Just Like Me

Disclaimer as usual.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pansy spent very little time with Draco over the next few weeks. Whenever she walked into the Slytherin common room, he was always hunched over a book with Blaise or listening to him. She assumed that Blaise was preparing Draco for induction into the Death Eaters, as Lucius had asked, but she was nevertheless somewhat jealous.

February passed into March, and on the morning of the first Friday, Blaise hailed Pansy in the courtyard.

She turned, giving him a smile. "Hello, Blaise."

"Hi. Listen, remember how I asked if you wanted to come look up your ancestry with me?" he asked. Pansy nodded, and he continued, "Well, we're allowed to go to Hogsmeade tomorrow, and we can use that chance to get down to London instead. Sound good?"

"Yes, that would be wonderful. When and where should I meet you? How are we traveling?" Pansy queried.

"Whenever the other students leave, in the Slytherin common room, Floo powder."

Pansy wrinkled her nose. "Floo powder is so dirty, but I suppose it'll have to do."

"If you knew how to Apparate, we could do that, but you can't learn by tomorrow. Sorry about the dirt," Blaise added. "See you." He ran a few paces forward and tapped Terry Boot on the shoulder. Terry's friends looked at Blaise suspiciously, while the black-haired Slytherin started up an animated conversation with the Ravenclaw in question.

Pansy smiled, and headed to her next class, which happened to be Charms. She took her usual spot beside Draco, who was asleep on his textbook.

She poked him cautiously. "Draco?"

No response.

"Draco, you're messing up your hair."

Draco stirred, muttered something, and was still again.

"He was up quite late last night," Blaise said, coming to stand by their desk and looking apologetic. "On the bright side, he learned one of the required spells perfectly."

Pansy chewed on her lip for a moment, thinking. "He can't sleep through this class, Flitwick would notice. Maybe if we propped him up?"

Blaise walked around to the back of Draco's chair, and pulled him backwards so that it looked like he was sitting up. Draco's head lolled onto his shoulder.

"His head's a bit of a problem," Blaise said.

"Hold his head up straight," Pansy said, and pulled out her wand. Blaise complied.

"Petrificus Totalus!"

Draco froze in place, and Pansy smiled. Blaise looked at Draco, his expression worried. "He can't stay this way the whole class."

"No," Pansy replied. "But for a while. Until he wakes up."

They left Draco like that for half an hour before Pansy unfroze him, and found that he had woken up the moment they had Petrified him. He was not amused.

Pansy and Blaise were very amused.

Typically of him, Flitwick didn't notice a thing. He continued talking while Draco ranted in a whisper at his two companions.

"You couldn't have woken me up?" he hissed. "Shook me, poked me, yelled something in my ear – ugh, my hair! I slept on my hair!" He smoothed it back, grumbling.

"We tried poking you, but it didn't work. Sorry," Pansy whispered.

Draco shot Blaise a death glare, mouthing the words "Wake me up next time". Blaise grinned and gave him a thumbs-up.

Class proceeded in a fairly regular fashion. Ron Weasley had to try his charm numerous times before it actually worked, and then only because of the help of Hermione Granger. Harry Potter quietly persisted, not asking for help from his friends, and eventually was able to do the charm satisfactorily. Neville set fire to Dean Thomas' desk.

The Slytherins came out of the class wiping away tears of laughter from the desk incident. Draco slung an arm around Pansy's shoulders, supporting himself while he laughed at the mental image of Dean's pants on fire.

Dinner was uneventful, apart from someone dropping Veritaserum in Mandy Brocklehurst's drink. Snape was livid, presumably because his storeroom was the only place one could get Veritaserum in Hogwarts.

The rest of the night was spent congratulating Tracey Davis on a prank well pulled. Mandy would be spouting the truth for hours; she had already confessed to having a crush on Seamus, cheating on a Transfiguration exam, and absolutely despising Padma Patil. She had consequently fled the Great Hall in tears. Tracey accepted compliments graciously, and soon left the crowd to sit in the corner plotting her next attack, this time on a Hufflepuff.

Pansy went to bed feeling unusually content.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The morning sun would have shone on Pansy, but for the fact that the Slytherins had a dungeon and not a tower, and there were no windows. Instead, the pallid glow of a lamp woke her, and she got up, contemplating whether or not she should skip breakfast.

Like so many other days, the answer was yes.

She showered, and dressed, and pulled her hair back loosely. Draco had told her once that he liked her hair that way.

And, speaking of Draco, he was currently barging into her chambers. As usual.

"You should try knocking for once," Pansy said, taking out her cosmetics. "Hasn't it ever occurred to you that I might be changing?"

