A/N thanks again for the reviews. I have to credit a couple people here. I never thought of Draco being a professor until I read Mynuet's Professor Draco series (so hot! Go read them!), so that belongs to her. Also, the line "Professor Death Eater" I read in Burgosdamasco's super While You Were Sleeping. Hope ya like this!
CHAPTER 4 Fall Again
The train ride to Hogwarts was almost liberating, in that Ginny could do nearly whatever she wanted, and not worry about Ron babying her or Hermione reminding her of the rules, or Harry having his arm wrapped suffocatingly tight around her. But there was nothing she wanted to do. She sat staring out the window, while Luna, Colin, Bianca, and Zoë chatted happily around her. She was acting ridiculous, she knew that, but she was still upset Draco hadn't even told her goodbye. Some friend.
"Ginny, baby, are you okay?" Zoë drawled.
"Huh? Yeah, I'm fine." Ginny forced a smile at the staring group. And I will be. His loss, not mine!
"Did you and Harry have a row?"
"Harry?"
"You know, your brother's mate. Easy on the eyes, black hair, scar, defeated You Know Who. Seems to fancy you quite a bit," Zoë raised an eyebrow.
"Oh." Ginny shook her head. "We broke up at the beginning of the summer."
"What?" Zoë shrieked.
"You did?" Bianca gasped.
"Why?" Luna questioned, suspicion in her eyes.
"Good," Colin smiled. "Now you can date me!"
Ginny snorted. "Similar to you, he's more like my brother than my boyfriend. He agreed. We're better friends."
"That's it?" Bianca groaned. "No messy rows? No loud scream fests?
"Nope, just a change of status."
The dinner that night tasted better than ever, and Ginny was determined to make the most of her last year at school. After this, she'd be expected to find a job and behave like an adult. She'd done decently well on her O.W.L.s, and she assumed she'd do just as well on her N.E.W.T.s, but to be honest, she didn't really care. She wasn't going to "Pull a Weasley" and vacate school like the twins, but she was working with Madam Hooch to get on with a Quidditch Team; any team would do actually as long as she could afford to pay enough bills to live on her own. Oh, her mum would just die when she found out. Her mum didn't even know that she and Harry had broken up.
When Dumbledore stood up, he announced that Professor Snape had been selected as the new DaDa teacher. Ginny nearly fell off her seat with shock, and she wasn't the only one. Next to her Colin let out a groan. "But I liked that class!"
"Who's gonna be our potions instruction then?" Bianca whispered. "I don't see anyone new up there."
"This means, of course," Dumbledore continued, "that he have a new potions professor. However, he will not be arriving until later tonight, so you will be meeting him as you have your classes this week."
Zoë scrambled for her schedule. "We'll meet him soon. We have double Potions first thing tomorrow."
"Are you serious?" Ginny moaned. "What if he's as horrible as Snape?"
"You better hope not," Colin said, staring at his schedule. "Cause we have Potions from 8 to10, and then DaDa from 10:15 till 12:15."
Despite the heavy schedule ahead, Ginny slept well that night, drawing the thick curtains around her bed and lighting her Galaxy Globe, letting it glow as she slept.
The next morning was full of the usual hustle and bustle to get ready, the girls flipping on the lights well before 6 am. Resolute to start her final school year on a good note, Ginny joined her friends in front of the long mirror and applied several cosmetic charms to ensure flawless skin. Her highlights had faded over the summer so she reapplied them and then had Zoë perform a shortening charm to her school skirt.
"Now do this," Zoë instructed as Ginny buttoned up the standard white blouse they wore. "Here." She undid the top three buttons and loosened Ginny's tie. "Perfect."
"I dunno." Ginny looked down and saw directly into her cleavage. "You can see what little I have."
"It looks great," she assured her. "Honestly."
"How about like this?" she offered a compromise, buttoning an additional button.
"It does," Bianca assured her. "Standing here I can just see a tiny bit, plus you've got your tie on."
Ginny looked in the mirror for confirmation. "Right." She began to pull on her black and pink Converse trainers and Zoë groaned.
"Do you have to wear those?"
"What's wrong with them?"
"Well, you look sexy, but the shoes . . ."
"I love these shoes," she defended herself. "I got them at a Muggle shop in London."
"I know they're Muggle shoes. My entire family is made up of Muggles. Try something like this," Zoë said, digging through her trunk and producing four pairs of shoes, each one taller and strappier than the next.
Ginny eyeballed them warily. "No way. I'll be on my arse before breakfast."
"She looks cute," Bianca interjected, pulling on her Gryffindor robe. "Kind of like the way Colin's brother's been dressing. That Muggle punk look."
