Chapter Four: In Which They Go on a Date and George Learns about the Bet
Monday's workday was almost over. George had given the pamphlets to Trish and Verity so they would know what the Enemy Beans would do and how to counter them. Both women spent the downtime in the shop reading it. He went into the storefront where Verity was just finishing up hers.
"George, I think this is going to be a splendid product," she commented as she looked at him. He was staring at the clock. Verity had a feeling she knew why. In fifteen minutes Discordia Malfoy was going to come through that door wanting to see the Pygmy Puff. Verity knew that wasn't the only thing the brunette came to see, but she would let George and her figure that out for themselves.
"Thank you, I hope it sells. Verity, can I ask you something?"
"Sure, boss," she answered.
"What do you think of Discordia Malfoy?"
"Fancy her a little do you? Well good for you. You haven't been the same since Fred died. As for her, she's nothing like that foul git that is her cousin. I mean she's spoiled for sure, but she doesn't seem as narrow-minded as the Slytherin wanker. Maybe you should take her out and see how you like her," Verity suggested. The two of them needed a push.
If there wasn't a charm on the carpeted floor in the storefront George would have worn a hole in it with his pacing. Discordia should have been there forty-five minutes ago.
The door chimed and Discordia entered followed by two young boys. George didn't have to ask who they were. They had those eyes, so obviously they were Malfoys of some kind.
"Aunt Cordy, can I get anything I want?" The older-looking boy tugged on the sleeves of her red robes. George raised an eyebrow at the new color on her, the fact that children were with her, and that one just called her 'Cordy.'
"I will get you each one thing, but only something that won't warrant my death from your parents," she told the boy as he stared wide-eyed at everything in the store.
"Aunt Cordy?" George asked with mockery in his voice.
"My nephews, they're my brother's sons, and they had a hard time saying my sister's and my name. I let them call me Aunt Cordy and she let's them call her Aunt Lona," Discordia explained.
George nodded. "What are you doing with them? Doesn't your brother live in Greece?"
"Yes, but he and his wife, Nicola, my sister and her husband, and my parents have decided to do their yearly vacation these next two weeks. While I'm at work they go to the Manor and drive my aunt and uncle nutters," she explained. She smirked and the smaller boy, who looked a lot like the ferret, tugged at her robes.
"Aunt Cordy can I have a wand? I've always wanted a wand. All the big people have wands," he chattered to her.
"Sure you can, Vinnie," she answered and he scampered over to the fake wand section.
"I don't know if you really want to get him that. They turn into rubber chickens or pants," George told her.
"He won't care. He's three years old and wants a wand like his dad," she responded as she turned to watch her godson play with the wands. The wand smacked him in the neck. He started to cry. She rushed over to him and picked him up in her arms.
"It hit me!" He wailed.
"Well Vincenzo, I told you this was a joke shop. They aren't real wands," she responded as she rubbed his neck. George sighed. She was good with children. He had to ask her out now, if just for that reason. He loved kids.
"Yeah, listen here Vincenzo, how about I give you a Headless Hat?" George asked as he bent a little to get into the small boy's eyesight.
"Wha's that?" He asked as he pushed his dark blonde locks out of his face.
"Well that is a hat that makes your head disappear to anyone looking at ye," George answered the little boy.
"I would like a headless hat," he answered with one last sniffle before George handed him a hat. He smiled brightly, and Discordia put him down.
"Good kid," George complimented.
"Spoiled rotten that one, mainly from me, he's my godson. Plus he's the only one in my part of the family with blonde hair," she said as she watched him show the hat to his older brother. "It makes all the rest of us, except his mother, fawn over him because we're not used to the light locks."
"Yeah, I meant to ask about that," George stated.
"His mother's an Italian blonde, and since blonde does run in our family, which I'm sure you've seen, he came out dark blonde," she answered.
Verity laughed at how she could be so easily forgotten when the two of them were focused on one another. However, it spoke of Discordia's character that she never once forgot her nephews were there. Both boys brought her armfuls of Weasley products and she would say no or yes to each thing. By the end of the hour, Discordia was spending over a hundred galleons on the two boys.
"So how old are they?" Verity asked as she rung up the vast amount of products that Discordia was buying for them.
"Romano, the older, is seven years old and Vincenzo is three," she answered smiling at both boys. They stood next to her. Each of them was petting a Pygmy Puff and grinning widely up at their aunt.
"Do you have to spend all of your evenings with them the next two weeks?" Verity asked lightly. Really she was trying to get information for George.
"No, if there's something I have to do, then I can send them to the Manor. I just don't like them spending the whole two weeks there. They'll just get into trouble with my uncle," she answered.
"Well at least if you need a moment you can send them there."
