You lot are the coolest bunch of readers and reviewers ever, and I would
love it if you could review this chapter for me,
Any way, remember to review!!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"So, Miss Weasley..." Mr. Weston began, and then stopped suddenly; looking down at the sheet of information in front of him "You wouldn't happen to be Arthur Weasley's youngest child would you?"
"Yes sir, I am" Ginny blushed slightly. Mr. Weston grinned at her, his files lay forgotten in front of him.
"I went to school with both of your parents, I actually had a few classes with your father" Mr. Weston smiled, reminiscently. "Your father is a good man ...."
"Yes sir, he is" Ginny replied proudly. Mr. Weston smiled again, and then looked back down at his papers.
"Well, you say hello to him from me next time you see him" Mr. Weston mumbled as his concentration was now turned to the sheet of questions that he had to start asking her.
"Yes sir" Ginny replied, smiling. Mr. Weston put down his questions and quickly prepared his quick notes quill. When he saw that it was working correctly, he turned to Ginny, shooting her a reassuring smile.
"Miss Weasley, first off, I would like to ask, what is your relationship to Mr. Malfoy?" Mr. Weston asked. Ginny watched nervously as the Warners seemed to lean forward a little in their seat. She could tell that they were highly interested in what she had to say about this subject.
"Draco and I are just friends, we met each other while attending Hogwarts, Draco is in the year level above me and was in a few of my brothers classes. When he told me about the situation with Jessica and Kayla, I offered to help him any way that I could" Ginny told him.
"Have you always been friends with Mr. Malfoy?" was Mr. Weston's next question. Ginny lowered her gaze slightly and shook her head.
"No sir, I have not been. Draco and I have had a few differences in the past. The men in my family don't necessarily get along with the Malfoy's and for a little while, Draco did not get along with the men in my family. But his relationship with Jessica, it seems, had changed him, and when I got to know him better, I realized that he was not as bad as people had always said that he was"
"So when did you begin your friendship with Mr. Malfoy?" Mr. Weston asked. Ginny took a few seconds to think of her answer.
"It would have been Christmas this year. I noticed that Draco was behaving differently, and that he had been for a little while so I decided to see if I could help him with what he was obviously going through, and that was when he told me of his story, after that we became friends while I was helping him become healthy again and prepare for not only his exams, but also for this hearing" Ginny replied.
"Would you say that your relationship with Draco is close?" he asked, Ginny nodded.
"Yes, sir. We have a very close friendship; we know we can trust each other with anything we have to say. And we stand by each other, the way real friends should" She explained. "We try not to let anything come between us..." She began to add, but then stopped, her mind traveling back to the kiss that they had shared the day before.
"Is your relationship with Draco strictly platonic?" Mr. Weston ventured, some what nervously.
Ginny took a few seconds to think of how she would answer that question. At that point, after all that he happened in the last few days, could she really say that her relationship with Draco was nothing more than friendship? But that was all she could really say about it all, that their relationship, until they had a chance to sort everything out, was just a friendship
"Purely platonic" She replied strongly. Mr. Weston nodded and then wrote something in his own notes. Ginny wished that she could read what he had written, but she could not see it properly from where she was sitting.
"You intend to support Draco emotionally if he successfully gains custody of Kayla?" Mr. Weston enquired.
"Yes sir, I do. I plan to be there for Draco and for Kayla if either of them needs me. My intention is to make sure that Draco and Kayla never feel as though they can't come to me, any way in which I can help, I will be there to help them"
"That may be a little hard when you are back at Hogwarts, Miss Weasley" Mr. Weston smiled. Ginny blushed a little.
"Well, that is only a year, I will more than likely come back for the holidays to lend a hand, and then, after I have finished my final year at school, I will be free to help when ever I am needed." She replied.
"You wish to be like a mother figure to the young girl?" Mr. Weston remarked lightly. Ginny blushed nervously, and shot a quick glance across the table at the Warners, who seemed very offended by the suggestion.
"No, not so much a mother figure, but I understand that a young girl does need a strong positive female role model, I hope that in time Kayla will learn to trust me, and I hope that she knows she can always come to me if she needs help with anything" Ginny informed.