"Yes, it has," Draco said, a mischievous glint in his eyes. Pansy raised an eyebrow at him, smiled, and turned back to her mirror.

"I brought you something to eat," Draco said, sitting on her bed and producing an apple. "You've been skipping meals again."

"Why Draco, I didn't know you cared," Pansy said, applying her cosmetics carefully.

"It's unhealthy. Catch." He tossed an apple at her. Pansy turned, caught it right before it hit her head, and glared reprovingly at Draco. "Don't throw things at me right after I've done my hair."

"Oh, and I'm touchy about my appearance?"

"Oh no! I slept on my hair!" Pansy mimicked, and ducked when Draco threw a pillow at her. It hit her mirror and bounced off. "Don't make me throw my lipstick," she threatened, brandishing the little tube.

"You'd throw that at me?" Draco said, putting on a mock-wounded expression.

Pansy tossed the lipstick. It hit Draco's forehead. Draco made an extended gurgling noise, fell back on the bed, and attempted to look dead.

"You're the most alive dead person I've ever seen," Pansy said. "Accio lipstick." She caught the lipstick and began to apply it. "You never were good at acting." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Draco sit up and glare.

"I'll forgive you for that comment if you eat," he said, and nodded at the apple.

Pansy looked at the apple, and pondered this deeply. "Hmm," she mused. "Draco's forgiveness, or eating?"

"Just eat the bloody apple, Parkinson," Draco said, his expression a mix of exasperation and amusement.

Pansy wrinkled her nose. "That would involve smudging my lipstick."

"So cut it up into smaller pieces!" Draco said.

"With what?" Pansy asked innocently.

"Oh, for the love of – give it to me." Draco transfigured Pansy's second pillow into a knife, caught the apple as it was thrown toward him, and began to cut it.

Pansy giggled and turned back to the mirror.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The students trickled out of the castle, talking excitedly and fingering their coins. Pansy, leaning on a windowsill many stories above them, watched them leave.

A horde of fifth-year Gryffindors swept past, shooting her dirty looks. One of them leaned over to his friend and whispered, "We'd better be careful or she'll know how to get into the common room."

Pansy felt an overwhelming urge to inform them that she knew where the Fat Lady was, knew that it was the entrance to Gryffindor, and had known since third year. The only thing barring her from entering and stealing their things was the password; she didn't know it.

There was also her conscience, but over the course of her years at Hogwarts, that had mostly been eradicated.

When all the Gryffindors had passed by, she walked down the hall toward the Fat Lady, who looked at her suspiciously as she passed.

"Oh, give it a rest," Pansy said irritably. "I'm not going to try to break in."

The Fat Lady looked indignant.

"And," Pansy added, "Pink is definitely not your colour."

"Well, I never!" the Fat Lady gasped. Pansy smiled, and continued on her way.

Blaise was waiting for her in the Slytherin common room, sitting comfortably on the couch in front of the fire. He looked up when she came in, and a smile spread over his face.

"Hello, Blaise," Pansy said, walking to the chair that had her coat slung over its back. "Shall we?"

Blaise fetched his own jacket and uncapped a small, clear bottle. He tipped some dark powder out onto his hand and tossed it onto the fire. "We shall." He motioned for Pansy to go first. "Just go to Diagon Alley, and we'll find our way from there."

Pansy nodded and stepped into the fire, wincing as the ash settled upon her hair. "Diagon Alley!"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

She stepped out of the fireplace, and looked down at herself in dismay. Her robes were covered in ashes, and when she took out her pocket mirror, she saw that her face was too. "Oh, dear," she murmured, and looked around for the nearest washroom.

Behind her, the fireplace popped again and Blaise stepped out, already brushing his sleeves off.

"I'll be right back," she told him. "I can't be seen looking like this."

Blaise looked bewildered. "Like what? You look fine."

"With this grime all over me! It's positively disgusting," she said, and made her way through the usual crowd in the Leaky Cauldron toward the door designated "Witches".

Blaise shrugged, and sat down at a table to wait for her.

Pansy cleaned her face, and brushed the ashes off her clothes, and left them scattered on the floor for the help to sweep up. She washed her hands, tidied her hair, and left the washroom before anyone noticed the spectacular amount of dirt she'd left on the ground.

Blaise was finishing up a mug of something warm and dark when she returned. He looked up, and smiled. "All done?" he asked, draining the last of his drink and setting the mug down on the table.

Pansy nodded. "Where exactly are we going?"

