"To be or not to be a Weasley"
Chapter 5: The Strangest Witch He Ever Met
By: Adrial
AN: Phew! I can't tell you possibly how difficult it was to get this chapter out, not to mention the fact that portkey is giving me hell whenever I try to upload my chapters. I've used .doc AND .html format, but it's being completely unreasonable. Oh well, hopefully I can get it soon.
I've just finished the final spell-check and I'm just amazed that I managed to get it so long. I actually like this chapter a lot. It's only Day 2 of Draco shacking up at the Burrow, so don't expect any more snogging for 1 or 2 chapters, but I put a lot of time into the dialogue so you could get a clear view as to where each Ginny and Draco stand with each other. I really appreciate all the reviews and hope that you'll keep on reviewing. I love the ones that tell me things to improve upon (hint hint). J I hope you enjoy!
--Adrial
Disclaimer: *guffaw* I wish!
----------------------------------------------------------
"Ginny, hold still, dear!" Molly Weasley's amble fingers worked steadily on the hem of what appeared to be a mountain of frilly lace topped off by a very red-faced, very annoyed Ginny Weasley.
"Mum! You poked me again!" Ginny fought the urge to rub her bum where her mother was magically working a thread and needle through her dress robes.
"Oh, hush. I've nearly finished the back side!" Molly said with an exasperated sigh and wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead.
Ginny huffed and continued to stare at the same wall she'd been staring at for the past half hour of pure, utter torture. She caught sight of her image in the reflection of a picture frame adorning the fire place mantle and groaned inwardly. The robes were a disgusting pale pink color, accented with a horrid amount of white and lavender lace and reeking of the second hand shop they'd come from.
Why couldn't Fred and George by me new dress robes? Now I've got to prance around looking like a deranged tooth fairy-Oh!
At that moment, a glint of something silver/white flashed in the corner of her eye and she whipped around impulsively. However, she ended up howling in pain as the sewing needle penetrated her thigh from her sudden movement.
"OW!" She yelped, losing all sense of proper fitting etiquette. She forced herself to choke down the swell of disappointment that expanded in her chest when she turned around to see that in that brief instant, what she thought had been Malfoy had disappeared.
Mrs. Weasley sighed dramatically and tugged Ginny's robes back down to the suspended needle and thread.
"Maybe now you'll manage to stand still?"
Ginny answered her by craning her neck again, wondering if she'd imagined Draco's face, but she couldn't smother the feeling that those cold grey eyes were watching her somewhere.
After her rather unnerving encounter with the insufferable Slytherin that morning, Ginny was at a loss to go back to sleep and had retreated to the living room to brood until everyone woke up.
She heard Draco head back up to his room and the sound of footsteps as someone else took their turn in the shower.
Damn him. She fumed, jerking as she felt the cold needle come dangerously close to her leg again. She vowed to herself that morning that if it was a game Draco wanted to play with her, then she would do everything in her power to make sure that she ended up victorious. She wasn't a Gryffindor for nothing, anyway.
She wrenched her thoughts away from the slick-haired nuisance and back to the ghastly contraption her mother was sentencing her to for three whole years. She wondered if Malfoy was off somewhere that instant with those sneering cold eyes squinting with mirth at her families' lack of dress robe funds. A strange feeling roused in her stomach and she tried to force it to go away. Why should she be worrying about what the pompous jerk thought anyway?
Right…wasn't supposed to be thinking about him anymore. But… She fingered a cluster of cheesy fake pearls sewn in half moon shapes on the sleeve and sighed inwardly. I'll be the laughing stock of 5th year, that's for sure. Scratch that. The laughing stock of Gryffindor. Biting her lip thoughtfully, she braced herself to rescue her pride from certain doom.
"Mum...do you think I could use some of the money I've saved to buy some...erm...different, dress robes?" She meekly interrupted her mother's silent mutterings as she instructed the needle with her wand.
Mrs. Weasley glanced at her with a weary gaze, "Ginny, dear...Oh, but you've been saving up for years. You just wait. In an hour or two I'll have these robes good as new." She smiled determinedly at her daughter, a smile Ginny had grown to know all too well. She saw the regret smoldering somewhere behind her mother's deep brown eyes and could have hit herself.
