Not Another Wedding Story

THE ELUSIVE FLOWER GIRL

The way Harry Potter walked into a room told you he was a man who'd endured a lot of heartache. His first crush had been in love with a corpse, and he'd defeated Voldemort only to find his one true love was more interested in a pompous Slytherin git. Sure, his heart had only been ripped from his chest twice, but it still hurt.

Now, on the day of his ex's wedding, he was sitting in the kitchen sulking. Unfortunately, no one was in the least bit interested in him. After all, there was a wedding going on.

Everything had been thrown into chaos after Harry had jumped. Without Ron, no one could look after Marissa, and so poor Arthur was drafted in. And he wasn't as sharp as he used to be. Then Fleur had arrived, looking far more fabulous than Ginny. Arguments ensued, after which Fleur agreed to wear a hat. Then, Fleur informed Ginny that her daughter Lisa had a stomach bug, and wouldn't be able to perform her duties as flower girl.

And so, Hermione grabbed the telephone and rang up the Zabini residence, where Draco was having quite enough trouble on his own. So, he made a few suggestions.

"Goyle could do it," he replied, before shouting at Goyle. "Oi! How'd you like to be flower girl you big gorilla!?" Hermione hung up.

"We've got no one," she said, sitting down holding her head in her hands. Harry merely grunted at her. "Are you still moping?" she snapped at him. "Get a grip!"

Harry turned his head to stare at her, before making his own contribution to how to solve the dilemma.

"Maybe Goyle could do it."

"Harry, Goyle's not doing it."

"What about Crabbe?" To this Hermione could not even muster the will to give a civilised response. She just sat their, and Harry continued to list his own suggestions, none of whom would really wish to be flower girl. Well, Fred and George might do it if asked, but they were the only ones. Other suggestions included McGonagall, Dobby and Snape. Harry decided to take matters into his own hands, and owl Snape.

Several minutes later, a red envelope arrived.

"YOU THINK YOU'RE FUNNY POTTER?" Snape's voice boomed at a hundred times its natural volume. "IF YOU EVER MAKE A SUGGESTION LIKE THAT TO ME AGAIN, YOU'RE FIND YOURSELF ON THE WRONG END OF THE DARKEST CURSES KNOWN TO MAN AND BEAST ALIKE! DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME POTTER?"

"Loud and clear," Harry told the letter as it crumbled into ash, looking considerably more pleased than he had done moments before. Then, Ginny came down the stairs.

"Was that Snape?" she barked, before noticing the familiar remains of a Howler. She rounded on Harry. It was more terrifying than any Howler.

"WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE PLAYING AT? THIS IS NO TIME TO BE ANNOYING YOUR OLD TEACHER! LEAVE THE GREASY GIT ALONE AND MAKE YOURSELF USEFUL!!!" So, Ginny stormed upstairs, and Harry continued moping around in the kitchen. Hermione decided to follow Ginny upstairs and break the bad news.

Then the phone rang again.

"You know, with all this magic it's amazing how many wizards have telephones," Harry said to no one in particular, before answering. "Hello... sorry, she's busy right now... well it is her wedding day. Can I take a message? ... Oh, okay... no prob..."

He put down the phone, and screamed.

Hermione practically fell down the stairs, wand at the ready, closely followed by the ever-vigilant Arthur Weasley.

"Did you find Marissa?" he asked desperately.

"You've lost Marissa?" Hermione asked in shock. He paled.

"Of course not," he told her hastily. "Er, um. We were playing hide and seek. I'll just go find her." He sprinted up the stairs again.

"So Harry, what's the matter?" Hermione asked.

"Nothing," he merely squeaked. "It's all under control." Hermione gave him a look up and down as if to say she didn't believe him, but she wasn't going to just stand here and try and force the answer out of him when she had much more important things to do. She went back upstairs. Harry picked up again, and for the third time that day the Zabini phone began to ring.

He promptly explained the dilemma.

