Draco fiddled nervously with the zipper on his jacket, moving it up and down rapidly while simultaneously chewing on his lip. He stopped for a moment to brush back a loose strand of his hair but quickly returned to his fidgeting.

"Well somebody looks nervous," a petite girl came up next to Draco, her hand running absentmindedly through her wavy black hair. She smiled slightly at Draco and rested her hand on her hips, her thumbs sliding through the belt loops of her jeans.

"Hey Lauren," Draco replied, looking down at his feet. Lauren Tait was an exchange student from the U.S., one of the many exchange students. Most were from France & Germany with one from Japan. Lauren was the only one from the Americas. Since the defeat of the Dark Lord things such as exchange programs became possible, and Hogwarts had practically been flooded. Lauren was the only one Draco had met yet, since his mother signed up to host one for the last few weeks of summer, just to brighten up their house a little bit.

"So what's up?" Lauren asked, "I mean, by all logic I should be the nervous one, getting ready to go to a completely new school and all."

"At least you have a chance for a fresh start," Draco mumbled, "I on the other hand have the accumulation of seven years of opinion awaiting me, and trust me when I say that none of it's good."

"Well, try wiping the slate clean, you know, maybe if you do a bunch of really good shit, it might outweigh all the bad shit."

"Do you really think that would work?" Draco asked skeptically.

"No," Lauren replied truthfully.

"Exactly," Draco rumbled.

"But it can't help to try, besides, you should try doing good stuff anyway, even if it doesn't change anybody's opinion of you, you should still do it. Change your opinion of yourself." Draco mumbled something incomprehensible and Lauren very obviously rolled her eyes.

"Just try it dude, it ain't gonna kill ya," she said, punching him lightly in the arm.

"What house do you think you'll be in?" Draco asked suddenly. He'd been avoiding this question for a while, Lauren was such a Gryffindor in a lot of ways, for one she was a good person, but Draco didn't really want to accept it. She was kinda the only friend he had.

"Quien sabe," Lauren replied, she was fluent in both English and Spanish and often switched the two up without even noticing, leading Draco to now be able to understand quite a lot of Spanish. "I hope I end up in Slytherin though," she said, "so I can be with you."

To anyone on the outside that would have sounded like a ridiculously romantic statement. But to those few who did know (i.e. Lauren, Draco & his mom), there was no way that could be possible. Why? Because quite simply, Draco was gay. He'd only recently come to terms with it, and even now the idea sounded foreign to him, but it would definitely explain a lot. As in alota lot. Lauren on the other hand was bisexual, or as Draco's mom so nicely put it, "that girl will screw anything that moves" and Draco was pretty sure that she would have no qualms about dating a gay guy.

"I hope you're in Slytherin too," Draco said.

"But if not, we'll totes still be friends, because these people are kinda scaring me, especially those three over there, they've been staring at us since we got here. I mean really, what the fuck? Creeping much?"

"Huh?" Draco looked up to where Lauren was staring, the only people there were Harry, Granger, and Weasley. Weasley was both glaring at him, he made sure that he'd noticed before turning away. Granger seemed to be ignoring Draco and had her eyes fixated on Lauren, he couldn't quite tell what kind of an expression it was, friendly or otherwise. Harry on the other hand made eye contact and kept it. Only he wasn't glaring as Weasley had, instead he just looked... curious. And friendly. And a little bit like a lost child as well.

"You know them?" Lauren asked.

"Yeah, they're in our year. The girl is Hermione Granger, the ginger is Ron Weasley, and the one with glasses is Harry Potter."

"Oh, so that's the famous Harry Potter," Lauren said, "dude, he's pretty cute, I'd so do him."

"Lauren!" Draco hissed.

"What? I'm just saying!" she defended.

"Yeah but if someone else had just heard that..."

"... Then they'd know that I wanna screw the boy who lived, is that a crime or something?"

"No, it's just…!"

"Just what? Improper? Who cares! Besides, he's totally way out of my league anyway, not counting the fact pretty boy Potter totally rides the gay town express."

"What?" Draco gaped at her. Lauren shrugged.

