AN- I hope this lives up to everyone's expectations! Anyway, don't worry, this leads into some interesting happenings, so it's not a total loss. BTW, since I didn't say this earlier- I don't own the HP characters, JK Rowling does! And I don't have a penny to my name (a few quarters, but no pennies, I can assure you) so it would be utterly useless to sue me.
The Search
Chapter Two: Here, Kitty, Kitty…
Draco fished through his pocket. After a moment he grasped his key ring and pulled it out, the keys jangling slightly.
"You sure this is gonna do any good? She wasn't kidnapped at her apartment, Malfoy," said Harry, eyeing the apartment door as if expecting it to leap up and bite him in the nose.
"Of course I'm sure, Wonder Boy," snorted Draco. "Otherwise we wouldn't be here, would we? Virginia kept records on just about everything she did in this old notebook of hers. I need to know if she was gettin' into anything that might have made Riddle just a tiny bit nervous."
Harry sent Draco a dirty look as the other man shoved a key into the deadbolt. "I'm not five years old, Snow-White," he said irritably. "I just fail to see why this matters."
"Stuff it." Draco opened the apartment door and stepped inside. Harry moved to follow him, but the door was promptly slammed in his face. He heard the click of a locked door and cursed under his breath.
"Be a juvenile idiot, then!" Harry hollered at the door. "See if I care!"
Draco ignored the words drifting through the closed door. He flipped on the lights and walked into the living room.
The entire place screamed Virginia Weasley. Sunny yellow walls, a strange assortment of multi-colored furniture ranging from the plaid armchair by the window to the rose-print velvet sofa in front of the television. Photographs lined the walls. A small entertainment center was propped up on one wall, next to the kitchen door.
There was a soft mew. A gray cat looked curiously up at Draco, blinking his green eyes slowly.
"Hey, Bowen," said Draco absently. He stepped around the feline and walked down the hallway towards Virginia's bedroom.
Everything in the bedroom was some shade of blue. Even the bookcase was a pale shade of blue. Just another facet of Virginia's eccentric personality, Draco decided.
"Where is it…" Draco pulled open the nightstand drawer and shuffled through its contents. A pair of novels- one romance, the other western. Loose Post-It notes. A locked diary. And, strangely, a green and yellow sock.
"Well, this is a lot of help," Draco muttered sarcastically. "Disorganized woman…"
Draco proceeded to comb through the entire room, seeing neither hide nor hair of Virginia's stash of notebooks. Finally, in a childish bought of frustration, he kicked a novel across the room.
"Rawwooo!"
Draco jumped. Bowen was standing a few inches away from where the book had fallen, fur bristling, hissing.
"Sorry, Bowen," Draco muttered. He eyed the angry cat, wondering if he was going to claw his way up his leg- Bowen had done it before, too.
There was something stuck to Bowen's collar.
Draco's eyebrows knitted together. This was just weird. Apparently Virginia had been reading too many serial mysteries. Either that or Bowen had a penchant for eating paper, who knew.
Draco crouched in front of the hissing cat. Bowen let out a kitty growl.
"I don't have time for this, fur ball," grumbled Draco. He grabbed Bowen by the collar and stifled a yelp as Bowen put claw marks down his bare arms.
"Fine! Be that way!" Draco grabbed the Post-It stuck to Bowen's collar and tossed the gray cat out of the room. Bowen ran the instant he hit the floor.
Draco stuck a cut finger in his mouth, wincing. "Stupid cat."
He examined the Post-It. It had some fur stuck to it, but he could make it out.
Paper makes up lots of litter,
it said, it Virginia's familiar chicken-scratch handwriting. Draco smiled wryly. Scratch was right, with that stupid cat around.So… what did this have to do with anything?
Draco flipped the note over. A crude cat's face was scrawled across the neon pink paper.
It might be just a random note… then again, it might not.
Draco rolled his eyes. He was completely mad. He stuck the note on the bedpost and left the bedroom.
He spent well over half an hour combing through the rest of the apartment, finding nothing of interest. Again.
Outside, Harry sat on the welcome mat, back against the door. He blew a stray lock of jet-black hair out of his eyes.
Stupid pale idiot. He didn't need to get so snippy just because he had stated his opinion.
Harry blew a raspberry into the air, for lack of anything better to do. This was bloody boring.
"Forget this," Harry mumbled to himself. "I'm goin' home."
He moved to stand, but before he could he fell over backwards.
