https://www.quotev.com/146289325 painted the fanart for this chapter and I love it so much!! It's the Quidditch scene from Chapter 118 and there are so many amazing details.
"So...You-Know-Who wants to kill me?"
"Yes."
"But he doesn't know that it's me that he wants to kill?"
"Essentially."
"Damn," Harper said, whistling as he stretched his arms up behind his head. "That makes me pretty special, doesn't it?"
My jaw dropped as I kicked his shin from across the train's compartment. We were back on the Hogwarts Express in the same compartment that we'd occupied on our journey home two weeks ago. The difference that those two simple weeks of winter holiday had made was stark. Instead of sitting on Anderson's lap, Astoria was now wedged between the wall and Malfoy on my side of the compartment while Anderson was seated grumpily across from her beside Harper. Harmony Flemming dwelled on Harper's other side, looking reasonably concerned by the news I'd just delivered, while I sat between the window and Malfoy, who had been uncannily silent this entire time. Ashley had opted to sit in a different compartment with Crabbe, which was fortunate for us, given that we didn't want Crabbe knowing who Harmony had Latched onto. I was considering having the young Gryffindor girl erase all of our memories of the fact just to ensure Harper's safety.
"This is serious, Harper," I snapped as he rubbed his shin. "The most dangerous wizard ever wants to sacrifice you so he can use Harmony's power to make himself more powerful. If he kills you, it's basically guaranteed that he's going to kill us all."
"Except Harmony," Anderson pointed out rather bitterly. "She'll get to live forever as the Dark Lord's Queen."
"If you're jealous, I'd be happy to let you take my place," she retorted with a momentary flash of Melody-like antagonism. Being in such a sour mood, Anderson only rolled his eyes and muttered to himself. When Harmony turned her green eyes toward me, I could see the worry riddled within them. "How can we stop this from happening?"
"Well, as of now, You-Know-Who doesn't know who you've Latched onto. But...I'm assuming the moment he finds out, he'll have the Carrows kidnap both of you. So, for now, the most important thing is to ensure that no one finds out about you and Harper," I advised, wincing slightly before I added, "so you two probably shouldn't be seen together at all."
"Oh," Harmony blurted, her posture stiffening as she blinked. Harper's cockiness over being the Dark Lord's target had faded and he was staring at me with deep concern.
"I can't hang out with Harm anymore? But, I..." He closed his mouth, unable to come up with an excuse that he wanted anyone else to hear.
"It's for the best," Harmony said, fighting to make her voice impartial. "It's the best way to keep you—and everyone—safe. I'll...just go."
"Harmony..." Harper began, but his protest died on his lips even before she exited the compartment. There was no argument to be had; their friendship—or whatever it had escalated to over the holiday—would have to be put on hold until the danger was neutralized. Until Voldemort was dead. I knew the exact feeling; I'd had to walk away from Fred just the same as Harmony was walking away from Harper, and if their relationship turned out the way mine had with Fred, there would be no coming back.
"'Stor, you can come sit over here now," Harper suggested, shifting toward the window and patting the empty space between himself and Anderson.
Astoria simply sniffed and said, "No, thank you."
I glanced at Malfoy where he sat beside me, thinking he might return the look, but his eyes were focused out the window beyond me. Weariness painted his face with creases and shadows, but unlike Astoria's dejectedness, which had stemmed from seeing Evan at the wedding, Malfoy's ailment was one of a physical kind. Even after a full week, the curse that Voldemort had inflicted upon him was still taking its toll. The blackness that had plagued his skin hadn't returned, but there was a darkness looming over his mind, fatiguing him in a way that our healing connection couldn't seem to shatter. It would fade with time, he assured me; apparently it was the same curse that he'd put on me not too long ago, the one that had spread darkness up my arm, though he'd executed his to be benign. Voldemort's was, obviously, of a malignant nature, and the pain that it was causing Malfoy only intensified my hate for the Dark Lord.
"Have you heard from Bethanne, Anderson? Did she and Garren enjoy their honeymoon?" I asked, hoping to alleviate the tension. The mention of Evan's girlfriend's sister only deepened the slump in Astoria's posture, but Anderson didn't seem miffed.
"Yeah, she sent us some pictures. Looks like they had fun. Too bad you're not really a Fitzroy. Then we'd probably spend holidays together and stuff now."
"Yeah, I know," I said with a sigh. Christmases with my brothers had always been so much fun, while Christmas with the Malfoys had been...deadly.
"Now you'll be spending all your holidays with the Mals," Harper added as if reading my mind. He scrunched his nose over at Malfoy, who didn't appear to have heard him. "Bo-ring. Mal sucks. No one likes Mal. Lay loves Anderson more than Mal—"
"I can hear you and I don't care," Malfoy droned, leaning his head back against the seat as he closed his eyes. "I'd prefer not to be here, and I only am because of her." He tilted his head in my direction and kept it there, the weight of his shoulder pressing against mine.
"Because you loooove her," Harper sang, wiggling his eyebrows even though Malfoy wasn't watching. I was expecting some kind of sassy comeback, but Malfoy kept his mouth shut in a simple smirk. When Harper and Anderson began to give me suggestive looks, I couldn't suppress the heat surfacing in my cheeks, and I was thankful that Malfoy's eyes were still closed.
"Also because her presence alleviates the pain," Malfoy finally answered, referring to how our healing connection seemed to mollify his headache.
"How romantic," Harper crooned as he propped his legs up on the bench between him and Anderson. "When's the wedding?"
Normally I would have glared at Harper for a comment like that, but I was still stuck on that one word that Malfoy had said, and it was gnawing at my curiosity. "Also?"
I thought he would stiffen or become defensive, but his sly grin only broadened. After a few moments of waiting for a response, I realized that I wasn't going to get one, not now, anyway; Malfoy had fallen asleep.
"He's never going to openly admit that he loves you, Lay," Harper said knowingly. "He's too proud. You'll have to confess first."
"I—well—" Pausing, I peeked over at Malfoy, where his lips had drooped and his breathing had become slow. Even though I knew he was asleep, his ears deaf to whatever I said, I still couldn't find the words to finish whatever I'd been about to utter to Harper.
"Did you dress up in your elf costume for Malfoy?" Anderson asked when I said nothing.
"Elf costume?" I repeated, bemused.
"Oh, yes!" Astoria exclaimed as she suddenly perked up. "Did you dress up in a sexy elf costume? I designed one for myself, of course, but...then..." Her eyes became glossy as she stared out the window, and I knew exactly what she was thinking about. Though I wanted to comfort her about Evan, coddling wouldn't help Astoria lose her feelings for my brother. But then again, maybe nothing would.
"Well, did you?" Harper prompted me, his eyes darting between sleeping Malfoy and me.
"Of course I didn't," I grumbled, shifting awkwardly in my seat. "What do you all think happens at that Death Eater infested Manor? We nearly died. Do you think I had time to create a sexy elf costume—or do anything sexy?"
"So you still haven't slept with Malfoy?" Anderson asked.
"You didn't even snog him?" Harper questioned. "Not even a little?"
"We—" I halted my speech as images of the cave flashed across my mind. They felt too intimate to share, so I finished with, "It's none of your business what we did and didn't do. If you really want to know, then you need to tell all of us what you and Harmony did."
I raised my eyebrows at Harper, but he didn't even flinch before saying, "Nothing. Harm and I are just friends—or we were, anyway. Now go, Lay. Tell us all the sexy details—"
"Well, not all of them," Anderson injected uneasily. "We'd just like to know if you actually got physical with Malfoy or if the two of you are just gonna live in denial for the rest of your miserable lives."
"Well, if we don't die in this war, we'll probably be forced to get physical whether we want to or not," I reminded them darkly. "The Malfoy name's gotta be carried on somehow, even if it's no longer pure—"
"You—a mother!" Harper blurted, slapping his knee as he began to chortle. "Please, Lay. You would make an awful mother—"
"I would not! I...love children—"
"Can I be the godfather?" Anderson interjected eagerly.
