CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
"TALKING" ((THINKING))
Ginny awoke the next morning with a start. ((No,)) she thought, eyes still closed tightly, ((It was such a good dream…))
When sleep didn't return to her, she opened her eyes and got out of bed, groaning. Her foot caught on something and then she noticed all the clothes sprawled out on the floor of her room. As she untangled her foot from one of her new shirts, she gave a small squeal of happiness.
Yesterday had been real after all; she had all these clothes to prove it. Ginny was Draco Malfoy's girlfriend. Ginny and Draco. Draco and Ginny. Of course, no one would ever know, but the mere fact that it was true was enough for her. She gave another squeal and dashed into her bathroom for a quick shower. Everything today would be perfect, for it was today she was revealing The New Ginny to an unsuspecting Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
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Ron tapped his foot impatiently in the common room. He hadn't found Ginny the night before, and when he had asked Professor Snape if she had come by to turn in her late work, he was given detention "for even suggesting such an atrocious thing."
He spent the rest of the night scrubbing cauldrons and re-labeling already perfectly labeled potion ingredients, as he had just re-labeled them the week before. After two hours, Ron finally came to the conclusion that someone had lied.
But, of course, it definitely wasn't, couldn't possibly be Harry Potter. Harry was his best friend, a goody-two-shoes, a hero, the BOY WHO LIVED, for Merlin's sake. He couldn't tell a lie, he was much like those crazy American kings that Hermione kept telling them about: George Washingmachine, and Honest Moley Top Hat Man. It was physically impossible by all natural Muggle or Wizarding laws for Harry Potter to mutter anything but the complete and absolute truth, Ron had reasoned. So, the only thing that could have possibly happened was that Ginny had lied to Harry about seeing Snape and Harry, who was so pure, innocent, and trusting, had believed her and passed the information onto Ron. That Ginny was always stirring up some kind of trouble, after all. Ron pitied Harry; the boy was so honest and trusting that he didn't seem to know it was possible for other people to do anything dishonest. Therefore, he was always being tricked out of his mushrooms.
Taking another moment to feel sorry for Harry, Ron began mentally listing all of the boy's many problems. Realizing happily that this particular list was longer than most, he felt immensely appreciative for his own life. Last night's detention episode gradually disappeared from his mind, and his day was beginning to feel like a good one.
Ron didn't pay any mind to the girl clicking her way downstairs, with obviously no respect for the Hogwarts dress code. She was just another one of those young girls nowadays that didn't have any respect for themselves. He pitied them as he shook his head disbelievingly. He preferred more sensible women, in particular, those who didn't care what people thought of them, maybe were a bit wacky, and enjoyed wearing giant lion hats…
"Ron?" Hermione broke the silence, tugging uncertainly at his sleeve.
"Hermione, you ruined my thought process," Ron whined as he jerked dumbly towards her and stared at where, or in this case, who she was pointing at.
There, at the foot of the stairs, was… "Is that Ginny?" Neville asked with a hungry look in his eyes, similar to many others who had just noticed the scandalously dressed girl who had just arrived.
"Of course it's not Ginny, Neville!" Ron snapped, eyeing the girl with a suspicious look on his face.
Hermione looked nervously at Ron. "Well," she explained carefully, "There is no one else in this school with hair like that besides you and Ginny."
"She must be an imposter!" Ron whispered, spazzing slightly.
"Are you going to dress like that at the ball?" Neville suggested with a goofy grin, as Ginny found her way towards them.
Ron squinted idiotically at her, and continued squinting as she stood beside him.
"What ball?" Ginny snapped, hands on her hips. Her narrowed eyes would have burned a hole in Neville, but she had to learn the incantation from Draco first.
"You know, the Valentine's Day ball, the one you agreed to go with me? Since last October?" Neville replied matter-of-factly.
After pulling Ginny's hair to make sure she was not an imposter, Ron finally realized that this shamefully dressed girl was his baby sister. Instead of continuing to gawk like an idiot, he had now resorted to opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. His eyes bulged as he pointed at her with a shaking finger.
"I am not going to the ball with you!" Ginny snapped in disgust.
"Hell no you're not!" Ron finally bellowed once he found his voice.
"What?" Ginny and Neville both spun towards him in unison.
"Why not?" Neville whined as Ginny squinted angrily at her older brother.
"I don't see how it's any of your business," she snapped.
