Hi Guys! So this story isn't finished yet and I'm pretty bad about writing regularly, so be warned. However, I'm on the site a lot so if you review, favorite, and follow I'll be more motivated to write. I have a few chapters so far, so there will be a buffer for my bad habits.

This is my first published fanfic, so let me know if there's anything that's driving you up a wall about the way I'm doing things. I can't promise to change, but I promise to read and at least consider it.

Also, I had a bit of a formatting issue with the site, I tried to fix is all but there might still be a couple of places where the formatting text is in the document. Sorry about that.

I OWN NOTHING! As attached as I am to these characters and this world, they're unfortunately the brain babies of J.K. Rowling, not me.

Special disclaimer: this chapter contains dialogue between Harry and Draco that is directly from the books, I do not lay any claim to it, it is entirely 100% JK Rowling's work. I'm just using this scene as a diversion point for how things could have gone differently, and I wanted to keep things the same up until that specific moment.

Melinda Malkin loved the end of July, the beginning of August. For a few weeks, every other customer was a dewey-eyed eleven year old popping in for a fresh set of school robes. Not only was the order easy to fulfill, but the excitement on the kids faces, and the awe on those of the muggleborns, made her feel like smiling all day. She laid a sixth set on top of the freshly folded pile, all ready to be fitted to their new owners when the children should inevitably come in, and smiled to herself. Back in the main store, the bell on the door tinkled. Melinda quickly stepped down from her footstool and swept out of the back room, ensuring her own mauve robes would billow just enough to impress a discerning customer with their quality, and turned towards the door. Her lips quirked into what she hoped would look like a smile. "Mr. Malfoy, what a lovely surprise. Your robes for the next Ministry gala aren't finished yet, I'm afraid. I'll have them for you on Friday, as agreed."

The blonde lifted one corner of his upper lip. "Fine, Melinda. Though I do hope you can manage to fit a set of school robes for my son before Friday. Draco!"

Melinda eyed the boy as he stepped into the shop, sidling around his father. She saw the younger Malfoy from tie to time, of course, but as she had his measurements on file, the older Malfoy tended to have her make the boy's robes without actually seeing the him, for reasons known only to Mr. Malfoy. Draco'd certainly grown since he was last in the shop. She'd known that, from the measurements on file, but to see it was something different. Growth wasn't just about inches. The last time Melinda had seen Draco, he was a wide-eyed boy who loved purple and didn't want to wear anything but, who begged and begged and begged for purple robes, but so endearingly that Melinda had happily gone against the elder Malfoy's directions and sewn a purple lining into the outfit. The entire time, the boy prattled on about the snake in the garden, who Draco had named Albert. Melinda still remembered how much that boy had loved that snake. Remembering that boy, Melinda could hardly reconcile him with the one stood before her now. This boy's eyebrows were sunk low over his eyes, fighting to meet each other in the middle but driven apart by a nose so high in the air that she was surprised he could see over it, and the mouth seemed to have been manhandled into a smushed frown fit only for an unhappy weasel. "Hello, Draco, it's a pleasure to see you again. Step up here, please."

"I don't want you dressing him in the standard wear, Melinda. Sew him a whole set from scratch if you must, but I want him properly dressed at Hogwarts."

Melinda wasn't sure who Malfoy thought his son would need to impress, as she was quite certain very few students, if any, would be able to tell that Draco's robes were more costly, and those students would most probably be the ones that already knew Draco's status in society, but nevertheless, she hummed her agreement. She tended not to argue with Malfoy when he wanted to write her a bigger paycheck, even if it meant extra work and extra time with the aforementioned thorn in her side.

The door tinkled again and to Melinda's relief, her assistant for the day, Matha Waterford, stepped into the shop, nearly running into Malfoy as she looked up from her collection of coffee cups with a squeak. The blonde raised one eyebrow at the girl, who quickly diverted her gaze and skirted around both Malfoys and hurried into the back of the shop to set down the cups.