Ginny sighed, "I know, Mum...I'm sorry. These robes are fine." She smiled feebly. She hadn't meant to hurt her mother's feelings; she was just frustrated. For all the hell the ministry liked to put her father through, they weren't even bothering to raise his pay. In the Weasley household, their lack of galleons was always seen but never spoken of. It was more than a touchy subject, and they and the entire wizarding community had grown used to shrugging it off. Ginny mused that at least they were all decent wizards; save for Ron, who seemed to knock off a year or two of his life expectancy whenever he picked up his wand.
"Has dad come home yet?" She tried to change the subject. Molly's eyes darkened for a moment and she took a break, sitting back on a little foot stool and sighing deeply.
"No...they've got him working overtime in the city. What with the Ministry finally getting the sense knocked into them, they've been trying to keep him out of the picture until it's all been smoothed over. I do hope he makes it in time for dinner..." She gazed at the clock. The spoon with Percy's proud smiling face had been decapitated (courtesy of Fred and George) sometime before and left a gaping hole next to her father's on "Work."
Ginny fiddled with a piece of lace near her elbow and watched her mother's despondent face cloud with worry. She knew that speaking about Dad's work only reminded her of Percy. Ginny's vision blurred with disdain for her idiot brother. The day he came to his senses as well would be the day Ginny would hex him into oblivion for putting her mother through such pain. She could hardly remember a time when the Weasley family had been without one of its number, and the deep sadness she saw in her mother's eyes whenever she thought no one was looking nearly broke her own heart.
"Mum...do you think we could take a break for a while? My legs are beginning to go numb..." Ginny broke the silence and shakily hobbled off of her perch on a stool.
Molly's mask of thought broke up suddenly and she nodded softly, "That's fine, dear."
Ginny smiled gratefully and gave her mother a small kiss on her cheek.
"Why don't you send Dad an owl with some of those danishes we made this morning? I'm sure he and Mr. Shakelbot would enjoy them," Ginny quipped and smiled at the light that flickered back on in her mother's honey colored eyes.
"Ah, what a wonderful idea! I'll just go borrow Bill's owl...oh, do you think we should make more? No...perhaps twenty will do. Though that Kingsley fellow could give Ron a run for his galleons... " Molly muttered excitedly, quickly gathering her sewing things and patting Ginny on the head absently. Ginny grinned. It was all she could do to at least give her mother something to do to feel as if she was in control of something, even if it was just her husband's stomach.
Once her mum had left, Ginny tore out of the lace atrocity and flung it on the couch, itching from the polyester lining. With a sigh, she walked out and into the living room. Hermione was sprawled out on the couch, pouring over a nasty looking book and scribbling notes rapidly on the parchment resting beside her elbow.
"Oh, goodness, Hermione, won't you take a break for once?" Ginny chided, drawing up a chair next to Bill and Ron's vicious game of wizard's chess.
"Blimey, Ron! Never thought you'd be better than Charlie," Bill muttered and winced as his Queen was throttled by one of Ron's nastier looking pawns.
Ron smirked smugly, "Checkmate."
"Argh!" Bill groaned.
"I'm up next!" Harry announced, stepping into the threshold with a handful of owl treats and Hedwig resting easily on his shoulder. She hooted softly as he gestured for her to perch on the window sill so he could play and accepted the proffered treats hungrily.
Hermione suddenly gasped and began digging through her pockets urgently, "Oh, Gin! I've nearly forgotten." She smiled triumphantly and withdrew a folded piece of parchment from her jeans.
"This came for you earlier while you were with your mum." Hermione smiled slyly and Ginny knew something was definitely up. She waved the letter in front of Ginny's face tauntingly in a decidedly un-Hermione like fashion, and Ginny rolled her eyes. She snatched the letter from her giggling friend's grasp and eagerly unfolded it.
"Oy! Who's that from? Another bleeding BOY?" Ron growled. Harry took the opportunity to check Ron's knight and smiled deviously.
"Check."
"WHAT?"
Ginny ignored her nosey brother and admired the neat script scrawled over the parchment. Her name was written elegantly in a deep blue ink in the top left hand corner. She smiled. Only one wizard she knew wrote in that particular hue.
"It's from Dean!" She exclaimed, a curious frown etching along her face.
Ron's face drained of color.
"Thomas? I thought you dumped him a month ago!" He stood, ready to confiscate the letter. Ginny hopped onto the couch, holding the letter high and out of his reach.
"Ronald! You stay out of my bloody business!" She growled. Ron glared at her.
