Hi everyone! I hope life has been treating all of you well this past week. I've got another update for you and I'd be lying if I said I didn't have some fun writing it. I want to give a shoutout to my friend Meghan for giving me her reflections on this chapter, and encourage you all to do the same! I'd also like to thank those of you who left reviews and messages regarding the previous chapter. They were so, so sweet. Much love.

~ Anna =)

Disclaimer: I own nothing recognizable.

"I already told you why I did it, Zabini."

I rolled my eyes.

"Right. Well if you could abstain from feeling me up in the future because you think I'm being a little too funny, or a little too weepy, that'd be really wonderful."

Malfoy let out a great, frustrated breath as I strode across the room.

"You should have heard yourself hyperventilating that night. I didn't know how to shut you up!"

I wheeled around.

"It's not your job to shut me up, Malfoy! Have you ever considered that? Have you ever considered that you are the last person on this planet whose job it is to shut me up?"

"And why is that?"

I paused.

"Because you are in no position to look down on me. Especially now."

"Oh, would you get a grip! I don't look down on you."

"So what are you saying? You look up to me? Don't be daft," I scoffed.

"I don't look at you any way that you wouldn't want me to, Zabini," he said.

"There it is again! You're so pretentious! What makes you think you know anything about how I want you to look at me?"

He furrowed his brows, and I could see, for a moment, a look of deep confusion on his face.

"Well … how do you?"

"What?"

"How do you want me to look at you?"

"I—"

I faltered.

"Zabini, is there something—"

"With respect!" I managed to say. "I just want you to look at me with respect, that's all."

"I do look at you with respect. Begrudgingly sometimes, I must admit, but I can't help that part."

"Is that what you call kissing me to shut me up? Respect? God, Malfoy, you just have to help yourself to everything, don't you!" I huffed.

"What?"

"That was my first kiss. I know it doesn't mean much, especially to you, but I was still saving it for the right person! I think I had the right to, don't you? And then you come along, with a desperate need to shut me up as always, and now I've wasted it on somebody who doesn't even care."

"Hang on, that was your first kiss? Ever?" he asked incredulously.

"You knew that. I told you that! When you pulled away and I panicked because I thought—"

"Jesus Christ, Zabini, you're sixteen years old! I thought you were kidding all those times you alluded to it being your first! What the fuck have you been doing until now?"

My jaw dropped open at the gall.

"Oh, let's see shall we?" I began counting on my fingers. "Thinking I'm abnormally ugly because of you, getting ostracized by a bunch of guys because of you, then Adrian Pucey came along but … oh yeah, that one fell apart because of you… and now I said no to Anthony because of you. So I guess you can say I've been down on my romantic luck, yeah?"

"You said no to Goldstein because of me?"

I immediately regretted my words.

"It's not why you think," I said, terrified he'd come to some sort of unwarranted conclusion. "It's complicated."

"How complicated?" he asked, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"Look, forget it. I don't want to talk about this anymore. I realize now that you probably just got a little bit confused that evening, and that you'd really intended for me to be somebody else. Well they're all coming here for New Years; all the possible suspects. So you can take your pick then."

"What are you talking about?" Malfoy demanded.

"Blaise'll be inviting Pansy, Daphne and Tracey over, among others I'm sure. I quite frankly don't even know which one you're dipping into right now, if not all three of them, but—"

"I don't know if you're doing this because you're over-exhausted or just extremely under-touched, but I'm starting to get really irritated with the things you're implying about me."

"Am I wrong?" I scoffed — fully aware, of course, that I had been. I knew Pansy and him were no longer, and although I wasn't fully certain about the other two, something in me knew he wasn't leaving much time for dating these days. And yet I was still determined to lash out and diminish him.

"Zabini, if I had to rely on getting my galleons exclusively from you being right, I'd be living down the road from Weasley."

"That'd be an upgrade from your current situation, wouldn't you say? Seeing as you're just about homeless now?"

I had hurt him. I knew I had. And it was mostly inexcusable, but there was a tiny, irrational justification in my brain that had stemmed from his lies about his father and his ignition of my vulnerability with his lips.

"You know what? I came in here to talk civilly. But now I just want to extend a massive fuck you, so I think that's what I'll do: fuck you, Zabini."

"I think you mean 'I'm sorry for lying about my father, Zabini.'"

He narrowed his eyes.

"I'm not sorry about a damn thing when it comes to my family. And I'm not going to stand here and justify my actions to somebody like you."

"Then you better leave, Malfoy, because if you stay in this room for one more second, I swear I'll—"

He didn't need to be told twice. The slam of the door, expected as it was, didn't fail to make me jump. I groaned in frustration; I had dug myself into a hole with him again.

