Chapter Four Eden
At breakfast on September second, Justin Finch-Fletchley suddenly decides that he absolutely has to sit next to me, no matter what Crabbe, Goyle and the Bloody Baron say. At one point during breakfast I actually find myself worried about his safety, until I remember that I don't care about him in the least. Crabbe and Goyle can eat him for all I care. Well, as long as they don't eat him in front of me; that's just unsanitary. Who knows what sort of muggle diseases he's got running through his blood.
I'm relieved when I leave the Great Hall, knowing that, even though Justin is following me now, he will have to leave at some point. It is with a heavy heart that I reach Charms class with the insufferably annoying mudblood trailing behind me, smiling maniacally.
I sit down at one of the long desks, stiffening as the mudblood sits down next to me, too close. I scoot to the side a little, and he scoots with me. I keep scooting until I reach the end of the bench, then resort to elbowing him away from me. It doesn't work, and he keeps up his annoying smile the whole time, making me angry. I am just about to reach for my wand so that I can hex him when Professor Flitwick enters the room. He stops when he sees the mudblood sitting next to me, and I tense, thinking he is going to remark on my involvement with a bug such as him.
"Mister Finch-Fletchley!" he squeaks. "My my, you came to class today! It's not your class, but it's a class, and I suppose that can be seen as quite an improvement to your behavior of old!" He beams happily at the mudblood, he beams right back. "Keep up the good work!" He then walks to the front of the room, leaving me to try and block out the annoying sniggers coming from the Slytherin's behind me.
The mudblood follows me to every single class I have, ever teacher allowing him to attend in an almost friendly manner, except for Snape, who kicks him out. (Thank Merlin for Snape.) The mudblood even tries to follow me into the Slytherin common room, which is the breaking point for me. I march straight to Dumbledore's office, telling the gargoyle's guarding the door to let me in.
"Password?" grunts one of them.
"Reducto," I say primly, pointing my wand at him. He explodes into a pile of dust and rubble and I turn to the other gargoyle. "Is that good enough for you?" I ask sweetly. He nods and the door opens. I step onto the revolving stairs and the mudblood follows me. He lets out an appreciative whistle once the stairs have started moving.
"Damn," he says. "That was badass!" My hands clench into fists at the sound of his voice and I can't unclench him no matter how hard I try. "You and me would make a great team!"
"You and I," I correct instinctively, through gritted teeth.
"Exactly!" he agrees.
My eye starts twitching. "That's not what I-" I begin just as the stairs stop their rotating. I rap sharply on the door, nearly blinded by fury. If this filthy mudblood doesn't stop soon I will kill him. I think as I wait for the door to be opened. I am just about to try unlocking it with a spell when it is opened by Professor Dumbledore.
"Miss Greengrass," he says kindly. "What are you doing here?" His voice has a calming effect on me, calming enough to let me focus on speaking instead of not killing the mudblood.
"Please tell this-this... boy to leave me alone." I manage to say without growling.
Dumbledore turns his eyes to the mudblood, looking him over with kind eyes. "Is this young man harassing you, Miss Greengrass?" he asks. "He doesn't seem to be the type, if you ask me."
"Oh, believe me, he most certainly is." I tell him. "Don't fall for that disgusting little smile and listen to the facts: he stalked me to every single class I had today and even tried to enter the Slytherin common room with me. If that isn't harassment, I don't know what is."
"I don't think it's harassment," says wise old Dumbledore. (Despite what most of you think, I am not so blinded by my pureblood status to think that Dumbledore is not wise.) "I think he just likes you and is going about it in an interesting way." Dumbledore's eyes twinkle. "Now, if you will excuse me..." He shuts the door in my open-mouthed, astonished face.
The next day is full of me considering either suicide or murder, or both. The mudblood follows me everywhere. He even tries to follow me into the bathroom. The bathroom! That was the last straw. I was about to hex him when Draco Malfoy appeared, looking hungover and haunted and needing something to make fun of.
"Eden," he sneers at me. "Still playing with your pet mudblood, I see." His sneer sets my teeth on edge and my wand starts slowly moving in his direction. Still with an annoying smile plastered all over his face, the mudblood stops my hand.
