AN: Alert! Alert! This is a mild Dramione fic. Because I am a Dramione shipper, so I put Dramione in my fics. If you don't like it, boo you. And there's not THAT many Dramione anythings in here. I mean, it's mostly just all of them being friends. And Hermione introduces herself as Hermione Malfoy. That's all, I swear. Plus, it kinda relates to my other fic: A Change of Pace. The heart-to-heart between Harry and Draco I talk about here happens there. So the pairings essentially are: Harry/Ginny, Draco/Hermione, Ron/Pansy, Blaise/Luna
The first to arrive, in only a few seconds, were Draco and Hermione, followed by Ron. They apparated into the room and quickly drew their wands.
"Oh, it's only Harry's Aunt and Uncle," Hermione sighed, stowing her wand away. Ron followed suit, grinning at Harry.
Draco, however, kept his wand trained on them. "Scarhead's Aunt and Uncle?" he growled, "Can I curse them?"
Hermione looked aghast. "Draco, no!" she shrieked, "They're just muggles! What did they ever do to you?"
Draco's eyes didn't leave the Dursleys, who looked fairly frightened. "It's not what they did to me, Hermione," he told her, "It's what they did to-"
He was cut off as Harry rugby tackled him to the ground. The pair landed with an oomph in front of Hermione's startled eyes.
"You said you wouldn't tell anyone!" Harry growled at Draco, before letting him up and hauling him to his feet.
"Fine," Draco glared at him.
"Wait, you know about whatever this is about?" Hermione demanded, "What has you and Harry all worked up and what put Ginny into shock?" She waved towards Ginny who was sitting stonily on the sofa, staring at Draco in disbelief. Draco just nodded. "Well, tell me, then!" Hermione almost screamed, "I mean, you know how much I need to know things! How did Harry tell you but not me?"
"Well, we had some kind of heart-to-heart," Draco said bitterly as Harry grimaced, "You know, one abused child to another."
Hermione winced. It was no secret that Draco's father treated him like dirt. After watching Lucius hurl curses and insults at a helpless Draco, no one dared mention his terrible childhood. Especially Draco. Draco looked extremely uneasy after his outburst and he stepped away from the spotlight, pulling out his newspaper and unfolding it. Then, Ginny spoke up.
"You-you knew?" Ginny whispered. At Draco's stiff nod, she turned on Harry, looking furious. "HARRY! HOW COULD YOU NOT TELL ME ABOUT ALL THIS! YOU TOLD DRACO, BUT NOT ME?" She launched herself at him and started crying into his chest and Harry wrapped his arms around her, looking bemused. Then, she pulled away and yelled, "I AM YOUR WIFE! I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU NEVER TOLD ME! THAT'S IT! I WANT A DIVORCE!"
Harry looked alarmed as he stammered, "W-what?" The Dursleys looked on with a mixture of smug-ness and amusement.
Hermione rushed forwards, wrapped an arm around Ginny's shoulders, and smiled warmly at Harry. "Don't worry, Harry," she smiled knowingly, "It's just the hormones."
"Oh, yea," Ginny beamed through her tears, "I forgot to tell you Harry. I'm pregnant."
"W-what?" Harry looked faint, but still fairly pleased.
"Hey!" Draco exclaimed from behind his newspaper, "They released the new SkyRocket 2400 today!" Ron's eyes widened and he raced over to Draco to look at it.
"W-what?" Harry shouted, turning to Draco, looking excited.
"Honestly," Hermione rolled her eyes, "Don't take it too personally, Ginny," she told the girl, "I'm sure Harry's really excited. It's just-"
"Well, of course he is!" Ginny cut her off happily, "The SkyRocket 2400! Do you know that's supposed to go from 0 to 80 in two seconds?" Hermione rolled her eyes again.
"That's enough!" Vernon interrupted, his face purple, "You are breaking and entering!"
"What?" Ron said, taken aback, "No, no, we didn't break anything this time!"
Vernon continued as if he didn't hear him, "I demand you leave at once!"
Ginny turned on them, her eyes flashing murderously, but Harry grabbed her, letting the more rational Hermione take care of it. "Well, you see Mr. Dursley," Hermione said nicely, "Because of Ginny's distress call, there is a possibility that some other witches and wizards might apparate into your house. In order to sort it all out, we need to stay for a few more minutes."
