Dealbreaker

Part One.

“If you wouldn’t mind stripping down to your delicates, Miss Granger; young Pansy will be with you in a tick.”

Hermione was standing in her bra and knickers before her brain had fully processed what she had heard. Surely Madam MacGinty (of MacGinty’s Bridal, Cornwall) hadn’t meant Pansy Parkinson, the Slytherin bully who had spent her teenage years refining bitchiness into an art form? She must have been talking about a different Pansy. A nice one.

There were no mirrors inside the fitting room, but that didn’t stop Hermione from feeling self-conscious. She crossed her goose-pimpling arms over her chest, lamenting the way her stomach curved outwards instead of being flat and toned like Ginny’s. She should have worn a better bra, too; this one had turned beige in the wash and one strap was always tighter than the other.

A petite young witch slipped through the curtains, face hidden by the veritable mountain of orange chiffon cradled in her hands. She knelt down and set it on the floor, then began unlacing the ribbons on the back. Hermione watched her warily.

The pint-sized shop assistant was wearing a figure-hugging black top and skirt, which had the instant effect of making Hermione feel dumpy and pudgy. Her sleek black bob was half-up, half-down, fastened at the back with a neat velvet bow. From behind she looked demure and put-together, and really quite cute. 

Still kneeling on the floor, she pulled out the final ribbon and looked up. Her pretty mouth fell open.

Hermione’s heart sank. It really was Parkinson. 

Pansy looked back down at the dress quickly and neither of them said a word until Madam MacGinty bustled back in. 

The bridal shop owner was a steatopygous woman who wore a gauzy, glittering scarf in an attempt to hide her ageing neck. She also wore an eccentric hat decorated with a stag beetle the size of a chihuahua. Hermione was a little worried it might move.

“Step in, dear,” she instructed.

Reluctantly, Hermione did so, allowing Pansy to hoist the fabric upwards and move behind her to relace it. At one point her head was level with Hermione’s hips, so she must have been able to see her lumpy thighs and the loose elastic on her knickers. She must be laughing at her.

Pansy’s fingertips skimmed the soft skin of her back as she deftly twisted the ribbons. Tingles shot guiltily up Hermione’s spine. 

Meanwhile, Madam MacGinty cast a critical eye over the front, adjusting the sleeves and hem as if trying to make everything perfectly symmetrical. A waste of time, in Hermione’s opinion, as nothing would stay that way without pins. Both women seemed to be ignoring her. She might as well have been a dress-up doll.

“Ready?” said Madam MacGinty, and without waiting for an answer led Hermione out of the dressing room and onto a circular podium. In front of her were three tall mirrors that reflected back three Hermiones, each looking equally orange.

“What do we think, ladies?”

I look horrendous, Hermione thought. She looked like a cake. A fat, ugly cake. 

The few square inches of the dress that weren’t ruffled were made of cheap-looking, shiny satin. It rustled when she moved, although the whole concoction was so heavy that moving had become quite difficult. 

It was even worse than Ron’s dress robes back in fourth year, and certainly a far cry from the slim, periwinkle blue number she had chosen for herself, or the purple velvet robes she had picked for her graduation. She felt itchy, uncomfortable and far too hot.

Hermione glared at Pansy, daring her to say something nasty, but she wasn’t looking at her. She was standing very still with her hands behind her back, as if bridal shop assistants weren’t allowed to move or speak.

“It’s very dated,” remarked Padma.

Molly Weasley threw her a look that would have curdled milk, but she didn’t notice. The maid of honour didn’t notice either. She was horizontal on the pastel pink sofa, flicking through a broomstick catalogue. Mrs Granger didn’t say a word about the dress, because she wasn’t there; she was performing an emergency root canal in Watford.

“It’s vintage, Padma,” Hermione explained quickly.

“It’s an heirloom,” Molly sniffed. “Classic styles never go out of fashion. This has been worn by six generations of women in my family, including myself. It’s an honour to pass it on to you, dear, seeing as my own daughter doesn’t appreciate tradition!”

“Mum, I’ve told you, I’m not wearing something I can’t fly in,” said Ginny. “We haven’t set a date yet, and I don’t think I’m even going to wear a dress. I look better in jeans.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, of course you’re going to wear a dress. Jeans, honestly.”

“Who bloody cares if I’m in a dress? Harry won’t mind.”

“I mind! It’s not a proper wedding without a dress.”

“Make him wear one, then!”

Molly tutted savagely, then looked conspiratorially at Hermione, as if only the two of them understood what proper weddings involved. Ginny rolled her eyes and turned back to her catalogue.

