Draco never believed he would meet a friend he enjoyed spending time with more, but that was Harry Potter. And his irritating ginger weasel of a friend, Ron Weasley. But Ron wasn't so irritating if Draco could just forget the fact that Ron was mentally eleven years old and Draco was older.
It was easy, sometimes, for Draco to slip into a natural state of immaturity. He hypothesized this to be the case because those feelings and impulses lingered, though his eleven-year-old self's conscious was no longer there.
The Gryffindors' first flying lesson had been one such occasion.
At breakfast the morning of, Rufus brought Draco a small package of sweets, sent by his mother at home. Obviously, things weren't going well between them, but Draco almost teared up when he opened it. It was just like old times, when he was in Slytherin.
A barn owl brought Neville Longbottom a small package from his grandmother. He opened it and showed them a glass ball the size of a large marble, which was filled with white smoke.
Draco remembered this, and started to choke on his cornflakes.
"It's a Remembrall!" Longbottom said. "Gran knows I forget things- this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red- oh..." His face fell, because the Remembrall had suddenly glowed scarlet, "...you've forgotten something..."
Draco watched Neville try to remember what he'd forgotten. An odd feeling of de-ja vu washed over him as Blaise Zabini, who was passing the Gryffindor table, snatched the Remembrall out of Longbottom's pudgy hand.
Harry and Ron jumped to their feet. Draco sat quietly, absorbing sensory information. Harry and Ron were clearly half hoping for a reason to fight Zabini, especially after he'd been boasting about near run-ins on a broomstick with muggle helicopters.
But Professor McGonagall, who was better at spotting trouble than any other teacher at Hogwarts, was there immediately.
"Mister Longbottom?"
"Zabini's got my Remembrall, Professor."
Coolly, Zabini dropped the device back on the table, flanked by Millicent Bulstrode and Pansy Parkinson. "Just looking," he said.
At three-thirty that afternoon, Draco, Harry, Ron, and the other Gryffindors hurried down the front steps onto the grounds for their first flying lesson. It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled under their feet as they marched down the sloping lawns toward a smooth, flat lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the forbidden forest, whose trees were swaying darkly in the distance.
Draco shivered, and it wasn't just because of the breezes.
The Slytherins were already there, and so were twenty broomsticks lying in neat lines on the ground. Draco knew how bad those school brooms really were. He would complain and say he missed his Nimbus 2001 at home, but that broom hadn't been released in this timeline, yet. Not far in the future, yet, though.
But Draco would never play Quidditch again- he wasn't in Slytherin, so Lucius would never buy his way onto the team. And Harry would become Seeker for Gryffindor, just like he had earlier, leaving no space for Draco.
He stared forlornly at the old brooms with the twigs sticking out at odd angles. Madam Hooch eventually arrived, and with her barking orders, the first years shuffled into two lines.
Draco's broom didn't look so bad, but the handle looked like it had been chewed on by a creature of some kind.
"Stick out your right hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!'"
"UP!" everyone shouted.
Draco's broom jumped into his hand at once, but it was one of the few that did. Harry's did beside him, and Ron's had smacked him in the face. Draco laughed, but Ron simply covered his nose and scowled at Draco.
"Up! Up!" The rest of the first-years were yelling. Hermione Granger's was still rolling around on the ground, and Longbottom's hadn't moved at all. He'd also gone particularly purple in the face.
Madam Hooch then showed them how to mount their brooms without sliding off the end, and walked up and down the rows. This time, Draco wasn't corrected for his grip. He gained a small victory for that.
"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," said Madam Hooch. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle- three- two-"
But Neville Longbottom, the chump, had pushed off hard before the whistle touched Madam Hooch's lips.
Now, Draco assumed that watching this over again would be just as funny as what happened the first time, but he was wrong. This was just depressing.
"Come back boy!" Hooch shouted, but Neville was rising straight up like a cork shot out of a bottle- twelve feet- twenty feet. Draco saw his scared white face look down at the ground falling away, saw him gasp, slip sideways off the broom and-
Falling. She stood behind him, her face crazed and hungering for blood. The darkness of the Astronomy Tower... "DO IT, DRACO! NOW!"
Dumbledore, falling, falling, failing...
There was a thud and a nasty crack. Neville lay face-down on the ground in a heap.
Dumbledore, falling, falling, failing...
Harry tugged on his arm. "Hey, are you okay?"
Draco blinked. Hooch was leading Longbottom off to the hospital wing already, and slowly, his senses came back to him. Laughter. He could hear laughter.
"Look," pointed Draco at the opposite end of the field. Harry turned.
"It's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him," Zabini and the other Slytherins were tossing around Neville's Remembrall, just like Draco remembered doing in his own memory.
Harry was quick to stride over to the Slytherins. "Give it here," he said quietly, with Draco and Ron behind him.
"Hmm. No." Zabini said, a smirk on his face that could really rival Draco's. "I think I'll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find. How about up a tree?"
"Give it here!" Harry yelled, but Zabini was leaping on one of the school broomsticks and flying pretty well. Hovering level with the topmost branches of an oak he called, "Come and get it, Potter!"
Draco could only watch as Harry grabbed a broom.
"No!" shouted Granger, butting in as always. "Madam Hooch told us not to move- you'll get us all into trouble."
