A/N I don't know how this chapter ended up the way it did. It simply happened. Enjoy.
PS: Caution, an F-bomb is dropped. My boyfriend is British, and I slipped in one of his favorite vulgar expressions. Hehe.
Draco followed them out of the party.
He left behind Pansy with the rest of their friends. The night had turned further sour the minute Ginny entered the after party with that damn Montague on her arm. He had watched from across the room all night as they danced and laughed, barely paying attention to Pansy.
He saw Montague ignore Ginny for a solid fifteen minutes while she stood idly by, awkwardly pretending she didn't care. The tapping of her fingernails on the glass she held was a giveaway; the habit developed in childhood when they began going to other Pureblooded children birthday parties.
Draco imagined himself going over to her, whisking her away for a dance that would last all night. But instead, for some reason that he couldn't quite place, he stubbornly stood next to the Christmas tree and listened to Pansy and Daphne's gossip, to Blaise and Theodore Nott's argument over Quidditch statistics, and watched as Montague led Ginny to the dance floor.
Draco knew the moment they began to drift to the left what Montague was doing. Mistletoe had been strung up in every corner of the room. So, when they left the party, Draco followed them. He kept to the shadows, and only until they reached Gryffindor Tower did he turn away and head back to his own common room.
There, the party continued for a few of the oldest students, lounging on the sofas and sipping expensive Firewhiskey. Draco went to his bedroom, where Blaise and Nott were missing from still, but Goyle and Crabbe were passed out on their beds.
Wrinkling his nose, Draco waved his wand so the bed curtains blocked the view of the pair.
He took his time getting ready for bed, changing into silk green pajama bottoms after a hot shower. His mind drifted to Ginny, and the uneasy feeling of her kissing Montague.
Draco knew that technically he would win her in the end. She was already his someday, in name, thanks to the magical marriage contract their parents made. But he also recognized that he hadn't exactly treated her very nicely since she joined him at Hogwarts.
Draco sighed and slipped under the crisp, white sheets. He closed his eyes and rolled over, deciding that starting this summer he would try and reverse some of the damage that he had caused with his friendship with Ginny. In the meantime, he would leave her alone to enjoy the remainder of the school year and do as she pleased.
The next Tri-Wizard challenge came and went. Ginny sat with the rest of the school staring at the Black Lake's surface, bored. There is little excitement in watching an event where all the action takes place out of sight. The only stir came when Harry resurfaced with both Ron and Fleur Delacour's little sister, Gabrielle.
After the challenge wrapped up, Ginny headed back up to the castle, Cora and Tallie in tow.
"What an absolute waste of an afternoon this has been," Cora whined, smoothing back her hair after a breeze whipped through.
"It could have been a bit better action wise, I suppose." Ginny acknowledged, thinking of how she spent the majority of the time looking at Ben Montague who had sat with his friends in the Durmstrang section below them.
In the weeks since the Yule Ball, they had stolen moments together here and there in various empty classrooms and sitting at times in the library studying side by side. But rarely did they cross paths often, being in entirely different years and living in completely opposite areas of the castle.
Deep down, Ginny knew that her time with him was close to concluding, and that eventually she would remember him fondly as the one who kissed her first, if she ever thought of him at all.
Depressing perhaps, but it was better to confront the reality head on than live in a pretend fantasy for too long. Ginny may be a Weasley by birth, but having spent enough time at Malfoy Manor, the influence of Narcissa couldn't be helped.
It did not help that she also thought of Draco often, wondering why she was noticing him around more. She saw him in the hallways every day, despite the fact their paths really shouldn't cross at all. Their schedules were completely different, yet every time she turned a corner, there he stood.
It was strange, and Ginny had been thinking about the meaning of it more than she cared to admit.
"Ginny?" Tallie waved her hand, getting the red head's attention. "Pansy Parkinson is heading this way."
Rather than brashly turning her head in the direction of the desperate, pug faced Slytherin, Ginny instead took a deep breath and straightened her back, arranging her face into one of utterly indifference that would make Narcissa Malfoy run for her galleons.
"Weasley!" Pansy shrieked as she got close, Daphne Greengrass and Millicent Bulstrode right behind her.
Immediately Cora and Tallie where on either side of Ginny, wands securely and discreetly at hand, ready for anything Pansy may think to try.
"Parkinson," Ginny replied, her tone one of boredom. "To what do we owe this honor? Have you reconsidered growing out your hair finally?"
"Watch it Weasley," Millicent stepped forward, her wand clearly in view.
"Oh how cute, you have your own bodyguard like Draco. Speaking of which, where is the ferret?" Cora let her own wand be seen too.
Everyone knew about Professor Moody turning Draco into a ferret after he apparently was caught trying to curse Harry behind his back. In Gryffindor House it had become a running joke, one that Ginny found herself giggling at alongside her housemates. Draco had been nothing but a prat towards her, so in her mind, his being turned into a ferret was a karmic justice. She deftly ignored the part of her that felt any flicker of sympathy towards him.
"Funnily enough, I assumed you lot would know." Pansy said, stepping close towards Ginny.
"And why would I know his whereabouts? We don't interact here at school as you obviously already know, Parkinson."
