A/N: This is the re-written Chapter Six. Enjoy!
Two days later, Ginny was back at work, scribbling her last assignment of the week, a report on the Bulstrode Ball, which by all reports, had Bombed. With a capital B. And probably a few exclamation points. Her current headline was, predictably, even for Ginny, "Bulstrode Ball Bombed!!!"
She had not been invited, which was perfectly fine with her, as the Bombing part had come in when someone had engorged the punch bowl contents to the extent that there was a giant blob of punch restrained only by the combined efforts of no less than six ex-death eaters. Their efforts allowed for most of the guests to evacuate, but one slime-ball spawn of evil decided that it was his turn to instigate some terror and mass-panic, and while no one was looking, he poked a hole in the large bubble of raspberry flavored juice, and watched with obvious glee as the thing exploded and set loose a tidal wave (and Ginny wasn't kidding; if her source was to be believed - the tidal wave was by all reports at least fifteen feet tall) which managed to wipe out the entire first floor and part of the second in Bulstrode Manor, as well as ruining thirty four heirloom ballgowns, a masterpiece painting by some 'Van Goo' fellow, and terrorize the three hundred and seventy seven guests who had actually bothered to show up.
Ginny rather wished that the ball had been less of a disaster, because it was quite a bit more work for her (although much more entertainment) watching the pensieve of her contact (she hadn't been invited, of course) as Busltrode Manor was overtaken by sticky, pink juice. Then she had to write the whole thing out, and make it seem like it was a credible story and not just a waste of space and a trule horrid example of 'Shadenfreude'.
When she glanced at the clock, after hurridly cramping her closing paragraph into an inch of parchment, she cursed violently. It was ten minutes to five - her family dinner was starting at five thirty. At the rate she was going, she wouldn't have time to change, and she hated going to her parent's house in her office clothes. She thought she looked quite nice, but her family always accused her of looking 'uppity' and said she looked like a 'scarlet woman'. Her mother usually just looked at her doubtfully and asked after a moment of stifling silence if Ginny didn't think she might settle down and have a family soon?
Ginny grumbled. As if she could juggle supporting herself, a deadbeat husband, AND some snotty children. Not that she didn't like children - oh, she liked them just fine, the swotty brats - she just didn't want any of her own, just yet.
Just as she folded up her parchment and stuffed it in the chute that would send it directly to her boss for editing, she heard a knock on her door.
"Come in," she said, entirely un-thrilled.
It was Ron.
"Hello, Ron," she said, even less happy. If he was coming to waste more of her time -
"Ginny, I need to talk to you, about Malfoy -"
- he was. "No," she said shortly, feeling peevish.
"What?" he blinked at her, his bright blue eyes strangely owlish in the dim light of her dingy office.
"No. No - no, no." She peered at him from behind her stack of files. "No?"
"But -"
"No."
"But I-"
"No?"
"I just-"
"Ah!"
"Huh?"
"Ahah!" she crowed.
He stared at her. "I forget what I wanted to say."
Ginny grinned widely, and whipped up a hard, uncomfortable chair for Ron to sit in while she finished clearing her desk of unnecessary papers and poorly written articles.
He fidgeted, drumming his hands on the armrests and making annoying noises with his tongue against his teeth. He fingered some of the knickknacks on her bookshelf, dropping a copper ball and knocking over a picture of her shaking hands with Anna Wintour, the editor of Vogue. She didn't particularly like Anna Wintour, or Vogue, as she found both to be distasteful and distant from regular people like herself, but she was a great fan of fashion and liked to tell herself that one day it would be Anna Wintour shaking her hand.
She glanced back at the shelf and noticed that Ron was getting closer to seeing the newspaper cutout of she and Malfoy dancing which she had framed and put on her shelf as a sort of joke with herself the day before. She pulled out her wand as slowly as she could without drawing attention to herself and was about to cast an illusionment charm on the photo so that he wouldn't remember what it was he'd forgotten, but Ron was too quick for her that day and grabbed it from the shelf as soon as she opened her mouth.
"You FRAMED IT?" he demanded hotly, shoving his finger at it. Her picture-self and the black and white Draco jumped apart in shock, glaring at Ron's grubby finger with loathing. Ginny groaned.
"So?"
"You FRAMED IT!"
"Yes."
"WHY -"
"No." She interrupted.
"Ginny-"
"No."
"GINNY!"
"N-"
"Don't you dare think you can get away with that twice!"
"Dammit," she said. He leaped out of his chair and made to throw the picture in the garbage beside her desk.
"Oh, no you don't!" she said, and she lunged around her desk to grab for it, but Ron was taller and simply held it over his head.
"Give it back!"
"Absolutely not!" Ron glared at her. She could see up his nose and quite honestly wanted to vomit.
"Roooon!" she whined, pretending to give up.
"Nooooo," he mocked her, still holding it high in the air.
She grinned at him with her scariest smile, showing a good portion of her teeth, and wound up her fist before sucker punching him in the groin. He doubled over, gasping, the photo frame all but forgotten in his probably incredible haze of pain, and Ginny snatched it out of his hand with a hoot of laughter. Her mother had always told her not to play dirty and go for a boy's weak spot, but Ginny rather thought that her mother underestimated the callous cruelty that sometimes nested in her daughter's body. Ginny returned to her desk and stuffed the picture in her purse, donning her light jacket and her showy and entirely useless gloves which offered no warmth at all, but looked good with her outfit. When she turned around and Ron was still clutching his nether regions and groaning on the floor, she grumbled.
"Oh, shut up," she muttered, and cast a handy pain relieving spell on him. Abruptly, he was standing and shouting at her. She put a silencio on him and carried on her way out of her office, flicking off the lights and allowing Ron to trail furiously after her, mouthing obscenities and trying furiously to speak the non verbal spell which would restore his voice to him. She hoped he'd never be able to master non verbal sorcery - he was much more fun silent.
