Twice the Trouble, Twice the Fun ((Anna & Grace))

[Damien Lennox S7]

“I don’t know how you managed to get away with this,” Damien murmured softly, his tone full of muted awe. “I mean, yeah, sure, you’re Head Girl and all but what’s-his-name…Reid! He’s Head Boy; how didn’t he catch you and stop you?” Despite his questions, Damien didn’t once stop in his actions, both his hands busy pinning Carlin’s hair up with practiced ease. It was an arrangement that suited them both: Damien occasionally fixed the parts of Carlin’s hair that she couldn’t reach in return for her fixing his tie on the rare occasions he actually wore them. Besides, it wasn’t like she had any girl friends that would help her get ready. Well, Theresa would do it if he asked her to but Carlin had reacted with extreme disgust at the idea of Damien’s ‘pathetic little pet’, as she called Theresa, coming within five feet of her. He was fond of Theresa, finding her an amusing distraction even if she did tend to cling to him like a limpet, but Damien had merely shrugged good-naturedly and told his cousin to drop by the boys’ dorm when she was ready for him to help her then. The other Slytherin seventh year boys should be more than accustomed to Carlin just dropping by unannounced anyway since she did it nearly every morning.

“You underestimate me too much,” Carlin chided him, flicking her wrist at him once she deemed her hair suitable enough to not need his services any longer. “Consider it one of your Christmas presents.” Accepting his offer to pull her to her feet, Carlin swept her cousin into a hug, her wicked smirk emerging once safely hidden from his sight.

“So who are they?” Damien asked inquisitively, narrowing his eyes when Carlin didn’t answer immediately. There was always something brewing in her evil little mind when she lingered over the answer to a simple question. He never complained; that which entertained Carlin generally amused him also.

Smirking unabashedly now, Carlin sauntered over to the door, her words and laughter floating back up the stairs as she descended. “Anna Monkshood and Grace Hunter. Merry Christmas, cousin!”

Less than an hour later, still shaking his head at her audacity, Damien stood in the crowd milling about the Great Hall, giving his best impression of listening to Carlin’s speech. He had given her most of the ideas for what to say, so he could pretty much guess what she was talking about anyway. It was a cruel little trick on Carlin’s behalf to fix him up with Elias’s sister as his blind date, not to mention that she had also given him a second date in the form of one of the Ravenclaw Quidditch players. Still, it would be an enjoyable night, if only for the entertainment factor.

Catching sight of one of his dates, Damien started weaving his way through the crowd, occasionally pausing to share a few words with other people he knew. By the time he reached his destination, he was confident that at least he would have someone sharing his bed tonight even if his dates turned out to be a waste of his time. Producing a neatly wrapped present from his pocket (it was nothing fancy, just a box of chocolates from Honeydukes but forethought and charm went a long way), he circled around to face the first of his dates, grinning irrepressibly at her. “Merry Christmas, Anna.”

[Anna Monkshood R5]

Anna tried turning the corners of her mouth up as she looked at herself in the mirror. Yes, she supposed she did look quite pretty, when she was smiling. She was wearing a floaty chiffon dress of a dreamy light blue colour, and her bright red curls tumbled irrepressibly down over her shoulders, not exactly unruly, but left entirely without ornament. A loose silver bangle rested round her wrist, thrown in to make the sensibly flat, silver coloured pumps tie in with the rest of her outfit. Well, it would do. It wasn’t as if she was actually looking to impress anyone, anyway. Only fools hoped for love from a blind date – hopeless fools from a blind date with Damien Lennox, of all people. Far better to make your own choice! But Anna had signed up for the blind dating just for the sake of having someone to spend the evening with; she didn’t think she’d have any need for a proper boyfriend for a few years or so yet: she had enough other things to fill her time with. Idle flirting would be quite sufficient, and for that, Damien Lennox should be a very good match.

It was time to go, and Anna made her way down to the Great Hall along with the other chattering girls from her dormitory, making a perfunctory effort to join in with the exclamations and compliments (they weren’t really her sort of thing). A wall of noise hit the group as they entered the Great Hall, and their conversation ceased; the Hall looked magnificent, as it usually did when decorated for Christmas, but with a few added touches. They made their way into the crowd, an on-duty Prefect offered each of them a glass of champagne from a tray. Anna took one, wondering as she sipped at it how many younger students would manage to wangle themselves some alcohol before the end of the evening.

