Disclaimer: I own nothing! All J.K. Rowling, all besides the plot.
A/N: I started this fanfiction years ago, before the last book so I'll try to follow it but some characters that died in the book are alive in my fic. My first fiction, please no flames! Thank you!
Chapter 2
July, 1998
Ginny left the Burrow after the second month memorial service her parents served in memory of Fred and all their friends who died during the war. Two months had passed and the pain was still too fresh. She couldn't hear another thing about Fred, about how funny he was, how kind and how brave he had been because she could no longer smile sadly and thank people for coming and join her family in their time of grief. She would beat the next person who talked about Tonks or Remus...
She was feeling broken inside. Her brother was dead. They won the war but her family would never be the same.
Ginny was a private person. In a big emotional family sometimes people forgot that she was different. She had fought bravely side by side with Neville all year long, suffering curse after curse, punishment after punishment with the strength of a lioness but now she was breaking. She didn't want therapy or sharing feeling at the dinner table.
She had no more strength, no more will to fight. Ginevra Weasley was hollow inside. She pulled her cloak close to her face. She didn't need people approaching her tonight. Since the war people seemed fit to walk up to her and praise her for her role in the war. She didn't need the attention. She needed space to grieve all that died.
She'd rented a small room at the Hogsmead Inn when her mother informed her of her intentions in hosting the memorial service and dinner. She walked the streets of Hogsmead into the Three Broomsticks. She looked around for a dark corner table where she could drink and be alone. She sat down and asked for a Firewiskey. No one asked her age. After the war nobody cared. They were just too happy (and drunk) to care if they're giving alcohol to an underage girl.
After a while Ginny barely remembered her pain. Alcohol was her refuge since the last battle.
"Young girls shouldn't drink so much" she heard from behind her. Ginny didn't need to see his face to know who it was. Ginny looked behind her. Sure enough sitting in a table behind her with a black cloak covering his face was Draco Malfoy.
"I don't see a young girl here do you, ferret? There is none left after the war" she snapped at him turning back to her drink. She could swear she heard him laugh lightly behind her. She felt him raise from his chair and approach her.
"I've been meaning to get in touch with you, Weasley but I thought I should wait and let your family grieve... I... I want to apologize for all the bad blood between us" Ginny almost choked in her drink when Draco whispered and sat beside her "I may be a bit drunk, mind you but this is an opportunity I can't let pass by." He brought his glass to his mouth and drank the rest of the firewhiskey "I'm sorry about your brother. He and George were the only two Weasleys I actually liked."
Ginny looked into his deep blue eyes and swore she was having an hallucination. Was she really sitting in the same table as Malfoy?
"Ah...thank you...?" she mumbled too numbed to scold him back to his table.
(some hours before)
Draco looked up from his drink when he felt Ginevra enter the Three Broomsticks. Even with her cloak hiding her face he knew her aura anywhere. She had an energy so powerful it was hard to ignore it.
In fact, Draco could never ignore her presence. Since he first saw her, he knew she was special. Too bad she was a Weasley or he would make a go at her and ask her out. But being a Weasley didn't mean Draco didn't lust her since his fifth year at Hogwarts.
It was the fourth time he saw her enter the bar that week. This time he had been wishing she would come as she had the nights before.
He kept silent for a while just watching her sitting in front of him with her back to him and a drink in her hand. One after another one, he saw the young Weasley drown her sorrows. He could only imagine what she was going through. Losing people one loved must be the hardest thing especially a brother.
Draco could say he was lucky. His parents were safe although both were in Azkaban. His mother was to serve eleven more months in prison and two years community service and his father was to serve eight years in prison plus ten of community service. But Draco knew they were proud of what they did in the last battle. What started as a strong alliance to the Dark Lord ended up being the ruin of their family and his parents love one thing above all other: Draco.