"Godfa—no—no, you cannot. If I do ever have children, I'm not entrusting them to you if I die. Or you," I added with a pointed scowl in Harper's direction.
"Who's it gonna be, then? Crabbe and Ashley?" Anderson questioned, and I couldn't stop myself from laughing.
"I don't want to imagine those two trying to raise a child."
"'Mum, can I have a pastry?'" Anderson imitated in a child's voice.
"'NO! YOU MUST BE IN TOP PHYSICAL CONDITION TO DESTROY UNCLE ADRIAN!'" Harper exclaimed in his best impersonation of Ashley.
"'But Mum, Dad's eaten twenty pastries today—'"
"'NO—'" Harper began to yell, but he cut the rest of his words short when something suddenly plopped onto my shoulder. Both boys froze for a moment before simultaneously breaking out in uncontrollable chortles. Slowly, I pivoted my face to the side to see that Malfoy's white-blond head was now resting on my shoulder, and my eyes went wide.
"Oh my God," I blurted, but Harper kicked my foot before I could squirm away.
"Don't move, Lay—"
"What do I do!" I hissed as Anderson nearly fell to the floor in a fit of giggles.
"Where is Mudblood Creevey when you need a picture taken?" he wheezed between laughter.
"Oh!" Harper nearly yelped as he jumped out of his seat and climbed on top of it to rummage through the luggage. After a moment, he pulled out a Muggle contraption that I instantly recognized as Colin's camera. "Creevey gave it to Harm so she could document this year at Hogwarts. This seems like a perfect moment to document."
"No—"
"Say, 'I love when Mal's on top of me'," Harper commanded as he held up the camera clumsily.
"What—no!" was all I was able to spew before Harper found the right button and blinded me with the flash. The only reason I didn't lunge at Harper to grapple with him for the camera was because Malfoy was sleeping so peacefully on my shoulder, and I knew he needed it. And...also...there was large part of me that enjoyed the sensation of his flesh resting on mine in a way that didn't warrant nervousness and expectations. It grounded our physical attraction to something deeper, something that could not and would not be easily uprooted.
∆
Fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—Malfoy shifted from my shoulder to Astoria's only moments before awakening, and therefore was under the impression that he had taken his nap with her as a pillow. He proceeded to joke about how he should sleep on her more often since it was the best sleep he'd ever gotten, and judging by the way his eyes lingered in my direction, I knew he was only saying it to irk me. Astoria was in too much of a dreary daze to comprehend what he'd said, and replied with a classic, "I know I'm amazing" before slumping away.
The next few days back at school were as uneventful as the last week of the winter holiday had been. Malfoy and I had spent our last days at the Manor holed up in my bedroom, reading and praying that the Dark Lord wouldn't disturb us. He appeared to have more important things to do than worry about his two teenage Death Eaters, luckily, and we'd left Malfoy Manor without any more threats to our lives.
The fear hadn't mitigated upon our return to Hogwarts, though. Snape hadn't proved to be a threat—to us, anyway—but I was nervous that he would catch onto the fact that Harmony had Latched onto Harper. Even if he did discover the truth, though, would he tell Voldemort? I just couldn't be sure with Snape. I had hope that he would preserve Harper's life, even if the young boy had never been his favorite student, if only for the sake of the rest of the wizarding world, which was why the Carrows were the ones that were making me truly anxious.
Before the break, their torturous ways had lessened to a degree, but something about being away from Hogwarts for two weeks had rekindled their heinous desires, and in only three days they had given out over forty detentions, many of which had included some very unorthodox methods of punishment. Somehow, I'd managed to evade punishment along with my fellow Slytherins, and our House's privilege was exemplified in the population of students in the library. Melody and I went there every day after dinner, and it was becoming increasingly rare to see anyone who wasn't sporting a green tie. I was beginning to wonder when the Carrows would just throw the rest of the Houses in the dungeons and declare this a "Slytherin only" school.
"That's four Ravenclaws so far," Melody droned, though I hadn't been aware that she'd been counting since her eyes were glued to her book. We were sitting at one of the library's tables, Melody studying up on the best ways to murder a vampire while I read about the history of Seers. Apparently Melody had also been watching every student that entered the library with some invisible extra pair of eyes. "That's an all time low. Usually they crowd up this place with their know-it-all-ness."
"Yeah, well, now all the Slytherins are crowding up this place with their snootiness," I whispered, glancing over her shoulder at the tables of only Slytherins. Malfoy was at one of them with Goyle, I noticed now, but he wasn't facing me, and I doubted he would want to talk. We were on good terms, sure, but friends was still not the phrase either of us would use to define our relationship.
"You're just bitter because you're lover's here and he's not snogging you," she drawled, reaffirming the fact that she had an extra pair of eyes. "Go sit with him, Fitzroy. I would prefer it. You talk too much—"
"You were the one that started this conversation—"
"What have you learned today?" she prompted as though she were my instructor. Her eyes peeked up over her book now, and she raised her purple eyebrows at me.
"I...well...nothing that I don't already know—"
"That's because you're only looking up information about Seers. Their magic is basic compared to Clairvoyants. Why won't you expand your research?"
"I...dunno," I admitted sheepishly. "I just...I'm not sure I want to know what I'm capable of, you know? What if I can do things that I don't want to do and the fact that I know I can do them makes them possible when they weren't before?"
"What if you're overcomplicating everything and pissing me off?" she countered, and I rolled my eyes.
"You asked... What are you hoping I can do, Melody? Kill your father with my Clairvoyance?"
"You could probably find a way to See what he's doing but you're too stubborn to try. It's no matter, anyway," she added as her vision slid back to her book. "You're slow and dim. It'll take you longer to learn how to harness your power than it'll take me to murder my father. Did you know that vampire meat tastes better than steak?"
I scrunched my nose as my lips contorted with disgust. "Are you planning to eat your father after you murder him?"
She shrugged noncommittally. "It would be funny."
"It would not be funny. God, your sense of humor—Is that what you've been reading about for the past two weeks? How your father's carcass will taste?"
"No, I didn't read at all." My eyebrows perked up dubiously, so she added, "I had the entire castle to myself. Do you think I read when I'm by myself?"
"Um...yes?"
"I only read when others are around," she scoffed, shaking her head. "Half of the appeal of reading is to be able to drown out everyone else's incessant noise. When no one else was here, I was able to explore the castle in complete silence—except for the ghosts. Those bloody bastards throw the most obnoxious parties..."
I bit my lip and drummed my fingers on the table. "Melody... Do you actually hate everyone, or is this just some act you put on to seem tough?"
"Optimism doesn't look good on you, Fitzroy—"
"I'm serious," I insisted, leaning across the table toward her. "I know you loved Lyle even though he was everything you should hate, and maybe it was just because you Latched onto him but...it seemed like more than that."
Her eyes were still fixed on her book, but they were no longer moving. She didn't even seem to be breathing, but I knew she was listening, and so I plunged on.
"Do you love Harper? Do you love your sister? Do you love anyone? Or are you just a hollow shell of hate? And...if you are...what are you living for?"
Melody placed her book down carefully on the table but still refused to meet my gaze. "All you do is care about people, and look where's it's gotten you. You're miserable—"
"And you're not?"
"I am," she ground out, now glaring viciously at me with those dark green eyes. "I am miserable, and why do you think that is? It's because everything I've ever cared about has been peeled away from me like layers of skin—leaving me as a bare skeleton. My mother was broken before I was born, my sister was destroyed before my very eyes, and Lyle...was stolen from me. I haven't forgotten about the thief. Once my father is finished, I will tear Voldemort limb from limb. Until then, though, there are too many uncontrollable variables. I can't afford to care about anyone now. There aren't any layers left."