"Go on, Draco, step up. He'll be a while, Mr. Malfoy, if you have other errands to run, feel free."

"The man sniffed, as if to say he wasn't leaving due to any suggestions from emher/em, and swept back through the tinkling door. Melinda turned to see Draco already stood up on the stool. She smiled warmly at him, hoping to get to the sweet little boy she remembered. "How are you, Draco?"

The boy smiled at her reflection in the mirror as she walked up behind him, but it was cold and hard, and didn't quite reach his eyes. "Mr. Malfoy is fine, Melinda. I'm well. Yourself?"

"Fine," she murmured, staring back at him in the mirror. "Er… well, last you were here there was a snake, Albert? You wanted to keep him."

"I don't recall. My robes, Melinda?"

Giving up, she turned to the back room and rose her voice just a bit. "Martha? Could you find me a set of our good black robes and come fit Mr. Malfoy?"

As soon as she heard the affirmative from the assistant, Melinda moved to examine the coffees in the back corner. Two were marked Chocolate Pomegranate, her favorite, so she took one and took a careful sip. A glance back at the boy showed him staring at the mirror, not admiring himself, just staring. Focused. Completely different from the younger version that had scampered to the window to people-watch every time she turned her back.

Martha returned with the robes and tossed them over Draco's head, who made a disgruntled sound and glared as she stuffed his arms through the holes.

"Did we really need this much coffee, Martha?"

"We've still got the Notts' orders for tomorrow and whatever else comes in today, it could be another late one. You're welcome."

Melinda smiled as the bell tinkled again and a scrawny boy walked in, peering around the shop with wide green eyes from under a mess of black hair. She set down her coffee and rushed to the front of the shop. "Hogwarts, dear? Got the lot here—another young man being fitted up just now, in fact."

Considering the boy's shocked look, she decided not to wait on a response and instead swept him to the back of the shop and onto a stool just next to the Malfoy boy./p
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"Hello. Hogwarts, too?" Draco asked.

"Yes," the boy managed, glancing sidelong at Draco.

"My father's next door buying my books and Mother's up the street looking at wands. Then I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms." Melinda tried not to laugh as she imagined Draco trying to drag his father anywhere. His mother, maybe, but the elder Malfoy, though he spoiled his son, was not one to be controlled by him. "I think I'll bully Father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow." The other boy didn't answer, and Melinda saw Draco shoot an irritated look at him. "Do you have a broom?"

"No."

"Play Quidditch at all?"

"No."

Melinda was starting to feel very sorry for the boy. She wondered if he had any idea what Draco was talking about, or if he'd even known about the wizarding world before he'd received his letter. She redoubled her efforts on his hem. The best thing she could do for him was to get him out of there before Draco could imprint on the poor boy and find reason to be cruel to him at school.

"I say, look at that man!"

Melinda did look, and there was Hagrid. Everyone knew Hagrid, Melinda thought, he spent enough time in Diagon Alley, did enough business on Dumbledore's behalf. He was friendly and quite talkative, particularly after a drink or two, so he met his share of people, and he wasn't easy to forget. She smiled as the big man waved wildly at her charge, pleased that at least the boy would be returning to a kind presence after the conversation with Draco.

"I think he's brilliant," the boy was saying, his voice tighter and higher than it had been before.

"Do you? Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead." Melinda frowned at her pin as it pricked her finger. She pulled it out and laid it aside.

"Oh, sorry." Draco didn't sound sorry. "But they were our kind, weren't they?"

Suddenly, Martha hissed and Draco yelped. "Merlin! I'm so sorry, Mr. Malfoy."

Melinda looked over to see Martha's coffee on Draco's robes, on the floor, on Martha… everywhere but in the cup. She stood up and interrupted the stream of apologies, "Martha, go get yourself cleaned up, I'll take care of these robes. Mr. Malfoy, are you alright?"

"Aside from soggy socks, you mean?"

"Of course, I can clean those for you right quick. The shoes, too, if you like?"