What Mrs Weasley didn’t know was that Harry and Ginny were already married, as they had eloped to Gretna Green last spring. Neither of them had fancied the fuss of a Weasley wedding. Hermione and Ron, their witnesses, had been sworn to secrecy.

“You will be wearing a bridesmaid dress, at least,” Molly declared.

“I’ll be wearing whatever Hermione wants me to wear. It’s her wedding, not yours.”

A tense silence followed. Padma sipped her complimentary glass of champagne. Hermione wished someone would hand her something stronger.

As if no one had argued, Madam MacGinty clapped her hands together and gushed loudly and insincerely. 

“Fabulous! Exquisite! A vision. I’m sure your groom will be quite delighted. You’re decided, then? We’ll arrange for you to come back for another fitting, as we may have to make a few teensy adjustments. It’s a little large around the shoulders," she said, fixing the garment with an analytic squint. "And the bust… And the hips…”

Hermione was exceedingly grateful that Pansy helped her down from the podium and led her back to the fitting room, as Molly had begun to shoot daggers.

Pansy unlaced the ribbons and pulled the mass of fabric down, kneeling on the floor again to allow Hermione to step out of it. When she looked up, she was shocked to see tears rolling down Hermione’s face.

“What’s wrong?” said Pansy.

Hermione couldn’t speak. Everything was wrong. She hadn’t chosen her wedding dress, her mum hadn’t come to the fitting but her mother-in-law had, and now she was crying in front of Pansy Parkinson. She was supposed to have come out in a white gown and watched everyone else wipe away happy tears while they told her how beautiful she looked.

“It’ll look a lot different once it’s tailored,” Pansy said soothingly. “It’ll fit you perfectly, I promise.”

Hermione stared at her. 

“It’s orange,” she said.

“Peach,” said Pansy uncertainly, smoothing a hand over the satin. “We supply other colours, if you’re not happy?”

Hermione shook her head.

“I have to wear it. It’s an heirloom, I already agreed to it. I have to be happy.”

Pansy looked as if she wanted to say something, but pursed her lips instead. She stepped beyond the curtain to hang the offending garment on a rack. Hermione collapsed on a velvet pouffé in her bra and pants and sniffled.

Face buried in her hands, she felt a warm hand on her back.

“I know there’s a lot of pressure to find the perfect dress,” Pansy said gently, “but it’s only for one day. Your fiancé will think you look beautiful whatever you wear, I promise. Men don’t know a thing about dresses.”

That was probably true, Hermione thought. She could turn up at the altar in a bin bag and Ron might not notice.

Pansy conjured a white handkerchief and offered it to her.

“Why are you being nice to me?” Hermione accused.

Pansy looked taken aback for a moment, and then abashed.

“I’m very sorry about how I behaved towards you in school.”

“You’re sorry?”

“Yes,” said Pansy, turning pink. “Very. I put people down to try and feel better about myself. It was wrong of me.”

Hermione couldn’t believe it. Parkinson was pretty and pureblooded, effortlessly stylish, with an even complexion and a voice like cut crystal. The only ugly thing about her was her personality, but even that appeared to have changed.

"What did you have to feel bad about?” she asked. 

Pansy reared back.

“What did I—? Everyone called me Pug-faced Parkinson!”

“Better than being called a Mudblood!”

Silence fell awkwardly and began to congeal. Hermione picked up the jersey dress she had come in and pulled it on over her head.

“Pugs are cute. I always wished I had a nose like yours,” she admitted.

“Really? I wished I was more like you. Brave. You never cared what anyone thought about you.”

Hermione paused in lacing her shoes.

“I cared,” she said strangely. 

Of course she cared. She tried not to let things get to her, but they did. Finding out she was a witch had explained why she didn’t fit in with her peers at primary school, but less than a year later she discovered she didn’t fit into the wizarding world either.

At Hogwarts, she had felt that no one except Harry and Padma had even liked her. Ron and Ginny had regularly made it known that they thought she was a bossy, boring swot. Lavender and Parvati had whispered about her hair and her shoes and her teeth and the Slytherins had called her a Mudblood.

“I’m such a mess,” she muttered, wiping her eyes with the borrowed handkerchief. “I bet you’ve never had a bride-to-be break down in the fitting room before.”

Pansy smiled sympathetically.

“Actually, it’s quite a big part of the job. Look, why don’t you come back another time and try on some different dresses?”

“I have to go with that one. I can’t change my mind.”

“Just for fun. Madam MacGinty takes a long lunch most days, she’ll never know. I won’t tell anyone.”

“I don’t know…”

“Please,” said Pansy. “I need to make up for being a horrid bitch.”

Hermione looked into her big, dark eyes, earnest and pleading. She had been a horrid bitch at school, but today she seemed a perfect angel.