A/N: So i really like this story very much so. It's one of my best babies. I have to admit it was sparked by this wonderful book i'm reading and my friend lent me. It's so great so, i kind of got the idea from that. But yeah. Enough rambling. Read, and review please. I'd really appreciate good reviews...but if you must flame me i don't care, you'll just lower my self esteem even more - . Well yeah here it is. i'm also open to name options. i hate picking names, it sucks. lol i end up changing them several times or they always end up starting with an A.

Disclaimer: I don't own any harry potter settings or characters and what not. I do own my chick. so back off. she's mine.

1: Not Like the Other Girls

She was slicing an apple, taking the pieces one by one and lightly placing them in her mouth. It was something about the way she did this that fascinated Draco in the first place. His eyes had caught sight of her from down the table for breakfast. He was watching her hands, the graceful movement that she took when the knife sliced through the core of the apple, splitting it completely in a perfect half. Then there was every slice after that, the same movement used again and again until the entire apple was gone and all she was doing was fiddling with the knife.

It wasn't in Draco's nature to stare, but this situation was gravely different. For one, she was new. It was either that or he had never seen her until today. It wasn't in his nature for him to be this intrigued about a new student, or about anything other than tormenting those beneath him. His eyebrows furrowed, and he continued to watch; she had started on a second apple.

He watched her hands closely. Her long fingers had a firm hold on the knife as she split the new apple in two. She picked up the half closest to her and started peeling the skin. She was half-done with peeling, when her hands froze. Draco narrowed his eyebrows and sat up straight. He lifted his eyes to meet hers. She had realized he was watching her. She remained still, glancing at him from beneath long, straight, jet black hair.

He cleared his throat and returned to the conversation he was supposed to be having with his friends, but he could feel her eyes glaring at him from the distance between them. He grew uncomfortable and finally looked up. She had gone, leaving her apple half-peeled and further untouched. He sighed in relief.

He faintly heard the bell over his conversation with Pansy about whether or not he was going to take her to the homecoming social, a dance that had been announced this morning and wasn't for a couple weeks, when everybody had settled in. He rose out of his seat and slung his bag over his shoulder, waiting for his goons to walk. Crabbe and Goyle followed obediently as they headed to their first class of the day.

The potions room was muggy as usual, a small chill creeping through the air as the three realized they were the last to arrive and therefore would have to split. His goons shrugged off to two empty seats they spotted right away. Draco frowned when he realized the only open seat was between Hermione Granger and the girl from breakfast. He sulked over there and sat down uncomfortably.

Hermione sighed on his right, glancing to her left to, where Draco sat and frowned. To his left, the girl had tensed upon his arrival. Her hand which had been relaxed against her cheek, curled into a fist, her fingernails digging sharply into her palm. He raised an eyebrow, wondering if she had drawn blood.

She jumped, which made him grin slightly, when the door behind the teacher's desk, slammed shut. The sound meant that class had started and Severus Snape walked forward, folding his hands over his chest as he examined the class of 7th years. His eyebrows rose as he walked by Draco's desk.

"I suppose there's no need for formality. You know who I am and what I expect of you in this class." His eyes stopped on several Gryffindors causing Draco to chuckle silently to himself. Snape's eyes moved to his table and stopped on the girl, raising an eyebrow and he took a step forward. He said no more and began class, instructing that where they were sitting today was going to be permanent until he said otherwise. He wrote their assignment on the small chalkboard at the front of the room and turned to his desk. Draco glanced sideways at the girl; she was busy doing her work, her eyes skimming the open book as she wrote down the information requested.

He lifted his head as a reaction, trying to read her work so he didn't have to copy it down himself. Her hand writing was as smooth as the way she handled the knife. Her quill never made a sound like the others around him. He tried to focus his attention somewhere else. Hermione was whispering quietly to Harry and Ron sitting a table away from her.

She leaned forward so she could speak so only they could hear. It worked to their advantage; Draco couldn't hear a word they were saying to each other. He heard a book slam on his desk, and he jumped, as did Hermione. Snape was standing over their desk, an eyebrow raised and a hand extended outward.

"Hand in your papers." A paper appeared as soon as he spoke the words, and the girl sitting next to Draco rose from her seat on upon hearing the bell ring.

The rest of the day went by quickly for Draco. The girl from breakfast had him in every class but one. Some how they ended up sitting together in most of them thanks to his constant habit of being late. Draco hated it, and he was pretty sure the girl did too.

Exhausted and some what irritated, Draco waltzed into the common room, throwing his book bag on top of the others. He sighed as he sat down in a circle that included most of his so called friends. They were having a small conversation, and it seemed as though he interrupted it.

"Draco, did you see that new girl?" Blaise implored, leaning forward in his seat next to Crabbe.

"New girl?" he asked, though he knew exactly who they were talking about. He looked at them, his face emotionless, waiting for their reply.

