A/N;; I ended up having to cut this chapter in half with where it was going, because a lot is happening in the next several upcoming chapters lol. That being said, that means that chapter 7 will end up probably being a fairly quick update! And also that the chapters may start getting a bit on the longer side, too!
Always gotta say it: Consistently amazed by the new readers that I keep seeing here, and thanking every little lucky star I've got for all the follows and amazingly lovely comments I've been left!
I appreciate y'all so very, very much!
Can't wait to see what you guys think of this chapter!
"I can hear you two giggling over there." I called across the dormitory.
Lucy and Daphne were over on the blonde's bed, whispering and snickering between one another. This had been an ongoing circumstance, the two of them conspiring. Despite their assumption that I was unaware of what was going on, I wasn't lost as to the timing of their little plotting meetings.
It was October, after all.
"No you can't, mind your own business." Lucy called back over to me.
I huffed out a laugh with a shake of my head. "You'd think if you really wanted to plan a surprise you two would find somewhere that I'm not to discuss it."
Daphne scoffed, playfully offended. "And what makes you think we're planning a surprise exactly?"
I looked up from the quidditch pitch drawing I had started back at tryouts - I was finally adding color to it now. A dark brow quirked upward in wordless challenge in the other girl's direction.
"Shush. Just do what you're doing." Daphne waved a dismissive hand. Smartly, however, she grabbed her wand off her nightstand and put up a silencing charm around her four-post bed. It was effective in keeping me from hearing my two friends now
It was still a couple weeks off, and while they had tried their best to keep me unaware of their intentions, I knew that they were planning something for my birthday. The Halloween feast was never quite enough celebrating for my friends - though it wasn't as if I didn't appreciate it. As if an added gift to me, it happened to fall on a Saturday this year, which meant I would get a day without classes, to boot. I wasn't sure entirely how much Daphne and Lucy were planning, but I definitely wouldn't know until the day of. Daphne could gossip like it was her job, but when it came to surprises, they were an art form to her - she took them seriously.
It was a good hour before Daphne was removing the silencing charm around her bed and Lucy came over to our side of the room, looking triumphant. A smile remained on my face, but I rolled my eyes just the same.
"I'm going to find out, you know." I teased with a slow shake of my head.
Once again, Daphne scoffed and she placed her hands on her hips. "If anyone tells you a thing, they're going to have to deal with me."
Lucy snorted. "Don't upset mum, now."
My shading green into the grass on my page halted as I fell into a short string of giggles. Daphne rolled her eyes with a gentle huff.
"Just let us have a little fun, would you?" She shot a pointed look at me, as if I was the only person that could be a potential threat to her whole plan. Lucy looked at me, too, but she was smirking knowingly.
"Blaise will tell me." I stated, unwavering. It wasn't necessarily the truth - Blaise might have been willing to share most things with me, but if Daphne was threatening to hex him he probably would make an exception.
"I've already warned Blaise that he'll have a head the size of a pumpkin if he says anything." Daphne said sweetly. How terrifying she could be when she was on a mission. It was rare that the blonde got to a point of threat at all, we may have laughed about such things initially, but on the flip side of Daphne's more playful and social side came an intense defensiveness and sour attitude. We didn't make her mad very often.
The rest of the evening turned into chat about other things. Lucy had wisely changed the subject - both in avoidance of me finding anything out and also not agitating Daphne about it. Daphne asked Lucy if she was really thinking about dating a Weasley twin and Lucy openly admitted that yes, yes she was. It had spiraled into a mildly hilarious girl talk about what experience with boys each of us had. I left a lot of detail - and a specific individual - out of mine. It wasn't until Daphne started yawning every few sentences that we realized it would probably be wise to finally head to bed.
Morning came with my typical getting up earlier than the rest - it was another Wednesday so my routine came naturally. Fortunately, I had been able to go back to enjoying my Muggle Studies class for the time being, with no other visits from the pink toad herself. The same couldn't be said for my second period class, however, because as I caught up with my friends and we headed all the way up to professor Trelawney's tower for Divination, we found professor Umbridge waiting there.