"It is all well and good, Miss Weasley, for you to say that you will always be there for Draco and his daughter, but what will happen when the time comes for you to move on and start a family of your own?" The question was asked softly. Ginny shrugged.
"I will always care for Draco and Kayla, and if the day comes that I do decide to have a family of my own, my new family will just have to understand how much Draco and Kayla means to me and that I would never leave them if they needed me" Ginny replied.
"Do you honestly believe that Draco is old enough, wise enough and responsible enough to look after his child?" Mr. Weston asked.
"Draco is one of the most responsible people I have ever met. After everything he has gone though in the last few years, he has gained a responsibility and common sense which is beyond his years. He is responsible enough to look after his child."
"To your knowledge, what preparations has Mr. Malfoy made for the arrival of his daughter?" Mr. Weston asked.
"Draco had lined up a job in the ministry of magic offices. It is desk job in the Magical Law Enforcement department. Being a desk job, it keeps him out of the line of danger so that he is not risking his life. Draco has also moved out of his father's home and established a place for himself and his daughter in Diagon Alley." Ginny explained.
"You helped him with all of this, I suppose?" confirmed Mr. Weston.
"Yes sir"
"You are a very good friend, Miss Weasley, if you would give up this amount of time to help Mr. Malfoy." He stated, Ginny couldn't help the blush that tainted her cheeks.
"Family is very important to me, Mr. Weston. It is very unfortunate that Kayla lost her mother so early on in her life, but she does not need to lose her father, Draco is offering to look after his little girl, and I think that he deserves the chance."
"I honestly agree with you Miss Weasley" Mr. Weston replied "Every one should have a chance to prove themselves"
Ginny nodded, she could tell by the way that Mr. Weston was talking that they had a very great chance of winning this.
Mr. Weston looked over his notes again, organizing them into some sort of order, and then, he looked at his watch.
"I am sorry to say that we have to leave the questioning here for the morning, I have a meeting to attend. I hope this does not inconvenience any one, but I must be going. If you could all return here at midday, then we can continue on with Mr. Malfoy's questioning. You are dismissed till then" Mr. Weston replied, standing from his spot and gathering his things, he left, and once again, the Warners and their representative left as well, leaving Ginny and Draco behind.
"Well, I guess we can talk now."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Draco and Ginny weaved their way through the crowds of Diagon Alley, but instead of going to the Leaky Cauldron like they had everyday for lunch, the two of them returned to Draco's house.
She groaned when she saw the pile of breakfast plates sitting in the sink, and the first thing that Ginny did was move to them, running water and preparing to clean the remaining oil and gunk off of them.
"Ginny, you don't have to do that" Draco told her softly from the doorway of the kitchen. Ginny, who had his back to him, just continued to pile the sink full of dishes. When all of the dishes were in the sink, Ginny turned the tap, allowing the pressure of the water to slowly chip away the dried on food.
"I know I don't have to do it" She replied, still not turning to him. Draco sighed and moved up beside her, reaching across to turn off the water. Ginny just stood with her hands in the sink, which only had about a cup full of water in it.
"I thought we were going to talk" He mumbled. Ginny sighed, removing her hands from the water and wiping them quickly on one of the towels. "We can talk in the living room if you want" he added.
They walked silently together through to the living room. Sitting on the lounge chair together, neither of them lifted their gaze from the floor.
"So....." Draco began
"So....." Ginny repeated.
"Do you want to start?" They both said together. Ginny giggled nervously.
"Why did you do it?" She asked softly. He shrugged.
"I am not sure, I guess I was being selfish, that's all" Draco told her. "I was trying to test myself, to see if I could kiss some one with out thinking of Jess"
"And you failed, because you were thinking of her when you kissed me" she mumbled. Draco shook his head. "I know you were thinking of her"
"No, no, not at all, I wasn't really thinking of anything when I kissed you..." He replied quickly, and then winced at how bad that sounded "No, I didn't mean it like that. I mean, I wasn't thinking of anything important, no, I mean..."
Ginny sighed. Well, at least he had not been thinking about Jess when he had been kissing her. He had been thinking about nothing. Ginny didn't really know which was worse.