"Yeah, I think you sat next to her in Potions…and every other class." Blaise looked like he was trying to figure out why that was so. He looked back to Draco, who had a scowl on his face.

"Oh yeah, her. What about her?" He tried to seem uninterested, but ever since that morning he was far from it.

"I was just asking if you had seen her- nothing special, though I did, notice you looking at her this morning at breakfast." Blaise rambled on and on about the girl. Draco chose to tune him out and got up to go to the dormitory. As he walked, not paying attention to where he was going, he ran into a solid body.

He stopped suddenly, looking down to see who he had run into. There she was, glaring up at him like she had been that morning. Her icy blue eyes penetrated into him as she walked on, still staring him down as though she were about to murder him. He shook it off and retired to bed.

Draco spent the next week examining her every movement. It would've been easy if it weren't for her spotting him every where he followed her. Crabbe and Goyle didn't have a clue as to what was going on and, frankly, neither did Draco.

He noticed habits, like how every morning she ate only fruit, mostly apples. He noticed time and time again the way she cut the apples perfectly, counting each individual slice as if she had memorized how many an apple could produce with out the core. He noticed that if she was unsatisfied with a slice, she'd make it even before she slowly consumed the slices.

In potions, she didn't talk to any one, and did her work. When she finished, she'd hand her work in and leave quickly. It was routine, and it got a little boring to watch her day after day. Her other classes were the same, it seemed; She'd sit down, do her work and never talk.

It was her eyes that haunted Draco every day. He remembered the look she gave him every time she saw him. Cold eyes that made him shiver every time she looked at him. It was almost as if she had put him on a mental list in her mind, to remind herself that if there ever was a war, to kill him first.

It was in Care of Magical Creatures, however, that he noticed something different, a love for animals. In the other classes she was hesitant to answer any question and refused to speak when a teacher called on her, but here, she was gentle with whatever animal Hagrid had planned a lesson for that day. She knew mostly everything. She was almost smarter than Hermione, and that made Draco smirk and laugh to himself whenever he thought about it.

Another thing was that she didn't have any friends. He could wonder why but the reason seemed so obvious; she hardly talked. He over heard Granger and Potter talking about it in Defense against the Dark Arts once. She had never had friends; no one wanted to talk to her. It was at dinner that Blaise interrupted his thoughts and started a conversation about the girl, again

"Do you think if I asked her, she'd go to the social with me?" Blaise was staring at her dreamily as he said this. She was reading, her hair tucked be hind one ear, eyes skimming quickly over the words as she flipped the pages. Pansy scowled across the table from her seat next to Draco, her hands clutching his arm tightly.

"I don't think she'll even talk to you. She's not very nice, a horrid cow- that's what she is," Pansy sneered, while Draco smirked at her sudden outburst.

"Is it me, or is Pansy just a little jealous of the new girl?" Blaise had spoken before Draco had the chance, but he was thinking the same thing. Pansy's expression told them that they were right though, she tried to hide it.

"Me? Jealous of her? Ha, that's quite the joke, Blaise. Why would some one like me be jealous of her?" Her question was serious and she looked at Blaise sternly folding her arms across her chest.

"Well your man's been pretty obsessed with her; doesn't that make you a little bit jealous?" Draco's eyes widened and he looked to his friend and supposed girlfriend with a smug smile on his face.

"I just want to know what she's about. She's so strange," he admitted sourly, stretching his arms out in front him. Pansy had, in the meantime, piled a load of potatoes on her fork and was aiming to launch it at the girl. "What are you doing?"

"I'm going to see if I can hit her. It's no harm, just a little potatoes." Pansy bit her lower lip and flicked the fork. The mashed food hit the girl square in the side of the face, and she flinched. The table erupted in gasps and they all looked in the direction of Pansy, who was laughing loudly.

The entire Great Hall had fallen silent and all heads were turned to the Slytherlin table. Pansy was laughing so hard she was snorting. The girl closed her book and looked at Pansy. She stood slowly; rising out of her seat with her eyes closed a furious scowl on her face. She walked towards Pansy and the group slowly, her hands clenched tightly into fists.

She stopped and grabbed a chunk of potatoes from the bowl and smeared it on Pansy's with a smirk.

"I'm sorry; did I get food in your hair?" She grinned, her voice quiet, dazzling Draco the second he heard it. She left Pansy completely humiliated in front of the whole school.

"That-that cow!" Pansy cried, trying to fight back tears but failing. Draco shook his head and picked up his fork, which had some spaghetti on it and flicked it at her. She cried even louder, mashed potatoes falling into her goblet and splashing her with pumpkin juice.

A/n: on an ending note: i hope you review, really i do. Again, i'm open for names. if you can think of any, you can either email me or what not i don't care. Please lend a helping hand! lol that's it i guess.

review por favor.

Ayla C. Raspus