Many would think Draco was tortured by his father or that his childhood was horrible but on the contrary Lucius Malfoy although a tough educator was also a doting and loving parent. He taught him to be the perfect Malfoy heir but he was not violent and he was sad to see Draco became a Death Eater so young. Once he'd thought he was better because he was a Malfoy and a pureblood and that because of those two things he deserved it all but then he saw what power and egocentrism could do to a person, he saw the horrors of war and what evil actions could do to a innocent soul like his was once upon a time.
Somewhere in the middle of his last year Draco decided he would play it smart, after all he didn't want to die. He was never a true Death Eater at heart. He had been forced to get the mark. He believed Voldemort's doctrine as it was what his parent taught him since he could remember but now he believed that maybe it was ok to think it but do nothing about it. He was not a changed man after all but he was indeed a changing man.
Draco had been imprisoned and was later presented to court for trial after the Final battle. Although he had not participated actively during the war for he had not killed anyone or done anything but cast some Cruciatus curses, he had had a significant part in the death of Albus Dumbledore and was a marked Death Eater.
His father took the blame for him and Severus Snape's memories also helped him to avoid time in Azkaban. Even Potter had given the court his testimony saying he believed that even if he thought Draco was a bastard, he was not evil and that he had been forced into it. And it was true... Draco had been too scared to take Dumbledore's offer of protection but when he was hesitating and about to accept it (for he knew his parents would prefer him safe even if it meant that the dark Lord would kill them or torture them) Snape had appeared and killed the old man.
Every day Draco wondered what his life would be now if he had accepted without hesitation the offer Dumbledore had made him that day. He wondered if the young Weasley in front of him had doubts about her life and her past... She was suffering. Of that he was sure for he had been observing her for the last days and hours.
"Young girls shouldn't drink that much" he said out loud without realising. He was shocked when she replied to his involuntary commentary that he laughed lightly considering that he indeed was more drunk than he thought.
'It's now or never' he thought raising from his table to join the young Ginevra Weasley.
Ginny couldn't believe she was drinking in silence with Draco Malfoy.
They didn't exchange a word since Ginny awkwardly thanked him for his apology.
During that week this "ritual" happen every night. Every night Draco would join her table without asking permission, without saying a word and they would drink in silence while the rest of the costumers partied around them celebrating the end of the war.
In the weekends Ginny would go to the Burrow to see her parents and tell them she was ok. She had been working part-time in a small record shop in Hogsmead making enough for her rent and her nightly tabs at the Three Broomsticks (although Malfoy now insisted he wanted to pay for her drinks). Molly Weasley was worried. Her only daughter was taking her brother and friends deaths very hard. She was distancing herself from the family... and Molly couldn't understand her need to move out and have space when Molly believed the best way to grieve was staying together as a family.
Ginny knew they all thought she was being selfish for adding more hurt to her mother but she could stay at the Burrow... she would rather die than to share her grieve with her family. She was not an open person. She kept her feeling inside her and dealt with her pain her way.
That Sunday she went straight to the Inn.
Draco Malfoy waited for Ginny but she never came. He waited the next day and the next and the next...
Draco Malfoy felt alone. Yes, he would admit it to no one, but Draco Malfoy was feeling alone. He was alone at home for his parents were in prison and he had no other family or friends around. His "friends" were also serving time or were not talking to him because he was now a blood traitor.
So Ginevra Weasley was the closest he had had to company for the last months.
Her absence was troubling him...more than he cared to admit.
A month later, Draco Malfoy was still doing his community work in Diagon Alley. He was helping to rebuilt what he helped destroy. Most of the Malfoy estates and businesses were still frozen and under audit from the Ministry so Draco was being forced into a modesty fast curse. 'Now I know how it felt to be a Weasley' he would often think sadly obviously exaggerating for he was indeed working hard and had little compared to what he was used to but he was still richer than the Weasley ever were before the war.
Every night he would go to the Three Broomstick in hopes of some Weasley company but every night he left the bar alone.
Until, nearly one month and a half after the last time he had seen her, Ginny walked in. This time she sat at his table. She didn't wait for him to join her.
They drank in silence but he could feel her gaze on him, her pretty blue eyes piercing his soul for answers.
