"I knew it!" The glowing orb walked towards her. As it appeared from out of the shadows she could make out a cheeky smile and red hair.
"Fred?" Gwen gulped. She didn't know what to do. She had just been trying to understand what happened with Draco minutes ago, and now she was caught.
"So, Malfoy?" Fred got continued to walk towards Gwen.
"It's," Gwen felt like something was grabbing her lungs. "It's not what you think it is?"
"What is it that I think?" Fred leaned against the wall next to her.
"It's nothing bad."
"No, I bet it's real good." Fred teased.
"No!" Her face had no color.
"Defensive are we?"
"I don't understand why it even matters to you." Gwen felt trapped.
"Well, it just proves I was right earlier." Fred said without missing a beat. Fred didn't really care about whether he had been right.
Gwen just stood there. To her there were only two options.
One, tell Fred the truth, but then she would be betraying her promise to Draco.
Two, refuse to tell him anything, and risk Fred telling the whole school that Gwen and Draco were together, which would be even worse.
"Can I trust you?" Gwen finally blurted out.
"Sweetheart, you're the one who lied to me earlier." Fred grinned.
"Can. I. Trust. You?" Gwen grabbed the front of Fred's shirt. She looked him in the eyes with unwavering intensity.
"Yeah." He swallowed. Fred had been caught off guard. He hadn't expected Gwen to take charge. Gwen scanned the hallway. They were still the only two around. She opened the door she had been leaning on, took him inside, and pushed him into an open seat.
Gwen went to the other side of the room. She still didn't know what to do. She knew that she would do anything to protect the people she cared about, and this was the first time she realized Draco was one of those people.
"What do you think you know?" Gwen asserted. She turned to face him. She crossed her arms in front of her.
"You and Malfoy meet down here every Tuesday." Fred exhaled and leaned forward.
"What else?" Gwen's lips twitched both in nervousness and frustration.
"You two are here for about an hour, and you always leave last." Fred rubbed his hands together and looked up at Gwen.
"How?"
"Well I'm assuming you use your legs." Fred joked.
"How do you know that we are here?" Gwen did not have the time for jokes.
Fred stayed silent.
"Well?" Gwen was growing impatient.
"There's a map." Fred confessed.
"A map?" Gwen wasn't going to buy this. How could I be so stupid? When had I been so clueless as to leave a trail? She thought.
"It shows everyone at Hogwarts. It shows you all the rooms and passage ways. If you know who you're looking for it's not hard to navigate. You are here every Tuesday. Then a few minutes later Draco shows up."
"Show me." Gwen thought he must have been pulling a prank on her.
"I don't have it now. Me and George steal it back from Harry when we get bored. He's so clueless he never notices." Fred let out a small chuckle when he said the last part.
"You don't know why we meet here, do you?" Gwen asked. She was starting to believe him.
"No, but why else would two young love birds sneak around the castle?" Fred smiled.
"I promise you it is not like that."
"What's it like then?" Fred stood up.
"You can't tell anyone." Gwen knew that it would be better if people knew it was purely school related, than if it was rumored that Draco was actually friends with Gwen.
"Okay."
"I'm serious. Not George. Not Lee. Not anyone in Gryffindor. You can't tell a single soul." Gwen was trembling. She was pretty sure she could trust Fred, but openly disclosing a secret went against all her values. She felt a lump start to fill in her throat.
Fred saw that Gwen looked like she might break. Fred had only intended to give her a hard time. Seeing her so upset made every inch of his body ache. He walked towards Gwen and placed his hand on her shoulder. He rubbed it lightly and gave her a reassuring smile.
"If it means that much to you, Gwen, I promise I won't tell anyone. Cross my heart." He said softly. Fred put a finger to his heart and drew an "X" across it.
Gwen took a deep breath and she lost the tight feeling in her body.
"I am helping Malfoy with transfigurations. He needed a tutor, and I agreed. That is all." Gwen felt a little relief when Fred looked underwhelmed.
