Sas: Annd here's chapter something-or-the-other. In which, Draco gets pissed and someone else unexpected decides to stick their butt in.
Disclaimer: We have no claims to Beethoven's Sonatas and JK Rowling's characters, there's no [Harry/Draco] slash, so it's all good, please don't sue us, so on and so on.
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"The
Impossible Sonata" as Ginny nicknamed it, had a lot of double-lined notes.
Ginny stared a bit helplessly, weakly twitching her bow up and down the
strings. Although she could actually read her music now, it didn't mean she
could play it. She seemed to have no sense of rhythm at all. Those black notes
and those big black notes seemed about as different as a zebra and a zebra.
"A….g f e f g f e d C….d….c b….natural
…c…d…c…b… fla-at…a…" tongue poking out the corner of her mouth. Her bow,
eyes, and fingers screeched their way slowly down the page, completely
disregarding beat and fingerings. She was very excited. It didn't sound very
good yet…but she was actually playing! She was playing the violin! And all on
her own!
Gleefully, Ginny realized she had
finished one entire page, and eager to try it again, started from the beginning
and replayed the whole page.
'This is fun!' she thought, and played
the page a few more times, before deciding to try the next page, with slightly
more enthusiasm.
Draco awoke from his dreams of
irregular jumping beans with red hair and stumbled downstairs. The clock read
'twelve o'clock', and he realized with dismay that he'd given the Weasley an
hour more practice time than he'd planned. Hurriedly, he brushed his hair and
strode downstairs, to where faint strains of the violin was sounding.
He met Lupin, who seemed to have gone
out for a bit.
"Oh hello. You've woken up?" Lupin
asked cheerfully. He shifted a large brown bag in his arms. "I just went out for a walk and thought
I'd pick up a bit of grub."
"Lovely. Er. Does that mean the
Weasley's been all by herself practicing this time?" asked Draco uncertainly.
"Well, yes. I thought she might concentrate
better without people around." Lupin replied. "Why? Should I have stayed?"
"No, it's alright. Can't blame you for
wanting to run out screaming," Draco shrugged. He opened the door to where
Ginny was practicing. "So, how's our little Musically Challenged Phenomenon
doing?" he called out as he entered the room.
"I can play three pages!" Ginny said
excitedly.
"That's nice. Three pages-What?!" Draco
pivoted and stared at her. Lupin blinked.
"Draco, maybe you really should leave
her to herself more often." Draco only stared.
"Oh, you can play, three pages?" he
asked neutrally.
"Yes!" Ginny cried, practically
bursting with pride.
"Alright… let's see you do it." The
faintest of hopes was beginning to stir in his chest. Draco motioned to Lupin to
put their lunch down, and sank down slowly onto the couch. He then waved to
Ginny, like 'go on, now. Impress me.'
Grinning madly, Ginny lifted her violin
up to her chin, and began playing Beethoven's Sonata No. 5. The first three
pages of it. It had taken the better part of her three to four hours, but she
could play every single note on the bloody page, and she did so now,
flourishing her bow grandly and holding her back ramrod straight, like the
Ferret had instructed. By God, she thought proudly. 'I'm really on my way to
being a real musi-'
"Stop!! Stop! Stop! Stop!!"
Startled, Ginny screeched to a deafening stop and stared at Draco, who had
leapt from his seat and was regarding her with a mix of abhorrence,
incredulity, and horror.
"You're murdering Beethoven!!
You're killing him! Stabbing him! Fairly dropkicking his poor, genius
arse to the ends of the bloody Antarctic!"
Sensing the
beginnings of an inevitable fight, Lupin hopped off his chair and hurried
towards the door. "Well,
seems like you two need to settle things down. I'll…er, be off for another walk
now." He took one more glance at the pair, and rushed out the door.
His disappearance
went unnoticed.
