Hello, hello! Here is chappy 2!!!! With of course special thanks to my beta reader, Sizarie! And moderate thanks to my best friend. And of course lots of thanks to all you wonderful reviewers!!!! Hope you enjoy this chapter!
Everyone remember to review, and if you have any questions e-mail me, I'd love to hear from you! So go on, read and have fun!
Draco looked up from his book as a loud crash echoed from the floor above him. Sighing to himself he closed his book and walked out of the room, towards the stairs. "What have you two done now?", he called as he approached their room.
"Nothing!", came the response.
"Some how I don't believe you." Drawled Draco lightly. Opening the door he discovered why he felt that way.
There on the floor was the hand crafted- six-foot tall- oak bookcase they had begged him to buy, just a few months ago. He stared.
"We wanted to get one of the spell books-", started Jewel.
"And it was on the top shelf-," Aquilus continued.
"So we tried to climb up." Finished Jewel.
"It seem logical at the time." Aquilus concluded, meeting Draco's eyes boldly.
At 28, Draco had heard similar stories thousands of times before. His two children, Jewel Rain, and Aquilus Phoenix Malfoy, had a strong tendency to get into trouble. He just thanked whatever gods were listening that they would be going to Hogwarts this year, and finally be out of his hair for a while.
The twins, now eleven, watched as their father pulled out his wand and righted the shelf with but a flick of his wrist. With but another flick, all the books were in their proper places.
"Which book did you want?"
Aquilus pointed, and Draco floated it down to hover gently between the twins.
"Thanks dad." Called Jewel, grabbing the book and running to the other side of the football field sized room, to sit on her bed with it.
"Yeah, thanks." Mimicked Aquilus, running after his sister.
"Just a minute, you little hell demons, you got your letters form Hogwarts today."
That got their attention, and quicker than you could say "Hogwarts" they were back at his side.
"Where are they, where are they, where are they?!" cried the twins in unison, practically hopping up and down.
Draco slowly reached into the folds of his robe and pulled out two identical looking letters, holding them up above his head he looked down at the twins as the jumped up, hands flailing, trying to grab the letters. "If you stop acting like your usual selves for a moment and behaved like children who had manners I will give you your letters."
They stopped jumping immediately and stood perfectly still and straight; the exact image of two perfect little angels. Too bad he knew they sported horns under that halo! He had taught them well; he was rather proud of them.
"Here you go." He handed them the letters.
In a flash the two had torn them open and had the sheets pulled out, their eyes racing across the words trying to absorb it all as quickly as they could. Finally, after reading each paper thrice, and then reading their twin's paper a couple of times they looked up wearing the happiest grins he had ever seen. Aquilus threw his arms around his sister; Jewel threw her arms around her brother, and hugging each other they spun around in circles jumping up and down screaming at the top of their lungs, "WE'RE GOING TO HOGWARTS, WE'RE GOING TO HOGWARTS!"
After putting up with the noise for a minute or so with a proud smile on his face, Draco walked over to them and clamped a hand over each mouth. "You're giving me a headache."
The twins shared a look and then threw themselves at him, causing him to fall over with them on top hugging him so tightly he could scarcely breath.
"You're going to buy us all new stuff of course…" Jewel murmured her head resting on his chest.
"Of course."
"And we're going to be Slytherin's of course…" Aquilus whispered, as if they were conspirers.
"Of course."
"And you'll be really proud of us?" asked Jewel.
"Of course, but I always have been, and as long as you let me breath soon, it'll stay that way."
"We'll think about it," commented Aquilus, resting his head down on his father's chest, too.
Draco wrapped his arms around them and stared at the ceiling, wishing their mother could see them now. Wishing their mother could have seen them period.
Ginny Weasley slowly trudged up the stairs to her flat. It had been a long day and every bone in her body ached. First the article on new dress robes hadn't been finished in time, then the picture for the latest cover had gone missing. The lunch order had come in all mixed up, Lavender had been called away by a family emergency, and their extra model had been late so they couldn't finish the photo shoot! That wasn't even mentioning the fact that her brand new robes were ruined, some new kid had spilled coffee on her, and her feet felt like they were on fire from modeling high-heeled shoes all day!
Sometimes she wished she could just give up co-running her and Lavender's magazine, 'Magic Touch'! Oh for the days when she only modeled! Or even better yet, for the days when she was an inventor working with the twins and then on her own, having not yet been "discovered" by a modeling agency.