"So you wouldn't care if You-Know-Who murdered Harper? You wouldn't care if I died?"
Her mouth remained shut as she stared out the window at the snow falling through the darkness of night.
"Even if you manage to put your father and You-Know-Who in the ground, there will always be new threats. There will always be 'bad guys', and beyond that there will always be danger. I could get a vision right now, fall down, and crack my skull. Harmony could fall off her broom playing Quidditch. Harper could be ogling at you and then slip and fall down four flights of stairs. You can't deny that's a possibility, because I'm honestly surprised it hasn't happened yet—"
"All of your scenarios include falling," Melody pointed out flatly. "Are you all really that clumsy?"
I crossed my arms over my chest and cocked my head to the side. "You're missing the point—"
"I get the point, Fitzroy. But I won't care very much if any of you fall and instantly die. It's pathetic, and I'll probably laugh—"
"You'll laugh?"
"That surprises you?"
"Well, no," I admitted before puffing out a breath and sitting up straight. "Do you love Harper, Melody?"
"Does it matter if I do?"
"It's just..." I sighed, running a hand through my hair. "If we all make it through this war...Harper and Harmony..."
"I'm aware," she growled as her eyes narrowed. "Why do you think I stopped sleeping with Harper? I'm a bitch but I'm not petty. I know when I'm crossing a line."
My brow creased skeptically. "Do you? I feel like you typically don't—"
"She's my sister. She's already been through enough shit, don't you think?"
"Well, yes, but...I just didn't think you cared... And, I thought...well, Harper thought you were hiding something—something physical—which was why you weren't sleeping with him or allowing anyone to see you unclothed—"
"Of course Harper would think that. That's his pitiful way of excusing the fact that I simply don't want to be with him."
"Do you? Not want to be with him, I mean."
Without a response, Melody picked up her book and resumed reading. I was going to prod her again, but then I realized why she'd halted our conversation; someone was approaching our table, someone who had been avoiding me for the past four days that we'd been at school. She looked distressed, her orange hair in a messy ponytail and her eyes an odd pinkish hue. When she arrived at our table, she refused to glance in Melody's direction and kept her bleary eyes trained on me.
"Lainey," Ginny greeted tautly. "Can we talk?"
"Not in here," Melody grumbled. "Go somewhere else, Weasley."
I shot my Slytherin companion a scathing look before standing from my seat and nodding toward the library's exit. We departed in silence, not daring to speak until we were in the empty third floor corridor.
"Is this about Harry?" I whispered immediately, but she shook her head, scanning the hall for any listening ears before commencing.
"Lainey...I...I can't do this anymore," she blubbered, stopping her strides completely to wipe tears from her eyes. "Everything is falling apart—D-Dumbledore's Army is crumbling. Luna was taken—"
"I'm really sorry about that, Ginny, I am," I assured her earnestly, but she didn't seem nearly as angry as she had that day on the train.
"I-I know you didn't have a ch-choice. I wouldn't want t-to see you locked up either... It's just...enraging—how easily they can beat us. We're witches and wizards and we have absolutely no power." She sucked in a shaky breath and then calmed herself with an exhale. "Is Luna okay? Did they hurt her?"
"No, she's all right. Locked in the cellar at Malfoy Manor, of course, but...she's alive. I hated leaving her to come back here, but...there's just nothing I can do about anything. I've felt this powerless for so long... Since I got the Mark, I suppose..."
"Neville wants to keep fighting, but he doesn't want anyone else getting hurt, and I don't see what we can do that won't lead to dire consequences. Every member of Dumbledore's Army has gotten at least one detention this week, and they aren't easy on us. They've been...chaining students to the walls, like we're prisoners. M-Michael tried to free one of the first years that they chained up, and the Carrows used the Cruciatus Curse on him so bad that he passed out and hasn't woken up yet. I...I was just visiting him before I came here, in the hospital wing... He was a bit of a prick to me when we dated, sure, but he's not evil, and he means well—and he certainly didn't deserve what they did to him. No one does. We're going to lose, Lainey. Hogwarts is already theirs, the Ministry is already theirs, soon the whole world will be."
"Well...if you came to me for an inspirational pep talk, I'm probably going to disappoint," I confessed, and she actually let out a hiccoughing laugh. "I'm trying my best, and I know you are too. We probably will lose, but that doesn't mean we should surrender."
Chewing on her lip, Ginny glanced back toward the library and sighed. "Sometimes I wish I were you. Even if You-Know-Who wins, you still have a chance to live, don't you?"
I blinked as she stared down at my forearm, where the Dark Mark lay. "What kind of life would that be, Ginny?"
"Not a great one, but...you'd have Malfoy, at least. If You-Know-Who wins, Harry will be dead—my whole family will be dead. Even if I could live after that, I wouldn't want to."
"Neither would I. Your family is like family to me. You're like family to me. You're more of a sister to me than Harry is a brother—but still I wouldn't want to see either of you die. We'll find a way to make it through this, and if we don't...we'll all go down together. Yeah?"
She nodded silently, sniffling back any remaining tears. "Christmas was terrible. All I could think about was the year that we played hide and jinx—remember how fun that was? We were all together, and we were all so happy... This Christmas, more than half of us weren't even there. You, Ron, Hermione, Harry... How could we let the good times pass so quickly?"
"I don't know," I said, my voice barely reaching a whisper. My mind was trailing back to all of the good times of my youth, all of the carefree fun that I'd taken for granted and the tedious drama that I'd thought was such a big deal. I wanted to relive every moment of it, the good and the bad, knowing what I knew now. I'd gone through most of my life naively thinking that nothing could get worse... Now I wanted to savor every prank with the Weasleys, every laugh with Ginny, every petty fight with Malfoy, because even when I'd been sad or mad or hysterical in the past, nothing compared to the complete despair that had characterized my life over the past year and a half. I remembered the day in my second year when I'd cried in these very corridors after seeing the boggart turn into my dead father and brothers. How I would have sobbed if I'd known that the boggart had been predicting my future rather than my fears...
As if the thought of fear had summoned it, darkness suddenly clouded my eyes, but it was not the kind of darkness that consumed me when I received a vision; it was the kind of darkness one found themselves in when a bag was thrown over their head.
"What the bloody—Hey!" I exclaimed, kicking and thrashing as two people grabbed hold of either of my arms. Feebly, I tried to buck my head to remove the cloth sac, but they'd secured it tight, ensuring that I saw nothing of where we were now walking.
"Where are you taking her?" Ginny demanded as she stalked after us.
"It's a secret, Weasley," a familiar voice drawled, and I jerked my elbow in his direction when I recognized it as Malfoy's. "Quit it, Mudblood. If you'd like to join us, Weasley, you're welcome."
I halted my struggling at Malfoy's words, and I could tell Ginny was just as baffled, because she stammered, "I-I can?"
"Of course. I'm surprised you don't already know. I'm certain that I gave that ferret loving freak specific instructions to invite you. He's in love with you, isn't he?"
"Anderson, you mean? Well...he was. Now he avoids me like I'm a diseased rat."
"I think weasel was the word you were looking for there," Malfoy said, chuckling mildly at his own joke. I attempted to elbow him again and he tightened his grip on my arm. "Feisty today, Fitzroy. Don't worry, Weasley, I'm accustomed to restraining her. If I hadn't learned how, there'd be no stopping her from ripping off all my clothes every time we're alone in a room together."
"You're hilarious, Malfoy," my muffled voice snapped. I could distinctly hear a low chortle on my other side, and I assumed that it belonged to Goyle. "Where are you taking me? How did you even know where to find me?"
