Hogwarts: Year 2
The morning sun streamed brightly through Ginny’s window, shining directly onto her bed. Ginny whined into her pillow—it was far too early to be awake, especially in the summer. She grumpily rolled over and buried herself in her blankets. She could hear Ron downstairs, talking loudly to her parents about Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and how wonderful Hogwarts had been. Ginny thought it was great that Ron knew Harry Potter—he was the hero of the wizarding world, and Ginny admired him greatly—but Ron did not need to be talking so loudly this early in the morning. Over the volume of Ron’s voice, she could also hear faint explosions coming from Fred and George’s room. She groaned—no one slept around here…
Ginny sat up and looked around her cluttered room—it had gotten particularly messy since her brothers had come back from Hogwarts. She had been having so much fun catching up with them that she had neglected her chores. Slowly sitting up and yawning loudly, she reached her arms up over her head and stretched out as best she could. Then she kicked aside the stray clothes lying on her floor to make her way over to her closet.
After getting dressed, she looked around her untidy room once more—she knew she would have to clean it later. She smiled at the corner of her bed where Draco’s letters were hidden. They had been writing quite a bit this summer—apparently his father was quite angry with Draco because he was not at the top of his class, and this made Draco write more often to escape from his home life. They completely disregarded the one incident at the Ministry the previous December. Ginny figured that if Draco was willing to risk everything to write to her, then she might as well return his letters. Besides, when he was not acting smug and distant, he was very fun to talk to.
She picked up a stray letter off her desk—she had received it just last night. She smiled as she looked at it—Draco had been raving about how his house elf had disappeared and he had to find his own dinner. Ginny rolled her eyes at the thought—he was so spoiled sometimes. She wrote him back a long letter telling him to get over it, because most people did not have house elves to do all their petty chores. She also had offered to send him the ghoul that resided in her attic, although she was fairly sure he would refuse.
They had not been able to meet at the Ministry much this summer for fear that they would be caught by Draco’s father again. Ginny still did not understand why they were sneaking around and not telling anyone about their meetings and letters, but she eventually decided she preferred it this way. In a family of seven children, she did not have a lot of privacy, so she liked being able keep some secrets. Besides, she was certain that her brothers would never cease teasing her if they knew she had a secret pen pal. Ginny imagined that they would assume that he was her boyfriend, and then they would go beat him up in order to protect her—or they would just tease her mercilessly. She never saw the logic in her brothers’ actions, but she had learned not to care. Talking to Draco was her special little secret, and no one needed to know.
Heading slowly downstairs, she eavesdropped on Ron’s conversations with her parents. “He hasn’t written at all this summer—me and Hermione have both written him loads of times and she says that he hasn’t written her either,” she heard him say. “It’s those Muggles he lives with—they don’t let him do anything.”
“Now Ron, don’t do anything rash. I’m sure he’s fine at home, they may not like magic, but I’m sure they’re fine” she could hear her mother trying to justify the situation.
Ginny scampered into the kitchen, “Good morning!” she said happily. “What’s this I hear about Harry Potter?” she asked, prompting her brother.
“Well, your lover Harry hasn’t spoken to anyone all summer, and we think something is wrong,” he said, putting a special emphasis on the word lover. All of Ginny’s brothers had been teasing her about her obsession with Harry any chance they got. Ever since she had said that she thought he was cute, they had taken to calling him her boyfriend in order to irritate her. Pouting, she sat down at the table and began to eat some breakfast. The way they teased her about Harry was yet another reason that she never intended to tell them about Draco—she did not need the mockery or the grief.
~*~
Hungry and irritated, Draco rolled out of bed in the morning to see if Dobby had returned. The stupid house elf had disappeared the previous night, and his father and mother had been out socializing so he had not had any dinner. He had tried to look for snack food, but he had been unsuccessful, and in the end he had written a lengthy cranky letter to Ginny before trying to go to sleep.
He rolled out of bed and sluggishly walked downstairs. His mother was looking in her pocket mirror, preening herself and fixing her make-up. His father was elsewhere—Draco did not care where. The less he saw his father, the better. These days, all his father did was nag him about Harry Potter and that damn Mudblood. Draco sat down grumpily at the table, and sat idly, staring at the table until Dobby brought him something to eat. Grateful that the house elf had returned but not willing to admit it, Draco began to devour the breakfast Dobby had made.
After breakfast, he wandered lackadaisically up to his room. His owl was waiting in the corner with a letter just for him. He smiled as he retrieved the letter and lay down on his bed. He loved how prompt Ginny was—mostly because she used his owl, but he appreciated it nonetheless. Smirking, he read the letter quickly. She had mocked him for being unable to find himself food, and for relying on a house elf for everything. He rolled his eyes—if she had ever had a house elf, then she would have understood his dilemma. It was just second nature to him; besides, he should not have to worry about food and cleaning when there was someone else to do it. She was probably one of those people who wanted to get house elves wages and vacations. He had a sinking suspicion that his father was right in deeming Ginny a Muggle lover. Draco knew there was nothing wrong with liking Muggles—he just was not allowed to like them because of his father.
Draco wrote a reply to Ginny and sent it on its way. He still loved how carefree and fun Ginny was, unlike the Slytherin girls. In fact, any girl that he was ‘allowed’ to like (by his fathers guidelines) was the exact opposite of Ginny. They were all malicious, cold, and power-driven—like himself, actually, but Draco did not really like himself at the moment. He was what his father wanted him to be, not who he really was. In reality, Draco was not sure if he knew who he was. Regardless, he had never met another girl like Ginny, and he would hate to lose her. Sighing loudly, he started shredding a piece of parchment nervously with his hands. If she ended up in Gryffindor, he would barely be able to talk to her without getting a huge hassle from everyone in Slytherin—and the rest of the school for that matter. He just hoped that they would still be able to talk at Hogwarts. He did not know if he would be able to cope with his father without having her to vent to.
~*~
Several days later, Ginny was woken up by the sound of her mother’s ear-piercing voice, yelling at Fred, George and Ron in the front yard. Ginny buried her head in her pillows, trying to block the sound. Eventually, the arguing stopped and everything became eerily quiet—no loud talking downstairs, and no explosions from the twin’s room. Ginny decided to seize the opportunity, and gained another hour of sleep.
Yawning loudly, she rolled out of bed a little while later. Looking around her room, she realized that she did not have anything clean to wear—now she really had to clean her room. She gave up with looking for something to wear, and started descending the stairs in her nightdress. She could hear her mother talking to her brothers, and there was another voice too. Curious, she scampered down the stairs and turned into the kitchen.