Opening the door to her rather spacious, and richly furnished flat, Ginny dropped everything she carried as soon as the door closed and collapsed on her couch. Exhaustedly she toed off her shoes and was asleep in a flash.
"Ginny. Ginny! Virginia, WAKE UP!"
Ginny woke with a start and looked over to her fireplace. Lavender Brown – her partner – was staring back at her. Or rather, Lavender's head, floating in the flames was staring back at her.
"What do you want?" She asked, not quite awake yet.
"I'm not going to be able to come in for a few days, my mum is in the hospital, she hurt her back and broke her leg."
Ginny was awake in a second. "Oh my god! Is she okay? Do you need me to come over and help you?"
"No, it's okay, she's fine. She'll just take a few days to heal, and needs someone to be around." Said Lavender.
"Your sure? Well, don't worry about work, I'll handle everything. We still have a week till our deadline."
"Thanks Gin. Oh, I have to go, bye."
And then she was alone again. Since she was already up, Ginny went into her kitchen and made herself a nice hot cup of tea. While the water was boiling, she slipped into her room and put on her favorite flannel pajamas. Buttoning up her nightshirt, her fingers strayed – like they always do when she's had a hard day – to the top drawer of her dresser. Before she could stop her self, she opened it up and dug through all her old mementos and keepsakes until her fingers brushed against what she was looking for. Pulling it out she felt herself sigh mentally.
Ginny could never figure out why she didn't just throw the picture in the garbage; he probably didn't even remember her anymore…. Draco Malfoy grinned back at her from the photo she held. He had on a black silk shirt and black pants, and wore his famously sexy grin. Standing beside Draco was her, in a light blue dress, with Draco's black cloak over her shoulders. She was smiling, and waving at the camera looking like she could float on cloud nine; Draco had his arm around her and had just given her a breath-taking kiss.
She missed him. She'd admit that much at least. After he left she couldn't stop thinking about him. Was he okay? Why had he said what he had? When was he coming back?
After a while she realized what a fool she'd been. But she still couldn't let him go…
"Dad? We had a nightmare again."
Draco didn't even open his eyes; he just pulled back the sheets and held out his arms. Two sets of feet lightly padded across the carpeted floor and got into bed beside him.
"Was it the usual dream?" he asked.
"Uh huh."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
There was a pause. "No." they said together.
"You going to stay here tonight?"
"Yes."
"Fine. What else?"
"Can we go visit them tomorrow? We want to say goodbye before we leave for Hogwarts and we won't have much time next week."
"Alright. Go to sleep."
"Dad?"
He sighed and opened his eyes. Jewel and Aquilus stared back at him imploringly. "Yeah?"
"Did they love us?"
Draco stared. Then he threw his arms around them, pulling them close to his chest. "More than you can ever imagine."
"They never even saw us."
"Doesn't matter." He said gruffly. "They loved you. Just like I do."
"We love you too."
He kissed both of their foreheads and hugged them. "Go to sleep." I'll protect you from your demons. I'll always will, I'll be here for you. He added to himself.
I'll never leave you.
How was it? Is it at all clearer? No? Well, I explain things a bit better in chapter three, so you'll just have to wait for it! Oh, and just so you all know, if you haven't read Pen Pal yet, you should go do that. There will be reverences later on in the story to purple/indigo colored elephants, multi/rainbow colored donkeys, pink monkeys, and even mooning over your mirrors! You'll have to read Pen Pal to understand!
Voice 17: You and your stupid strangely colored animals… why could you just go steal a car like a normal teenager?
Dazma: Because that wouldn't be as interesting. Now hijacking a car… that could be good.
Voice 17: Well let's go do that!
Voice 18: You most certainly will not! ::raises her frying pan to hit him over the head::
Voice 17: ::desperately:: We'll take you shopping!!!
Voice 18: In that case, go ahead. ::lowers frying pan::
Dazma: I don't want to take her shopping. Whenever we do, I always end up broke!
Voice 18: Fine, be that way! ::raises frying pan::
***** Sorry kids, we're trying to keep this story's rating down so I'm afraid we're going to have to stop here! Remember to review, and don't forget… beating people to a bloody pulp – even if they are only voices in your head – is wrong! Have a nice day!****