"Yes," Discordia answered and handed Verity the money for her purchases. "Alright, you two, come on, we don't want to bother Mr. Weasley and his clerk anymore," she said to the boys as each one grabbed one of her hands. They exited the store.
George followed after them. He was going to do this.
"Did I forget something?" Discordia asked.
"No, no, I just wanted to ask if you wanted to get lunch with me tomorrow," he asked.
"Sure," Discordia answered trying to make sure she didn't let out a 'whoop' of triumph. It would surely give away that she had wanted such an endeavor to occur between them. He nodded at her answer and proceeded back into the store.
Discordia refused to be late. If she didn't pick out an outfit in the next ten minutes, then she would be. She had spent more time on her hair than she meant to spend. She had charmed it up into a messy bun with strands falling lightly around her face. Finding the right charm had taken fifteen minutes longer than it should. Now, she was scurrying through her closet trying to find something suitable for work and a lunch date. She chose a black pencil skirt that went just below her knees and a red silk short-sleeved button-up blouse. The sleeves had a slight puff to them and only went a few inches down her arm. She grabbed onyx earrings and hastily pinned them in her lobes. Her black tailored robes were still sitting on her bed; she threw them on over the outfit and made a mad dash for her fireplace.
She stepped into her office with one minute to spare. Breathing in and out in a way meant to stop her racing heart, she took a seat at her desk. She needed to finish writing a detailed report on how a raid works. Greece needed to start implementing these tasks. More wizards of the Dark Arts influence would be found this way. Right now, her home country was suffering from an uprising of Dark Arts. It was nothing as scary as Voldemort, but worrisome enough to the Greek Minister of Magic.
Discordia was startled when there was a knock at her door, but she quickly composed herself. Her hand with wand in it flicked and the door opened to reveal a very curly haired brunette. Discordia recognized her from Draco's wedding as the third and final of his former school enemies.
"Hello Miss Malfoy, my name is Hermione Weasley, and I'm here to give you information on the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures," Hermione greeted with her hand out as she approached the desk. Discordia shook the other woman's hand, returned the greeting, and gestured for Hermione to sit.
Both women sat silently measuring the other. Discordia knew how smart Hermione was from the constant ramblings Draco would spout. However, Discordia was intelligent. She hadn't graduated top of her class for nothing.
"Listen, I'll cut to the point. I could have had my assistant bring this file to you, but I had to meet you for myself. My brother-in-law, George, fancies you. He's not sure of it, but I can tell. I need to know you aren't going to hurt him. We almost lost him that first year without Fred. The two of them were practically the same person. George hasn't recovered from that loss of a piece of himself. So, if you plan on hurting him, I need you to know that I'd have to hex you," Hermione said without a single hitch in her voice. Discordia remained cool and collected even though she felt some guilt.
"I plan on going on a few dates with him. I don't plan on anything more or less," Discordia responded in a drawling voice. Hermione winced at the familiarity of the tone. It was the foul git's in a feminine octave.
"Fair enough," Hermione answered in a steely voice. She got up, bid the other woman a farewell, and left.
"Well Draco wasn't exaggerating about that, she really is an insufferable know-it-all," she muttered as she proceeded to peruse the file on Hermione's department. It was a decent enough file to send home, but the policies in it were for a government that was already stable like Britain's. Greece was still in turmoil and these laws would do nothing to help fix that. Nevertheless, Discordia penned a polite thank-you to both Hermione and Minister Shacklebolt for the information. She then proceeded to put the file in a filing cabinet marked, "After Repair Information."
George heard the chime at the door trumpet the lunch signal. He knew that Discordia would be here any moment to go to lunch with him. He felt the same way he had on that first day of Hogwarts, a bunch of nerves.
"Nervous?" Trish asked as she came back into the stockroom.
"No," he lied. Trish let out a small chuckle and grabbed her stuff to leave.
"Have a good afternoon, Mr. Weasley," she said as she exited the building.
The chime announced someone entering and George stood up to see Discordia entering. Her robes were fastened shut, but he could tell by her bare legs that she was wearing a skirt.
"No blue today?" He teased.
"Well, not anything that you'll be seeing," she answered with a trademark Malfoy smirk. He had to give it to her. She was extremely attractive, even more so with the evil grin.
"Just give me a few moments to change and we'll go to lunch," he told her as he headed to the back of the stockroom to go up the steps to his flat. He quickly went to his room without glancing in the direction of Fred's. He slipped into black trousers and a medium blue polo. He slowly went back out and down to the stockroom.
Discordia almost lost her outer composure at the sight of George returning from upstairs. He was wearing nice black trousers and a polo that brought out the blue flecks in his hazel eyes. It was weird but she barely ever noticed that he only had one ear. It was as if that small flaw didn't really exist on him.
"Well milady, shall we go to lunch?" He asked with charm evident in his voice.