There in the kitchen, sitting at the table, was Harry Potter, eating sausages and fried eggs. Ginny shrieked and ran out of the kitchen—no one had told her Harry was coming. In the hallway, Ginny groaned and leaned back against the wall, staring at the ceiling. Now they would give her an even harder time about liking him—they would probably tell Harry too. She banged her head on the wall—she should not have reacted like that, it had only made everything more obvious.
Ginny did not even know if she liked him anyway; she had never really met him. All she had told her brothers was that he was heroic and good-looking, and of course, they took this to mean that she loved him like nothing else.
She listened carefully to the noise in the kitchen now, she could hear faint clips of conversation, most of which seemed to be about her. Disconcerted, she ran back upstairs into her room and dove headfirst onto her bed into her pillow. This was too much to deal with right now, maybe after she slept a little bit more…
When she woke up, she could hear cheery conversations from outside. Looking out her window, she realized Fred, George, Ron and Harry were all de-gnoming the backyard. She looked around her room and picked up the cleanest looking clothes she could find before piling the rest in a basket to have them cleaned. Then she headed downstairs to the kitchen to find some food while her brothers were outside—that way she would not have to deal with them.
She did her best to avoid Ron and Harry for the rest of the day, and when her father finally returned home from the Ministry, she gave him a huge hug before heading upstairs to her room. She hid silent giggles as she heard her mother scolding her father about his flying car—it was always funny to hear her father’s reaction when her mother yelled at him. Apparently her brothers had flown the car to Harry’s house last night to retrieve him. She briefly wished she had been with them so she could have flown over England in the dark. Then she realized that if she had gone, she would have gotten teased the whole way there about Harry, and the entire return trip would have been very awkward.
After the din had ceased, she sat for a moment in the silence of her room, listening to the noises of the house. She could hear a faint popping from Fred and George’s room, followed by barely audible laughter. Her mother and father were now talking quietly about something—she could not hear what. She heard Percy’s door creak open as he left his room to go use the bathroom. She smiled wickedly, now she could go steal more parchment from Percy’s room. He was the only one in the house with a plethora of parchment and ink; Ginny figured this was because he was the only person who actually did his homework. She opened the door and looked out, only to see Ron leading Harry up the stairs. Harry looked up curiously, directly at her. She looked at his bemused expression and his green eyes for a split second before she freaked out and slammed the door. She had not been expecting them to be there.
Slapping her forehand with the palm of her hand, she wondered what he thought of her. He probably believed that she was a loony with the way she kept running away. She listened carefully at the door until she heard Ron and Harry reach his room. Then she carefully crept to Percy’s room, stealing the materials that she needed before tucking them into her pocket and running back to her room.
Much to her dismay, Fred and George were sitting on her bed when she returned to her room, their faces showcasing identical mocking smiles. Knowing they were here to tease her about Harry, she shook her head resignedly and gave them a weak grin.
She ambled over to her bed and sat down between the twins, and smiled warily as they bantered about how she kept running away from Harry. She thought about the situation—it was ridiculous, honestly. Everyone enjoyed teasing her about her supposed crush on Harry Potter, which she had neither confirmed nor denied. She thought of it mostly as curiosity—after all, he was the one who defeated You-Know-Who, and here he was, in her very own house. She had never met him either, so how everyone thought she was in love with Harry was beyond her. The only detail she had learned from the whole experience was that she should never tell her brothers anything. She would never tell them about Draco—she would hate for them to torture her about him.
Sighing, she lay down on her bed and covered herself with her blankets. She could hear her brothers laughing about how she was hiding from the truth, or something like that. She buried her head in her pillow and pretended to sleep until she felt her brothers get off her bed and traipsed to their own room. She waited a few moments longer, wondering how everyone got the impression that she liked Harry. She bit her bottom lip in thought—maybe she did like him, it was too hard to tell.
Sighing, she sat up and pulled the parchment from Percy’s room from her pocket. Smoothing out the creases, she carefully inked her quill and started writing a letter to Draco.
Draco,
How are you? Is everything still all right with your father? I asked my mother, and she says that I’ll be going to Diagon Alley to get all my Hogwarts supplies in a couple weeks. Perhaps I’ll be able to see you there—I’ve missed seeing you at the Ministry. I’ve gone there only a handful of times this summer, and each time all I do is sit in the waiting room, wondering if you’ll walk in. I know your father won’t allow you to go anymore, but it’s still so lonely. I almost wanted to go there today, just to escape from my house. My brother’s friend from Hogwarts just came to my house to spend the rest of the summer here, and everyone in my family seems to think that I like him. I haven’t even met him really, so I’m not sure what they’re talking about. It’s starting to irk me though, because they won’t leave me alone about it. I was so stupid about it too, because I kept running away whenever I saw him, so he probably thinks I’m a nutter. I’m not sure what to do about it. Luckily, summer is nearly finished. I can’t wait to start school in several weeks. I hope we get to spend some time together there. I miss you!
-Ginny
She neatly folded the letter and placed it on her windowsill. The night was still young, and usually Draco sent his letters a little later in the evening. She opened her window wide enough so an owl would be able to fly in, and she left her letter in a convenient spot for his owl to pick up if he came. She placed an owl treat next to the letter and then changed into her nightdress. She stared out the window into the distance for moment—if only she could get away from all the turmoil here. She brushed her ginger hair out of her face and pulled it into a loose braid, before slowly lying down on her bed. Maybe they would stop teasing her tomorrow, she thought optimistically as she fell into a deep sleep.
~*~
Draco looked quizzically at the letter that had just come through his window—his owl had returned awfully quickly. Ginny must have left a letter for his owl to pick up—she did not normally do that unless she was troubled about something and could not wait for him to write. He read her letter, smiling at how her brother teased her about liking his friend. Draco wondered who her brother was, and his friend, since they obviously went to Hogwarts. He shrugged, he would find out soon enough—once they got to the Sorting Ceremony at Hogwarts he would finally find out her surname. He could ask her right now if he wanted, but he did not really care.
He quickly penned a letter telling her to ignore the repartee and that he would also be going to Diagon Alley next week. He wanted to think of something supportive to say to make her less upset about being teased, but he was at a loss for appropriate words, so he just told her not to worry, because in a few weeks she would be at Hogwarts and she could go be friends with anyone she wanted. He sealed the letter and gave to his owl, and then went to sleep for the night.
~*~
Ginny continued to deal with the constant ridicule from her brothers over the next week. It was starting to make her very angry. All of their attention and banter was the reason that she was getting so self-conscious around Harry. If they just stopped teasing her about him, then maybe she would be able to act normally, without having to worry about what her brothers would think about her actions.
