Summer Writing Series Challenge (July 22)
Challenge: Musical Week: Comedy
Challenge Conditions: Using the daily theme, choose a scene or song from any musical you like (stage
or screen) and rework it using our favorite characters.
Title: It Couldn't Please Me More
Word Count: 1,000
On a bitter cold December evening, Hermione Granger found herself cuddled on the couch by the fire, wrapped in a blanket in the living room of her flat reading a very thick book. Just as the grandfather clock, a gift from her father for graduation, chimed nine o'clock, the doorbell rang. Begrudgingly walking to the door, she vouching to curse the person that came to pull her from her comfortable couch to the next century.
However, her vouch was quickly forgotten in pleasant surprise when she saw Harry Potter, her best friend for over nine years, standing at the door, his cheeks pink from the cold, in his Quidditch uniform.
"Hey, Hermione."
"Harry!" Hermione cried before ushering him to the flat and pulling into a tight hug. "What are you doing here? I thought you and the team were staying in Hawaii for the night?"
Harry had been recruited to play for Puddlemere United soon after the war ended, when their old Seeker decided to retire. With Oliver Wood as Captain and Harry on the team, Puddlemere United had yet to lose a game. "To win, we must become one with the field and let it guide us to victory," was Wood's strategy, and also why the team always arrived one week prior to practice on each field before their actual game. No one truly knows if it's this odd strategy, as Wood claimed, that aids the team to come out victorious in each game, or the actual skills of the players.
Thus, Harry had been in Hawaii for the past week, training for the game that had been held this afternoon. Hermione already knew that they had won the game 340-120, because Harry had sent a note earlier. He also told her that the team was celebrating their victory at the beach and would be spending one more night on the island.
"I missed you," Harry replied simply when she released him from the hug.
She looked at him incredulously, "You skipped a night on the beach to visit me in this cold, because you missed me?"
"Yeah," Harry smiled a smile. "Besides, I already spent a week there."
Leading Harry into the living room, Hermione apologized for the state of the room, though it was rather unnecessary because the room was as clean as a brand new mansion.
"Here, I brought you something," Harry said, producing a brown paper bag.
"What is it?" Hermione asked curiously as she accepted the gift.
"Open it."
Peering into the bag, Hermione gasped. "Harry, is that what I think it is?"
Nodding, Harry asked, "Do you like it?"
"Oh, of course. If you brought me diamonds, or pearls, or roses, it couldn't have please me more than the gift I see. But, Harry, this is too much, I can't accept this. I mean, it's a," she paused to take Harry's gift out of the bag. "Pineapple."
You used to be able to get a pineapple anywhere, but now, pineapples were even rarer diamonds. A couple years back, before he was destroyed, Voldemort had unearthed an ancient spell that could only be performed during a complete solar eclipse. It had the power to destroy all the muggleborn witches and wizards in world, which was exactly what Voldemort had intended to do. However, when Bellatrix Lestrange, who had been given the honor of performing the spell, stuttered over one single letter of the incantation when she broke a nail (the spell had a rather elaborate wand motion), instead of erasing the entire muggleborn race, the spell had killed every single pineapple tree in the world. That had been the end of Bellatrix. And luckily, the Prophecy had been fulfilled before Voldemort had another chance try the spell. Now, both muggle and wizard scientists all over the world are trying to recover the lost pineapples, which was a rather difficult task due to the lack of seeds and existing models, without much success. Over the past year, a few wizards had been able to transfigure or create one or two pineapples, but they rarely lasted over a few hours before they transfigure back to their original form, or disappeared.
Harry nodded proudly. "And it couldn't please more than to see you cling to the pineapple I brought."
"Oh, I can just hear the Hawaiian breezes blow," Hermione said dreamily, clinging the fruit in front of her.
Harry debated nervously before saying, "It's from California."
"Even so! How can I ever thank you?"
"There's no need to thank me."
"But of course I must thank you, Harry. Would you like a slice? I'll go cut it up now," she said, raising her wand, ready to summon a cutting board of knife.
"That would nice, but frankly, it would give me gas," Harry replied, while blushing furiously. "And I doubt you'd want to eat it either, we don't know how safe it is, the wizard I bought it from said it was still in the experimental stage."
"Then, we'll leave it here," Hermione said, setting the pineapples on the coffee table. "Not to eat, but see. But you must not bring me any more pineapples, you hear? It's not proper. It is a gift a young man would present to his ladylove."
"Then let's make it proper, Hermione."
"What do you mean?" Hermione asked, was Harry asking what she thinks he is?
"Will you be my ladylove?" Harry quoted Hermione's earlier words with a nervous grin.
"YES!" Hermione screamed, surprising Harry, as well as herself. She, then, leaned forward following another impulse, and captured Harry's lips with her own.
The couple sprang apart breathlessly when a loud 'bang' sounded from the coffee table. The pineapple had exploded and covered the coffee table in a disgusting looking purple goo.
"I'm sure glad I didn't eat that."
"There goes another failed experiment," Harry said, deadpanned, before the couple burst out laughing.
"At least it did some good in bringing you to me," Hermione said softly before kissing Harry again.
A/n: It Couldn't Please Me More from Cabaret. Just a tiny confession, I've never seen the stage show of Cabaret. I went out and rented the movie last night at 12 o'clock, but found to my disappointment that the movie did not contain this scene. :(