“What are you, some kind of pervert? I don’t
havta listen to that kind of language! Get away from me!” Flint was rapidly
backing off, eyes widening in horror and shock as the petite red haired girl
he’d thought would be easily bullied sent him packing. “Creep! I’m a student of
Hogwarts, not some kind of prostitute!” Her booted foot lashed out and kicked
him quite hard on the shin. The kitten yowled victoriously and made his own
swipe with soft claws. Ginny watched with great satisfaction as Flint was
escorted from the shop, and all the gossipy biddies started gabbling in
horrified pleasure.
Madame Malkin, eyes wide in horror at a
potential loss of customer, apologised to Ginny constantly as Flint was booted
out of the shop. “I’m so sorry, nothing like this has ever happened before.”
“That’s alright, I was just a bit taken aback.
I know it had nothing to do with you.” Ginny smiled sweetly as the shop owner,
who nodded in relief and went to look after her other customers. A slow
handclap greeted her acting and Ginny turned to give that person a dirty look.
“What?”
“A wonderfully inventive way of ridding
yourself of an annoyance. Blaise Zabini.” The tall dark haired guy leaning
against a wall introduced himself. He just screamed class, from his fitted
robes, to the softly falling fringe of sooty hair that came over his forehead.
His fingers were long and artistic looking. Snob.
“Virginia Weasley,” she said curtly. His delicately
curved eyebrows went up. Damn it. Snob, snob, snobbity snob. “Gryffindor. And
you’re a Slytherin, so we really don’ have much more to say to each other, do
we?” She gave him a falsely pretty smile and got up as Madame Malkin came over
to discuss her new robes.