The Head Girl, a Slytherin who must be some relation of Anna’s blind date since they shared a surname, made a speech, as did August, whom Anna knew relatively well now as a result of being on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team. Not a long time after the dance opened, Anna, still sipping cautiously at her champagne, found herself face to face with the infamous Damien Lennox.
“Oh, thank you!” Anna said, taking the proffered gift, which from its size, shape and weight was chocolates for certain. She suppressed what would have been a rather stupid ‘but I haven’t got anything in return!’ just in time – after all, she’d bothered to turn up, hadn’t she? – but she still blushed very slightly. She smiled back at him uncertainly, genuinely pleased that he’d bothered to get her a token gift, but a bit wary in spite of herself. Something sly in his grin suggested that he was aware that his reputation preceded him. “Merry Christmas to you too.”

She fumbled with opening the gift until another Prefect came along bearing a tray to relieve her of her empty champagne glass, after which it was much easier. Proper thanks for Honeydukes’ finest repeated, she commented thoughtfully, “I’m glad I avoided Prefect duty for this, I suspect Midsummer Fireworks will be much less tedious.” She wondered whether the Head Girl and Boy would escape the drudgery of tasks associated with running the dance – perhaps they had already discharged their duties in the planning stage. That brought another question into her head. “Is Carlin your sister?” she asked with disinterested curiosity. “It’s always difficult to tell whether people are siblings or first cousins or other random connections, the wizarding world is so inter-related.”

[Damien Lennox S7]

The girl was pretty enough, he concluded after an idle inspection. Blue for her House and silver for his? How…cute. Yes, ‘cute’ was probably the best word for the colour association if it had been deliberate; it showed a simple, almost childish approach to accessorising. Cynthia would probably have dressed herself in a similar way. Carlin would have rolled her eyes exasperatedly at the very thought. Still, life was easier when his dates didn’t share a similar attitude to the older of his two female cousins. Carlin was tricky to manage; it had taken him nearly five months to figure out the best way to handle her, but he had been eleven and less familiar with her back then. Cyn was remarkably easier to please but, then again, eight year olds always were.

Anna’s question brought a faint smile to his lips; it was always a bit surprising when he found someone who didn’t know Carlin or himself. Her sense of superiority had clearly infected him at some point over the years if he had somehow come to believe that everyone should know not only their names but their family tree. Elias had known about them. Not that Elias had proved to be at all accommodating; it had taken Damien days to catch up on all of the conquests he had ignored in favour of trying to win over Elias. So perhaps it was a promising sign that Anna needed clarification? “She’s my cousin, but we spend so much time together that she might as well be my sister,” Damien answered, reaching out to snag two glasses of champagne for them from one of the passing Prefects. That he didn’t even have to glance around to locate the tray clearly spoke of how many parties similar to this he had attended. Both his parents and Carlin’s had a partiality for lavish parties, whether attending or hosting them. While certainly not as opulent as those events, this holiday ball had a touch of Carlin about it that, to Damien, was instantly recognisable.

“I enjoy having a close-knit family,” he continued seamlessly, preferring to ignore his glass until he needed something to occupy him during Anna’s part of the conversation. Most girls loved the idea of boys who loved their families; it was just coincidence that he truly was rather close to his family, especially Carlin and her parents. His own parents could be rather taxing sometimes and his actual siblings very rarely made themselves useful to him. “Carlin and I may not always agree but we’re always there for each other.” Damien paused to sip from his glass, using the action to mask his real intention: trying his absolute hardest to recall anything he might know about his date. His memory thankfully didn’t fail him, even serving up a piece of previously useless trivia that made him smirk. Oh, the only thing that could please him more was if Carlin had actually managed to fix him up with that ferocious little Beater; the cousins held no fondness for Shaw after their encounter with him during the summer. “You’re on the Ravenclaw Quidditch team, right? With the Beater that really seemed to hate Shaw?”