Chapter One

Anything really is possible, mused Draco Malfoy as he watched the petite redhead in the small black cocktail dress tilt her head back and laugh. If the little Weasel girl can turn into an at least semi-attractive woman with actual breast, I wonder what else could happen.

He smirked to himself as his eyes lingered on her breasts.

Not bad, he admitted to himself.

At that moment Ginny Weasley turned her head and caught his eyes resting lazily on her chest. She looked down, confused, and when her head came back up she had an indignant and slightly angry look on her face. He quickly looked down at his drink and swirled it nonchalantly. After a few seconds he dared a look in her direction and saw that she was walking purposely toward him.

Shit, he thought to himself as he looked quickly away and nervously scratched the back of his head. I knew I shouldn’t have come to this stupid reunion.

“Hello, Malfoy,” Ginny said sweetly as she arrived in front of him.

He cleared his throat.

“Hello, Wease...Weasley.”

Ginny smiled tightly and Draco had a feeling she knew what he had been about to say.

“Can I ask you a question?” she said in that same sugary voice.

“Certainly.” He avoided her gaze.

“Is there anything particularly interesting... anything really entertaining about the upper part of my body?” she asked sharply.

Draco knew there was only one way to handle this. Like a true Malfoy. He would not have her intimidate him into stuttering and trying to grasp a usable excuse as to why he had been staring at her breasts.

“You have a lovely pair of breasts and I was admiring them,” he said simply. “From afar,” he added.

Her jaw dropped open and she stared at him for a few long seconds. He wasn’t sure if he had approached it correctly, but so what? She was a Weasley. He didn’t really have much regard for her. Or her breasts, for that matter.

Yet when her mouth closed and a small smile played at her lips, he was oddly relieved.

“Honesty,” she said, studying him thoughtfully. “It’s refreshing.”

“Refreshing?” he repeated, not sure what to think of this.

“Yes,” she said firmly. “Refreshing.”

“Oh. All right.”

They stood staring at each other for a few moments. Draco’s eyes swept over her small, heart-shaped face; her large, sparkling brown eyes, her small nose, peppered with dainty freckles, and her mouth, set in a small, involuntary pout.

“Well. Since that’s settled. I... uh, I’d better go back with Luna.” Ginny indicated toward a heavily pregnant blonde witch in a dark blue maternity dress who Draco recognized as Loony Lovegood.

“Right.”

“Yeah. So. Um. Enjoy your, uh, your reunion.”

“I will.”

“Great. Well... see you around.”

She flashed him a small smile before turning away and walking toward Luna.

Draco was stumped. He shook his head, trying to rid himself of the joy that had shot through him as the sight of her smile. He could not understand why it had done that to him. He took a long sip of his drink and handed it to the nearest house elf before heading away from the makeshift bar that had been set up in the Great Hall to find his best friend, Blaise Zabini. He found him leaning casually against the wall with five blonde girls clustered around him.

“Blaise,” said Draco. He meant to sound cool as usual but somehow his voice came out a bit panicked and higher than usual.

Blaise immediately understood Draco’s need to talk.

“Excuse me, ladies,” he said coolly.

“Okay,” they chorused.

Draco led Blaise out of the Great Hall and onto the steps of the building in which they had spent 7 years of their life. They sat down.

“What’s up?” asked Blaise.

Draco was silent for a moment.

“Did... did you... have you seen, erm, Ginny Weasley? I mean, today?”

“I have,” answered Blaise. “Looks great, doesn’t she? Great rack. Even greater dress. Excellent legs.”

“Yeah,” said Draco. “Well, I was kind of, looking at her, and uh, she noticed and came over and talked to me.”

“All right...” Blaise wasn’t sure why this was making Draco so fidgety and nervous. “Go on.”

“Well, we didn’t really talk for long, but then when she left she gave me this... this smile...thing and....” He sucked his breath in. “Blaise, it was... I mean... It was like seeing a naked woman. But it wasn’t a naked woman. It was just a Weasel in a short dress smiling at me. Yet it felt...”

“Like a naked woman,” Blaise filled in for him sympathetically.

“Yes! Usually I only feel happy like that when... you know...”

“Yeah.”

“And I mean... it was just... a smile... but it was... an amazing smile.”

Draco buried his head in his hands.

“What’s wrong with me? I’ve never felt the naked woman feeling from, you know, a smile. And I’ve seen plenty of smiles from attractive women... more attractive than Weasley, by the way. Well you know, I mean... look at me.”

Blaise leaned back and studied Draco.

“No... No I can’t say I understand where all those smiles come from,” Blaise said, sounding mock confused. Draco punched him in the arm and Blaise laughed.

“So what do I do?” asked Draco on a more serious note.

“About what?”

“Um, the girl Weasel, what do you think?”

“Oh.” Blaise rubbed his arm. “I don’t know. Ask her out.”

“Ask her out...” Draco repeated doubtfully. “Isn’t she involved with Potty?”

“Nah, that’s long over. It was in the tabloids.”

Draco snorted.

“You read that shit?”

“Sometimes,” said Blaise, shrugging. “You’re in there quite often, you know.”

“That’s lovely,” said Draco, rolling his eyes.

“Sure is,” agreed Blaise seriously. “Seriously, though. Ask her out. Go before some other bloke does.”

“Who would ask her out?” sneered Draco, but inside he felt slightly panicked.

Blaise smiled. He knew Draco better than Draco thought.

“Quickly,” he said. “Go. Last I heard Wood had his eye on her.”

“Wood? Oliver Wood?”

“The one and only.”

“Oh, hell no. That stupid fucking bloke with his stupid fucking accent...”

“It’s dreamy,” said Blaise languorously.

Draco glared at him.

“Not helping, Zabini.”

“Well, I apologize, Malfoy. If you really want to go out with her just go ask her. You’re acting like a twelve-year-old.”

“I am not,” huffed Draco before hurrying back into the castle.