"You're too young for him!"
"I'm fifteen, Ron! He's sixteen!"
"He...erm...he doesn't like quidditch!"
"What does that have to do with anything?" Ginny was fuming. Hermione chose that moment to interject, tugging Ron's elbow gently.
"Ron! She's right. And how are you to know what his intentions are anyway? She's not even read the letter yet!"
Ron's crimson flush faded slightly. "Alright then. Read it."
Ginny could have screamed. "I'll do as I wish, thank you very much! And I'd rather if you tended to your own personal affairs and left me to mine."
"But Gin-"
"Don't 'But Gin' me, Ronald. I'm sick of you charging onto the scene whenever you think I need your bloody protection," She ignored the sound of the crumpling letter as she clenched her fists. "I'm not a child anymore. I've grown up. Perhaps you should as well."
She gave him another healthy glare and stomped out of the room, ignoring the flash of hurt that struck through Ron's face and stung a tiny part of her heart.
Bill called her back calmly, but she waved him away and tore through the house-through the kitchen, past the pale-faced Mrs. Malfoy staring dejectedly at a plate of greasy bacon, out the back door, hop over the garden gnome, past the shed, stumble into the woods, collide with a tree, fall onto the ground dizzily…
That's going to hurt in the morning...
Ginny rubbed her forehead gingerly and tried to focus her eyesight. Blue and brown swirled together as the sky and trees merged into one great collage of color. She groaned.
"Can you stand or are you going to sit there forever?"
Ginny's head whipped around only to see what appeared to be three different Malfoys all spinning around lethargically with that same, bloody sneer.
"Damn…and I thought one of you was bad enough," She mumbled and moved to stand. An arm snaked beneath hers and she found her footing. Once the world had ceased to spin, she wrenched her arm from around Malfoy's and scowled.
"Can't a girl fall down without some sodding boy trying to play the hero all the time?" She growled and poked a finger directly into Malfoy's chest, "You know, I am fully capable of getting up on my own, thank you very much! In fact, I could fall down a cliff and get up just fine-ALONE. I don't need to be protected all the time like some bloody porcelain doll!"
Ginny's breaths came out in huffs as she spat the words directly into Malfoy's dumbfounded face. She drew a breath, ready to continue her tirade when he clamped a hand over her mouth, effectively smothering her next words.
"What the bloody hell are you going on about?!" He screwed his face up in wonder. This girl's got a screw loose somewhere. Oh wait, I've forgotten. She's a Weasley. He nodded to himself, happy with his own logic.
Ginny slapped away his hand and growled, "Why have I got to shut up? What? Can't a girl speak her mind? Or are you too convinced I haven't got one?!" She stomped her foot for emphasis and did that jabbing thing with her finger in his chest again.
If this is one of those things they taught us about in primary school… He shivered at the thought of his ten year old mind being scarred for life by the videos his professors showed him years before about the unspeakable things their bodies went through, especially girls. What had they called it again? Post Monstrous Cyclops? Pre Mental Symptoms?
"Are you quite finished with that, yet?" Draco nodded suggestively at the finger that was poking a bruise onto his chest cavity.
Ginny's reddened face drained slightly but still glowed bright in her cheeks. He caught the embers of a dying fire glowing in her eyes before it, too, dwindled to nothing but a very abashed young Weasley wishing she had run a bit harder into that tree and thus been knocked unconscious.
Her hand slowly dropped from his chest and to her side.
"Sorry about that," She muttered. Without her raging temper to guide her vocal chords, she was having a hard time finding something coherent to say.
Draco stared at her for a moment, feeling slightly awkward after their run-in that morning and tried to dreg up some look of disgust or disdain but was left blank-faced and suddenly wondering why he'd even tried to help in the first place. Had he asked her if she was alright?
Watch it, Malfoy. Soon they'll have you taking tea with muggles.
"What are you doing out here, anyway? I thought you'd be off somewhere with your mother, disinfecting all the door handles or something," She added the last bit with a scowl, trying to let him know that she hadn't forgotten that morning and her newly discovered despise for him.
Malfoy crossed his arms over his chest, "Aren't you feisty, little Weasel?" His lips sneered mockingly, "If you must know, I was looking for my cloak. I seemed to have misplaced it somewhere."
