A/N: Thank you reviewers...i appreciate it.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, etc.
The next day he woke up with a house elf prodding his left elbow and telling him that his mother was looking for him.
Groggily, Draco lifted himself out of the chair, rubbed his eyes and stretched. The kitchen was busy, and the cowering house elf talking beside him seemed to be the only one that was paying attention to him. He nodded to it and quickly left the room. Jumping the stairs two at a time, Draco came to his room slightly out of breath. His room was clean, there were no clothes strewn anywhere, and going over to the closet and opening it, he realized that all his clothes were already gone. It was no surprise; he never did his own packing. Draco looked at his silver watch that hung loosely on his right wrist and swore. It was 11:00; that left him only half an hour to get to Kings Cross station. He turned and started to run down the stairs and into his living room where both of his parents were already waiting; his mother had an impatient look on her face, meanwhile his father's was quite characteristically blank.
"Draco, we have been waiting here for half an hour! Where have you been?" His mother's shrill voice filled the large room, "We even sent the house elves looking for you."
"Sorry, I fell asleep…lost track of time." His lame explanation won him a disappointed look from his mother. He didn't even glance at his father, but assumed he had the same blank expression on his face that he did when he first walked in.
"Alright, well let's not waste any more time." Narcissa pushed Draco towards the fireplace and threw in some floo powder. He stepped into the green flames, said the name of his London home and shut his eyes while the whirring around him became louder and he could feel himself spinning faster and faster. Draco landed on the floor of the immensely large living room of his London home. He brought himself to his knees and coughed as a pair of simple, black shoes came into his view. He stood up and was staring into the face of his butler, Giles. He had neatly combed grey hair and was wearing a pin striped suit. Draco started to hold out his hand in a formal hello, when his mother bumped into him from behind. He barely missed hitting the fellow in front of him, but was quick to move out of the way.
Narcissa picked herself gracefully up from the floor and smiled haughtily to the man in front of her, giving him a tight 'hello', before stepping aside to wait for her husband who stepped elegantly from the fire just moments later, amazingly he did not even stumble.
Lucius politely shook hands with Giles and then walked over to Draco's trunk that was on the other side of the room.
All three of them quickly assembled his accoutrements and made their way to Kings Cross station, with Giles driving to be as muggle-like as possible. They stepped through the barrier at platform 93/4 and were engulfed in steam, but peering through it they could see they were facing the long scarlet train that was the Hogwarts Express. The train's whistle was blowing; Draco loaded his luggage onto it and went back to his parents to say goodbye. His mother gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and patted his back. When he turned to his father, he saw how his face only showed plainly indifferent features. They both locked penetrating gazes with each other, but Draco only waited a few hesitant moments before he was the first to break their stare. He then nodded his head and started to turn away. Lucius didn't even say anything, but just watched as his only son walked onto the train and out of his sight.
Draco walked towards the back of the train where he was sure the rest of the Slytherins were, but as he passed by one compartment, he heard his name being mentioned amidst hushed tones. He paused and opened the compartment door with a smirk on his face. It was probably an admirer. But quickly his smirk disappeared and was replaced with a scowl as he saw none other than Potter, Weasley, and Granger. This was just great. The trio looked up at him, and was immediately quieted. Ron's face became even redder, as it always did whenever he saw Draco, Harry reached for his wand, and Granger stiffened, also reaching for her wand. He knew the looks of pure hatred on their faces weren't totally unwarranted.
Draco leaned against the compartment doorway and tried to sound aloof and cold while he said, "Why hello, gang. What are you up to besides discussing me? Am I to be included in your latest plans to save the world?" He laughed coldly while waiting for their response.
"Shut up Malfoy, if you want to keep your limbs." Ron snapped, starting to stand up.
"Oh Ron," cut in Hermione impatiently. Draco just raised his elegant eyebrows at this interruption, curious as to what this mudblood had to say. "He's not worth it. He thinks because he's rich everyone will bow down at his feet. I don't understand even why or how your father could like you. Look at yourself in a mirror. You're pathetic." The look on her face was of true disgust and loathing that really got to Draco.
He put on a bravado as he said, "I look quite great in the mirror, thank you, Granger; however, I highly advise you to take a look in one yourself." He spun around and continued to the back of the bus and didn't stop until he reached an empty compartment. Draco slumped down beside the window and leaned his forehead against it; trying to shake off the awful feelings of failure that had come over him the moment Granger had opened her stupid mouth. It just confirmed everything he had thought about himself. He was starting to wallow in self pity. Draco knew that if he ever wanted to change he had to censor his mouth, and that included when he was around the sickening dream team. It was the only way Draco was ever going to get out of this depressing situation he was in. The only way to become a better person was for him to be nice…yes, actually be civil to people, including his long time enemies. He thought it would all be worth it, though, if he could finally be happy. His resolution was made, and he was starting to plan out his how he would handle his next encounter with them, when Crabbe and Goyle walked into his compartment and sat clumsily down next to and across from him.
They grunted hellos in that odd, non-human way they have. He answered them with stiff replies and they sat in silence for a long time before Crabbe spoke up.
"Hey Draco, I saw Potter near the front of the train. Nearly knocked his teeth out too, but I thought you would've wanted to see it."
Not sure what to say to that, especially after his newfound resolution, he said, "Well...Ahem...Thanks Crabbe, that was a nice thought. But from now on, could you," Draco paused to gather the courage, "could you stop beating up on them?"
The two other boys stared at him.
"What? Why do you care? You've always wanted to get rid of them, especially Potter." Goyle finally asked.
"Well, yes. But I don't think father would like us getting into trouble for beating on people who couldn't properly defend themselves." Draco knew his excuse was lame, but didn't know what else to say without having them turning on him.