"That's why you have been slinking around the school?" Fred almost laughed in her face, but stopped himself.
"Yes, Malfoy said no one could know. I'm a half-blood, Hufflepuff, muggle lover. I'm probably the worse thing that could ever happen to him, except that I'm good at Transfigurations. He just needs me to get ahead in class." Gwen confessed. She knew that even though she would defend Malfoy, that the feeling was probably not mutual.
"Hmm."
"What?"
"I mean that makes so much more sense. Why else would you converse with Malfoy? He's so awful, and you're so-" Fred stopped himself. He dropped his hand from her shoulder. They both sat for a second.
"Well, now you know. I know it's lame, but I really do appreciate you not telling anyone." Gwen half-smiled. "I'm gonna head back to my common room now, unless you have something else to interrogate me about."
Fred shook his head. He wasn't going to tell, but not for Malfoy's sake. Gwen obviously cared about Malfoy, and Fred didn't want to hurt Gwen, so when George asked him that night if Fred had seen anything he simply replied "No."
Gwen left the room. The day had been more hectic than she could have ever imagined. Even after she was done being confronted by Fred she kept thinking back to the moment she had with Draco. When their hands touched she felt a wave of emotion she had never felt before. She didn't know what it was. She felt it again when Fred had threatened to expose Draco. It felt like a cloud was fogging up her thoughts. She would not admit it to herself, but she knew that whatever she felt for Draco, she felt it all over. She just wanted to go back to their lesson before he walked away. She could have done something different. She wanted to be there for him. She wanted to hold him.
"You're back early." Hannah said as she entered the common room.
"I, um, finished early." Gwen sat down next to her on the couch, and then she remembered she couldn't tell anyone what had just happened.
"That's good." Hannah smiled at her before burying her nose in a book.
"Sure."
Gwen desperately wanted to tell Hannah everything. She hadn't ever kept anything from her this long. She wanted to talk through what she was feeling. She wanted to understand what had switched to make her yearn for someone who a month ago would have called her names. She wanted to ask for advice. Her brain felt like it was swelling with emotion. Gwen couldn't hold everything in all at once. She was only human. This was starting to be too much for her.
She stared blankly at the fire. She needed to tell Hannah. She wanted to tell Ernie and Justin. She wanted to tell her on-call fake brother, Cedric. She wanted to tell Duncan. She wanted to keep talking to Fred tell him more since he knew, but she knew that would be a bad idea. She wanted to talk to Draco. She wanted to understand what happened. She wanted to tell him that Fred knew they had been studying together. She just wanted to look at him. She wanted a hug.
She had a month worth of experiences and secrets, but no one to tell them to.
A single tear fell down. It rolled across her cheek. It landed on her lips. She could taste the salt. She put her hands to her face. Her flesh was hot. She felt her throat tighten. She quickly stood. She started for her room.
"Are you okay?" Matteo Toll tried to stopped her.
She just shook her head. She continued into her room. She got into her bed. Gwen sobbed quietly until she was asleep.
"I need you." A cool voice echoed through her head.
When Gwen woke up the next day she could only remember one thing from her dream. A sound. A short phrase. I need you. She didn't know why they had said it, but she knew who did. Draco.
Gwen had felt much better. Crying had been extremely cathartic. She no longer felt overwhelmed. She knew what she was going to do. She knew how she was going to keep her mind at peace. She had a plan.
"Are you feeling better today?" Hannah asked Gwen when she woke up.
"Much. You know sometimes you just feel a little emotionally overwhelmed." Gwen smiled.
"I get it. Do you wanna talk about it?"
"No, I'm fine now." Gwen said, but in her head she was still screaming to tell her.
"You wanna head to breakfast?"
Gwen's morning went as usual. Her plan wouldn't even be possible until the afternoon, so she tried to think about it as minimally as possible. At breakfast she sat with her friends. Draco was sat with his. He never walked alone, except two times a day. Before lunch on his way to the Great Hall, and leaving the Astronomy Tower right before curfew.
