Author's Note: Not much to say this time, except that if you are waiting
for the next chap of AAWIH, don't be surprised if it takes a little while.
And oh, this chap was too big, so I had to split it into two.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue.
You've Got Mail: Ch.5-Exactly How Much Does Dumbledore Know?
It was dark. Midnight, probably. She was in a forest, in some sort of clearing in the middle, and Ginny couldn't see the sky through the thick foliage above. Disoriented as to her whereabouts, the redhead stumbled through the grass, shivering. She looked down, but it was too dark to really see her clothes. Ginny lowered a hesitant hand to her torso, and upon feeling silk, gasped.
Ginny was stopped from further pondering about her location by the sound of footsteps getting closer and closer. Panicking, she looked around quickly, before spotting an old gnarled tree and racing towards it. She ducked behind it, wincing as she heard silk rip, and had just tucked herself into a hollow between the tree and some bushes when the footsteps reached the clearing, and stopped.
She quieted her breathing, and listened. By now she was sure of it, it was two people, probably men judging by the rather heavy footfalls.
"Are we alone?" Asked a rather whiny, wheezing voice nervously. She wrinkled her nose; for some reason Ginny was reminded of Peter Pettigrew (her brother had told her the entire story that summer).
Another voice answered him quickly. "Yes, I've made sure of that," a deep, commanding voice said with a slight foreign accent. Ginny frowned as she tried to figure out where his accent was from, most likely Russia or somewhere in eastern Europe.
"Now, I trust you have had sufficient time to consider our offer. What is your decision?" Said Foreign Man.
Ginny could almost feel the Whiner sweating as he answered. "We still haven't decided. We need more time," he said desperately.
There was a sudden chill in the air. "You have had enough time." His voice was coldly neutral.
Ginny drew in a ragged breath and peeked around the tree trunk just in time to see the tall, hooded figure that she guessed to be Foreign Man pull his wand out and point it at a chubby silhouette that was the Whiner. He gasped and backed up, bumping his back into a tree. A ray of elusive moonlight lit up his face, and Ginny almost choked when she saw the blood- red eyes and the sharp fangs of a vampire.
Foreign Man was edging closer and closer to the vampire, and finally he bent down to whisper viciously at the other man. "You disobeyed me. And I think you know the price for that," he said, and pointing his wand straight at the man's throat, cried some words in a guttural language unknown to Ginny, though she did start to shiver at the harsh tones and sinister sounding words.
The vampire uttered a small moaning shriek, before he turned a deep, dark blue, and, to all appearances, began to shrivel and smoke. Ginny wanted to look away, tried to look away, but her gaze was fixed on the horrible spectacle.
But most of all her gaze was fixed on the slow, evil smirk spreading across the other man's face.
When the vampire was fully gone, he turned and briskly wiped his hands on his trousers, still smirking evilly. Ginny shuddered and drew back to hide again, but unfortunately for her, he had been trained to spot such movement. His eyes narrowed, and before she could even regain her breath after the horrifying spectacle, he had swiftly crossed to her hiding place and hauled her up roughly by the arm.
She tried to scream, but he covered her mouth swiftly with his hand, smiling maliciously at her.
"So.it seems we have a spy, don't we?" He asked her, piercing blue eyes glinting. Ginny whimpered a little, struggling to get out of his grasp, but to no avail.
Suddenly, an odd look came over his half-hidden face and he cocked his head to the side as if listening to some voice in his head. He growled a little, and inclined his head slightly.
"As you wish," he said in his strange accent, and before she even knew what was happening, the scene had changed to a ballroom with music playing, Ginny was now wearing a rather revealing but beautiful deep red gown of the finest satin, that rustled as she moved. And move she did; simultaneously as the scene and dress change, the man had spun her away from him, and onto the dance floor.
Her body moved without her own accord, and so soon she was dancing back to him, though mentally she cringed at the idea. But when she got back to him, it wasn't the foreigner at all, but Harry.
She was about to exclaim at seeing him, but he swiftly changed faces to Snape. In another blink, she was dancing with Lucius Malfoy, then the vampire, then it changed to Draco Malfoy.
