I'm As Free As My Hair

[gretagarbled.livejournal.com]

Title: I’m As Free As My Hair
Author: gretagarbled
Length: 1.433 words
Rating: PG-13 (one instance of swearing)
Summary: In which Dean Thomas and Angelina Johnson have an interesting dicussion about hair, race and Hogwarts. And yes, the title is stolen from a Lady GaGa song.
Disclaimer: Harry Potter is mine because I’m a fan, in the same way Buckingham Palace is mine because I’m British. In other words, not at all.
Author's Notes: I was three-quarters through ‘Confessions and Epiphanies of a Gay, Black Wizard’ when this scene popped into my head. Having no space for it in there, I decided to make it a little story in its own right; it can be read as a standalone or as a tributary of ‘Confessions and Epiphanies’. Un-beta’d. Enjoy.
 
 
I hate being late for breakfast, Dean thought to himself as he sprinted down the corridors. He took the shortcut that meant he could avoid the moving staircases and was about to make his trademark ‘I-am-in-a-hurry’ leap from the top of the Entrance Hall stairs to the bottom when he collided with someone and fell over, coming to a rather painful and upside-down rest on his back.
 
“Oh, God, I’m so sorry!” Dean looked towards the voice to see Angelina Johnson. She looked anxious and upset, but she was still standing; probably something to do with all the Quidditch she played. He shook his head and moved to get up, trying to smile at her but grimacing instead. She moved to help him and made him sit down on the banister while she charmed her books to fly back into her arms.
 
“Sorry about that, Dean,” she repeated. “I was just in a bit of a rush to get my things.” She smiled but it didn’t seem genuine, because her eyes were red-rimmed and watery.
 
“No worries,” he said, racking his brains to find a way to make the smile reach her eyes. If Harry had a helping people complex, Dean had a helping-distraught-girls complex. But this was different; Angelina might have been in the same House as him, but she was a seventh-year, Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team and companion to the eternal tricksters Fred and George, and he was only a fifth-year who hadn’t spoken to anyone but Seamus until his second year and liked to draw people while they weren’t watching.
 
“Are you... are you all right?” Dean asked, feeling suddenly shy. She blinked at him.
 
“All right?” she repeated.
 
He nodded. “Yeah. It’s just your eyes... they’re a bit red, that’s all.”
 
Angelina looked at the floor suddenly, as if concealing her eyes’ bloodshot state meant that Dean would forgot he had ever seen them. “No, I’m fine, just a bit tired. The...” Here, she looked around to see if anyone was listening, even though they were completely alone. “The... er, teaching session went on for quite a while last night.”
 
Dean nodded; she was talking about the last DA meeting. “It did, yeah,” he grinned. As he got up, he noticed the tiny red and gold beads in the ends of her braids. They weren’t the usual big ones that girls normally put in their hair, but the little seed beads one often saw on embroidered clothes. The ends of her braids were almost saturated with them, so that, at a distance, one got the impression that her naturally black hair faded into the metallic shades of Gryffindor pride.
 
“Angelina, your hair is incredibly cool,” he said, taking a step closer. “How did you get the beads in like that?”
 
“Oh, um, this spell I found in the library,” she said, looking at the ends of her braids with a kind of blank distaste. “I think I’m going to get rid of them soon, actually.”
 
“Really? Are the beads tricky to wash or something?” Dean asked, genuinely curious.
 
“I was talking about the braids,” Angelina said, still eyeing them.
 
“What? No, you can’t do that!” Angelina and Dean himself were both surprised by the strength of his reaction. He smiled sheepishly and scratched the back of his head. “If I tell you something, will you promise not to be creeped out?” he asked her.
 
She didn’t say anything, but narrowed her eyes and nodded curtly.
 
“You have really cool hair to draw. You’re actually in a tie with Lee Jordan and the entire Weasley clan for position of Coolest Hair of Hogwarts.” You forgot Seamus, said a small voice in Dean’s head. He ignored it.
 
