Written for the International Wizarding Schools Championship.
Round : Round 8, Muggle Studies
School : Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Year : Year 3
Theme : Floral Muggles—Theme Chosen by Year 2 Student
Prompts: 7. (Pairing) Write a Pairing picked by a teammate. [Main]
Pairing picked by Year 1—Draco and Ginny.
(Colour) Green [Additional]
10. (Action) Watching someone from afar. [Additional]
Word Count: 1445
In which Draco runs a quaint flower shop and Ginny is the beautiful woman that drops in every morning.
It is early in the morning when he is helping Pansy put up fresh bouquets for display that Draco sees her for the first time, and he is, for the lack of a better word, dumbstruck. The lady that has walked into his flower shop, The Green Narcissus is about his own age, with hair as red as a fresh rose in bloom set against a skin so pale it reminds him of snow. He stares at the woman in the green dress until Pansy, who has been observing her friend for the past few minutes gently slaps the back of his head.
"Close your mouth, Draco dear, you might let a fly in," she says drily as he glares.
Pansy only hands him the bouquet of Chrysanthemums she's been working on and goes instead to attend the new customer as Draco watches from across the room. He fiddles with the arrangement of the flowers in his hand for a moment and then sets it down at a corner of the display and picks up another, all the while stealing glances towards the two women who have walked over to the other side of the room to look at the fresh cut flowers. He doesn't expect to have the red head looking at him, however, so when their gazes meet, he freezes like a deer caught in the headlight and then looks away very quickly, cursing himself as he does for not offering a courteous or friendly gesture. He can feel his skin burning. He imagines his face is about as red as her hair at the moment.
Ginny visits The Green Narcissus every morning, to get herself a bouquet of flowers to take to her coffee shop a few blocks away, and to watch Draco, the owner, blush and stutter. She smiles. She's not trying to be mean, she finds it genuinely cute. And honestly, that she has this effect on a man like Draco Malfoy is quite flattering.
She enters the shop with a tinkle from the bell hanging above and turns towards the counter from which she generally picks her fresh cut flowers to replace the older ones on the tables in her shop, looking around to see if either of the owners were in sight. She feels a slight pang of disappointment on not seeing Draco but turns her attention back to the flowers tied up in bunches. She looks through the asters and lilies and roses and chooses finally a bunch of pink peonies to take away. She finally does see Pansy outside, guiding some transporters on putting in wedding flowers so as to not crush them, and Draco is out there too, although on seeing her he smiles and excuses himself to come inside towards the counter.
"Morning," she says to him cheerfully. "Big order?" She asks, nodding her head towards the Lilacs and Hydrangeas being loaded and hands him the flowers in her hand.
"Yeah. We get big orders sometimes—setting up stages for the minister or weddings and reception. Pansy likes to be perfect and precise for those." He nods towards the said woman telling the men yet again how to put in the flowers. He examines the peonies quietly and whistles.
"Did you know that flowers have meanings too, Ginny?" He looks up from what he is doing and it is when his gaze pierces her own that she realises that she was supposed to answer.
"No. Do they?" She says, and she feels incredibly stupid as she does, because she does know that they have meanings, just not what they are. Why did she say that? Draco glances at her and smiles, and Ginny blushes. It is he who is confident today and she who is bristling. Have their roles been reversed today?
He finishes ringing her up and hands her a basket. "Their necks would probably snap if you carry them by hand. They're delicate, so be careful, okay?" He hands out the basket to her and she is acutely aware of how their skins brush each other when she reaches out to take it.
"Well, bye," he says "I'll see you later? I mean, later … tomorrow, I … " it seems as if his nerves have come back and Ginny cannot help but smile.
"Bye, Draco. See you later." She turns around and leaves, smiling. She wonders if she should do something about their situation. If he acts this way around her, he likes her, doesn't he? She shrugs. Maybe she should ask for some more opinions on this. Hermione would be able to help.
It takes more than a little persuasion on Pansy's part to convince him that Ginny does, infact, like him back, because if she does not and he tries asking her out he would be risking both business and friendship. And it wasn't like it was his fault he had trouble processing this bit of information. There are a very few relationships in his life which are not even a little toxic. He has always seen his parents fight, and his father had very little regard for mothers needs and limits and personal space, and he fears that if he does something like this he might begin to turn into his father himself, no matter how much Pansy denies it.
He does finally put the rose and the note inside the basket, although he is wondering even as he watches her leave if he should simply apologize and ask for it back. He is all nerves, and he had kept those suppressed when he was ringing her up—who was he kidding? It was a miracle he had been as smooth as he had because he was doing all he could at that point to simply not tremble and stutter.
He finally heads outside to where Pansy is still trying to find a flower friendly position in which to send said flowers and stands watching. Pansy looks at him with a half hearted look of exasperation.
"Well?" She asks "did you do it?"
He nods. She looks him over up and down, nods and goes back to work.
"It's going to go great, Drake. You'll thank me later."
It is not until after Ginny has set the "closed" sign to say "open" and put up a kettle to boil and taken out ingredients for some cupcakes does she turn towards the basket of peonies she had bought. She has thrown out the older blooms already, so she goes around the shop putting in two peonies in each case until she reaches the end and finds in the basket a poetically beautiful red rose. She sets down the basket on the counter and lifts the beautiful flower in her hand, wondering if it sound up with her by mistake until she sees the note.
Ginny,
You don't have to know the language of flowers to know that roses as red as your beautiful hair symbolise romantic love. I know this should have been a poem, but I have never been too good with words. I do really like you, and I was wondering that if you return the favour, would you perhaps like to go out together sometime?
—Draco
P.s. It's perfectly fine if you don't, too.
It is evening by the time Ginny closes her shop and rushes towards The Green Narcissus. She would have left then, but Mondays are always busy days. She opens the door to the shop and the bell chimes to signal her arrival. It is Pansy who is at the counter and she looks at her with a knowing gleam in her eye.
"I'll fetch him," she declares, and leaves Ginny alone with the numerous plants, all of them bright coloured. Should she have brought a flower along? But this is his own flower shop. She cannot bring another's flowers here, but she also cannot give him his own flowers. She frowns. No, She is better off without.
The sound of his footsteps alert her to his presence. He stands awkwardly near the counter while she stands near the displays. She knows what she wants to say, but she's suddenly very shy. She goes through it anyway.
"I… I got your note. And I…" she falters, and Draco picks up from a completely different track.
"I'm sorry about it, I shouldn't have … " he mumbles "It's okay if you wouldn't want to co—"
"Draco." she stops him. "You mentioned you'd like to go out. I was wondering if you would like to come have some coffee with me down at the coffee house?"
"Oh, I…Yes. Yes I would. I'll just go tell Pansy."
Ginny smiles.