Putting the last of her clothes neatly in her closet, she surveyed her room once more. She had taken to spending most of her time in the privacy of her bedroom, as she had a tendency to become clumsy and quiet whenever she was in the same room as Harry. However, the change in her behavior did not lessen the comments from her brothers—in fact, it seemed to increase the quantity of jokes they poked at her.
It seemed the only good thing that she had accomplished this week amid the constant teasing whenever Harry was not around, was that she had managed to completely clean her room so it was absolutely spotless. She had also written quite a few complaining letters to Draco, but he seemed to think that her dilemma was hilarious, and neglected to offer any form of support or advice.
One week after Harry had arrived at the Burrow, she was sitting down to enjoy her breakfast—her brothers were still all upstairs and sleeping. It was the first time she had been able to enjoy a silent meal without teasing comments and meaningful looks. Her mother and father were sitting with her, and they were all quietly enjoying their porridge when an owl flew through the window and dropped off six letters from Hogwarts.
Ginny smiled as she reached across the table to retreive her very own Hogwarts acceptance letter and booklist. It was so official looking, and it made her feel very grown up to finally have it. She started skimming the materials list when she heard a noise in the hallway out of the kitchen. She tried to act normal as Ron and Harry rounded the corner—she figured she should stop acting like a shy little girl in front of Harry. Ginny moved to put her spoon back in her bowl of porridge and say good morning properly, but in doing so she accidentally knocked over her bowl onto the floor.
Entirely embarrassed, Ginny crawled under the table to fetch her bowl. She could feel a crimson flush rising on her face—it was the one time she was going to try to act normal, and she had to go and do this. Her twin brothers arrived downstairs, and the room was uncharacteristically quiet as everyone sat silently, reading their letters. Finally, her brothers broke into a conversation with her mother about the cost of books.
“I expect we’ll be able to pick up a lot of Ginny’s things secondhand,” she heard her mother say. Ginny smiled weakly—everything she owned was secondhand, either passed down from her brothers, or bought from a cheap, secondhand shop. At least her mother was considerate to buy her girls clothes, although Ginny did have a large collection of her brothers’ shirts and pants that they had outgrown. She wore them to bed when her usual nightdresses were dirty.
“Oh, are you starting at Hogwarts this year?” she heard Harry ask. Flustered, Ginny just blushed, trying to think of what to say. It should have been obvious as to what to say, but it was the first time Harry had ever spoken to her. She felt her face continue to get warmer and warmer at the delay of her response, and just as she was about to respond she felt her elbow fall into the butter dish. She wanted to disappear under the table. Luckily, at that very moment Percy marched into the room proudly with his Prefect badge pinned to his chest.
Ginny sat at the table for a little while longer, idly listening to everyone else talk about Diagon Alley, school, brooms, and a letter from Hermione. Finally, Ginny excused herself and slipped quickly out of the room.
Upon reaching her bedroom, she changed her clothes, and wrote a short letter to Draco detailing the humiliation of her breakfast, and telling him that she would be at Diagon Alley the following Wednesday. Then she went downstairs to go find something to do—her brothers had disappeared with Harry to go play Quidditch out back. They never invited her to play Quidditch; the only way she could ever practice flying was to steal their brooms when they were not around, which was not very often.
Finding that there was nothing to do in her house, she quietly crept down to the paddock where her brothers and Harry were playing Quidditch. She climbed one of the bushy trees surrounding the paddock—she knew they would not see her; they never had. Distracted, she watched them as they threw apples and took turns riding Harry broom. Harry seemed like a nice boy—she just did not know him at all. Maybe someday she would—or perhaps she would find other people to talk to at Hogwarts, like Draco. If only summer would just be over, and school would finally start, Ginny thought to herself.
~*~
The following Wednesday, Draco was wandering through Knockturn Alley with his father. It was time for Draco to get all his school supplies, primarily books. However, his father had wanted to do a couple things in Knockturn Alley first, and for once, he brought Draco with him. Draco looked at his father inquisitively; his father had been very strange today, acting as though he was on a very tight time schedule. This was odd, because usually his father did everything when he wanted to, because no one would question a Malfoy. Trailing his father into Borgin and Burkes, he curiously studied his father’s seemingly prearranged actions—he seemed as though he was on a mission.
Draco looked at the different dark objects around the shop. Fascinated by their strange appearances and even stranger uses, Draco read the tags of all the displays as he followed his father over to the front desk.
“Touch nothing, Draco,” said his father curtly, just as Draco was about to reach out and touch a realistic looking, magnificently smooth glass eye. Draco put his hand down, but continued to look around the store.
“I thought you said you were going to buy me a present,” Draco remembered. His father had promised a gift after he had abruptly woken Draco in the morning and demanded that he immediately get dressed so they could leave for Knockturn Alley.
“I said I would buy you a racing broom,” said his father, waiting impatiently for service. Draco knew that his father was not used to waiting for anything.
Draco sighed and continued, “What’s the good of that if I’m not on the House team? Harry Potter got a Nimbus Two Thousand last year. Special permission from Dumbledore so he could play for Gryffindor. He’s not even that good, it’s just because he’s famous… famous for having a stupid scar on his forehead…” Draco continued bitterly. He glanced down at a shelf full of skulls and elaborated further, “…everyone thinks he’s so smart, wonderful Potter with his scar and his broomstick—”
“You have told me this at least a dozen times already,” his father retorted severely, giving Draco a menacing look which made him want to take back everything he had just said. “And I would remind you that is not—prudent—to appear less than fond of Harry Potter, not when most of our kind regard him as the hero who made the Dark Lord disappear—ah, Mr. Borgin.” Draco stared around the shop bitterly as Lucius turned to Mr. Borgin to discuss his business. Distractly, Draco stopped listening to his father and began to look around the shop. He walked over to a withered hand on a cushion and stared at it for a moment. He had no idea what it was—maybe he could use it to strangle Harry Potter. Draco resentfully narrowed his eyes as he thought about that Harry Potter. He had managed to avoid most talk of Potter all summer, but now it was back, staring him in the face. He hated it.
He pointed at the hand and obnoxiously interrupted his father, “Can I have that?” he asked.
Draco smugly smiled as Mr. Borgin abandoned his father and his ‘business’ to rush over and tell Draco about the withered hand. Not caring about the ‘Hand of Glory,’ Draco distractedly contemplated where he would be able to meet Ginny today when suddenly his father’s voice brought him back to reality. His father was talking to Mr. Borgin about him and thieves, “—if his grades don’t pick up, that may indeed all he is fit for—”
“It’s not my fault,” Draco tried to explain, “The teachers all have favorites, that Hermione Granger—”
“I would have thought you’d be ashamed that a girl of no wizard family beat you in every exam,” his father retorted. Draco glared angrily at his father—it’s not as though he had not been trying in school. The Mudblood was just everyone’s favorite; Granger, Potter, and the Weasel were teacher’s pets, everyone could see that. Draco stalked off to another part of the store and smirked to himself as he pretended to examine the tags of the objects. He was so sick of hearing everyone talk about Granger and Potter. If only he could just transfer somewhere else so he would not have to deal with it.