He looked around for Ginny and spotted her standing with her brother and the ever-bushy-haired Granger next to a table of food. He then spotted Oliver Wood striding toward Ginny with his eyes fixed upon her. Draco quickly shoved his way through the crowd of attendees at the Hogwarts reunion and raced toward Ginny. Wood saw him and sped up, but Draco reached Ginny with time to spare.

“W...Weasel,” he panted, putting a hand on her shoulder.

“What are you doing with my sister?” Ron Weasley demanded indignantly, refraining from taking a bite out of the muffin he had held up next to his mouth.

“What is it, Malfoy?” Ginny asked. “Are you all right?”

“Y...yeah... Fine...” Draco could see Wood nearing. “Weasley, listen. Go out with me?”

“What?”

“Tomorrow night. Dinner.”

She stared at him.

“What do you say?” he said, staring right back into her eyes.

“No!” Ron answered for her. “Obviously! What are you thinking, Malfoy? Of course she wouldn’t, that just wouldn’t be...”

“Okay,” said Ginny abruptly.

“Yes, it wouldn’t be okay, and I think that you, Ferret boy, should...”

“No, Ron. I mean...Okay. I’ll go,” Ginny interrupted, still staring into Draco’s eyes.

“Great,” said Draco, feeling triumphant.

A painful silence ensued. Ginny looked slightly dazed, and Hermione Granger as if she was trying to suppress a laugh. Ron was biting viciously into his muffin while taking turns in glaring at Draco and Ginny.

“Well... I was just about to leave,” said Draco finally as Oliver Wood was almost by them. “Give me your address and I’ll pick you up tomorrow at eight.”

“Oh... all right.” Ginny conjoured a piece of paper and a quill and wrote her flat and street number on it. She handed it to him and he stuck it in his pocket.

“Thanks. Well I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“Yeah.”

Their eyes were still connected as Wood approached Ginny.

“Ginny...” he said breathlessly. “Hi. How are you?”

“Fine,” she said without taking her eyes off of Draco’s.

Draco smirked and turned away, happy with how he had left the situation and convinced that Wood would leave the reunion empty handed.

Chapter Two

The next evening it was seven forty-five and Ginny had not yet selected what she was going to wear. She was currently only wearing a short T-shirt and a pair of boyshorts.

“Fuck,” she muttered as she dug her way through the heaps of clothes on her bed. She held up a lowcut, fuchsia shirt and, after two seconds’ consideration, cast it aside. She suddenly spotted a bit of white sticking out from her mass of colorful clothes and seized it, pulling it out. It was a floaty, cotton summer dress with thin straps. She held it up to herself. It just covered her knees and accentuated all the right curves. Perfect, she thought. She quickly changed from her casual underwear to a lacy white bra and matching underwear, just in case. She then pulled the dress over her head and smoothed it out as she studied herself in the full length mirror in front of her. The dress looked great on her and felt even greater in the hot July weather.

“Right,” she mumbled as she searched for her wand. She found it lying on her dresser under a green tube top and grabbed it. Quickly she performed a few spells on her hair and soon it floated down her back in carelessly beautiful copper curls. In record time, she cast her wand aside, raced into the bathroom, and made up her face.

By five to eight she was sitting restlessly on her couch, wearing a pair of high heeled sandals and clutching her favorite purse. She was incredibly nervous, yet did not really know why. She was just going out with Malfoy. No big deal. He had never mattered to her during her time at Hogwarts, apart from a few nasty pranks they had played on each other preceding Voldemort’s death and the ultimate merge of Gryffindors and Slytherins. Draco and Harry had never quite made odds, but so what? She and Harry were long done. He had made sure of that when he slept with her supposed best friend. It didn’t matter what Harry thought. Did it?

Ginny couldn’t stand sitting in silence, waiting, with all of her thoughts bouncing around in her head. She grabbed the nearest readable item (a Daily Prophet from a few days ago) and begin to scan it.

POTTER INDUCTED INTO WIZARD HALL OF FAME, read one of the bold headlines. WIZENGAMOT REACHES DECISION ON LESTRANGE CASE, read another. Almost all the articles were still going on about the aftermath of the war. Ginny couldn’t concentrate on anything in the paper, so she cast it aside and checked her watch. Hmm. 8:02. She had guessed he wouldn’t be perfectly punctual. Sighing, she pulled her legs up on the chair and crossed them. She closed her eyes and attempted to calm herself down. No big deal. No big deal. No big deal.

The doorbell rang.

Her eyes flew open. BIG DEAL, screamed her heart as it began racing. Ginny stood up hastily and almost fell over as her legs got caught up in each other. She steadied herself, took a deep breath, and walked to the door of her apartment. Peeking through the looking hole, she saw Malfoy standing outside, the small hole making his head seem comically large compared to the rest of his body. He looked good. Merlin, he looked good. Ginny closed her eyes quickly and looked back out at him. He was now studying his shoes. Was that a bad sign? With one last deep breath, Ginny opened the door. Malfoy looked up at her as the door swung open.

“Hi,” she said, putting one hand on her hip. It felt unnatural so she took it off and let it hang limply at her side instead.

“Hello,” said Malfoy with a small smile as he looked her up and down. She hoped he thought she looked as good as she thought he looked.

“Um, come on in,” she said. “I just need to grab my purse quickly.”

“All right.”

She stepped back and let him enter her apartment.

“Sit down,” she offered, gesturing toward the cream colored couch in the living room.

He took a seat, setting one ankle on the knee of his other leg and looking up at her expectantly as she stood there.

“Oh... um, I’ll be right back,” said Ginny.

“That’s fine,” said Malfoy calmly. Merlin, why was he so calm?

Ginny shuffled out of the living room and into her bedroom. She sank down onto her bed and held her head in her hands. She could not, for the love of Merlin, understand why she was acting this way. She was usually an extremely outgoing person; she was never afraid to speak her mind and she had dated various men with more power and good looks than Draco. Why was she so meek when she was around him? She hated when girls acted like she was acting at the moment. What if he fell in love with this version of her? It wasn’t truly her. She couldn’t let that happen.

