Material Girl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psQ5F39rduU

Early morning on a random street in the Surrey suburbs. The neighborhood has only just begun to awaken. The smell of bangers and mash and scrambled eggs hangs heavy in the air. Wives in the kitchen, children still abed, bleary-eyed husbands brushing their teeth.

HONK

Heather Dursley, who was only pretending to sleep, vaults out of bed and snatches up her trunk. Down the stairs, elbowing her porcine brother out of the way. Presses a kiss to her mother's cheek, mouths love ya against her ear. Her father is already rising to his feet, trailing behind her as she throws the door open and grins at the sight of three girls sitting in a loud crimson Bugatti right outside her house.

"GET IN, LOSER," the driver shouts. Hint of a Russian accent. Colored sunglasses on her long face. Heather's father stands on his tiptoes as he unsubtly tries to catch a glimpse of her friend, the one whom she says lives on a country estate and shoots pigeons for fun. Ronnie waves obligingly, one long pale arm swaying to and fro, and Heather's father straightens to attention, moustache quivering. Heather laughs giddily, still wrestling with her trunk.

She thinks about the teenagers whom she sometimes hangs with at the corner shop and hopes some of them live on Privet Drive. See, she thinks vindictively. Told you I wasn't lying. Bet you wish you'd given me first draw on the fag now. She's reached the Bugatti. Opens the boot and stuffs her stuff in. It shouldn't be able to fit four huge trunks, but magic's magic. So fuck it, right?

"What if the neighbors," her father begins, half-heartedly, but Ronnie calls him "Mr Dursley" in what they've dubbed her hot-girl-voice and he doesn't finish his sentence. Heather throws herself bodily into the car and kicks the back of Alya's seat, gives the entire neighborhood the bird as they speed away. Her dark hair streams behind her as she fishes a packet of cigarettes out of her back pocket and lights one with a snap of her fingers. "Heather," Gillian begins, reproachful, but Heather says "don't start" and she doesn't continue.

Alya twists a dial on her stereo and suddenly Madonna roars into blessed life. It's an old song but she's not feeling reggae today and Ronnie's delicate sensibilities can't take hip-hop. So they're on the road to King's Cross, a dozen honking cars left in their wake as Alya changes gears with the fatalistic gravitas/insane daring of a True Russian and Ronnie, hanging on for dear life, screams you're going the WRONG BLOODY WAY and Gillian offers her a Capri Sun.

Some boys kiss me, some boys hug me
I think they're okay
If they don't give me proper credit
I just walk away

King's Cross. Heather grinds her third cigarette under her heel as she pulls out Gillian's trunk for her. A security guard pauses and does a double-take but Ronnie smiles at him and he walks into a lamppost. "Budget Confundus," Alya says and it is funny, so Heather laughs. One after the other they breach the barrier and board. Swing their trunks into the space up top and stake their claim on their compartment. Students stream past, some new, most old. They point out the odd ones as they pass; here the house-elf, there the sentient origami-thing. "Cordelia Black's not taking the train this year," Heather says.

"Good," from Ronnie. "The less I see of her two loathsome brothers, the better. They made my first-year hell. Not even Firethorn could do a thing."

Alya: "Bastards." Then: "You know, my father says we're descended from Lithuanian nobility? That's the party line now."

"How far the mighty have fallen."

Alya grins widely, glances over Heather's shoulder and makes a rude gesture at a passing Hufflepuff. Probably one of the Quidditch fanatics. "Capitalism is a game, tovarisch, and Russia is winning."

Gillian: "You think Crouch would be able to talk to Vlad?"

Alya, pensive: "Worth a shot." Then: "So, have you cracked pennies yet?"

Gillian shakes her head, pulls a face, produces a stack of newspapers and spreads them out between them. Ronnie seizes the opportunity to pull out a study schedule for the four of them. Heather tunes out. Madonna again, in her ears:

They can beg and they can plead
But they can't see the light (that's right)
'Cause the boy with the cold hard cash
Is always Mister Right

The morning after the Sorting Feast. Heather catches Gillian as she's leaving the greenhouse, offers her a cigarette. Gillian declines. "One of these days," Heather says. "We'll get you yet." Changes the subject. "What've you got?"

"You know the new transfer student? He's an orphan from Ontario." Gillian likes to think of herself as the nice one, but she's just as hungry for gossip as the rest of them.

Into the Great Hall. Heather stakes out the Gryffindor table - "just wait, G, this is gonna be good" - and waves Ronnie and Alya over.

"I'm telling you," from Alya. "He's into you."

Ronnie: "Yes, but it's just puppy love. He'll get over it. And he's so common! I mean, I'd put out for an Arnault, but…"

Gillian: "How about a Bonaparte?"

"Not if he was the last man on Earth."

Heather: "Not even if he was six feet tall?"

"No."

Alya: "Not even if his cock was this big?"

Ronnie blushes and refuses to answer.

The food comes and goes. Heather gets increasingly impatient. Finally she hails English down, seeing as he'd been in the Hall all the while. Ronnie edges away as he draws close. "Did Black come down?"

"Yeah, 'fore you got here."

"Damn."

"You can tell us about it later," Gillian says. Heather, annoyed, stomps up to Double History and slots her earphones in.

'Cause we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl
You know that we are living in a material world
And I am a material girl