"She really does have to ruin everything, doesn't she?" Lucy grumbled to me as we made our way to our tables.
My eyes were fixed on the small woman, hoping that I didn't end up singled out by her again. Other than seeing her in Defence class periods, I hadn't been called to her office or anything. We hadn't had any further discussions of her use for me, which led me to believe that she was waiting for the right moment. Whatever a right moment might be for a pudgy, pink, power-hungry toad.
Lucy sat at a low table with Daphne and Theo for this class, while I sat with Blaise and Draco. The two boys were murmuring to each other as I approached, but Blaise nodding in greeting at me seemed to halt the interaction.
"As if this class isn't stupid enough." Blaise muttered, glancing forward toward professor Umbridge.
I knew that Divination as a subject was something that a lot of students - even outside of my housemates - didn't find a large amount of interest in. Even professor McGonagall had once referred to it as 'fancy guessing' more than magic. Still, it somehow was made even more grating by the presence of everyone's least favorite professor this year.
"Trelawney looks like she's going to have a meltdown." Draco noted. I blinked a quick couple times; it was the first time he had actively spoken in front of me in a while. Other than when we were in a common space like the house table for meals, or when I happened to pass him barking instructions at Crabbe and Goyle between classes or in the dungeons, his communications around me were generally limited.
"Probably will." Blaise snorted with a nod and Draco let out a dry laugh in agreement.
I glanced back and forth where I sat between them, but the two boys didn't seem to notice. Pulling out my dream journal - as it was fifth year course material for O.W.L.'s - I flipped to the last page that I had filled in. Dreams weren't something that I had very many of, or at least that I remembered much of. Even as a child, I couldn't remember a point that I had ever excitedly gone on about a dream I'd had. Which meant that most of my dream journal was fabricated, just barely believable. They were dreams, though, so it wasn't like they could be wrong, right?
Professor Trelawney really did try to get into the day's lessons, but she kept getting distracted. Each time Umbridge's quill would flick while she jotted something down, the wide-eyed woman would stumble over her words, forget where she had just left off in her instruction. Just when she finally got her bearings again, starting in on what we would be going over for the day, Umbridge cut into her speech to ask her how long she had been teaching the class for.
"Five galleons she cries." Draco whispered.
"That's not a bet, it's an inevitability." Blaise snickered softly.
"Both of you shut up." I rolled my eyes with a shake of my head. It was the closest I had gotten to speaking to Draco in nearly a month; how ironic I should be telling him to shut up of all things.
Umbridge was on her way to the door after another few minutes, but once again, couldn't seem to help another interruption on her way out. "Would you predict something for me?"
A distressed confusion washed over professor Trelawney and she clutched at the book in her hand anxiously. "I- I'm sorry?"
There was a weighted silence that fell over the classroom. We had barely begun discussion on what we had written in our dream journals, hadn't even reached the point of analysis of them yet, and now we all were tuned in to whatever sort of confrontation was mounting in front of us between our teachers. I doubted it would be anything like the one that I had missed between professor McGonagall and professor Umbridge.
"One teensy little prophecy?" The short woman's voice was achingly patronizing in its false sweetness. My teeth ground together and Blaise shot me a questioning, sideways glance.
I didn't much care for Divination as a subject or professor Trelawney as a teacher, that much was true, but something about the example that Umbridge was trying to make of the woman didn't sit right with me. It reminded me too much of how she had threatened me, boxed me into a corner and left me no choice but to do what she asked. There was a panic about professor Trelawney that I didn't feel in myself - any stress in that moment between myself and the woman had been easily replaced with anger. Our Divination teacher didn't have the same sort of cold self assurance, however.
"Pity." Umbridge frowned, her tone disappointed as she wrote down one last thing on her clipboard before turning to leave the tower.
"No, wait, wait, no!" I winced as professor Trelawney called after her, clearly scrambling in a desperate attempt to make up for not giving the small woman what she wanted. "I think I do see something. Yes, I do! Something dark. You are in grave danger."
