Submission for Round 4 of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition
Seeker for the Chudley Cannons
Prompt: Apocalypse
Word Count: 1851
"It's the end of the world!"
"There, there," Pansy said, mostly succeeding at holding back her laughter, "it's really not all that bad."
"Yes, it is!" Draco moaned, flinging an arm across his face dramatically. "It's like an ah-pocky, a pock-lisp, an — oh, whatever the Muggles call it!"
"Apocalypse," Pansy said dryly. She had paid attention in Muggle Studies this year, thank you very much.
"Exactly!"
Pansy sighed. "It's really not a big deal, Draco. Come on, let's just go to dinner."
"I can't go looking like this!" He stood up from his bed, and Pansy finally got to see the whole of what the misdirected spell had done.
A bunch of third year Slytherin girls had been trying out some wardrobe spells on the old armoire in the Common Room, one that was meant to turn every item of clothing into something ridiculously frilly, flowery, and girly. Unfortunately, one of the spells had misfired.
It had hit Draco, instead.
His outfit (and everything he attempted to put on his body) immediately turned undeniably feminine. Draco's shirt now had a scalloped collar and delicate floral embroidery, his green tie had a paisley pattern, his pressed trousers had transformed into a knee-length pleated skirt, and best of all, his face cream had turned into a subtle, shimmering, silvery-green highlighter that accentuated his cheekbones perfectly. It was completely unfair, Pansy thought, because even in girly clothes, Draco still looked incredibly hot.
"I look ridiculous," wailed the sad, pathetic excuse of a ferret in front of her. "I just can't."
"Fine!" Pansy snapped, feeling her eye start to twitch. "I'll go down and bring you back dinner, but you owe me!"
She left his dorm room to the sound of his promises of everlasting adoration, although he wasn't really getting out of anything by skipping dinner, just delaying the inevitable. Madam Pomfrey had already looked him over and said that it would wear off in a week, and that he wasn't excused from classes.
Pansy couldn't wait for tomorrow morning.
Draco being himself, of course, he'd whinged about his clothes up until the moment before they entered the Great Hall for breakfast the next morning, at which point he seemed to decide that he was just going to own it. He straightened up and walked in like it was one of those Muggle fashion events. He made a beeline for the Slytherin table, too caught up in his aloof act to notice the rest of the student population's reaction, but Pansy was not.
The whole of Hogwarts, it appeared, agreed with her: Draco was hot, no matter what clothing he happened to be in. Even more interestingly, the rest of Hogwarts also included one green-eyed, bespectacled Savior of the Wizarding World, who had apparently forgotten how to chew upon seeing Draco. The sight of his open mouth was horribly unattractive.
"Everyone's laughing at me, aren't they?" Draco pouted after he'd sat himself safely at the Slytherin table, surrounded by Theo, Blaise, Daphne, and Millicent.
"Yes, dear." Pansy patted his head with false sympathy. "Even Potter."
Draco's head turned so fast it was comical. Pansy exchanged glances with the others, all chortling into their tea.
"Salazar, he's looking at me!" Draco ducked down, out of eyesight. "This is so humiliating."
Blaise snorted. "It's more humiliating for us, mate."
"Yeah," Theo chimed in, "you look bloody amazing in anything. How are we supposed to compete?"
"I'm wearing girls' clothing," Draco hissed. "It's disgraceful, not attractive. Just look at Potter; he clearly thinks I'm ugly."
Pansy looked over at the Gryffindor table. Potter did look disgruntled, but by no means did she get the impression that he had any issue at all with Draco's clothing.
"Potter does not think you're ugly," Blaise laughed.
"How would you know?" Draco sneered.
"Ginevra," Blaise shrugged, and that got Pansy thinking. Blaise was close to the youngest Weasley; if his information was good, then perhaps they could take advantage of this spell, and be done with Draco's obnoxious pining once and for all. Draco started moaning about how Ginevra was Potter's ex-girlfriend, so she couldn't possibly be trusted to know anything useful, but Pansy tuned him out.
She just needed a plan.
All purebloods had been required to take Muggle Studies this year, and Ronald Weasley was no exception, although he always looked considerably happier to be there than anyone else did. Normally, Pansy partnered with Draco, but today she timed her arrival in the classroom so as to be sure that one of the others would partner him first, and she elbowed everyone else out of the way until she was sitting next to Weasley.
"Er, hello?" Weasley said uncertainly, looking at her with brows furrowed in confusion, as if she were one of Trelawney's crystal balls.
Pansy decided to jump straight to the point — that was usually the best approach with Gryffindors.
"Is Potter being absolutely driven out of his mind?"
Weasley laughed. "Merlin, yes," he said. "He couldn't stop staring this morning, and then he pretended he left his Charms essay upstairs when we asked his opinion on Malfoy's outfit."
"Excellent," Pansy said, pleased that they were on the same page. "So, what do you think? Lock them in a broom cupboard?"
"Hard no on the cupboards." Weasley grimaced. "I dunno, Sticking Charm?"
