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CHAPTER 9 Changes and Chances
One morning, Ginny scurried to gather her belongings and get out of his class when he called to her.
"Ms. Weasley, may I have a word?"
She wasn't the only person who froze. Nearly the entire class knew that had had some sort of row and watched with unashamed curiosity.
"Just Ms. Weasley," he hissed. "If the rest of you are not out of this room in 5 seconds, I will dock 15 points from each person."
There was a stampeding for the door; only Ginny remained glued to her seat. She said nothing, just sat silently, staring at the desk top and waiting for him to speak.
"I sent her to the mediwitch yesterday."
Ginny didn't answer.
Draco cleared his throat. "She was going to . . . end it, but she's too far along."
Ginny still said nothing, wondering if he seriously thought he was making her feel better.
"So, it can't be mine. She's about four months pregnant, not two and a half."
She heard his footsteps, and then could see his robes as he stood at the edge of her desk.
"Could you at least look at me?"
Ginny shook her head, tears threatening to escape her eyes.
"I just . . . wanted to tell you. It's not mine."
She could hear the despair and frustration in his voice, but she just nodded and stood to her feet. But you still slept with her.
"I know what you're thinking. I'm sorry Ginny, I am."
"Me too," she whispered before leaving the room.
She heard Draco's raging voice, filling the room with explicit words, and heard the tinkling of breaking glass as she ran down the hallway.
"What did he say?" Zoë hissed as she slipped into her seat in Professor Snape's class.
Ginny shook her head and pulled out her DaDa book and wand and stared at it blankly. It would be so much easier if she could hate him; if she could direct all spare time and energy, which wasn't really much, into absolutely hating him. But she couldn't. The mere thought of him made her want to cry, and attending his class three times a week was more than torturous. It was hard to hate someone so beautiful, someone she had willingly, happily given her virginity to. It was hard to hate the first person who had ever told her `I love you', the first person she had ever felt the same way about. But if she couldn't hate him, she was hurt, and hurting was far worse. Hurting meant that she couldn't sleep or eat or put any sort of effort into homework or class or friends or-
"Ginny!"
She glanced up to see Bianca staring at her.
"You're my partner. Come on."
She looked to the front of the class, where Professor Snape watched her with narrow eyes. Behind him, on the blackboard, she could see the outline for the day's assignment. "Oh. Right."
Ginny half heartedly practiced blocking the temporary blindness curses that Bianca kept throwing at her, barely noticing when the spells hit and she could no longer see.
"Ms. Weasley," Professor Snape's voice jarred her from her thoughts. "If you do not at least attempt to be interested in today's lesson I cannot justify giving you a participation grade."
Over lunch, Zoë and Bianca demanded to know what he had said, so Ginny gave up resisting and told them.
"Did he think that would make you feel better?" Bianca asked, disgusted.
Ginny shrugged. "I don't know."
Zoë sat her fork down and swirled her pumpkin juice thoughtfully. "We need to do something fun. We need something to get our mind off of this."
"Like what?" Bianca asked, her interest roused.
"Dunno," she mused. "Give me a week or so, and I'll know."
Ginny barely heard the conversation. For her, the days passed like years and the weeks like millennia. Eating, sleeping, breathing, living, it was all becoming painfully hard. There was no peace in Draco's revelation; not even the slightest sense of relief. The aching sorrow that filled her was slowly morphing to numbness. Not feeling was only slightly less difficult than feeling acute sadness. The emptiness was so defined that Ginny secretly thought if she threw herself from the Astronomy Tower, she wouldn't feel a thing.
***
"So, what are these?" Bianca asked as Ginny emptied the contents of a large package onto Zoë's bed.
"Not sure," Ginny admitted. "Some sort of candies. Fred and George sent them. Want to know what we think."
"Are they safe?" Zoë wondered, picking up a red wrapped treat.
"I think so," she nodded. "The letter said none of the effects last for more than five minutes." As the weeks had passed, the numbness had begun to grow into a secret anger and indifference. It was Quidditch that freed her mind, but being loaded down with more homework than she could possibly do by herself didn't hurt either.
Zoë giggled. "You go first."
Ginny sorted through the pile and chose a purple wrapped candy and popped it in her mouth. Her eyes bulged as a unicorn horn sprouted from her forehead. "I wonder how much I could get for this?" she said, poking it.
Zoë began to giggled and tentatively picked up a loud pink wrapped candy. "What do you think this is?"
"Don't know. It's a variety pack they said," Ginny shrugged.
Zoë carefully licked the candy, shrugged and then put it in her mouth. "Ouch!" she shrieked as large pink wings sprouted beneath her nightshirt.
