A Night of Firsts

It had been a night of firsts.

It had been the first time in several years that Hogwarts had had the privilege of hosting an All Hallows Eve ball, and with a nod to both Muggle and ancient Magical traditions, it was a costume ball.

This both thrilled and irritated the collective sum of the faculty and student population. The faculty was convinced that the Headmaster had indeed finally lost whatever sanity he had had remaining to him to institute an utter madness as this one. What about the planning such an event requires? What about all the effort that must go into such a thing? The professors asked. "We're already bogged down with class schedules and grading and the like. Which one of us has the time to devote to something like this?" they told the Headmaster. Who in turn, merely smiled and said that it had all already been taken care of and that they needn't trouble themselves about it. The planning had been placed in the hands of the people who had come up with the idea and it was shaping up quite nicely under their capable hands. Suspicious, the professors naturally wanted to know who "they" were. But their pleas were to no avail, for the Headmaster merely smiled and once more reassured them that everything was under control.

The students, on the other hand were for the most part, absolutely thrilled with this turn of events. The majority of them were already making plans to go with so and so and avidly discussing costume ideas. The costume ball was the subject of the day, everyone was talking about it. The two notable exceptions to this mania that had insinuated into the general student population were this year's Head Boy and Head Girl. Yes, Blaise Zabini and Hermione Granger were the only two students not seemingly going gaga over the amazing prospects of the upcoming Halloween Costume Ball.

It had been the first time in quite a number of years that there had been a Slytherin Head Boy and a Gryffindor Head Girl that were not constantly at each other's throats. An intriguing pair to say the least they were, the Head Boy from Slytherin and the Head Girl from Gryffindor, they got on quite amicably to the pleasant surprise of their teachers and especially their Heads of Houses. Neither of whom had particularly relished the idea of having to constantly referee the inevitable (or so they assumed) squabbles. Both students were reasonably level-headed, very diligent in their studies, and not afraid of hard work. Even more importantly both students were respected and highly regarded by the student population. They had managed to keep the peace and somewhat formulate a decent working relationship among the Prefects and there were fairly fewer spats between the Houses.

It had been the first time that either one had had a chance to step out from the influences of their Houses and truly be noticed for who they really were. In doing so, both Mr. Zabini and Miss Granger discovered that they had had much more in common than either one of them had previously considered. Both were possessed of the same slightly-on-the-snarky-side sense of humor and both were forced to admit their closet obsessions with chocolate and coffee. She introduced him to the joys of Monty Python, Jane Austen, and Miles Davis; he introduced her to the Princess Bride, Oscar Wilde, and Queen. Many a night, there was a fierce dispute, a furious clash of wills over a game of Wizarding Scrabble (or two or three). He knew that she loved to sing and play the piano; she knew that he was an excellent artist and enjoyed playing his cello, which was more than most of their friends knew about them.

It was the first time in a long time that her friends saw her truly happy, so at ease with as one brave soul had put it, 'life, love, the Universe, and everything else.' Where before she had been so incredibly tense, constantly worrying or agonizing over something or someone; now she seemed to have relinquished a bit of her obsessive need to study, organize, and control. The thing they were most thankful for however was the peace she seemed to have made with all of the losses that she personally had sustained during the war. Her sixth year had not only brought with it all of the normal issues that came with part of the Golden Trio, but also the death of a dearly beloved great-aunt. Right on the heels of that tragedy came the further deaths of the majority of Hermione's immediate family. All she had left were her adult cousins, Sandy and Dennys, who were attending graduate schools in America and her little six-year old niece, Psyche. Psyche had shown the signs of budding magical potential and was, for the moment placed with a secure purebred wizarding family. The major sign though that they had that showed that Hermione had truly healed, truly changed for the better was that she was no longer the deathly silent, withdrawn shell of a human being she had been at the beginning of the year. She was quieter than she had been, yes, a touch more soul-weary, a bit harder, a bit grimmer in her outlook on life, but such are the consequences of war, such are the consequences when children are forced to grow up before they are ready to. It is unthinkable to have passed through such ordeals and not expect to come out other than you were. Hermione was able to smile and she was able to laugh and those who loved her praised the heavenly deities for it.

It was a first for his friends to really get to see the true face of their friend. To see him as he truly was, not the indifferent mask he generally showed the outside world. To see and to know that this Blaise was indeed the true Blaise, that this Blaise was the one that before had lurked, had hidden itself beneath all the masks and barriers that had been required of them and had insured their continued survival at time, even at the earliest of ages. It was a relief for most all of them actually, to be able to talk, debate, and just generally be without having to constantly monitor one's every move and cautiously observe one's every word. Having to always make an effort to ensure that nothing you said or did went against the proscribed party line that was drummed into them at every turn. Never giving them any hint, any evidence of what one's true feelings might be on any given subject, knowing that if you said or did anything out of the ordinary, it would be reported back to your parents and the Dark Lord more than likely and if you had no extremely rock-solid excuse for your behavior, then your holidays would be most unpleasant indeed. To be free from the restraining influence of evil that was a constant reminder of what they were expected to do in this life and woe betide the person who dared go against it. Blaise's friends could see that for one of the first times that they could remember, Blaise was just Blaise. Not the quiet, mysterious Slytherin, not the eldest son of a notable purebred family, he was just Blaise.

With all of these new-found revelations, it came as somewhat of a shock when none of their friends or professors could find them at the ball. Added to this was the realization that neither set of their friends actually knew what either of the two were going as. This mystery hit even the faculty, with both their Heads of Houses intrigued and perplexed respectively at this apparent secrecy. The Headmaster himself was slightly off-put when he could immediately tell his Head Boy and Girl apart from the rest of their classmates, he had wanted to thank them privately for the absolutely spiffing job they'd done with the decorations, music, and food. He sighed, preparing to stand up and ask both of them to come to the front so that they could be recognized for their superb efforts when all of the sudden something in the far corner of the Great Hall caught his eye and when his brain had finally processed what he was seeing...

It was a first for the entirety of the student population and many of the faculty as well when they saw the Headmaster stand up, presumably to announce something, stare hard at the back wall for an instant and see the great man, himself's jaw indubitably become unhinged and drop clear through to the dungeons. Turning about, very nearly as one, the students and faculty turned to see whatever it was that had shocked the unflappable Headmaster so. And rightly so, for here was a sight unforgettable and disturbing to say the least; for at the back wall the sight, so astonishing to the rest of the castle was the sight of what appeared to be Gryffindor's House Head madly snogging the living daylights out of what appeared to be Slytherin's House Head. There was much hyperventilating by the occupants of both Houses and the faculty until it was realized that both McGonagall and Snape were in fact staring horrifically at the pair along with everyone else, McGonagall's husband sitting next to her, thoroughly enjoying this hilariously funny turn of events. Leaning over his petrified with shock wife, Declan McGonagall briefly whispered something into Dumbledore's ear. Nodding briefly and grinning at his old friend, Dumbledore called the now blushing couple up to the front.

The mystery of what had happened to the Head Boy and Girl had been solved.