"Goyle was watching you in the library," Malfoy informed me breezily as we began to ascend stairs. I should have known how to do it from muscle memory, but somehow I managed to trip on almost every single step. "Did you think we were there to study? We followed you as soon as you and Weasley left, but then she was crying so pathetically—"
"Do you want me to jinx you, Malfoy?" Ginny threatened from behind. "I'm not opposed to watching bats shoot out of your nose."
"I'm just trying to explain the situation to Fitzroy. You know how moody the Mudblood gets when she's uninformed."
"Aren't you going to defend me, Ginny?" I questioned, nearly falling forward when we reached the top step and I thought there were more.
"Well, you are rather adamant about always knowing everything—"
"But I'm not moody—"
"Well..."
"I'm not—"
"I'd say you're being fairly moody right now," Malfoy reckoned, and I made another attempt to drive my elbow into his side. As punishment, he let me fall to my knees as we began up the next staircase. "We can't tell you where we're going because it's a surprise. If that's not enough of a hint, then you're truly the daftest witch of your age."
"Oh, is that my new title? Will you put it next to my name in the Hogwarts yearbook?"
"What's a yearbook?" was Malfoy's only response, and I rolled my eyes under the bag.
"Why would the fact that this is a surprise give me any hint as to what the surprise is? That is the worst clue I've ever received."
"Maybe you are the daftest witch of our age," Ginny said, causing me to emit a gasp that was interrupted by a grunt as I stumbled on one of the steps. "I just mean that I already have a fairly good idea as to what's about to happen—"
"You can see—"
"Oh, don't tell me that your all powerful Seeing eyes haven't predicted this already, Fitzroy," Malfoy teased as we came to an abrupt halt. I wished that my Seeing eyes could peer through the darkness of this sac on my head, but, unfortunately, I still had very little knowledge pertaining to our position other than that we were in a corridor a few floors above the third.
"If this is what I think it is, though," Ginny's voice rang through the quietness, "then Malfoy's the one who doesn't have a clue—"
"Of course I have a clue. Who do you think contrived this plan, Weasley? Goyle?"
Goyle shifted awkwardly at my side as Malfoy let go of me. Perhaps I should have taken the opportunity to run, considering Malfoy's unnaturally good mood could only mean bad news for everyone else, but Ginny was still here, and since her perception of this situation didn't permit concern, I allowed my curiosity to root me to the spot.
"I don't believe today is the day you think it is, Malfoy," Ginny said as a doorknob clicked. I wasn't sure what to expect as the door creaked open, but the jubilant ruckus of laughter and music was the last noise I would have anticipated from any surprise that Malfoy had orchestrated.
"Today is exactly the day I think it is," Malfoy droned with his normal haughtiness as he yanked the bag off my head.
Blonde curls obscured my view, but I brushed them hastily out of the way to witness what lie in the portal before me. It certainly wasn't a room that I'd known existed in Hogwarts, but there was something familiar about it despite its oddities. The first objects that caught my attention were three ginormous water slides that spiraled from the ceiling at the far side of the room and emptied into a pool that was currently occupied by at least twenty students. The rest of the room was packed with students dancing in party attire and swimsuits that sipped on butterbeer as they jammed out to the Weird Sisters. Carl Vaisey was manning a bar on the right side of the room, handing out a medley of butterbeers and Bletchley's potions. Currently, he was attempting to coax Hufflepuff Stephanie Wood into buying a pink potion that I knew was Nice&Nude. She was smirking but clearly unconvinced.
"What the hell...?" Malfoy muttered as his grey eyes studied the scene.
"Oh, did you not intend to bring me to this huge party that the entire school is attending?" I questioned, crossing my arms as I glanced up at him.
"Lainey!" someone exclaimed, and I spun my head to see that Ryan Harper was running out of the crowd to approach us. Like many other males in this crazy room, he was shirtless and wearing green swimming trunks, but there was something about him that I couldn't stop staring at. A part of my brain would always see Harper as that little eleven-year-old boy with the goofy grin, but right now, as he stood before me at nearly the same height as Malfoy, he appeared strangely mature.
"Why didn't you alert us that she was coming in?" Harper asked Malfoy, who still seemed perturbed by the party thumping around us. Goyle had closed the door, sealing us in this party chamber, and Ginny was nearly giggling as she marveled at the water slides.
"I didn't think you'd start the party before we got here. Nor did I think it would turn out like this," Malfoy grumbled as he motioned toward the water park on the opposite side of the room. His eyes narrowed as he caught onto the three silver poles that extended from the ground in front of us, none of which I'd noticed in all of the commotion. "Are those—"
"Stripper poles? Yes," Theodore Nott confirmed as he materialized out of nowhere and handed Malfoy and I each a butterbeer. His hair was dry, indicating he hadn't been in the pool, but he'd still taken this opportunity to be shirtless, which many of the girls seemed to be enjoying, judging by the goggling eyes. "You told me to make this party awesome, so I stepped up to the wall and thought, 'Strip club, strip club, strip club'—"
"While I simultaneously wished for a water park," Blaise Zabini intoned as he joined our group, tossing a butterbeer at Ginny, who barely caught it.
"You like water parks?" I asked Blaise with raised eyebrows. "I can't see you liking water parks—or anything, for that matter. You are the dullest person I know."
In response, he gave me a cold, dry stare that only confirmed my opinion. I was going to point out that he wasn't even wearing swimming trunks, but Theo interjected first.
"Oh, happy birthday, Mudblood. I'm glad you were born. Not because any of us actually like you, but because you're the only person who Draco would ever plan a party like this for, and this party is hot. No one's taken a spin on the poles yet, but the water park was a good idea as far as getting girls to lose the school uniforms."
"The water park was my idea," Blaise piped up blandly.
"It was a good one," Malfoy said, craning his neck to look past his friends at a group of half-dressed females.
I rolled my eyes rather dramatically. "Ginny was right: You don't have a clue, Malfoy. If you listened to me, you would know that today isn't my birthday."
"We know you love to deny your birthday, Lay, but it's January 8th," Harper informed me as he tapped the bottom of my butterbeer bottle and slowly pushed it toward my mouth. "You need to drink. I'll go get you more—"
"No, Harper," I persisted as I grabbed his wrist. "It's not my birthday. I-I'm a Potter, remember? Harry was born in July—five months ago. My real birthday's in August—August 8th."
"Oh..." Harper said as his shoulders deflated. After a moment of contemplation, though, his blue eye lit up. "That means I'm older than you! We all are! You're the youngest member of the Slytherin Six. Well, now we need to start treating you like the baby of the group. I'll take that butterbeer away—"
"Don't get all parental on me, Harper," I chided, smirking as I backed out of his reach and then slurped down some of the sweet drink.
"You screwed up bad, mate," Theo said to Malfoy as he sipped on his own bottle of butterbeer. "Don't even know your girl's birthday."
"Oh, I know it," Malfoy assured him, taking a swig of his drink that was, somehow, as pompously executed as every other move he'd ever made. "I just knew that purposely having this party on the wrong date would irk Fitzroy, and that's the only point of all this, isn't it?"
He shot me a wink that made me want to hurl my bottle at him and tear off his clothes at the same time. I refrained from both and simply downed the rest of my butterbeer, allowing the warmth of it to permeate my interior as the sultry air of this water park strip club coated my exterior. When I finished, I chucked the empty bottle back at Theo and then twisted to face Ginny.
"Race down the water slides?"
"I'm game," Harper enthused as he passed off his drink to Blaise.
"I didn't bring a swimsuit, though," Ginny griped as I grabbed her forearm and tugged her away from the Slytherin boys. Students of all Houses were present, and I wanted to know if Malfoy had intended to invite them all or if word had just gotten around, but instead I focused on loosening my Slytherin tie, and once it was free I flung it back at Malfoy and laughed when it hit his face.
"Neither did I."