'If people could recognize them they would think something was truly wrong with this new world...a Weasley having drinks with a Malfoy... never heard of, never seen!', she thought.
"Have you ever wonder what would your parents think if they knew you were having a drink with a Weasley?" her soft whispering voice took him from his own thoughts.
"Father would lock me up in St. Mungus for sure" he joked knowing perfectly well that his father would yell and berate him for such a poor choice of drinking buddy but in the end would cave and let him do what he thought was best.
She gave him a small smile.
"I think I'm done with getting drunk every night. It isn't helping..." she said looking at the empty glass in her hand.
She had made peace with half of what had happened to her over the war. Although she was not over the pain and although she was still grieving she knew she had to let go of the past and she couldn't do that completely numb from the Firewhiskey. She had avoided coming to the Three Broomsticks. She was getting too comfortable and enjoying Malfoy's company too much for her taste. She couldn't allow her emptiness to let her make bad choices. So she didn't came for a month and a half but she had seen him entering the bar and every day he seemed less like the arrogant and confident Malfoy she used to know. She knew why she felt comfortable in his silent company. He was empty, he was hollow just like her... Maybe their reasons were different but the results were the same. She could see it in his eyes... he had that lost look in his eyes she often saw in her mirrow.
"Tell me, Malfoy, why is it that two enemies find each other company so appealing?" she asked matter-of-factly.
"You are really talkative tonight, Weasley..." he replied uncomfortably. She was staring again like she saw more of him that he would like to show.
"I don't believe you're reformed. I still hate you and all you did to my family and friends but I still came here tonight trying to figure out what brings you to this bar every night. What could be so wrong in your life that you have to drawn your sorrows in alcohol just like I did for the past months" she knew she was pushing him, she was prepared to hear him reply with a petty insult like those he used to give her at school. But the insult never came. Nor did he reply. He asked the bartender for another round of FireWhiskey and another and another...and so Ginny drank with him in silence like all those nights ago.
If you asked Ginny what made her break down in front of Draco Malfoy that evening after getting drunk again on their way to the Inn, she didn't know how to answer.
All she knew was that suddenly she was telling him all about how she missed Tonks, Remus and Fred. She told him of all the times she was tortured in their last year at Hogwarts. And in return Draco told her why he sat drinking every night.
"I go home to an empty house. I work all day rebuilding what was destroyed. I keep reliving it every day, every spell I cast, every curse I did... all there in those ruined alleys..." he confessed while they were sitting on a bench in front of the Inn "I'm starting to have regrets ...ugh..." he stated like he was tasting something disgusting.
"I know what you mean..." Ginny replied "Every time I go home to the Burrow I see Fred and all the good times we had there... it's unbearable!"
"At least when you go there you have your loving family there... I have no one. They're all locked up. No one cares if I'm alive, if I'm ok... I'm an outcast now... People look at me with disgust. I had people spiting on me to see if I'd let my guard down and curse them and gain a one-way ticket to Azkaban!" he said almost rolling his tongue around the worlds.
He was really drunk... he had tried to avoid these confidences with Ginny by getting her really drunk and unable to have coherent thoughts but in the process he got himself drunk enough to talk to her, a Weasley, about his feelings ("yuck...feelings...", he thought).
Ginny looked at Draco and saw him without his usual mask. He was after all a real boy... he had a heart...
"Having a caring family isn't always a good thing... I can't do anything without someone on my case... I need comfort but without the entire emotional stuff that usually come with it. I just want to forget..." she said softly.
"I know..." he replied looking dark and serious once more his gaze looked in hers. And his deep blue eyes were the last thing Ginny remembered before his lips touched hers and she forgot the world.
24th September 2005
CEO and vice-CEO's office
"Ginevra Weasley, please, pleeeeasse sit down! You're making me nauseous!" whined Pansy rubbing her eyes.
It had been six months since any of them had a day without worry. Malfoy was buying music companies and shops all over Britain and decided that he wanted to have a music recording department in his empire. So, Mystic was struggling.
