"TAKE MY HAND" A Draco Malfoy Love Story

HE's BACK

Next day, I deliberately missed breakfast, as I couldn't shake off the look Draco gave me, neither could I accept the fact that DA was over. So I continued to sleep late into afternoon.

When I was going for lunch, I landed on the Hufflepuff common room to find Ernie, Justin, Susan, Hannah, Leanne were huddled together, along with Smith. I went towards them. They fell silent when they saw me coming. Justin and Susan passed a warm smile to me. I eyed them carefully, waiting any one of them to charge me with something, as they did yesterday, but they all slowly smiled at me.

"That's new!" I thought.

"Did I miss something?" I asked them.

Ernie stood up and I took a few steps back, my hand tightly clutching on to my wand. But he didn't, instead he folded his hands in front of him in a sorry gesture and said, "Florence, I am sorry. We all are." I looked at all of them and they were nodding their head too.

"What for," I asked.

"We thought you betrayed us! But today morning Harry told us the truth; it was Marietta Edgecome from Ravenclaw. She was the one who went to Umbridge yesterday and rattled everything."

"Of course she couldn't say everything, because....." Hannah said and looked at everyone, trying hard to suppress her giggles, as did the rest, except Smith.

"Because what?" I asked. Then they told me everything, how Marietta just mentioned the meeting and pimples covered her face which spelled 'SNEAK' across her face and she couldn't talk anymore and was hiding her face the entire time. It was a jinx put up by Hermione, when we put down our name into the parchment. And of course, Dumbledore's great escape from the Aurors, without brutally hurting anyone.

"So.....Umbridge is our new headmistress?" I asked staggered.

"Yes, but....." Ernie said with a glint of hope in his voice, "I don't think they can keep away Dumbledore for long. They sacked him in second year, remember? He came back. He will be back again in no time. I am sure about it." We all nodded in response. I went up ahead for my remaining classes.

When I was coming out of Astronomy class, Hermione stopped me along the way. She was not alone. Harry and Ron were behind her. They were all looking at me with puppy eyes. Hermione said, "Florence.....we are really sorry. We have doubted you all the time, but....." she stopped to glance at Harry and Ron. Then Harry spoke up,

"I am sorry Florence. We misbehaved with you."

"So am I." said Ron.

"It's alright guys. You were just trying to be careful. I am not.....it's fine. No harm done. Thank you for apologizing, it means a lot." I smiled at the three of them and turned towards the Great Hall. When I entered Great Hall for dinner, my eyes drifted towards the Slytherin table and I found a pair of eyes just looked to the other side. Draco was sitting as if he never noticed me and Pansy was hanging on to his shoulder, just like she used to. When I sat down at the Hufflepuff table, I glanced at him gain, but this time his head was turned towards his plate and he never glanced this way again. I breathed out a sigh of regret and continued with my dinner.

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I smirked at the news and the name Walden Macnair......arrested.

He is finally where he belongs, but for how long? Somebody has to take his place.....

My head was ramming with all these thoughts since a few days now and on top of all I couldn't talk about it to anyone. Draco simply stopped talking after the whole D.A. fiasco and whenever he looks at me; his eyes were full of regret and anger. Of course he is back to Pansy dangling on his arms 24/7/365.