She watched as Draco continued to try to pull himself out of the hole that he was digging with his words. After a little while, he had seemed to give up, and the room fell into an awkward silence again.
Draco knew he had to break the silence, it was driving him mad, he had to do something, anything to make the conversation flow again. He needed to tell her how he really felt, he needed her to know that he was confused as to what they were to each other, that he was confused as to what they could be to each other, and more than anything, he was scared, petrified even, of weather or not he wanted to be anything to her.
Their friendship was so strong, evolving it into something more would either make them stronger, or weaken what it was that they had already had. He was not even sure if he wanted that type of relationship with her. Or if she even wanted that type of relationship with him.
"I am almost over her" he mumbled after a few minutes in the heavy silence. Ginny looked up, and for the first time since the conversation started, she looked him in the eye.
"No you are not" she accused lightly "And I don't blame you, you are going to need a lot longer than this to get over some one that you loved as much as you loved Jessica"
"I can get over her" Draco replied lightly.
"If that is what you want to do" Ginny replied.
"It is for the best, don't you think? The sooner that I can get over Jessica, the sooner I can get everything else in my life back on track" Draco told her. "The sooner that happens, the sooner I can move on"
Ginny nodded slightly, wondering what he meant by that. Wondering what he meant by telling her all that to begin with. Did he mean that one day he wanted to move on with her? Did he mean it as a warning that one day he would be moving on with out her? Was he hinting?
But did Ginny want him to be hinting? Did she want Draco to mean that he would consider moving on with her. She didn't know. Usually, Ginny was so sure of everything, but this was one thing that she was definitely not sure of.
Ginny didn't know what she wanted from him. Their friendship was strong but could their relationship be stronger? Up until the night before, she had never even considered anything happening between the two of them.
"You confuse the hell out of me, you know that" Ginny whispered, surprising Draco a little.
"I do?" he asked, shocked.
"You do, when I started this friendship with you, it was with the intention of me helping you get Kayla back, but now, now I don't know, I don't know about anything" Ginny told him truthfully.
"Well, I am sorry" He mumbled, Ginny just smiled. "I never meant to confuse you"
"That's ok, don't apologize" she told him. Draco reached over and pulled Ginny into his tight embrace.
"Still friends?" Ginny mumbled
"Maybe more one day" he added.
Ginny sighed, wondering what he meant by that. So she just replied with "Maybe one day"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Mr. Weston entered the room, that now contained every one involved in the case, but he refused to look at Draco and Ginny. He placed his file on the table and then sat.
Draco looked nervously from Ginny, and then to Mr. Weston, who was still yet to acknowledge their presence. Mr. Weston looked crest fallen, almost like he was depressed. Opening his folder, Mr. Weston picked up his first sheet of paper, and then finally looked at Draco and Ginny.
"Mr. Malfoy" He began sadly. "It has been strictly advised by a few superior members of the ministry that I dismiss this case, no questions asked."
Ginny's jaw fell open, shocked. Who would advise a kind and understanding man such as Mr. Weston to drop this case. The case that Draco was obviously winning. Ginny clenched her hands into fists as she watched the Warners, large smiles spread across their faces. If the Case was dismissed, they would get Kayla. Ginny was so angry, they must have done something, they must have bribed some one to get their case kicked out of court.
"Dismiss the case? What? You can't do that! Why would you want to?" Draco exclaimed, outraged.
"It has been brought to my attention that you have recently stolen a large sum of money from a ministry official who is high in the ranking order, our department does not take lightly to leaving minors in the hands of thieves, I am sorry son, but this is out of my control....."
Ginny turned angrily to Draco, but only said one thing "Lucius!"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
What, you really expected Lucius Malfoy to keep his nose out of the custody case. Next chapter contains another fight between Draco and his father, and also getting help from an unexpected place. Yay.
Ok, so I am on the Warm and Fuzzy 12 step programme, trying to curb my addiction, if this chapters is not as good as the others, then blame it on the symptoms of withdrawal.
Anyway, I need you to send me more warm and fuzzys. At least if you send them to me, I can sell them on the black market. Yep, that's right, I am graduating to a Warm and fuzzy dealer.
