The group of first years were standing in front of the great doors that separated them from their future peers, and Harry swore he could almost feel the boys and girls behind him quivering in unison with excitement. There was an atmospheric buzzing around them, as if there was a force field encircling them and them alone, because the rest of the building appeared to be still. He adjusted his glasses, grateful that the strange prissy girl on the train had fixed them for him. She seemed nice; Bossy, but nice. He looked through the corner of his eye to the enthusiastic red-headed boy next to him, who had been in his carriage on the train, remarking to himself that he looked sort of like a goofy puppy.
Harry began looking at all the portraits on the walls, still in awe of the magic of the place and noting how the figures within them moved with such grace as if they were not paintings at all. As his gaze wandered, he could feel another curious stare had fallen upon him, and he locked eyes with a white-blond haired boy, his hair as pale as his skin.
"So it's true then?" the boy announced loudly, a volume above the group that caused a hush amongst the youngsters. "Harry Potter has come to Hogwarts". A gasp sounded out and a series of whispers followed it. Harry was used to this behaviour by now, and kept his attention on the boy who was now striding over, two bigger boys on his wings. He was a little smaller than Harry, but the way he held himself you would have thought he was Headmaster of Hogwarts. Harry could tell this boy was rich, perhaps of some Wizarding nobility, and he suspected that generations of his family had attended this school. His robes were brand new, and his hair was as slick as the smile that was upon his face.
"I'm Malfoy, Draco Malfoy" he said, his tone oozing importance and pride, but there was a snigger from Ron, the red-head when he said it. Draco's eyes left Harry's, and fell on Ron, not intimidated by the snigger, nor even humiliated, but he seemed merely disgusted to be in his presence. At first, Harry naively did not think that there would be major problems with class within the Wizarding world because at the end of the day, everyone was magic, and in his view, that was really cool. So he was surprised by this.
"You ought to be careful with who you become friends with Potter, you certainly don't want to be friends with the wrong sort" Draco remarked pompously, puffing his chest out. "I am the right kind of person…" and he stuck out his hand for Harry to shake. Although his arrogance irked Harry slightly, he figured that it's good to have as many people on his side as possible. So he took his hand, and he shook it. Because that's what men do, they behave with respect to each other. Harry had always promised himself he would treat everyone with kindness after his own upbringing was the exact opposite.
Later on that evening, when Harry, Ron and the prissy girl whose name was Hermione had been placed into Gryffindor, and Draco into Slytherin, they were eating the vast feast on the long tables. For the past twenty minutes, Ron had been trying to convince Harry that there was not a witch or wizard in Slytherin that hadn't gone bad, but somehow as Harry looked to the Slytherin table and at Draco enthusiastically eating two chicken legs, he could not believe it. Draco Malfoy was a normal eleven year old boy just like him and Ron.