There was a long pause and I heard a couple of my housemates on the levels behind me snickering, whispering among themselves. Even in a sideways glance at Draco, I noticed he had a smug smirk on his face.
"Lovely." The pink toad wrote one last thing on her clipboard and finally exited the classroom.
Blaise cleared his throat to stifle a laugh beside me and I shook my head as Draco didn't even bother, snickering on my other side. Professor Trelawney stared wide-eyed in the direction that professor Umbridge had just left in, hand still outstretched in front of her. It took her several moments to seem to collect herself enough to get back to teaching.
"Back to- Yes. Back to the palmistry readings then." She stammered.
I quirked a brow and glanced around at my classmates. Even on the other side of the room, the Gryffindor students in our shared period were sharing looks of question. Palmistry was a subject we had covered in third year, and we had very clearly been on the subject of our dream journals prior to the disruption of the new High Inquisitor.
Evidently, no one saw it fit to correct the woman - surprising even me that none of my housemates found the opportunity to poke fun at the woman's ability to keep her mind in order. I figured it had to do with the fact that none of us particularly enjoyed this dream analysis unit we were in. Settling into the subject that she requested, instead, I shoved my dream journal back into my book bag then held a hand out to Blaise for him to give me his hand.
"She knows we did this already, right?" Blaise settled his hand palm up in mine.
"She's batty, I don't know what you expect." Draco replied. My back was half-turned toward him in my shift to focus on reading Blaise's palm, but I could just catch the shrug of his shoulders as if he were disinterested.
"I'm not really sure what, specifically, I'm supposed to be reading here." I admitted, ignoring them. I glanced behind us to the next level up where Daphne, Theo, and Lucy were chatting. They weren't bothering with the pretense of reading one another's palms - knowing Theo he probably kept to the original lesson at their table.
"Tell me how long I'm going to live." Blaise requested with a snort.
I rolled my eyes. "You know it doesn't work like that."
"I don't, actually. I copied someone else's assignments for this unit in third year." He admitted and Draco let out a laugh on my other side.
I shook my head at them but had to roll my lips together in order to conceal my own amusement. It was a pleasant reminder that sometimes we really did get to just be stupid kids at school, coasting through assignments and not worrying about our futures.
"Ah, ah!" Professor Trelawney had stopped in front of our table, attracting the attention of our housemates behind us as she waved her hand in a wide circle toward the three of us. "There is reason to believe that you, miss Xavier, you are the one requiring a reading today."
Blaise's brows shot up. "You dying and forget to tell us or something?"
Draco tried but failed to refrain from laughing, and I was aware of Lucy also giggling behind us. Idiots, my friends.
"Can I ask why?" I asked our professor, trying once again to not let my own amusement flash on my features.
A swishing wave jingled the many bangles around the woman's arm and she tilted her head as if she was looking up at something. "I've got a good sense about it."
"Yeah, Tal, a good sense about it." Blaise mumbled, snickering throughout. I resisted the urge to smack him in the chest.
Huffing out a sigh and mumbling an 'alright,' I dropped Blaise's hand and instead turned my own palm up to hold in front of him. The moment that he reached to take it to do as our professor had asked, she halted him with another jingling wave.
"Mister Malfoy," Oh no. "You do the reading, if you please. Take miss Xavier's hand."
Blaise looked somewhere between surprised and amused as his eyes flicked between the two of us. I didn't move right away, blinking at our teacher. I thought maybe she was joking, but then I remembered this woman and her feelings were never actually a joke here. It felt like a rather large joke, considering the fact that Draco and I hadn't been speaking for weeks, and now her 'good feeling' required him to practice palmistry reading on my hand.
Stiffly, I shifted more in Draco's direction and breathed in deeply. He looked at me with a much more subtle amusement than I would have assumed, but it was there just the same. His hand was cooler than my own as I dropped the back of it against his outstretched fingers. For a few seconds he continued to look over my face, checking my expression for my response, no doubt.
"Now, locate her life, head, and heart lines." Professor Trelawney instructed.