Wha-?
"Nice to see you too, Potter."
Harry scrambled to his feet and turned to face Draco. He opened the door while Harry was still leaning against it, hence the subsequent over-balancing act.
"Shaddup," said Harry irritably, trying to salvage some of his defaced pride. "So, did you find what you were looking for, Oh Pale One?"
Draco chose to ignore the bait. "No," he said snippily. "Unless you'd like to take a gander, Haystack."
Harry stuck his tongue out in reply, knowing full well that he looked more like an angry toddler than a full-grown man.
"How mature," muttered Draco. He pushed past Harry, smirking as he noted that he towered head and shoulders over the Wonder Dork.
"Maybe I will go look," said Harry, wincing inwardly at his childish tone. "And I'll even find it, ha!"
"Be my guest, midget."
Harry rolled his eyes and marched through the still open apartment door, nose in the air, trying hard not to look as miffed as he felt.
He thought he heard a muffled giggle from Draco's general direction, but ignored it.
Harry stood in the middle of Virginia's front room, hands on hips, and looked around the rather eccentric-looking room. He adjusted his glasses and glared at the plaid armchair as if it were the cause of all his problems.
"Smashing good search method," Draco drawled sarcastically from the front door. Harry bit back a stinging retort and began riffling through the room, even looking in the video cabinet and under the sofa cushions. The entire time Draco stood just inside the apartment door, delivering scathing comments that made Harry wonder what Draco would look like smeared across Virginia's ceiling. He smirked to himself at the mental image.
"What's so funny, Potter? Finally realized how stupid you look?"
Harry bit back a growl and shoved the couch cushion back into place.
Draco rolled his eyes at the ludicrous spectacle. The man was a complete imbecile. Did he really expect to find a secret stash of tax records under the sofa? He'd thought Potter was a bit off his onion, but this took the cake.
"I'm leavin'," said Draco suddenly, surprising both himself and the still-rummaging Harry. "Be psychotic in private and leave me out of it, shrimp."
Draco adjusted his jacket and marched stiff-legged from the apartment, wondering if he should lock Harry in. He abandoned the idea and headed towards the parking lot.
Harry sent the closed door an irritated glance. He was just about done with the living room, anyway.
"Does he have male PMS or something?" Harry muttered to himself as he peered into the coat closet. "Ruddy irritable, he is."
* * *
Draco tossed his jacket into the closet on top of a mound of shoes and baseball caps. He kicked the door closed.
He headed into the kitchen, pressing a button on his answering machine as he passed the table in the entryway. He half-listened to it as he peered into the refrigerator in search of the bottle of Gatorade he knew was in there somewhere.
"Draco, it's Mum. You really need to stop working so late; it's nearly ten. Anyway, call me back. Lots of love."
Draco rolled his eyes and grabbed the orange juice in lieu of his precious—and apparently gone—Gatorade. "I'm surprised she hasn't given herself cavities. Sweeter than a bowl of treacle, and twice as unbearable."
"Malfoy, it's Ron Weasley. Have you seen Virginia? She was supposed to come to my place tonight and I haven't seen her. I thought you might have some idea of where she got off to. Number's 583-472-9784."
Draco groaned theatrically and smacked his forehead with the palm of his left hand. He should have known better than to think he could get away with not contacting the Weasleys. From the sound of it, Dumbledore hadn't bothered calling them. Or if he had, he hadn't given the entire story, just some cock-and-bull rubbish that made no logical sense. Not that anything Dumbledore ever made any sense, mind you.
He sighed, rubbed his face, and took a swig of juice. He was too ruddy tired to deal with the Weasley clan tonight. He had every intention of going to bed and staying there for the next three millennia.
Or at least until tomorrow morning.
* * *
Harry glanced at his watch and groaned. It was eleven thirty at night, and he still hadn't found anything.
"Forget this," he muttered to himself. He marched into the bathroom, intent on relieving himself and then going home.
After he took care of his stuff, Harry opened the small closet in search of a towel. All he saw were various cosmetics and a bag of kitty litter.
Harry rolled his eyes. He glanced behind the kitty litter, but didn't see any towels. He turned to leave-
Wait a second.
Harry yanked the kitty litter out of the closet and stared at what lay on the floor.
Three battered notebooks, a scrapbook, and a pile of envelopes.
Harry let out a whoop of triumph and grabbed the booty.
"Take that, Malfoy!"