"Draco refuses to talk to me, and I know you're the reason behind it, Ginevra. I'm just here to remind you to back away, far away. His parents might tolerate you enough to be your godparents, but I can't stand you. You're just a poor, ginger haired weasel underneath those fancy dress robes. And Draco will never pick you voluntarily." Pansy smirked, as though hinting that she knew about the damn marriage contract.
The sound of a cough off to the side caught all of their attention before Ginny could hex her.
"Really Pansy, speaking on my behalf these days?" Standing taller than she last remembered him to be, but still every bit of cocky, was Draco himself. His blonde hair was a bit on the longer side nowadays, but it was still styled sleekly in a distinctive way.
Crabbe and Goyle were nowhere to be found, but Blaise Zabini and Theodore Nott stood a few feet away, pretending to not pay attention.
Around them, students still walked up to Hogwarts, but the last of the crowd was beginning to thin out completely. If they stood there any longer, a professor or prefect would eventually come to investigate.
"Draco, I …" Pansy faltered at his stone cold glare.
"It is a dangerous thing, to make assumptions. One might assume, after all, that your family is on the verge of ruin since your mother was spotted a few weeks ago selling family heirlooms in Knockturn Alley. But that is just a nasty rumor, isn't it Pansy?" Draco lifted an eyebrow, daring her to try and dispute it.
It wasn't a rumor, and she knew it.
At this, Daphne gasped in horror, quickly clamping her mouth shut and taking a step away from Pansy. Her family was one of the wealthiest, influential Pureblood families in Wizarding Britain. To be spotted with someone financially and socially disgraced would hurt Daphne's own chances of someday securing the excellent match her parents naturally wanted for her.
Daintily, Daphne muttered a quick goodbye and made a beeline for the school's entrance, sure enough to spread to her fellow Slytherin peers about this latest new information.
Millicent snorted, stashing her wand away in her robes and taking her own leave. Though not one to really care for Pureblood politics, she still came from a reputable family. Someone in the distant future would want her to marry their son.
This left Pansy standing alone, outnumbered and thoroughly humiliated.
"My family might have some current struggles, Draco, but we still have our dignity. My name is still of high value, and we have some well off relatives in Europe. You should remember that."
"Europe isn't Great Britain, Pansy."
She shrugged, unconcerned. "I'm still better for your reputation than her."
Blaise burst out laughing at that comment. "Oh Pansy. That is so far from the truth…"
Even Theodore quirked a bit of a smile, following Blaise up the well-worn path towards the school as the sun began to set.
"You're making a huge mistake, Draco. Choosing her over me is laughable," Pansy huffed, marching away.
"Merlin, good riddance!" Tallie looped her arm through Cora's, ready to get to dinner. "You lot coming too?"
"I'll meet you there," Ginny replied, looking warily at Draco. Her friends hesitated for a second before slowly going the same path as the others had.
She waited until they were far enough out of earshot before rounding on him.
"Sabonsabi!" A blue light flashed from her wand straight at him. It took a second but then –
"Fucking hell, Ginny!" Draco spat out soapy bubbles that had formed in his mouth, coughing. She rolled her eyes, conjuring up a glass of water for him to rinse with.
"What was that for?" He asked, after the last of the soap was finally gone. The taste, unfortunately, lingered.
"Haven't you learned by now that if you have nothing nice to say, you don't say it? Especially to the person's face! Dammit, Draco, any upper hand you may have had with that girl is gone. What a lousy Slytherin you are."
"I come to your rescue and soap in the mouth is the thanks I get?"
"I didn't need it."
"True, but I did save you from a possible detention. I saw the look in your eye, Ginny. You were about to hex her."
"You just ruined Pansy's life. There's still several more weeks left of this term before summer, Draco. Couldn't you have waited to snub her during the June social season?"
He merely shrugged.
"Honestly Draco, I could care less what she said to me. She was simply venting her own insecurities. That hardly warranted a scandal dropping."
"If it makes a difference, Rita Skeeter is planning to drop the story tomorrow in the Daily Prophet. Everyone in the morning will know about it anyways."
"Not the point Draco! What I want to know is why all of sudden, after ignoring me for so long here at school you feel the need to step in between me and your biggest admirer…" Ginny's eyes widened, staring him down icily.
"Merlin, I know why! It's because of Ben Montague, isn't it?"
He didn't deny it.
"You utter twat!" She hit him with a mild stinging hex.
"Ouch, Ginny!"
"You think that just because I'm stuck with you by contract, that just because you decided your too good for me while we're at Hogwarts, because I'm a ginger haired Gryffindor Weasley, that you can decide to step in and claim what's yours when you feel like it?"
She got him again with a few more hexes to his arm.
"How dare you."
Finally, rather feebly, Draco put up a defensive ward around him to avoid her amicably aimed hexes.
"Ginny! Let me explain, dammit."
She paused, her wand poised in front of her. Her red hair was wildly loose down her shoulders, having slipped out of the side ponytail it had been pulled into.
"You can explain it all to me this summer, while I'm visiting. Be forewarned that I might hex you again then, and before this term is over." With that, she turned away and seemingly floated gracefully up the entrance of the school, her hair vividly shining from the sunset above them.
It was all Draco could do to stay still and watch her go.