Draco's gray eyes drifted down to my palm finally. Evidently he didn't simply copy the work like Blaise did - or if he had, the copying of it served it to memory enough - because his thumb traced each of the respective lines in my palm as he identified them. I could feel everyone's eyes on us; our teacher singling us out making it hard not to pay attention to whatever was going on. My own focus remained on Draco, however, watching the subtly bored expression on his sharp features as he did what the teacher asked.
"And what, my dear, can you tell us of note of these lines?" The professor prompted.
Gray eyes flashed up to meet mine for a fleeting moment, and I caught the wordless disbelief in them - like he truly couldn't believe we had to do this at all, let alone be walked through the process. I grinned faintly despite my previous attempts at composure.
"The life line is used to determine experiences and vitality. It gives an image of life as a journey, instead of just," he paused, looking passed me at Blaise with a grin. "How long you're going to live for."
My own grin inched wider and I rolled my lips together to hide my wordless encouragement of their behavior.
"And what do you make of miss Xavier's life line, mister Malfoy?" Professor Trelawney pressed.
He shot the woman an unpleasant look out of the corner of his eye. Surely, he wasn't enjoying this particular attention. What with our housemates and the Gryffindor side of the classroom tuned in, and our teacher prompting him through it, it wasn't the sort of attention he thrived off of. Not to mention the fact that this class tended to be something of a joke to most of us. I nudged my knee softly against his; a gentle grounding. Even though we hadn't been speaking, I hoped it might be even a little helpful of a gesture. He huffed shortly but looked at me once again.
"Her life line is long, which means she internalizes a lot of outside influence in her life. Lets other people tell her what to do too much, probably." Draco informed flatly.
The grin on my face faded and my brows twitched upward. His eyes met my own and I could see in them a glimpse of recognition - he knew he'd hit a nerve. Along with that recognition there was a fleeting sympathy. Draco knew just as well what it was like to do as he was told, no matter how much he tried to act otherwise.
Professor Trelawney flourished her hand in a circle for Draco to continue and with a frown, he got into explaining what he could gather from looking at my head line. I took a moment to look back at our classmates behind us. Lucy was watching our exchange curiously, and Daphne was intent, leaned forward with her chin in her hand and all. Theo, on the other hand, was writing away - no doubt working on something much more important than this. Behind them on the next level, Crabbe and Goyle were tossing little torn shreds of parchment back and forth at one another, wholly disinterested. Most interesting was Pansy, who watched with the same intently focused gaze that Daphne did, but she seemed tense. The dark haired girl's jaw was clenched and she had her arms folded across her chest.
If she had a problem, she'd have to take it up with professor Trelawney, because I was not getting into that with her. She wasn't worth my energy.
"And lastly, of course, the heart line." I turned back at professor Trelawney's declaration, looking questioningly at her then at Draco.
Blaise shifted closer over my shoulder as if he were suddenly interested in what he might hear.
Draco rolled his eyes but took a second to drag his thumb over the line in question in my palm. I watched the motion curiously before looking at his face. His attention was on my hand between us, though I couldn't say he looked very focused. He still had that vaguely bored expression, but he paused to give the appearance of thought. A second time, his thumb traced the line in my palm. For a quick moment - so fleeting that I would likely have missed it if I weren't actively watching his face - Draco's jaw tightened as he swallowed hard.
"It's a longer, deeper line." Draco shifted - perhaps because of the amount of eyes on him, or perhaps something else entirely. "Usually means that you value deep personal relationships and that you form long-lasting bonds with people." It was the first time he had actually spoken right to me during the reading, not just simply answering professor Trelawney's questions. "Also that those bonds you form carry large importance and influence in your life."
I felt like I couldn't look at his face now, because what he was saying hit a little too close for comfort. It carried too much of a weighted implication, given it was him saying it. If our teacher wasn't standing close to witness and judge this reading I would have hurriedly pulled my hand back. I didn't terribly like having my personal vulnerabilities read to the class. Just because they were true didn't mean I wanted to hear them. Especially not when they were also being read by the person who tended to make me the most vulnerable in the first place.
