Masquerade

AN~ hey! It seems, from the reviews, that ya'll liked the first chapter, well, here's the next one! Keep reviewing! --Pix--

Chapter Two

The next morning the girls woke to the loud bleeping of Hermione's alarm clock.

"Ugh," moaned Bridget. "What time is it?"

"Rise and shine, darlings!" sounded the annoying voice of Parvati from across the room. "It's already seven and we have to be down by eight, since classes start at nine."

"Good God," sighed Emily and promptly fell off the bed as she rolled over. The girls cracked up and soon were all on the floor from laughing.

"Yes, well, now that you've all gotten over that immature little... thing... shall we shower and dress?" Lavender was of course jealous of the new girls whom the boys had taken such a liking to and did not want to see them having fun.

"Yes, oh Queen Lavender, we shall be with thou in minutes!" said Kieran, and walked stately into the bathroom, sending the girls into another fit of giggles.

By the time they'd all showered and dressed it was five minutes to eight and they had to meet the boys. Taryn, Kieran, Bridget, Hermione, Emily, and Griffin trooped downstairs. When they reached the common room the boys were already there, looking tired and as if they'd rolled out of bed five minutes before.

"Hey guys!" called Bridget and jumped on Sky's back, almost knocking him over. "I didn't know you were meeting with us, Schuler."

"Yea, well, I am," replied Sky lamely.

"We figured all the guys would want to meet you girls, so we brought along some others," said Ron with a grin. The girls looked around and all but Hermione saw some new faces.

"And they would be...?" asked Kieran.

"This is Fred and this is George," said Harry, nodding to two tall red heads that looked a lot like Ron. "They're Ron's twin older brothers. This is Neville," he said, pointing to a short guy with brown hair. "This is Seamus, and this is Dean." Harry pointed to two guys, one a blonde, one a brunette.

"Hello boys," said Emily, with a purr and an exaggerated wink. Everyone laughed and headed out of the dorm.

"So how do you like Hogwarts?" Ron asked Emily.

"It's beautiful, but really big," she replied.

"Yea, well you get used to that pretty quick."

"I hope so... it's sorta overwhelming... Salem was kinda small."

"So how do you like the chicks?" David asked Fred and George. "Hot, eh? I haven't seen any from here that are half as good looking, except Hermione."

"Oh, well then you haven't seen anything yet. We've got a couple good ones. We'll point them out at breakfast. And the girls are gorgeous. I especially like the little blonde one," replied George and Fred agreed.

"Bridget or Taryn?" asked David.

"Both," they replied. Fred pointed to Bridget. "She's hotter though."

"I dunno... Taryn's pretty good looking too," said George.

"Yea, they're both great. Bridget's hilarious," said David.

As if on cue, Bridget ran up to Emily, who was chatting with Seamus, and said, "Look! Do you see it?! IT'S A RHINO!!" Both girls chorused the end and started running down the hall. When they got to an intersection, they looked around. Seeing a big staircase to their right, they continued toward it. Everyone behind them was laughing and Ron whispered to Harry, "I really like Emily. I think I'll ask her to the ball."

"I don't think we're allowed to have dates," muttered Harry.

"Well we all know who you'd ask if we could..." said Ron ominously and sarcastically.

"Shut up, you little prick," said Harry good-naturedly. Ron grinned and called to the girls, who had reached the staircase and we're proceeding to slide down the staircase, "You're going the wrong way!"

"DAMN IT!" they heard Bridget yell and saw the two sprint back down the hall in the other direction.

"Where the fuck are they going?" muttered Parvati, sounding annoyed.

"Downstairs, dumbass," replied Ron, giving her a withering look.

"Right..."

"Damn straight!" said David, coming to his friend's defense.

"So, man, I see the way you're looking at Emily," David said to Ron, once everyone else was out of earshot, following the crazy girls. "She's hot isn't she?"

"Yea, she is. She's gorgeous!" replied Ron, sounding excited.

"Now don't get too excited, she's a tough one to catch."

Ron laughed, "Don't worry, I'll get her."

"Yea..." said David.

The two jogged to catch up to their friends. By the time they did, everyone was in the Great Hall, chomping breakfast. Hermione was chatting with Mark and Harry. Ron winked at Harry, who grinned. Then Ron sidled over to sit next to Emily and Bridget, who were force-feeding each other. Everyone around them was laughing and the two girls had food all over their faces.

"Girls, do stop that incessant racket and eat your breakfasts properly, with your own two hands." Bridget and Emily looked up, surprised. They had not expected someone to notice, for they acted like that all the time at Salem. A pale, long face with a rather large nose and beady eyes glared down at them. It was Snape, the one Hermione had warned them about the day before.