He reached out towards a large, black cabinet, planning to see if anything interesting was inside when he heard his father snap at him, “Come, Draco—” He followed his father out of the door and into Knockturn Alley, wondering why it had to be like this. He had never understood why he was supposed to hate Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers, he only knew that if he did not, then he would be punished. He feared that if his father found out about how much he talked to Ginny, then he would be severely disciplined; or worse, his father would do something to Ginny.
Draco trailed his father down the twisting Knockturn Alley until he could see Gringotts in the distance. Looking around Diagon Alley, Draco saw many students roaming with their parents, same as every year. However, he did not see Ginny anywhere. He could see Ron Weasley with three of his brothers and his father, looking around frantically as if they had lost someone. Maybe there were just too many Weasleys to keep track of, Draco decided.
Draco looked towards where his father had been, only to realize that his father had slipped off down the street, probably for his ‘business’ reasons, Draco thought bitterly. He looked around town once more, but there was still no sign of Ginny. Figuring the best thing to do was waiting for her somewhere, he headed towards Flourish and Blotts. That was the one place he knew she would have to go eventually to get her books. With luck, she would show up before his father came back to whisk him back to the Manor.
As Draco reached Flourish and Blotts, he was disappointed when he realized that half of the wizarding world was cramming inside the shop, lining up to see Gilderoy Lockhart, an egocentric author with a flashy smile. Draco sighed and pushed past the crowd and into the shop. He still did not see Ginny anywhere so he pressed on up the stairs to the second floor and distractedly looked at the book titles. He picked a nice large book full of hexes and curses, and positioned himself so he could see people entering and exiting the store.
About an hour into his book, he saw Ginny walk into the store with a red-haired woman who looked very familiar to Draco, although he could not exactly place her. He contemplated going downstairs to greet her, but then figured it was useless because he could barely think over the excited clamor in the store, let alone carry on a coherent conversation. He stared at Ginny a moment longer—she looked so happy—if only he could just go down there and say hello…
Draco continued to gaze distractedly at Ginny until the line had moved so that he could no longer see her. A few minutes later, he saw the Weasley twins enter the store and the older brother, and then moments after they arrived, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and that Granger girl all entered the store. Draco rolled his eyes—he was not sure that he had ever seen them do anything separately. He hid his face behind his book as he watched the Weasleys and the Golden Trio move forward towards the back of the shop.
Suddenly, Draco heard a loud shout, “It can’t be Harry Potter!” exclaimed Gilderoy Lockhart. The already loud din became positively unbearable, and Draco had a sudden urge to throw up.
Climbing to his feet, Draco threw the book back towards the shelf and headed downstairs. He turned towards the back of the store, and disgustedly watched as Lockhart grabbed Potter and smiled brilliantly for the Daily Prophet cameras. Draco listened in horror as Lockhart announced that he would be taking the Defense Against the Dark Arts position this year, and then presented Potter with a load of his books. Draco glared at Lockhart and his ridiculous smile for a moment longer before turning his attention towards Harry Potter.
Draco stalked across the room, walking up to Harry from behind. “Bet you loved that, didn’t you, Potter?” he asked menacingly, a sneer on his face. “Famous Harry Potter, can’t even go into a bookshop without making the front page.” Just then, he saw Ginny peek out from behind Harry, a mixture of shock and anger on her face. He felt his heart drop—he knew she would never approve of what he had just said to Potter—that probably explained the look on her face.
“Leave him alone, he didn’t want all that!” Ginny exclaimed, looking him in the eyes. Draco stared at her for a moment, not sure how to react. He still was unsure why she was supporting Potter, and what she was doing over here with him in the first place. She was the first person who had defied him in quite some time—probably since the last time she had spoken to him like this. But that was not the point—she had told him off in front of Potter—that would not do.
Draco glared at her and drawled, “Potter, you’ve got yourself a girlfriend!” He looked at Potter for a moment before turning his gaze back to Ginny, whose face was turning a shade of scarlet that clashed horribly with her hair. He felt bad for a moment, but at this point, there was really nothing he could say to her in front of Potter. Draco glanced to the side, and groaned as he saw Granger and the Weasel pushing through the crowd to join Potter.
“Oh, it’s you,” the Weasel started, staring at Draco disgustedly, “Bet you’re surprised to see Harry here, eh?”
Forgetting that Ginny was standing right next to Harry, Draco smirked and responded, “Not as surprised as I am to see you in a shop, Weasley. I suppose your parents will go hungry for a month to pay for all of those.” He smugly smiled at Ron’s flushing face—teasing the Weasel almost made up for all the bitterness he had about the Golden Trio until he looked into Ginny’s brown eyes, which were staring at him with a sort of sadness in them. He had disappointed her, somehow. He looked at her again, and then at the scarlet Weasel—he had never noticed how similar they looked.
Draco barely noticed Weasley’s father come over, or his own father grasping his shoulder. He kept wondering to himself why he had never noticed the resemblance between Ginny and the Weasleys. His head started to pound as all the memories from the past years flooded back. Everything fit—the secondhand clothing, the freckles, meeting her at the Ministry, where her father worked—she was a Weasley. That also explained why she was with Granger, Potter and the Weasel. But that meant… That meant that she was talking about her brother’s friend in the letters… Potter! She liked Potter? Draco was beginning to feel sick. It was too much to comprehend at one time. His one childhood friend—the one that he could openly confide to; the one who was always honest with him regardless of everything—she was a Weasley?
He turned to leave the store to find somewhere to think, when he realized that his father was brawling with the father Weasel on the floor. It seemed as though they had been fighting for some time, and they were getting quite brutal. His father was sporting a rather bruised eye, and Weasley’s father had a cut lip.
Suddenly, Hagrid the oaf walked over and pulled them apart. Draco stared in shock at his father—it seemed so uncharacteristic of him to fight with someone, especially someone that he would normally not give the time of day. Draco heard his father snap at Ginny, “Here, girl—take your book—it’s the best your father can give you—” Draco had the sudden urge to tell his father not to talk to Ginny like that, until reality tumbled down on him once more. Ginny was a Weasley—a Muggle loving, blood traitorous Weasley—and he would never be able to talk to her again.
A/N: Now it’s time for Ginny’s first year at Hogwarts!! Yay!!