Determined to be herself and not feel intimidated by the tall blonde sitting in her living room, she stormed out of her room and back into the main part of her flat.

*~

Malfoy had mixed feelings about how the date was going so far. He was impressed with how beautiful Ginny looked in her white dress, with her hair falling in curls around her face. He was, however, disappointed with her lack of conversation. He had always heard about how smart and opinionated she was, not only from fellow students while he was at Hogwarts, but from colleagues at the Ministry and the gossip magazines at Blaine’s flat which Malfoy occasionally read in private. Most of the women that Draco dated were gorgeous, but couldn’t string a plausible sentence together to save their lives (unless they were discussing fashion, how they looked, or the bitch that had copied their shoes at work last Tuesday). He had been extremely curious to see how he would react to a woman with an actual opinion on things. So far, though, she hadn’t said five words to him. He uncrossed his legs. Maybe he was being stupid. Their date had, after all, just begun. She could just be nervous. Yeah, that was probably it. He could understand that, considering his good looks.

Draco laughed out loud at himself. He was being really silly. Had he expected her to pummel him with her view on Rufus Scrimgeurs’ new law on house-elves as soon as he walked in the doorway? No, no. This date had just begun, and it was going to get even better, he thought to himself confidently.

“Hey again.” Ginny appeared in the doorway. “I forgot– my purse was in here all along!”

She smiled at him and then walked to where he was sitting. She picked up the suave bag lying on the sofa next to Draco and swung it onto her shoulder. Draco stood up.

“So. You ready?” she asked. She was much shorter than him, he noted, as she smiled up at him.

“Yeah. Yeah, let’s go,” said Draco. He could sense that there was a change in her since she had returned from looking for her purse. She was less shy, more confident.

“How are we getting there?” she asked interestedly.

“Side-apparation, I thought,” he replied.

“Oh, all right.”

“Right. Well then.” He placed a hand on her basically bare shoulder and felt tingles in his stomach before he apparated them to Le Broux, the fancy restaurant in the heart of Diagon Alley. The restaurant was brightly illuminated by torches on the walls and the place exuded prestige.

“Mister Malfoy, how pleasant to see you again.” A middle-aged male waiter with dark, slicked back hair and a rather snooty air about him greeted Draco with a tight-lipped smile.

“Thank you, Francis.”

“May I show you to your seats?”

“Certainly.”

Francis led them to a small round table at the back of the restaurant. He pulled the chair out for Ginny and handed them menus.

“Whenever you’re ready,” he said and left.

Draco opened his menu and started scanning the list of foods. He was just debating whether he should order the salmon, as he usually did, or go out on a limb and try the pork when he heard a small giggle. He looked up from his menu to see Ginny trying hard not to laugh.

“What?” he said. He was utterly confused.

“N-nothing,” she giggled. “It’s just....”

“What?!”

“No... no, nothing. Nevermind.” She opened her menu and fixated her eyes upon it, a smile still fixed on her face. Draco shook his head and looked back down at his menu. After a few minutes Francis returned to take their orders.

“Yes, I’ll have the cooked salmon with potatoes and green beans on the side please. Lemon sauce and pepper on the salmon, and creme fraische on the potatoes. Pinot Noir to drink.”

Ginny, apparently, thought this was very funny, for a few moments later she was laughing out loud. It was quite a pleasant laugh, tinkering and gentle, yet Draco felt immensely annoyed by it at the moment.

“Would you tell me what the bloody hell is so funny?” he demanded, leaning forward over the table.

Ginny could not speak for laughter. The occupants of the tables surrounding theirs turned to stare at her, yet she did not seem to care. Once she had calmed down she breathlessly ordered the sautéed chicken breast and ice tea. Francis gave her a disapproving look before leaving their table with their menus. As soon as he was gone Ginny relapsed into her wild giggles.

“Tell me what’s funny, and tell me now,” Draco said through clenched teeth.

“W-well... um,” Ginny began after her laughter had died down. “It’s just... I have this really good friend, her name is Penelope, and I believe you’ve taken her out for dinner before. She, uh, predicted what would happen on our, er, date, and... well... everything she’s said you would do... you’ve done.”

“What? Like what?”

“The restaurant. The table. The food. Even the waiter is the same. Is dating, like, a routine for you?” she asked. She was more serious now.

“Well... well, no,” he said. He was very taken aback. “I mean, I date a lot.” He smirked to himself, noting how he could always subtly complement himself in every conversation. “It’s not that fun coming up with, you know, different stuff to do all the time. I mean, if I’m really into someone I’ll take them some place else for another date, but I think this is fine for the first date.”

“Right,” she said tonelessly.

“It’s the most expensive restaurant in Diagon Alley,” he added.

“I see.” Was he imagining things or did she sound a bit frosty? “So, you just take out any woman who crosses your path?” All right, now he was sure she was pissed.

“Well, no, I mean... I’m a Malfoy. We have standards.”

“Right. Well, I’m a Weasley, and we do too.”

She scraped her chair back, grabbed her purse, and stood up.

“Have a lovely dinner,” she said, and left.

Chapter Three


That Monday, at work, Draco could think of nothing but Ginny Weasley. He sat primly behind his desk and absentmindedly adjusted the curtains in the window using his wand. He could not, for the love of Merlin, understand what her problem was. He had taken her out for a nice dinner at a nice restaurant. So what if this was what he did for all of his first dates? It was not bloody cheap to eat there, couldn’t she just appreciate that, eat her food, and go home with him for a nice shag?

Deciding he could no longer sit in his office and obsess about Ginny, Malfoy let his secretary know he was leaving and apparated to the Ministry. He took the lift up to the sixth level and strode purposefully toward Blaise’s office in the Floo Network Authority Department. He did not even bother consulting Blaise’s secretary before banging the door to Blaise’s office open and grittily announcing, “She left in the middle of the date because I took her friend to the same restaurant.”