Sure, in real life she hated his guts, but that didn't seem to matter in this dream world that seemed oh so real. Now, all she cared about was being away from all of the others, and being with someone she knew
He smirked at her as they waltzed, and leaning in closer, he whispered softly in her ear in a rather romantic manner. "Virginia," he said, his voice no more than a whisper. She practically melted, and leaned in to kiss him (the sane and rational part of Ginny almost fainted at this, but that's not the point). She shut her eyes, and was barely an inch away, when there was a gust of cold wind, and a sudden jolt that caused Ginny to snap her eyes open.
And what she saw in front of her caused her to stumble backwards with a scream.
It was Tom.
Not the sickly vision of death that was Voldemort, or an evil ghost feasting off others. No, it was just Tom Riddle, her Tom.
"No," she said softly, then repeated it, louder and louder till she woke up in her own bed in Hogwarts screaming.
"NOOOOOO!!!!!"
While Ginny was still getting her bearings, the girls sharing her dorm room were just waking up to see what the commotion was. Aimee was the first up, and she raced to Ginny's bed, scrambling to her side to try and calm her sobbing friend.
"Ginny, Ginny, it's me, Aimee, you're at Hogwarts, wake up Ginny, wake up," she pleaded desperately.
Finally, Ginny opened her eyes slowly, and breathed a sigh of relief as she saw it wasn't Malfoy, or Tom, or anyone. Just Aimee. She raised a hand to wipe her eyes, and shuddered slightly as she felt some wetness at the corners of her eyes. Noticing Aimee still looking at her with a frightened expression, and the other half-asleep girls making their way to her canopy bed, she forced a smile at them.
"It's alright, just a nightmare," she told them reassuringly. Aimee gave her a searching look, but she just looked innocently back and Aimee dropped it with a shrug. The other girls complained a bit about the wake- up, but went back to sleep rather quickly.
"Hey Ginny," someone said from a little behind Aimee. It was Tina, a shy, studious girl that rarely ever spoke to Ginny or anyone else. Since Tina, Ginny and Aimee were the only girls in their dorm not concerned with boys and fashion, she had felt a sort of kinship to this girl, so occasionally they talked or did homework together. She smiled at Tina, waiting for her to continue. "Sometimes I get bad dreams, but I've found it really helps to go to bed tired. Work really hard at a sport or homework right before bed, I promise it'll help," she told the redhead. Ginny nodded along with this, before she said goodnight to her and she went to her own bed.
When she was gone Ginny looked down at her hands still clutching the covers and snorted. "Fat load of help that'll be," she muttered to herself. After her first year, nightmares of this type had been rather expected every night. Ginny had tried everything, but to no avail.
Aimee heard her muttering, and guessed the reason with a wry smile. They had been friends ever since Ginny had woken up from a nightmare in her second year, screaming and sobbing. Aimee had been very calm, soothing her quickly and explaining that it was just a dream. They had been best friends ever since.
Now, Aimee, began to get up. "Ginny, try to get some rest. You can tell me the dream in the morning, but remember what I told you a while ago. He's gone, gone for good," Aimee told her firmly and walked back to her own bed. Ginny could hear her softly snoring within five minutes. Everyone else was long asleep.
And suddenly she felt so very alone.
***
Finally, though, Ginny managed to get back to sleep, shoving all thoughts of vampires, Malfoys, Tom and other demons from her mind. Unfortunately for her, the other dream was still in the back of her mind, so she kept replaying it as she slept.
When she woke up again, it was morning and she had sweated through her pajamas. Throwing the covers off herself, she stood and took a sideways glance at the clock.
And shrieked upon seeing she had fifteen minutes to get to Potions.
She literally jumped in the shower, turning on the water with on hand while the other scrambled for shampoo. She washed her hair and was out and drying herself off in the record time of two minutes. Hoisting a towel around herself, she raced back into the deserted dorm room and to her trunk, throwing random belongings behind her till she found her uniform and underwear. Ginny performed a drying spell on her hair and her body, then changed quickly, before grabbing her outer robe, school bag, and jumping into her shoes as she raced out the door.
And in her mind, all she could think the entire time was, Shit shit shit.
***
Draco Malfoy was also having a less than satisfactory morning. He too woke up with only a quarter of an hour to get to class, though he was going to Transfiguration not Potions.