"We shall," she said as she slipped her arm into the crook of his and they left the store. Once outside, George quickly disapparated them to a small wizarding community outside of Dublin. He gently guided her to a restaurant at the other end of the busy street.
They were seated and glancing at the menu when someone from the wait-staff came by and took an order for drinks. He left almost as quickly and unnoticeably as he appeared. Discordia glanced around the small place with its easy décor and appealing aroma.
"Fred and I found this place not too long after we made our first sales in the shop. I thought you might enjoy it as well," he explained. He watched as her eyes darted around the room to soak in all of the sight. It may not be a Malfoy-standard restaurant, but she was delighted by it, and that pleased him.
The restaurant was a bit warm for the bright end of September day so she slipped her black robes off and put them over the chair behind her.
If George hadn't been raised by Molly Weasley, then he'd have been slack jawed at the sight of her. She had a shiny red blouse that he knew was more than his whole outfit put together, a tight black skirt, and black strappy heels that elongated her rather short legs.
"Red is extremely becoming on you Cordy," George said using the nicknames that her nephews had the previous evening.
"Thank you, I should say the same about blue to you," she responded. She didn't even mind that he called her Cordy. She was enjoying his company and was sad to see that it was time to go back to work.
"Evil little sods," Draco vented as he tried to get both of his second cousins to remain seated for longer than five minutes.
"I think they're wonderful," Astoria cooed as she smothered Vincenzo into her.
"Don't start Astoria; we are not having any for at least three or four years. Little beasts," he let out again as he sent an Impedimenta curse at Romano. The boy stopped in his tracks. "There, now see what happens when you drive Uncle Draco nutters? Merlin I don't know how Discordia is spending so much time with you two without killing you."
"Aunt Cordy spends all day at work and tells us that we are treasures when she picks us up at the end of the day," Vincenzo informed everyone.
"If you're treasures then I am the Bloody Baron," he muttered so the child couldn't hear him. He looked at Romano, "I'll release the spell, but you better behave or I'll do it again." He set the young boy free and he plopped down on the floor where he was with one of the things he got from the joke shop.
The boys sat like that for the next hour until Discordia fetched them from the Manor. She entered the study that they were in with Draco and his wife and both boys jumped up to greet her. They ran full force into her legs and latched onto her.
"Hello boys," she greeted and her robes fell onto them as they pulled at her. Both didn't want to let go because they had such a horrible time with their uncle Draco.
"Aunt Cordy, how was your date Mr. Weaswey?" Vinnie asked as he looked brightly up at her.
At the question, Draco snapped his head up to look at Discordia. She shot him a smirk and scooped up her precious godson.
"My date went very well, Vinnie. I even brought you home some of the food for dinner," she answered.
"Is any of it ice cream?" Romano asked eagerly.
"No, no ice cream tonight. I bought you plenty of stuff yesterday," she replied. She really was trying not to spoil them, but she couldn't help it. They were the only children in the family as of yet, and everyone couldn't help but adore them. Well everyone except for Draco, but she was sure that men didn't really develop that feeling until after they had a child of their own. She looked at the boys and thought about children of her own. Except you have to be involved with a man to have children, and you can't do that. Career first, Discordia. She scolded herself in her thoughts.
"Did you really have a date with Weasley?" Draco inquired with alarm in his voice.
"Yes I did, and it was splendid. Also, he said that we should do this again, at the end of the date. I just may get, oh, I don't know, five or so dates with him," she slyly answered. Draco narrowed his eyes at the implications and then relaxed back to normal.
George had gone back to the shop and helped Verity with a large rush of customers. There were tons of older wizards and witches in line for various goodies. George could only guess that they were being sent to children away at school. He couldn't really believe that these witches and wizards wanted Fred Weasley's Coloring Enemy Beans for themselves. Each witch or wizard was probably trying to secure the new product for their child.
"How was your date?" Verity asked once the last customer had been rung up and sent out the door happily.
"It went splendid. Attractive that one is," he answered.
"Good. Bout time you started acting like the George I remember," Verity mentioned as she wiped a counter. She started to head out the door, but turned around and looked at her boss. "It won't hurt to move on, George. Fred would understand." She left soon after she said it.
George thought about her words for a few minutes and silently agreed with her. He knew Fred would want him to move on. He went up to the flat and went to the kitchen to cook up something for supper. He decided on pasties and whipped them together quickly. He sat at the green stool and ate his dinner in silence.
The fireplace made a crackle and George went over to it and saw the face of his good friend, Lee Jordan.
"Can I come in, mate?" Lee asked with a bit of excitement in his voice.
"Of course, come in," George replied as he stepped to the side to let the tall black man enter.
"I got a bit of news today," Lee announced quickly.
"Have ye?"
