AN: Sorry for the long wait. Got laid off and my time is being spent on more important things. I will finish this, but it may go slow.

Ignoring Draco, however, proved to be impossible, but not as bad as Ron would have thought. Most of the time, Draco did his best to keep to himself and focus on his studying, but as more people tried to single him out, the more he seemed to hang around Ron. As the only ex-Death Eater on campus, there were a lot of bad feelings venting Draco's way and Ron supposed his helping Draco out on the first day made the Slytherin feel safer around him.

"Would you please stop following me?"

"I'm not following you, we just happen to be headed in the same direction. I mean really, we have the same classes."

"Yeah I know, but you don't have to walk right next to me."

Draco only responded with an eye roll and a sneer.

Potions that day were with Gryffindor and Ron was looking forward to meeting up with Harry. Once he made it to the old dungeon he ran over and sat next to his best mate.

"Hey Hermione."

Hermione smiled. "Well, good morning. Nice of you to grace us with your presence again."

Ron laughed. It was good to be back with the old gang again. He never thought he would miss them as much as he did after such a short time, but as he glanced over to the rest of the Everlux eighth years who weren't lucky enough to have their own houses to sit with he couldn't help but feel right at home.

Near the top of the Everlux side, Ron spotted Draco sitting in the middle of a small group of Everlux-Slytherins looking morose and distant.

Harry nudged Ron in the ribs. "What's with the prince of darkness?"

"Who?"

"Malfoy."

"Oh, Draco? Nothing, he's just pouting 'cause I won't sit with him." He chortled to himself at the irony of the situation, then noticed his two friends looking startled and confused. "What?"

"Draco? You two on a first name basis now?"

"And why on earth would he want to sit with you?"

Ron grinned. "Hell, Hermione, you say that like sitting with me is a terrible thing."

Hermione would have come back with a clever retort, but class started and she wasn't about to interrupt the teacher and she was reluctantly forced to turn her attention to her classwork. After class was over, however, she was all questions again. "So what's going on between you two?"

"I dunno, I guess since I was the one who helped him out that one time he feels safer with me around."

Harry bumped into him playfully as they walked out of the smoking classroom where a number of the advanced potions had gone wrong. "That's hilarious."

"I know."

"It was really nice what you did for him though."

Ron shrugged, but couldn't help but smile at any praise he got from Hermione. "I guess you could say he owes me one."

"Well," she beamed up at him, glad to be getting along so well again, "I think it shows a great deal of maturity."

"And I think it shows a great deal of stupidity."

The trio turned around to find the owner of the snide voice and spotted Draco walking up to them.

Ron frowned. "What are you talking about? If I hadn't stepped in -"

"I would have never gotten hurt in the first place."

Ron folded his arms and leaned over the shorter man defensively. "Now wait just a minute -"

Draco leaned right back into him, having never been one to back down from an argument, and jabbed him in the chest with an accusing finger. "If you hadn't been so set on interfering and trying to disarm me in the middle of a duel that had nothing to do with you, I would have never been hit by that hex."

"Well," Ron stood upright again, "well, I didn't know he was going to hurt you like he did. But I did help!"

"Yes, helped me right into the fire."

"Oh yeah, well if I'm such a nuisance, why have you been following me around like some kind of lost puppy for the past three weeks?"

"I've been looking for a fireplace to push you in and return the favor!"

"Boys!" Hermione pushed her way in between them. "This is no way for eighth years to act. We're supposed to be examples to the younger students."

"Oh, shut up Granger, nobody was talking to you!"

"Don't you talk to her that way!" Ron, red-faced and furious, grabbed Draco by the lapel and hit him as hard as he could.

In the blink of an eye, a crowd had gathered around the brawling pair, Harry had pulled Hermione out of the fray in just the nick of time, and a pair of Professors were pushing their way through the mass of cheering teenagers.

()()()

The disapproving look on Minerva McGonagall's face was almost enough to make the two boys regret the fight they had gotten into. Almost.

"I cannot believe the two of you. I would have thought, after all we went through, that the two of you might have finally learned how to act like a pair of human beings."

Draco and Ron looked down at their feet, which was easy to do as their feet were directly in front of them. During the fight, they had somehow moved towards the steps leading further down to Slytherin house and tumbled roughly down them. Now they were confined to the hospital wing while Pomphrey patched them up.

"I expected more, though I don't know why." Minerva pressed her lips irritably. "I have no choice but to take twenty points from each of you."

"Twenty?" But as the headmistress looked down at him, Ron didn't dare say more.

"Now, I've asked Mdm. Pomphrey to keep you in here for the rest of the day to teach the two of you a lesson."

At this Draco sat upright in his bed. "But, Headmistress, I've missed so many classes already. Can't I just get a detention?"

"Your enthusiasm for study is noted and appreciated, Malfoy, but your enthusiasm for getting into fights is not."

"But -"

"My mind is made up." She gave the two of them one more warning look before walking away and letting their visitors enter the room.

A gang of Slytherins, a far larger crowd than usually showed Malfoy their support, came in to see Draco while a more diverse crowd came in to see Ron. Amusingly, the heated glares from the hospital guests were ten times more heated than the passive glances Draco and Ron gave each other and after only fifteen minutes, Mdm. Pomphrey tossed the visitors out and left the boys alone.

Two hours of staring out the large windows and avoiding eye contact with each other later, Draco finally broke. Earlier, when the two of them had been allowed visitors, Harry had brought Ron his old chess board and his and Ron's chess pieces in hopes of playing over lunch, but with all the other people crowding around the two beds it had proved impossible.

Draco gingerly got up out of bed and pulled up a chair. "I've heard you play a decent game."

"You play?"

"Of course I play." He pulled up Ron's side table and tossed the board on top.

Ron shrugged. "Ok, but I'm just going to kick your ass again."

"Hm. Well if you play as well as you fight this should be another easy victory for me." Draco set up Harry's pieces with complete civility as Ron set up his own. "White goes first," and he made the first move.

The game was hardly started when the two of them were dismissed for dinner and they were forced to very carefully carry the board up to their common room and into the bedroom where they placed it on the side table between their four poster beds. Even then, the boys had a hard time walking away from it.

Ron never knew Draco was such a passionate chess player, nor would he have guessed he would have been as good as he was, and as the days began to pass him by, all Ron could think about was the chess board and Draco Malfoy.