Remembering the Second Yule Ball

They sifted through the pile of photographs together, hungrily drinking in the visions caught and suspended in time for all to see.

"Ooh, look at this one!" she squealed excitedly. She held out the picture in question, and he took it. Memories flooded through his mind.

It was Christmas at Hogwarts. Well, nearly, anyway. It was the twentieth, and every student was looking forward to the Yule Ball that had been resurrected from three years earlier during the Triwizard tournament. The halls were decorated with beautiful, magic-enhanced decorations, and the Great Hall looked phenomenal. The dance was on the twenty-fourth: Christmas Eve. Only four days remained.

Most students had been paired up for days, busily planning which other couples they would sit with to eat, what they would wear in order to match color-wise (although this was more the female half of the population more than anything).

Ron and Hermione were going; after all, they had been a couple for the previous year. Parvarti and Lavender were going with Seamus and Dean respectively. Neville had opted for a sixth-year that nearly nobody knew. Harry had asked Ginny, based on the strong "suggestion" he had received from Ron on the subject. Protective or not, Ron did not want Ginny ending up alone for an event as big as the Yule Ball. Harry had agreed without much argument. He had nothing against Ginny at all. She was a nice girl, and pretty enough too. Besides, he had no one else to go with. So he'd asked her- and she'd said yes.

So here they were, four days before the Yule Ball, and both of them were looking forward to it and being with each other. They weren't interested in each other as more than friends- but they liked each other well enough, and a night together at a dance would be fun.

Four days later, six PM...

"Well..." Harry said, resigned, to Ron. "Guess we'd better get ready for the ball, huh?" Ron looked at his watch.

"Oops, maybe so. It's not that late, but we might as well. We can play chess while we wait if we're ready early."

"Doesn't matter if we're early or not- the girls'll make us late," Harry quipped. The boys in the room laughed appreciatively.

"Hear hear, Harry!" Seamus called loudly from across the room where he was playing Gobstones with Dean. Harry grinned. The boys headed up to their rooms. The girls, consequently, had headed up to theirs in a similar fashion--only four hours earlier.

Some four hours earlier, two fifteen PM...

"Hermione!" Ginny squealed, looking up from her Potions essay, which she was getting a head start on before break ended. "Look at the time!" Hermione frowned, looking at her watch.

"It's a quarter past two. What's wrong?" Ginny looked at her in shock, mimicked by the other girls in the room who had also realized what she was getting at.

"It's a quarter past two, Hermione. A quarter past two." Hermione scowled.

"So what?! We don't have anything going on toni--Omigod! It's a quarter past two!!" She jumped up. Ginny laughed.

"Wondered when you'd get that." She turned to the rest of the fourth year and older females in the Common Room.

"Girls!" she called. "It's a quarter past two!! The ball starts at seven!!" There was a group scream, and then a mass exodus, followed by a stampede up the stairs. Hermione and Ginny followed them at a run.

The girls slid into the bathroom, each fighting to get a shower before they ran out, but magic had reached the bathroom ahead of them. Apparently their bathroom knew when such an occasion was at hand, and it had rearranged itself to fit their needs.

Each girl was able to shower with no one left out. The bathroom was also handily equipped with a huge counter and benches placed in front of it at intervals. The wall behind the counter was solid mirror, and all other free wall space in the bathroom was completely covered in full-length mirrors.

The counter was about a foot thick, and at each spot a wide, tall drawer was fitted into the counter. When the girls opened it, they found it full of makeup, nice creams, fancy hair things, accessories, and a small book of spells for hair and such.

"Hermione!!" Ginny said, sitting down at her spot. "Come here, quick!! I need help!!" Hermione came over on the run.

"What's up, Gin?"

"How in the world am I supposed to use all of this? There's too much to choose from!! Help me!! What robes do I wear? What accessories? How do I do my hair? How-"

"Calm down, Ginny. I'll help you, you can help me, OK? This bathroom is great, everyone can help everyone. We'll all look fabulous, I promise. Now first things first. Sit down, I'll do your makeup." Ginny sat. For a bookworm like Hermione, she certainly knew a lot about makeup and how to apply it.

She cleaned Ginny's face thoroughly, and started with the basics. She put on just the tiniest amount of blush, because too much would look out of place on Ginny's pale skin. She put on mascara and clear lip gloss, and light, light green eye shadow that matched her eye liner, to bring out the tones of her hair.

"Okay, makeup's done. Dress, now. What do you have?" She followed Ginny into her room, and they dug through her closet.

"Um- Hermione, shouldn't I be wearing robes?" Ginny asked.

"Robes? No way. Remember- Dumbledore said it'd be fun to do a dance like Muggles do? That means dresses for the girls and suits for the blokes. Trust me- you will be shocked when you see all the boys in suits. It's one of my favorite sights. Now let me see your closet..." She began rooting through the contents of her wardrobe.