Appalled, Ginny stared at Draco with
wide eyes, mouth moving in the manner of a fish as she struggled to get her
words out. "M - mur - murdering?! I nearly killed myself practicing
the first three pages of this impossible sonata! I played my little heart out,
I played 'til my fingers hurt, and you just stand there, criticizing me and
accusing me of murdering an already dead guy!" she shrieked,
jerking the bow into Draco's chest for emphasis.
Draco, face beet-red with contained
rage, swiftly caught the tip of the bow with his left hand as Ginny brought it
towards him for another hard jab. The impact of those two opposing forces
caused the thousand-dollar bow to snap in half. Ginny gasped in horrified
terror when Draco nonchalantly grabbed the now-useless bow from her grip and
threw it away from him. He watched the "stick" clutter away, then turned
quickly to glare at the redhead
He took in a shuddering, controlled
breath before speaking in a constrained voice. "You may have been playing
your heart out, but you were not playing WITH it!" He took in another
breath, sobering slightly. "You may have been playing the violin
physically and maybe-just maybe- mentally, but you were not playing it
emotionally, no passion at all." His hand had been moving up unconsciously
as he spoke, and now rested over his heart.
Ginny sneered at him, despite the serious
situation at hand. "Oh, and how is playing with all of my heart going to
help me play this right?"
Draco's anger flared again.
"Obviously, Weasley, you don't want to do this! I should've known…the
ability to play a violin would have increased the daily income you 'earn' from
your sidewalk harmonica show! Well, Weasley, if money is the only reason you're
doing this, then forget about the deal. You are excused from this pathetic
situation."
"What?!" Ginny gasped, eyes widening
even more. "Wait-what?!"
"You heard me. Go. Get on with your
life. Here's some money to buy some other god-forsaken harmonica." He shoved a
few bills into her hands and spun on his heels, reaching for his flask of
alcohol.
"Wai-wait!" Ginny shouted, racing after
him. "You can't just give up on me like that!"
"And why not?" Draco asked coldly, gray
eyes practically blue with ice.
"Because…because I've been working my
butt off for two weeks straight, and you can't give an allowance for just one
time of no passion?! I don't understand!" Ginny cried, bewildered and hurt.
"It hasn't been just this once!" Draco
practically shouted. "Since the beginning, you've never ever tried to listen.
To me, yes, but to the music? NEVER." Draco returned his unopened flask to his
robe as he turned to her.
"Have you ever listened to this song?"
he pointed at the sheet music that Ginny had been practicing.
"Well, of course, I mean-"
"No. No, you haven't. You have not
listened to that song. You have never listened to any song." Draco corrected.
"What- what do you mean? I-"
"Weasley. Let me tell you something. It
wouldn't matter at all to me, to Lupin. It wouldn't matter to the world
if you could not tell apart a quarter note and a whole note. As long as you
understood the music. You, you're like a robot. You may be able to play with
your fingers, and pretty movements they are too, but if you can't feel the
music, then forget about it. I give up." Draco threw his hands into the air, a
sign of defeat.
Upon hearing his last statement, Ginny
didn't know whether to laugh or beg for a second chance. She chose the first
option, hoping to poke at the Malfoy pride. "Ha…ha…You-hoo…give up? A
MALFOY…giving up?" She gave a few more weak chuckles before stopping
immediately at the look on Draco's face.
"Weasley, there is a first time
for everything, and this is well worth that first time. There's one thing that
I hate more than scar-head Potter, and that's an undedicated scum who dares
call himself a musician," he hissed, face twisted into a scowl.
Ginny panicked, and jumped at the
second option. "PLEASE Ma - Professor Malfoy -"
"Go pack your bags," Draco
snapped, turning around to head out the door.
"NO! No no no….please, give me a
second chance!" Ginny called after the retreating back.
Draco whirled around,
eyes narrowed to slits as he glared at her. "Give me one good reason why I
should. ONE GOOD reason."
"I can give you five! One: You've never
given up your entire life! Two: You'll be throwing me out onto the streets!