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The time I spent trying to ignore my brother and Malfoy's vitriolic sneers over the next few days was rivalled only by the time I spent surreptitiously following my mother around in an attempt to ensure her wellbeing.

"Your brother isn't angry with you, Heidi, he's angry with your father," she explained as we stood in the sunroom, arranging bouquets for 'good energy'. It was the only way I could get her out of bed.

"Is that why he called me a jumped up bitch in the hallway?" I asked as I passed her some flower shears.

"What can I say? He's got more than a small dose of Robert in him. Watch it, darling, you're cutting into the petals."

I forced a smile and put down the begonias I was maiming.

"Lucky him, then. Maybe if I had a bit of Dad in me the two of them wouldn't despise me so much."

"Heidi! Your father doesn't despise you; he shamed himself in front of you. He doesn't know how to handle it. He wants very much for you to think highly of him."

"Then maybe he shouldn't have been getting it on with that glorified bank teller."

My mother flinched, and I regretted what I said immediately.

"I'm sorry, Mum."

"It's alright. You're not wrong. Though perhaps you could be less crass about it; I've really no idea where you get it from."

I sighed.

"I ask myself that every day, honestly." A dreadful thought struck me. "Mum … is there any possibility that I'm adopted?"

Her startled laugh reverberated through the sunroom.

"I'm afraid not, darling. You were completely our doing, from toes to eyelashes. I'm sorry if that disappoints you," she said with a wry smile.

"I'm not disappointed," I reassured her.

"Good. We'd rather like to keep you around. I was worried sick when you left that evening, and when I realized Robert didn't even know where you had gone … I can't describe it. It was a good thing Draco was there."

"Was it?" I asked, trying my best not to sound resentful.

"Oh yes, he seemed quite concerned for you."

"That doesn't sound implausible at all," I muttered under my breath as I went back to looping some ribbon around my crooked bouquet.

"Say what you will, darling, but he came to find me right away to tell me you were safe. I wouldn't have slept otherwise. You know, I've been meaning to ask… are you two getting on better now?"

I thought about the last thing he'd said to me, which, had my mother heard it come out of my mouth, would have been cause for grounding.

"No."

Later that day, however, Draco Malfoy was the last thing on my mind. I was instead frantically screaming for Blaise, having found my mother lying motionlessly on the piano room floor. He rushed into the room, Malfoy on his tail.

"I found her like this! I have no idea how — we need to send for someone!"

"What did you do?" snarled Blaise as he helped lift her onto the chaise longue.

"I didn't! I don't know—"

"She's just fainted," said Malfoy, who had been watching the scene unfold without intervening. "You don't need to send for anyone. Just get her some water."

"Right, because you would know, having attended class virtually never," I snapped. "Blaise, we need to get a Healer to—"

"I didn't learn that in class, Zabini," he said. "I learned it through peeling my mother off the floor nearly daily this past summer."

I froze, teeming with guilt.

"I just meant…"

"But carry on. You're the expert Healer among us, right? Rivalled only by your talent for meddling in marriages."

Blaise shot me another glare at Malfoy's words, and the disdain emanating from both of them made me shrink into myself.

"I'll go get some water," I muttered.

"Stellar idea."

My mother came to not two minutes later, as Malfoy had promised she would. As I tucked blankets around her, amidst her protests that she was fine, I realized very clearly that she was anything but.

The few days that followed had drained me more and more, and by the December 31st had made its appearance on the calendar, I felt like I'd already lived out the entire new year.

"Get out."

I looked up from the book I had only just cracked open, having exhausted the majority of the evening listening to my mother cry about my father's inopportune bachelorhood. Five expectant Slytherins were staring from the doorway at my curled up form, all looking significantly more posh than I did in my static-generating jumper and leggings.

"I live here … you all do know that, right?"

Blaise looked at me contemptuously.

"Go read upstairs. We're using this room."

"For nothing but the most intellectual pursuits, by the looks of it?" I said, nodding at the clinking brown paper bag in Tracey Davis' hand.

"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked, eyes narrowed.

"It's fine, you two," said Pansy, her own alcohol unhidden. "I suppose Zabini over here just wants to stay for the party."

"No, I'm seriously just here to read the sequel to my favourite courtroom erotica," I said, pointing to the book in question and eliciting an amused snort from Theodore Nott.

"Suit yourself," said Pansy as she settled into an armchair beside mine and began uncorking a bottle of wine. "Is Draco coming?" she asked my brother, who led the rest of them reluctantly into the room.