Ginny's eyes widened for a split second. She remembered throwing the cloak into her closet the previous night, so Hermione wouldn't find it and question her. She'd planned to sneak it into Malfoy's room when he wasn't around but had forgotten. But she couldn't very well let him know she'd taken it.
Just what I bloody need. Malfoy thinking I steal his clothing and sleep with it in my bedroom…
"Oh…well haven't you got others?" She dug the toe of her shoe into the ground and bit her lip.
Draco sighed as if she were missing some point, "Of course I've others, Weasel, but that one just happened to be the one my father gave me for my last birthday. As if it's any business of yours, anyway," He added with a healthy dose of Draco-glare.
Ginny returned his challenging gaze, "Fine. I'll leave you to it then." And she stalked off deeper into the woods. She couldn't very well go back into that house again. The house with all those blathering idiots she called brothers. The house with Mrs. Malfoy's cold, elegant face screwed up in silent disgust at every speck of dirt she saw or imagined. The house with the chance of bumping into that GIT named Draco strutting around.
The sound of branches cracking signaled Draco's departure, and she sighed, feeling a great weight lifted off of her shoulders.
Five minutes later found her sitting comfortably on the dock of the neighboring reservoir. She dangled one of her feet near the water, barely flinching as it slipped beneath the water's surface briefly. Hot sun rays beat upon her back, and she pulled her hair off of her shoulders, letting it roll onto her back in gilded curls.
She remembered Dean's letter in her pocket but didn't open it. Ron was right; she had broken things off with Dean a few weeks ago. She didn't really know why, but he gave her this impression that he was only dating her for convenience rather than desire. His parents were pushing him to be engaged before school let out, so he could be married off by his 18th birthday. Ginny had been one of the first on his list of possible matches, but she didn't seem too keen on being a number in a waiting line for someone who couldn't even remember that her favorite flowers were sunflowers, not daisies.
She sighed and picked at a splinter in the wood. A cool wind blew over the lake. Ginny watched it sway the bordering trees in a domino effect before tousling her own hair and sliding over her face.
With a yawn she leaned back onto the warm dock and relaxed her muscles. There were hardly any clouds in sight, so she had nothing to make pictures out of (a hobby she happened to be rather fond of), only the occasional bird that flew overhead.
She didn't hear the rustling of brush as Draco made his way through the thick woods and towards the lake. She didn't feel the dock creaking with the weight of his footsteps as they carried him unknowingly towards her. Her eyes fluttered closed and she felt sleep tug gently at the corners of her mind until she was submerged in it, leaving cold, grey eyes to speculate what exactly to do with her.
----------------------------------------------------------------
"Ron, you've really got to calm down already; she'll be fine," Hermione's exasperated pleas were beginning to sound only half enthused as she'd been attempting to take Ron's mind off of his little sister for the better part of the afternoon.
Ron refused to hear reason, however, and was presently tying a slip of parchment to Pig's tiny leg. Pig hooted excitedly, flapping its miniature wings against Ron's hands as they tried to get around the giddy owl's seizure-like movements.
"Who's that for?" Hermione's curious honey eyes narrowed at Ron's struggle to get Pig to stop moving.
Ron merely grunted in reply muttering things like "teach" and "boy" underneath his very heated breath. She threw a reproachful glance at Harry, who'd been staring off at nothing in particular during Ron's minor melt-down.
For a moment, her heart softened, forgetting about Ron's antics and settling upon The Boy Who Lived before her. Her heart broke to think of just how much he'd been forced to live through. Now that Sirius was gone…she wasn't sure what Harry would do. He'd been acting perfectly normal since Dumbledore had given his approval for him to finish the last month of his summer with the Weasleys. But still…there were moments when his emerald gaze would darken, his jaw would clench, and he'd sit silently for hours at a time, off in a world she knew nothing of.
"Harry, are you alright?" She meekly asked, unsure as to what deep thoughts she was disturbing, but finding it unbearable to see him so despondent.
Green eyes flashed up to hers, clouded with something neither of them were sure of. She swallowed, wondering if only moments before, she'd crashed through an image of Sirius falling through a black veil or a memory of the Department of Mysteries. Harry's gaze revealed nothing, however, as he gave a small smile and shrugged. "Just a bit tired I guess. That bloke kept me up half the night with his bloody snoring."
Hermione laughed a small, gentle laugh and was pleased to hear him at least joking a bit. In the meantime Ron had successfully pinned Pig to the living room table and had just finished attaching the letter to his leg.