"Stuff it, Ginny, if you know what's good for you! You're lucky I don't owl Mum right this instant about this!" Ron scowled with distaste.
"About what?" Ginny shot back.
"Look at what you're wearing!"
"There is nothing wrong-"
"I won't have my baby sister walking around Hogwarts dressed like a… like a…"
"Like a what, Ronald?" Ginny snarled.
"You're not going to the ball, Ginevra, and that's that!" Ron yelled, getting red in the face.
"But, Ron!" Neville cried.
"Shut UP, Neville!" Ginny screamed. "Please, Ron! I really want to go to the ball!"
"You really want to go?" Ron frowned.
Ginny let out a breath of relief. "Yes. Please. I really want to go."
"Fine," Ron turned away, "but I'm taking you."
And there he left Ginny and Neville staring at his retreating back with open mouths. Then suddenly Ginny turned to Neville and screamed, "What the HELL is your problem? Why do you have to ruin EVERYTHING by mentioning the STUPID BALL?!"
"Whatever, Ginny! Who else were you planning to go with anyway?" Neville replied like the snot-faced jerk he was, "Draco?" He laughed pompously.
Ginny didn't answer, just glared at him, wishing once again she knew the incantation to burn holes in people with her eyes.
"Did he even ask you to go with him, Ginny?" Neville asked patronizingly, raising an eyebrow. He then turned around and left Ginny there to ponder the question. After a moment of staring after him, Ginny recomposed herself and stalked off to the Great Hall.
Hermione simply just stood there, feeling lost. She thought she knew everything, and here she had never been so
confused before in her life.
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Draco strut down to the Great Hall with his head held up slightly higher than usual (and that's pretty high). He had finally accomplished his goal. Ginny had resisted and resisted, but he had finally broke her down. He was the winner once again, as he always should be. Now all he had to do was get her a Valentine's Day gift better than personalized knickers. Damn that Blaise. And at that moment-speak of the devil-the raven-haired boy jumped out from behind a corner, face flushed, holding a piece of parchment in his left hand and a pair a fuzzy blue socks in his right.
"Dra..Dra..Dra..Draco," he panted. "I've," pant, "been," pant, "looking," pant, "all over," pant, pant, "for you…" he finally managed to say.
"Why is that?" Draco asked lazily.
When Blaise finally caught his breath, he replied, "Think Harry Potter wants attention! But I don't. But I don't…"
"Excuse me? Have you lost your mind, Zabini?" Draco asked, frightened and backing away.
"Because I wanted to ask you if I could borrow your socks," Blaise said as if he were repeating something he had already said very clearly. He held up his right hand and smiled brightly.
Draco colored slightly, but was still very pale, of course.
"Those aren't mine!" he hissed.
"Of course they are," Blaise wrinkled his brow, "look at them!" He then proceeded to shake the horribly fuzzy socks in Draco's face so the silver "DM" on the ankle was visible.
"Get those revolting rags out of my face!" Draco yelled and slapped away the shedding socks.
"Nice alliteration," Blaise complimented. "Oh! Can I borrow them, please?!" he whined.
"Whatever, take them. Keep them! They aren't mine, I tell you!" Draco cried with his arms crossed in front of his face.
Blaise let out a yell of triumph and threw his arms around his best friend. At that moment, the group of first years that were walking by stopped in their tracks and stared up at the embracing boys.
"That's Draco Malfoy; he's Head Boy!" one tiny girl with extremely frizzy hair whispered to her friend.
"Why is he doing that? I always thought he liked girls, not boys… But perhaps that was just hope," the second girl piped back.
A small boy behind them could be heard snorting haughtily. "What a disgrace to us Slytherins. You know, he once was the most looked up to in Hogwarts. Now he's snogging boys in the hall! I thought the Malfoys were an esteemed and proper family. These incidents are what shame us pure bloods…" The two larger boys on either side of him guffawed stupidly.
Draco pushed Blaise off of him and turned to the kids, face twitching dangerously.
"GET OUT OF HERE!" he roared, "BEFORE I HEX YOU ALL AND SEND YOU HOME TO YOUR MOTHERS IN MATCH BOXES!"
As they all scattered, the small Slytherin boy could be heard saying, "Merlin, if you wanted some privacy all you had to do was say so."
Draco let out a growl that could challenge a lion's, and immediately the whole hall was devoid of life, save Draco and Blaise.