"Don't." he says to me, and for once he's not using exclamation marks. I don't know if it's this or the fact that it actually sounds like he cares that makes me slip my wand back up my sleeve, but something does.
"Yes, Eden, don't." sneers Draco.
"You look miserable." I comment dryly. "Did one of your boytoys dump you?" I see the mudblood's eyes widen a bit in surprise at this
.
"Actually, no," Draco says without even flinching. "I just haven't had sex with anyone in a while. I was wondering if your pet was interested?" His smirk is still annoyingly in place.
"No," I say. "And even if he was, he wouldn't do anything with something as disgusting as you." I turn on my heel and leave, hearing the mudblood following me. For once, I find the noise comforting instead of annoying.
The week following our little meeting with Draco is a blur of classes and the mudblood. He follows me everywhere, even swiping some Gillyweed from Slughorn to try and weasel his way into the Slytherin common room. In fact, we have started being called "The Inseparable Couple" because of the fact that he sticks to my side like a n elbow leech sticks to someone's elbow.
It was all fine, I guess, until the Howler from Mother.
It came during breakfast the first Saturday of the school year. An owl drops it in my plate of eggs, sweeping out of the Great Hall soon afterwards, as if it knows what's coming. I sigh deeply as it begins smoking, then pick it up and toss it behind me to land in the food of some unsuspecting Ravenclaw first year. I switch my plate's with the mudblood's (I'm not going going to eat anything that Howler has touched) and begin eating, ignoring the sound of my mother's voice screaming at the Ravenclaw, who has started crying.
"So," the mudblood asks, piling bacon and sausage on his new plate. "what was that all about?" He's stopped saying absolutely everything with an exclamation mark at the end, but he still always has that annoyingly smug smile.
"My mother," I say dryly. "She probably heard that you've been tailing me recently and wanted to publicly humiliate me out of it."
He looks shocked, smile slipping just a bit. "Your mother would do something like that to you?"
I look at him, smile a mix between sarcasm and sadness. "Look, it may be different for you and your muggle parents, but that's what my parents are like. That's what most of the family's of the Slytherin's here are like. Don't worry about it, though. I stopped caring what my mother said a long time ago." He looks at me, with an unidentifiable expression, smile gone for once, and I feel a twinge of... something, deep in my chest. Suddenly I feel like crying, which hasn't happened for years now.
He starts to say something, then stops, looking around as if he's just realized where we are. "Nevermind," he says, and the smile is back in place in a flash as he dives towards his bacon. I hear sniggering and look up to find Draco staring at me, smirking as usual. He looks awful, dark circles under his eyes, paler than usual. I give him an evil look and say snarkily, "You look dead." instantly the smirk dies, to be replaced by a glare.
"Can you say that when you're always accompanied by that thing?" he asks coldly.
"Yes." I turn back to my food, suddenly not hungry anymore.
"What's with that guy?" Justin asks brightly. I get the sudden urge to touch his curly hair.
"Oh, he just thinks he's the boss of me because we're engaged." I roll my eyes. "It's not like I'm planning on doing that, though."
"You're engaged?" Justin asks, wide-eyed. "To Draco Malfoy?"
"Yeah," I answer with a shrug. "It's a pureblood thing, arranged marriages. Nearly all of us have an arranged marriage." I shrug again. "It's no big deal or anything though. I'm not marrying Malfoy. It's just not happening. I'm not going to marry a gay guy and he's not going to marry a straight girl."
"Oh," he says, and suddenly he stops eating his food with such gusto. I try to pretend that I didn't notice, but I did, and I glance at him from the corner of my eye as we finish eating. I get up to go to class, expecting to hear him following behind me. To my surprise, I don't hear his footsteps, and so I turn around to see what's keeping him.
"What is taking you so long?" I inquire, trying to sound nothing more than vaguely curious.
"Well, I just thought that I'd go to my own class today, if that's okay with you." he says, smiling awkwardly at his feet. I stare at him for a moment, then shrug.
"See you around, then." I say, turning and walking away.
I hope no one else can see my heart breaking.