"That's childish." Pansy waved it off. "And besides, I'm pretty sure both of them would be able to undo it in a heartbeat."
Weasley nodded in agreement. "What should we do, then?"
Pansy wasn't sure. She'd been hoping he would have a good idea.
"What about Under the Witch's Hat?" Hannah Abbott said, leaning over from her chair on the other side of Weasley.
Now there was an idea, Pansy thought. She was surprised that Abbott knew about it, but one could never tell with Hufflepuffs.
"Sorry, what's a witch's hat got to do with anything?" Weasley asked in confusion.
"Oh, don't worry, Weasley," Pansy smiled. "It's the perfect solution."
Under the Witch's Hat was a secret club beneath The Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade, and it was only accessible to people in the know. It opened after ten on Friday and Saturday nights, and there was a passphrase to get through the wards and gain entrance. Once you were aware of the existence of the club, that was usually easy enough to find.
"Sarsaparilla," Blaise told her when he joined her in Draco's dorm room on Friday evening.
"Thank you," she said absently, considering Draco's wardrobe.
"What are you doing, Pans?" the boy in question asked her from his face-down position on his bed.
"Picking your outfit."
"It's not like it'll matter," Draco groaned, lifting his head to eye her narrowly. "What are you choosing an outfit for?"
"Oh, didn't I tell you? We're going out."
Since they were eighth-years, McGonagall allowed them quite a few liberties, one of which was that they could go to Hogsmeade any time they wished, instead of only on select weekends. Pansy was sure she hadn't meant it to be used for this purpose, but loopholes were meant to be exploited.
"What! I can't go out! My clothes are still a — a global catastrophe!"
"Yes, I know, Draco," Pansy said, turning to look at him with a smirk, "and I think I can work with it."
Draco gulped.
Yes, she had done her job well, Pansy decided an hour later, walking a circle around Draco. The spell had taken Blaise's pair of loose-fit denims and tightened them into skinny jeans, and in a burst of inspiration, she had used a slicing spell on one of Draco's shirts, prompting the spell to turn it into a sweet, lacy little crop top when it went on his body. After that, he'd only needed a few small touches from her personal makeup collection to look positively stunning.
"You're perfect," she declared.
"I don't know if I even want to look in a mirror," Draco said warily, looking down at himself. "Why can't I have a full shirt, again?"
Pansy opened her mouth to explain, but just then Theo opened the door.
"Are you lot ready yet? Daph and Millie are — oh, shit." Theo raised an eyebrow and whistled when he saw Draco.
"Don't look at me!" Draco snapped, wrapping his arms around the skin that the crop top left exposed. "I'm hideous."
"Mate, you're not hideous." Blaise rolled his eyes. "If Potter doesn't declare his undying love for you —"
"Blaise!" Pansy hissed, but it was too late.
"Potter?" Draco exclaimed. "He's going to see me in this? Oh, why can't the world be consumed by Fiendfyre?"
Pansy glared at Blaise, who cringed in shame. With his help, and Theo's, they dragged Draco out of the castle. He stopped putting up so much of a fight once they were out in the corridors, but insisted on sulking the entire way to Hogsmeade, even though Daphne and Millicent had brought along a thermos of something that was definitely stronger than Firewhisky.
By the time they'd reached the entrance to Under the Witch's Hat, however, Pansy was pleased to note that he looked nervous, and was visibly fidgety as Blaise said the password and the door to the club opened.
"Come on," Pansy grabbed Draco's hand as soon as they were inside, "you need at least one more drink."
"Potter's not here," Draco said, when she emerged from the crowd around the bar with two glasses. "Was Blaise having me on?" He looked vaguely disappointed as he took a glass from her.
"Probably." Pansy shrugged, hiding how pleased she was. If Potter wasn't here yet, she needed to get Draco distracted so that he didn't notice when Potter did show. Which he would, eventually, if Weasley stuck to the plan.
"Dance with me?" She knew she didn't really need to ask; Draco loved dancing, and his eyes lit up immediately.
She wasn't sure how much longer it was, but sometime in the middle of a Weird Sisters song, she turned around to make sure she hadn't lost track of Draco on the dance floor, only to see that Potter was slowly making his way towards them through the crowd, eyes fixed on Draco and looking like he'd been hit on the head with a Bludger.
She tapped Draco's shoulder to pull his attention away, and half-yelled into his ear, "I'm going back to the bar, do you want anything?" He shook his head, and Pansy moved away, dropping her pretense of going to the bar, and hoping that finally those two idiots would get their act together.
She really needn't have worried, as it turned out, because when she'd made her way back to Draco again to assess his progress, it was to discover that he was enthusiastically snogging Potter. As if he felt her looking, Draco glanced up momentarily.
End of the world? Pansy mouthed at him with a smirk. He rolled his eyes at her, and went back to devouring Potter's face.
With a smug smile, Pansy went to find Theo and Blaise. She deserved a congratulatory drink.