Under the Willow Tree | Draco Malfoy

chapter 33: you manipulated her

Lorelei Jones | 4th Year

Lorelei woke up a day later with a splitting migraine and an enormous amount of confusion. She was in the hospital wing, but she couldn't recall what for. She looked at Madam Pomfrey scuttling around the space until her memories from the day before started to flood back into her mind.

Quidditch. Draco. The bludger. The cruel chanting. Draco coming to visit her in the hospital wing.

"Ouch," Lorelei groaned when she moved and pain rippled across her temples. She pressed her fingers to her head gently and squeezed her eyes shut until the pain subsided again.

"Oh, good. You're awake," Madam Pomfrey said as she rushed to Lorelei's bedside. She shoved a small vial of transparent liquid into Lorelei's hands. "Drink this."

Not wanting to disobey, Lorelei threw the contents of the vial into her mouth at once and nearly gagged at the taste of it. As the bitter, rotten-tasting liquid slid down her throat, Lorelei started to wonder exactly what was in the vial she had just drank from. What if she was allergic to that?!

"Give it another couple hours, and you'll be safe to leave, dear," Madam Pomfrey said before she stole the empty vial from Lorelei's shaking fingers and rushed off.

Lorelei watched her go with her mouth agape and head swimming with questions, but the doors to the hospital wing creaked open at that same moment, so Lorelei stopped her worrying and tried to strain to hear what was being said. She couldn't quite make out the hushed voices, and a curtain was drawn around her bed for extra privacy, so she couldn't see anything either.

She cleared her throat in preparation to call out to whoever was there, but the curtain whipped back to reveal Fred and George Weasley. They were both donning huge grins as they stared at her wordlessly. Fred was wiggling his eyebrows while George was staring at her hard, as if he was trying to read her mind. Lorelei hoped to the heavens that George Weasley didn't know legilimency.

"Hello, Lorelei," they said together after she looked between the two of them with her eyebrows drawn together for a long moment.

"Uhm, hi?" Lorelei trailed. She adjusted her sitting position in the hospital bed and scratched the back of her neck. "Do you need something?"

"Not yet," George said with a wide smile.

"We just wanted to thank you," Fred explained with a devilish look in his eyes.

"What for?"

The two brothers smiled at one another. They lifted their eyebrows and twitched their lips in what appeared to be their own unspoken language. Lorelei watched with her shoulders slowly coiling. What were they up to?

"I mean, ickle ronniekins is certainly grateful to you as well," Fred started and took a step closer, his eyes dripping over her soft features and gentle confusion.

"No one's talking about him anymore," George added in explanation as he followed his brother's lead and got closer.

Lorelei processed their words and humorous tones. No one was talking about Ron anymore? What did they mean by that?

"The little Hufflepuff-"

"-who threw off the big, bad Draco Malfoy is stealing all the spotlight-"

"-and everyone wants to know why," George finished with a cheeky grin.

Lorelei flushed bright red. "What do you mean I threw him off?"

Fred had a sparkle in his eyes as he finally launched himself onto the foot of Lorelei's bed. "Your unfortunate accident captured his attention, and Harry caught the snitch first because of it."