Blaise rose, leaving the mug where it sat. "It's not in Diagon Alley, it's a few blocks away, so we've got about a five minute walk ahead of us. It's a large stone building with collections of family trees going back a few millennia, so we're bound to find something interesting there."

He pushed open the door to the Leaky Cauldron, squinted when the bright sunlight hit his eyes, and continued talking. "I've been there a few times, so I know my way around fairly well, but it might have changed since I've visited it last."

Pansy followed him outside, shading her eyes with her hand. He turned left, and she walked with him, past crowds of Muggles. Pansy looked around her at the soaring buildings, made of red brick and grey stone and one that looked to be a tower of glass. She looked back at Blaise when she realized he was talking.

"So, we've managed to persuade Dumbledore," he said, grinning broadly and pressing a little button on a street corner. Pansy looked at the button in confusion, and back at Blaise. "Sorry, I didn't catch that. What did you persuade Dumbledore to do?"

"Hold a Spring Ball. We didn't get a Yule Ball, and it's our last year, so a bunch of us from different Houses went and talked to Professor Snape, who went and talked to Dumbledore, who eventually agreed." A light changed, and Blaise started walking across the street. Pansy hurried to catch up.

"That's wonderful," she said when she was walking alongside him again. "Who's going to be arranging it?"

"A committee, I'm not sure who it's made up of yet, but a bunch of students are going to do everything." He turned a corner. Pansy followed.

"Are you taking anybody?" she asked. He shrugged. "We'll see. Anyway, we're almost there. Do you see the one straight ahead, tall building, older-style architecture, cars parked in front?"

Pansy nodded.

"Well, it's the one beside it. Not a particularly noticeable building but it serves its purpose." Blaise strode toward the building, and Pansy hurried to keep up.

The building blended in, and Pansy noticed that the Muggles passed by without giving it a second glance. Quite frankly, most of them didn't even give it a first glance; their eyes slid over it as though they saw it, but didn't register its existence. Pansy was intrigued, and if it wasn't for Blaise holding open the door, she could have stayed out there the whole day and watched the Muggles walk by.

The interior of the building was not much more elaborate than the exterior. Two staircases curved off from the entrance hall and led upstairs, to what looked like shelves and shelves of books.

"They have the most amazing system of reference here," Blaise was saying excitedly. "Come on, let's see if we can find your family in it."

Blaise ducked down a badly-lit hallway, and they walked past a seemingly endless amount of closed doors. Pansy tried to see inside them, but the windows were cracked and dirty, and it was almost impossible to make anything out.

The room at the end of the hallway contained a number of bizarre objects. Desk upon desk sat there, with large, almost square boxes sitting upon them. The boxes had glass fronts, and plastic things in front of them with the alphabet, and the numbers, and a few other things on them. Pansy looked around curiously.

"These," Blaise was saying proudly, "are Muggle machines, but the wizards in charge thought that they were a brilliant idea, and use them to keep everything organized. As far as I know, it's going quite well. Let's see if I can't work one!"

Pansy wandered around the room, looking at the high windows that stretched across the far wall, while Blaise tapped away happily on the plastic thing. She opened one window, which looked out into the tiny alley between the building they were in and the next one. Not the most spectacular view.

"Here you are," Blaise said. Pansy turned away from the window and wove her way through the maze of desks until she reached the box that Blaise sat in front of. On the glass screen, the words "PARKINSON, PANSY" stood out in black against a white background. A line stretched upwards from her name, linking to the names of her parents which, in turn, linked to the names of their relatives.

Blaise pressed a few buttons on the plastic thing, and the words moved to show more names branching off. Tiny, short biographies sat below each name. Pansy read some of them and skimmed others. She frowned. "There's my cousin, but why does it say that he's married?"

"Maybe he forgot to tell you," Blaise suggested.

"He's my relative. He wouldn't forget to tell his family members." Pansy peered at the wife's biography and did a double-take. "No wonder he didn't tell us, she's Muggle-born."

Blaise winced, and pressed a few more buttons. The screen shifted to show her great-grandparents and their family members. Pansy settled into the chair beside Blaise's and skimmed their biographies.

Over the course of the next few hours, Pansy read through the history of her family. She unearthed various interesting facts, including that one of her great-great-great-grandmothers was half-Veela.

"So that's why my mother is blonde," she commented, and moved onto the notably eccentric family of her half-Veela ancestor's brother, her great-great-great-great uncle. According to his mini-biography, his most prized possession was his pet sock. Pansy continued reading.

She was perusing a granddaughter of her four times great uncle when Blaise made a choking noise. He pointed at the granddaughter's husband.

Pansy choked. "A Weasley?! Oh, ugh!"