###

As a child Ginny had always been fascinated with the idea of getting married in a Muggle church, just like her parents had done. To get the thing done properly. And, any church wedding needs a priest. I mean, it would be daft to even consider a wizard conducting the ceremony.

Finding a priest was easy, finding one that didn't keep throwing holy water at them and holding a crucifix in their faces was the real trick. Eventually, they found a rather open minded priest who had done a wizard wedding before.

However, he had just turned out to be a little too open-minded.

The police had just busted up an international drugs and prostitution ring, and it turned out that he had an alternate lifestyle under the name Big Daddy. Oh, and Dean Thomas was caught out as well.

Draco called upon his newly appointed best man to do the deed of finding another priest. His instructions were clear.

"Money is no object, just find me a priest. Any priest! I don't care if he's in handcuffs, find one!"

Ron quickly returned to the Burrow to find the only wizard alive who knew the names of any priest. His father.

"Of course Ron my boy, I'll just phone up the chap who did me and Molly's wedding," Arthur told him cheerfully. "But then, I really have to find Marissa before your wife finds out!"

Rest assured, inside Arthur Weasley's head was the sound of one man, clapping slowly.

Ron was now faced with the mountainous task of locating his daughter. A lot of people compared her to Fred and George, but no. She was worse. At least with Fred and George you had a chance of catching them out. But Marissa was a lot more subtle. At one point she'd disappeared for six hours whenever Ron had tried looking for her. He eventually found her with a packet of crayons, censoring all of Ron's old adult magazines.

In desperation they scoured the house from top to bottom, trying as inconspicuously as possible to look under the bed in Ginny's room, where everyone was getting ready. Arthur was helping considerably by checking all the teacups, hoping to find that Marissa had inherited Molly's magnetic attraction to tea sets at all those Muggle auctions they went to.

Then, the answer struck Ron firmly on the head. If he were a small child, stuck wandering around with an idiot, what would you do? You'd find something more interesting to do.

It was a good thing Hermione didn't look out the window at that particular moment. Because if she had, she'd have noticed her husband trying to drag their daughter away from some raw chicken she was enjoying.

"Aha, there's the little devil!" Arthur said triumphantly when Ron entered the kitchen with Marissa. "Caught me by surprise. The old reflexes aren't what they used to be."

Ron was rather unwilling to leave his daughter in the hands of one who had used that excuse far too often. He used it when Marissa got away, when Fred and George sprang a well placed joke on him or when the last piece of turkey seemed to evade his fork. However, he summed up his options. It was Harry, or Arthur. And Harry was still sulking.

Yet again, Marissa found herself stuck with the rather dull Arthur Weasley.

"But Daddy," she moaned. "The old man just talks about plugs all day! Plugs is boring."

"My dear Marissa," Arthur said dramatically, drawing himself up to his full height. "If loving our noble cousins, the Muggles, is boring, then I'm boring! If wanting to know how these noble souls cope without magic is boring, then I'm boring! And if dismantling Muggle objects just so I can have the satisfaction of putting them back together is boring, then consider me the most boring man on earth!" He stood there, his chest drawn out with a look on his face that suggested he'd just won a great victory. Marissa looked unimpressed.

"Whatever Dad," was all Ron could muster. "Just make sure you phone that priest before you explain Elect Ricky to her." Then, he turned to leave, only to find his way blocked by the most terrifying sight he'd ever seen.

There, standing in the doorway was a man. His long, red hair was hastily died blonde, and he was dressed in a pink tutu (which he had clearly had much difficulty putting on), tights and high heels. Marissa giggled, Arthur vomited, and Ron told still in shock. Even Harry, who had faced dangers that would make even the bravest men crap themselves, was utterly speechless.

"I hear you need a flower girl," he said, giving them a little twirl.

"First Dean Thomas, now this," Ron said. "I think I need a cup of tea."

"Oh yes, that would be lovely," said Percy, as if it was completely normal to be standing in the doorway dressed like a Barbie doll.