Disclaimer: Phbbbt.

Dedications: Andy, and the dog next door. And Tom Felton, because I was looking at an extremely inspirational picture of him when I started this.

A/N: Redid some bits, because I know I switched tenses towards the middle. I also italicized the journal entries. I'm going to try to get a second chapter up this week, but I've got a little over a million things going on right now. However I managed to finish my National Merit essay thingy, so that's one thing to check off.

  One of These Days

  Wednesday, October 27th: I hate Draco Malfoy. I hate him more than anything in the world. Not only does he insult my family and me, he insults my friends too. And he's perfect – which is not an admirable quality in his case. His stupid blonde hair is always perfectly kempt and neat, his face is just the right shape, he's extremely well proportioned, and his clothes… always neat and clean, always pressed, never shabby. I can't stand him He's everything I'm not, and I HATE HIM.

"Aww, look! The Weasel keeps a diary!"

My head shoots up from the paper, and I drop my quill to the grass below me. Speak of the devil. "It's not a diary," I mutter, my face flushing. I reach down to pick up my quill, but Malfoy stomps his foot on it. Crabbe and Goyle chuckle stupidly.

"Not a diary?" I look up, and he's standing right over me, with a cocky eyebrow raised. 

"No," I reiterate staunchly.

"A journal then? A confessional?" He interrogates me, not moving his foot.

"It doesn't matter," I say to the ground, still trying to tug my quill away.

"Doesn't matter? Of course it matters! This must be your way of letting go of those repressed feelings. You know -" he plops down, now sitting on my quill, "I have this theory, Weasley. I think that all the anger you bottle up in yourself must reflect on you physical appearance."

I'm getting a crick in my neck. I release my hold on the quill and sit up.

He's just sitting there, as though waiting for me to give him permission to continue. I look at him doubtfully.

"You see… sadness makes your limbs grow to extreme lengths - in the manner of a Weeping Willow." He smirks at his own wordplay. Conceited bastard. "Anger makes your hair red, and affects your complexion to an undesirable degree. And your freckles are caused by…" he pauses for emphasis, "indecisiveness."

I narrow my eyebrows at him. "Put a lot of consideration into this, have you Malfoy?"

There's a flicker of something that might be anger in his eyes, and then he's back to a blank, smarmy, sarcastic stare. "You don't like my theory then?"

I just glare.

"Now, seeing as you're ugly enough already," he tells me calmly, "I have decided to let you keep your journal."

"Since when was that your decision?" I snap.

He just shakes his head sadly at me, and then grabs the journal out of my hands and tosses it into the lake. "Fetch, puppy!" He calls after me as I race after it. He and his shadows stroll away chortling, and I blush, still madly trying to fish my journal away from the Giant Squid.

I enter the Gryffindor common room still holding the sopping book. Hermione's high whine is the first voice that reaches my ears. "Ron! Where were you? We've been waiting."

Not 'we've been worried' or 'we were wondering', but 'we've been waiting'. Right, thanks Hermione.

"Down by the lake. Had a run-in with Malfoy."

Harry looks up from his Quidditch magazine for the first time since I walked in. "How'd it go?" 

"Pretty well," I say, "considering how it could've gone." I gesture with my soggy journal, and Harry winces sympathetically.

Hermione clicks her tongue, and waves her wand. "Aquabrado!" she says, and I feel the book dry beneath my hands.

"Thanks, 'Mione. Anyway, shall we head to dinner?"

Harry nods, and drops his magazine. Hermione slowly stows away her books, and rises.

Wednesday, October 27th continued: I hate him more than anyone in the world, including his father and maybe even He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. What goes on in his head, anyway? One of these days, I swear I won't take it anymore. I'm just going to snap or something. It'd be awful satisfying to punch his prissy, perfect little face in. One of these days…