The morning sun streamed brightly through Ginny’s window, shining directly onto her bed. Ginny whined into her pillow—it was far too early to be awake, especially in the summer. She grumpily rolled over and buried herself in her blankets. She could hear Ron downstairs, talking loudly to her parents about Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and how wonderful Hogwarts had been. Ginny thought it was great that Ron knew Harry Potter—he was the hero of the wizarding world, and Ginny admired him greatly—but Ron did not need to be talking so loudly this early in the morning. Over the volume of Ron’s voice, she could also hear faint explosions coming from Fred and George’s room. She groaned—no one slept around here…
Ginny sat up and looked around her cluttered room—it had gotten particularly messy since her brothers had come back from Hogwarts. She had been having so much fun catching up with them that she had neglected her chores. Slowly sitting up and yawning loudly, she reached her arms up over her head and stretched out as best she could. Then she kicked aside the stray clothes lying on her floor to make her way over to her closet.
After getting dressed, she looked around her untidy room once more—she knew she would have to clean it later. She smiled at the corner of her bed where Draco’s letters were hidden. They had been writing quite a bit this summer—apparently his father was quite angry with Draco because he was not at the top of his class, and this made Draco write more often to escape from his home life. They completely disregarded the one incident at the Ministry the previous December. Ginny figured that if Draco was willing to risk everything to write to her, then she might as well return his letters. Besides, when he was not acting smug and distant, he was very fun to talk to.
She picked up a stray letter off her desk—she had received it just last night. She smiled as she looked at it—Draco had been raving about how his house elf had disappeared and he had to find his own dinner. Ginny rolled her eyes at the thought—he was so spoiled sometimes. She wrote him back a long letter telling him to get over it, because most people did not have house elves to do all their petty chores. She also had offered to send him the ghoul that resided in her attic, although she was fairly sure he would refuse.
They had not been able to meet at the Ministry much this summer for fear that they would be caught by Draco’s father again. Ginny still did not understand why they were sneaking around and not telling anyone about their meetings and letters, but she eventually decided she preferred it this way. In a family of seven children, she did not have a lot of privacy, so she liked being able keep some secrets. Besides, she was certain that her brothers would never cease teasing her if they knew she had a secret pen pal. Ginny imagined that they would assume that he was her boyfriend, and then they would go beat him up in order to protect her—or they would just tease her mercilessly. She never saw the logic in her brothers’ actions, but she had learned not to care. Talking to Draco was her special little secret, and no one needed to know.
Heading slowly downstairs, she eavesdropped on Ron’s conversations with her parents. “He hasn’t written at all this summer—me and Hermione have both written him loads of times and she says that he hasn’t written her either,” she heard him say. “It’s those Muggles he lives with—they don’t let him do anything.”
“Now Ron, don’t do anything rash. I’m sure he’s fine at home, they may not like magic, but I’m sure they’re fine” she could hear her mother trying to justify the situation.
Ginny scampered into the kitchen, “Good morning!” she said happily. “What’s this I hear about Harry Potter?” she asked, prompting her brother.
“Well, your lover Harry hasn’t spoken to anyone all summer, and we think something is wrong,” he said, putting a special emphasis on the word lover. All of Ginny’s brothers had been teasing her about her obsession with Harry any chance they got. Ever since she had said that she thought he was cute, they had taken to calling him her boyfriend in order to irritate her. Pouting, she sat down at the table and began to eat some breakfast. The way they teased her about Harry was yet another reason that she never intended to tell them about Draco—she did not need the mockery or the grief.
~*~
Hungry and irritated, Draco rolled out of bed in the morning to see if Dobby had returned. The stupid house elf had disappeared the previous night, and his father and mother had been out socializing so he had not had any dinner. He had tried to look for snack food, but he had been unsuccessful, and in the end he had written a lengthy cranky letter to Ginny before trying to go to sleep.
He rolled out of bed and sluggishly walked downstairs. His mother was looking in her pocket mirror, preening herself and fixing her make-up. His father was elsewhere—Draco did not care where. The less he saw his father, the better. These days, all his father did was nag him about Harry Potter and that damn Mudblood. Draco sat down grumpily at the table, and sat idly, staring at the table until Dobby brought him something to eat. Grateful that the house elf had returned but not willing to admit it, Draco began to devour the breakfast Dobby had made.
After breakfast, he wandered lackadaisically up to his room. His owl was waiting in the corner with a letter just for him. He smiled as he retrieved the letter and lay down on his bed. He loved how prompt Ginny was—mostly because she used his owl, but he appreciated it nonetheless. Smirking, he read the letter quickly. She had mocked him for being unable to find himself food, and for relying on a house elf for everything. He rolled his eyes—if she had ever had a house elf, then she would have understood his dilemma. It was just second nature to him; besides, he should not have to worry about food and cleaning when there was someone else to do it. She was probably one of those people who wanted to get house elves wages and vacations. He had a sinking suspicion that his father was right in deeming Ginny a Muggle lover. Draco knew there was nothing wrong with liking Muggles—he just was not allowed to like them because of his father.
Draco wrote a reply to Ginny and sent it on its way. He still loved how carefree and fun Ginny was, unlike the Slytherin girls. In fact, any girl that he was ‘allowed’ to like (by his fathers guidelines) was the exact opposite of Ginny. They were all malicious, cold, and power-driven—like himself, actually, but Draco did not really like himself at the moment. He was what his father wanted him to be, not who he really was. In reality, Draco was not sure if he knew who he was. Regardless, he had never met another girl like Ginny, and he would hate to lose her. Sighing loudly, he started shredding a piece of parchment nervously with his hands. If she ended up in Gryffindor, he would barely be able to talk to her without getting a huge hassle from everyone in Slytherin—and the rest of the school for that matter. He just hoped that they would still be able to talk at Hogwarts. He did not know if he would be able to cope with his father without having her to vent to.
~*~
Several days later, Ginny was woken up by the sound of her mother’s ear-piercing voice, yelling at Fred, George and Ron in the front yard. Ginny buried her head in her pillows, trying to block the sound. Eventually, the arguing stopped and everything became eerily quiet—no loud talking downstairs, and no explosions from the twin’s room. Ginny decided to seize the opportunity, and gained another hour of sleep.
Yawning loudly, she rolled out of bed a little while later. Looking around her room, she realized that she did not have anything clean to wear—now she really had to clean her room. She gave up with looking for something to wear, and started descending the stairs in her nightdress. She could hear her mother talking to her brothers, and there was another voice too. Curious, she scampered down the stairs and turned into the kitchen.
