Lily
3 September 1973
Violette stood in the mirror in her dorm room, which she shared with four other girls. All of them were well acquainted with each other, and would stay up all night filling each other in on what happened to them over the summer. Violette would lie down and pull her quilt over her head, and when the girls thought that she was asleep, they talked about her family.
“ My father says that they are related to the French royals. ”
“ I think I read somewhere that the Laurent’s lived at Versailles at the same time as Marie Antoinette .”
“ I’d bet that Versailles was more their home than any king or queen. ”
“ Did you hear about her father? ”
“ My sister told me that they own two thirds of France, and now they’re here to conquer England. ”
Violette shut her eyes as their words filled her head. To tune them out, she imagined that she was in ballet class, focusing on pointing her feet and keeping her legs straight. She could hear her old teacher’s voice in her head. She dreamt that she was back in the old studio, wearing a baby pink leotard holding onto a cold ballet barre.
“Corps serré, jambes droites. Garde le torse bombé, Violette.”
Tight core, straight legs. Keep your chest up, Violette.
In the mornings, the girls acted casually, like they hadn’t been gossiping about Violette the entire night. They were kind to her face, sometimes overly kind. They knew who she was, and were too nervous to say the wrong thing, or to embarrass themselves in front of someone like her.
Violette straightened out her green and silver tie, then she pulled on her new Slytherin robe. She examined herself and her new uniform in the mirror, and she supposed that dark green wasn’t the worst house color she could’ve been dealt. She grabbed her things and left her dorm room, and as she walked down the hall, she heard voices echoing throughout the common room.
“It isn’t so bad.” A boy said, “My brother says fourth year Ancient Runes is the easiest.”
“Oh, don’t go whining about it, Mulciber.” Another boy said, “Don’t be so sure that you would rather be in Divination.”
When Violette turned the corner, she saw a group of boys with their things sprawled all over the black leather couches by the stone fireplace. It was always blazing, but the Slytherin common room never seemed to get warmer. One of the boys she recognized.
“ Open up your inner eye to see the future! ” Said Regulus, mocking a woman’s voice and flailing his arms around. The boys stopped laughing when Violette approached them. She tip-toed over to them, timid as a cat. When Regulus turned around, his exaggerated grin relaxed into a more genuine smile.
“Hi Violette.” He said, then he cleared his throat and relaxed, “Gentlemen, this is Violette Laurent.”
“We know, Regulus.” One boy groaned, then he stood up to shake Violette’s hand, “My name’s Evan. My brother Louis says that we’re cousins.”
“We must be.” Violette nodded, “Distant, I think, I’m not sure.”
Evan looked a lot like his brother, with blonde hair and a sweet smile. He gestured at the boy at the end of the couch with black hair and a long nose.
“That there’s Severus.” Then he pointed at the boy next to him, “This is Mulciber.” Then the boy across from him, “And Avery. We’re all third years, except for Regulus.”
Regulus rolled his eyes at that, crossing his arms. They all headed up to the Great Hall for breakfast, then after breakfast was time for class. In her first two classes, Violette knew nobody. Her third class was History of Magic, and when she sat down, she was met with the same scene she had been seeing ever since she arrived at Hogwarts. Her new peers, all chittering and chattering together and catching up with each other. Violette chose one of the only open desks, which of course happened to be toward the front of the class. Students would walk in, and see her, and they would always just stare and move on. Violette shrunk in her chair, hoping that if she made herself small enough that nobody would notice her. As the class filled up, Violette was sure that nobody would try and sit next to her, then the sudden plop of books next to her crumbled those hopes. In the seat next to her sat a girl in a Gryffindor robe, and her hair was as red as the fabric inside of it. She smelled of cinnamon and apple, and she organized her desk neatly with her books stacked on top of each other from biggest to smallest. Once her place was set, she sat up straight with her hands in her lap, and she waited patiently for class to begin.
The red-haired girl sat there, tapping her foot on the ground and pursing her lips. She leaned over and grabbed a small tin out of her bookbag. She pulled the lid off and picked out a little red and white striped peppermint, then held the tin out toward Violette.
Violette glanced at the tin, and when she didn’t reach out and grab one, the girl shook it slightly.
“Would you like one?” She asked.
Violette loved peppermint. She thought for a moment, her eyes flickering at the girl, and the tin. Slowly, she nodded, gently picking a piece out of the tin.
“Thank you.” Violette said, and she held the mint in her hands and in her lap.
It was quiet again. The girl tossed the tin back into her bookbag and dropped it onto the floor beside her chair. She began to tap her foot again.
“You’re new.” The girl turned, “Remind me of your name again?”
Violette stared down at the peppermint, and with her face low, she looked up at the girl.
“Violette.”
The girl smiled. “Pretty. Like the flower?”
Violette nodded, shyly.
“My name’s Lily.”
A small grin warmed Violette’s cheeks, and she parted her lips, then she and Lily spoke at the same time.
“Like the flower.”
The two of them shared a girlish chuckle, and then the teacher walked in.
Lily had already known who she was. There wasn’t a soul in that castle who hadn’t heard of her by then. All everyone talked about was Violette Laurent and Theo Laurent. Lily had heard all of the gossip that people were trading, all about this girl and her family. They had made her out to be some French priss who walked with her nose in the air. Her brother might have fit that description, but when Lily looked at Violette, she just saw a girl, quiet and pretty and pleasant.
The professor started the class off, introducing himself and giving everyone a rundown of what the year was going to look like. As he rambled, Lily listened closely, taking down notes of all of the important things he told them. Violette sat quietly with the piece of wrapped peppermint in her lap.
