Chapter 10 – The request

The days at Hogwarts seemed more brilliant than ever before now Hermione could just walk around freely with Draco at her side, without needing to feel embarrassed.

The students seem to treat her a little different than before, some of them were refusing to talk to her and she needed to duck every time she passed Pansy in the hallway, because she would always get targeted with a curse or a charm, but other than that, things seemed to go perfectly.

It wasn't quite the same for Draco though, most of his house didn't want anything to do with him anymore now it was clear who he was hanging out with. Some people, like Crabbe and Goyle, still stayed close to him and some others actually even seemed to appreciate his choice and started to act a lot less hostile against Mudbloods, but other than that, his school life had most definitely taken a turn for the worst.

He still remains to the fact though, that he would much rather have his life like this, then to go back to the life as it was before he knew Hermione, but Hermione can't help but feeling guilty.

Two weeks has passed since, Hermione and Draco see each other almost every day if their schedule allows it, most of the time they just do their homework together and sometimes they escape the castle for a little while to go back to the place where they met for the first time as boyfriend and girlfriend.

The Christmas holidays are drawing near and teachers keep giving their students less and less homework, everyone's looking forward to the holidays.

On one of those occasions in which they have time to spare, Draco walks up to Hermione, his face betrays a flicker of shyness as he sits beside her, immediately, some other people on the table stand up and leave.

He gathers all his courage as he sees Hermione smiling at him. "Would you like to spend Christmas at my place?" he asks in one breath.

Hermione's smile disappears as soon as it came and he clasps a hand in front of her mouth. "I'm so sorry, Draco, I already promised Ron to spend Christmas with his family!" she says, sounding quite shocked.

The already oppressed face becomes even more sad. "I shouldn't have asked it at such short notice. Ah well, it's probably for the best… I'd get a lot of complaints anyway if I'd take you home with me…" he murmurs and with a quick kiss on Hermione's cheek and an attempt for a forgiving smile in Ron's direction, he walks away and rejoins his own house.

Ron casts an embarrassed look in Hermione's direction and says: "If you want I could ask my family if they'd want to have him over for Christmas."

Hermione can't hide the glimpse of hope in her eyes fast enough and Ron immediately nods. "I'll send them an owl." He says without asking further and he walks out of the study hall, on to the common room.

Harry looks at Hermione and raises an eyebrow. "No one asks for my opinion these days." He jokes.

Hermione chuckles a little. "I'm sorry if you don't agree to it, I was planning to refuse the offer, but he was gone before I could even respond." She murmurs shyly.

Harry shakes his head. "Christmas is something you should celebrate with friends, family and loved ones, strangely enough, Draco has recently become part of that." He says like it's the most normal business in the world.

Hermione nods and smiles again, but this time not in embarrassment, but in gratitude.

That evening, a hyperactive owl reaches the Weasley family, he flies right into Misses Weasley's dinner.

"It's a letter from Ron!" she says with a smile and she helps the owl back on it's feet.

Absent minded, plucking owl feathers out of her dinner, she reads the letter.

With a strange sort of scream, she throws the remains of her dinner over her lap.

Mister Weasley gives her an amazed look. "What is it honey?" he asks, sounding worried. "Is something wrong with Ron?"

Misses Weasley shakes her head. "Ron's fine, but I think Hermione has lost her mind." She says breathlessly.

Mister Weasley grabs the letter from his wife and starts reading it.

'Dear mom and dad,

This might come as a complete surprise to you both, no one here expected it at least, but Hermione's got a boyfriend.

Now, that's not really a surprise of course, but the one she's hanging out with sure as hell is. The name of the love of her life is Draco Malfoy.'

Mister Weasley's hands nearly pinch holes in the parchment, but he calmly continues reading.

'After long consideration between Harry, Ginny and me, we decided not to let Hermione down because of her relationship with him, she's been our friends for years, we don't want to lose her because of this. To our utter surprise, Draco isn't really that bad to be around as long as he's not surrounded by someone of his own house. You should know that his whole house practically hates his now, just because he's got something going on with Hermione, but he chooses her over everything else.

Now I'll ask you the most surprising question, coming from my side this time.

