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Colin watched as the blonde slammed her hands down on the desk, her eyes level with Percy's and pretty much fire laser beams at the man who had just assigned them their fate.
"This is utter bullshit and you know it!" She snarled at the man who looked completely unphased by her outburst, but then Colin supposed that there was every possibility that every couple that he had talked to today had reacted in the same manner. "My family weren't even involved with the Death Eaters!"
Colin flinched as he always did at the mention of the Death Eaters. He had lost his little brother during the Battle of Hogwarts when Dennis had followed him back through the tunnel. Colin knew that he was responsible for the death of his brother, but it was still at the hands of the Death Eaters too.
"The law is the law, Miss Greengrass." Percy said as he adjusted his glasses in a way that Colin figured was rehearsed. "None of us are above the law. You and Mr Creevey are to be married for two years just like every other matched couple."
Colin pulled in a breath before shifting in his seat. "Astor - Miss Greengrass, we really shouldn't keep Mr Weasley for much longer. He has a whole waiting room of people to see."
"And more lives to ruin." Astoria muttered, but she did push off of the desk and turn away from Percy as she stormed out of his office without another word.
Colin let out a sigh before he thanked Percy and followed his future wife out of the office and past all the other people who were waiting to hear their fate.
"Wait up!" He called after her. Her long legs meant that she was already halfway down the corridor leaving him in her dust. The thing was that he knew that they were legally and magically bound to marry within the month so it wasn't as if she could just run away from their problems. They had to go through with this or Colin didn't even want to think about what might happen.
Astoria did stop in her tracks but she didn't face him. "I have to marry you, that doesn't mean I have to talk to you."
"I mean…" Colin swallowed thickly before he pulled some confidence out of thin air. It was enough that the two of them were being forced into this situation together - they didn't need to be hostile about it on top of that. "I think it would do us some good to talk."
"I have an appointment to get to." Astoria said tersely but Colin noticed that her shoulders weren't quite so rigid, almost as if she was realising that there wasn't any point in having her walls built up so much. "We can talk after that."
Colin nodded before he remembered that she couldn't see him. "Yes, I'd - that sounds like a good idea." He hoped to at least get to know her as a person and put his own mind at ease because he didn't particularly want to be stuck with a Slytherin that he didn't know any more than she would want to be stuck with a Gryffindor that she didn't know.
She spun on her heel to face him, grabbing his hand so that it was between them and pulled a muggle pen out of her pocket. Colin frowned as he watched her write on his skin and when she released him, he saw that it was an address and a time. He looked up, ready to question her about why she even carried a pen around with her to find that she had already gone.
Colin let out a sigh before he made his way out of the Ministry and deciding to take a walk around Muggle London, with his camera, until it was time to meet up with Astoria. He was half-expecting her to send him on some wild goose chase so that he would get lost and she wouldn't have to deal with him, and this concern only grew when he saw that the address in his hand was actually in Muggle London.
**
Colin was almost late, not because he had gotten lost like he had suspected he might, but because he had gotten distracted by the world through his camera lens. Everything always fascinated him when he didn't look at it directly, though of course at this point his camera was merely an extension of himself.
'Miss Greengrass." He greeted the blonde as he took a seat opposite her - did her eyelashes look longer? And her hair… there was something different about her hair, but he was nearly observant enough to figure out what that something was.
"Tori, please." She seemed calmer now, at least, and Colin didn't feel as if she would hex him if he said the wrong thing. "Call me Tori."
Colin gave a slight nod. "Tori." He said quietly, doing his best not to allow himself to smile about the fact that he had somehow already managed to break through her resolve. "Thanks for meeting with me."
Astoria was silent for a moment before she let out a sigh. "I know you don't want this anymore than I do. I know this isn't your fault." She sounded broken and in turn Colin's heart broke for her. He wondered if she was already in a relationship but he didn't think that he should just ask about something so sensitive.
"It's just two years." He said quietly. "We can get along for two years, can't we?"
"No offense, Creevey, but I don't even know you. I don't want to be forced to spend any portion of my life with a stranger." She said not at all unfairly. He could see where she was coming from, but that didn’t stop it from stinging a little bit. He always wanted to believe that he was a kind and inviting person.
“We can get to know -” He began but she cut him off.
“If you knew even the first thing about me, then you would know that I don’t even deserve to be in this position. I don’t associate with other purebloods. I work for a muggle magazine, for pity’s sake!” She was getting more than a little annoyed and he hated that he was the cause of that annoyance when he was just trying to say the right thing.
“I… Oh.” Colin whispered, his eyes dropping to the table for a moment before he looked back up at her. “Maybe… Maybe we should appeal then?” He suggested, though he knew that it wouldn’t be as easy as that.
“We can’t. My parents took me and my sister aside and spelled it out to us what could happen to our family if we don’t go through with this. Our parents might not have been Death Eaters, but we were associated with some. They could face time in Azkaban. Not me, not my sister, but my parents.” Astoria rubbed a hand down over her face. “I tried to put that world behind me, I tried to make a new life for myself in the muggle world and here I am being sucked back in.”
“You can still live in the muggle world.” Colin pointed out. “My dad’s a muggle.” He added as he shuffled in his seat slightly. He didn’t want to leave the magical world behind, but he would if it meant making her comfortable.
Astoria let out a long-suffering sigh. “At least all of this will give me something to write about at the end of the day.”
“You’re a writer?” Colin asked, deciding that while he could he was going to try to get her to talk about herself. She was the one that didn’t want to be stuck with a stranger for the next chapter of their lives, after all, and the only way for them not to be strangers was to get to know each other.
“Yeah, that’s what I do at the magazine, write articles about fashion, popular opinion and other such topics…” Her eyes flickered to meet his gaze for a moment before she picked up the menu, hiding herself behind it. “It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do and it’s actually how I convinced my parents to let me go and live in the muggle world - by writing an essay for them.”
Colin blinked a couple of times. He couldn’t really understand why someone would willingly write an essay, but then he also knew that everyone had their own hobbies and passions, and he wouldn’t judge her for liking to write when he enjoyed taking pictures. He was well aware that his passion for photography had annoyed many people during his teenage years.
“You must have talent.” He said softly, a smile flickering across his lips as he picked up his own menu. “Is it just articles and essays that you like to write?”
“No…” When Colin glanced up at her he could see that her cheeks were tinged with a pink blush so he made a point of diverting his eyes. “I also write stories, mainly children’s stories, but those are all, well they’re just for me.” Something told Colin that she would quite like to share those stories with someone someday, but he wasn’t going to force her into doing that today - especially not when she had already pointed out that they were strangers.
Colin couldn’t help but be glad that she was able to talk to her about these things, however. She might not have wanted to open up to her about anything, but it seemed that she didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter either, and Colin knew that spoke to his own personality. He was the sort of person that people could just talk to and he was proud to be that person.
It bode well for their future, for all the time that they were going to be shackled together. They were going to be man and wife and while that didn’t necessarily mean that they had to live as man and wife, they would still have to live together and put up with one another, and Colin knew that that would be easier if they got along. He had a good feeling about it all now, not the feeling of dread that had tried to settle in when they had been in Percy’s office earlier that day. Colin knew now that everything was going to be okay.