Blaise looked up from the paperwork he was doing.

“What in the world are you talking about?” he asked.

“Weasley,” answered Draco, taking a seat opposite Blaise at his desk. “Ginny bloody Weasley. I take her to the poshest restaurant in all of London and she leaves, telling me that Weasleys have standards and she won’t put up with going on the same first date as all my other women.”

“All your other women?” Blaise raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I hope you didn’t phrase it like that.”

“No I did not! I was a perfect gentleman and I got her the best table in the entire restaurant- and all she can do is bitch about it and embarrass me in front of everyone there! Who the hell does she think she is? She can’t do that to me!”

Blaise smirked.

“Well, well, well. It looks like Draco Malfoy, breaker of hearts and taker of virginities, has met his match.”

“W-what? My match?” sputtered Draco. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

“I am not,” Blaise answered patiently.

“Ha! My match! As if,” sneered Draco. “A self-righteous little tart who talks about me behind my back to girls named Penelope who I might or might not have shagged in the past....”

“Wait, wait. You shagged her friend?”

“Might’ve.”

Blaise groaned quietly.

“Draco,” he said in a pained voice. “You are my best friend, but you are being really, really thick at the moment and basically a total arse.”

“An arse?” Draco repeated indignantly. “I am not!”

“Admit it,” said Blaise. “You want her.”

“I’d want to shag her sometime,” Draco replied with a sneer. “That’s as far as my want for the little weasel goes.”

“Really? So you wouldn’t mind if I took her out, say, tomorrow night?”

“You wouldn’t dare....”

“No, I wouldn’t. But someone else will. So hurry up and make up your mind about her, or it’ll be too late. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a meeting with Smith that I can’t miss. He’s after my job and he’s more than willing to tell my boss if I’m in any way shape or form late for it. I’ll Floo in later, yeah?”

“All right,” Draco agreed unenthusiastically.

He left Blaise’s office and wandered aimlessly around the Ministry for a while. As he was passing through the Department of Magical Games and Sports, he spotted a head of fiery red hair sticking out from the rest of the crowded hall. Draco suddenly had the fabulously ridiculous idea of consulting Ginny’s brother for advice.

“Hey...Hey Weasley! WEASLEY!”

Ron Weasley turned around abruptly. When he saw Draco waving at him his eyes narrowed. Draco indicated for him to come over to where he was standing, and Ron reluctantly did so.

“What do you want, Malfoy?” he asked shortly.

“You work here?” said Draco, trying his best to be polite in order to loosen Ron up for some serious conversation about how Draco could win Ron's sister back.

“Yes,” said Ron after a moment. He was still glaring pointedly at Draco.

“Really. What do you work with?”

Ron’s face turned slightly pink and he mumbled something indistinguishable.

“What’s that?”

“The Official Gobstones Club! I’m president of the Official Gobstones Club!” shouted Ron, causing several people walking by to look over at him.

“No need for the raising of the voice,” Draco said silkily, smirking at Ron’s odd career choice.

“That’s it. Go ahead and shag my only sister, what do I care-- this does not, however, entitle you to the pleasure of my company or the ridiculing of my job, which, by the way, is a highly sought after position!”

“I do not seek the pleasure of your company,” Draco said in a bored voice. “Nor did I say one word ridiculing your job.”

Ron mulled this over, thinking back on their conversation.

“So... so what do you want, then?” he asked suspiciously.

“I would like to know what I did to offend your sister and then possibly fix it.”

Ron’s eyes widened.

“What did you do to her?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea!” answered Malfoy. “I took her out for dinner and she got upset because I didn’t think of a completely new dinner-plan and left me during the middle of dinner!”

Ron’s face was blank for a few seconds, then his face split into a wide smile.

“You mucked it up with my sister,” he said joyously.

“No,” said Draco quickly.

“Yes, you did! Now you don’t get to shag her and I can finally get some sleep tonight!” Ron sounded giddy. “Oh, thank Merlin that you’re such a bumbling idiot around women.”

“I will have you know that I am perfectly well educated when it comes to women,” Draco interrupted indignantly. “I have shagged more women than... than all the socks you own put together.”

Ron stopped laughing and contemplated this.

“Are we talking single socks or pairs?” he asked.

“It doesn’t bloody matter, Weasley. The point is...” Draco sighed. “The point is, I would really like to get to know your sister and I’m afraid I might have missed that opportunity. Would you please just explain to me what I need to do to get on her good side again?”

Ron was silent for a few moments.

“When you say ‘get to know’ her,” he said finally. “Do you mean ‘get in her knickers’?”

“Do you really think that if I was going by sexuality here I would pick your sister?”

“Hey! My sister is a very attractive woman!” Ron said loudly. This earned him more stares from passersby.

“I’m not disagreeing with you,” said Malfoy calmly. “Come on, Weasley. I know you and I don’t always get along, but the war is over and I could make your sister happy. What do you say? I’ll take you to dinner.”

“Are you asking me out on a date?” asked Ron, raising an eyebrow.

“Shut up. You know what I mean. You can bring Granger too, if that helps keep your homophobia at bay.”

“All right,” agreed Ron after a few seconds. “But I’m definitely bringing Hermione then. She knows more about all that feelings crap than I do anyway. And you are paying for both of our meals.”

“Right.”

“And I am not discussing anything other than my little sister.”

“Yes.”

“Oh, and if I do this, and you two start dating again, you have to promise me you won’t shag her for at least six weeks.”

“Six weeks?!”

“Six weeks.”

“That’s an awful long time...”

“Do you want my help or not?”

“Well... all right.”

“So we are agreed then? No hanky-panky until a month and a half have passed?”

Malfoy groaned.

“Fine. No hanky-panky.”

“Super. So, what’s for dinner?”

Chapter Four



Hermione could not imagine a more awkward situation.

