Gasps filled the air as an uninviting smile tugged at the corner of his thin lips.
Professor McGonnagal ushered him right to the end of Slytherin table where people completely ignored him. Luna couldn't help but feel bad for Draco. She knows what it's like for everyone to talk about you and completely ignore you because you're not saying or doing the most normal thing. Ok, maybe not for Draco, but no-one deserves to be treated like that. Not after what Draco has been through. Maybe he was a bad person, but like McGonnagal said, he changed. He even smiled when he clearly did not want to be here. One of the best parts was that he was teaching a potion, at least that's one thing he'll get respect for.
"Mr. Malfoy is a teacher here now, so if I see any-one disrespecting him, you shall be punished as if you would to any other teacher. If you do this without me there but that would be hard since I'd be watching all his lessons here." She raised her eyebrows at everyone and then sighed.
Luna turned straight in her seat and started forking around with her food, eyeing Draco with his back to her. He was hunched over in his robes, except they weren't school robes, they were his own. It would be a little odd if he was wearing school robes and was teaching the class.
"She's mental!" Luna heard Ron exclaim, shaking his head and sighing. "His parents are in Askaban!"
"I can't believe she'll let Draco back. He's got the mark." Ginny said in disbelief.
"Ginny, you have to change classes, you can't have Malfoy as your teacher." Ron ordered.
"Believe me I would, but as you should know I've finished my OWL's and can't change classes anymore." Ginny replied with a sigh and frowned taking a bit of her sandwich.
"Why are you three even back?" Ginny asked furrowing her eyebrows.
"Why? Don't you want us here?" Harry teased smirking at Ginny.
"No, it's not that. It's just your supposed to finish school." Ginny shrugged and took another bite.
"Well, we missed school all year, so we asked Professor McGonnagal if we could come back this year and she said yes for reasonable reasons." Hermione said.
"Well, actually Hermione taught us into coming back." Ron added.
"It's for the better Ron." Hermione said in defence.
Luna smiled, knowing that Harry was going to be here all year. Luna desperately needed a friend like him. He was nice to her. He was her friend. A good friend.
Luna once again eyed Draco, and now saw him with his hands through his messy hair, stirring his soup in front of him, like he was performing voodoo or something.
"Gosh, just look at him. He looks like he's doing witchcraft in his soup." Neville sighed.
"I still can't believe McGonnagal would let him back in, after all he's done." Hermione sighed also.
Everyone agreed, except Luna.
"Well I'm going to sit with him." She smiled at everyone and left before any-one could stop her. She skipped across, over to the Slytherin table. People were aware of what she was doing, but she continued to do so.
"Hello Draco." Luna said and shot him a bright smile.
He gave an unwilling smile back and sat up straighter than his hunched back form.
"So how are you Draco? Teaching Potions? I always thought of you as a Darks Arts teacher." Luna said, pouring another glass of pumpkin juice because she had left hers over on the Griffindoor table.
Draco glared at her.
"When did you decide to come back?" Luna asked.
"I didn't." Draco spoke for the first time in a hoarse, croaky voice.
"Oh."
"Listen Loony, why are you here? Your friends seem to be worried about you." Draco said and looked back to everyone who were trying to call Luna back to the table, but she ignored them.
"I thought you needed to talk to someone." Luna smiled. Draco gave her a weird look, as if she just double back flipped on a pogo stick, singing Christmas carols in six different languages, whilst juggling ten balls of fire.
"Listen Draco, you're not on your own. I've got Potions next, so I guess I'll see you then." Luna said, standing up since the bell rung.
She skipped around the table, but stopped once she was behind him. She bent down so she was whispering in his ear.
"Oh, and don't slouch, or the Wrackspurts will get you. They like to pick on the laziest people in the crowd." She said and skipped down the hallway to her first lesson, leaving a confused Draco sitting alone.
-
"See you later Neville!" Luna grinned at him, walking away from him, off to her potions lesson.
"Bye Luna, save me a seat at dinner." Neville waved and emerged into the Herbology corridor.
Luna skipped down the hallways, catching up to Ginny Weasley and Hermione Granger.
"Off to potions?" Luna questioned.
"Yep, sadly. Draco is teaching us." Hermione groaned, rolling her eyes forcefully. "Why did you sit with him at breakfast?"
"He looked upset, he needed a friend." Luna smiled.
"You can't be friends with Draco, he's not a person! Well he is a person, but he's not like us, Luna. He is a death eater! He's evil." Ginny exclaimed.
"But not anymore. Voldemort's dead and Draco and his family have no-one to look up to now. Even Professor McGonnagal told us he shall be forgiven." Luna's smile faded as they started moaning about not to talk to Draco.
Luna sighed, thinking in her head, ignoring their orders. She can be friends with whoever she wants. She doesn't need people to order her not to be friends with someone who has changed. If you think about it, Draco wouldn't even be here if he hadn't changed. He hated Hogwarts, for him it was just a pathetic excuse to perform magic with a valid reason. He hated how the teachers had the nerve to tell him off if he did something wrong or how he had to wake up so early just for a lessons on unicorns or fairies. No really.