It was a stroke of bad luck that the class he was late for was also the one class where the teacher had never accepted his excuses, and he knew McGonagall wouldn't believe he was late because of Head Boy business. With a frustrated growl, he took a rapid shower and changed, leaving his robe unbuttoned and billowing out behind him as he raced down the hall, trying to fix his tie as he turned a corner.
And ran smack dab into someone.
He had been moving so quickly, he fell right on top of her, and they landed on the stone floor with an "Oof!" Draco blinked, and looked down at who he had fell on.
By now, you really should have guessed it was Ginny.
***
Ginny heaved her bag over her shoulder, and set her attention to buttoning up her shirt. Right now, it was flapping open, and looking less than modest.
She was just breathing a sigh of relief (she was going to make it!) when she turned a corner near the dungeons and ran straight into a tall blond figure. He was a good six inches taller than her, so she fell down on the floor with him on top.
She moaned a little at the pain coursing through her head, and fluttered her eyes open. And gasped upon seeing Draco Malfoy.
They both looked at each other with their mouths open for a moment, before they both came to their senses and scrambled up and away from the other. Ginny eyed him with slight confusion. His hair was wet and disheveled, sticking up at odd angles, and his robe was open to reveal an only half-buttoned shirt with a loose tie. In short, he looked a mess.
Ginny noticed Draco's gaze travelling up and down her body, and looked down too. She almost screamed when she saw exactly what he was looking at.
Her shirt was only buttoned in about three places, showing her bra fully, and her skirt was twisted around, hiked up around her thighs. Blushing profusely, she fixed her skirt and started to button her shirt properly. Ginny looked through a curtain of hair to see his face twist into a smirk.
"My, my, Weasley, you just keep getting more and more desperate. I know you want me, but do you really have to throw yourself at me so much?" He asked her with a sneer.
Ginny scowled at the insult, but she didn't have the time or heart to argue with him. Especially after that dream. She flipped her hair out of her face, perfectly ready to flip him off and leave, but before she could, she saw his jaw drop as he looked at her face.
"Merlin, Weasel, what happened to you?" He asked, dumbfounded.
Ginny was confused for a second, before her mind registered fully what he meant. As it usually was after a particularly bad nightmare, her face was pale, making her freckles stand out, and her eyes were bloodshot. She looked terrible.
Ginny ducked her head, and bent to collect her books, which had scattered from her bag. "Nothing," she muttered under her breath, not meeting his eyes. "Just slept badly, that's all."
Draco raised an eyebrow, but didn't question her any more since at that moment the tardy bell for class rang. They both started, before grabbing their individual belongings, and racing past each other, not even noticing that they had each grabbed the other's favorite quill.
***
Ginny stormed to the Great Hall, Aimee and Colin power walking behind her with amused looks on their faces.
"I can't stand that bastard!!! GRRR!!!" She shouted as she practically ran to the nearest bench and threw her stuff down, then herself. Aimee and Colin shot each other looks before walking next to her and sitting down, trying hard not to laugh at her.
It was after Double Potions. For arriving late, not only had Snape given her detention, he had also taken twenty points from Gryffindor. Twenty! Ginny could hardly talk through the unfairness of it all.
Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, she had been called on to brew the potion du jour in front of the entire class. It was supposed to be something to temporarily stop time, called the Maltempo potion, and normally Ginny would have been excited to try something that advanced, but not that morning. She could barely stay awake, and that coupled with Snape breathing down her neck caused her to completely botch the potion. Instead of becoming opaque sky blue and rather runny, hers was a clear gel that when moved, ended up exploding bright purple mist over Snape. She probably would have started laughing hysterically, but the professor quickly stopped that by giving her detention for a week.
Thus, Ginny was now on the rampage, and there was little her friends could do to calm her (though they had thought her potion mishap hilarious).
"There, there Gin," Aimee said sympathetically, rubbing her friend's hunched shoulder. Ginny currently had her forehead on the table and was banging against it with a steady rhythm.
"This has been the worst day of my life," she was about to bang her head again but Aimee had just given Colin a worried look so he slipped his hand under her head and gently pushed her upright.
"What happened?" He asked with slight amazement. Ginny was never usually this self-pitying.
