Read the original ~ Purple by Jori

 
Frustration ~ A Remix
by Jenny
 

Of all the stinking rotten luck.  

You're supposed to be at Quidditch practice, but no, you're stuck in detention (again) with Potter (again), who's busy politely asking Professor McGonagall what tonight's activities will include.  You hold your breath as she tells you both, "I think locking the two of you in a room together is punishment enough.  When I walk out of this room, the door will disappear. I'll be back in a few hours."  Alone in a room with Potter?  For a few hours?  It's almost too good to be true.  You run through the list of painful curses you can inflict on him while McGonagall is away.  But no, you think, it is too good to be true.  You wait for the other shoe to drop.

"Give me your wands."

There it goes.  But you're not giving up without a fight.  You put on your most horrified expression.  "What?" you cry indignantly, "I'm not just going to give it away!"

She doesn't even blink.  Perhaps you're losing your touch.  "You're giving it to me, Mr. Malfoy; it will be perfectly safe, I assure you."  You pout a bit under your scowl as you hand over your wand.  This is going to be much less fun than you'd originally imagined.

McGonagall taps your wand against her palm as she says, "Yours too, Potter," as if this will alleviate Potter's obvious reluctance to disarm himself.  "I can't have you two killing each other during a routine detention."  You think bitterly that she'd be perfectly happy to have Potter kill you, just not so happy if it turned out the other way around.  Stupid Boy Who Lived.  Has to be Champion of the World and all that.  This is going to be awful.

McGonagall tucks your wands inside her hat, steps out of the room, and pulls the door shut behind her.  As expected, the door and its frame hiss and disappear with a wisp of white-gold smoke.

Bugger.  

"Great," you say, turning to Potter, "stuck in a room with you for hours, and I can't even turn you into something nasty."

"Like you've paid that much attention in Transfiguration."  

You glare at Potter, mulling over possible retorts related to Potter's galling performance in Potions.  Before you come up with a really good one, though, he continues, "Your hair looks great, by the way."

Your hands immediately move to touch your usually white-blonde hair.  There is a mirror over the fireplace in your dusty temporary prison, and you turn your head, hoping at least some of the colour will have faded.  No such luck.  It is still the same ridiculous shade of purple it has been since Potter hexed it during class earlier in the day.  It still looks awful.  Most of your hair is still a sort of riotous violet, but the ends are even worse: a deep redish-plumish purple.  You look like you slept with your head immersed in a bowl full of expensive wine.  You hate the colour purple.  Bloody, stupid Potter, that little orphaned flobberworm.  When you get your wand back --

You stop and take a deep breath.  It won't do to let Potter know how much he's flustered you.  Instead of cursing him, as McGonagall has currently made that a non-option anyway, you say in as disinterested a voice as you can manage, "It still hasn't faded, has it?"  Potter smirks, and you feel your calm facade slipping.  "This had better fade, Potter, or I'll --"

"-- Or you'll what, exactly?"

"Like I'd warn you in advance."  You think that's a pretty nice cover for the fact that you hadn't finished thinking up a fitting threat.  You would've had something good if Potter hadn't been smirking at you like that.  Distracting little git.

Potter arches an eyebrow in your general direction, but you turn back to the mirror, once again a study of indifference.  From this angle it looks like the colour might be fading.  You turn again.  No.  It's not.

"Damn."

Potter catches your eye in the mirror, the beginnings of a smile playing across his smug Gryffindor face.  "Really so disappointed you can't turn me into a piglet, too?"  You're sure this is Potter's lame attempt at a verbal barb, but you allow yourself a moment of pride anyway.  Potter's frog-that-was-supposed-to-be-a-teacup had looked much better as the cute and befuddled pig you'd transfigured it into that morning, just before Potter purpled your hair.  That bastard.

You turn back to the mirror, scowling.  Your hair has always been one of your favourite things about yourself, and this shade of purple is truly horrific.  "My hair," you whine, tugging at a particularly wine-coloured strand and pouting again.

"What?" Potter asks.  You can see him over your shoulder in the mirror, and he looks as confused as the transfigured pig had looked in the middle of McGonagall's classroom.    