She, Ron, and Draco Malfoy were seated around a small round table at the Leaky Cauldron, waiting in silence for their meals. Ron was studying Malfoy’s pale, slicked back hair with a good amount of fascination. Malfoy did not notice this. He was slouching in his chair with his arms crossed and a slightly bored look on his face as he avoided looking at his dinner partners. Hermione had a feeling it was more lack of what to say than displeasure at the company he was in that drew forth that haughty look on Malfoy’s face. After all, according to what Ron had told her, Malfoy had been the one to suggest dinner.

“As much as I hate to break the silence,” Hermione said, clearing her throat. “I need to ask you something, Malfoy.”

He turned his head to look at her with the same cool expression on his face.

“Yes?”

Hermione leaned forward a bit over the table.

“Did you really shag Blaise Zabini’s mother while you were at Blaise’s for Christmas?”

Ron and Malfoy both stared at Hermione with shocked looks on their faces.

“Did I... if I... are you serious?” asked Malfoy.

Hermione shrugged and nodded.

“It was just something I heard around the office,” she said.

“Who I shag,” Malfoy said importantly, “and when I do it, is none of your business, Granger.”

Ron opened his mouth furiously at the tone of Malfoy’s voice but Hermione smoothly intervened.

“It certainly is my business, if you’re going to charm my sister-in-law.”

She had a smile fixed upon her face but Draco could sense she meant business.

“Can we please just change the subject?” he asked. “I’m here to talk about Ginny, not my past shags.”

“So you DID shag her!” Hermione said triumphantly.

“I did no such thing!”

“Hermione,” Ron interrupted, “I’m going to go with Malfoy on this one. Let’s change the subject.”

They both turned to stare at him.

“What?” he said. “I don’t want to know where his...” he paused delicately and glared at Draco’s crotch, “... hands... have been.”

Hermione shook her head.

“Okay. Fine. Let’s change the subject.”

“Cheers,” said Ron, raising his Firewhisky in the air above him briefly before downing half of it in one swig.

“So. Malfoy.” Hermione turned to look at him.

“Draco.”

“No, I’m Hermione.”

“No, I mean, you can call me Draco.”

“Oh.” Hermione looked startled by this. “Well, all right, then. Draco. Tell me what happened, and start at the very beginning.”

Draco sighed and described his woeful date to Ron and Hermione, starting from when he rang her doorbell to having to finish his dinner by himself, humiliated. (Ron interrupted him at this point to ask why he hadn’t just left the restaurant and spared himself the embarrassment of eating alone. “Have YOU ever walked out on fish worth a week’s salary?” Draco replied snarkily.) At first he felt self-conscious and uncomfortable, but he relaxed after a while. Ron and Hermione were very good listeners – well, Hermione was. Ron kept interrupting and snorting in what he apparently thought was an admirably condescending sort of way, but which, in reality, sounded like he had something large and wet stuck up his nose.

Hermione had waited patiently as Draco had been telling them his story, but as soon as he finished, she shut her eyes, smiled, and uttered a small, “Oh, Malfoy.”

“What?” asked Draco.

“You really do need my help,” Hermione replied, opening her eyes again.

“Our help,” Ron corrected her with his mouth full of bread.

“What did I do?!”

“What you need to remember, erm, Draco...” Hermione did not seem accustomed to calling him by his first name. “Is that when you take a girl out, she expects you to make her feel special. If you take her out on the same date as you have for dozens of other women, she’ll feel like just another one of your shags. Is she just another one of your shags?”

“Well... well, no. I mean... I’ve never... she’s the first girl that I’ve... er...” Draco wanted to say ‘obsessed about’, as this was the truth, but he felt Ron might not take it very well, so he finished with, “thought about... a lot... after a date.”

“Because she didn’t go home with you,” Hermione finished for him, nodding slightly. “You’re used to taking any woman you like out and then doing whatever you please with her afterward. Then you send her home, promising you’ll take her out the following night, while in reality never bothering to speak to her again.”

Draco was very surprised that she knew all this about him. She didn’t seem to register his slight shock as she steamrolled on.

“So, you take an attractive woman out, and you expect the same from her as every woman. She refuses you. It’s very understandable that you would obsess over this. It must be a huge blow to your ego.”

Draco gaped at her.

“How do you...”

“Oh, it’s common knowledge.” Hermione dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “You, my friend, fit exactly into a certain stereotype.”

“A stereotype of what, if I may ask?”

“A... what should I call it...” Hermione seemed to think for a few moments. “I’ll just call it a Casanova for now, for lack of a better word.”

Ron spit out his bread.

“A Casanova?” he asked in alarm. “But that’s a flesh-eating plant, isn’t it?”

“No... no, last time I checked it wasn’t,” Hermione answered, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Oh.” Ron went back to eating.

“If it’s not a flesh-eating plant, then what is it?” asked Draco.

“Let’s just say you... you, erm, get around a lot.”

“Get around?”

“You’re a flirt. But worse than a flirt, because you use women sexually and leave them crushed.”

“I wouldn’t say crushed,” Malfoy interrupted. “Half of the women I’ve shagged don’t have enough brain capacity to comprehend that they’ve been used.”

Hermione rolled her eyes.

“Well, Ginny certainly is not that kind of girl.”

“I know that!” Draco replied hotly.

Hermione smirked at the defensive tone in his voice.

“Of course you do. Which is why you probably understand that Ginny will not be willing to have anything to do with you, romantically, without some real time and effort on your part. Are you willing to commit to it?”

Draco considered this. He had never gone out of his way to take a woman out before. Usually they were the ones pleading for his time of the day. Why should he put effort into taking this woman, who was not really special in any kind of obvious way, out again, when he could easily take a more beautiful woman out without any form of effort on his part?