"Yes, Katie's one month pregnant. She'll be having our baby in May," he answered proudly. George gave him a big clap on the back and a masculine hug. After Fred had died, Lee had been the one to pull George back into sanity. His best friend in the world would always be Fred, but Lee was a very second close. George knew the same applied to him for Fred.
"Congrats, mate. I expect ye'll want me to be godfather," George stated.
"Of course!" Lee exclaimed. He couldn't think of a better godfather for his son than one of his oldest and dearest friends.
"Come, and eat some dinner with me," George offered and Lee joined him. He knew to sit on the white stool opposite of George instead of the orange one on the left of him. The orange seat was Fred's and George would never say something to Lee, but he knew better than to sit there.
The old friends talked over dinner and George told Lee about Discordia. Lee suggested to him that they should all go on a date together the next time. George told him that would be a good idea. He could really see if she would fit in well with his friends.
It was hours before Lee left. The men had finished off a bottle of Ogden's Old Firewhiskey together in celebration. George stumbled down the hall and into his room. He took off his shirt and managed to fall into his double-sized bed.
Discordia sat at her desk Wednesday morning thinking about the lovely Tuesday she had enjoyed. She had a wonderful lunch date with George, picked the boys up, rubbed her date in Draco's face, and played a game with the boys that night.
"Hello?" Ron Weasley asked from the doorway.
"Yes, Mr. Weasley?"
"Just call me Ron, my dad's Mr. Weasley," he suggested.
"Okay, Ron, what can I do for you?"
"Nothing, I just needed to bring these over," he answered as he handed her a thick file, "These are the files on Azkaban. You can learn everything about our prison from this."
"Oh, thank you," she replied before taking the file from him.
He nodded and left her alone. She proceeded to flip through the files. It was just another report she would have to write-up and send off to Greece. Her correspondent in the Greek Ministry, Athena Argyros, was a good friend from school. She was glad to have a trusted person receiving her owls because otherwise she wouldn't believe that anybody was putting to good use what she was sending them. Athena always sent a reply about how she was going to use the new information.
An owl fluttered into Discordia's office as she started her Azkaban report. He dropped a letter onto Discordia's desk. He waited for treats and a response.
Cordy,
Would you like to accompany me to dinner with my best friend, Lee Jordan, and his wife on Friday evening? We wouldn't leave until after I've closed up shop.
George
Discordia shuddered with guilt. She couldn't keep dating him if he was going to introduce her to important people in his life. These dates were for a bet. She didn't want to be in a stable relationship with anyone. Merlin, what have I gotten myself into?
She quickly jotted a note back to George.
George,
How about we have dinner tonight, and if that goes well, then I can accompany you Friday?
-DM
She gave treats and the response to the bird and he fluttered away. It took about an hour for the bird to return with another message from George.
Cordy,
For a minute, I thought you were your cousin with your initials, funny that. To the point, I would love to have dinner with you. Meet me at the store after you are done at the Ministry.
George
Discordia sighed. She would have to tell him about the bet with Draco. She could not possibly keep up the façade any longer. The guilt would eat her alive. Good thing her family didn't live here during the dark times, she would have been killed by Voldemort instantly for being so weak.
George had been startled by the invitation to eat dinner tonight, but decided that she was just nervous to meet his friends. She seemed to be somewhat of a loner herself. She didn't even have cronies like her prat of a cousin.
He had told Verity if she needed him to call up to him at the flat. He decided to clean up the place and serve her dinner here. He spent an hour cleaning up the flat and going through his mother's recipes. Deciding on roast chicken and potatoes, he pulled the recipe out of the stack of parchments.
"Seems I might not have all the spices," he mumbled to himself. No worries, he thought to himself, I'll just pop over to Mum's and borrow some.
George's clock chimed five o'clock, and he fidgeted nervously. He didn't understand why he was nervous since he told himself he merely found Discordia attractive. Her Malfoy-ness prevented him from developing feelings for her. That's at least what he was telling himself as he set the table, put their meal on it (with the necessary heating and cooling charms), and headed back down to the storefront.
No sooner than he made it down to the shop, Discordia was walking through the door. She smiled at him.
"Madam, I would like to escort you to my flat for some dinner," he said as he took her hand in his.
He's definitely charming. Discordia thought as they went upstairs. He opened the door for her and she entered his flat. She followed him through an open doorway to the kitchen that was straight ahead. He gestured for her to sit. She took the white stool.
"So why would you rather have dinner with me at my flat than go out with me and my friends Friday night?"
"Well we're just getting to know one another. I didn't think we should be introducing friends and family just yet," she answered with her eyes on her plate instead of looking at him.
"No, tell me why you really don't want to go," he insisted.
She looked up at him like a child caught with her hand in the cookie jar, and answered, "Because, I bet Draco I would go on five dates with you in two months."