"Dunno. He was cooped up in our library last I saw him."

"He's been acting so strange lately," remarked Daphne as she tucked a blonde curl behind her ear. I couldn't help but scowl at her prettiness over the pages of my book, stopping only when she shot me a strange look. "Are we really going to do this here?" I heard her whisper to Pansy.

"Hey, she lives here too, right?" Pansy replied with a smirk to rival Malfoy's. "Theo, where are the glasses you brought?"

"We've got some at the house," offered Blaise.

"Excuse me, you are not using our mother's good, vintage crystalware for crime," I interjected.

"Well I can certainly see why we've opted to have her here," snapped Tracey.

Pansy rolled her eyes.

"It's New Years, Zabini. Loosen up." She counted all the heads in the room. "Get six, will you?" she asked Blaise who nodded and disappeared.

I sighed and went back to my novel, peripherally aware that a large portion of the room was looking at me with trepidation.

"Well don't party too hard," I said sarcastically, without ripping my eyes from the pages.

Nott let out a quiet laugh.

"What's so funny?" Daphne asked.

"I don't know. Having her here, I guess?" he said with a shrug.

"I don't find it funny at all. We can't talk about anything," complained Tracey.

"Gossip rots the soul," I said in my most irritating, holier-than-thou voice. "Though I think you actually have to have one for that to work…"

"Oh damn," snickered Nott. "Blaise, I don't think your sister's in the mood to play nicely today," he told my brother, who had returned to the room.

"Yeah, what else is new," said Blaise resentfully as he set six wine glasses down on our marble side table. "Pour it, Pans."

"Seriously, where's Draco?" asked Daphne, fiddling anxiously with her skirt.

"Is he your siamese twin or something? Do we have to take you to St. Mungo's to separate you?"

"It just feels wrong doing this without him," she snapped at me. "He's our friend."

I was none too happy with my jealous outburst either, and attempted to curb the tendency by becoming more engrossed in my novel. By the time they had begun discussing the swathes of girls that were planning to ask Malfoy out for Valentine's Day, however, I was more inclined to use the hardcover to smash myself in the face.

"I heard Nicole Hurst's going to make her move."

"Good luck to her, then. He's not into short girls," announced Daphne proudly. "Romilda Vane's thinking about it, too."

"She's a Gryffindor."

"And a virgin," added Tracey.

I reviewed the checklist in my head. Ah, three for three, was it? Wonderful.

"You alright, Heidi?"

"Er … yeah," I said, trying not to appear too surprised at the sound of my first name coming from Nott's mouth. "I'm just very bored."

"Yeah, no shit. Can we cut the discussion of Malfoy's incoming sexual escapades? You're losing literally half your audience and the poor bloke's not even here to defend his lecherous ways."

Pansy craned her neck in my direction.

"You didn't pour your sister a drink?" she asked Blaise.

"Oh, I'd rather not get poisoned, thanks," I replied sweetly, waving away her offer.

She snorted.

"I don't like what you're getting at; I've been nothing but nice to you."

"For what probably amounts to an hour," I pointed out.

"Well I've only liked you for an hour, you see."

"Yeah. What brought on this concussion, by the way?" I asked, ignoring the glass of wine Nott was attempting to hand me.

Pansy shrugged, a coy smile on her lips.

"What can I say, Zabini? You've got some impressive balls when you aren't busy having your head up your arse."

"And I hate to disappoint you in your eternal search for those, but I think you've got the wrong twin," I said mock-innocently, pointing to my brother.

"Don't reward her for what she did, Pansy," snapped Blaise.

"Well let me ask you this, Blaise my darling, who don't you see wandering the halls of your house anymore this holiday season?"

"My father."

Pansy rolled her eyes.

"He'd have left anyway. But that woman was going to stay for as long as she was welcome, believe me."

I was beginning to wonder if Parkinson was speaking from personal experience, and would have asked her had Daphne not emitted another loud huff.

"That's it, I'm looking for him. Where's your library again?"

"Third floor, three doors to the right," Blaise said.

"Oh come on, we don't really need to bring him down, do we?" complained Nott. "He's turned into a complete nutter."

"He's our friend!" argued Daphne and Tracey in unison.

"Maybe yours," he mumbled darkly.

I sighed and closed my novel for the definitive time.

"I'll do it. I'm going there anyway to get a better book; I can hear you over this one, you see."

I found Malfoy a few minutes later, bent over a pile of volumes and flipping furiously through two of them at once.

"You're going to clean this up, I'm assuming?" I said to him. He slammed both books shut and wheeled around in his chair.