Then her large, sparkling brown eyes seemed to appear before them, framed by delicate, dark lashes. He imagined her seated across from him at a dinner table, laughing at something funny he had just said; her sitting on his lap in front of a cozy fireplace, resting her head on his chest; her holding his hand in public with a proud, brazen look on her face; her standing in his bedroom, wrapped in his bed sheets with her hair a mess; her standing beside him in a white dress, promising to be his forever...

His head snapped up.

“I am willing,” he said. “I will do whatever it takes to get her back. You just tell me what to do, and I’ll do that.” Deciding it wouldn’t hurt, he added, “Please.”

Hermione smiled.

“Exactly the kind of attitude we’re going to need,” she said. “Now, here’s what you need to do....”

Chapter Five


Ginny Weasley was in a bad mood.

She had just returned to her building after a long day of work to the realization that her wand was buried underneath a huge pile of rubbish in her purse. She did not want to go through the trouble of searching for it now, but, as the door to her building was locked and she had long abandoned the idea of carrying keys around with her, she had no choice. Setting down the huge cardboard box filled with potted plants that her boss had asked her to take care of over the weekend, as he would be on vacation in Croatia, Ginny began rummaging through her purse.

She did not notice the small flash of silver near her, nor the tiny potted flower that was dropped into the cardboard box. After a few moments, she managed to pry her wand out from between a self-help book (“Am I Addicted to Wizards and What Can I Do About It?”) and a half-empty box of chocolate drops from Honeydukes. Triumphantly, she unlocked the door and unsteadily held it open with her ankle as she leaned forward to grab hold of the cardboard box again. She went inside and took the lift up to the third floor.

As she unlocked the door to her flat and shuffled into the dark front hall, she suddenly wondered why she hadn’t simply Apparated into her flat. Shaking her head at her own stupidity, she put down the box of plants down, closed the door, and turned on the light. It illuminated her cozy flat and she smiled, glad to be home at last. She cast the plants a scathing look and, ignoring her boss’s instructions to put them in a place easily accessible to sunlight and water them straightaway, she went into her bedroom and changed from her work robes into her softest pair of flannel pajamas. She fed her obese cat, Nancy, and put some popcorn on the stove. On her way into the living room, she caught sight of the cardboard box and decided to put the plants up and get it over with.

She hauled the box into the kitchen (Nancy looked petrified and ran to hide under a chair) and set each individual plant onto the windowsill, her mind wandering to Draco Malfoy and his goddamn unoriginality. She had been thinking about their date and her dramatic exit from it for the past couple of days, and she could not decide whether or not she had done the right thing. Of course, it was a slap in the face that she was treated like all of his previous women (and future women, she thought darkly), but had leaving the restaurant and publicly embarrassing him been rational? Good Ginny was appalled at what she had done and wondered if she should send him a letter apologizing for her behavior. Bad Ginny, also known as Alfonsa, Ginny’s delightfully horrible alter ego, advised against this, reminding Ginny gleefully of how she was no one special with this man, and poking fun at her for even thinking that this could go somewhere. ‘What if he fell in love with this version of her?’ Draco Malfoy? Love?

Ginny had to give it to Alfonsa. She had been stupid to have those thoughts. Draco Malfoy was nice to look at, and charming in his own way, but he was definitely not relationship material. At least Ginny hadn’t put out for him like poor Penelope, and had managed to leave in a slightly dignified, if not plain cool, exit.

Once she was finished, she set the box back into the hall, took her popcorn into the living room, and settled herself onto her couch with a romance novel. She had barely reached the part where Sir Edward Caden, the handsome and charmingly rude wizard living in Scotland by himself, had seduced Helena, the poor Squib working for him, when there was a slight pop and Hermione was standing next to her.

“Oh, hi, Hermione,” said Ginny, sitting up. She was slightly startled by this unexpected visit.

“What are you doing here?”

“Um… I, uh… I live here.”

“No, no…” Hermione waved her hand impatiently. “Why aren’t you on your date?”

“I wasn’t…really… aware that I had a date,” said Ginny, more than a little confused by now.

“You mean… you didn’t see… Ah.” Hermione sat down at Ginny’s feet, shaking her head. “I told him… not obvious enough…”

“You told who? What’s not obvious enough?”

“Never mind. Get up.”

“What?”

“Get up. Get dressed. Look nice—but put something Muggle-ish on. You have five minutes.”

“Are you joking? Is this a joke?”

“No, just go get dressed,” said Hermione, standing up.

“I will not!” Ginny stood up as well, crossing her arms. “I’ve been working all day and now I’m tired and I just want to eat my Muggle food and read my book!”

Hermione glanced at the cover of Ginny’s novel, which featured a very suggestive illustration of a tall, handsome man and a beautiful Indian woman, and raised her eyebrows.

“Oh, fine!” Ginny muttered. She went to her room and slipped her pajamas off. “I’m not dressing up, though!” she shouted, for Hermione’s benefit, and quickly pulled on her most ragged pair of jeans, with a lot of very noticeable holes in odd places, and a worn T-shirt she had purchased a few years ago at the Quidditch World Cup. Her hair was still up in a large, messy bun at the top of her head and she did not bother doing anything else with it.

Feeling smug, she exited her bedroom and posed jauntily for Hermione.

“Don’t I look gorgeous?” she asked sarcastically, blowing her a kiss.

Hermione crinkled her nose.

“What’s with the jeans?” she asked.

“What?” Ginny asked defensively, even though she hadn’t been going for compliments on her interesting wardrobe choice. “These are my favorite jeans. I’ve had them since I was sixteen.”

Hermione snorted.

“Don’t snort at me,” said Ginny hotly. “You might have forgotten this, seeing as both you and my dim-witted brother get big paychecks every month, but I do not come from a very rich family. We learned to keep things that we can reuse, even if it is frowned upon by some people.”

“Yes, well,” sniffed Hermione. “Not all of us can still fit into the clothes we wore when we were sixteen.”

Ginny understood where Hermione, who was fourteen weeks pregnant, was coming from and reached over to give her a quick hug.

“I’d rather be loved than skinny,” she murmured, patting Hermione’s small baby bump.

