The Boy Who Made the Right Choice

7- Plant lover's punishment

Later on saturday morning, Harry was sitting with Ron, Hermione and Ginny when a first year Gryffindor approached them, holding what looked to be a package. "This is for... Ronald Weasley." Ron chuckled when the boy said his name as 'Wesly', and took the large, rectangular box from him.

"Wha..?" He opened it and pulled out what looked to be a long, maroon velvet dress. It had a moldy-looking lace frill at the collar and matching lace cuffs. The two Patil twins from further down the table sniggered, grinning widely but looked away. "Uh, Ginny? I think these are for you."

Ron gave the dress toward Ginny who looked as though she were refraining from fake puking. "I'm not wearing that, it's ghastly." The Patil twins laughed even harder, and soon Fred, who was chatting to a Ravenclaw in his year at the Ravenclaw table nudged George next to him, pointing at the frill-collared dress robes Ron was holding up, and the red-headed twins didn't bother stiffling a laugh.

"They're not for Ginny," Hermione said, after she got her snorting under control. "They're for you. They're dress robes." Harry nearly choked on his pumpkin juice at that. 

"But what for?"

"'What for?'" Draco mocked from the Slytherin table. He and his Slytherin friends had been eavesdropping on the conversation, and Goyle could no longer hold in his laughter. Draco snorted and swerved his legs over the bench at their table, turning to face the Gryffindors. 

"Guess I'm not surprised you didn't know, seeing as your father was never in high ranks at the ministry." He scoffed, earning an irritated eye roll from the Weasley. "I'm talking about The Yule Ball. It's only one of the oldest traditions tied to the Triwizard Tournament." He rolled his eyes, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Yule Ball?" Draco heard Harry say as he sweeped his legs back over the bench.

"Guess he's already got a date." Draco mumbled as he looked away from Harry and Ginny and took another sip of pumpkin juice.

"Aww, you jealous?" Blaise teased, and Draco shot juice out from his mouth. 

"What's that supposed to mean?" 

Pansy giggled slightly. "Relax! It's just a joke." 

Draco rolled his eyes, but smirked nontheless. "Weasley has to wear that abomination!"

"Yeah, and I bet you'll have something that's so much better," Blaise said sarcastically. "I guess the more money you spend, the better."

"Hey! The ones I got from father are only 10,000 galleons and they look great!" Draco pouted. He wasn't that big of a rich brat.

Pansy snorted and Goyle shook his head. "Malfoy, not everyone is so rich that they own an entire wing of their house like you do."

Draco's face flushed slightly red. "That's besides the point! Weasley's mum couldn't've gotten him some normal dress robes? It's gonna do damage to me too, you know! I might pass out from second hand embarrassment-"

"Oh, shut it!" Blaise shoved a blueberry muffin in his mouth to shut the blonde up. "So, who're you going with? I hear Daphne's little sister Astoria likes you."

Draco made a disgusted face as he removed the muffin from his mouth, and put it down onto the table. "No way. She became little miss class-representative-and-queen-bee-of-Slytherin the moment she was sorted into our house. I mean, come on, she's like a brunette Barbie!"

"Is that short for Barbara? Classy name."

"No idea. Apparently she's this muggle icon of a perfect teenage girl with the perfect life... whoever she is, Astoria just is not my type." Draco propped his head up on his fist, and his stormy grey eyes wondered back to where Harry was sitting.

~~~~~

Later on Monday, instead of having their normal morning classes, Draco and the Slytherin boys were sitting on rows of bleachers, across from the girls on the other side of the room. Snape suddenly walked into the room, his flowing black robes trailing behind him. 

"The Yule Ball has been a tradition of the Triwizard Tournament since it's inception." He begun, walking slowly down the isle of separated boys and girls. "On Christmas Eve night, we and our guests gather in the Great Hall for a night of well-mannered frivolity. 

'The Yule Ball is first and foremost........... a dance." He seemed to really dread the word, as if  it were as intimidating as saying the Dark Lord's name. He begun walking slowly over to the large entrance doors of the hall. "The Slytherin house has demanded the respect of the wizard world for nearly ten centuries. I, nor Salazar nor Merlin will have either of you in the course of a single evening besmirching that name by behaving like a babbling, bumbling band of baboons... "

When he did his signature long-mid-sentence pause, Blaise nudged Draco, "Try saying that five times really fast!" Draco just grinned and didn't even try as he continued listening to Snape.

"Miss Roberts?" Snape quickly turned to where Alicia had unfortunately been caught feeding her Mimbulus Mimbletonia plant during the lesson.

"Yes?" 

"Will you join me?"

It was more an order than a request. The blonde girl gulped, her face going red in embrassment while her hands gripping the pot plant went white as paper. Shakingly, she set her plant beside her on the bench and took Snape's awaiting hand. 

He walked the girl over to the middle of the room (Draco guessed just by the look on his face that he'd only done that to make a point at Alicia for not paying attention), and looked over to where the Bloody Baron was floating beside an enourmous old-fashioned music player. 

Trying desperately to slow her breathing, Alicia stood with her feet firm on the ground as Snape guided one of her hands to his shoulder, and took her other in his own. The Baron ghost switched on a type of formal waltz tune of music on the music player, and the two began swaying to the music.

~~~~~

"Can you imagine dancing with professor Snape? I bet Alicia's probably truamatized right now, poor girl." Blaise hissed in Draco's ear as they exited the room an hour and a half later, having not seen any sign of Alicia since they left through the crowd of murmuring Slytherins.

"I think I'd rather dance with frickin Potter." Draco joked, though his face told concern for poor Alicia.

(A/N) Literally all I could think when I was writing the scene was Alicia, I am so sorry you poor girl 😘