Gwen had the plan perfectly constructed in her head. She had thought about what she was gonna do at least one hundred times over. She was going to pull him aside on the way back to the Slytherin common room from the Astronomy Tower. She needed to tell him that Fred knew about them studying, and that they should create a more irregular schedule so people don't continue to catch on. This would allow them to continue the lessons, and Gwen to be less worried about anyone else confronting her about Draco. Then they would plan the next time they met. It would only take five minutes, and then she would be back in her common room. She went over every flaw that the plan could have had until it was seamless. She thought she was prepared for everything.
In the Hufflepuff common room she waited until she could execute her plan. She ran through it over and over in her mind.
"Are you thinking hard, or hardly thinking?" Cedric smiled at her.
"Thinking hard." Gwen rolled her eyes.
"If I become a champion I'm gonna ask out Cho."
"Congrats?" Gwen didn't know whether this was an announcement or a cry for help.
"She'll say yes, right?"
"Yes. And she will say yes even if you aren't picked as the Hogwarts champion." Gwen assured him. It was a cry for help.
"I'm just so nervous around her. I can never tell what she's thinking. I'm so afraid I'm gonna say the wrong thing."
"I'm sure she feels the same way." Gwen tussled his hair. She caught a glimpse at her watch. 8:34. She needed to leave if she was gonna be able to execute her plan.
"I'll be right back. I-er forgot I needed to get a book from the library." Gwen excused herself.
"I'll be waiting!" Cedric shouted to her as she left the common room.
She fast walked up to the third floor. It was the floor easiest to sneak around on without risk of someone seeing you. I mean Dumbledore hid a three-headed dog here my first year. She waited in between a large pillar and an unlocked door.
When he comes around the corner all you have to do is grab his arm and pull him into the room. It's easy enough.
Gwen's heart began to flutter. Plans were easier in her head than they were in execution. She heard whistling coming down the hall. She peered her head out from around the pillar. Draco was there, and alone.
Here he comes. Three. Two. One.
Gwen held her breath and darted out in front of the pillar and latched onto Draco's sleeve. She quickly dragged him into the door next to her.
"Let go of me, or I'll hex you!" Draco yelled as Gwen pulled him into the room.
Gwen let go of his arm and locked the door behind her.
"Gwen?" Draco said confused.
"I'm sorry, I just really needed to talk to you." Gwen said making sure the rest of the room was secured.
She had never been in this room before, but it was eerily familiar. The room had a blue tint that illuminated all the walls. The walls were covered in centuries worth of silver, gold, and bronze medals. There were trophies ranging in size and scale. The room had no candles, but was lit with the pale moonlight. It was a very still room. Everything was perfectly aligned and symmetrical.
"I'm gonna make this quick. Someone found out that we have been meeting." Gwen continued quickly.
"Who?" anger flashed in Draco's eyes.
"It's not important. I know they won't tell anyone." Gwen walked up to him closing the large gap between them.
"You Hufflepuff's are so trusting. How can you be sure they won't tell?" Draco's tone was harsh, but Gwen knew he was really just scared.
"I just do." Gwen put her hand on his bicep. "Believe me. I would never let them." She looked up at him with her kind blue eyes.
Draco looked down. She could see the slight panic in his face and the thoughts scrolling through his brain.
"I think we can make sure no one else knows. I think if we start meeting with less of a schedule it would be impossible for anyone else to catch on. I have already thought it all out. We will just have to plan them the meeting before. It will be super easy." Gwen tried to comfort him.
She wanted to reach out and embrace him. She could tell in this moment that even more of the puzzle pieces were falling into place. Draco was vulnerable. His reputation was all he thought he had.
"How many people know?" He said flatly. Draco didn't want his time with Gwen to end. She was the only person who wasn't nice to him because of his family, but nice to him because he was himself. Draco wished he knew what to say. He wanted to tell her that he wanted to keep seeing her.
"Only one. They won't tell anyone. No one else will know that you know me. You don't have to worry. No one will think we are friends." Gwen smiled.