"What are you doing?" Helena and Rory Abbott asked, entering the room. "Couldn't you find anything better to do on a Friday night?"
"Like what?" Zoë demanded, making her wings flap. "Go out dancing?"
"Wouldn't that be nice?" Helena sighed, flopping down on the bed and picking up a small box. "What are these?"
"Don't know," Ginny said, tossing a yellow candy at Bianca. "My brothers sent them."
"These look like Every Flavor Beans," Helena noted, looking at the box.
"Try them," Bianca told her, carefully placing the yellow candy on her tongue and immediately sprouting feathers.
Helena stuck a small pale gray colored bean in her mouth and immediately made a face. "This tastes like . . . like . . ."
Zoë picked one up and chewed it thoughtfully. "It tastes like semen!"
"Ew!" Bianca and Rory shrieked.
"I was going to say soap," Helena retorted.
"That is so gross," Ginny made a face as her horn began to fade.
"Well, it does," Zoë shrugged. "Anyways, semen tastes like soap."
"Ew!" they shrieked.
"It does not," Bianca insisted. "You have to be lying."
"I'm not," she shook her head. "Ask anyone."
"Why are we talking about this?" Ginny pretended to gag. "Who cares what it tastes like?"
"More like laundry detergent," Helena said thoughtfully, chewing another candy.
"Laundry detergent is soap," Rory reminded her.
"And when did you taste that?" Ginny asked.
"Laundry soap or semen?" Helena giggled.
"Never mind," Ginny wrinkled her nose and stuck out her tongue. "I don't want to know."
"So look, I've got a plan," Zoë interrupted them.
"Oh yeah?" Rory perked up, now chewing on a cinnamon colored candy and spouting flames as she spoke. "What kind of plan?"
"Well," she smiled impishly, "I thought we should do something really fun for our spring holiday. It'll be four days of no classes, and I figured we should make the best of it."
"Like the mountain of homework we have?" Helena rolled her eyes.
"No. Forget about that," Zoë wiggled her eyebrows.
"What do you have in mind?" Bianca asked, brushing the feathers away from her.
"Well, my cousin told me about this new club that's in London-"
"Your cousin?" Ginny interrupted.
"My Muggle cousin. Anyways, it's right close to the Leaky Cauldron, and it's supposed to be amazing. It wouldn't be hard to make fake ID's and get in."
"What's a fake ID?" Ginny asked.
"It's what Muggles use to prove their age."
"Why?"
"Just trust me on this one. So listen. We can Floo to the Leaky Cauldron's public fireplace and walk from there. We'll meet my cousin and get trashed, and hopefully pick up some hot boys!" She sat back, triumphant.
"That sounds . . . risky," Bianca said finally.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, we can't just Floo out of here from the common room," Rory pointed out.
"No, but we can use the fireplace on the 7th floor. In the Room of Requirement. It still works."
"What about when we get back?" Bianca asked. "Flitch will kill us!"
"No, it's gonna be late when we get back. We'll just Floo into the common room."
"Where are we gonna get Floo powder?" Ginny asked.
"Well . . . you still know Professor Malfoy's password. You can borrow some of his!" Zoë smiled.
"I'm not going anywhere near him!" Ginny shook her head.
"You don't have to go near him," Helena spoke up. "Just his Floo powder."
"Come on, Gin," Zoë pressed. "It'll be so fun. Dancing, hot Muggle boys, alcohol . . ."
"Speaking of hot boys," Helena added, "I know someone who's got it bad for you Ginny."
"For me?"
"Uh huh."
"Who?"
"Gable."
"Gable?"
"Yup."
"As in the guy you threw your potion all over?"
Helena giggled. "Yes."
"I don't want anyone. I'm not interested," Ginny crossed her arms.
"Oh come on. You know he's absolutely gorgeous, and it would make Professor Malfoy bloody jealous!" Helena told her.
"I don't want to make him jealous," Ginny muttered. "I don't want to think about him."
Zoë chewed thoughtfully on a candy that was causing her hair to shimmer and swim about her head like millions of little fish. "You know, it might not be a bad idea."
Ginny rolled her eyes. "No. No way. You both fancied him and now you're trying to shove him off on me?"
"He's a good snog," Zoë shrugged. "I like this candy. Tell your brothers this is my favorite."
Ginny sighed and flopped backwards, staring at the hanging on Zoë's bed. She had skillfully avoided nearly all conversation with Draco since Valentines weekend, with the exception of his latest announcement, but that didn't mean she was over him. Not at all. She missed him so much it physically hurt her to think about it - so she tried her hardest not to think about him. Maybe someone like Gable would be good for taking her mind off him, as long as Gable didn't get the impression that he meant something to her. She watched as Helena's cat played with a wide silver string. "I dreamed about that," she said suddenly, flashes of a dream returning to her.
