"Mom!" Hermione yelled. It was the last day of the summer holidays and the letters from Hogwarts had finally arrived. Hermione raced down the newly polished oak stairs down into the living room. An odd smell of paint reached her nose. Her mother was standing next to a wall and covering it in a light pink color.
"I'm Head Girl!" she exclaimed brandishing her badge and waving it in front of her mothers face.
"Oh, that's wonderful dear!" cried her mother, at once abandoning the wall she was painting and advancing to stand near Hermione. "That's my girl," she smiled and patted her daughter on the head.
At the same time in… Malfoy ManorDraco gazed at his badge for a second and popped it back in the envelope. He glanced around his room, surprisingly bare, except for a writing desk, bed, and a bedside cabinet. In a corner of his room stood a dusty trophy cabinet, and through its dusty glass doors could be barely seen a pillow with his only prized possession, his prefect badge. The young Malfoy rose from his bed and trudged up the stairs to his fathers study. His father was absorbed in writing what seemed to be a very long letter.
"I have been elected Head Boy father," said Draco.
"I shall never praise you if you only do what is expected of you son. Don't trouble me with stupid notices such as these again," drawled Lucius Malfoy irritably, merely glancing at his son and then resuming to bend over his letter.
"Yes father," agreed Draco involuntarily and went back down to his room.
Platform 9 3/4"Harry, Ron!" Hermione squealed. She ran across the platform to hug her two best friends finally seeing them for the first time after a long summer. She was so glad to see it all again, platform nine and three quarters, Hogwarts Express puffing up big balls of steam.
"Hermione, how are you?" asked Harry, then gazing down at the 'Head Girl' badge gleaming on her robes, added, "I see good." They laughed. It was good hearing her two friends laugh again, oh how she missed them these holidays, when her parents had forced her to spend her summer with the family.
"Do you know who's Head Boy? After all I have to share living quarters with him." She asked with concern. Hermione looked searchingly around the platform as though hoping to see something gold and gleaming pinned to the front of somebody's robes.
"Oh." Chorused Ron and Harry clearly not wanting to get Hermione's wrong side too early in the morning.
"Don't want to get your spirits down but – "
"Ahem," As each of the friends turned to look at the intruder in their conversation, their faces absorbed a look of disgust. "You've got it right mudblood, Head Boy – me." Spat Malfoy, "and you better be appreciate it, it's not every day that someone like you gets to hang out with a pure blood," he added.
"Mudblood – kill – him - Hermione – doesn't deserve – beat – him – up," Forced Ron out of himself through clenched teeth, apparently being strangled by Harry who was trying to keep him from jumping on Malfoy.
"See you later, Granger," said Malfoy, and disappeared behind a door in the train marked 'Head Boy and Girl'.
"NO!" screamed Hermione, "and I am supposed to take THAT all year round? What was Professor Dumbledore thinking?" Harry and Ron were looking at her with pity.
"Well I'd better be going," sighed Hermione, "Better pay a visit to his majesty, the pure-blood," she said in a mocking voice.
"See you," uttered Harry and Ron sulkily, as they parted each leaving to a different compartment.
At the same time in a different compartment.
Pansy Parkinson had made a final attempt to win over Draco's heart. As Draco opened the compartment door, he looked at her in awe. He proceeded to sit next to Crabbe and Goyle continuing to stare at the thing as his face changed from a look of surprise, to disgust. She was wearing extra short and tight robes revealing much of her short and fat legs. At the sight of Draco she had made a leap upwards running forth to hug her idol. He stopped her with a gesture of his hand suggesting he would rather eat Neville's toad.
"Seriously Parkinson, I can have any girl in this school, you really think I'm going to waste my time on you?" Snapped Malfoy wiping the smile of Pansies face.
"Any girl is it?" grunted Goyle enviously. The look Malfoy gave him was one of great surprise 'so, the toad shall talk and stand up to me now? Really I was fine with having him blend in with the atmosphere,' thought Malfoy.
"Any," persisted Malfoy with an I'd-like-to-see-you-try kind of look on his face.
"Well then, if it's any girl," smirked Crabbe, "I think that one would be a piece of cake." He said pointing outside the compartment door. Hermiones bushy hair, untamed as a wild tiger usually, and today surprisingly more so swayed in the wind as she walked past Crabbes and Goyles compartment. "In fact," added Goyle, "I can bet my pocket-money you can't have that one kiss you of her own free will." Goyle looked surprised at his own cleverness, while Malfoy-put out.
"You can add my allowance in that as well," grinned Crabbe.
"Sure. The bet is on. I'll proceed to my own compartment now," breathed Malfoy wondering how he was going to get out of this one.
'The filthy mudblood, a Malfoy actually looking at her in a way other than disgust is a betrayal to the family. Stupid, pathetic know-it-all Granger,' Malfoy muttered to himself as he proceeded down the corridor to the Head Boy & Girl compartment.
He came in, and absorbed in his thoughts, was relieved to find it empty. 15 minutes later, Hermione backed into the compartment door, absorbed in a book, she merely glanced at Malfoy, and plunged into her book again. Malfoy, clearly not expecting such a lack of interest looked quite put out. Then, just as he was going to fall into complete despair, he suddenly got an idea, and silently marveled at it.
Hermione was still reading her thick volume entitled " Arithmetic's: your favorite subject."
'…These come from an ancient way of cross-multiplying that dates back to the Incas. The many…' she was distracted by a loud sound of singing. Leveling her eyes with the tops of the book, she gave an astonished squeak. Malfoy was folding his shirt, which was obviously not on his muscular stomach anymore and yelling out random verses of a new hit from "The Weird Sisters".
"And what do you think you are doing?" asked Hermione in a strict tone, not letting her eyes slip past his face.
"Changing," said Draco matter-of-factly, "what, are you going to punish naughty Drakie for changing?" he mocked in a low voice, getting into a what he assumed was a sexier position.
"No, absolutely not," choked Hermione once again drowning in her book.
' Serves her right,' thought Draco, 'but she wont come without a little more work… well after all I am Draco Malfoy, and I am certainly up for a challenge…'