Ginny was, surprisingly, not very opposed to the idea of stripping down into our undergarments to go down the slides. We were too deep in the crowd for Malfoy to see, but Theo was peering over heads at us, shouting, "Oi, we've got two strippers! Wouldn't pay more than two knuts to watch 'em, but they're females! Come back to the poles, Fitzroy!"
"Go back to hell, Nott!" Ginny yelled in response, and I laughed uninhibitedly as we weaved through the throng of dancing students toward the slides. Insecurity didn't burden me as we waltzed half-naked through a sea of familiar faces; the Dark Mark on my forearm would have felt shameful months ago, but now I wore it as a reminder that there were times that had been and will be much worse than this, and so I should live in the moment, enjoy what I had, abandon my reserve, and just make the most of whatever abnormal settings I found myself in.
"We're in the Room of Requirement, aren't we?" I asked Ginny as we neared the pool. Travis Anderson was making a point of splashing every person he could while Rachel Harper swam behind him and apologized to all of his victims.
"Yeah, it is," Ginny confirmed. "It's a bit weird to think this is the same place we had all our D.A. meetings in... I've always heard rumors that older students threw parties in here, but I didn't expect it to be like this. Nott's defiled this room with his foul mind."
"Zabini did a good job, though," I admitted, admiring the tubular green slide that loomed above us. "I haven't been to a water park since I was a kid."
"I haven't been to one at all. It's not much of a wizard thing, I s'pose. Though, if we do make it out of this war alive, perhaps I can convince Fred and George to open a magical water park. That would be wicked."
I wanted to agree, but trying to think about Fred and George post-war—or at all, really—was giving me a depressive headache, so I was thankful when Harper, who was positioned at the bottom of the farthest slide, called over, "Ready?"
"We have to climb all these bloody stairs first," I retorted, but he simply chuckled before jogging up the spiral steps that led to the top of his slide. I'd taken the middle one, while Ginny had claimed the left one, and it took us almost a full minute to reach the top. The slides were impossibly tall, and the faces of our peers below were nearly indistinguishable. When I glanced toward the front of the room, where we'd been standing with the Slytherin boys a few moments ago, I saw that they'd all dispersed, and Malfoy was nowhere to be found.
"You are so slow!" Harper yelled over to me.
I waved an unfriendly finger in his direction. "See you at the bottom," I taunted before launching myself into the plastic tube.
Harper's shouts of protest were lost as my body whizzed into darkness. When I was younger, I'd always been afraid to go down the slides alone. I'd pretended to be brave, and I'd force Garren and Evan to go first so they wouldn't see me beg Lyle to go down with me. There had never really been much pleading involved, though; Lyle always accompanied me, and he never told our other brothers why. It was a stupid fear, really, like all of Evan's phobias, but there was something about the dark unknown of this tube that had always been daunting to me. Perhaps it was the notion that I was leaving something good behind and the place I would end up might not be as good.
There was nowhere I could end up now though that could possibly be worse than all of the places I'd been. So I slid through the blackness calmly, soaking in the momentary silence before I blasted out the end into the pool—and a person who was wading in the pool.
He was actually chortling when he pulled me out of the water, and I sucked in a breath before coughing up gross pool water. After prying my wet hair away from my face, I blinked my eyes open and was unsurprised to find Draco Malfoy standing before me with a drink in his hand and a grin on his lips. Shirtless and dangerously close, I could feel his body heat through the water, and even though we were surrounded by others, I was strongly reminded of the last time we'd been in such an intimate position.
"Well, Mudblood, looks like we've found ourselves in a pool again. Shall we finish what we started?"
My eyes darted around at all of the witnesses, all of the innocent little first and second years that were splashing around in the water. "This is...different."
He inched closer to me, his eyes roving over my body, which was partially obscured by the water. Even so, with the intensity of his gaze, I felt that he was staring into my soul rather than at my skin. "Not so different... You're still wearing that ghastly bra."
My eyebrows shot up in disbelief. "Are you suggesting that I take it off?"
"Not here," he scoffed with a collective glare at all of our companions. "I was actually referring to the fact that you're wearing the same bra. Didn't you see the little gift on your bed this morning?"
"Don't talk so loud. Ashley could be listening. You know she's still trying to 'uncover to truth' of who cheated the game and gave their partner a Christmas gift."
"Well, this wasn't a Christmas gift. It was a birthday gift—"
"It's not my birthday—and since when do you give birthday gifts, anyway? I thought you were against that sort of kindness."
"I am, unless it benefits me, of course."
"Of course..." I repeated with an exaggerated eye roll. "Well, for your information, I did find your gift, and it was certainly little. Either way I wouldn't have worn it," I amended when his lips began to curl, "but it didn't fit. Too small."
"That was the point, Fitzroy—"
"Oh? And was the point of this party to get me undressed? You could have done that easily if you just got us alone in the same room." His coolness faltered at that, so I added, "I'm just dying to rip off our clothes all the time, aren't I?"
The smirk didn't resume at that, though. After a moment of scrutiny, he took a swig of his drink and said, "I didn't plan this party with ulterior motives. I just...figured that after everything that went down at the Manor, we could both use...something like this. Some kind of distraction."
"You know that I'm also content with late night walks in the moonlight, fancy dinners, jewelry...pedicures—"
He rolled his eyes at that. "I know you're not so easily wooed. I'll remember all that, though, in case I ever am forced to marry Greengrass."
I bit my lip as I searched beyond him for any signs of Astoria. She usually thrived at these types of events, but I couldn't even find a trace of her sparkly head in the mass of students. "I don't think she's that easily wooed either. Not anymore."
When I met his gaze again, his expression had become stony, and he seemed to be mulling over something serious, something he was about to say, but before he could open his mouth, there was a giant splash beside us. I spun to see that Anderson, who I hadn't noticed before, had just been drenched by the wave, and he was spluttering indignantly as the perpetrator surfaced.
"Watch where you're splashing! You almost drowned Smell—" He paused his lecture, blinking as Ginny flipped her red hair out of her face. Bafflement consumed her features at the sight of shirtless Anderson in the pool before her, holding little white Smellfoy in his arms.
"Wh-What are you doing with a ferret in a pool?" she demanded incredulously.
"I was trying to teach him how to swim—"
"What took you so long in the slide?" I asked Ginny as I nodded toward the tube that she had just been ejected from.
"I got stuck in some sort of magical wormhole, I reckon. Certainly not going down that thing again—"
"Hey, hey, chumps!" Harper called as he struggled through the water to reach us. "My brain was just whammed by the most brilliant idea for a game—"
"More brilliant than The Game?" I questioned as he positioned himself between Malfoy and me.
"Well, no, but—"
"Did you get stuck in a wormhole too?" Ginny interrupted as she motioned toward Harper's slide.
"A worm—what—no, Weasel, I was just scolding my younger sister for wearing such skimpy swimming attire. If I were your older brother, I'd be scolding you as well—"
"We're the same age—"
"Oh, and, Lay, c'mon, what are you doing?" Harper complained as he refocused his attention on me. "You've still got that old bra? Are you expecting to impress Mal with that thing? Because I'm not very impressed—Not that I was looking at...you—"
"How have you seen her bra before, Harper?" Malfoy asked after finishing off his drink and tossing his glass over onto the solid ground. Surprisingly, it didn't shatter. Magic.
"A-Anderson was looking through her drawers that one time after the second task, remember? I have not slept with Lay—"
"All right, Harper. Why don't you explain this game to us before you dig yourself into a bottomless pit, hm?" I prompted as I crossed my arms over my ancient bra.
"Oh—yeah—okay. Let's go round everyone up so I only have to explain it once. Also, Lay, your job is to find Harmony and tell her she's not allowed to play."
"She's—here? And she's not allowed to play? Why?"