It wasn't even something I could be angry about, in reality. Draco knew me well, at least at the core, and sure, that gave him insight into who I was as a person, but what he was saying wasn't simply a ploy on his behalf. I knew as soon as professor Trelawney took a look at my hand herself in order to assess whether or not Draco had read my palm correctly, at the very least he had gotten that part right.
I really should have spoken up about this not being the unit we were in.
Professor Trelawney made an empty grabbing motion toward my hand and I finally removed it from Draco's careful hold. I tried not to think about the absence of his touch as I let the woman take her own look. I looked sideways at Blaise who was glancing back and forth between Draco and me curiously. Some thoughtful hums and tilts of her head later, and then professor Trelawney was finally clasping my hand between both of hers.
"Yes, yes, excellent, excellent, it appears that mister Malfoy has been touched by the powers of Seeing." She confirmed.
"He's definitely been touched by something." Lucy snorted behind us.
The classroom bustled with gentle laughter at her comment but I barely managed a small smile. Glancing at Draco, I realized he was watching me carefully now.
It was a little awkward, getting up to leave class when it was finally over. Being forced to speak to each other, let alone in the manner and setting it had occurred, it added confusion to the situation. I felt a little at war with myself. I had told Draco I wanted him to leave me alone for a legitimate reason, after all. However, even that brief, specifically centered interaction served as a reminder of what having him more present in my life did do for me, what it did make me feel, at least when things were civil between us.
I didn't rush away from the rest of the group as me and my friends headed out of the tower and down the winding spiral staircase. Draco fell into step beside me, but it was Blaise that spoke first out of all of us from Draco's other side.
"Why the bloody hell did you know all that anyway?" He asked. He sounded both bewildered and amused, like the idea of Draco having that knowledge was somehow funny and impressive at the same time.
"It's all a bunch of rubbish, you can just make it up as you go." Draco scoffed dismissively.
"It's because of me." Pansy spoke a few steps behind us. She was just far enough back for me to not have noticed her presence but just close enough to hear our conversation, clearly.
Lucy was walking in front of me and she glanced back over her shoulder. The look in her eyes was a wordless question and I nodded subtly to let her know that I was okay. That didn't stop her from shooting a cold look passed us up at Pansy before turning forward again.
"We studied all of that together in third year. I used to practice reading Draco's palm all the time." Pansy continued proudly.
I couldn't help but feel like this bit of information was being shared just for me.
"I could probably tell you things you don't even know that I managed to learn from all that." The girl finished finally. Without looking at her I could hear the lilt of a smirk in her tone.
I'd kept my lips pursed tightly, gaze ahead throughout, but I wasn't about to allow myself to walk away from this conversation without saying something to her. "I'll have to find you a ribbon for that then, Parkinson, would that give you the validation you're searching for?"
Blaise snorted out a laugh at the same time Lucy clapped her hands together loudly. Daphne cleared her throat to stifle a snicker of her own and even Theo half-turned for me to see the amused smirk I'd managed to render from him. I didn't look at Draco. Instead I quickened my pace just enough to step up beside Lucy and loop my arm through hers. I towed her away from the others before Pansy had the opportunity to say anything else to me.
"We're not skipping lunch, are we? Because I'm dying. I won't make it through the afternoon without eating." Lucy noted as I came to a stop around a corner.
"No, I just want everyone else to get far enough ahead that I don't have to deal with them." I answered.
Lucy gave a slow nod of her head. "So you're avoiding that whole thing still, then?"
I blinked at her as my brow furrowed. "Not you, too."
"I didn't say anything."
"You said enough." I groaned and lifted a hand to pinch the bridge of my nose. "You don't even like Draco, what do you care if I'm talking to him or not?"
"I only care because I know you care, Tal, don't be stupid about it." Lucy laughed lightly. "Malfoy may be an absolute git, but just because he and I aren't each other's favorites doesn't mean I need you to feel the same way about him as I do. We're not bloody Hufflepuff's for God's sake."
I let out a laugh and shook my head at the girl. "You know, sometimes I really do think you're too logical for us."