Draco had asked Hermione to join him and his family for Christmas this year at the Malfoy manor, but seeing as Hermione already arranged to be here for Christmas, I was wondering if Draco might be allowed to join us this year, so that you can amaze yourself over his change in behavement as well.

If more members of the family allow Draco to join us, I would like to have an owl back as an acknowledgement, or else with a rejection.

Thanks in advance,

Ron

Mister Weasley takes a deep breath and nods. "Fine then, I would love to see a completely different side from Malfoy." He says wit a grin, the underlying thought being that he'd be able to bully Lucius with that at work.

Misses Weasley seemed to be able to guess her husband's thoughts and nods as an agreement, after cleaning up the mess on the dinner table with a single swoosh of her wand, she grabs a quill and some parchment to write the same message on different sheets of parchment, to send to the other members of the family who have been invited over.

When she's finished she decides to take a slightly more reliable owl and puts Pigwidgeon, Ron's owl in the closet where he feels most at ease, so he can get some rest.

It is not until the end of the next day that Harry gets Pigwidgeon back with the answer of his parents.

With a face that shows that he doesn't know which answer would satisfy him most, he unties the letter from his owl's leg and puts in back on his feet again, seeing as he flew right into a fruit bowl.

He reads the answer and sees to his huge surprise that all the other family members agreed on having Malfoy over with Christmas. He had at least thought that Fred and George would disagree, but after having thought about it for a moment, this would actually be the perfect chance for the twins to make a complete fool out of Draco. He can't quite suppress an expecting grin.

Completely at the bottom of the letter, there are a few quickly scribbled words, evidentially coming from his brother, Bill, who asks what Draco would like as a Christmas present.

Seeing as Ron doesn't know the answer to this question, he decides not to answer, Pigwidgeon has flown enough for today.

With a cleared face, he walks down the hall, where he knows he'll find Hermione and Draco.

"I've talked to my family and… if you want, you can join us for Christmas, so you can still be with Hermione." He tells Draco, keeping his face as polite as possible.

Draco watches him with open mouth. "Christmas as your place?" he asks, not knowing for sure if he should take this as good news or not.

Ron nods and immediately regrets his decision. To his utter amazement, Draco starts to smile and holds his hand out in front of him. Without shaking it, Ron looks at it in suspicion.

"I really appreciate it that you wanted to do this for us, I know almost for sure that you didn't do it on my behalf, and I can't blame you for that, I also know that it probably took quite some convincing to get your family to agree with this, so… thank you." Draco says, his voice sounds surprisingly nice and even grateful.

Ron's face looks a lot happier after this, the idea that Draco didn't make any weird comments about his family and the money they don't have makes him feel a lot better. "So you'll join us?" he asks.

Draco nods. "I'd love to, although I think I'll have to tell my father a different story else I'll immediately be erased from the family tree." He jokes.

Ron chuckles nervously and nods as well. He murmurs a goodbye and leaves Draco alone with Hermione again.

Hermione smiles up at Draco and Draco smiles back, wondering what the heck he's going to tell his parents now he's not coming home for Christmas.

He shakes his head and says: "I think I'll go down to the common room to write something to my parents." He says softly and with a light hug for Hermione he walks to his common room.

Once he's arrived there, he thinks about what he should write, whatever it'll be, it's going to be a complete lie, if his parents would ever find out, they'll definitely be pissed.

With a great sigh, he grabs a quill and a piece of parchment.

'Dear father and mother,' he starts

'I decided to celebrate Christmas at Hogwarts, seeing this is our last year.

The people from my house have decided to throw a large party, the house elves are going to make an immense load of food for us, under the threatening wand of Pansy, so Christmas dinner won't be a problem.

I hope you'll have a nice Christmas.

Kiss from your son,

Draco.'

He reads his letter again, but can't find any mistakes or things that can be misread, the part about the House elves will probably convince them even more that he's staying at school.

With a satisfied nod, he stands up and walks to the tower where the owls are currently sleeping. He wakes a big, noticeable owl and sends it away.

As soon as he goes back downstairs he crosses the path of Severus Snape who gives him a strange smile, he puts a hand on Draco's shoulders and whispers in his ear: "It'll do a person good to get presents for Christmas, maybe you should think of something to give to those people."

Draco looks at him and nods. Snape wants to continue his way up the stairs and Draco quickly calls after him: "Thanks for paying the bill to our room."