They had been expecting this but still… As CEO's of Mystic they had to work extra hard and not panic although it was not easy considering Malfoy was now openly competing for one of their biggest clients, The Weird Sisters.
And Ginny was officially freaking out. The Weird Sisters were one of their biggest clients and if they lost the group, the company would have to lay people off.
"Oh, God!" she moaned "Mum's gonna kill me if we lose Celestina!"
Hermione sighed and rose from her chair.
"Ginny, STOP!" she commanded. Ginny obeyed and stood quiet.
Hermione looked at her apprehensible.
"You look drained, Gin. You must calm down. You have been doing this for six years-"
"And Malfoy was trained to take care of his family business since he was born!" Ginny shrieked "That's why he is crushing my negotiations with Celestina! The stupid ferret is bribing her and the rest of the group with things we cannot offer them..."
"We knew he would not lay cool while we rocked the market. We knew this was going to happen ever since his father died in Azkaban eight months ago and his mother had to step away from business... We prepared for this." She paused and sighed again looking at their monthly charts "And if this continues, we still have Mystique"
Both Ginny and Pansy looked at Hermione sadly. Ginny was the first to break the silence.
"Herms, Mystique retired" Ginny said darkly "She's the reason we're here but she retired and wants nothing to do with us anymore...or anyone ".
Hermione stared at Ginny and then at Pansy. Crestfallen Hermione pointed at last month's sells chart.
"If Malfoy keeps stealing our artists, she is our only choice. Ginny will have to talk to the Boss and that's it" she said dropping herself in her chair again.
Ginny did the same. They sat in silence and wondered how from one moment to the other the company started to fall after so many years on top. Ginny looked up from her papers at her two partners. They were the image of two very tired women. No one would say so if not for the bags under their eyes because both women dressed nicely and proudly and had a very professional air.
Ginny sighed and dreaded what was to come. No one wanted to do business with them anymore. Malfoy was bad-mouthing all over the market…and bribing their clients to quit their contracts and join his new agency. 'Why?' Ginny wondered. He had been quiet for three years, when he could have started this even with his mother dealing with the family business, so why now?
If he started expanding further then Mystic would not have any other alternative than to bet the wild card…
Mystique …
'The singer that made the company grew from a tiny little thing to the force that it is – was' Ginny thought jadedly.
She sighed again… no, The Boss was not going to be happy…
25th September 2005
Ginny woke up with a start and rubbed her eyes. As she looked around her she saw both Pansy and Hermione sleeping profoundly at their desks.
She stood up and looked at her watch. Four a.m. Great!, she thought with sarcasm.
She walked to Hermione's desk and gently tried to wake her up.
"Herms, Herms…" she called twice.
Hermione opened one eye, looked up at Ginny and smiled.
"Looks like we fell asleep in the office again…we should really think about installing a dormitory here." She said jokingly and she stood up and arranged her clothes.
Ginny nodded and walked up to Pansy. She called her twice as well and as usual…
"I'm UP! I'm Up!" Pansy woke with a start dropping from her chair.
"Yes, Pansy, we know you never fall asleep as we do" Hermione said rolling her eyes at Ginny who giggled.
Pansy laughed sarcastically as she looked for her shoes under her desk.
It was the nth time the three of them had fallen asleep while trying to find a way to keep their accounts.
Ginny grabbed her purse and straighten her robes. As she turned around something fell from her purse. A small silver mobile phone. Ginny grabbed it and noticed it was glowing.
"Oh, great!" she said out loud "Mom phoned me twenty times since seven p.m."
Pansy laughed. Even after truly knowing Ginny's family for four years she still could be bewildered by Molly's desperate attempts to contact her daughter every day.
"Molly is always calling you, Ginny. Maybe you should go visit her tomorrow" Hermione said as they walked out of the office to the elevator "You never visit nowadays and they miss you."
"I visit them!" Ginny replied indignantly.
"Yeah, right, once a month maybe." Pansy snorted and Ginny glared at her.