“Binns is easy.” Lily whispered, “He has a bad habit of falling asleep between lectures. He’s quite lenient, too.”
Violette nodded with a plain face, “Oh. That’s good.”
“Yeah.” Lily said, and Binns dismissed the class. She stood up, and both her and Violette began gathering their things.
“So, you’re in Slytherin. Have you met Severus yet?”
“Severus?” Violette thought for a moment, “Um, yes, I think so, this morning.”
“He’s a good friend of mine. He’s quite reserved, but he’s like an egg, you see, once you get past that hard outer shell, he really is quite pleasant. I-”
A girl had approached Lily as she and Violette packed up their book bags. Her black curls were tied back in a ponytail, and her robes were Gryffindor red, just like Lily’s.
“Are we still going to the library before lunch?” The girl asked, “I can’t believe I picked up the wrong Herbology textbook.”
“Yes, of course we are.” Lily replied, putting her ink jar into the pocket of her bag, “I still need to grab my Arithmancy book.”
With Lily’s attention averted, Violette had nobody else to talk to, and no purpose to stick around in the classroom. She tucked the peppermint into the pockets of her robe and slipped the strap of her book bag over her shoulder. She left without Lily noticing.
“Hey,” Lily started, “... do you want to come with us to the-”
Then she saw that Violette had gone already. Her smile faded fast, and she pursed her lips in disappointment, and turned back to her friend. As the two of them walked down the hall, Lily clutched the strap of her bookbag with one hand, letting the other hand hang free.
“And then Frank told her that she looked ‘nice’.” Mary said, filling Lily in on the new gossip that she had missed, “I mean, nice ? That’s so common. Alice was pleased though, of course. And then,” Mary turned, noticing that Lily’s eyes were staring forward aimlessly as they walked, “are you listening?”
“I was going to ask that girl to come with us.” She sighed, “Perhaps Wednesday will be better. She must have had somewhere to be.”
“What girl?” Said another one of their friends who had caught up with them in the hall. Marlene McKinnon. She tucked her blonde hair behind her ear, then slowed down to match her friends’ pace.
Mary scoffed, “Violette Laurent. She’s Lily’s seat partner for History of Magic.”
“Violette Laurent?” Marlene furrowed her brow, “Why would she hang around with us?”
“Why not?”
Marlene’s lips parted, and she raised her eyebrows.
“She’s like royalty to those pureblood freaks. Seriously, all of those weirdos lick the floor she and her brother walk on. We’re nothing but low-life degenerates to people like her.”
Lily sighed, chuckling, “Oh, Mar, you’re so political. You don’t even know the girl. Everyone is whispering about her right in front of her face because they’re afraid of her, and for no good reason.”
“I just gave you the reason.”
The three of them entered the library and found a table for them all to sit at. Lily set down her bag and turned around to search the bookshelf behind her.
“Well, I’d like to figure it out for myself.” She reached up for a book, “Just because she’s a pureblood doesn’t mean she’s just like the rest of them. She seems nice.”
Marlene sat back in one of the wooden chairs, and kicked her feet up on the one across from her. She sighed, and leaned back in her chair whilst Mary and Lily sifted through the shelves of the library.
“What do you think?” Marlene asked.
Mary sighed, “I’m not sure, yet. I overheard some Ravenclaw girls talking about her brother, though. Well, actually, they were pretty much gushing over him. Apparently he’s a big book worm. One girl said that the Laurent’s own a centuries-old chateau in the French countryside with a library larger than this one.”
Marlene scoffed, tossing her head back, “A chateau? Of course they have a chateau.”
“I heard they’re richer than even Sirius’s family.”
“Who’s richer than Sirius’s family?”
Lily turned around to see four boys approach the table they had set their things on. She pursed her lips and rolled her eyes.
"Not so happy to see me, Evans?" James smirked.
“Don’t tell me you’re talking about the new girl.” Sirius groaned.
“It just so happens that we are.” Mary nodded, “And, her,” she mocked a French accent and sat down, “ Château de Laurent .”
“It sounds so fanciful when you say it like that.” Lily said.
“Have you heard about what they’re calling them?” Remus sat down with a grin, “The Pureblood Prince and Princess.”
They all had a laugh, save Sirius, who leaned back on the table with a wrinkled brow, and Lily, who crossed her arms and tilted her head.
“Lily wants to befriend her.”
Sirius looked up.
“Oh, is it that big of a deal, Marlene?” Lily chuckled to herself.
“You know, if Evans makes friends with her,” James pointed, “... maybe we’ll all get an invite to Château de Laurent .”
“I’m only trying to be nice.” Lily smiled, shaking her head, “She seems a little shy… and, can you blame her?”
“Are they as looney as your lot, Sirius?” Mary asked.
“Hm?” He cleared his throat.
“The Laurent’s.”
Sirius thought for a moment. He knew that he would be a fool to believe that a family of such status could be so accepting. His surely were not, and although part of him wanted to think that Violette was more like him than the rest of those pureblooded psychopaths, he remembered the conversations had between his family and her’s.
“They might be loonier.” He shrugged, “I don’t think Walburga would think so highly of anybody who wasn’t.”
“See?”
“You’re all so dramatic. Remus said it himself, I can make friends with anyone.”
Remus sighed, “I did say that.”
“You’ll see.” Lily gathered her books up to go check out with the librarian, “She and I will be great friends, and we’ll throw these tremendous parties at her chateau.” Playfully, she whirled around, “and none of you are invited.”