"Um, Hermione?" Ginny said tentatively. "Shouldn't you be looking through my wardrobe?"

"No," Hermione said decisively. "You don't own anything that would work... Agh, there's nothing in here either." She charged over to the next wardrobe, which happened to be Lavender's, and began digging through it.

"Green?" Hermione mused. "No. Too cliché for redheads. Pink? No--some redheads can wear it, but not tonight. White? No, too bride-like. Cream? Ah... I've found it!" She said triumphantly. She lifted out a light- blue colored dress. It was a halter top. Ginny looked askance at it.

"Doesn't that show a little too much--skin?" she asked uncertainly. Hermione laughed.

"Muggles wear much worse than this, Ginny. Put it on; let me see." Ginny pulled the dress over her head and arranged it with help from Hermione.

"Now look at me," Hermione commanded. Ginny turned to face her. It was beautiful. It was made out of stretchy material, left her entire back bare and sank down low in front into a rounded v-shape. The skirt was straight, with slits about halfway up her thighs. Hermione sighed.

"Oh, that looks gorgeous on you. Here, put on the sandls." She held out a matching pair of sandals, made out of zigzag strips of narrow fabric. Ginny obediently pulled them on and stood upright.

"Gorgeous," Hermione announced. "Hair time. Come on." She pulled Ginny back into the bathroom, which was a mass of excited girls and mists of hairspray in the air.

"Sit," Hermione commanded again. Ginny obeyed. Hermione reached for a hairbrush. "Any ideas?" She asked briskly.

"Um... leave it down? I don't want that much of my back showing." Ginny proposed.

"Boys'll love it..." Hermione said enticingly. Ginny shook her head. "No. I'm not comfortable with it. Leave it partway down, at least." Hermione sighed.

"Okay," she said. "Spoilsport." Ginny giggled. Hermione parted Ginny's hair off to the side a little, then pulled small pieces of it from the front back into a clip that the drawer had produced to match the dress. She took out her wand and went over every inch of the ends of Ginny's hair, curling them into ringlets, which she carefully separated and gave a "careless" look. She pulled small strands from the front of her hair and hung them down in front of her face, curling these also into loose curls. Spraying hairspray one last time, she looked down at Ginny.

"Done!!" she announced, looking pleased. Ginny stood and walked over to a full-length mirror. She gasped. She looked- beautiful. She had never seen herself look so nice. Harry would flip. She walked over to Hermione and carefully hugged her.

"Thank you!!! I look fabulous!" Hermione grinned.

"And so humble too... what a great combination of traits."

"Oh- you!" Ginny said, swatting Hermione's arm. Hermione laughed.

"My turn!"

"Absolutely," Ginny nodded. "Siddown," she commanded her friend in a mock imitation of herself.

"Yes sir!" Hermione said, saluting. Ginny laughed, and looked at Hermione critically. She was actually very pretty naturally; she just didn't do anything to enhance her looks.

"Okay!" Ginny said. "I know exactly what to do. Allow me," she said. Hermione grinned and nodded at their reflection in the mirror.

"Full steam ahead. Make me dreamy." Ginny laughed. She opened the drawer and began to set out different things.

"Mm..." Ginny said thoughtfully. "Okay- yeah. That'll be perfect." She set about her job.

Half an hour later, the makeup was done. Her skin was very brown, so Ginny used different colors than she had used on herself. The blush was a little more noticeable in Hermione's cheeks than Ginny's. She had a light coat of red lipstick on, and a careful mixture of light blue and gray eye shadow, and brown mascara that enhanced her eyes.

"Dress!" Ginny said, leading the way. "I already have an idea for what I want on you... let me see what you've got here..." She dug through the wardrobes in Hermione's dormitory. No one would care if a dress of theirs was borrowed.

"Yes!" She said, pulling a red dress out or Parvarti's closet. It was short and sleeveless, and it had black designs stitched all over it. "This is perfect to match your hair and skin," she said, draping the dress over Hermione's lap. "Put it on while I get the sandals." Hermione tugged the dress over her head. It fell a few inches above her knees, and it had spaghetti straps, diving down low on her chest. Ginny looked at her.

"Looks great. Here're the sandals. Put them on." Hermione sat on the edge of the bed to obey. The sandals were simpler than Ginny's- they were solid black, and quite tall (as Hermione was extremely short next to Ron) and they were hardly there at all- just one narrow strip across the toes and some strips at the top to keep them on.

"Bathroom," Ginny ordered, taking Hermione by the hand.

"You do realize you've been speaking practically in monosyllables since you've started this?" Hermione said mischievously.

"Of course," Ginny retorted. "It's hard work. Takes too much energy to talk." She grinned at Hermione, who smiled back.

"Okay, hair time. Ideas?"

"Do whatever you want. Just make it look good."