I like." The blonde handed over the socks and shoes after Melinda had pulled the robes over his head and she quickly went into the back room. Martha was nowhere to be seen, so Melinda figured she had gone upstairs. Melinda knew her assistants keep some items in the mud room up there, so hopefully Martha had a change of clothes. Melinda had to focus on saving the expensive robes. And keep an ear on those boys in case someone struck a nerve. But it was quiet. At least at first.

"If you meant were they a witch and wizard, then yes." The venom in the boy's voice was heavy.

"Oh." There was a long pause. "I really am sorry. Have they been dead… long?"

"I was a baby."

"Oh."

Another long pause, this one long enough for Melinda to gently separate the coffee from the fabric fibers with a spell of her own making, before the boy spoke up again.

"What are the Houses?"

"What?"

"Well, you said something about Houses, and Slytherin and Hufflepuff, and I just… I didn't know what you meant."

"How do you not know about the Hogwarts Houses? I thought you said your parents were like us?"

"They were… but my aunt and uncle aren't."

"Oh. But surely you knew you were a wizard?"

"They tried to stop me from being one."

"That's ridiculous."

"You know when you do that to your face it looks ridiculous."

"Do what?"

"I dunno, that thing with your lip that makes it look like you think I'm a bug on your windshield."

"My what?"

"Your windshield."

"What in Merlin's name is a windshield?"

"It's the glass on the front of a car that protects the passengers from the wind while they drive… you do have cars in the wizarding world, don't you?" Melinda thought the boy sounded rather proud, perhaps to know something Draco didn't.

"We don't need them. Not when you've got the Floo, and Apparition, and brooms and the train. At Hogwarts they've got carriages, but I don't think they've got windshields."

"Oh. Well see, when you drive a car, bugs hit the glass, and they get smashed on the windshield, and it's annoying because there's this big splotch of bug guts right in front of your eyes while you're trying to drive and sometimes it just won't go away even with the windshield wipers. When I don't know something or you disagree you look at me like I'm a bug on your windshield."

"Oh. And that's clever, for muggles?"

"Well, I wouldn't call it clever. It's just something that's there, like a roof. It serves a purpose, but no one really notices it or does anything with it."

"That's… interesting."

There was more silence.

"Melinda? How're the robes?"

Melinda quickly turned to shush Martha, then realized she'd completely forgotten the robes and Mr. Malfoy would likely be back soon. But she wanted to give the boys another moment. This mystery boy seemed to be getting through to Draco, and Melinda couldn't think of anything she wanted more, in that moment, than for the little boy with wide, grey eyes to come back.

"Did you yelp?"

"No. Malfoy's don't yelp."

"You definitely yelped."

"I did not!"

"Don't get mad, I yelp when I spill hot water on myself, too. It hurts, even if it's not hot enough to burn, and it's surprising."

"And do you do this a lot?"

"Probably more than you do. So I'm more used to it, and I still yelp. So you don't have to feel bad for yelping. But it can still be funny, can't it?"

"I suppose."

Martha touched Melinda's shoulder. "Mr. Malfoy will return soon. We should get back to work."

Melinda nodded reluctantly and studied her handiwork on the robe again. Spotless. Like it had never happened. "You finish up on the boy and I'll get Mr. Malfoy done."

Martha nodded and returned to the room, followed shortly by Melinda. The boys didn't speak anymore, as if they weren't sure how to interact with others in the room. So when Martha finished the boy's school robes, rung him up, and sent him out the door, Melinda looked up to see him casting an uncertain glance back at Draco, and looked up in time to see Draco glance at the door after it shut.

I hope you guys liked the first chapter! I'll try to have more up, soon. I'm not entirely sure where this story is going to take me, but hopefully it's super fun and full of smut. Also, if you like my writing, check out my website: carsoncosta dot com. My goal is to become a novelist, so if you join my newsletter, you'll be among the first to know when I have original stories out. And those will happen way more often than updates here, since, you know, actual career writing takes precedent over super-duper-fun fanfics. Unfortunately.

Thanks for reading!