"Zabini, I swear to Salazar—"

"Some light reading you've got there," I remarked, earning myself a few dirty words. "Why are you reading about Apparition, anyway? Scared you'll fail the practical?"

"What are you up here for?" he snapped.

"The usual library business, shockingly enough," I said, holding up my book. "I'm also supposed to get you downstairs so I won't have to bring in the New Year listening to Greengrass lament about how good you are with your mouth. She's overplaying it a little if you ask me."

"Think so?"

"Yeah, but I'm also not huge on the whole kiss and run thing — call me old fashioned."

"Well, Zabini, the difference is," he muttered as he leaned in towards me, "I never got the urge to run when it came to her."

He didn't give me time to respond — not that I could have. The pain in my chest that his comment had ignited was blocking my brain's overtime efforts to come up with a clever retort. I was beginning to long for the times he hexed me, if it only meant less moments like this.

The second Malfoy left, I collapsed in the chair he'd been using and pinched my hand to try and shock myself out of crying. I still had to put on a brave face and check on my mother.

I tried to be quiet as I peeked into her room. She was buried under blankets, the surrounding area littered with balled-up tissues. Her forehead was hot and her sleep appeared restless, despite the Dreamless Sleep potion she'd taken earlier. Taking care not to wake her, I dabbed at her forehead with a cold compress I'd asked Roley to prepare.

"I'll be back in a bit," I whispered as I adjusted her blankets.

Back downstairs, the guest list had mysteriously expanded to include a bunch of Slytherins in years other than ours, and some that had evidently graduated. I narrowly dodged Flint, who tried to scoop me in by the waist before realizing who I was.

"Blaise, what is this!" I said, gesturing to the crowd. There had to be at least forty of them.

"What?" he slurred.

"Why are all these people here!"

"They're here because I invited them, loser. See I invited them, and then they invited each other, and now we're — Evans don't do that!" he bellowed as a surly looking kid made a wreath of flames come out of his wand.

I gripped at my hair as I did a three-sixty around the room. It was still manageable, but only barely: my brother was five levels of drunk, the Ministry was probably going to blow the door down for underage magic within the hour, and the only possible voice of reason I could think of was nowhere to be seen.

And then I saw him. He was talking to Urquhart with his arm draped casually around Greengrass' waist — and, true to his words, he was not running.

"Need something?"

It was Pansy.

"Yeah, for all of you to get out!" I snapped.

"Oh, don't be a killjoy. No one's done anything too illegal," she said.

I let out a frustrated groan.

"I can't believe he's gone and done this! He knows our mother is sick upstairs!"

Pansy put a hand on my shoulder, and I instinctually knocked it away, fearing an assault.

"Merlin, you are a lunatic," she said as I mumbled an apology. "I was only trying to explain that you ought to stay downstairs and have some fun tonight. Your mother doesn't want you moping by her bed on New Years, believe me. It'll only make her feel like even more of a failure. Do you really want to spend four hours trying to convince her that your allowing men to objectify you isn't rooted in the insecurities she's passed on due to her own failed marriages?"

"Er … no?" I said unsurely. "Although that's oddly specific, I've got to say…"

Pansy waved away my attempts at digging for backstory.

"Either way, there are therapists for that, Zabini; and a therapist you are not."

I sighed.

"Look, even if I didn't have an unwell mother upstairs, I can say with complete honesty that there isn't a soul at this party that I actually want to talk to. No offence."

Pansy giggled.

"Who said anything about talking? I think Pucey might be here if you wanted to try that out again," she said, wagging her eyebrows.

"Hard pass."

Pansy nodded, scanning the room.

"Alright, alright. Urquhart?"

"Ah, an intellectual," I said sarcastically as I watched him open a bottle of Butterbeer with his eye socket.

"My god, you're picky," she complained as she led me over to the drink table in spite of my protests. I settled on some Butterbeer and set about trying to uncap it with my teeth.

"I guess I should let you in on a little secret," she said as I took a sip of my drink. "I'm partially being nice to you because I think your brother's an absolute delicacy."

I swallowed quickly before the beverage had a chance to shoot down my lungs.

"That's disgusting, first of all," I said. "And secondly, your tactic's a bit off; I think you're supposed to be subtle about fishing for information, you see."

"Maybe. But I'm thinking the Gryffindor in you much prefers blunt honesty."

I snorted, but held back the urge to ask her if she even knew what the word honesty meant.

"Alright, what do you want to know?" I conceded. "Be warned, he probably talks to you more in a week than he's done with me my whole life."