REVIEWS ROCK, SO DO REVIEWERS
Any way, remember to review!!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"So, Miss Weasley..." Mr. Weston began, and then stopped suddenly; looking down at the sheet of information in front of him "You wouldn't happen to be Arthur Weasley's youngest child would you?"
"Yes sir, I am" Ginny blushed slightly. Mr. Weston grinned at her, his files lay forgotten in front of him.
"I went to school with both of your parents, I actually had a few classes with your father" Mr. Weston smiled, reminiscently. "Your father is a good man ...."
"Yes sir, he is" Ginny replied proudly. Mr. Weston smiled again, and then looked back down at his papers.
"Well, you say hello to him from me next time you see him" Mr. Weston mumbled as his concentration was now turned to the sheet of questions that he had to start asking her.
"Yes sir" Ginny replied, smiling. Mr. Weston put down his questions and quickly prepared his quick notes quill. When he saw that it was working correctly, he turned to Ginny, shooting her a reassuring smile.
"Miss Weasley, first off, I would like to ask, what is your relationship to Mr. Malfoy?" Mr. Weston asked. Ginny watched nervously as the Warners seemed to lean forward a little in their seat. She could tell that they were highly interested in what she had to say about this subject.
"Draco and I are just friends, we met each other while attending Hogwarts, Draco is in the year level above me and was in a few of my brothers classes. When he told me about the situation with Jessica and Kayla, I offered to help him any way that I could" Ginny told him.
"Have you always been friends with Mr. Malfoy?" was Mr. Weston's next question. Ginny lowered her gaze slightly and shook her head.
"No sir, I have not been. Draco and I have had a few differences in the past. The men in my family don't necessarily get along with the Malfoy's and for a little while, Draco did not get along with the men in my family. But his relationship with Jessica, it seems, had changed him, and when I got to know him better, I realized that he was not as bad as people had always said that he was"
"So when did you begin your friendship with Mr. Malfoy?" Mr. Weston asked. Ginny took a few seconds to think of her answer.
"It would have been Christmas this year. I noticed that Draco was behaving differently, and that he had been for a little while so I decided to see if I could help him with what he was obviously going through, and that was when he told me of his story, after that we became friends while I was helping him become healthy again and prepare for not only his exams, but also for this hearing" Ginny replied.
"Would you say that your relationship with Draco is close?" he asked, Ginny nodded.
"Yes, sir. We have a very close friendship; we know we can trust each other with anything we have to say. And we stand by each other, the way real friends should" She explained. "We try not to let anything come between us..." She began to add, but then stopped, her mind traveling back to the kiss that they had shared the day before.
"Is your relationship with Draco strictly platonic?" Mr. Weston ventured, some what nervously.
Ginny took a few seconds to think of how she would answer that question. At that point, after all that he happened in the last few days, could she really say that her relationship with Draco was nothing more than friendship? But that was all she could really say about it all, that their relationship, until they had a chance to sort everything out, was just a friendship
"Purely platonic" She replied strongly. Mr. Weston nodded and then wrote something in his own notes. Ginny wished that she could read what he had written, but she could not see it properly from where she was sitting.
"You intend to support Draco emotionally if he successfully gains custody of Kayla?" Mr. Weston enquired.
"Yes sir, I do. I plan to be there for Draco and for Kayla if either of them needs me. My intention is to make sure that Draco and Kayla never feel as though they can't come to me, any way in which I can help, I will be there to help them"
"That may be a little hard when you are back at Hogwarts, Miss Weasley" Mr. Weston smiled. Ginny blushed a little.
"Well, that is only a year, I will more than likely come back for the holidays to lend a hand, and then, after I have finished my final year at school, I will be free to help when ever I am needed." She replied.
"You wish to be like a mother figure to the young girl?" Mr. Weston remarked lightly. Ginny blushed nervously, and shot a quick glance across the table at the Warners, who seemed very offended by the suggestion.
"No, not so much a mother figure, but I understand that a young girl does need a strong positive female role model, I hope that in time Kayla will learn to trust me, and I hope that she knows she can always come to me if she needs help with anything" Ginny informed.