"I'm just noticing that he has like a million girls flirting with him, and he's only had like what, two girlfriends? And didn't they both fail, like, big time?"

"Well I'm not so sure about the last one..."

"Does it matter, it's still another failed relationship, he's definitely on your team."

"No he's not," Draco insisted.

"Whatevs Draco, he's queer. You know it. I know it. He probably knows it. I don't think anybody else does though. Nope, cross that out, the ginger girl knows."

"Oh, you mean Ginny Weasley?" Draco asked. "That's his ex."

"Weasley, isn't that the same last name as...?"

"Ron Weasley? Yeah, they're siblings."

"Dude, he dated his best friends sister? No wonder his love life sucks, he totally just broke one of the rules." Now it was Draco's turn to roll his eyes. Lauren believed in a list of random rules that she basically lived her life by and used as her guides for all relationships, friendly or not.

"I don't think that's why they broke up," Draco said.

"No, of course not, they broke up because he's queer."

"No he's not!"

"I'm totally gonna prove you wrong," Lauren said smugly.

"Prove what wrong?" They both jumped, (though Draco a little more than Lauren), at the sudden presence of the one and only Harry Potter.

"Oh nothing," Lauren said, "we were just arguing about whether or not Angelina Jolie is going to adopt another baby or not." Harry clearly didn't get the reference (of course neither did Draco) but it seemed to satisfy him.

"So, um, I'm Harry Potter," he said, holding his hand out to Lauren.

"Lauren Tait," Lauren replied.

"You're one of the exchange students, right?" Harry asked.

"Yup," Lauren grinned, "I'm from the states."

"Oh, that's cool," Harry said smiling.

"Harry!" They all turned to see Granger rushing over to them, her eyes flashed to Draco, and then over to Lauren, lingering an oddly long amount of time.

"Um, Ron and I have to go to the prefects cart, so..." she trailed off.

"Okay, see you," Harry said.

"Yeah, bye," she told Harry, she looked back up at Lauren and gave her a tiny wave before quickly rushing off.

"So, d'you two have a compartment on the train yet?" Harry asked.

"Unless our trunks became animate objects and found one for us, no," Lauren replied. Harry let out a soft laugh.

"Well, d'you want to sit with me? Ron and Mione are both in the prefects cart, and Ginny's stopped speaking to me, I don't know about the rest of my friends so I just thought…"

"We would love to occupy the same compartment space as you," Lauren said, earning her a weird look from Harry for her odd phrasing of the sentence. "What?" she asked, "I was just trying to make sure it didn't sound awkward, because for some reason I have this strange talent to make the most innocent things sound totes awkward."

"I know," Draco gumbled, he's been on the receiving side of her "talent" one to many times for his comfort. Lauren grinned, remembering a few.

"So, shall we go?" Harry asked.

"Lead the way, capitán," Lauren said, grabbing her trunk and passing Draco's to him. Harry have her another odd but amused look. He turned and led them over to the train, helping them get their trunks onboard they walked town the aisle to a compartment at the very end.

"Ooh, we're at the back," Lauren said, "you know what happens at the back of vehicles, don't you?"

"Lauren!" Draco said, his face turning a light shade of pink as he tried not to think about what she was insinuating.

"What? I was talking about how the people at the back always get everything last, what were you thinking?" she smirked.

Draco just grimaced. Harry laughed.

"Well I was thinking that the back of the cars is where people always have sex, right?" Harry said bluntly, Draco blushed even harder.

"Exactly," Lauren said grinning.

"I get the strangest sense that this trip is going to be horrifying," Draco grumbled.

"Oh you know it," Lauren said.

"But it's okay," Harry added, "we'll try not to torture you too much. No promises though."

Draco groaned.

"Oh hey, Harry, I know we've just met and all that, but are you gay?" Harry gave her an odd look.

"Am I really that obvious?" he asked. Lauren just laughed.

"Nah, it's just me." Lauren turned toward Draco, smirking.

"Why'd you ask?" Harry asked.

"Oh no reason, it's just that Draco has been dying to fuck you all summer so I just figured I'd check to see if he actually has a chance."

Draco didn't think he could blush any harder.