“Are you calling me fat?!” Hermione demanded, pulling away.

“No,” replied Ginny quickly. “Of course not. You’re ravishing, Hermione, especially for being…”

“You were better off without the ‘especially’ part,” interrupted Hermione, rolling her eyes. “Now get some shoes on and let’s go.”

Ginny quickly stepped into a pair of beaten Birkenstocks and beamed up at Hermione.

“Are you trying to look like a hobo?” Hermione asked pointedly.

Ginny opened her mouth to reply, but Hermione had already grabbed a hold of her hand and they were swirling away in apparition. She closed her mouth, and then her eyes, and allowed herself to be transported from her apartment to…

Chapter Six


Ginny opened her eyes.

Okay, what the hell.

She turned to ask Hermione why she was standing in the middle of a forest with nothing but trees in sight, but Hermione gave her a quick grin, said, “Have fun!” and Disapparated.

Ginny looked around uncertainly and folded her arms to keep herself warm as an unusually chilly gust of wind passed her by. She stood this way for a minute or two, during which she started to have serious doubts concerning Hermione’s sanity. Just as she was getting ready to Apparate back to her flat, she heard a rustle in the bushes next to her and twirled to face it, whipping her wand out, just as Draco Malfoy stepped out of the bush.

Ginny lowered her wand.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, her voice mingled with surprise and distaste.

“I’m… I’m here to take you on a date,” he answered, slightly lamely and very un-Malfoy-ishly.

“You?” she asked, shocked. “You’re here to take me… on a date? But… all right, I think there’s been some sort of mix-up… I mean, Hermione took me here…”

“She did? Ah, I should have listened to her. Not obvious enough…” Draco muttered to himself.

“What… what? What am I doing here?” Ginny asked.

“I… I wanted to take you out. On a date.”

“You already took me out on a date. It was pathetic.”

“Pathetic? Oh, please.” Draco seemed to be regaining his Malfoy-ishness. “That was the nicest restaurant you’ve ever eaten at, don’t lie.”

“The nicest restaurant I’VE ever eaten at? Is that supposed to be a crack at my family and how much money we have?” Ginny demanded furiously.

“No! It wasn’t! I swear,” said Draco quickly. “I’m just saying… it was a very nice restaurant. It’s my favorite restaurant, you know.”

Ginny stared at him.

“That snooty, derivative, perversely clean place, which charges you far too much for a simple meal? That’s your favorite restaurant?”

“Yes, it is,” replied Draco huffily, “and I happen to find it quite adequate for first dates.”

“All right, we are not going to get into this again, and I am most certainly not going to go out on another one of your stupid, clichéd dates again. Take me home. Now.”

She folded her arms again, looking away with what she imagined to be an impressively haughty air.

“Careful, if it rains, you’ll drown,” said Draco nastily, referring to how high up in the air Ginny’s freckled nose was.

Ginny glared at him.

“Right. Sorry, that just slipped out,” Draco said apologetically. “Just… I’m sorry… I’m sorry about taking you out like all my other women.”

“All your other women…?” she started, enraged, but Draco didn’t let her finish.

“I know I’m not an angel. I’ve taken a lot of women out, and treated them like they were worthless, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry that you thought you were like every other woman I’ve ever taken out, like you were just a person in the crowd… because you’re not, all right? I’ve been thinking about you ever since you walked out on me, and you were right, I needed a straightening out. So, I’m sorry, all right? I’m sorry. You’re not like everyone else. You’re not. And I’m sorry that I made you feel like you were. But I thought that you were a rightly decent person, and wouldn’t a decent person give a bloke a second chance? Also, you should know that I’ve probably fit more 'I’m sorry’s' into that sentence than I have otherwise uttered throughout my entire lifetime. So… please. Please go out with me. I have something really good planned to make up for that bad first date. Go out with me. Do me the honor. Please?”

Ginny studied him, astonished. It was eerily quiet for a few moments. Then…

“You’re serious?” she asked. Her voice was a bit hoarse. She cleared it and blushed slightly.

“Dead serious,” he replied. After a moment’s hesitation, he reached his hand out for her. “Please?”

She stared him for a few seconds, and then a resolute look appeared on her delicate face.

“Promise this isn’t a joke, and that you have actually changed, and that you won’t treat me shitty, like all your other women?”

She said the last four words in a slightly mocking tone and he had to stop himself from smiling.

“I promise,” he said.

“Okay.”

She took his hand.

Draco looked at their hands in disbelief and then back up at her. She offered him a small smile and he returned it and started leading her through the trees. He kept looking back at her. She was wearing a pair of incredibly worn out jeans and a T-shirt which was loose but nicely accentuated the perfect curves of her upper body. Normally, he found this sort of scruffiness a turn-off (he usually liked his women dolled up and ready to go), but he did not mind it at all and couldn’t help but notice how good she looked, even without trying.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“You’ll see,” he answered. He liked how tightly her little fingers were gripping the side of his hand.

After a few minutes of walking, they reached a clearing in the trees. The setting sun cast gleaming orange rays on the grass growing symmetrically on the ground. A large, beige blanket was spread out on the grass and there was a picnic basket set out on a corner of the blanket.

Ginny stared at the sight of it.

“Do you like it?” Draco asked.

“You—yes, yes I do. You set up a picnic?” she asked, looking back and forth from him to the blanket. “But… I love picnics.”

“I know,” he said, leading her to the blanket. She let go of his hand and sat down, looking up at him.

“How did you…?”

“I have connections,” he smirked, sitting down opposite her, next to the basket, and plucking food from inside the blanket to sit in front of them.

“Have you been stalking me?” she teased, giving him a suspicious look.

“Maybe,” he said shortly, a small smirk playing at his thin lips. “Chicken sandwich?”

He held a wrapped sandwich up and she grabbed it, her eyes widening.

“I love chicken sandwiches!” she said. “And I’m starving!”