Draco hadn't smiled when she said this. He did think of Gwen, and he thought of her often. His eyes looked like pale sapphires gazing at Gwen.
From his eyes he saw that she looked like a goddess. In the white light her skin shone like marble. Her ample figure resembled that of a magnificent statue.
"So, I think we can meet again the day after Halloween, November first, in a room on the fifth floor. I think one of them is open." Gwen dropped her hand from his arm.
Draco opened his mouth to speak. No words came out. He nodded and continued to look at the moonlight shining onto Gwen's soft, round face.
Gwen looked forward. His chest was even with her eyes. He looked so tense. Every part of him looked like he was about to implode. She heard him pull air into his chest. She watched his chest expand towards her, and then release. She looked down at his hands. She saw his veins twitch and his fingers start to stretch out. Gwen slowly panned her head up to make eye contact with him.
The night made him look ethereal. His eyes drew her to him. She caught sight of his soft pink lips. Gwen and Draco lingered in the space. Time had seemed to escape. Every second she spent admiring his beauty the stronger she was pulled to him.
Gwen quickly leaned forward and connected her lips with his. She felt Draco's start to kiss her back.
Draco violently pushed her away from him. He hadn't expected her to kiss him. He was in shock. He very quickly realized he had made a mistake. He wanted every inch of her. He longed for it.
Gwen didn't know what to do. She knew that she had messed up.
"I'm so sorry. I don't know what I was thinking. You don't have to see me again." She bit her lip and started to turn away.
She felt a strong hand grip her wrist. Draco pulled her back with great force. Their bodies were pressed against one another. He bent down and kissed Gwen.
They both craved each other. Before now they had both refused to accept the connection they felt to one another. They seemed so different at the surface, but underneath they wanted the same things. They wanted to be seen. They wanted to understood. They wanted to be wanted.
He leaned deeper into the kiss with every passing moment. He wrapped his strong arm around the small of her back. He continued to force her body onto him. She wrapped her hands around his neck trying desperately to pull him closer to her. She ran her hands through his bleach blond hair, grabbing harder with every touch. The two of them gasping in between kisses. He drifted his hands to the base of her back and picked her up. Gwen wrapped her thick thighs around his middle. Draco slammed her against the wall. He started kissing down the side of her neck.
Gwen needed more of him every second she was with him. He made her feel worthy and desired. She could have spent the whole night with him.
Until, she checked her watch 9:39. Her "quick run to the library" had now gone on for more than an hour, and Cedric was waiting up for her.
"Draco," Gwen whimpered.
"mhm." Draco moaned into her collarbone.
Gwen unwrapped her legs and stood up. Draco leaned over her.
"Is something wrong?" Draco asked.
"I-I have to go. I wasn't supposed to be out this long."
"Please, " He leaned down and whispered into her ear. "I need you."
"I really have to go." Gwen smiled. She didn't want to leave, but if she didn't now she might never.
"Well, November 1st is so far away."
"It will be sooner than you think." Gwen was beaming. She stole one more kiss from his lips.
Gwen left the room quickly, so she wouldn't be sucked back into Malfoy's magnetic touch.
That did not go as expected. Gwen thought she had planned for everything, but she had not planned for that. She still felt where his hands had once been all over her body. Her face still felt flushed, and her mascara had clumped under her eyes.
She tried to flatten her hair and straighten out her clothes before she entered the Hufflepuff common room.
"You were at the library for a long time." Cedric said without looking up. When he looked away from the fire he saw her disheveled state. "Have you been crying? You look awful. Where's your library book."
"They didn't have it." Gwen quickly rubbed under her eyes.
"Are you alright, Gwen?" Cedric looked concerned and confused.
"Of course. I-I just ran all the way back. Mrs.Norris saw me. I am actually gonna go to bed now. Goodnight." Gwen hurried down the girls hall and into her room.
When she got there she fell back blissfully on her mattress. She took a deep breath, and fell asleep remembering the trophy room.