Vernon stared at her, before rudely saying, "Who the hell are you?"
Hermione looked taken aback. Not only her, but the four behind her glared at Vernon. "Well," she said, sticking her hand out, "My name is Hermione Malfoy." The Dursleys all looked at her hand suspiciously and she hesitated for a second before pulling her hand back. "Well, then," Hermione huffed, affronted, "Maybe I should have let Draco curse you."
Draco's eyes widened and he looked mildly excited, pulling his wand out. "No, Draco," Hermione sighed, without even looking behind her, "No, you can't curse them." Draco deflated and stowed his wand away, leaning against the wall sullenly.
"Tough luck, mate," Ron patted his shoulder comfortingly. Draco sniffed dramatically for effect. Hermione rolled her eyes again.
"So, Mr. Dursley," she began, smiling again, "What is it that you do for a living?"
"I work with drills, I've got this company for them," Vernon said slowly, suspiciously.
"How fascinating!" Hermione said brightly, steering the three towards the kitchen, leaving the other four in the foyer, "Business? My parents are dentists, and they've never had an aptitude for business and finances."
"Well, what do you do then?" Vernon sneered.
"I work in the Ministry," Hermione answered politely, "I'm a lawyer, to be honest."
"So, those freaks need lawyers?" Vernon asked rudely. By now, the other four had followed them, and Ron and Ginny looked kind of livid.
"Well, of course, Mr. Dursley," Hermione continued politely, ignoring the angry looks on her friends' faces, "I deal with things as serious as criminal activity, to simple things like divorce."
"Why?" Dudley piped up. Hermione stared at him.
"Why what?" She asked slowly.
"Why do you go work?" He asked insensitively, "Why would you even go to work if you're just going to settle down and get married anyways?"
"Excuse me?" Hermione asked, her polite façade gone. Instead, she was slowly reddening and she looked furious.
"There's no point in working for women," Dudley shrugged, "I mean, my mom never worked. She stayed home to take care of me and the house. And that's what all women should do."
Draco, Ron, Harry, and Ginny all collectively gasped. Hermione was slowly swelling up like a bullfrog and she looked like she was about to snap his neck.
"Hermione, love," Draco called over from a safe distance. Scratch that, he thought savagely, with Hermione, there IS no safe distance. "Hermione, breathe, sweetheart.""It doesn't look like it's working, Draco," Ron whimpered, "Can we all go take cover?"
"Why you little-" Hermione drew her wand but, before she could say anything else- Petrificus Totalus- she was frozen solid, a livid expression on her face.
The other four magical people looked among themselves confusedly, until they saw Harry standing there with his wand out and a sheepish expression on his face.
"Harry!" Ron screeched in a voice a couple octaves higher than normal, "What have you done?""I-I couldn't think of anything else I could do!" Harry defended himself, "I mean, she was going to curse them! And we all know Hermione! They'd have nightmares for a year!"
"Serves them right," Ginny said angrily, glaring at them so hard that the three of them flinched.
There was a pause while they appraised the situation and tried to come up with a way to make Hermione less mad.
"Well," Ginny finally spoke up, "This could be a good thing?"
"How is this a good thing?" Ron asked hysterically, his hands in his hair.
"Well, when we finally unfreeze Hermione," Ginny shrugged, "She won't care about any of us, she'll go straight after Harry to hex him."
Draco nodded solemnly, a smirk spreading across his face. Ron looked even more panicked.
"What?" He gasped, "Harry? No, not Harry! He's my best mate! He's like my brother! He's the savior of the wizarding world! She can't!"
"Alright, everybody, calm down!" Harry shouted, and everyone fell silent. "I'll deal with this."
He made his way over to where Hermione was frozen and gently pried the wand out of her grasp. "There," he said, "Now we're good."
Draco opened his mouth to say something, but then snapped it shut, looking a bit smug.
Harry waved his wand over Hermione, and she unfroze, still glaring murderously. "I'll deal with you later, Harry Potter," she seethed before turning towards Dudley and, before anyone could even think about stopping her, pulled her arm back and punched him right in the nose.
Everyone winced as Dudley fell back with the force of the blow, holding his broken and bleeding nose and staring at Hermione with a sort of grudging respect. Petunia shrieked and immediately ran to the aid of her son while Vernon yelled and started towards Hermione, only to be stopped by Harry, who had his wand out threateningly towards him.