There in the kitchen, sitting at the table, was Harry Potter, eating sausages and fried eggs. Ginny shrieked and ran out of the kitchen—no one had told her Harry was coming. In the hallway, Ginny groaned and leaned back against the wall, staring at the ceiling. Now they would give her an even harder time about liking him—they would probably tell Harry too. She banged her head on the wall—she should not have reacted like that, it had only made everything more obvious.
Ginny did not even know if she liked him anyway; she had never really met him. All she had told her brothers was that he was heroic and good-looking, and of course, they took this to mean that she loved him like nothing else.
She listened carefully to the noise in the kitchen now, she could hear faint clips of conversation, most of which seemed to be about her. Disconcerted, she ran back upstairs into her room and dove headfirst onto her bed into her pillow. This was too much to deal with right now, maybe after she slept a little bit more…
When she woke up, she could hear cheery conversations from outside. Looking out her window, she realized Fred, George, Ron and Harry were all de-gnoming the backyard. She looked around her room and picked up the cleanest looking clothes she could find before piling the rest in a basket to have them cleaned. Then she headed downstairs to the kitchen to find some food while her brothers were outside—that way she would not have to deal with them.
She did her best to avoid Ron and Harry for the rest of the day, and when her father finally returned home from the Ministry, she gave him a huge hug before heading upstairs to her room. She hid silent giggles as she heard her mother scolding her father about his flying car—it was always funny to hear her father’s reaction when her mother yelled at him. Apparently her brothers had flown the car to Harry’s house last night to retrieve him. She briefly wished she had been with them so she could have flown over England in the dark. Then she realized that if she had gone, she would have gotten teased the whole way there about Harry, and the entire return trip would have been very awkward.
After the din had ceased, she sat for a moment in the silence of her room, listening to the noises of the house. She could hear a faint popping from Fred and George’s room, followed by barely audible laughter. Her mother and father were now talking quietly about something—she could not hear what. She heard Percy’s door creak open as he left his room to go use the bathroom. She smiled wickedly, now she could go steal more parchment from Percy’s room. He was the only one in the house with a plethora of parchment and ink; Ginny figured this was because he was the only person who actually did his homework. She opened the door and looked out, only to see Ron leading Harry up the stairs. Harry looked up curiously, directly at her. She looked at his bemused expression and his green eyes for a split second before she freaked out and slammed the door. She had not been expecting them to be there.
Slapping her forehand with the palm of her hand, she wondered what he thought of her. He probably believed that she was a loony with the way she kept running away. She listened carefully at the door until she heard Ron and Harry reach his room. Then she carefully crept to Percy’s room, stealing the materials that she needed before tucking them into her pocket and running back to her room.
Much to her dismay, Fred and George were sitting on her bed when she returned to her room, their faces showcasing identical mocking smiles. Knowing they were here to tease her about Harry, she shook her head resignedly and gave them a weak grin.
She ambled over to her bed and sat down between the twins, and smiled warily as they bantered about how she kept running away from Harry. She thought about the situation—it was ridiculous, honestly. Everyone enjoyed teasing her about her supposed crush on Harry Potter, which she had neither confirmed nor denied. She thought of it mostly as curiosity—after all, he was the one who defeated You-Know-Who, and here he was, in her very own house. She had never met him either, so how everyone thought she was in love with Harry was beyond her. The only detail she had learned from the whole experience was that she should never tell her brothers anything. She would never tell them about Draco—she would hate for them to torture her about him.
Sighing, she lay down on her bed and covered herself with her blankets. She could hear her brothers laughing about how she was hiding from the truth, or something like that. She buried her head in her pillow and pretended to sleep until she felt her brothers get off her bed and traipsed to their own room. She waited a few moments longer, wondering how everyone got the impression that she liked Harry. She bit her bottom lip in thought—maybe she did like him, it was too hard to tell.
Sighing, she sat up and pulled the parchment from Percy’s room from her pocket. Smoothing out the creases, she carefully inked her quill and started writing a letter to Draco.
Draco,
How are you? Is everything still all right with your father? I asked my mother, and she says that I’ll be going to Diagon Alley to get all my Hogwarts supplies in a couple weeks. Perhaps I’ll be able to see you there—I’ve missed seeing you at the Ministry. I’ve gone there only a handful of times this summer, and each time all I do is sit in the waiting room, wondering if you’ll walk in. I know your father won’t allow you to go anymore, but it’s still so lonely. I almost wanted to go there today, just to escape from my house. My brother’s friend from Hogwarts just came to my house to spend the rest of the summer here, and everyone in my family seems to think that I like him. I haven’t even met him really, so I’m not sure what they’re talking about. It’s starting to irk me though, because they won’t leave me alone about it. I was so stupid about it too, because I kept running away whenever I saw him, so he probably thinks I’m a nutter. I’m not sure what to do about it. Luckily, summer is nearly finished. I can’t wait to start school in several weeks. I hope we get to spend some time together there. I miss you!
-Ginny
She neatly folded the letter and placed it on her windowsill. The night was still young, and usually Draco sent his letters a little later in the evening. She opened her window wide enough so an owl would be able to fly in, and she left her letter in a convenient spot for his owl to pick up if he came. She placed an owl treat next to the letter and then changed into her nightdress. She stared out the window into the distance for moment—if only she could get away from all the turmoil here. She brushed her ginger hair out of her face and pulled it into a loose braid, before slowly lying down on her bed. Maybe they would stop teasing her tomorrow, she thought optimistically as she fell into a deep sleep.
~*~
Draco looked quizzically at the letter that had just come through his window—his owl had returned awfully quickly. Ginny must have left a letter for his owl to pick up—she did not normally do that unless she was troubled about something and could not wait for him to write. He read her letter, smiling at how her brother teased her about liking his friend. Draco wondered who her brother was, and his friend, since they obviously went to Hogwarts. He shrugged, he would find out soon enough—once they got to the Sorting Ceremony at Hogwarts he would finally find out her surname. He could ask her right now if he wanted, but he did not really care.
He quickly penned a letter telling her to ignore the repartee and that he would also be going to Diagon Alley next week. He wanted to think of something supportive to say to make her less upset about being teased, but he was at a loss for appropriate words, so he just told her not to worry, because in a few weeks she would be at Hogwarts and she could go be friends with anyone she wanted. He sealed the letter and gave to his owl, and then went to sleep for the night.
~*~
Ginny continued to deal with the constant ridicule from her brothers over the next week. It was starting to make her very angry. All of their attention and banter was the reason that she was getting so self-conscious around Harry. If they just stopped teasing her about him, then maybe she would be able to act normally, without having to worry about what her brothers would think about her actions.
