What if He had a Choice?

53

The new teacher was relatively...well they were alright. Draco would save any good thoughts for later, after all this was only the first class. There was plenty of time for it to go to shit, but then one could tell a lot from the first class. After all, he had known Lockheart would be absolutely useless, and look at his first class. An entire quiz about himself. What an absolute narcissist. Draco didn't even understand why it was that Dumbledore had even bothered. Sure, he seemed great, but anyone with half a brain could tell that the man was obviously a fraud. He was just surprised that Dumbledore had fallen for his stupidity.

"Your homework..." Draco tuned out the rest of what the teacher was saying, and merely began packing his stuff into his bag. He wished that he could go see Tom now, but that would just have to wait. Now that he reflected...he probably was getting rather unhealthily attached-but he just couldn't help it. He did not know whether this teacher was going be good or okay, but he also did not think that it would matter too much. Either way, he already knew a majority of what the textbooks were going to say anyways. His father was quite strict on his knowledge, and Tom was not much better. They had two new teachers this year too, so things had the potential to be double bad. He had even less hopes for the DADA teacher, considering he was not quite sure whether he was hired but Dumbledore or not. It was possible that they had some sort of saving grace...maybe he would be decent. Draco did not know, and he was not sure he cared enough to know.

"What are we going to do about Tom?" Pansy murmured under her breath to Blaise. Blaise gave her yet another glare, clearly not wanting to entertain this topic. What he had said he had meant. It was obvious that Tom had been approved by the Malfoy family, and there was nothing for any of them to do about it. Lucius would never accept someone less than perfect for Draco, although Blaise did have to admit it was rather odd that he would approve of a half blood at all, let alone for marriage. Although he supposed Draco could always simply have a consort until he birthed an heir, not like it made much of a difference to the Wizarding World as long as there was an Heir at all.

"Nothing, Pansy, we will do nothing. I have already said that." He huffed, turning away from her.

"But there is something just...just not right about the whole thing." She insisted. He rolled his eyes. He was full well there was something odd about it all, especially considering the age difference and how young Draco was. It also did not help that for the longest time it was believed by almost everyone in the Wizarding circles that Parkinson would be the one to be betrothed to Draco. The sudden change had to be killing her mother and father. Still, Lucius had chosen, and it was too late to do anything about it. Even if they tried their hardest, it was children against the Noble and Ancient House of Malfoy. There was no way that they would come out on top, even if Draco decided to take their side and well...if how starry eyed he had gotten talking about Tom's courting gift was any indication that was not likely to happen.

"Look, I get you care about him, trust me, you are not alone, we all care about Draco. There is nothing we can do about this, and if you think you can figure out how to terminate their betrothal go ahead and try, write a letter to Mr. Malfoy about the situation, see if he gives any shits about it, but honestly, Pansy, I would just encourage you to drop it." She would not. Blaise could tell from the determined spark in her eyes that there was no way she was going to drop this. That did not mean that he had to enjoy it, though. He was quite frustrated with the whole thing. He decided then and there as long as she was not going to try and involve him in any of her stupid shenanigans it did not matter.

"Come on guys!" Draco hissed, his eyes flashing towards them as he had seemed to finally notice they had not followed him. Both Pansy and Blaise rushed to gather their things, ignoring the stare of their Professor, and hurried to Draco's sides. "What in the world were you even talking about to forget to leave the bloody classroom?" Pansy shook her head.

"It was just...You know the new DADA?"

"Of course I do," Draco punctuated with yet another eyeroll.

"Did you see his outfit? Scandalous!" Draco agreed, but did not verbalize it. He already knew that was not what they were talking about, but he decided not to push too hard. He would figure it out anyways. He always did.