"Ah HA! You hyper little bugger," He muttered at the defenseless bird and grinned at his minor victory. "Now you take that straight away to DEAN-THO-MAS."
"What?!" Hermione seized the bird from Ron's death grip and cradled it in her arms. "Ronald Weasley, if you plan on sending death threats to Dean, I'll make sure you receive howlers every day for the entire school year!" She glared at him and gingerly removed the letter from Pig's leg. The tiny owl seemed miffed at being tossed around so much and then stripped of such an important job, and it hooted haughtily before buzzing off into the kitchen.
"Come off it, Hermione! That bloke's got a thing for my little sister and he needs to know just what he's got coming if he does her wrong!" Ron, red-faced and irritated at Hermione's actions, tried to snatch the letter back from her.
"You know what, Ron? Ginny was right! You do need to GROW-UP!" With that, Hermione took the confiscated letter and ripped it to shreds right before his eyes. Ron's round gaze stared at her unbelievingly and suddenly turned to fury.
"I had to knick Bill's red ink to write that! How'm I supposed to scare the knickers off of Thomas if I write it in prissy pants blue, like him?" He clenched his fists at his sides.
Hermione scoffed, "Listen to yourself for once you flaming git!" She was so frustrated that she could barely configure the proper words she needed to insult the freckles right off his face. She gave up and huffed dramatically, after which she stomped out of the room and up the stairs. Ron waited for the ceiling to crumble on top of him as it shook with each of her heavily weighted foot steps. Finally, a bedroom door slammed shut and he let out a compressed breath, unsure of whether he should be stark raving mad or slightly embarrassed. He settled on a contemplative frown.
"Guess I won't be getting any help on that Charms essay tonight, then."
Harry guffawed loudly and clapped him on the shoulder.
"I'd say you won't be getting any help on anything for a while, mate."
Ron scowled, "Bloody girls." A moment of silence passed between the two before Ron swallowed loudly.
"Erm, Harry, where'd you say I could get one of those cups, again?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ginny rolled over lazily on her side, basking in the warm summer breeze that covered her like a blanket in her slumber. She concentrated on the fleeting dreams that flew by in her mind, never lingering long enough for her to grab onto before dissolving into something more enigmatic than before.
Suddenly, another vision began to transform, and a flaxen-haired boy appeared amidst a blinding white light in her mind. It nearly drowned out his pale flesh and hair, and Ginny squinted subconsciously to focus in on icy grey eyes she knew only too well. Malfoy sneered malevolently at her, beckoning into the amorphous shadows behind him as the light suddenly shifted from the purest of whites to the darkest of grays. Ginny'd seen that color before, right before a terrible thunder storm. As if to confirm her thoughts, the sky rolled on into giant purple clouds, spinning lethargically amidst spider-webbed lightning that glinted off of Malfoy's eyes every time it sliced through the sky.
"What are you doing here, Weasley? Come to play the hero have you?" Malfoy scowled at her. For some reason that hurt Ginny in a place she'd never thought someone like Malfoy could touch. Her mouth opened and closed but no sound would come out.
"Are you willing to choose then?" His gaze suddenly lost its malicious glint and fell behind a curtain of almost disbelief.
Ginny felt herself nodding, but she knew not why.
Malfoy's face suddenly darkened, his eyes turned to ice, his lips curved into a familiar sinister grin. Just as the platinum hair framing his face began to flow out to his shoulders, Ginny felt herself being shaken roughly. Her hands reached out blindly towards him, but she could not stop the tremors assaulting her body.
Her eyes snapped open almost instantly. She focused blearily upon the face of the very person she'd just been dreaming about.
"You know, you are one of the strangest witches I've ever had the misfortune to meet, Weasley." Draco uncoiled his fingers from around her shoulders and wiped them on his robes absently.
Ginny stuttered for a moment, trying to fight between arguing with this Malfoy or attempting to grasp the dream Malfoy that had left her vision only moments before. She settled on scrambling shakily to her feet and glaring as best she could at the former.
"Considering the lot you hang around with, Malfoy, I'd beg to differ." She reached for her hair and ran her fingers through it. The soft curls sprang back to life by her gentle prodding and she brushed it off of her shoulders once again.