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Ginny walked into the Great Hall a little later than usual, so everyone (Draco) would notice her when she burst through the doors. Well, EVERYONE did notice her. Everyone except Draco, that is.
When she came in, at first the whole Hall seemed to fall into a deathly silence in which she hoped was awe. But, as soon as she took her first step, came the wolf whistles and cheers. Several Slytherin boys even tried to make swipes at her as she walked past. She could just see the anger radiating off of her brother. Harry looked a bit disturbed, also.
((He had his chance,)) Ginny thought angrily.
Neville looked as though he hadn't eaten for days, and Hermione was tugging on his arm, jealously eyeing Ginny.
But, Draco wasn't at the Slytherin table. He wasn't harassing the Gryffindors. He wasn't in the Great Hall at all.
It took Ginny a moment to realize that Blaise was also absent. Therefore, in her mind, Draco's nonattendance was entirely and exclusively Zabini's fault.
Oh, how he would pay.
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Draco and Blaise had decided to skip breakfast and take a stroll around the lake. Well, Blaise had convinced Draco to; Draco thought it was a rather troubling thing to do.
"I don't understand why you want to take a walk! Blaise, only couples do this!" Draco gestured at himself, Blaise, and the lake in which the Giant Squid had just winked knowingly at them.
"What are you talking about? Today is sunny and cool, considering that it is FEBRUARY and-wait… how are we not a couple?" Blaise inquired, "There are two of us, are there not?"
Draco sighed heavily, "I don't mean `couple' as in numbers, but `couple' as in a boyfriend and a girlfriend. Obviously you're not a girl." Draco looked at Blaise, scrutinizing him, "So you definitely aren't girlfriend material."
Blaise scoffed. "Well, excuse me," he snapped three times, "but I couldn't say the same for you! You're so pretty; sometimes I mistake you for a girl!"
"Well, what about you?! With that long hair and violet bloody eyes!" Draco countered. "Who the bloody hell has bloody violet eyes?"
"They also have electric blue specks," Blaise added smugly, winking at Draco.
"Argh!" Draco slapped his hand to his forehead, frustrated. "Okay, let's just get back to the Great Hall. I've got to be a good boyfriend and walk my real girlfriend to class."
"What, as if I'm not real?" Blaise sniffed as he trailed after him.
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The moment Draco and Blaise stepped into the Great Hall, they were immediately bombarded by a symphony of sound…that sounded like multiple screeching Moaning Myrtles.
"What the fuck?" Draco muttered, looking around.
The whole Hall had gone crazy, nuts, mad!
"What the fuck?" Draco repeated. It seemed that everyone but the teachers, who were staring helplessly from the front table, were crowded around the Gryffindor table. It was a mass of people and every few seconds a ripple would ascend through the crowd as people switched places, pushing a shoving.
Draco and Blaise were suddenly thankful for their heights as they strode toward the mob. After throwing a couple of first years out of the way and tripping a few fourth years, they finally had a slight view of the center.
"Bloody hell!" Blaise gasped at the same moment that Draco screamed similarly to a five year old girl.
Right there, in the middle of the table half-sat, half-laid a cross-legged Ginny Weasley. Several boys were shouting out crude remarks toward her, Blaise being one of them.
"Take if off!" he cried joyfully, punching the air with his fists.
Draco glowered at him.
"Gosh, sorry," Blaise muttered under his breath.
Draco looked out into the crowd and noticed Ron and Harry trying to fight their way to the center of the swarm. Draco growled slowly and rolled up his sleeves.
It was as if the Red Sea had parted once more; students literally fell to the sides of Draco as he plowed his way to Ginny.
Her eyes widened as he plucked the half eaten cherry out of her hand, grabbed her upper arm, and dragged her out of the Great Hall, everyone staring after them. The doors slammed behind them, and everyone was silent.
Then suddenly, "What the BLOODY FUCK?!" Ron bellowed at the top of his lungs.
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Ginny struggled helplessly as Draco pulled her out of the Great Hall and down the corridors toward his room.
"Let me go!" she whined. Draco ignored her and continued to pull. Once they reached his room he threw her in and slammed the door shut. He turned to face her with a look of mangled confusion and anger on his face.
"What's going on?" he asked her calmly.
"I-what do you mean?" Ginny tried to look innocent, which was turning out to be quite difficult considering her outfit.