"I'm only saying that you should go more often. It's been six years Ginny... You can't avoid going there. I go there every week and I'm not family" Hermione continued "…at least not yet"
Ginny and Pansy laughed. Ron had been promising Ginny he was planning to propose to Hermione very soon but he had been making that promise for two years now…
"He will propose!" Hermione yelped "He just needs time!"
Pansy rolled her eyes at Ginny at this. It was a fact well know that Hermione would wait forever for Ronald Weasley.
"Oh, I would not roll my eyes if I were you, Pansy darling." Hermione replied "At least I know that Ron will propose but Harry is not even thinking about it"
Pansy glared at Hermione. Harry and Pansy were an on-off couple. Pansy was too volatile and Harry was too hard-headed sometimes but they loved each other too much to stay away long.
Ginny smiled sleepy at the other two antics.
Ginny sighed and waited for the enchanted elevator to stop. Life was good…stressful, but good.
Finally it stopped.
They passed by the night guard, John, and bid him goodbye with a smile as he waved at them.
Ginny kissed her friends and co-workers goodnight and walked home. Her old sweet home of three years was the only place she felt safe and truly happy.
She gazed one last time at the fashionable Mystic building and sighed. She walked down the street and turned a corner to her house. She smiled as she closed the door of her apartment. She could still hear Pansy's voice when she bought the house telling that maybe it was easier and cheaper to live in Mystic. Yes, she knew it was really close to her working place and that was, for her, a bonus.
She dropped her coat on the sofa and walked straight to her bedroom. Once inside she fell into her bed and sighed jadedly. She regarded her bedroom thinking. It was apparently a small apartment for someone of her wealth. Five years working in Mystic had given her more than she ever thought she could earn in a lifetime. But she did. Her apartment had two bedrooms, two bathrooms, one resting room and dining room and one small kitchen. Everyone in her family thought this apartment was too big for her, a single woman. She used to laugh at this because only she and Harry knew how big the apartment really was. After all, Harry was the one to find it. Her eyes gave a quick look in the direction of the hidden rooms of her apartment.
Her secret room of dreams and inspiration... Only Harry had ever entered those rooms besides Ginny and no one else knew of their existence.
No longer feeling sleepy, Ginny stood up and walked to her wardrobe.
She withdrew her wand hesitating only a second. She tapped the right corner and then the left corner. Leaning into the back of the wardrobe she whispered, "When the sky is bright but the dawn is scary, hold tight, I'll be there to kiss you goodbye!"
She stood back as a door appeared in the back of her wardrobe.
Ginny hold her breath as she opened the door of her music room.
She stepped in taken by the memories that room kept intact. One wall full of every CD Mystic had ever sold since it was born. In the other wall a collection of guitars placed neatly in it. Seven, one for each day of the week or the mortal sins… seven, for the day she was born and nearly died… Seven guitars propriety of the seventh born child. One baby blue, one baby pink, one purple, one black, one black and white, one blood red and an emerald green one. Collecting dust they were. Displayed there to tell her what she lived for, what she had to fight for…
Her work but also her life ... her way to forget her demons.
Finally she turned her gaze from the guitars and entered the other room: her own recording studio.
It had been almost three years since she had used it but still felt great to be there.
She looked around at the room and smirked.
If Malfoy wanted war, War it was.
30th September 2005
"Miss Weasley, the Daily Prophet, the Velvet and the Quibbler are all in the conference room" her assistant said dropping the daily newspapers on her desk.
Ginny looked up to thank him but Julliard had already left the room. "I'll make them wait a bit..." she thought smirking at herself.
She continued to read her papers. Five minutes later, Pansy walked in the room arguing with Hermione in hushed tones.
Ginny looked up from her papers and looked at her watch. Twelve p.m.
"Is this time for the Heads of the Company to arrive at the office?" she snapped "I've been here since 9 a.m.! I need your opinion in some of the ideas I had overnight!"
Hermione glanced at Pansy and Pansy nodded encouragingly.