You wonder, yet again, how Potter has managed time and again to not be killed by Lord Voldemort.  "My hair," you explain as patiently as you can.  "It's --"  You pause, trying to decide how to phrase your problem.  The truth is that if you tell Potter exactly what you've been thinking -- that you should've used magic to grow your hair out when you actually had your wand with you because you've been wanting it longer for ages but your father keeps making you cut it short -- you will look stupid, which, in front of Potter, is unacceptable.  Luckily you haven't said any of this out loud.  "It's short," you say succinctly.  Good enough for Potter.

Harry continues to appear dumbfounded.  "Your hair.  Is ... short."

You fight the urge to roll your eyes.  Looks like the short version of the story won't be good enough after all.  "Yes. It was getting long -- the longest pieces were about chin-length -- and I liked it. But then I went home for Christmas -- some of us have homes to go to, you know -- "

Ha!  Take that, Potter.

" -- and my father made me cut it.  I could just have grown it out magically, but it didn't occur to me until just now.  And I don't have my wand."  Why you've just divulged all of this, you're not sure, but you did land at least one good verbal punch in there.  You stand there, preening, half-watching Potter out of the corner of your eye.  He's standing just to your left, looking out the window, chewing on his lower lip.

Then he catches your eye in the mirror again and says, "That's the strangest thing I've ever heard."

His tone is just condescending enough to make you snap, "Shut up, Potter."  What a great name to say in anger, you think absently.  There is such a satisfying pop to that letter P.  Potter.  It just rolls off your tongue, even when you're not saying it aloud.  Stupid Potter.  Stupid, Golden Boy Potter.

Stupid Potter who is once again apologizing.  "I'm sorry," he says, and it sounds sincere.  "I mean, if I'd known you were so touchy about your hair, I wouldn't have touched it."  You're eyeing him suspiciously, wondering why Potter is suddenly making nice, when he finishes, "I'd've turned your nose bright purple instead."

That bastard.

You think about punching him, about bloodying up that smug little smile of his, but you're once again distracted by the disaster that is your hair.  "It really is bright purple, isn't it?"  

Potter nods, managing to keep a straight face, which leaves you feeling vaguely impressed.  Your expression in the mirror, however, is one of deep sorrow.  

You sigh and turn away from the mirror. "I hate purple."

Potter takes a step closer to you.  "It -- it doesn't look that bad. It looks kinda cool."

You aren't really listening to his blithering, so you start to say, "Sure, for a cur -- " but then you realize what Potter said.  "Hey, did you just compliment me?"

Potter is looking at his own feet.  "No."

Now you feel as befuddled as the pig.  "Oh."  You pause, waiting for Potter to say something else.  He doesn't, so you say, "Good."  Back to the status quo.

Potter seems to regain his composer then, and he scowls.  You think his face looks particularly self-righteous, all scrunched up like that.  "What," Potter starts, "is being complimented by me the worst that could happen to you?"

"No, being in your presence is."  You're about to give yourself a mental pat on the back for that one when Potter hauls off and punches you.   Hard.  In the face.

Ow.

You find yourself sprawled on the ground at Potter's feet, staring up at him in angry disbelief, rubbing your very tender nose.  "What was that?" you splutter, getting to your feet.

Potter is aggravatingly calm.  "It's called a punch. You should know; you've hit me often enough."

You can't believe this.  "I know what it's called, Potter, I just never realized the all-powerful Harry Potter would have to stoop so low as to hit people unprovoked."  You're not sure that 'unprovoked' part is entirely true, but it seemed like the right thing to complain about.  

But Potter's insolence continues.  "As you've already pointed out, we don't have our wands, and I felt the need to hurt you."  

Anger knotting inside of you, you swing back your right arm and slap Potter across the face.  Your palm stings in a satisfying way as Potter staggers backwards and regards you with narrowed eyes.

"That was really low," he growls just before he launches himself at you.

You manage to avoid most of the punch aimed at your stomach by grabbing Potter's robes and tumbling to the cold stone floor, pulling him down on top of you.  You realize belatedly that this might not have been the best plan as Potter clearly has the advantage, being on top of you and all, but you quickly remedy the situation by kicking Potter in the stomach.  Yes, that was satisfying as well, especially the part that left Potter gasping for breath.  As Potter wheezes, you maneuver yourself out from under him and, once on top, you pin him down by sitting astride his midsection.