Putting the last of her clothes neatly in her closet, she surveyed her room once more. She had taken to spending most of her time in the privacy of her bedroom, as she had a tendency to become clumsy and quiet whenever she was in the same room as Harry. However, the change in her behavior did not lessen the comments from her brothers—in fact, it seemed to increase the quantity of jokes they poked at her.
It seemed the only good thing that she had accomplished this week amid the constant teasing whenever Harry was not around, was that she had managed to completely clean her room so it was absolutely spotless. She had also written quite a few complaining letters to Draco, but he seemed to think that her dilemma was hilarious, and neglected to offer any form of support or advice.
One week after Harry had arrived at the Burrow, she was sitting down to enjoy her breakfast—her brothers were still all upstairs and sleeping. It was the first time she had been able to enjoy a silent meal without teasing comments and meaningful looks. Her mother and father were sitting with her, and they were all quietly enjoying their porridge when an owl flew through the window and dropped off six letters from Hogwarts.
Ginny smiled as she reached across the table to retreive her very own Hogwarts acceptance letter and booklist. It was so official looking, and it made her feel very grown up to finally have it. She started skimming the materials list when she heard a noise in the hallway out of the kitchen. She tried to act normal as Ron and Harry rounded the corner—she figured she should stop acting like a shy little girl in front of Harry. Ginny moved to put her spoon back in her bowl of porridge and say good morning properly, but in doing so she accidentally knocked over her bowl onto the floor.
Entirely embarrassed, Ginny crawled under the table to fetch her bowl. She could feel a crimson flush rising on her face—it was the one time she was going to try to act normal, and she had to go and do this. Her twin brothers arrived downstairs, and the room was uncharacteristically quiet as everyone sat silently, reading their letters. Finally, her brothers broke into a conversation with her mother about the cost of books.
“I expect we’ll be able to pick up a lot of Ginny’s things secondhand,” she heard her mother say. Ginny smiled weakly—everything she owned was secondhand, either passed down from her brothers, or bought from a cheap, secondhand shop. At least her mother was considerate to buy her girls clothes, although Ginny did have a large collection of her brothers’ shirts and pants that they had outgrown. She wore them to bed when her usual nightdresses were dirty.
“Oh, are you starting at Hogwarts this year?” she heard Harry ask. Flustered, Ginny just blushed, trying to think of what to say. It should have been obvious as to what to say, but it was the first time Harry had ever spoken to her. She felt her face continue to get warmer and warmer at the delay of her response, and just as she was about to respond she felt her elbow fall into the butter dish. She wanted to disappear under the table. Luckily, at that very moment Percy marched into the room proudly with his Prefect badge pinned to his chest.
Ginny sat at the table for a little while longer, idly listening to everyone else talk about Diagon Alley, school, brooms, and a letter from Hermione. Finally, Ginny excused herself and slipped quickly out of the room.
Upon reaching her bedroom, she changed her clothes, and wrote a short letter to Draco detailing the humiliation of her breakfast, and telling him that she would be at Diagon Alley the following Wednesday. Then she went downstairs to go find something to do—her brothers had disappeared with Harry to go play Quidditch out back. They never invited her to play Quidditch; the only way she could ever practice flying was to steal their brooms when they were not around, which was not very often.
Finding that there was nothing to do in her house, she quietly crept down to the paddock where her brothers and Harry were playing Quidditch. She climbed one of the bushy trees surrounding the paddock—she knew they would not see her; they never had. Distracted, she watched them as they threw apples and took turns riding Harry broom. Harry seemed like a nice boy—she just did not know him at all. Maybe someday she would—or perhaps she would find other people to talk to at Hogwarts, like Draco. If only summer would just be over, and school would finally start, Ginny thought to herself.
~*~
The following Wednesday, Draco was wandering through Knockturn Alley with his father. It was time for Draco to get all his school supplies, primarily books. However, his father had wanted to do a couple things in Knockturn Alley first, and for once, he brought Draco with him. Draco looked at his father inquisitively; his father had been very strange today, acting as though he was on a very tight time schedule. This was odd, because usually his father did everything when he wanted to, because no one would question a Malfoy. Trailing his father into Borgin and Burkes, he curiously studied his father’s seemingly prearranged actions—he seemed as though he was on a mission.
Draco looked at the different dark objects around the shop. Fascinated by their strange appearances and even stranger uses, Draco read the tags of all the displays as he followed his father over to the front desk.
“Touch nothing, Draco,” said his father curtly, just as Draco was about to reach out and touch a realistic looking, magnificently smooth glass eye. Draco put his hand down, but continued to look around the store.
“I thought you said you were going to buy me a present,” Draco remembered. His father had promised a gift after he had abruptly woken Draco in the morning and demanded that he immediately get dressed so they could leave for Knockturn Alley.
“I said I would buy you a racing broom,” said his father, waiting impatiently for service. Draco knew that his father was not used to waiting for anything.
Draco sighed and continued, “What’s the good of that if I’m not on the House team? Harry Potter got a Nimbus Two Thousand last year. Special permission from Dumbledore so he could play for Gryffindor. He’s not even that good, it’s just because he’s famous… famous for having a stupid scar on his forehead…” Draco continued bitterly. He glanced down at a shelf full of skulls and elaborated further, “…everyone thinks he’s so smart, wonderful Potter with his scar and his broomstick—”
“You have told me this at least a dozen times already,” his father retorted severely, giving Draco a menacing look which made him want to take back everything he had just said. “And I would remind you that is not—prudent—to appear less than fond of Harry Potter, not when most of our kind regard him as the hero who made the Dark Lord disappear—ah, Mr. Borgin.” Draco stared around the shop bitterly as Lucius turned to Mr. Borgin to discuss his business. Distractly, Draco stopped listening to his father and began to look around the shop. He walked over to a withered hand on a cushion and stared at it for a moment. He had no idea what it was—maybe he could use it to strangle Harry Potter. Draco resentfully narrowed his eyes as he thought about that Harry Potter. He had managed to avoid most talk of Potter all summer, but now it was back, staring him in the face. He hated it.
He pointed at the hand and obnoxiously interrupted his father, “Can I have that?” he asked.
Draco smugly smiled as Mr. Borgin abandoned his father and his ‘business’ to rush over and tell Draco about the withered hand. Not caring about the ‘Hand of Glory,’ Draco distractedly contemplated where he would be able to meet Ginny today when suddenly his father’s voice brought him back to reality. His father was talking to Mr. Borgin about him and thieves, “—if his grades don’t pick up, that may indeed all he is fit for—”
“It’s not my fault,” Draco tried to explain, “The teachers all have favorites, that Hermione Granger—”
“I would have thought you’d be ashamed that a girl of no wizard family beat you in every exam,” his father retorted. Draco glared angrily at his father—it’s not as though he had not been trying in school. The Mudblood was just everyone’s favorite; Granger, Potter, and the Weasel were teacher’s pets, everyone could see that. Draco stalked off to another part of the store and smirked to himself as he pretended to examine the tags of the objects. He was so sick of hearing everyone talk about Granger and Potter. If only he could just transfer somewhere else so he would not have to deal with it.