"It is all well and good, Miss Weasley, for you to say that you will always be there for Draco and his daughter, but what will happen when the time comes for you to move on and start a family of your own?" The question was asked softly. Ginny shrugged.
"I will always care for Draco and Kayla, and if the day comes that I do decide to have a family of my own, my new family will just have to understand how much Draco and Kayla means to me and that I would never leave them if they needed me" Ginny replied.
"Do you honestly believe that Draco is old enough, wise enough and responsible enough to look after his child?" Mr. Weston asked.
"Draco is one of the most responsible people I have ever met. After everything he has gone though in the last few years, he has gained a responsibility and common sense which is beyond his years. He is responsible enough to look after his child."
"To your knowledge, what preparations has Mr. Malfoy made for the arrival of his daughter?" Mr. Weston asked.
"Draco had lined up a job in the ministry of magic offices. It is desk job in the Magical Law Enforcement department. Being a desk job, it keeps him out of the line of danger so that he is not risking his life. Draco has also moved out of his father's home and established a place for himself and his daughter in Diagon Alley." Ginny explained.
"You helped him with all of this, I suppose?" confirmed Mr. Weston.
"Yes sir"
"You are a very good friend, Miss Weasley, if you would give up this amount of time to help Mr. Malfoy." He stated, Ginny couldn't help the blush that tainted her cheeks.
"Family is very important to me, Mr. Weston. It is very unfortunate that Kayla lost her mother so early on in her life, but she does not need to lose her father, Draco is offering to look after his little girl, and I think that he deserves the chance."
"I honestly agree with you Miss Weasley" Mr. Weston replied "Every one should have a chance to prove themselves"
Ginny nodded, she could tell by the way that Mr. Weston was talking that they had a very great chance of winning this.
Mr. Weston looked over his notes again, organizing them into some sort of order, and then, he looked at his watch.
"I am sorry to say that we have to leave the questioning here for the morning, I have a meeting to attend. I hope this does not inconvenience any one, but I must be going. If you could all return here at midday, then we can continue on with Mr. Malfoy's questioning. You are dismissed till then" Mr. Weston replied, standing from his spot and gathering his things, he left, and once again, the Warners and their representative left as well, leaving Ginny and Draco behind.
"Well, I guess we can talk now."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Draco and Ginny weaved their way through the crowds of Diagon Alley, but instead of going to the Leaky Cauldron like they had everyday for lunch, the two of them returned to Draco's house.
She groaned when she saw the pile of breakfast plates sitting in the sink, and the first thing that Ginny did was move to them, running water and preparing to clean the remaining oil and gunk off of them.
"Ginny, you don't have to do that" Draco told her softly from the doorway of the kitchen. Ginny, who had his back to him, just continued to pile the sink full of dishes. When all of the dishes were in the sink, Ginny turned the tap, allowing the pressure of the water to slowly chip away the dried on food.
"I know I don't have to do it" She replied, still not turning to him. Draco sighed and moved up beside her, reaching across to turn off the water. Ginny just stood with her hands in the sink, which only had about a cup full of water in it.
"I thought we were going to talk" He mumbled. Ginny sighed, removing her hands from the water and wiping them quickly on one of the towels. "We can talk in the living room if you want" he added.
They walked silently together through to the living room. Sitting on the lounge chair together, neither of them lifted their gaze from the floor.
"So....." Draco began
"So....." Ginny repeated.
"Do you want to start?" They both said together. Ginny giggled nervously.
"Why did you do it?" She asked softly. He shrugged.
"I am not sure, I guess I was being selfish, that's all" Draco told her. "I was trying to test myself, to see if I could kiss some one with out thinking of Jess"
"And you failed, because you were thinking of her when you kissed me" she mumbled. Draco shook his head. "I know you were thinking of her"
"No, no, not at all, I wasn't really thinking of anything when I kissed you..." He replied quickly, and then winced at how bad that sounded "No, I didn't mean it like that. I mean, I wasn't thinking of anything important, no, I mean..."
Ginny sighed. Well, at least he had not been thinking about Jess when he had been kissing her. He had been thinking about nothing. Ginny didn't really know which was worse.