All of this had not gone unnoticed by Malfoy. With the sweltering summer sun shimmering in her hair and the ever-present fire sparkling in her eyes, the female weasel almost looked…
"What are you staring at, Malfoy? And I thought I'd gotten rid of you," Ginny huffed and turned around. The rippling waters faced her. She could have gone back to the house, but that would mean having to cross paths with Malfoy again, and she needed a few seconds to collect herself before she did that. She resorted to taking up her previous seat on the end of the dock, swinging her legs a bit faster over the surface of the water. She prayed he would take the hint and bugger off. Unfortunately for her, the powers that be weren't listening or simply didn't care, and a few moments later, Draco took a seat a few feet away from her, eyes cast out over the lake.
Ginny fought desperately not to look at him. His elusive presence in her dreams had caught her off guard. It was one thing to have to deal with him by day, but if she had to fear seeing his sneering face every time she closed her eyes, she swore she'd never sleep again.
A few minutes passed by slowly for the unusual pair. Ginny's sandals were soaked by then and she gently took them off, setting them beside her. She leaned farther over the edge and watched fish jet by underneath her swinging feet.
Draco wasn't sure exactly why he'd decided to stay with the strange girl, but for some reason he felt that if he were to leave, he'd be missing out on something. He broke their uncomfortable silence reluctantly.
"So…what were you screaming and flailing about for anyway, Weasel?" He cast his gaze over at her for a brief second just to make sure she'd heard him before returning it to the lake.
Ginny bit her lip. She wasn't about to tell him she'd been dreaming about him. No way. She wouldn't dare reveal that he'd hurt her feelings by being so cold. She'd eat flobberworms before she did any of that.
"Curious, are you?" She stated after a few moments of silence. Draco shrugged offhandedly.
"You could say that, I suppose. But then again, it's not every day I get to hear girls calling my name out in their sleep." Now when they're awake… that's a different story all together. He smirked at the thought.
Ginny was more than baffled. She was mortified.
"Believe me, if I'd had my choice of dreams, it would not involve the likes of you." She hoped she hadn't let on that he had caught her off guard.
Draco gave a fleeting smile, "But I'm sure I present a better fantasy than that prissy Potter, don't you?"
Ginny didn't say anything for a while after that.
"You know…you never answered my question." She resorted to a change of subject after several moments had passed. Draco's silver eye brows narrowed.
"What was that, Weasel?"
Ginny swallowed, "Whether or not you ever grow tired of being a…a Malfoy?" She let the wind lure her hair over the side of her face, hiding Draco from her view.
Draco contemplated her question for a moment. It was ridiculous, that was for sure, but perhaps there was some dodgy, ulterior motive in her inquiry.
"Why do you ask?"
Ginny smiled slightly, "You can't answer a question with a question, Malfoy."
He found himself wanting to return her challenging grin, but quickly squashed the pesky impulse.
"You've just done it yourself."
Ginny thought for a moment. "Fine, you answer mine and I'll answer yours," She held out a hand, "Deal?"
Oh, Merlin. What would Ron say if he caught me striking a deal with the spawn of Satan reincarnate? She deviously thought that she really did not care. If it annoyed Ron, she was all for it.
Draco stared at her proffered hand, slightly perplexed.
"Come on, Malfoy. I assure you that the Weasley epidemic isn't contagious." She turned so she was facing him directly and stuck her hand closer towards him.
He mulled over her comment and hesitantly took her hand in his own. Ginny felt his long fingers coil around hers and nearly jumped out her skin at the softness of his touch. Before she could dwell on that longer, he'd let go of her hand and placed it back beside him.
"So…you want to know if I ever get tired of being a Malfoy?"
Ginny nodded slightly.
"Are you mad?"
"That was a question, Mr. Malfoy. I believe we're looking for answers, here." She smiled again. Draco found himself wanting her to do it again, but a curious frown found its way back onto her freckly face once again.
"Right, well then my answer is this: of course not! And you should be sent to St. Mungo's for ever asking that bloody asinine question in the first place."
Ginny frowned deeper. "But…everyone knows you by it! Listen to how I address you. 'Malfoy.' Don't you wish people would just call you," She paused, wondering if saying his name would be taking things a bit too far. Oh come on, Gin. You're not talking about bloody Voldemort here! "
…Draco?" She finished triumphantly, feeling slightly as if she'd released a small pressure from her mind.