"You'll see," he said almost ruefully before hauling himself out of the pool. The remaining four of us did the same, each of us soaked and trailing water as we shuffled through the dancing crowd. Ginny and Anderson complied to Harper's wishes and attempted to usher everyone toward the center of the dance floor while Malfoy simply sauntered to the other side of the room and retrieved another glass of hard liquor from the bar.
As my eyes roved the room for a head of blue hair, I was struck with the notion that maybe Malfoy had only been so flirty with me in the pool because of the alcohol. Sure, he flirted with me in the cave and at the Manor and any time we were alone, but it was rare for him to show affection in public. The thought shouldn't have bothered me; it was to be expected of the git. But, still...there would always be that lingering hope in me that he could change—that we could be something, not just to ourselves but to everyone else too.
As the music died down, the pool emptied, and all of the tipsy students gathered in a circle around Harper, I finally spotted Harmony on the outskirts of the horde, her blue hair bright against the dullness of everyone else's.
"Harmony," I said, grabbing her sweater-covered arm with my wet hand. I withdrew immediately, but she still turned to face me with mild shock.
"Lainey—hey. Oh—you're drenched. Here." She paused to pull out her wand and cast a Hot-Air Charm on me, which instantly dried every inch of my body. The warmth of the room returned to me, and I nodded my thanks at her as I collected my unruly hair up into a knot.
"Harper's got a game planned," I informed her as we both looked toward the converging crowd. "He says you're not allowed to play."
"Of course he does," she muttered, scowling over at him as he drew in everyone's attention. "He's been especially cruel to me since we got back to school. S'pose he figures it'll make our...connection less obvious."
"He...cares about you," I assured her, but my voice sounded weak. "Are you...doing okay—with the whole thing? I'm sorry that it had to be this way. I know what it's like, but it must be even worse for you..."
"It's not the same as you and Fred," she said, her green eyes gazing far away as she spoke. "You love Fred. Harper... I... Well, it'd be more like how you'd feel if you couldn't be around Malfoy anymore—because of your healing connection. It sucks, sure, but...it's not like you're in love with him. I don't...love Harper..."
I winced rather noticeably, maybe because of what she'd assumed about my sentiments toward Malfoy or maybe because her lie about her feelings for Harper was painfully blatant.
"Did it...go well with you two over the holiday?" I asked her, but her sigh contradicted my suspicions.
"Well, I slept in his room."
"Oh?"
"Not in his bed. Well—yes, in his bed, but he slept on the floor," she explained uneasily. "Anyway...every night he would mumble in his sleep... Mumble her name..."
"Melody," I guessed flatly, and she nodded dejectedly.
"I've...Latched onto him, but even if I hadn't, I would still...fancy him. I would still want to be with him, but I don't want to be with him knowing that he'll always love my sister more than me. Now, I s'pose that dilemma's been solved for me by You-Know-Who. I can't have Harper, so Melody will get him, if only because she wants to spite me."
"Lainey will spin the bottle first, since it's her ex-birthday," Harper announced, pulling my focus back toward him. I wanted to say more to Harmony, but my body went rigid as I comprehended his words.
"Spin the bottle?" I repeated as heads pivoted to face me. "What are you talking about?"
"Did you not listen to a word of my instructions, Lay? I just explained the game to everyone."
"What game? Spin the Bottle? You know that game already exists, right?" I inquired as I approached the circle. I noticed as I neared it that not many members of Dumbledore's Army were present. Most of them, I assumed, were either in detention or in the hospital wing, like Michael Corner. The thought made me feel a bit guilty—being here, having fun, while they were all fighting for freedom from the Carrows. None of the other students seemed to have this haunting thought on their mind, though; they were all anxiously awaiting the beginning of Harper's game, the beginning of a distraction from all of the terrors that had been occurring outside of this room. Ironically, though, this room was where the terror had begun. In a different version of this room, Malfoy and I had allowed the Death Eaters to enter, and their presence hadn't left since...
"This game is like Spin the Bottle on one of Bletchley's insane potions," Harper explained as I stepped into the middle of the circle with him.
"So...you want me to—what? Bonk whoever this bottle lands on? No thank you—"
"No, no, no," Harper reassured me as others began to snicker. "You're gonna spin it three times, and the people it lands on get to be the first players in the game."
"So...I'm not involved?"
"Not yet. Just spin it."
With a glance around the massive circle, I marched up to the empty butterbeer bottle that Harper had placed on the ground and did what was asked of me. Slytherins cheered when it landed on Carl Vaisey, but he just groaned.
"I have to run? This sounds like a lot of unnecessary work..."
"You'll like the reward," Harper assured him before prompting me to spin the bottle again. I was confused as to what the running was about, but I chose not to question it as the bottle rotated toward the next player. The Hufflepuffs whooped this time when it chose Stephanie Wood.
"Better watch out, Vaisey," she taunted, causing him to perk up a bit. He downed a potion while the bottle twirled for a third time, but I didn't get to see what the effects were because I was too honed in on the bottle's third target: Harmony Flemming.
"This will be fun," she said slyly from where she now stood amongst the others.
"What the hell, Lay!" Harper exploded as he stomped over to her. "I told you she's not allowed to play!"
"Just because you're dating my sister doesn't mean you control me, Harper," Harmony snapped, and he blanched as though she'd slapped him. "You're not my big brother yet."
Harper was frozen with her words, but, luckily, whatever potion Vaisey had taken had kept him semi-sober, and so he announced that the game would begin. Unfortunately, he cheated and sprinted across the dance floor toward the pool before the two girls could even register what was happening. They were quick on his heels, but Harmony, who hadn't heard the rules or the object of the game, stopped dead in her tracks when the Slytherin and the Hufflepuff dove into the pool and swam toward the slides. Still in her school uniform, she inhaled a breath and then jumped in after them, only reaching the bottom of the stairs by the time the other two had already reached the top.
"Did you tell her I didn't want her to play?" Harper asked numbly, and for a moment I was so absorbed in the race that I didn't realize he was talking to me.
"I—yes, I told her," I affirmed, and he ran a hand through his damp hair.
"She wouldn't have wanted to if she'd heard what happens at the end," he muttered, glancing down at the bottle.
"You're playing," I reminded him gently. "You can't control her, Harper. She's not a little girl. She's tough. She grew up with Melody."
He let out a laugh but it was hollow. "I know she's tough. That's not why I didn't want her to play. I...eh...selfish reasons."
My brow was knitted, and I was positively confused, but as the three racers emerged from slides, swam across the pool, and ran back toward the circle, I started to understand what Harper meant. Harmony followed as the other two each sprinted through the crowd, spun around respective stripper poles, and then arrived within the middle of the circle, where Harper and I still stood. We slowly joined the outer circle as Stephanie tumbled into the center, followed closely by Vaisey, and then finally Harmony.
"Ha! Beat you," Stephanie sang as she poked Vaisey's bare shoulder. Her golden curls were a dark, flat mess, but she exuded smugness as she stepped up to the bottle and spun it. Harmony's eyes widened as she registered what was happening, and I could feel Harper's dread radiating beside me.
Stephanie's first spin landed on a Ravenclaw boy, choosing him as the next player in the game. The second spin, though, landed on Theo, whose face immediately cracked into a clever grin. Giving Vaisey the same crude gesture that I'd given Harper on the slides, Stephanie sashayed over to Nott and tangled him in an embrace that she likely wouldn't have been so glad to ensnare herself in if she'd been fully sober—or if Vaisey hadn't been watching.
The kiss elicited the desired reaction from jealous Vaisey, who snarled and then marched over to the bottle to spin it for himself. My heart nearly stopped when it landed on me the first time, but that only meant that I had to play next, and while I wasn't necessarily thrilled about the prospect of running this race and then spinning the bottle, I was grateful not to have to snog Vaisey—or anyone—in public...yet...