Draco eyed her cautiously. "What do you think you were doing-performing a strip tease for all of Hogwarts? Where are the rest of your clothes?"
"These," Ginny gestured her ensemble, "are my clothes."
"What the bloody hell did you go and dress like that for, and then go dance on your house table?" Draco massaged his temples.
"I did it for you!" Ginny pointed out matter-of-factly.
"Me?" Draco smirked.
"Well, yes," she continued, "I wanted to look nice for my boyfriend, after all."
"Well, Ginny darling, I wouldn't describe this as nice," he looked her up and down with the same smirk on his face.
She playfully smacked his arm. "You weren't even there!" She pouted.
"Was I supposed to be?"
"Oh, well…I just thought…" she looked away.
"Come on," Draco said as he took her hand, "let's walk you to class." He gave her a peck on the cheek as they left his room.
"Aren't you cold? Put this on, nobody should see you like this except for me," Draco said as he handed her his robe and the door closed behind them.
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Ron sat in History of Magic, clenching and unclenching his buttocks fists. It was startling to Hermione, for this was the first time he had stayed awake in the class since…well, no, it was actually the very first time. He kept throwing death glares at Draco, who had strut into class ten minutes late smirking and stage-whispering to Blaise about walking his new girlfriend to class.
Ron was ashamed. His own baby sister was fraternizing with the enemy. And the whole school now knew that he had failed her. Oh, the shame. The disgrace. The unimaginable humiliation. The absolute-
"Ron!" Hermione suddenly clouded his vision. He blinked at her.
"Stop crying, Ron, everyone's staring!"
The red-head then noticed that he couldn't catch his breath. He had also flooded his desk with salty tears; his parchment, quill, and ink were ruined. Abruptly Harry let out a loud snore and Ron, grateful to be excused from the class's attention, bolt out of his desk immediately, aiming for the door. But, it seemed luck was not on Ron's side. He slipped on his spilled tears and the whole class stared after him as he gathered his things, got up, and stalked sobbing out of the classroom.
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Ginny ran up to her bed and threw herself onto it. "Ouch!" she screamed as she landed on a spike heel. She sighed, got up, and walked out of her room toward the Great Hall for dinner.
A/N:
Llama: Well, there. Chapter Twenty-Two. Did you like it, enjoy it? Was it not posted quickly enough for you? We truly hope so. Because as you know, our lives only consist of serving you, and nothing else. God forbid we ever displease any of you.
Dolly: Okay, Llama. I think they get it. We got a flame from a person complaining about how long it takes us to update in a very rude way. Please don't flame us because you think we're taking too long to update. And do not further insult us by implying that we do not have lives, saying that we should update because we have nothing better to do. We do, in fact, lead lives like normal people outside of the world of Harry Potter, although we appreciate its entertainment value immensely. We actually do have families, friends, jobs, etc.
Llama: And if you're going to flame us, stand by what you say. Sign your reviews; don't post as "Anonymous," you scaredy cats. Readers, we'd like to take this moment to thank you all, truly, for sticking by our story for this long. We've enjoyed writing it and we hope you've enjoyed reading it. Although we do intend to finish this story, we do not promise that it will be finished soon. If you think our story doesn't deserve to be read because we don't update as quickly as you like, by all means, stop reading it. Nobody is forcing you. For those of you who think we should hurry up and finish our story; it's finished. There. The end. Goodbye.
Dolly: But for those of you who are willing to wait patiently for our creative juices to flow and time to open up in our busy schedules, please stay tuned for the next chapter. But, like Llama said, we don't know when that is going to be. Llama's going out of town in a couple days and when she gets back we both have to go to school. It's tough these days to find time to sit down and actually write a story.
Llama: Please don't get us wrong. We love writing this story and we immensely appreciate and love the fact that many of you have read it and enjoyed it as we have enjoyed writing it. And we do want to write more and finish. But, after everything is said and done, this is meant to be fun for us, and for you. We want this experience to remain a positive one, not one in which we are insulted and told that our story does not deserve good reviews. That's not going to make us want to write more, so it won't help you or us. If you have something criticizing to say, there's no reason to be impolite. Go ahead and say it nicely; don't show off the fact that you know how to be rude, so do we. It's cool that you want us to update soon, it shows you are interested in our story and we like that. But refrain from the attitude and thinking that you know better than us what is good for our story.
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