"Gin dear, have you…uh…seem by any chance the Daily Prophet?" she asked backing outwardly nonchalantly to her desk in the other side of the room.
Ginny frowned and reached for it.
Her jaw dropped as she read the front page of the daily newspaper.
Malfoy and Zabini – United!
Former owner of Zabini Brooms Enterprises, Blaise Zabini, sold his company to Mr. Draco Malfoy last night. The union of these companies makes Mr. Draco Malfoy the owner of 80% of the national sports industry. He's also holds one of the biggest Potion's investigation department and is now seeking new horizons.
Lately Mr. Malfoy started a music agency and hired some unknown singers and bands but his eyes are set on two very famous names: The Weird Sisters and, the missing in action, Mystique.
'The negotiations are almost finished', Mr. Malfoy said to The Daily Prophet when questioned on his negotiations with the Wizarding famous band.
When asked about the mysterious singer, Mystique, Mr. Malfoy only smiled and assured he would soon reveal the singer's real identity before Christmas and get her to sign a contract with his company.
Will he? Will little family company Mystic survive? Or will it crash and burn?
Only time will tell.
... it continued but Ginny was done reading. Tossing the offending paper across the office, she yelled furiously.
"Little family company!" she yelped.
Hermione looked at Pansy nervously and then back at Ginny that had started throwing everything she saw. Both Hermione and Pansy decided that the best was to protect themselves from Ginny's tantrum.
"It will be alright, Ginny" Hermione said from under her desk.
"Bloody fuckin' Malfoy!" she yelled throwing another object against the wall.
"And there goes another flower vase", thought Hermione after hearing the breaking noise.
"We still got alternatives" Pansy offered from the other side of the room "He hasn't bought any thing related to fashion and literature"
Finally the breaking sounds stopped and Hermione ventured out. She stood up and looked around the battle field A.K.A their office. 'Wow it's worse than when Ginny discovered that Neville accidentally broke the industrial printer, last Christmas, making us postpone Violet's new book 'til February' she thought.
She looked for the redhead but Ginny had left the room.
"Is it clear, Herms?" Pansy whispered from under her desk.
Hermione laughed.
"Yes, the monster is gone" she joked.
It was not as if Ginny was a very complicated person to work with but she sure had her Weasley moments.
She bared a passion for Mystic than not everyone understood but Hermione and Pansy did. The company was a part of them. They had to work hard to be where they were and now seeing Malfoy threaten to crush their work…well, it was not a happy thought.
"Thank God we didn't tell her that he bought the radio station" Pansy stated coming out of her hideout.
"He bought what?" asked the 'monster' in a very tiny voice.
Both women turned to the door where Ginny had appeared with coffee in her hands. Expecting another outburst from their best friend, both women ducked under their tables.
But Ginny didn't move. She didn't say anything. She just grabbed her notes and headed to the conference room to meet the reporters.
Ginny sat quietly at her table thinking of what she could do. She had stripped down her fancy business robes and put on her baggy pyjamas. The mug of tea between her hands was cold, forgotten by the young woman.
Suddenly she could no longer think. She stood up and walked to her room. She closed the door and opened the music room.
In the past this had been her sanctuary, a place for when things went terribly wrong in her life. So, maybe it would help her now.
She grabbed the baby blue guitar and sat in her black leather sofa running her fingers through the strings. She felt a calming wave invading her and then she did something she hasn't done in a long time. She played and sang until she could no longer feel the pain.
A/N: Soooo what do you think about it? Please review! I know Ginny and Draco's story back in 1998 is still a bit confusing but it will get clearer as we go on. Just remember that Ginny is 16 in 1998. She was not part of the Horcruxes hunt but she went to school during the war, when some of the Professors were Death Eathers and she was "a blood traitor". She fought as a member of the Dumbledore Army and she lost her innocence and after the war she had to deal with a lot of issues and scars left from her warrior time. It will get clearer as to way Ginny and Draco felt so irrationally attracted to each other after a few nights and drinks.
Please review! I want feedback =) no flames please!*****