***
Draco was in an extremely boring meeting. He sat there idly, drumming his fingers on the oak table, counting down the seconds 'till the clockchimed five, when he would be released from his hellish captivity. The meeting was a mundane discussion of which branch of the company should be sold - a completely unnecessary waste of time, since this particular company was so far beyond rescuing that in Draco's opinion, the whole thing needed to be either re-worked or shut down.
The other members would reach the best conclusion and inform him later. His presence was merely decoration. Unless the conclusion they reached was so blatantly idiotic that he could not in his good conscience allow it, he usually just sat there, pretending to give a damn. This company was a gift from his late grandfather, a business venture that Draco had no interest in and never would. He quite honestly did not care. The only reason he let it continue festering and rotting from the inside out was because there were plenty of good, hardworking employee's that depended on the income, and Draco didn't want to leave them out in the cold.
When the meeting finally dwindled to an end and he was free once more (an entire five minutes ahead of schedule), he leapt to his feet and strode out of the room before anyone could ask him his thoughts, of which he had too many to list, and most of which were rude and based on his utter loathing of the other board members.
He turned the corner and saw the youngest Weasley and her oafish excuse for a brother enter the elevator. Quickly hurrying to catch them before the doors closed, he rammed his hand between the doors and waited until they reopened to admit him. Ginny was shocked to see him, and Ron looked as red and blundering as usual, though quieter than Draco would have expected. Draco appraised him with the same silence and wondered why he was there. As far as he knew, Ron didn't have a job, unless one counted flying aimlessly around a homemade pitch and waiting for the day he would be recruited by a professional Quidditch team as a job.
"Hello Ginny," he said, smiling at her as he admired the lovely figure she made in her navy blue sailor jacket and her pretty white gloves. She had done something different with her hair today, flipping it somehow. She looked delicious, and very classy.
"Hello,"--she looked at Ron warily-- "Draco, how are you?"
"Very well, yourself?" He winked at her.
"I'm wonderful, Draco," she told him, her cinnamon eyes twinkling as she glanced at Ron and back to him. "What are you doing today? I don't often see you here."
"Oh, I was just coming home from a business meeting. A horribly boring one, too." He smiled, and glanced at Ron, who was looking green and making like he was mouthing words and choking at the same time. "Is he okay?" he asked, turning back to Ginny. She looked at her brother.
"He's fine. He just can't hold his - er, tongue."
Draco raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.
"Anyways," Ginny said, "We're just going to a family dinner. You know, one of those noisy, messy, annoyingly filling dinners with food fights and the lot."
"No, I wouldn't know. I've never been to one." He smiled again, somewhat ruefully.
"What?" she asked, truly dumbfounded. Her twinkly eyes dimmed at the thought. "Oh, dear. You've quite missed out." she told him. Draco could see her mind whirling and watched Ron turn greener and greener, mouthing frantically and reaching to grab Ginny before it was too late.
"Draco, you should come tonight. I'm sure my mother would really love to have an exra mouth to feed."
"Oh, no, I couldn't impose. You go ahead, enjoy yourself. I'm sure the elves have prepared something for me already."
"The elves? Don't you eat home cooked meals?"
"Who's to cook it? My mother? Narcissa Malfoy does not cook." He grinned again.
"Oh, Draco, you must come for dinner. You need to experience one. Truly." Draco watched her lips as she spoke, and then instantly regretted it, for they were soft and peachy and delectible on her face, small pillows of softness in a creamy complexion he just wanted to touch and run his fingers across and -
"What?" he asked, suddenly lost. Ron was shaking in the corner, with either fury or sickness Draco couldn't tell, and Ginny was looking at him soulfully with her eyes wide and her sooty, coal black eyelashes long and vibrant against her pale skin.
"So you'll come?" she smiled at him, and it was such a beautiful smile that he couldn't bear to be the cause of stopping it - he nodded, and was relieved when her smile grew even brighter, and he reached out and took her hand.
"Anything for you, my dear." He brushed his lips against her achingly soft knuckles and was gratified to see her shiver.
When the elevator stopped, the air temperature went down several degrees, and as they stepped into the quiet Atrium, he couldn't see anyone around except the poor, overworked clerk at the security desk. The two Weasley's were making their way to the floo places, but he stopped them in the middle of the hall and whipped out his wand. He saw Ron's eyes widen as the redhead yanked his wand clumsily from his own robes as well, but Draco only smirked at him and continued with what he was doing. He conjured a boquet of daisies and a pink ribbon and tied it aorund the stems, after pulling one from the bundle and handing it to Ginny. She blushed.
"Why daisies?"
"Do you know daisies have magical properties?" Draco asked her. She shook her head. "Daisies promote friendship and joy when they are given as a gift."
"Oh," she said, and then she laughed. Before Draco even knew what she was doing she was hugging him, and her soft, pillowy lips were pressed firmly against his jawbone.
He would have to give out more daisies in the future.
Ron, whom he could see over Ginny's scarlet hair, was visibly looking ill now, and Draco whispered in Ginny's ear. "Are you quite sure that your brother is alright?" She turned around in his arms (he wasn't quite willing to let go yet - he discovered that the rest of her was quite soft too) and giggled.
"Ron, I'm sorry. I forgot all about you!" She pulled her wand from her purse and waved it at him. "Finite," she said, and suddenly Ron was yelling something that sounded suspiciously like 'bucking fastard' and running full tilt towards them. Draco pushed Ginny aside and raised his fists, but Ron was much too fast, and his freckled, grubby knuckles connected with Draco's cheekbone before Draco could move.
He would need more daisies, indeed.
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