Crabbe and Goyle stared with mouths agape at what Draco had just said. This was the first time he had told them to stop when it came to their attempts at debilitating Potter or one of his entourage. The two boys didn't like to argue with Draco, and so Goyle said very timidly, "That hasn't stopped you before."
Draco was getting frustrated. "Listen, Goyle, I said we aren't allowed to beat up on them, and I mean it. If you want to be expelled, be my guest, but I'm staying here and out of trouble this year." That silenced them, and for the rest of the train ride all three of them just sat in stony silence as the minutes to their arrival at Hogwarts reduced and Hogsmeade finally came into view. The train stopped and the three boys stepped out onto the platform and then into one of the horseless carriages, unfortunately joined now by Pansy Parkinson. Pansy was incredibly annoying. She wouldn't stop talking, and no matter how disinterested he seemed, she still continued. He was very thankful when they finally reached Hogwarts.
That night was quit a blur to Draco. He first met up with all the other Slytherins while habitually ignoring the other tables and waited impatiently while all the first years were introduced; the meal was next and Draco kept to himself as the rest of his house told stories about their summer holidays.
When everything was finally over and all of the dishes were cleared away, Draco walked slowly down to his dorm in the lower legions of the castle by himself. Usually he was outgoing and was the one telling all of the good summer stories, but this year, Draco didn't have the heart to pretend his 'great' life was better than everyone else's, when it was so very not. The Slytherins barely noticed his uncharacteristic quietness in their excitement of seeing new and old faces and the start of another school year, and so Draco hid in the shadows, avoiding their shallow and trivial talk as much as possible. When he made it to his dorm, Draco fell onto his bed and almost immediately fell asleep, still fully clothed.
The next morning he woke up in his icy room after a fitful sleep. He quickly showered and dressed into his uniform and then headed down to breakfast alone. The first class of the day was Potions, one of his best subjects and also his most favourite, and so with a fair bit of alacrity, he headed down to the potions room that was deserted as of yet. Draco took out his books and quill to set them beside his cauldron. After a few minutes he was joined by none other than Neville Longbottom – an incredibly clumsy and forgetful Gryffindor who was also friends with Potter. When Neville spotted him, he did a double take and began to slowly back towards the door from whence he came only seconds before, no doubt not wanting to be alone with him. Draco just rolled his eyes and bent over his blank notebook. The fear he instilled so obviously in people like Neville Longbottom made him feel proud, but as soon as that feeling surfaced, he tried to push it back down because he knew he shouldn't feel proud. To be so cruel to someone it makes them too afraid to be in a room alone with the other person shouldn't be something to be proud of.
Before he could dwell anymore on his feelings, three of his fellow Slytherins entered the room behind the already frightened boy. They just stood there as Neville bumped into them. The Gryffindor jumped, turned, and then after realizing who he had just ran into, began apologizing profusely while trying to maneuver his way around the three massive bodies that refused to move. One of the towering boys pushed Neville hard and he fell backwards into the corner of a desk – it looked like it hurt. Another of the Slytherins shoved Neville against the wall, pointed his wand at him, and said "spearo". Draco knew that was a cruel spell. It made the recipient feel like a thousand needles were prodding every inch of their skin; it was a less harmful and less painful form of the Crucio curse, and also wasn't categorized as unforgivable, but it still hurt – a lot. He watched as the helpless boy fell crumpled to the floor, twitching. Draco felt an unpleasant twinge of something he couldn't identify making its way through his gut. He had flashbacks to when he performed similar incantations on other helpless people, including the boy before him, but he had never cared about them or how hurt they were. Draco looked at Neville's face and saw that it was screwed up in pain; he also saw the silent tear that he hastily wiped away so his tormentors wouldn't see it. Through all of this Draco sat silent and still in his seat. He tried to reason with himself; it wasn't like he could just stand up for Neville, all of the respect and admiration he had gained throughout his years at Hogwarts would go down the drain if he did anything so foolish. Yet if he wanted to be respected by people that truly liked him for him and who could help him feel worth something, then he had to give them reasons to befriend him.
Although Draco didn't make any moves to help the poor boy (because he seemed glued to his seat), something in side of him suddenly connected with the anguish on Neville's face, something that he identified with affected his conscience and guilt like it never had before. Draco averted his gaze from the boy to try and shake the intense feelings inside of him, and looked towards the doorway where he saw Potter, Weasley and Granger enter and start helping Neville to his desk. All three of them shot evil looks his way, like they suspected he had something to do with it, but that was far from reality.
The rest of Potions class that day turned out to be very eventful: Draco's jar of liquefied bat brains fell onto the floor and spilt everywhere after he had accidentally ran into his (thankfully) empty cauldron, which earned him an impatient look from Professor Snape; he forgot to add several ingredients to his potion, and added the werewolf intestines five minutes too late, causing it to turn a sickly brownish colour that was emitting tiny whistling noises. Finally at the end of the lesson, and after Snape had been compelled to rid his cauldron of its nauseating liquid, Draco had slipped out of class alone and feeling quite incompetent. He wasn't too busy in class, though, not to notice the peculiar looks and whispers that everyone had made while they thought he wasn't looking, and he also knew that people would be wondering what was up with him, but he was trying not to care, and it was definitely hard when he had been so conditioned from birth to want to make an impressing impact on other people.
Potions class had finally come to an end, though, and it was time for his next class. The problems that had occurred during first period did not seem to abate throughout the following class, or the rest of the day for that matter, and the more he tried to concentrate on the task at hand, his mind would always return to the inward turmoil that besieged it.