As she stood by the window staring wistfully out into the street, Alex closed her eyes tightly. As her heavy lids closed, Alex was thrown into a weird sort of dream.

She was in a spacious backyard that was surrounded by flowers. There were two children examining something in the grass nearby, obviously mesmerized. She recognized the two kids as herself and Draco but they had to have been only about nine or ten at most, judging by their appearance. It had been a hot summer afternoon and instead of working on the potion his father had ordered him to make, Draco had decided to play outside with her. She could remember running through the sprinkler and eating animal crackers, her favorite food. She remembered asking Draco what was on his back as she ran her fingers down the long scars the plagued his upper body. She saw them running to get away from his, father. She remembered reassuring him.

"I'm always there for you Draco. No one will ever love you like I do."

Alex shuddered as she saw the hard, calloused hands of Draco's father come down upon the small boy again and again…

"Cold?"

Unbeknownst to Alex, Draco had joined her by the window and was looking down at her with taunting eyes. Alex backed away from the window and forced herself to look into the boy's steely gray eyes.

"As a matter of fact I am. I'm going upstairs to grab a sweatshirt."

As she started towards the stairs, Draco began to follow her. She stopped and looked at him questiongly.

"You didn't expect me to let you go up there alone did you? How do I know you weren't going to do something stupid and run off?"

Alex rolled her eyes and against her better judgment said nothing but began instead to climb the long staircase. When she reached the top of the stairs her cat, Shadow ran by. Startled, she stopped suddenly causing Draco, who was still walking, to bump into her and fall backwards down the stairs. As he fell and slid gracelessly down the staircase, his head hit almost every step until his unconscious body stopped on the cold hard floor at the bottom.

******

'Damn', thought Alex as she was wrapping cubes of ices in a towel.

'I just met the guy and already I've practically killed him.'

After the little charade on the stairs, Alex had managed to drag Draco into the living room and prop him up beside the couch. He was still unconscious and the site of the pale boy with a growing purple bruise on his forehead tickled Alex so much that she would have laughed if not for the severity of the situation.

She exited the kitchen and went to press the ice to the boys head. As she knelt down before him she started to place the compress when his hand shot out and grabbed her arm.

"Did you think that was funny? Knocking me out for a bit? Did you have your fun?"

He tried to stand up while holding on to Alex's' arm at the same time but Alex was too quick for him. I one swift movement she had reclaimed her arm and was halfway across the room, trying to explain.

"Look I didn't mean too. It was my cat…she scared me and then I stopped and I…I'm sorry Draco."

At hearing her use his name, the anger that Draco had felt just a few seconds ago melted away.

He looked at her standing there. She looked so helpless and afraid.

"Well I guess it's alright. But you better not try anything like that again."

Alex let out a sigh of relief.

"Right then. Do you want something to eat?"

Draco smirked.

"We don't have time for that now, we need to get going."

Alex looked at him with a look of utter confusion on her face.

"You didn't think that we could stay here with all those deatheaters running around now did you?"

Alex looked down at her feet which were shuffling across the salmon-colored carpet.

"I guess not. But Draco, where are we going to go?"

Draco thought about that for a second. Where would they go? He didn't want to let Alex know that he had no plan…

"It's not important. What's important is that we get out of this alive. Now let's go."

Draco started towards the front door and when he realized that Alex was not following him he turned around to meet her gaze.

"What?"

The girl grinned mischievously dangling something in front of her face.

"I've got a much better idea."

******

"Where is he?"

The deatheater struck her again, this time in her face. Narcissa cringed at the pain and cried out in anguish.

"I don't know."

The deatheater said nothing as he rendered a vicious kick to her midsection. Doubling over in pain, the room around her began to blur as she collapsed to the ground gasping for air. The figure in black reached down and pulled her to her feet by her hair.

"Woman I told you to tell me where your son is! Since you have decided not to obey…"

******

"Alex stop! You are going to kill us!"

For the past five minutes, Alex and Draco had been racing down the streets of London towards the pub that held the passageway to Diagon Alley. It had been Alex's idea to take her mother's car to get to where they were going but it had been Draco's idea to have Alex drive. Was that ever a mistake.

They had peeled out of the garage so fast, Draco felt as though he had left his body behind. She wasn't that bad a driver; she just drove a little too fast. Draco, being accustomed to riding in the back of cars was acting like a nervous mother who was supervising her child during their first time behind the wheel. As He shouted out directions, Draco grabbed at the ceiling as if it was a life jacket and inhaled deeply whenever Alex turned.

"Shit! Drive much," Draco yelled as Alexa narrowly avoided hitting a parked car on the side of street.

Alex looked over and grinned.

"Nope. You?"

As they had gotten further away from Alex's neighborhood, things were just the same as they had always been. There was still people outside and cars in the street. It was like nothing had ever happened. The earth hadn't open up, letting out a whole bunch of evil men in robes. There were no cars in houses. Everything was normal.

"Turn! Turn! Turn!"

The tires of the car squealed as Alex's turned sharply onto a busy street. As the two sat in the station wagon breathing heavily, Alex nervously pushed a strand of hair out of her face and turned to Draco.

"Can you please tell me where we are going now?"

Draco smiled and nodded, pointing to a pub that was slowly coming into view.

"Keep your eyes on the road! How many times do I have to tell you?"

Alex straightened herself in the seat and became quiet. Draco felt bad, but didn't apologize…it wasn't him.

"Right there, do you see that pub?"

Alex nodded, not taking her eyes off of the road.

"Pull over there, that's where we're going…"