Ginny raised an eyebrow. "In that case . . ."
Bianca giggled, and said feebly, "I like it."
Ginny kicked off her shoes and stuck her feet into a pair of plain green flip flops, Muggle shoes, as well, and then pulled her robes on and headed for the door. "Let's go see if our new professor is at breakfast."
They scanned the head table, but no new faces were there.
"Oh well," Colin shrugged. "We'll find out in 20 minutes."
They made their way to the dungeons after breakfast, meeting up with the handful of other seventh years who had made it into N.E.W.T.s level Potions. Ginny took her seat in the second row and tugged at her skirt, which stopped around mid thigh. "How do you keep this thing down?" she hissed at Zoë who was already flirting with Gable Pyrnne.
"You just keep your knees together," Bianca advised.
Ginny settled for pulling her robes across her legs, and was so caught up in covering herself, she didn't notice when the class went silent, until she felt Bianca's elbow in her ribs. Ginny's head shot up and she saw Draco Malfoy standing at the front of the room.
"I will be your Potions instructor for this year," he said smoothly, making no introductions. "I have been instructed to inform you to address me as Professor Malfoy." He glanced around the classroom, his expression uninterested even as his eyes swept over Ginny and her indecent amount of bare leg. He gave them the standard "N.E.W.T.s are important and serious" lecture before assigning them to work in pairs on an Invisibility Potion, which was the most complicated thing Ginny had done so far.
"What is he doing here?" Bianca whispered as they measured the ground salamander tongue.
"Teaching, I guess," Ginny whispered back. She had tried catching his eye, but gave up when he didn't even show any signs of recognizing her. So much for not letting him get to me.
Luna crept around the cauldron that she was sharing with Colin and asked, "Did you know?"
Ginny shook her head quickly, hoping to avoid any questions.
"Why would you know?" Bianca demanded, accidentally spilling the rookstone weed to the floor.
From behind them, Draco cleared his throat and glanced pointedly at the mess.
"Sorry . . . Professor," Ginny told him eyeing him innocently before diving down to scoop up the rookstone.
She and Bianca finished their potion with no real disasters, and although it wasn't quite the shade of orange it
was supposed to be, Draco held up their vial and nodded curtly. "Not perfect, but acceptable."
"He is hot!" Zoë whispered, detaching herself from Gable as he took their vial to Draco.
"He's okay," Ginny shrugged, watching Gable strut to the front. "Easy on the eyes. Isn't that what you said about Harry?"
"Not him," Zoë hissed. "Professor Malfoy."
Ginny's eyes shot to her friend. "Are you serious?"
"Yes!"
"You didn't think so last year."
"Last year he was a prat!"
"Who says he's changed?"
The bell rang before they could have any further words on the subject, and Ginny scrambled to get her bag, eager to get out of the room and away from Draco, since he obviously was no longer interested in her.
"Ms. Weasley. May I have a word?" Draco's voice cut across the noise.
Ginny froze in her tracks, while Zoë made some sort of jealous noise in the back of her throat. "Go on," she hissed. "Put in a good word for me."
Draco waited until the room was empty before speaking. "Surprised to see me?"
For a moment, Ginny watching him silently, taking in the pale hair and silver eyes, and yes, the gorgeous face and matching body. "Yes."
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing. Just surprised."
"I was going to tell you on Saturday, but . . ."
"But what?" Her voice was a bit crosser than she meant for it to be.
He shrugged. "I saw Potter and he said he'd already taken you to lunch."
"So you couldn't even come say hi? Or bye?"
"I didn't want to interrupt you and your boyfriend."
Ginny frowned and then began to laugh.
"What?"
"I didn't tell you?"
"Tell me what?"
"We broke up. At the beginning of the summer."
It was Draco's turn to be surprised, although he only let it register for a second before pulling his expression to blankness again. "You did?"
She nodded. "Yeah."
A small smile curled over his lips. "You better hurry. Snape won't excuse you."
"Right. See you." She dashed out of the room and up the stairs, gasping for breath as she slid into her desk in DaDa seconds before Snape bustled into the room. She felt better already.
The week passed with surprised speed, and despite being loaded to the hilt with homework, they managed to find time to gossip. Nearly every girl in the school was talking about how gorgeous Professor Malfoy was, which Ginny found slightly amusing since no one had mentioned that the previous year; at least, they hadn't mentioned that in front of her. And everyone, males included, was talking about the change in Professor Snape. He really knew a lot of interesting and useful stuff about DaDa, and they spent most of the class period practicing it. So far, Ginny hadn't heard of anyone receiving detention from him or losing points.