"About what?" Bianca asked.
"That string."
"I just got that today. It was on a letter," Helena told her. "How could you?"
"Well, I dreamed about a string that was silver. It was tying my hand . . . to Draco's. Professor Malfoy's I mean."
"When?" Rory asked, abruptly sitting up.
"A while ago," she admitted, straining to remember the dream. "On that weekend we had our row."
Rory scrambled from the bed and began to dig through her trunk. "Look, I got this for my birthday." She held up a thick brown book.
"What is it?" Bianca asked, interested.
"A dream book."
"A dream book?" Zoë rolled her eyes. "Those aren't real!"
"Not a Muggle one, a real one." Rory began to flip through the book. "It was written by Daria Clinkstaff. She was the most famous seer of the century."
"I thought that was Trelawney," Zoë giggled.
"Silver threads symbolize soul binding," she read, ignoring Zoë. "Although the thread is not physically real, when he is so inclined, Lord Morpheus can use this to symbolize what he needs to communicate in dreams, and seers have seen it in visions."
"Who is Lord Morpheus?" Bianca asked.
"I don't know," Rory shrugged. "It doesn't say."
"Soul binding?" Ginny asked skeptically. "What's that?"
"It just means that the souls are bound together. That's the way it is, no matter what happens."
"That's just great," she sighed dramatically. "My soul is bound to Professor Malfoy."
"So," Helena said after a short silence. "What happened with you two?"
Ginny shrugged. "I really don't want to talk about it."
"Right," Helena nodded shortly, and turned to Zoë. "I want to hear more about this plan."
***
Ginny finally did agree to borrow the Floo powder from Draco, and that afternoon before their spring holiday began, she waited until he came into the Great Hall for lunch, and quickly snuck down to his office, helping herself to a large quantity of the powder.
"Did you get it?" Zoë asked, as Ginny dove back into her seat at the Gryffindor table.
Ginny nodded, her heart pounding. "Why did we need so much?"
Zoë smiled mischievously. "A lot of people want to go!"
"Like who?" Bianca asked, leaning closer.
"Well, us, Helena and Rory, some of those hot boys in Slytherin," with that, she gave a quick wave and a smile at the gaggle of males watching her, "a couple of Ravenclaws, and Colin and his friends."
Ginny groaned. "We are going to get caught!"
"No we're not!" Zoë hissed. "Stop that. Think positive thoughts!"
Ginny tried, but it was near impossible. During her training with Madam Hooch, she couldn't keep her mind off Draco and the looks he had given her during his class. She had, as she usually did, tried her best to ignore him, but he seemed intent on staring her down, his eyes locked into her skin for the entire two hours.
Every question he had, he directed at her, forcing her to speak, at least indirectly, to him. His mood was still as foul as ever, awarding detentions and taking away points with no end.
At the end of class, he had told her to stay, and once again, she stared at her desk until the room was empty.
"Will you at least look at me?" he demanded, shutting the door.
Ginny forced her head up, and was greeted by the familiar stinging of tears. Draco was still so absolutely gorgeous. His pale hair hung long and messily across his silver eyes, and Ginny wanted to melt at his feet. Maybe she could forgive him. People made mistakes; they just happened. Maybe he really was sorry. Maybe they could start again, and-
"What do I have to do to prove how sorry I am?" he asked, standing in front of her.
Ginny was silent, drinking in his perfect pink lips, and wondering what kind of answer she could give him. "Nothing," she said finally. "I already know."
"Then will you forgive me? Can we put this behind us?" he asked. His face was blank and hard, but there was the slightest hint of desperation in his voice.
She wanted to give in, she really did.
But she had never, ever been hurt like this before, and she wasn't quite willing to risk going through it again. She knew what Zoë would say; Zoë would give her line after line about taking risks and love and on and on. Bianca would bite her lip and tell Ginny it was a hard choice to make. "I have to go," she whispered, grabbing her bag and dashing from the room.
"Weasley!"
Ginny nearly fell off her broom. "Yes?"
"Are you okay? You've been sitting there for three minutes. You're the Chaser!" Madam Hooch shouted.
"I don't feel good," Ginny lied, lowering her broom to the ground. "I think I'm going to be sick."
Madam Hooch eyed her suspiciously for several long, silent moments. "This wouldn't have anything to do with Professor Malfoy, would it?"
"Maybe," Ginny mumbled, looking away.
"Well, I suppose that we've done enough for one day. I expect you to be back on track Monday though!"
"I will," she promised, hurrying off to the broom shed, thankful for the uncharacteristic sympathy she'd heard in Madam Hooch's voice.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
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