"You're not giving yourself enough credit, Zabini," she said, pausing to give Flint the finger as he tried to approach us. I happily joined in.

"Oh yeah, how's that?" I asked once Flint had gone.

"You have more sway than you think; enough that I actually have to go through the inconvenience of patching up our terms before trying to get serious with your brother."

I shot her my most unappreciative look. She shrugged innocently.

"I'm new at the honesty thing."

"What're you two laughin' bout over here," slurred my brother as he refilled his shot glass. "She bothering you?" he asked, obviously intending the respondent to be Pansy.

"Oh yeah — yeah she's bothering me loads. Do not under any circumstances spend any more time with this person than necessary. In fact, I forbid it," I said, grinning, to Blaise's clear confusion. Pansy shot me a glare. "I'm kidding!"

My eyes wandered to a corner, where Daphne and Malfoy were now standing alone. I felt the smile slide off my face, and no matter how much I tried, I couldn't reinstate it.

"Getting awfully cozy, aren't they?" Pansy commented, having followed my line of vision. "Ah well, I suppose he needs it. He's been a little 'volatile' lately."

I feigned apathy as best as I could, and sipped my Butterbeer while looking around the room. The pit in my stomach didn't go away nearly as quickly as the falsified nonchalance, however, and before I could filter, I turned to Pansy.

"Why did Malfoy break up with you?" I asked.

She appeared caught off-guard by the question.

"He didn't. I broke up with him."

"Why?"

"Because we had some slight trouble loving the other more than we loved ourselves," she replied. "That's how it felt, at least."

"Cool," I said awkwardly.

She cast me a funny look. "Not really."

"I basically just don't know how to answer something like that," I admitted.

"You don't have to ans— oh shit, here comes Warrington. Pretend we're talking about something really deep," she gasped as she ducked into me.

Luckily, Warrington swerved around us and went to talk to Tracey instead.

"He's a real prat," she explained as she resurfaced. Her face lit up. "Say, you know which Slytherin isn't?"

"No," I said honestly.

"Terence Higgs. He's insanely boring, so you'd definitely like him. He's just over there." She pointed to a spot near where Malfoy and Daphne were standing.

"Oh, no, I—"

But she was already dragging me after her through the crowd.

"Hi, Terence," she said sweetly. I saw Malfoy momentarily stop whispering into Daphne's ear and look over at me.

"Hey, Pansy. Happy New Year," said Terence.

"Not for another twenty minutes," I pointed out lamely, anxious to contribute something to the discussion so that Malfoy didn't think I was lingering just to be around him.

"Right, er…"

"Heidi. Heidi Zabini," I said.

"No shit! You're one of the Gryffindor beaters, right?" he asked, eyebrows raised.

"Correct."

"Adrian told me how good you are. Said you were Blaise's sister. I didn't believe him, though."

I took an awkward sip of my drink.

"Believe it."

"Mind you the team went to shit after they replaced me as Seeker," Terence said. I couldn't help but grin, knowing that Malfoy was listening behind us.

"Oh yeah, it was a complete downgrade. Don't think he's ever won a game," I lied.

I became vaguely aware that Pansy had slipped away, but before I had a chance to panic, Terence eased me into more Quidditch talk. I had barely noticed the clock strike midnight until a cheer erupted around us.

"Happy New Year!" he said, clinking his bottle to mine. I smiled, and accidentally caught Malfoy's eye. Against my better judgement, I mouthed Happy New Year at him, but he turned away before I could finish. Trying not to show my hurt, I went back to my conversation with Terence and spent the rest of the night debating various Quidditch techniques.

"So," Pansy asked me a few hours later as she helped me fold up the cloth that had been placed over the drink table. The room had been emptied of everyone besides the pair of us and Blaise, who was groaning drunkenly into a bucket. "Meet anybody worth talking to again?"

I laughed.

"No, you're all nutters. It has convinced me to do one thing, though."

"And what would that be, Zabini?"

"Try for some normalcy."

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The next time I found myself sharing a table with Malfoy, I had the good sense to get up and walk to the other side of the room.

"Hi."

Anthony looked up at me in mild confusion. I fought through the nerves until I had successfully convinced myself that I didn't care that the class was watching, or that Snape had just walked into the room. He had gone through more for me.

"I was wondering if you'd like to go out on a date with me? Perhaps sometime this week?"

He nodded slowly, as if the moment wasn't being fully absorbed by his mind.

"Good. We'll go through the details later then," I said, as some of the class began hooting cheerfully at us.

Exhilarated, I returned to my seat. Malfoy's facial expression — a mixture of disgust and betrayal — was just icing on the cake.