She took a deep breath before launching into a tirade that they didn't really catch. "I had a nightmare about this vampire and this foreign guy who killed the vampire then saw me and said I was a spy then he talked to someone in his head and the scene changed to a ballroom and I was in this super cute dress but I was dancing with the guy then he changed to Harry then Snape then Malfoy's dad then the vampire then Malfoy himself but I was actually happy to see Malfoy and I almost kissed him then he changed to Tom and I woke up," here she took a deep breath, bright red from lack of oxygen and embarrassment.
Colin and Aimee's jaws had dropped long ago.
"Oh my god, that's horrible! No wonder you woke up screaming! How awful, Malfoy!" Aimee exclaimed. Colin and Ginny shot her a look, and she frowned. "What? Malfoy's a huge git!"
Shaking his head, Colin turned his attention to Ginny. "She's right though, it sounds like a horrible dream. No wonder you're so edgy!"
Ginny snorted. "That's not even half of it. I woke up late this morning, and when I was rushing to class, ran into Malfoy-literally. I was looking rather messed up, so of course he took the opportunity to insinuate tons of crap about how I was desperate, then he saw how pale I was and acted like he cared, then I went to class. And you guys know the rest," she finished, before remembering something else and pouting. "And oh yeah, I lost my favorite quill."
Aimee and Colin looked at each other with their eyes widened. Ginny put her head in her arms laying on the table and continued to talk to them.
"But honestly, I'm waiting to see how this day will end. What do you want to bet that I'll get tons of homework, or my detention will be really hard, or, hell, I can just imagine Malfoy finding out I had a dream with him in it!"
Suddenly, Ginny heard a drawling voice behind her, the one voice she didn't want to hear. "You dream about me Weasley? Now that's pretty sad," Malfoy said.
Ginny fainted dead away.
***
Draco's day had almost paralleled Ginny's in bad events. He had arrived at Transfiguration almost ten minutes late, and as predicted, McGonagall had not taken too kindly to his excuses or complaints or even observations.
Who knew remarking that the middle-aged witch looked like a Hippogriff when angered would land him in detention for a week?
So, he had realized he was treading on thin ice, and had backed off, agreeing to detention and taking his seat with only a medium-strength glare at the professor. They had learned some trivial malarkey about transfiguring specified things like a book with exactly two hundred and thirteen pages, or a Dalmatian with only fifty-six spots. Draco could have snorted at these easy tasks. He started when the Professor glared at him, so he made a show of rummaging around for his quill and a piece of parchment.
Well, actually, he was looking for his favorite quill, the black one with the monogrammed nib. He had gotten it as a gift a long time ago, and had never lost it. But now, since all he could find was a light pink one, he began to get worried (well, worried and angry at the Dream Team behind him sniggering about the quill color). Where could it be?
Then he realized. Weaselette had it.
They must have accidentally exchanged quills in the scuffle to get their own belongings that morning when they were both late. He paled at the thought of a Weasley touching /his/ quill. Oh great, now he'd have to burn it.
They left the class two hours later with a foot and a half long parchment roll due the next Monday, but while others (mainly Scarface and Weasel) were complaining about the workload, his mind was thinking back to the incident in the hallway with the littlest Weasel.
He frowned. What was with her? Normally she always seemed up for a good verbal battle, but that morning she just hadn't been into the fight. And she had looked so sickly, wait a second, was he actually /worried/ about her? He shuddered at the thought. At that moment however, he was stopped from mentally killing himself by the fake tanned arm of Pansy slipping through as she sidled up to him.
"Hi Drakie," she simpered with a flutter of glittery eyelashes. Draco's lip curled in disgust but she didn't appear to notice. "I didn't get a chance to talk to you last night. How was your summer? You'll have to tell me all about it (he prayed her next words were 'sometime, maybe' but no such luck) over lunch," she said as she steered him towards the Slytherin table. He looked about him wildly for some route of escape, and the perfect idea hit him.
"Sorry Pansy," he said coolly, retracting his arm, "but I'm afraid I have to go find my quill. That idiotic Weasley girl bumped into me this morning and took it by accident. I'll just be a minute," he told her, mentally crossing his fingers at the rather blatant lie.
She pouted, but he swept off towards the Gryffindor table before she could really protest. He was just behind the redheaded girl when he heard her say something that almost made his heart stop.
Apparently she had been complaining about something to her friends before he showed up. He heard just the last part of what he guessed to be a rant.