"Tough, mate," Draco called over, "I mean, she had a wicked right hook back in Third Year, and she's only gotten better."
Hermione smirked down at Dudley, who was still on the ground, and said, "Come on, Draco, let's leave."
Draco started to leave the room and then turned back suddenly and asked the other three, "Right, so I'm meant to ask you all, for the Malfoy New Year's Eve ball, are we better at Malfoy Manor, or the Villa in Venice?"
"Best to do it at the Manor, mate," Ron said, "Pansy's due a bit over a week after New Year's, and apparently, we're not supposed to portkey anywhere when she's over seven months pregnant, and apparation's definitely out of the question."
"Right," Draco nodded, and was probably going to say more if Blaise and Luna hadn't just apparated right into the Dursley's living room. The three Dursleys screeched in outrage as the two appeared with a pop and, although Blaise seemed alarmed, Luna simply regarded them calmly.
"Not more freaks!" Vernon groaned. Everyone ignore him.
"What the bloody hell are you two doing?" Ginny asked them breathlessly. Harry groaned again and sat down hard on the sofa, passing a hand over his face tiredly.
"We got the signal," Blaise answered simply, pulling out the fake galleon.
"Yeah, like twenty minutes ago," Hermione said, sounding amused.
"We were busy," Luna explained simply.
"Seriously, Lovegood?" Draco chuckled, "If there really was some trouble, Scarhead and Weaslette could have been killed twenty times by now."
"I'm sure the invisible Siberian juglax would have come," Luna shrugged, "It always comes to help those noble in heart."
However, instead of the classic shrug-and-sigh approach that Hermione usually took whenever Luna sprouted some of her ideals, Hermione brightened up, her expression thoughtful.
"Oh, right, Luna!" she smiled, "The juglax! I'm pretty sure it's already here, what with everything that's going on. I think I sensed its presence. It's supposed to be pretty dangerous, though, we should probably be careful. I think we should leave."
The others smirked, catching on, and nodded, following Hermione as she walked out of the living room.
"W-wait," Vernon called after them, "If there's one of your ridiculous freak creatures here, you have to get rid of it! We don't want any of your unnatural dangerous stuff here!"
Ginny stuck her head back in and smiled evilly. "Oh, Mr. Dursley, it's obvious that we're not exactly welcome, so we'll just be on our way. And, don't worry about anything! The juglax is a nocturnal creature! So you're all fine during the day."
"Just be careful during the nights," Draco added, "The juglax really likes clean places like this, so I'd imagine it'd probably stay here. That would actually make it very difficult to get rid of it, so just be on your guard."
They were out the door before the Dursleys could say anything else.
"I can't believe James slept through all that," Ginny smiled fondly down at her son, who was still sleeping in her arms, "I mean, Hermione can be pretty loud."
Hermione paused for a second, and then smiled and said, "I'm going to take that as a compliment."
Without a backward glance, the group opened the front door and left the Dursley house for the final time.
"Hermione, that was brilliant," Ron burst as soon as they exited, "You punched that prat right in the nose!"
"It felt good too," Hermione grinned viciously, flexing her wrist, "He's been such a git to Harry, and he really deserved it."
"God, Potter," Blaise shook his head, "I had no idea your family was so horrible."
"Oh, they're not my family," Harry said with a small smile, looking at everyone around him, "Not really. I mean they haven't even done a tenth of what you lot have done for me. So, I guess, you're all my real family."
There was a pause as the group absorbed this.
"Aww, Harry, that's so sweet," Hermione smiled at him.
"It's nice to be included in a sentiment like that," Lune said softly.
"Goddammit, Potter," Draco groaned, "Stop being a bloody Hufflepuff."
"Yeah, a bit too much mate," Ron smirked.
"God, you sound like a freaking poof, Scarhead," Blaise rolled his eyes, "I'll just pretend you didn't say anything."
"Aww, come on, you lot," Harry grinned and threw his arms around Draco and Ron's shoulders, "Let's go back to our place. What do you say to some Quidditch?"
"Right, and then, we can paint our nails and talk about our feelings," Draco rolled his eyes, but grinned despite himself.
They stood together for a split second, and then all disapperated.