She watched as Draco continued to try to pull himself out of the hole that he was digging with his words. After a little while, he had seemed to give up, and the room fell into an awkward silence again.
Draco knew he had to break the silence, it was driving him mad, he had to do something, anything to make the conversation flow again. He needed to tell her how he really felt, he needed her to know that he was confused as to what they were to each other, that he was confused as to what they could be to each other, and more than anything, he was scared, petrified even, of weather or not he wanted to be anything to her.
Their friendship was so strong, evolving it into something more would either make them stronger, or weaken what it was that they had already had. He was not even sure if he wanted that type of relationship with her. Or if she even wanted that type of relationship with him.
"I am almost over her" he mumbled after a few minutes in the heavy silence. Ginny looked up, and for the first time since the conversation started, she looked him in the eye.
"No you are not" she accused lightly "And I don't blame you, you are going to need a lot longer than this to get over some one that you loved as much as you loved Jessica"
"I can get over her" Draco replied lightly.
"If that is what you want to do" Ginny replied.
"It is for the best, don't you think? The sooner that I can get over Jessica, the sooner I can get everything else in my life back on track" Draco told her. "The sooner that happens, the sooner I can move on"
Ginny nodded slightly, wondering what he meant by that. Wondering what he meant by telling her all that to begin with. Did he mean that one day he wanted to move on with her? Did he mean it as a warning that one day he would be moving on with out her? Was he hinting?
But did Ginny want him to be hinting? Did she want Draco to mean that he would consider moving on with her. She didn't know. Usually, Ginny was so sure of everything, but this was one thing that she was definitely not sure of.
Ginny didn't know what she wanted from him. Their friendship was strong but could their relationship be stronger? Up until the night before, she had never even considered anything happening between the two of them.
"You confuse the hell out of me, you know that" Ginny whispered, surprising Draco a little.
"I do?" he asked, shocked.
"You do, when I started this friendship with you, it was with the intention of me helping you get Kayla back, but now, now I don't know, I don't know about anything" Ginny told him truthfully.
"Well, I am sorry" He mumbled, Ginny just smiled. "I never meant to confuse you"
"That's ok, don't apologize" she told him. Draco reached over and pulled Ginny into his tight embrace.
"Still friends?" Ginny mumbled
"Maybe more one day" he added.
Ginny sighed, wondering what he meant by that. So she just replied with "Maybe one day"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Mr. Weston entered the room, that now contained every one involved in the case, but he refused to look at Draco and Ginny. He placed his file on the table and then sat.
Draco looked nervously from Ginny, and then to Mr. Weston, who was still yet to acknowledge their presence. Mr. Weston looked crest fallen, almost like he was depressed. Opening his folder, Mr. Weston picked up his first sheet of paper, and then finally looked at Draco and Ginny.
"Mr. Malfoy" He began sadly. "It has been strictly advised by a few superior members of the ministry that I dismiss this case, no questions asked."
Ginny's jaw fell open, shocked. Who would advise a kind and understanding man such as Mr. Weston to drop this case. The case that Draco was obviously winning. Ginny clenched her hands into fists as she watched the Warners, large smiles spread across their faces. If the Case was dismissed, they would get Kayla. Ginny was so angry, they must have done something, they must have bribed some one to get their case kicked out of court.
"Dismiss the case? What? You can't do that! Why would you want to?" Draco exclaimed, outraged.
"It has been brought to my attention that you have recently stolen a large sum of money from a ministry official who is high in the ranking order, our department does not take lightly to leaving minors in the hands of thieves, I am sorry son, but this is out of my control....."
Ginny turned angrily to Draco, but only said one thing "Lucius!"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
What, you really expected Lucius Malfoy to keep his nose out of the custody case. Next chapter contains another fight between Draco and his father, and also getting help from an unexpected place. Yay.
Ok, so I am on the Warm and Fuzzy 12 step programme, trying to curb my addiction, if this chapters is not as good as the others, then blame it on the symptoms of withdrawal.
Anyway, I need you to send me more warm and fuzzys. At least if you send them to me, I can sell them on the black market. Yep, that's right, I am graduating to a Warm and fuzzy dealer.
REVIEWS ROCK, SO DO REVIEWERS