"You and I both know the Ravenclaws couldn't handle me." Lucy smirked with a shrug of one shoulder.
My eyes glinted mischievously and I smirked back at her. "But a special sort of Gryffindor could, right?"
She caught exactly what I was referring to and her head tipped back with a loud laugh before she slid her arm through mine again to get us headed back to the Great Hall. It had barely been acknowledged, her implying that I shouldn't be avoiding things with Draco. Lucy never drilled things in until it was too serious not to, though, and we definitely hadn't reached that point just yet. I knew that she was aware my not speaking to him had so much more to it than just what issues the two of them had between each other, which meant I also knew that she could see how it had changed demeanor in him and me, let alone the group dynamic.
As we approached the Great Hall, Lucy mentioned that she would be spending lunch at the Gryffindor table once again. She made a point to tell me I should come say at least hello to the boys and since I wasn't quite ready for the potential of a battle of wits with Pansy in front of everyone at the moment, I followed her. Unsurprisingly, heads turned and an even combination of confusion and offense was shot my way. Harry Potter himself clenched his teeth together and followed me with his darkened eyes until the moment I stopped by the Weasley twins.
"Look who it is, boys." Lucy greeted with a grin. She sat so casually, so easily on George's left. The two of them nudged each other with their arms in the same moment and I smiled faintly.
I lifted my hand in a small wave as the twins turned to look at me. George looked pleasantly surprised, Fred looked amused.
"Well have a seat then, lovely lady, yeah?" Fred offered, motioning to the open space on his right.
Lee Jordan and Angelina Johnson were sitting across from the two boys and when I spared them a glance I noticed them watching me wearily. Not a lot of my time at Hogwarts had been spent socializing outside of my own house. While Lucy had primarily stuck with her friends being in Slytherin, Lucy also didn't have the same attitude that a lot of our fellow housemates did. She was charismatic and charming, so it was easy for her to branch out. She also didn't have the same family or upbringing that a lot of us in Slytherin did; the kind that I had.
"I was just coming to say a quick hello." I smiled tightly. The way I was being stared at was starting to weigh on me. If I wasn't careful I was bound to snap at someone and give them a real reason to stare. Particularly Potter with his consistent scowl.
"Gracing us with your presence, that should definitely get me through the rest of the week now." Fred joked. Angelina kicked him in the shin under the table and I actually let out a laugh.
George was smirking, amused at his brother's antics, but then he half-turned over the back of the bench he sat on to look at me. "You'll have to forgive him, there wasn't enough room in the womb for both of us to get the same amount of brain cells."
Once again, I laughed - particularly as Fred gasped in mock offense. I could see why Lucy liked to spend time with them. Sure, there was the fact that they were nice to look at, but there was also a lightness about them. They were playful, joking, even when a lot of that seemed to have gone away from the world for the time being. Even with things growing as serious and dark as they were, these two managed to be making prank candies and flirting with girls. I wasn't quite naïve enough to think that they had no idea what was coming, so I had to commend them even more for maintaining a certain level of brightness through it all.
It was different than people in my own house. A lot of the kids in Slytherin had some idea of what was coming - whether their parents were directly involved with the tasks of the dark lord just yet or not - but where the Weasley boys kept with happy distractions, a lot of the people in Slytherin allowed for the inevitable shift of darkness to serve as a shield. Like Draco, they acted as if they were untouchable by what was to come. Perhaps there was some truth to it, because I knew a number of their parents, what they got up to, how it was similar to or the same as my own parents. I still thought it was rather unwise, thinking that the blood in our veins and a serpent on our house crests somehow made us better, safer.
After a couple minutes of casual chatter, talking about the ridiculousness of fifth year workload and hearing these older students tell us we didn't have the faintest idea what we were in for just yet, I excused myself and told Lucy I would see her later. I shook my head with a huff of a laugh as Fred once again had to comment on how 'lovely it was to see me.'
As I approached the Slytherin table, I noticed that Pansy was sitting closely beside Draco. She made it a point to start up a conversation with him as soon as I came up to the table.