Potter is breathing hard -- panting, really -- and looking up at you with what appears to be a mixture of fear, anger, and ... awe?  Interesting.  There is definitely something enticing about this position of power, about having Famous Harry Potter trapped like this, pinned down like a helpless beetle about to be thrown into a cauldron.

"I've waited so long for this ..." you murmur, leaning in to better survey Potter underneath you, but, because he's useless and can't stay still for any amount of time, Potter sits up all in rush, tumbling you off of him in the process.

You're sprawled on the floor again, angry at having lost your seat of power, but angrier that Potter's immediate reaction is to laugh, and laugh and laugh and laugh.  You glare at him, but he keeps laughing.  Stupid, irritating Potter.  You get to your feet once more, as gracefully as you can, and you stalk over to the window.  You don't have to deal with Potter.  He can laugh himself silly waiting for McGonagall to return with your wands.  You can keep to yourself.  You don't need to pin Potter down, to straddle his hips, to --

Potter has stopped laughing.  Potter is walking toward you.  Potter is sliding in close, cupping your chin with his hand, brushing your lips with his.  Kissing you.

And you like it.

You panic.  "What the hell was that, Potter?"  These words echo cavernously, bouncing off the mirror over the fireplace, the flagstones, the walls.  You cower a bit as your words bombard you from all sides.

Potter, too, shrinks back from the force of your stunned anger.  "I... I thought... I thought that was what you wanted. And then you'd leave me alone."

Potter's reasoning -- or lack thereof -- confounds you once again.  Just because you'd been thinking about climbing on top of him again was no reason for him to kiss you.  You gape at him.  "Why," you splutter, flustered, "why would you think that I'd want that?"

"You were sitting on me a second ago," he says, and you can't argue with that.  "I thought it was maybe, y'know, pent-up sexual frustration or something."

You're frankly shocked.  Again.  Potter is making less than no sense.  "If it's my sexual frustration," you ask him, "why did you kiss me?"

Potter doesn't answer right away.  You wonder if he's going to tell you the truth.  Finally, he says, "To get you to leave me alone."

He doesn't look you in the eye as he says it.  

You turn away, confused yet again, and unsettled as well.  You want to say something sharp, but all that comes to mind is, "Nancy boy," so that's what you mutter.  It's what your father calls boys like Potter, boys who kiss other boys, at least in more polite company.  Still, he always says it with more venom than you've used now.  

You can feel Potter's eyes on you even though you're not looking at him.  "That doesn't even make sense."

You know it doesn't, but you get defensive anyway.  "Well, it's more creative sounding than 'bloody faggot'."

Potter doesn't say anything to that.  You turn to look at him again, and as your eyes take in his messy hair, his lightning scar, the flush of his cheeks, the Gryffindor crest on his robes, the neatly buckled belt of his school trousers, your mind snaps back to when you were kneeling astride Potter.  You study his too-familiar face once more, but this time the quirk of his lips reminds you, irrationally, of the feel of him under you, the way his hips fit snugly against yours, both when you were under him and when you were on top.  You close your eyes, and, when you open them again, Potter is waiting, watching you with a sparkle in his eyes that you've never seen before.  Or maybe this is just the first time you've been paying this part of him close enough attention.

"Oh, bloody hell," you whisper, giving in.  "Maybe ..."

"Yes?"  Potter looks amused.  You wonder how easy you are to read.

"Maybe it is a bit of pent-up sexual frustration."

Potter grins, and you pull him close for another kiss, a real kiss this time, not just a brushing of lips but a meeting of mouths, a sharing of tongues, a tasting, a devouring.  You have just enough presence of mind to decide that this poetry of yours is clunky and awkward, and you abandon it as you continue to kiss Potter, deeply and fully.  You like the way his thumbs feel, moving against your hip bones, even through your clothing.  You like the cold metallic bite of his glasses against your neck as he moves lower to kiss your throat.  You love the low moan that escapes him as you thread your left hand through his messy hair, your fingernails scratching just lightly enough against the back of Potter's neck to give him goosebumps.  You shiver sympathetically as Potter bites down on the lobe of your ear.

As Potter returns his lips to yours, you make a mental note to complain as loudly as bitterly as you can to McGonagall when she returns so she'll still think that locking you alone in a room with Potter is a good punishment.

Even though your hair is still purple, you think that perhaps your luck isn't so rotten after all.
 

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