Draco scoffed, "Who bloody well cares? My family is the longest living line of pure blooded wizards EVER. My father practically runs the Ministry of Magic, and I will never have to work a day in my life thanks to my last name," He said it all animatedly as if it were blatantly obvious, "If I were you, I'd be wishing I could have my last name and not the cheap life that comes along with the one you've got to live with."
Ginny's blood boiled at his ending statement, but then again… She remembered all the times she cursed her last name or felt embarrassed by her throng of siblings and fiery hair. By the hand-me-down wardrobes and tell-tale freckles. By her father and his love for all things muggle. But she settled on one thought at last and voiced it clearly.
"I'd rather be a Weasley than ever have to live the life of a Malfoy." Her statement was calm and quiet. She stared fixedly on Draco's eyes as she said it, and watched as they wavered for a moment.
In Draco's mind he was screaming with indignation at her comment. She had no bloody idea what it was like to be a Malfoy. It had taken him years to convince his father he was even semi-worthy of his own heritage. And to think that this girl, this Weasley, was trying to put herself in his bloody shoes and judge him on it made him want to grab her and shake sense into her brain. He prided himself most on carrying out the legacy of his last name, and she was sitting there acting as if she knew everything there was to know about being a Malfoy. As if…she could read him without even himself knowing.
He shivered at the thought, willing himself to convince her that her previous statement was just about as ludicrous as it was for the two of them, a Weasley and Malfoy, to even be conversing- civilly, for that matter.
"Give me one good reason why you'd rather be poor and shadowed by fifty brothers when you could be the sole heir to an endless fortune?" Ginny knew he was clearly flabbergasted by her resolution.
She stared at him for a moment. A million thoughts were running through her mind at once. She thought of the cruelty that sparked to life inside of Draco's eyes whenever he laid eyes on a muggle-born. She thought of the snobby air of his mother and the way neither of them spoke to each other as if in some constant inner argument. She thought of his father and the way she'd seen Draco treated by him that time in her second year. She thought of what a cold, hollow comfort he took in money and luxuries.
Finally, she envisioned the warmth of having her mother crush her in a loving embrace, of her brothers' constant struggle to make sure she was never harmed in any way, her father's kind heart and diligence, and the comfort of having a safe world to return to after 8 months at Hogwarts.
Her heart, in that moment, opened up to the boy sitting before her. She was nearly suffocated by the desire to show him what she saw. To let him feel the love and security she was practically submerged in since the day she'd been born. She unconsciously took his hand in her own.
"Love."
Draco's hand was burning beneath her own. Was she serious? Love? She must have been reading too many of those sodding romance novels.
Love?
Such a contemptible emotion did not exist for Draco. Respect. That was what mattered. That was what his last name assured him for the rest of his life.
Draco stared deeply at her, wondering if she were at any moment to going burst out in laughter. But her face was dead set, and she had meant what she'd said.
"And that is exactly why you are you and I am me." He finally said. Ginny didn't miss a beat.
"What is that supposed to mean?" She furrowed her brow but neither removed their hand from the others.
"You build your life upon wild dreams of love and all that nonsense. We Malfoys depend on a cold, hard foundation. We invest our time in our money and our reputation. The likes of you, Weasley, waste all their time on dreams and ruddy good deeds. And look where it's gotten your lot. A sorry old house and second hand clothing."
Ginny pursed her lips. "And you're so happy, are you? Tell me, Malfoy. Would your parents do anything for you? Would your friends risk their lives to help you if you needed it? Would your father work his arse off for something he believes in to teach you how a decent man should act?"
Draco wanted to scream in frustration at the girl. Of course none of the things she'd said were true. They all involved silly trifles called emotions. Silly trifles no member of his family would ever bet a bit of their fortune on.
"No." He answered simply. Ginny gently removed her hand from his.
"I suppose you're right then. There's a reason you are a Malfoy. But that doesn't stop me from feeling sorry for you."
With that, she stood up gracefully, grabbing her damp shoes and beginning to leave him to himself. Their conversation had deeply upset her and she knew she'd be dwelling upon it for some time afterwards.
Draco felt offended by the way she'd said she felt 'sorry for him.' He was appalled at the thought of that little girl thinking he needed Love to be happy. He shook his head with a pensive frown.
"I meant what I said before, Weasley. You are the strangest witch I've ever met."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
So…what'd you think? Let me know! Review Review Review Review!
love,
Adrial