"It's because You Know Who is gone," some said. "He was being controlled by him."
"It's just a ploy to catch us off guard," others insisted.
Ginny thought that although the change was unusual, it was a welcome one. This was the job Snape had wanted for years, and she considered privately, he was probably as relieved as the rest of them that Voldemort was gone.
During the week, Draco ate his meals at the high table with the rest of the staff, but on the weekend, he met her outside to have lunch. They had barely spoken to each other all week, but they had exchanged private smiles and glances, and so when Ginny and Draco sat down underneath a tree by the lake, the other students were gaping.
"What the hell?" Draco muttered, casting a dark look around.
Ginny giggled. "Well, you are our professor now."
"So?" he demanded. "I'm one bloody year older than the rest of you!"
"But now," she teased, "you have so much authority!"
"Right," he snorted. "All I got was a lecture on why I shouldn't abuse my position!"
"Since you're the professor now all the girls keep talking about you, you know."
"What do they call me?" he grunted. "Professor Death Eater?"
"Hot, dreamy, gorgeous."
For the first time ever, Ginny saw the pink tinge of blush pass over his cheeks. "Shut it!" he warned as she giggled.
When she stopped laughing, she asked, "Why did you take this job?"
He shrugged. "What else was I going to do?"
"I'm sure there are a lot of other things," she pressed. "You know, like shopping and dining out and getting your hair done and your weekly manicure -"
"What are you trying to say?"
"Nothing," she grinned at him. "Nothing at all."
Draco frowned. "I didn't know you and Potter had broken up, but let's just say that you may have had something to do with it."
"Really?" Her heart fluttered in her chest and she felt ridiculously pleased.
"Really. Now let's change the subject."
The weeks flew by, and despite the heavy studying and literal mountains of homework, mixed in with Quidditch practice in the most disgusting fall weather she had ever seen and gossip sessions with Zoë and Bianca about Ginny's non existent relationship with Draco, she managed to spend time with Draco. They hadn't progressed any further than the friends-who-spent-a-lot-of-time-together, but that was fine with Ginny. She really did simply enjoy his company. It wasn't like her short lived relationship with Dean Thomas in which they never spoke, just snogged, nor was it like her relationship with Michael Corner, in which they argued continually, or even like her too relaxed relationship with Harry.
Not that she didn't think about kissing Draco. She did, and quite often. Even though it was obvious to the other students and professors, she and Draco had agreed to some silent truce to keep themselves out of trouble with Dumbledore and out of any major gossip.
Draco helped her with her homework, continually offering to let her skive off Potions assignments.
"I have to do it. What if someone finds out?" she argued, tucking her feet underneath her as she sat hunched over her stacks of parchment. They were in the empty potions dungeon, Ginny trying to study and Draco talking incessantly.
"It's not like I keep them anyways. Besides, I only grade people on how much I like them," he smirked.
"Oh really!" she exclaimed. "In that case there better not be anyone else who gets O's on all their papers like I do!" She hadn't meant to say those words out loud, and could feel a very visible blush rushing to her cheeks.
"There's not," Draco answered, his voice lower than she was used to.
Her head shot up to find Draco's face only inches from her own. She opened her mouth to speak, to laugh, to do anything to break the heaviest silence she had ever experienced, but before she could, Draco's lips were pressed ever so lightly against her own.
She tried to enjoy the moment, tried to savor the absolute thrill of kissing Draco Malfoy and memorize the lines of burning static as they zigzagged through her body but she couldn't. All she could do was remember to kiss back. When he pulled his lips away, she was disappointed. She wanted more, wanted to wrap her arms around him and truly taste him. Without thinking, she brought her fingers to her lips, wanting to savor his touch.
He watched her with a small smile on his face and Ginny shoved her parchment aside and pulled him to her. "I need more."
Draco pulled away long enough to wave his wand at the classroom door and slam it shut. His mouth flew back to hers and she felt it open, pulling hers with it, and then the lemony sweet taste of the candy he had popped in his mouth minutes ago.
When they finally came up for air Ginny glanced at the clock on the wall. "It's almost curfew," she said softly.
Draco nodded.
She gathered her books, her fingers itching to relive all the spots Draco had kissed.
"Hey Gin?"
"Yeah?" she asked, standing to her feet.
"Will you be my date for the Costume Ball?"
The corners of her mouth curled upward. "Are teachers allowed to have student dates?"
"I already checked it out with the powers that be," he replied.
"Then yes. I'd love to."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I'm putting another spoiler in my LJ right now, so scurry over there & comment in my LJ too. I will love you forever!
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