A.N.: WOW, this is the quickest I've EVER updated on a story…the same day! (Well, I started typing it the same day.) I can't guarantee such long chapters or quick updates all the time. (As I told my first reviewer!)

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

The next day, after his parents went out again, Draco set out to explore the house. He started with the downstairs. The entryway was furnished with wooden coat racks, and had paintings of stoic people on the wall. The living room had fancy couches covered in red velvet with matching curtains. There was a grand cherry wood paneled fireplace to match the walls. Moving on to the dining room, he saw a long white table. The wooden trim on the wall matched. The walls, carpet, and curtains were all midnight blue with a subtle silver design. The kitchen turned out to have tan and gold stonework with dark wood trim and marble countertops.

Draco quickly found that the whole house had been furnished. "They must have been planning this for a while," he muttered with disgust as he went up the stairs. He passed his own room and looked in his parents' room. It turned out to have a king size bed with snakes worked into the head and foot boards in black iron. The cherry wood dresser had a mirror with matching snakes. The walls were covered in royal purple silk with a gold design. The carpet was matching purple, with gold throw rugs. The curtains and comforter were gold. Even the guestrooms had been furnished, each with its own color scheme: one with chartreuse and magenta, one with black and tan, and one with dark orange and blue.

Deciding he needed to get out for a while, Draco headed outside for a walk. He headed down the same street as the day before. He once again headed down to the other end, turned right, went two blocks, and turned left. As he walked, he enjoyed the colors of the sky and the trees and the general city. The house was so incredibly, majestically dark and dreary. He came upon the amazing factory of Mr. Wonka's.

Willy Wonka sighed. He hadn't been able to concentrate all morning. He kept wondering if that strange boy would come by again. Knowing he wouldn't be able to get a moment's peace until he knew, he headed out to the front of the factory, where he had seen the boy the previous day. He opened the window again, in case the boy started talking, like he had before. Within twenty minutes, Willy saw the boy headed towards the factory. Once again, he paused outside the factory gates. Willy smiled.

The boy just stood there and stared. This gave Willy Wonka a good chance to look him over, which he did. He looked about 15 or 16, with pale blond hair and porcelain skin. Willy couldn't see the boy's eyes from here, but imagined they were blue. A cold, icy blue to match the rest of his coloring. The boy's features were delicate, yet not weak. Willy desperately wanted to know his name.

Over the next couple of weeks, Draco made it a habit to take a walk past the factory every day at noon. He would stand there for a while, taking in the scent of it and wondering what it was like inside. And every day, a silent witness watched him pass. Willy Wonka made it a habit to take his lunch into the front hall and wait for his troubled young teenager to pass.

One night, when Draco's parents got home late, he crept downstairs to see if it was safe to approach them. Unfortunately, a stair creaked, giving him away. His father was on him in an instant, dragging him down into the entryway.

"What are you doing, spying on us?" he demanded from his son.

"I wasn't! I just…haven't seen much of you lately!" Draco protested.

"Don't go prying into OUR private affairs," Mr. Malfoy said, gripping his son's arm even tighter. Draco cried out in pain.

"Let go! You're HURTING me!" he pleaded.

"Don't tell me what to do!" his father yelled. He slapped Draco hard across the face. Tears came to Draco's eyes. "Go on, get out of here!" his father shouted, letting go of him. He left quickly and returned to his room.

As usual, Willy Wonka waited in the front hall with his lunch to see his young friend. As soon as the young man approached, Willy sensed something was wrong. Setting lunch down, he got up and headed towards the open window. Almost immediately, the boy started talking.

"Please help me," he moaned. "He's p-put me down my w-whole life. He's n-never actually HURT me before." He collapsed. Willy almost rushed out that second, but stopped as the boy continued speaking. "'You're a bad boy, Draco Malfoy, making friends with riffraff.' 'You're as bad as that rogue headmaster of yours, Dumbledore.' 'Why couldn't you have been different?' I've gotten used to that. But WHY does he have to abuse me?"

'But putting you down is just as much abusing you as hitting you is,' Willy Wonka thought. But what could he do to help the poor kid?

"Someone, p-please help me t-till I get back to Hogwarts," the kid murmured, and then fell into a silent sob. Before Willy could make another move, the boy suddenly got up and nearly ran away. By the time Willy got to the gates, he was gone.

'How could I have been so STUPID?' Draco thought. 'Sitting out there, ranting like a lunatic.' He hadn't thought about what he'd been doing. When he came up to Wonka's factory, he'd remembered that first chocolate bar, and had broken down. 'As if some strange muggle could help me, anyway,' he thought. 'As if he'd WANT to.' He slammed himself into his room and totally broke down.

To make things worse, his father hadn't spoke to him, hadn't even looked at him, since he'd hit him. Every time Draco would enter a room, his father wouldn't even look his way. 'It would be better if he'd just leave,' Draco had thought at breakfast. It had been extremely tense, trying to eat breakfast, and trying to get his father to speak to him. "Father, I-I'm sorry about last night. I wasn't trying to spy. Honest." Mr. Malfoy hadn't even grunted in reply. He asked his wife about the weather, he read his paper, he commented on how cheeky the mudbloods were getting. Not once had he even glanced in his son's direction.