"Can I cut it?" Hermione's hair had grown out quite long since her fourth year. Hermione looked startled.

"Cut it? I guess so. I hadn't really thought about it. Not too short though, okay?" Ginny nodded.

"Okay. Let me think..." She tapped her chin with her finger. "Got it!" She pointed her wand at Hermione's hair, looking at the book that the drawer had supplied them with. She pictured what she wanted very clearly, and then said,

"Incisio!" Immediately Hermione's hair was shorter, and the excess hair had disappeared.

"How's it look?" Hermione said anxiously.

"Great!" Ginny answered. Hermione's hair was now just past her shoulders. Ginny put a straightening spell on it, and then curled it under. She parted it in the middle and pulled one half back with a black clip. The other side she brushed carefully down to fall softly against Hermione's cheek. She had feathered the hair when she cut it, so combing it like this framed Hermione's face nicely.

Ginny pulled a silver bracelet out of the drawer and pulled it onto Hermione's wrist.

"There!" she said, satisfied. "Go drool over yourself." Hermione stood up and walked to the same mirror Ginny had used two hours earlier. Her jaw dropped as she looked into it. She was incredible looking. Ron's eyes would absolutely bug out of his head. She wasn't classically beautiful like Ginny was- but she was sexy and hot. Pretty in a different way- and a way that Ron liked.

She turned from the mirror. Most activity had ceased in the bathroom. Every girl was ready and every girl looked fabulous.

"Wow," Parvarti said, staring at all the girls. "We look good." That broke the spell. The girls giggled nervously.

"Well..." Lavender said. "I suppose we should go meet the boys, huh?" The girls walked carefully down the stairs to where they knew the boys would be waiting.

Six o' five pm Five past six PM, back to the boys...

"I'd say this is easily the earliest I've ever got ready for something," Ron said philosophically to Harry as the walked into their room. "Usually I just, you know, wait until ten minutes before it's time to leave. Ginny must be rubbing off on me or something."

"Really," Harry said in agreement. "Those girls--they left at like, two o'clock!! What in the world do they do for so long? It's insane."

"I hear you mate," Dean said from behind him.

"But just think," Seamus said from the front of the line. "We get to drool over them when they come down. They always look great when they spend forever getting ready." The boys agreed loudly.

"Why-" Ron said in disgust a few minutes later, "did Dumbledore decide to do this Ball Muggle style? What are these things that we're supposed to be wearing?"

"They're tuxedos," said Harry, laughing at Ron. "I kind of like them. Robes make me feel like I'm wearing a dress all the time." Ron's face darkened.

"A dress? Ugh. Maybe there is something to Muggle clothes after all. How do you put this thing together?" He said, struggling to pull his vest over an overly starched shirt.

"Keep trying Ron, you'll get it," Harry said helpfully.

"Argh," was Ron's only answer. Harry laughed and finished adjusting his jacket so it hung right. The rest of them were ready within minutes.

"See?" said Dean as the trooped down the stairs. "We can get ready and look dashing-" Ron snorted, "in twenty minutes flat." They stopped, lining up in front of the fire place. "Why can't girls--" His voice trailed off as the girls in question stepped down from the landing into the Common Room.

"Wow..." was his closing comment. The other boys were reacting similarly. Harry closed his jaw and whistled. Ginny blushed. Ron just stood, transfixed, as he looked at Hermione.

"What'd I tell you?" Seamus said in a sing-song voice, elbowing Harry in the ribs.

Harry elbowed him back. "Shut up Seamus. Just let me die now and I'll die happy."

Colin bounded down the stairs, camera in hand.

"Pictures of the couples!" he cried excitedly. "You've got to have a picture to remember this by!" The room started murmuring. Ginny looked at Harry, a questioning look in her eyes. Harry shrugged, then nodded.

"We're in," he told Colin. Colin's face lit up.

"All right then!! Go over by the fire. It'll be a good background." Harry and Ginny followed directions. "Okay, now pick a pose..." Colin said, adjusting his camera. Harry thought for a minute, then smiled. He leaned down to whisper to Ginny, who smiled and nodded back.

"Okay Colin. We're ready."

"Hang on," Colin said distractedly. "These are going to be Muggle pictures, okay, guys?" Harry and Ginny nodded. "All right, pose!" Harry swept Ginny up in his arms. CLICK! went the camera, and the pose was saved forever: Faces tilted, smilingly happily at each other, Ginny's arms around Harry's neck and his arms supporting her, one of her legs pointed out in a classic pose, frozen forever in time.

He smiled, remembering that night.

"Look at this one," she said, handing him another. It was the exact same pose, only a different day- in this one she was wearing a white fluffy dress and he a white tuxedo instead of a black one. In one of her hands she held a light blue bouquet. On her other hand a diamond ring glittered, catching the light of the matching ring on his corresponding hand- forever frozen in time.