She unwrapped it and bit hungrily into it. As the mix of chicken, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, black olives, mayonnaise, and whole-wheat bread filled her mouth, she closed her eyes and happily munched on her food. After she swallowed, she opened her eyes to find Draco staring at her.

“What?” she said.

“That… was probably the biggest bite I have ever seen anyone take,” he said, giving her a weird look.

“So what? I love these sandwiches! Did you get them from that little place in Diagon Alley? And how did you know how I liked my sandwiches?”

“You said it yourself,” he said in a serious voice, his face completely straight. “I’ve been stalking you.”

Ginny, who had taken another enormous bite of her sandwich, discontinued her vigorous chewing for a few moments to return the weird look he had given her a moment earlier. He did it back, this time stranger than ever. She challenged this with an even odder look. Draco, never being one to step down from a challenge, mustered the weirdest look possible and flashed it at her.

Ginny choked on her food as she began laughing. She swallowed it hastily and kept on laughing, her giggle loud, unapologetic, and really, really cute, he realized as he watched her laugh with a smile on his own face. Her face began turning red with laughter and she covered it with her small, thin fingers. He wished she wouldn’t; she was very cute, even with a red face.

“Careful, or your whole being may start to match your hair,” said Draco seriously.

She smacked him on his shoulder with one hand, while keeping the other one over her mouth as she giggled.

“Ow.” He rubbed the spot where she had smacked him and pretended to be hurt, but in fact, he didn’t mind it.

He didn’t mind it one bit.

Chapter Seven



“So how was it?” Hermione asked eagerly.

She was seated across from Ginny on a squashy couch in her and Ron’s living room, rubbing her belly and watching her sister-in-law intently.

“It was…” Ginny smiled, looking down at the floor. Her hair, which was straight and silky that day, swung in front of her eyes. “It was really, really good.”

“I knew it!” said Hermione triumphantly. “I knew I saw something there. Aren’t you glad I helped get you two together? Aren’t you?”

“Yes, I am, but I would appreciate if next time you tell me before you give out personal information to and set up dates with random warlocks.”

“Oh, come on. If I had told you who I was setting you up with, you would have stayed in those hideous pajamas and read one of your filthy books all night long instead of having the best first date ever, thanks to me. You are the most stubborn person I know.”

Ginny opened her mouth to argue, and then shut and it nodded with agreeable consent.

“Yes, I am.”

Hermione laughed and shook her head.

“You weird little Weasley. Shall we go for a walk? I need to pick up a few things from the Apothecary.”

“Sure.”

They apparated from Ron and Hermione’s spacious flat to the Leaky Cauldron, where they chatted with Tom the bartender for a few minutes before proceeding into Diagon Alley. It was a pleasantly warm summer afternoon and Diagon Alley was immensely crowded. Ginny and Hermione strolled around, chatting and looking into shop windows. They stepped into the Apothecary, where Hermione bought a few things, and Ginny mused at how incredibly bad it smelled.

After they exited the Apothecary, they stood and marveled at an array of new witches’ dress robes. It was there that Hermione spotted a tall head of familiar red hair bobbing a foot higher than the rest of the crowd and shouted, “Ron! Ron! Over here!”

Ron saw them and waved. He began walking toward them, barging through dozens of people to get to where they were standing.

“Hullo!” he greeted them cheerfully, giving Hermione a kiss on the lips and beaming at Ginny. “What are you two doing here? Ginny, how was your date? I was part of the committee, you know. Oh, yes, directly approached by Draco Malfoy himself.”

Ginny laughed.

“It was…”

But she trailed off as she caught sight of who had been following closely behind Ron.

Ginny had not set eyes upon Harry Potter since the previous Christmas at the Burrow, which had been the first Christmas in nearly seven years which they had not spent as a couple. It had been only three months prior to Christmas of that year that Ginny had discovered Tamara, her alleged best friend, in bed with Harry, her fiancée. It had been the worst, most awkward Christmas of Ginny’s life, and since then Ginny had keenly avoided Harry. He had not changed much; his messy, jet-black hair was a little shorter and his skin was a bit darker, perhaps from vacationing with that extremely good-looking witch Ginny always saw him with in the tabloids.

“Hello, Ginny,” said Harry.

Ginny just stared at him.

“How… how have you been?” asked Harry unsurely. When she did not answer, he tried again. “So… Draco Malfoy, huh?”

There was something mocking in his tone; something malicious glinting in his emerald green eyes. Ginny knew this look very well. Harry had adapted it every time he set eyes upon things that he was sure to ridicule.

“Don’t you dare,” she said dangerously.

“Mixing with a Malfoy, that’s a good one,” said Harry flatly. “Way to get back at me, Gin.”

“Get back at you?!”

“Oh, come on. You wouldn’t go out with someone like him unless you were trying to get back at me. You need to get over me, Ginny.”

“I AM ‘over you’,” Ginny shot back. The hurt inside her was immediately replaced with red-hot, blazing anger. “I was ‘over you’ the moment I saw you in bed WITH MY BEST FRIEND!”

Harry laughed uncomfortably and started to say something but Ginny would not permit it.

“No, shut the fuck up! You think you can treat me like I’m one of your pathetic groupies? We dated for EIGHT YEARS! That said and done, I have absolutely no fucking feelings left for you, because doing something that horrible to the person that you supposedly loved more than anything made me realize that I didn’t know you at all after all. You think you’re so great because you have a scar on your stupid face and the wizarding world at your smelly feet. Yeah, I said it. Your feet STINK. So guess what, Mr. Big-Shot-War-Hero?”

“What?!” Harry demanded, his face red. People walking by had quieted to hear their argument.

Ginny grabbed a bag of beetle eyes, opened the bag, and held it up to spill all over Harry.

“THIS! Now, fuck off, you fucking asshole.”

And she marched away, not noticing a middle-aged woman with long, red nails and a Quick Quotes Quill excitedly scribbling down everything from a small distance…