"Have enough of that, then?" Daphne snickered as I settled beside her with a sigh. Thankfully she was sitting a good foot away from where Pansy and Draco were; if we wanted to say something to one another we would really have to make an effort to do so.
"Getting awful looks shot at me the whole time? Yeah, gets a little tiring." I snickered. "For a boy who couldn't seem to shut his mouth in Defence, Potter sure has mastered the art of silently death glaring now."
Daphne rolled her eyes dramatically. "Who cares about Potter anyway?"
I flicked a pointed finger toward the blonde in wordless agreement. Getting some lunch on my plate, I finally spared a first glance in Draco's direction. He looked annoyed as Pansy continued to speak to him, but when he noticed I was looking at him, his expression softened just slightly. That same searching that was becoming more regular with him was there in his eyes. I wished I knew what he was looking for. I wished we knew how to tell each other what we needed.
"I heard a couple of Ravenclaw sixth years talking," Theo started, pulling my attention to him across from me and Daphne. "They think that Umbridge is planning on giving Trelawney the sack."
"Of all teachers, that would make the most sense." Daphne nodded. I gave her a sideways look and she huffed shortly. "Honestly, the woman is mad. Do any of us actually know what she's on about sometimes? We were doing third year lessons today all because she got a little in a tizzy."
"Talia and Malfoy were doing third year lessons." Theo corrected, smirking faintly. "The rest of us had nothing to do with it."
"Funny." I muttered dryly. It only proved to earn a breath of a laugh from him and a quick snicker from Daphne beside me, as well.
"You two should be okay then, right? I mean, aside from the whole Parkinson being a territorial cow thing." Daphne inquired.
A small, humorless laugh left me and my gaze drifted toward Draco once again. He was talking to Blaise across from him now, not looking at me, but more importantly, not giving Pansy the attention she wanted. Which was probably why the girl was glaring down in my direction, as if I had anything to do with that. I shrugged finally after another moment.
"She can be territorial all she wants." The corner of my lips twitched upward and I tilted my head. "It's nice to know I can do absolutely nothing and still manage to make her feel threatened by me somehow."
Theo glanced up at me with a smirk, almost as if he were proud of me. Daphne on the other hand rolled her eyes with a shake of her head. I didn't miss the grin on her pretty features, however, so she couldn't fully feign disappointment.
As I finished eating and settled into talking with my friends about classes and assignments, I became increasingly aware of the purposefully loud giggling from a short distance down the table. Pansy really was laying it on thick for the day. I shot a look in that direction, but specifically to Blaise who rolled his eyes dramatically for my benefit. I muttered to Daphne that I was going to meet them in Transfiguration next period, making an excuse that I had to stop by the dorm to grab something. I don't think she believed me, but she nodded anyway.
I was just up the corridor from the stone stairs down into the dungeons when Draco was calling my name behind me. He half-jogged to catch up with me and my brow creased downward in confusion as I slowed to a stop. If he had followed me the whole way from the Great Hall, I hadn't even noticed him.
"Sorry, did you need something?" I asked. The question came out a little more sharp than I had intended. My irritation brought on by Pansy's incessant need to flaunt her link to Draco had grown over the course of our lunch break. Evidently the short walk alone on my way to the dungeons hadn't done much to help rid me of it.
Draco stood stiffly about a foot and a half from me - just enough space that we were close but not too close. I wondered if he did it consciously. He looked tense, ready on the defense, though I couldn't figure out why he might be feeling defensive. "Saw you talking to the Weasley's." His tone was unpleasant, accusatory.
I blinked slowly and pursed my lips with a slow shake of my head. "You know, I've changed my mind. I think I liked it better when we weren't speaking to each other, after all."
As I turned to head in the direction of the dungeon stairs again, Draco's hand caught my arm to stop me. A couple other students wandered by, looking at us curiously as he pulled me toward the corridor wall and stood in front of me. He was beginning to make a habit of getting my back to a wall, and I was angry that he did so in order to prevent me from walking away from him. As if the only way we could talk to one another was if I listened to everything he had to say, even the parts I didn't actually want to hear.
