Loony Lovegood(s)

Part 1: The Tea Party

Luna Lovegood was always seen as the wacky, crack-brained, colorful, expressive, big-eyed, wonderous, thoughtful, opinionated, "loony" girl who wandered dreamily. . .and aimlessly. . .through the corridors of Hogwarts, thinking intensely about how house-elves reached the top shelf; and, although she provided many the students with a good laugh now and again, and wasn't all too "loony" as the years trickled by, there weren't many souls at Hogwarts who could actually say that they knew Luna Lovegood in all of her bedazzling mystery. The greatest surprise of all (even though Miss Lovegood, herself, was full of surprises), was when fourth-year rolled upon the students and another starry-eyed, white-haired, crooked-smiling Lovegood walked through the big, arched doorways of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

"You don't look much like Luna," noticed Neville Longbottom in a quizzical sort of way. He glanced between the two girls with heavy, furrowed brows, "-Luna's eyes look like the color of the moon. . ." Neville blushed and set his blue centers on the brown eyes of Dawn Lovegood, who sat opposite to him, "-and yours. . ." he paused, thinking curiously, ". . .yours are the color of emeralds. Very pretty emeralds, of course. . .not in a bad way, either, you know. . .just-um-green. . .a very pretty green and-"

"Thank you, Neville," interrupted Dawn, "-and you're right, my eyes are green. . .and emeralds are beautiful gems. . .no need to apologize."

"She's right, Neville," added Luna in her soft, reluctant tone, and although she spoke with the conversation at the time, her eyes were glued to a pair of broken glasses that lie lazily in her palms, "-in folklore, many put emeralds under their tongues to see the future. . ." she paused and finally glanced up from her glasses and into the eyes of the two confused faces before her, "I suppose an emerald would taste sweet."

"And how did you reckon that?" laughed Dawn, who was entirely intrigued by Luna's fanatics.

"Chemists used to lick their gems to collect data through the senses," answered Luna, raising her eyebrows, "-but I always thought green looked bitter, I suppose it's just me then."

"William Shakespeare spoke about green-eyes once," Dawn spoke, poking a fork around lazily in her plate, above her candles hung and shone vibrantly, and her eyes glimmered as the words formed around her tongue, "O beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on."

Her voice slowly faded, but the words lingered, and Neville and Luna were both perpetually confused, to say the least.

"Y-" Neville paused, "You're not a monster. . .a-are you?"

Dawn furrowed her brows and, in the process, crinkled her entire forehead, "What? No!" she exclaimed, undermining the hatefulness in her voice, "-what he was trying to say is that greed and jealousy mocks the person it inhabits, a green-eyed monster."

"So. . .you're greedy?" questioned Luna, tilting her head slowly to the left.

Dawn sighed, "Nevermind," and again she added, "-you know, when dogs. . .and wolves. . .look into the eyes of a human, they can grow a bond. . .just how humans do," she paused and sighed, "I've always wanted a dog."

"You don't like Warticus?" Luna gasped in exclamation.

Dawn quickly thought the picture of her groungy, fur-clinging, wet, nearly-bald, scabby cat with long, skinny legs, and a back so hunched, it appeared as if she was always snarling. Warticus hardly had enough fur to cover her body, and where there was fur, it was only in patches, of a dark gray, because her black fur had faded with the absolute stress of being a brooding, angsty, meticulously angry cat.

"Oh. . .no. . .Warticus is lovely. . ." Dawn gulped, flashing what bit of a smile she could muster. Warticus was the cat that Luna had given to Dawn upon arrival to her home, and she wouldn't dare say any of her monstrous thoughts aloud.