Whatever Angelina had been expecting, it obviously wasn’t that. She blinked a few times, opened her mouth as if to say something and then exhaled deeply. “Coolest Hair of Hogwarts,” she repeated flatly.
 
Dean nodded, his cheeks burning. “Yeah, it’s... incredible. I mean, when I’m sketching, I have to make sure I get the texture and pattern of each braid without it actually looking like a pattern, and then when I’m using inks or paints, I have to be careful so your hair doesn’t just end up looking like a blob of black. It’s the same with Lee’s dreads, only it’s harder as I have to get the actual texture of his hair. And the Weasleys are brilliant for watercolours. You know every single one of them has hair that’s a different shade of red?”
 
“Really?” Angelina looked doubtful.
 
Dean nodded. “It’s how I tell Fred and George apart,” he said. “In dim light, they look completely identical, but under sunlight, George’s hair is a smidgen closer to auburn, while Fred looks much more like a true redhead, like Ron.”
 
Angelina twisted her braids around her hand. “You really like them that much?” she asked.
 
“Angelina, if my parents weren’t so strict about that kind of thing, I’d be sporting them myself,” he grinned. “Why? Have you gone off them?”
 
She looked ahead and Dean saw her eyes become suspiciously bright before she closed them and sighed. “I know it’s stupid,” she started. “But about a week ago, that Parkinson idiot in your year said they looked like worms, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. I thought she was being kinda racist, you know...” She glanced at Dean and looked back down at the books she was holding with one arm. “Then I remembered that she’s a pureblood and her understanding of racist is probably different to mine, not that she cares...” By now, she was crying properly; she wiped away the tears hurriedly, leaving chalk-marks all over her face.
 
“And I’ve just been feeling so paranoid and weird, because now that I think about it, there aren’t that many black people here. I mean, I should be used to it, I live in the countryside, but Hogwarts was safe, you know? It was free from all that shit if you hung around with the right people, and now it’s ruined.”
 
Dean didn’t know what to do. While this uncertainty was usual for a boy of his age when confronted with a crying girl, it was unusual for him, because Sabina was in tears every other week when he was at home, and he’d comforted Hermione once, so he was used to weeping women, but again, this was different. They didn’t really know each other, even though they were in the same House. He settled for putting an arm round her, and was surprised to find that he was a tiny bit taller than her; for the majority of his time at Hogwarts so far, she’d towered over everyone – boy or girl – with the exception of Percy Weasley and later, Ron.
 
She cried on him for a bit and then moved back, shaking her head. She laughed a little. “You must think I’m such an idiot,” she muttered, wiping her face vigorously with the sleeve of her robe. A few people started leaving the Entrance Hall, and Angelina shook her head. “And now I’ve made you miss breakfast. Sorry.” She turned to leave and was already a few steps away when Dean said, “Wait!”
 
He sprinted after her and held her by the elbow. “You’re not... you’re not alone, Angelina. You were right; if you hang out with the right people, it doesn’t matter. I mean, Fred’s never given you any grief over the fact that the two of you are different colours, has he?”
 
Angelina shook her head.
 
“Exactly! To everyone in their right minds, skin colour carries no judgement or.. or entitlement. It just is. I mean, I know what you mean about the minority thing, because I live in London and it’s strange to be one of so few, but here, it just...” He shrugged. “It just doesn’t matter. None of it.”
 
She sniffed, but there was a small smile on her face. “Thank you, Dean. I mean it. Thanks.”
 
He shook his head. “Any time.” He turned to go, wondering whether he could beg some food from Ron, who often took extra supplies of toast to eat during History of Magic. “Oh, and by the way,” he called over his shoulder and Angelina turned around. “Parkinson’s an idiot, but worse still, she’s an idiot with no taste. The braids are beautiful,” he said, and was pleased to see a real smile cross her face. “Keep them.” Dean sprinted off, because catching Ron before the bad mood that settled over him before their first lesson would  determine whether he got breakfast or not.
 
This meant that he didn’t see Angelina standing on the Entrance Hall stairs, oblivious to the people walking around her, and staring at her braids with a secret smile.