Vaisey's second spin halted directly on Stephanie, who was still entwined in Theo's arms. I was actually silently cheering Carl on as he stalked over to them, ripped Nott's arms away and then assumed the position that the other Slytherin boy had just been occupying. Stephanie was resistant for only the briefest moment before submitting to the kiss, and the two of them melted into the crowd in a passionate embrace that had the crowd clapping and hollering. Theo's friends were all mocking him, but the excitement didn't last long enough to permanently distract everyone from the final player. Eyes soon turned back to Harmony, who stood paralyzed and alone with the bottle at her sopping wet feet.
"Ummm...she came in last place, so she doesn't have to spin!" Harper announced hastily. "Just pick someone to be the third player in the next round—"
"Rubbish! You said all three players had to spin!" one Ravenclaw girl shouted, and her objection was rapidly repeated by others.
"Well, then, I won't cheat," Harmony stated with a pointed glower in Harper's direction. With that, she bent down, spun the bottle and watched as it twirled and slowed on Draco Malfoy. He stood on the opposite side of the circle from me, chugging a bottle of firewhisky that he instantly dropped upon seeing that the bottle was aimed at him.
"I'm not kissing that half-blood Gryffindor freak—"
"You don't have to," Harper assured him. "Now, next three players get ready—"
"I'm not finished," Harmony injected as she flicked the bottle for a second time. I cringed over at Harper who stared breathlessly and remorsefully as it stopped on a fourth year Hufflepuff boy. The boy seemed dazed as Harmony waltzed over to him and planted a kiss on his lips—her first kiss, likely—all while staring at Harper. I felt an eerie wave of déjà vu, considering I'd done almost the same exact thing just a few years ago to irritate Malfoy, only then Harper had been the object through which revenge was taken rather than the object that revenge was directed toward.
Anderson was the one to lead the game now, since Harper had retreated away from the circle at the sight of Harmony's vengeful kiss. I saw a hint of regret in her eyes when she finally pulled away from the Hufflepuff boy, but I didn't get the opportunity to confront her before I was escorted out of the circle along with a Ravenclaw boy and Draco Malfoy.
"Reeeady, Fitzroy?" Malfoy slurred, his eyes heavily lidded but his eyebrows raised in my direction.
"Druuuunk, Malfoy?" I countered, but he just continued to give me that lazy smile until Anderson yelled, "Go!"
To everyone's shock, including mine, I was actually the first one to make it to the pool. The Ravenclaw boy was big but clumsy and out of shape, rendering it difficult for him to run and then swim across the pool. Malfoy was fitter than me normally, but he'd apparently consumed a few too many drinks and stumbled into the pool before nearly drowning. I waited at the bottom of the steps for him to haul himself out of the water safely, giving the Ravenclaw boy a rather hefty lead on both of us.
Malfoy slipped down the stairs five times before reaching the top, and though his knees were red and bloody, I couldn't help myself from laughing and shaking my head as the two of us disappeared down our separate slides. I was going down the one that Ginny had earlier, and, luckily, I didn't get trapped in some magical wormhole, allowing me to spout from the slide at the same moment that Malfoy did. The Ravenclaw boy was already halfway across the pool now, but Malfoy didn't seem to care; his current objective in this game was to splash me endlessly as I giggled and choked and struggled to reach the other side.
We both slipped and tripped and face-planted as we ran across the dance floor, and I reached the stripper pole with too much inertia, spinning around it three times before I gained control of myself and sling-shotted back toward the circle. The Ravenclaw boy won and was already spinning the bottle for the second time when Malfoy and I stumbled into the ring, his feet just barely a step ahead of mine.
"Malfoy spins next," Anderson declared after the Ravenclaw boy awkwardly kissed a Gryffindor. I didn't think much of Anderson's words until Malfoy swaggered inelegantly up to the bottle, and I became aware of the fact that it would land on someone—someone who probably wouldn't be me—and I would have to watch drunk Malfoy snog some other girl at my "birthday" party. Perhaps it would be better than watching sober Malfoy snog some other girl on his own accord, but not by much.
His first uncoordinated spin stopped on a third year Gryffindor, and her Housemates cheered for the next chosen player. His second spin wasn't as sloppily careless, and everyone watched impatiently as it came to a slow halt. I was considering just leaving, as not to let this stupid game ruin whatever good sentiments I felt toward Draco Malfoy, but then, as my protuberant eyes stared at the decelerating bottle, I realized that the top was pointing at me...
And then it wasn't. The tip of the bottle stopped one notch too late, landing not on me but on the girl standing at my left, the gorgeous, pureblood, fourth year Slytherin that Malfoy had always tantalized me with: Coral Dent.
Smirking devilishly, she flipped her silky red hair over her shoulder and pursed her lips as Malfoy started in our direction. As he passed the bottle, though, he tapped it slightly with his foot, causing the tip to point directly at me instead of Coral. For a petrifying moment, I thought that he'd done it accidentally, that he would still stroll over to Coral and kiss her still, but then the craftiest of smirks pulled at his lips, and his grey eyes settled on me as if Coral didn't exist. Though no physical aura radiated off of him, I knew exactly what thoughts and intentions were swimming through his mind.
Still, though, he managed to catch me off guard when he sauntered up to me and pressed his body to mine instead of his lips. There was something gentle but also predatory about the way he guided me through the crowd, my feet stumbling over each other as I walked backward, leaving the circle of ogling students at Malfoy's back. He didn't stop until he was forced to stop—until my spine collided with the metal pole that I had left behind only moments ago.
Though he wasn't rough as he pinned me between pole and himself, there was something unsettlingly wrong about this scenario, something about the way his glazed eyes peered down at me that made it feel like he wasn't really there. He wasn't possessed or in a trance or anything magical, but he was just...drunk. And this wasn't how I'd envisioned our first public kiss to be—in the Room of Requirement on my fake birthday after he'd spun the bottle and had purposely made it choose me... But, maybe that was what made it candid and real—the fact that there was nothing perfect or planned about it. Our relationship had been built upon a series of spontaneous situations, so maybe it was only fitting that we publicly displayed our affections in a way that was completely random.
When his face closed in, though, I knew that I couldn't do it. They all thought we did; the entire crowd cheered—even the other Houses that hated us, even the Slytherins that hated us—as our faces met. Their view of it was distorted and skewed from the angle they watched us from, but only the corners of our lips brushed as I whispered onto his cheek, "You're drunk."
He didn't flinch or pull away, but I felt his body stiffen where my hands rested on his sides. Our bare skin was touching in so many places, and this was physically the closest we'd ever been, but for some reason he felt impossibly far away, and I couldn't shake the loneliness that devoured me in this room full of people.
"Malfoy's kissing Potter!" Theo's voice rang out throughout the clamorous crowd as we remained in this awkward embrace. I thought Malfoy would pull away and deny it, but he kept his cheek rested against mine, his breaths strong and even despite the frigidity of his body.
I could have kissed him then, and perhaps I should have; everyone thought that we did, and whatever humiliation came with that would occur whether or not the kiss was real. But even if everyone thought we were this uncommitted couple that enjoyed drunk snogging, that wasn't what I wanted us to think about our relationship—and that wasn't what I wanted our relationship to be. Maybe one day Malfoy would be kissing Potter, but today wasn't that day. My lips craved it, but my heart wasn't ready. There were too many cracks and fissures, and none of them could be filled by the drunk affections of this boy that I loved. I wondered if any of them could ever be filled at all.
∆
Unfortunately—or perhaps fortunately—Malfoy suddenly fainted in my arms as we "kissed", and therefore I was unable to take my turn spinning the bottle because I had to drag his heavy body back to the Slytherin dungeons. I kept thinking that we would get caught as I hauled him down the stairs, but then I remembered that all of the Prefects had been at the party and the Carrows were probably too busy tormenting members of Dumbledore's Army to be patrolling the corridors.