"They probably don't know they're distantly related to you, since her maiden name wasn't Parkinson," Blaise said, scrolling down. "Oh, good – it's not the branch of Weasleys that includes Ron. They died out, actually."

Pansy was still staring at the screen, horrified. "At least I don't have any Weasley blood in me!"

Blaise looked sympathetic. "If it helps, I'm distantly related to Seamus Finnigan."

"Finnigan isn't as bad as Weasley," Pansy said. She glared at the screen, and proceeded to determine how pureblooded she was. She eventually came up with the satisfactory result of approximately 82% pure-blood.

It was nearing six o'clock by the time they left. Blaise was talking excitedly about an ancestor of his who had worked on a project with Salazar Slytherin. Pansy privately thought that one of her ancestors, a man who had been one of Slytherin's closest friends, was much more impressive.

At Blaise's suggestion, they stopped at the Leaky Cauldron for dinner before heading back to school. Pansy looked in disgust at the menu, which was mostly made up of regular heavy pub fare. She opted for a light salad and a glass of water, although she really would have preferred to skip the meal.

They returned to Hogwarts at quarter past eight. Pansy thanked Blaise and was about to retreat to her dormitory, when Blaise caught her arm.

"If there's a Spring Ball," he said, "will you come with me?"

Taken by surprise, Pansy nodded. Blaise grinned broadly and released her. "Glad to hear it. Later!" He walked down the hall, toward his own room.

Pansy opened the door to her dormitory, and immediately smiled, half in exasperation and half in amusement. "Draco, you great lunatic, get out of my bed. How did you get past my lock?" she demanded, gesturing to the lock that Draco had given her for Christmas.

"I kept a copy of the manual, and I refuse," Draco said calmly, not looking up from his book. "Your bed is more comfortable than mine." He stretched, and settled into the pillows.

"Move over, then," Pansy retorted. She shut the door. Draco stretched again, lazily, and slowly shifted over. Pansy rolled her eyes, sat down next to him, and pointed her wand at Millicent's bed. "Accio pillows!"

Millicent's six pillows came flying over. One of them knocked Draco's book out of his hand before settling down next to Pansy. Cursing, Draco reached over the side of the bed and picked it up. Pansy set the pillows behind herself and reached over to her bedside table. She picked up a novel of her own, which was a steamy romance set in northern Africa, opened it to where she had left off, and began to read.

They read in silence for at least ten minutes before Draco glanced over at her book and burst out laughing. Pansy narrowed her eyes. "Are you laughing at Love in the Desert?" she said, leveling a glare at Draco.

Draco nodded, still snickering, and grabbed the book out of her hands. He turned it over and began to read the summary in a dramatic, sultry voice.

"'Jennifer is on vacation when she meets the most handsome man she has ever laid eyes upon. She is shocked when he turns out to be the ruthless'…Parkinson, you can't seriously like this crap!" Draco's voice went back to normal, and he looked at her, amusement written all over his face.

"You're an insensitive male. You don't understand the needs of women," Pansy said, and grabbed her book back. "Now excuse me, Jennifer and Abdul were in the middle of arguing." She snuggled into the pillows, pulling the blanket up over her legs, and continued reading.

It was hard to read when an obnoxious blond was snickering in the background. Pansy lowered her book and glared. Draco grinned back. "I strongly dislike you right now," Pansy said primly, and returned to the teary row that the two main characters were having.

Draco laughed and went back to reading his novel.

Love in the Desert was heart-wrenching. Pansy snuggled further into her pillows, reading, and hoping that the fight would be over and they'd be back to being in love.

By the time the fight ended, she found that at some point, she had stopped using Millicent's pillows as head-rests and started using Draco's shoulder. It was less bony than she had expected, so she continued, getting drowsier as the night went on.

They read, in amicable silence, until Millicent started banging on the door and demanding to be let in. Draco gave an exaggerated sigh, put a bookmark in his place, and rose. He opened the door. "Yes?" he said.

Millicent blinked at him. "Can I come in?"

"No," Draco said, his tone bored. "Go sleep on one of the couches in the common room."

Millicent nodded, and lumbered off. Draco watched her go. "You know, I didn't think she was that stupid," he commented, closing the door. He turned back to Pansy, who was curled up in the spot that Draco had been sitting, and was fast asleep.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pansy woke up the next morning. She sat up, and discovered that she had been tucked in carefully, and the pillows had been arranged under her head. Her book sat on her bedside table, with Draco's bookmark tucked in it.

Pansy smiled, and picked the book up. She removed the bookmark, set it down beside her, and continued reading.