"Good morning, Professor Snape, smashing day for a toddy, isn't it?" said Bridget in an annoyingly fake English accent.

"Yes, dear boy, do sit down and have a jolly kipper with us," said Emily, waving a fish in his face and managing to smack Bridget with it as well. By now everyone in the Hall had turned to see what the two brave girls were thinking.

'Have they lost their minds?' thought Taryn. 'Hermione was just telling us about him last night!'

"Girls, do shut up and eat," said Snape with a look that could have striped paint.

"But sir, we'd just adore it if you'd join us for a kipper. We don't really like them, so you can eat ours!" said Bridget with a fake smile.

"I'll eat my own fish, thanks all the same."

"But we want you to eat ours!" said Bridget, while Emily waved the fish.

"One more word and it'll be, say, twenty points from Gryffindor? Now eat!"

"Fine, we'll just eat our own fish!" said Emily. With a final shake, the kipper just couldn't take any more abuse and promptly flew out of Emily's hand to slap the professor in the face.

"That's it! The final straw! Twenty points off!" said Snape and stalked to the teacher's table. Even the teachers had to laugh and the fish-slobbered, undignified Snape.

"What on earth were you thinking?!" asked Lavender.

"That was bloody brilliant!" said Ron at the same moment, with a huge grin.

"Wow that's one huge ass grin," said Bridget, with a big smile of her own.

"You just lost us twenty points!" cried Lavender, again.

"That was fucking hilarious!" yelled Mark from down the table.

"Nice fish-handling skills," came a voice behind Emily.

Emily whirled and grinned up into the ice blue eyes, "Why thank you! I pride myself in my fish skills!"

"Malfoy, Draco Malfoy's the name," said the pale, platinum blonde boy and offered his hand.

"Gregg, Emily Gregg's the name," said Emily and proceeded to grab his hand and pull her hand back and snap.

"YES! Jamaican handshake!" Bridget said loudly. Everyone laughed and Malfoy smiled maliciously.

"Nice uh... did you say handshake?" he said.

"Yes, I did. Did I stutter, white boy?" asked Bridget in her ghetto/latino voice. Emily grinned.

"I know you stole my fish sandwich! You went into my house, opened my refrigerator, and stole my fish sandwich," said Emily, in a ghetto voice, and Bridget cracked up.

"Yea... well I'll see you in Potions second period," said Malfoy with a sneer.

"Tell yo mama I said ea!" Emily called to his retreating back.

"You guys have guts," called Neville from down the table.

"Yea, you really do! And you've only been here for about twelve hours!" agreed Hermione.

"So?" asked Bridget.

"They're always like that," said Griffin with a grin.

The rest of the meal went by with no mishaps. At quarter to nine the group trooped back to Gryffindor tower to get their book. The Salem people grabbed bags, parchment, and pens but didn't have books yet. The teachers would hand them out in class, they'd been told.

"First class is Transfiguration with McGonagall," said Dean after the group had met up again and was walking to their first class. Separate smaller groups had already been formed within the big group. Emily, Bridget, Ron, Hermione, and Harry were the "popular" group. David, Mark, Kieran, and Sky were the "punk" group. Taryn, who had joined the ranks of Lavender and Parvati, had left the big group. Dean, Neville, and Seamus didn't have a label they were just... Dean, Neville, and Seamus.

"Is she a bitch, or is she cool?" asked Sky.

"She's cool when Slytherin's are in the class but otherwise she's a bitch," replied Neville.

"Oh," said Sky.

After Transfiguration, the group went to Potions, which was ok because Bridget and Emily were making fun of Snape the whole time... to his face. In the afternoon they had DADA with Professor Lupin, who had returned. When that was over, they all returned to the common room to chat.

"What should we do for the ball?" Bridget asked Emily, when no one was listening. "Thought of any ideas?"

"Actually, yea. I have a few. We could do day and night, or two princesses, two fairies, or... I dunno. Have you thought of any?"

"No, but I like the day and night one. Lets do that."

"OK, but I'm night and you're day 'cause I've got brown hair, which is dark like night and you've got blonde hair, like day."

"OK."

Just then Hermione walked over. "Hey guys, I was reading a book about Frederick the Insane and his favorite type of ball was masquerade. Now, when they held one in his honor, this one time, there was a princess. Princess Silvia. She had this dress... well, I won't tell you. I'll just tell you that that's what I'm gunna do."

"Cool," chorused Bridget and Emily.

The next two weeks were spent in preparation. People sent home for clothing and other supplies. The school had provided white silk masks of different shapes for everyone to try and people had decorated their masks. The day of the ball was approaching and the whole school was expectant of a fun night.