"How long are we going to do this for?" He questioned, light brows raised. He sounded a little less confrontational now, but his body language was still rigid. He was still braced like he was ready to argue.
Incidentally, so was I. He may have gotten my back to the wall, but I stood as tall as I could manage, my shoulders back and chin inched upward. He had over half a foot on me as height went, so at the very least I had to stand my ground, not look as small as I was. Our conversations more often ended in argument or unnecessary commentary, I was prepared for that. It was an unfortunate lesson I'd had to learn over our years at Hogwarts. Peaceful conversation with Draco was rare, it was chaos he was often after in some form or another.
"I hadn't really put a cap on the length of time I wanted you to leave me alone for, actually." I pointed out.
"This is-" Draco cut off to let out a low, frustrated growl and shook his head. A frown appeared on his sculpted features, but his eyes were dark with the frustration he still felt. "It's strange." The two words were spoken as if they taxed him to say them; like it was a confession he had been holding onto and not prepared himself to share. "It's strange not talking to you at all."
There was that trap to easily hook me again. It started to, too. My face softened and I let out a soft breath, my eyes shifting from being locked with his to looking passed him. Telling him I wanted him to leave me alone had been a foot put down. It had been me giving myself the space to exist in a way that I didn't necessarily have to be aware of the changes in him, the changes in us. Broaching the subject of where we stood had never been a strong suit for us, it was hard to imagine that suddenly changing, but maybe this was finally the year for it. Maybe with everything else changing around us, we would change, too.
I hoped that I wasn't making an idiot of myself in thinking so.
"You said you wanted to work things out, right?" The question was heavy with meaning. It called back to what he had said to me after quidditch tryouts, but it went beyond whatever specifics he had been referring to in that one moment in time. I wanted so terribly to believe that it was true, that maybe we finally would be able to work on repairing this broken bridge between us. Maybe that meant that the foot I needed to put down wasn't Draco leaving me alone, it was in Draco keeping his word.
Draco swallowed hard and gave a stiff nod of his head. He said nothing, but his eyes took in the seriousness of my expression. When our gazes locked again, I swore there was a hope there in his. If my brain was playing tricks on me, feeding me wishful thinking, it would hurt later.
"Well, you're going to have to give me reason to believe that, Draco. It's going to take time, effort. You're going to have to prove it." I rolled my shoulders back and shifted on my feet. "No more empty promises."
For a moment, that defensiveness in him made a reappearance. His eyes narrowed, teeth snapping together to tighten his jaw. I thought he was going to argue, tell me that he hadn't done anything of the sort and that he didn't know what I was talking about. It wouldn't have surprised me if that was what came, in fact I half expected it at this point.
"Alright." He breathed finally, heaving out a large sigh afterward.
I quirked a brow. "Alright?"
Draco hesitated, a thoughtfulness flashing in his eyes beneath a furrowed brow. He lifted his hand in between us after a moment and he cleared his throat awkwardly. I became very aware of the shift in that moment; the display of vulnerability. Because Draco was holding up his pinky finger to me in the small space between us. I felt my chest tighten notably, like it needed to physically restrain my heart as it started to beat rapidly.
I didn't know where it had come from, this moment between us. The distance of not speaking for weeks had been something that had affected me, but in a way that I suppressed well, in a way that I could ignore if I tried hard enough because I had plenty else to focus on. I hadn't given thought to whether or not it would affect Draco. If anything, I had automatically assumed that Draco wasn't bothered at all by it. That was part of our issue, that disconnect, that lack of understanding of one another. I missed my best friend from childhood, true, but I also craved the friend that he had promised me he would continue to be, the one who understood me, my life, where I came from. We were two sides of the same coin, Draco and I, and as much as I had tried my best to not think about it, I needed him. Maybe that blind naivety I sometimes possessed had made me believe that he didn't need me the same. But maybe he did, maybe I was wrong.
Smiling faintly, I looked down at Draco's unexpected show of openness. My own hand lifted and I curled my pinky slowly, familiarly around his.
The heavy, relieved sigh that left the both of us felt like a confirmation.