A/N: Hello, lovelies! I wasn't going to post this today, because I'm currently in the middle of writing a... well... a particularly saucy fic, but I'm not quite sure who I want the main characters to be. As of now, it's Neville and Hannah, who I've never tried to write before, but I'm quite looking forward to it. (If you wanna check it out, it's up now. It's called Success.) Anyway, I wasn't going to do this, but my Doc Manager was up, so I figured, eh, why not, right?

Anyway, chapter three!

Enjoy! :)

Chapter Three

Malfoy was the first person out of the room once Professor Michaels dismissed us. I was shocked at how quickly he left, and without looking at anyone.

I was still thinking about it when Seamus, Dean, and Neville caught up with me.

"So, Ari, how awful was it being paired with the snake prince?" Dean asked. I winced at the nickname.

"At least he didn't yell at her," Neville argued. "Pansy nearly ripped my throat out." While Neville was considerably braver since the war, there was one thing that would always scare him: Pansy Parkinson. Ever since Neville had cut the head of Voldemort's beloved snake, Nagini, Pansy had been begging Neville to take her on a date. The girl only dated men who she deemed "powerful" enough, apparently. However, the could-have-been-Chosen-One was completely infatuated with one Hannah Abbott, which was most likely the cause of all the death glares Neville had been getting. Parkinson wasn't overly fond of rejection.

Dean and Seamus had a good laugh at Neville's expense and I headed off to Muggle Studies with him. Nothing exciting happened, especially since I knew how Muggles lived already and wasn't going to learn anything new. When we walked in to Defense against the Dark Arts Neville saw Hannah and sat next to her leaving me to sit with Seamus while Dean ran off to sit with Ernie MacMillan.

"So, really. Wha' happened with Malfoy?" Shay asked quietly. "He didn't even complain about being paired with a Gryffindor."

"Yeah. He..." I didn't know what to say. I was sure Draco wouldn't want me gossiping about what we'd talked about. "He didn't say much at all."

Professor Ikeridge walked in then, and Shay didn't have time to say anything else.

After DADA, where we reviewed a few spells and spent the rest of the hour talking about the war and the most commonly used spells during the time (a touchy subject for all of us) I met up with Dean and Seamus to walk down to the Great Hall for lunch. Dean was still on his rant about Professor Ikeridge. "I'm not saying he's a bad guy, but he's American. He wasn't here for the war! He doesn't know anything that happened. All he did was spout off statistics he read from old Prophets."

"Yes, Dean. But he did teach Hannah Abbott the proper way to perform Serpent Sortia," I countered, trying to at least keep the boy from hating our new professor.

"That's a second year spell," Dean argued. "It doesn't count."

"I disagree," Seamus said. "I've used it loads of times to scare someone long enough for me to throw a better spell their way."

"Whatever," Dean resigned. "I still think he's stupid."

I smiled at my friend's stubbornness as we walked into the Great Hall but my smile quickly faded. I could feel someone watching me, and it was very creepy. I stopped walking, immediately scanning the tables. There.

Draco Malfoy's silver eyes were glued to mine and I found it impossible to look away. Why was he staring at me? Was he angry? I couldn't think of any reason he would be angry with me, unless he was miffed that I brought up his dad… But I thought we understood each other more because of that…

"Ari? Let's go!" The sound of Seamus' voice brought me back to reality. I quickly looked at him so he wouldn't see me staring at Malfoy. Luckily, he didn't notice. He just pulled me along with him and Dean to our usual spot with Ginny, Neville, Hermione, Ron, and Harry. When I sat down, I spared a glance behind me. Malfoy was still staring, but looked down once our eyes met again.

"Arianna, what is your deal?" Ginny asked. My head snapped back around to face my friends, and I hoped no one would notice the blush slowly staining my cheeks.

"Sorry," I said. "What was that?" Gin had a look of disapproval on her face.

"Seamus was asking why Malfoy was staring at you, and I want to know why you were staring back," she said, taking a sip of her pumpkin juice. She had a knowing look in her eyes and I was terrified that she would take this out of context.

"Malfoy was staring at me?" I asked, trying to sound innocently confused. "That's odd."

"Don't act like you didn't notice." Seamus narrowed his eyes at me. "You were gazing right back."

"I don't know what you lot are on about," I replied. "I only talk to him when I have to, and that's in class." I took a bite of the roast beef we were having for lunch, hoping someone would bring up another subject that didn't revolve around me.

"Why would he be staring at you then?" asked Hermione. I noticed that she, Ron, and Harry were all listening intently to our conversation.

I shrugged my shoulders. "Maybe he's thinking of insults to use the next time he sees me," I suggested half-heartedly. No one looked particularly convinced, least of all Ginny and Seamus, but they finally let it go and the topic became centered on Ginny and her Potions class with Professor Slughorn.

xXx

That night, in the common room, I was going over my schedule and the likelihood that I would have a good final year. I had Uniting Houses with the Eighth years; Muggle Studies with the Hufflepuffs; Defense with the Hufflepuffs; then, after lunch, there was Arithmancy with the Slytherins; Herbology with the Slytherins; and finally, Potions with the Ravenclaws.

Suddenly, a wild red-haired girl appeared in the chair across from me. I snapped from my reverie to give her my attention.

"I'm going to talk to Harry," she said, not bothering with formalities. My eyebrows rose and I smiled.

"That's great, Red! I hope everything goes smoothly," I replied.

"Yeah, it'll be nice if everything works out. Then everyone will have someone! Neville and Hannah, Dean and Parvati, Ron and Hermione, you and Malfoy, Seamus and Delia, and me and Harry!" she exclaimed.

"Yeah. Except, Dean, Seamus, and Neville aren't technically dating those girls. Yet," I smiled. Ginny and I spent a little while talking about our guy friends until Harry walked through the portrait hole. Ginny excused herself to go and speak with him. Fifteen minutes later she ran over and hugged me, ecstatic that she and Harry were back together. We spent a good while talking about that, and soon I left to go to bed. It wasn't until I was almost asleep that I realized what she had said.

Me and Malfoy?! As if!