My body was aching by the time we entered the empty common room, and I wasn't very gentle when plopping Malfoy onto one of the leather couches by the fireplace. His eyes fluttered open as he moaned, and when he registered who I was in the flickering light of the fire, he scrunched his nose.
"Where are we?"
I ignored him as I grabbed one of the green knit blankets and threw it over his damp, bare torso. "How do you feel?"
"Like I was thumped on the head by a mountain troll," he grumbled as he curled the blanket up to his chin. "My body wasn't ready for...that."
"For...what?"
"Drinking, running, swimming...snogging..."
I rolled my eyes as I sat down on the floor next to the couch and stared at his pale face. "We didn't snog."
He pried one eye open to give me a dubious look. "You think I don't know that?"
"Well...you are a bit...out of it..."
"I'm not...completely over that curse yet," he admitted, wincing as he turned on his side to face me. "I didn't drink that much, I was just...loopy from it... Still dizzy..."
"You should rest. We can talk tomorrow."
"Talk?" he repeated as both of his eyes sprung open. "What—are you cross with me because I didn't snog Coral Dent? If you hadn't been there—"
"You would have kissed her?" I finished when he paused.
His jaw shifted as he stared past me at the fire. "I wouldn't have had a choice, I suspect. But...I wouldn't have wanted to, even in this state I'm in. And two years ago, maybe even one year ago, I would have gladly snogged Coral Dent with you in the room just to piss you off."
"But now...what? You think we're at a point in our relationship where it's acceptable for us to snog publicly while you're drunk? As if it means nothing?"
His brow knitted as if he were in pain. "Relationship?"
My face went cold as I clenched my fists and began to stand. "Sleep well, prat—"
"Wait, Fitzroy," he pleaded, unburying his arm from his blanket to grasp my wrist. I didn't wrench myself away, but I was rather adamant about staring at the flames rather than pivoting to face him. "Stay with me...here...tonight. I...need you. I...sleep best with you—when you're around, I mean."
I gnawed on my lip but refused to turn. "I thought you slept best with Astoria."
The smirk in his voice was prominent as he said, "I knew that was you I was sleeping on, Mudblood, on the train. You smell...different."
"I smell good is what I think you meant to say—or maybe just better than Astoria—"
"Let's not come to rash conclusions—"
Spinning, I ripped my arm from his grasp, but my lips were curving when I met his droopy eyes. "Move over."
"Oh—I wasn't inviting you to sleep on this couch with me. No, I think we both know your place is on the floor—"
I yanked the blanket upward and slid under it before he could make any more of his mocking comments. My school uniform was covering my body again, but he was still half naked, and I could feel the ridges of his chest as I sandwiched our bodies together under the warmth of the blanket. The couch was narrow, and our faces were close enough that I could feel the heat of his breath on my lips, but I ignored all of this, every tingling sensation that sparked through my body, and closed my eyes, willing my breathing to remain steady.
"I'm only doing this because I'm a generous human being," I murmured as I forced my eyelids to stay closed.
"I believe I'm being the generous one here, Fitzroy," he purred, each breath sending a shiver down my spine. "This is a privilege, really. Not everyone gets a night with Draco Malfoy."
"Well, I've had several, and it's not an activity I would recommend to others."
"Right, because you're selfish and you want to keep me all to yourself."
"Exactly," I muttered, and though I meant for it to sound sarcastic, the word sounded as genuine as it was due to my sleepiness. He might have continued the banter after that, but I drifted into another reality before his voice hit my ears again.
I was in the Manor's dining room, but the minute details were distorted by a blurry haze. Even so, the atmosphere was lighter with the curtains drawn back, and Draco's hair appeared white in the sunlight that streamed in through the window. He was seated at the head of the table reading a copy of the Daily Prophet, and even though some of the elements were distorted, he was obviously older than the Draco that my body was sleeping within the Slytherin common room. Some wrinkles lined his face, but even in his late thirties, he was just as handsome as he'd ever been with his slicked back hair and sharp features. When his grey eyes glanced up at me, I was petrified...until I realized that he wasn't looking at me, but through me. Someone who was really in this vision had entered the room behind me, and when I spun around, I found that it was almost an exact replica of Draco in his youth.
The young boy was probably twelve or thirteen, and though he wore a clean-cut suit like his father, his blond hair was far more disheveled than Draco's ever was. The color of it was slightly off, as well; instead of the bleach blond of the Malfoys, this boy's hair was a shade or two darker, almost like...almost like a sun-kissed version of my hair color. His grey eyes were his father's, but there was something about the shape of his face that was...familiar...
"Father," the boy prompted, even though Draco was already looking at him. I could barely breathe as my eyes followed him into the room. This was Draco Malfoy's son. I was seeing a vision of...the future. But...if Draco Malfoy had a son...did that make me the mother? It—It couldn't be, though. I couldn't allow my brain to imagine a time past the war, but here we were, in a vision of a post-war world where Draco had a son. Was Voldemort...dead? Was he still here? Did the Death Eaters still occupy this house? It was impossible to tell without leaving the room, but I was planted in this spot; my Seeing abilities only extended so far, and tonight this was all that I was meant to See.
"Is your mother out?" Draco asked his son as he placed the newspaper on the table.
"She went to visit Mrs. Pucey, since she's back from her tour."
"Right, of course... Sit?" the father asked as he pulled out the seat next to his for his son. The boy took it with a nervous smile. "Are you here to complain about your mother? If you are, I'd be glad to join you—"
"No," he said with a laugh as he leaned back slightly in his chair. "Mum hasn't been so crazy lately... She seemed happy that Mrs. Pucey is back."
"I should have gone with her, I reckon, but your mother does love her independence. Wouldn't want to leave you alone, anyway—"
"I'm twelve now, Dad," the boy griped lightheartedly. "I didn't come to talk about that, though. I did come to talk about Mum. I... Did you always love Mum?"
Draco snorted immediately, shaking his head as he stared absently at the Prophet. "No, certainly not." After a long pause, his eyes slivered suspiciously at his son. "Why?"
"I...er...have a crush on someone...from school."
Draco's eyebrows arched with intrigue. "Do you? Does it happen to be the Pucey girl? We could go visit the Puceys, if you're so infatuated—"
"No, Dad, it's not the Pucey girl," he mumbled as he stared down at the table.
"One of the Vaisey girls, then? Or is it a boy? The Palmer boy—"
"It's a girl, Father, but it doesn't matter which girl," the boy interrupted rather exasperatedly. "I just...I like her, but she doesn't like me."
"Well, I have no idea what that must be like," Draco drawled as he stretched his arms behind his head. "Your mother always had a bit of a crush on me, I reckon."
"Always?"
Draco's face darkened as he contemplated. "Perhaps not always. There's hope for you and your girl. Unless she's one of those blasted Weasleys. God, they are everywhere, aren't they?"
The boy coughed an awkward "Yeah" as he scratched the back of his head. "You didn't always love Mum, but...you love her now, right?"
"Of course I do," Draco practically scoffed. "She irks me to no end, but I do."
"Do you love her more than you've ever loved anyone else?"
Draco cocked his head to the side. "This is a trick question, isn't it? If I say I love your mother most, you'll be offended—"
"That I will."
Draco's smirk was crooked as he studied his son. "I love you both, but you most. Don't tell your mother."
The boy's smile was timid, but it faded quickly with his next question. "Does Mum love you more than she's ever loved anyone else?"
All amusement drained in Draco's face as he stared beyond his son, ruminating over his past. "I dunno," he responded finally and truthfully. "I dunno if she loves me more than she's ever loved anyone else. But I hope so."
Michael Corner's torture is mentioned by Neville in The Deathly Hallows Chapter Twenty-Nine, "The Lost Diadem".
Also https://www.quotev.com/120847262 gave me the idea of Draco falling asleep on Lainey's shoulder in the beginning of the chapter :)