Three: I can and I will and I do want to learn! Four: You don't-can't-
be sure that I'm hopeless! And Five: Five…er…five…" she looked up uncertainly.
"You'll….give my family multiple heart attacks?"
Draco glared at her, and reluctantly
admitted that the sight of Ron Weasley and those aggravating twins on the floor
gasping for breath at the news of their sister living with their one great
enemy would be positively the best sight he'd see for a long time.
"And is that the best you can do?" he
hissed, gesturing wildly towards the room. "Is that all you're willing to give?
You don't seem to still understand. Music is something you have to sacrifice
everything for. I told you that when you started. You have to abandon yourself.
Loose yourself. You can't be yourself when you play music."
"And I can do that! Just… one more
chance, Malfoy. One more chance." Ginny whispered, hand unconsciously clenching
at her skirt. "Please."
Scowling, Draco took an angry step
forward, then stepped back, muttered something unintelligible, and growled.
There was a tense silence, broken by cracklings of Draco's anger. "One more chance. I give you one week to play
this like something else." He tossed her something, which she barely caught in
time. "Track 3. Listen to it. This is your food, drink, and your sodding
toilet. By Tuesday, your sonata had better sound better than that." Raking an
irritated hand through his silver hair, he stormed back up the stairs, leaving
Ginny feeling slightly numb and incredibly jiggly at the same time. She took
one look at the CD cover and gulped. Beating Itzhak Perlman was going to be no
easy test.
"Draco? Ginny? Are you there?" Remus
cautiously stepped into Draco's home. When nothing flying and potentially
dangerous came his way, he turned and motioned for the person behind him to
come in.
"When I left them, they were at each
others throats. Gods, I hope they haven't killed each other off by now," he
muttered anxiously. His companion didn't say anything, only stood in the room,
noting the simple furnishings with mild distaste.
"What's Malfoy doing in a place like
this?" he inquired a mite nastily.
Remus shrugged as he
locked the door and strode down the hall. "Beats me. Although I believe it had
something to do with driving an old lady bonkers."
"Figures."
"Ginny?" Remus ventured into the Green
Musical hallway, and his ears instantly picked up on a faint melody coming from
one of the rooms. Recognizing it as one of Ginny's violin pieces, he nodded his
head to the man behind him and led him down the corridor towards the music. As
he approached the source of the music, he realized that the playing couldn't
possibly have been Ginny. No way was she that good. And besides, he hardly
thought orchestras would fit in that one room, even with magical enhancing. "Ginny, it's Remus. I'm coming
in…" Cautiously, the professor turned the handle and pushed the door open
gently.
The music, he realized, was not coming
from Ginny as he had rightly guessed. It was coming from the Muggle
contraption, a CD player. Ginny herself was sitting at a desk, furiously
scribbling notes on a piece of lined paper. Crumpled up paper were scattered
around her feet, and Remus noticed that another pile of CDs were stacked
precariously on her desk.
"…this…piece…makes me feel….very…"
Ginny muttered to herself, breaking away from her concentration to take a swig
from an aluminum can. "Feel…very…"
"Ahem. Ginny?" Remus ventured
cautiously.
"What?!" the snappy answer threw Lupin
off for a moment. He decided he'd really have to talk to Draco about the amount
of Red Bulls he allowed her to keep stock.
"Turn around, my dear. Er. You have a
visitor."
Startled but annoyed, Ginny whirled
around in her seat, and could feel her eyes widen and her stomach shrink as she
realized who was standing next to her professor.
"Fred…"
The man looked at her in mild horror.
"Gosh, Gin. You really have been away too long. Can't even tell me apart from
the twins anymore?"
"Ron!"
"Ah, yes. That's more like it."
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Haha…we give Ron the role of…Eliza's dad. Except he gets a bigger role. Anyways, questions? Comments? There's a very handy button down there that says something akin to 'Review here'. Go ahead and clickety click. And tell us to update more. Or else the next chapter will be up next February. Ehehe…
-_-;;