"Luna, are you even listening?" Hermione said, snapping Luna out her daze, twice today that has happened.
"Sorry." Luna said small and clutched her books more tightly.
"Alright, come on Luna were at potions class, with Draco. Don't talk to him." Ginny instructed and grabbed her wrist, pulling her into class with her. Luna stumbled on her feet because Ginny was walking a bit too fast and was a little taller than her.
She led Luna and Hermione to the back working space, furthest away from Draco, were he was sitting at the desk, looking through the text book. He looked up nervously as the three girls came in, realizing we were the first ones.
"Hullo Draco." Luna smiled at him waving a little.
Draco gave her friendly, forced, small, really small smile.
"Luna!" Ginny whispered angrily, but Luna just merely shrugged. She sat herself down and waited until the whole class gathered together.
"Ok, erm, settle down class." Draco said standing up, adjusting his robes.
The class quieted, and turned their attention to Draco.
"I think I'll have to go and find Professor McGonnagal, so if you could just-" he started nervously, but Luna cut him off.
"I'll go find her if you like Professor!" She offered happily, holding her hand up.
"Oh, uh...yes, Loon- I mean Lovegood. Uh, thanks." Draco said as Luna skipped out the class.
"Ok, well let's get started I think." Draco said once she left the room.
Luna skipped down the halls humming to a 'The Weird Sisters' slow song, skimming the hallways in search of Professor McGonnagal. She turned a corner on her last hope, and there she was.
"Oh, Professor, Draco was just asking me to come look for you." Luna grinned at the coincidence of this event. "Oh, it's funny how much of a coincidence it is." Luna laughed a little.
"Yes Miss Lovegood," Professor sighed irritably. "I was a little late from an interview for a new Ancient Runes teacher. We better get going then." Professor replied and they scurried off back to the classroom.
"As Professor Snape told me to never cut a bean, but crush it with the side of your knife..." Draco was saying, trailing off and letting his eyes falls on the two that just walked in.
"Sorry to disturb Professor, I'll just take a seat here and Luna can rejoin you." Professor McGonnagal said quietly and pulled an empty chair out and sat on it whilst Luna returned to her chair.
"No problem professor." Draco smiled small and return to talking to the class. "As I was saying, it's physically impossible to cut a bean, so crush it with the side of the knife." He placed the textbook back down on his desk. "Ok, let's get started on this. Brewing takes a while, so we'll continue with this in our next lesson, but get as much done as possible." Draco said and smiled forcefully at the class. The class stood up and gathered all ingredients and equipment. Hermione paired up with Ginny, Cho paired up with someone else and everyone else in class had a partner, except Luna. She sighed. This was fairly normal for her. She was fine with it. She thinks of it as 'complimenting behind their backs'. She took the final working space and started gathering ingredients.
"Lovegood, where's your partner?" Draco asked, standing a good 5 feet away from her.
"Oh, I don't have one. There's 31 in the class today, I believe Mary McEwan has woken with boils on her face this morning. Rushed straight to the hospital wing." Luna said and added some Salamander blood to her cauldron.
"Wouldn't you like to work in a three?" He asked, raising his eyebrows, once again looking at her as if she was more awkward than he thought.
"No, I'd rather be alone. But thanks for the suggestion Professor." Luna smiled and crushed her bean with the side of her knife like Draco had said.
"Oh, alright. Te-...tell me if you need any help." He said and awkwardly gave a nod and walked towards Ben Coates and Virginia Adams who were Ravenclaws in Luna's year, observing what they were doing to their potion.
"Luna," Hermione's voice echoed in her ears.
"Oh, hello Hermione." Luna said as she stood next to her observing Luna's potion.
"Why didn't you come work with us?" She asked.
"Oh, that's alright. Three would be too much people. I wouldn't have been much use." Luna smiled and added the crushed bean into her potion.
"Nonsense. Next time you come with us. It will save malevolent Malfoy over there. Disturbing you again." Hermione sneered and triumphantly walked back over to her working space with Ginny.
Oh hullo everyone, I'm terribly sorry but I seemed to put this story in a category of 'Hungarian' language! How silly of me! (Thank you to the anonymous reader for that one) I'm very unobservant, I'll tell you now. Since this story has been written up to chapter 10 I thought I would add another chapter, just because I am not busy at all during these holidays and this year is finally ending! I really hope you enjoy my story, I have cut out a bit of it from when it was on hpff. If you are from hpff, I'm terribly sorry but you'll probably have to wait even longer for this story to continue where I left it off over there. I hope I haven't made any more mistakes...please tell me how I'm doing just by a quick review! I'm not begging for reviews, but I would like to know how I'm doing...?
But anyway, thank you for reading this. You're all quite amazing. Until the next chapter, good bye!