A/N: Thanks for the great reviews! Here's the second chapter! Hope you'll like it as much as the first one! D


Chapter 2 – The Redhead

All the life

Spilling inside;

Words I can't hide

Cut like a knife…

Ginny shred yet another piece of paper, throwing its remains into the fire she had lit earlier. It was Friday, early in the morning, first week of school, and all the other Gryffindors were still fast asleep. Thousands of emotions and questions without answers were making her feel insecure and she didn't like it. She kept trying to put everything away somehow, but no poem was good enough to do that.

"So, trying to answer the 'who am I' question?" the young man's voice took her by surprise.

"Not really. How come you're up so early in the morning, Harry?"

"Well, it's not very unusual after having a nightmare…"

Harry Potter's half-ironical tone couldn't fool Ginny.

"Seriously, Harry! Haven't you realized yet how much you need the Occlumency lessons? I know you loathe Snape, but he is right: Voldemort can take you out very easily if you refuse to concentrate as you should!"

"O.K.! Now you're annoying me…"

Ginevra was ready to give a harsh reply, but the sound of the door bursting open stopped her from doing it.

"Morning, Harry!" Neville Longbottom appeared in the doorway, still sleepy and yawning.

"Oh… Gin… Ermmm… Hi…" he mumbled at noticing the girl. Obviously her presence made Neville feel uncomfortable, as he refused to meet her eyes.

"Hi…" Ginevra replied, lowering her head.

( flashback )

"Listen, Nev, I'm really sorry…" a redheaded girl kept apologizing over and over again.

Leaning against a cold brick wall, a young man was gazing at the floor, desperately trying to stop a stream of bitter tears from bursting out at the first impulse.

"Neville, please…"

"Shut up! Don't make it even harder for me!" Neville said, angry about himself being so weak. "It's over! I got the message! I'll never be as smart, as good looking, as brave as Harry, or Dean, or even that Corner lad!"

"You know that's not what I meant!"

The young man's only answer was a furious gaze, full of pain. He felt miserable for being who he was, for being the way he was, for letting Ginny do this to him in the first place.

"Why did you even accept dating me?"

No reply came from the girl in front of him.

( end of flashback)

"Hey, Ginny! Gin!"

"Sorry… What were you saying, Harry?"

"Noting, what were you thinking of? Or who were you thinking of?" Harry grinned.

"Nothing… no one…" Ginny was only half-conscious of what she was saying. She had fixed her gaze on Neville, silently asking for forgiveness, but, as no reaction came, she decided it would be better for her to get out of the Common Room for a bit of a change. "I have to go to class!" she quickly explained to a puzzled Harry, unaware that there was still an hour and a half left until the beginning of classes that day.


She hurried out of the Gryffindor Tower, down the stairs, eventually realizing what time it was and slowing down on her way to the library. Still, she couldn't take her mind off Neville, so as she walked absently through the large hallway, she suddenly got knocked off by someone. She had no time to clear out her thoughts – he helped her get up as suddenly as he had knocked her off.

"Sorry for that." Ginny rose her eyes to find none other than Draco Malfoy standing in front of her and looking a little embarrassed.

"It's… O.K…." she mumbled, quite surprised. No 'get out of the way, Weasel-girl'? No 'look out, you're ruffling my expensive new robe'? No 'stupid little Weasley'?

"Errmmm… I've got to go now… See you around…' said Draco, seeming not to understand what was taking place in Ginny's mind and turning away from her as if nothing had happened.

Ginevra gazed startled at the young man's silhouette until it went out of her sight. Was she dreaming? A painful pinch on her arm showed her she was not.


Draco hadn't even truly realized it had been Ginevra Weasley the girl he had just knocked off. He was much too troubled by his inner life to actually notice anything about the outer happenings. He knew that he needed someone to help him put an order to his thoughts, that he needed a friend, someone he could trust, someone he could rely on. He started wandering what would have happened if Harry would have been his friend from the very beginning. He had thought Harry was a nice person that day, on Diagon Alley. If he wouldn't have been such a jerk – yes, a jerk – to Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, what would have happened? How would his life have been changed by that?

Slowly, before he could even get aware of it, Draco's thoughts had flown over to Ginny and he began asking himself why he had always been so mean to her. Along with his perspective on life, his feelings, too, began to change that moment…


A/N: Do you think I should have made this chapter longer? If yes, please say so in your review and I'll do my best to add more to it and update it.