Draco didn't even need to open his mouth to shut her up- Harry ignored her anyway. He mounted the broom and kicked off against the ground, and up, up he soared. There were gasps of girls and an admiring whoop from Ron.
Draco leaned back, watching the confrontation up in the air. Zabini, clearly quite confident on a broom, was stunned as Harry turned his broomstick sharply to face him in midair. The first-years squinted in the sun to see the figures move back and forth, taunting each other.
"Give it here," Harry was yelling, "or I'll knock you off that broom!"
Draco couldn't hear Zabini's response, but he guessed at what it would be. Then, he watched Zabini throw the Remembrall high into the air and watched it streak back toward the ground.
Harry immediately fell into a dive. He leaned forward and pointed his broom handle down- next second he was gathering speed, students on the ground yelling and screaming, some out of fear, some out of support.
Draco knew that the dive would be successful. He'd seen it before. Harry caught the Remembrall a foot from the ground, just in time to pull his broom straight, and he toppled gently onto the grass with the sphere clutched safely in his fist, and an energized grin on his face. Ron and Draco ran over to meet him, Ron clapping his back and shouting, "Brilliant!"
But it couldn't last.
"HARRY POTTER!"
Professor McGonagall was running toward them.
"Never- in all my time at Hogwarts-" She was almost speechless with shock, and her glasses flashed furiously, "-how dare you- might have broken your neck-"
"It wasn't his fault, Professor-"
"Be quiet, Miss Patil-"
"But Zabini-"
"That's enough, Mister Malfoy. Potter, follow me, now."
And Harry was led away by McGonagall, but Draco knew that he would be fine. He was the youngest Seeker in a century, after all. At dinner, his belief was confirmed.
"You're joking."
Harry had just finished telling Ron and Draco what had happened when he'd let the grounds with Professor McGonagall. Ron had a piece of steak and kidney pie halfway to his mouth, but he'd forgotten all about it.
"Seeker?" he said. "But first-years never- you must be the youngest house player in about-"
"-a century," said Draco, pretending to act surprised, "Good on you, mate."
Ron was so amazed, so impressed, he just sat and gaped at Harry.
"I start training next week," said Harry. "Only don't tell anyone, Wood wants to keep it a secret."
Fred and George Weasley now came into the hall, spotted Harry, and hurried over.
"Well done," said George in a low voice. "Wood told us. We're on the team too- Beaters."
"I tell you, we're going to win that Quidditch Cup for sure this year," said Fred. "We haven't won since Charlie left, but this year's team is going to be brilliant. You must be good, Harry, Wood was almost skipping when he told us."
"Anyway, we've got to go, Lee Jordan reckons he's found a new secret passageway out of the school."
"Bet it's that one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy that we found in our first week. See you. Alright, Malfoy?"
Draco jumped, hearing that damned surname. He really hated it. "Alright," he responded, and the twins left.
"What's wrong?" asked Harry, shoveling pie into his mouth over the excitement of the afternoon.
Draco groaned. "I just wish everyone would call me Draco. It's hardly a challenge. I positively loath hearing 'Malfoy, Malfoy, Malfoy' all the time."
"Oh."
"I wish I could change it," scowled Draco. "I'm not my father. But y'know, for that to happen, I'd have to be friends with everyone. I mean, you both call me Draco, but- eh-"
"You hate everything," said Ron and Harry together, "We know."
Draco focused on cutting his chicken up. "When did I say that?"
"Oh, you know. Almost every time you sit down in the common room and declare 'I hate everything.'" Harry smartly replied.
Draco did do that a lot, but it was mostly impulsive and he didn't mean anything by it. He mostly said it when he had a lot of homework.
"But that's just me complaining," said Draco, "I create a lot of my own problems. Which isn't ideal, I should just shut up- yeah."
They lapsed into silence. But no more than a moment passed when someone far less welcome turned up: Blaise, flanked by Bulstrode and Parkinson.
"Having a last meal, Potter? When are you getting on the train back to the Muggles?"
"You're a lot braver now that you're back on the ground and you've got your little friends with you," said Harry coolly. There was of course nothing at all little about Millicent or friendly about Pansy, but as the High Table was full of teachers, neither of them could do more than crack their knuckles and scowl.
Draco had preferred his own choice of Crabbe and Goyle over the girls, but maybe Zabini actually needed slightly more intelligent conversation to survive. Even if Millicent was a bit sullen and Pansy was an annoying cow.
"Blaise could take you any time on his own," Pansy said, sneering.
"Oh yeah?" Draco retaliated, "How about tonight? Wizard's duel? Wands only, of course."
He remembered this little trick, and suspected that Zabini would do the same thing. So they wouldn't be going.
"Of course," Zabini grinned, "I've been waiting to show you your place. I suppose blood-traitors support blood-traitors, after all. Weasley must be your second."
"As a matter of fact, he is," said Draco, airily. "He has a killer bat-bogey hex, I'm not sure you want to risk it."
Or was that the Weaselette? Draco couldn't remember.
"Whatever," said Zabini, not knowing that Draco had just lied about Ron Weasley knowing a sixth-year spell. "I'm only interested in challenging Potter, anyway. Crabbe's my second, I doubt it'll come to that. Midnight all right? We'll meet you in the trophy room; that's always unlocked."
When Blaise had gone, Ron and Harry and Draco looked at each other.
"Sorry, but what's a Wizard's duel?" asked Harry.