He reached out towards a large, black cabinet, planning to see if anything interesting was inside when he heard his father snap at him, “Come, Draco—” He followed his father out of the door and into Knockturn Alley, wondering why it had to be like this. He had never understood why he was supposed to hate Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers, he only knew that if he did not, then he would be punished. He feared that if his father found out about how much he talked to Ginny, then he would be severely disciplined; or worse, his father would do something to Ginny.
Draco trailed his father down the twisting Knockturn Alley until he could see Gringotts in the distance. Looking around Diagon Alley, Draco saw many students roaming with their parents, same as every year. However, he did not see Ginny anywhere. He could see Ron Weasley with three of his brothers and his father, looking around frantically as if they had lost someone. Maybe there were just too many Weasleys to keep track of, Draco decided.
Draco looked towards where his father had been, only to realize that his father had slipped off down the street, probably for his ‘business’ reasons, Draco thought bitterly. He looked around town once more, but there was still no sign of Ginny. Figuring the best thing to do was waiting for her somewhere, he headed towards Flourish and Blotts. That was the one place he knew she would have to go eventually to get her books. With luck, she would show up before his father came back to whisk him back to the Manor.
As Draco reached Flourish and Blotts, he was disappointed when he realized that half of the wizarding world was cramming inside the shop, lining up to see Gilderoy Lockhart, an egocentric author with a flashy smile. Draco sighed and pushed past the crowd and into the shop. He still did not see Ginny anywhere so he pressed on up the stairs to the second floor and distractedly looked at the book titles. He picked a nice large book full of hexes and curses, and positioned himself so he could see people entering and exiting the store.
About an hour into his book, he saw Ginny walk into the store with a red-haired woman who looked very familiar to Draco, although he could not exactly place her. He contemplated going downstairs to greet her, but then figured it was useless because he could barely think over the excited clamor in the store, let alone carry on a coherent conversation. He stared at Ginny a moment longer—she looked so happy—if only he could just go down there and say hello…
Draco continued to gaze distractedly at Ginny until the line had moved so that he could no longer see her. A few minutes later, he saw the Weasley twins enter the store and the older brother, and then moments after they arrived, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and that Granger girl all entered the store. Draco rolled his eyes—he was not sure that he had ever seen them do anything separately. He hid his face behind his book as he watched the Weasleys and the Golden Trio move forward towards the back of the shop.
Suddenly, Draco heard a loud shout, “It can’t be Harry Potter!” exclaimed Gilderoy Lockhart. The already loud din became positively unbearable, and Draco had a sudden urge to throw up.
Climbing to his feet, Draco threw the book back towards the shelf and headed downstairs. He turned towards the back of the store, and disgustedly watched as Lockhart grabbed Potter and smiled brilliantly for the Daily Prophet cameras. Draco listened in horror as Lockhart announced that he would be taking the Defense Against the Dark Arts position this year, and then presented Potter with a load of his books. Draco glared at Lockhart and his ridiculous smile for a moment longer before turning his attention towards Harry Potter.
Draco stalked across the room, walking up to Harry from behind. “Bet you loved that, didn’t you, Potter?” he asked menacingly, a sneer on his face. “Famous Harry Potter, can’t even go into a bookshop without making the front page.” Just then, he saw Ginny peek out from behind Harry, a mixture of shock and anger on her face. He felt his heart drop—he knew she would never approve of what he had just said to Potter—that probably explained the look on her face.
“Leave him alone, he didn’t want all that!” Ginny exclaimed, looking him in the eyes. Draco stared at her for a moment, not sure how to react. He still was unsure why she was supporting Potter, and what she was doing over here with him in the first place. She was the first person who had defied him in quite some time—probably since the last time she had spoken to him like this. But that was not the point—she had told him off in front of Potter—that would not do.
Draco glared at her and drawled, “Potter, you’ve got yourself a girlfriend!” He looked at Potter for a moment before turning his gaze back to Ginny, whose face was turning a shade of scarlet that clashed horribly with her hair. He felt bad for a moment, but at this point, there was really nothing he could say to her in front of Potter. Draco glanced to the side, and groaned as he saw Granger and the Weasel pushing through the crowd to join Potter.
“Oh, it’s you,” the Weasel started, staring at Draco disgustedly, “Bet you’re surprised to see Harry here, eh?”
Forgetting that Ginny was standing right next to Harry, Draco smirked and responded, “Not as surprised as I am to see you in a shop, Weasley. I suppose your parents will go hungry for a month to pay for all of those.” He smugly smiled at Ron’s flushing face—teasing the Weasel almost made up for all the bitterness he had about the Golden Trio until he looked into Ginny’s brown eyes, which were staring at him with a sort of sadness in them. He had disappointed her, somehow. He looked at her again, and then at the scarlet Weasel—he had never noticed how similar they looked.
Draco barely noticed Weasley’s father come over, or his own father grasping his shoulder. He kept wondering to himself why he had never noticed the resemblance between Ginny and the Weasleys. His head started to pound as all the memories from the past years flooded back. Everything fit—the secondhand clothing, the freckles, meeting her at the Ministry, where her father worked—she was a Weasley. That also explained why she was with Granger, Potter and the Weasel. But that meant… That meant that she was talking about her brother’s friend in the letters… Potter! She liked Potter? Draco was beginning to feel sick. It was too much to comprehend at one time. His one childhood friend—the one that he could openly confide to; the one who was always honest with him regardless of everything—she was a Weasley?
He turned to leave the store to find somewhere to think, when he realized that his father was brawling with the father Weasel on the floor. It seemed as though they had been fighting for some time, and they were getting quite brutal. His father was sporting a rather bruised eye, and Weasley’s father had a cut lip.
Suddenly, Hagrid the oaf walked over and pulled them apart. Draco stared in shock at his father—it seemed so uncharacteristic of him to fight with someone, especially someone that he would normally not give the time of day. Draco heard his father snap at Ginny, “Here, girl—take your book—it’s the best your father can give you—” Draco had the sudden urge to tell his father not to talk to Ginny like that, until reality tumbled down on him once more. Ginny was a Weasley—a Muggle loving, blood traitorous Weasley—and he would never be able to talk to her again.
A/N: Now it’s time for Ginny’s first year at Hogwarts!! Yay!!
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