"But honestly, I'm waiting to see how this day will end. What do you want to bet that I'll get tons of homework, or my detention will be really hard, or, hell, I can just imagine Malfoy finding out I had a dream with him in it!"
He started at the mention of a dream, before training and experience took over. "You dream about me Weasley? Now that's pretty sad," he sneered at her.
She turned slightly, before he watched her doe-brown eyes roll back in her head and she sank off the bench to the floor with a slight moan.
He certainly hadn't been expecting that.
***
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue.
You've Got Mail: Ch.5-Exactly How Much Does Dumbledore Know?
It was dark. Midnight, probably. She was in a forest, in some sort of clearing in the middle, and Ginny couldn't see the sky through the thick foliage above. Disoriented as to her whereabouts, the redhead stumbled through the grass, shivering. She looked down, but it was too dark to really see her clothes. Ginny lowered a hesitant hand to her torso, and upon feeling silk, gasped.
Ginny was stopped from further pondering about her location by the sound of footsteps getting closer and closer. Panicking, she looked around quickly, before spotting an old gnarled tree and racing towards it. She ducked behind it, wincing as she heard silk rip, and had just tucked herself into a hollow between the tree and some bushes when the footsteps reached the clearing, and stopped.
She quieted her breathing, and listened. By now she was sure of it, it was two people, probably men judging by the rather heavy footfalls.
"Are we alone?" Asked a rather whiny, wheezing voice nervously. She wrinkled her nose; for some reason Ginny was reminded of Peter Pettigrew (her brother had told her the entire story that summer).
Another voice answered him quickly. "Yes, I've made sure of that," a deep, commanding voice said with a slight foreign accent. Ginny frowned as she tried to figure out where his accent was from, most likely Russia or somewhere in eastern Europe.
"Now, I trust you have had sufficient time to consider our offer. What is your decision?" Said Foreign Man.
Ginny could almost feel the Whiner sweating as he answered. "We still haven't decided. We need more time," he said desperately.
There was a sudden chill in the air. "You have had enough time." His voice was coldly neutral.
Ginny drew in a ragged breath and peeked around the tree trunk just in time to see the tall, hooded figure that she guessed to be Foreign Man pull his wand out and point it at a chubby silhouette that was the Whiner. He gasped and backed up, bumping his back into a tree. A ray of elusive moonlight lit up his face, and Ginny almost choked when she saw the blood- red eyes and the sharp fangs of a vampire.
Foreign Man was edging closer and closer to the vampire, and finally he bent down to whisper viciously at the other man. "You disobeyed me. And I think you know the price for that," he said, and pointing his wand straight at the man's throat, cried some words in a guttural language unknown to Ginny, though she did start to shiver at the harsh tones and sinister sounding words.
The vampire uttered a small moaning shriek, before he turned a deep, dark blue, and, to all appearances, began to shrivel and smoke. Ginny wanted to look away, tried to look away, but her gaze was fixed on the horrible spectacle.
But most of all her gaze was fixed on the slow, evil smirk spreading across the other man's face.
When the vampire was fully gone, he turned and briskly wiped his hands on his trousers, still smirking evilly. Ginny shuddered and drew back to hide again, but unfortunately for her, he had been trained to spot such movement. His eyes narrowed, and before she could even regain her breath after the horrifying spectacle, he had swiftly crossed to her hiding place and hauled her up roughly by the arm.
She tried to scream, but he covered her mouth swiftly with his hand, smiling maliciously at her.
"So.it seems we have a spy, don't we?" He asked her, piercing blue eyes glinting. Ginny whimpered a little, struggling to get out of his grasp, but to no avail.
Suddenly, an odd look came over his half-hidden face and he cocked his head to the side as if listening to some voice in his head. He growled a little, and inclined his head slightly.
"As you wish," he said in his strange accent, and before she even knew what was happening, the scene had changed to a ballroom with music playing, Ginny was now wearing a rather revealing but beautiful deep red gown of the finest satin, that rustled as she moved. And move she did; simultaneously as the scene and dress change, the man had spun her away from him, and onto the dance floor.
Her body moved without her own accord, and so soon she was dancing back to him, though mentally she cringed at the idea. But when she got back to him, it wasn't the foreigner at all, but Harry.
She was about to exclaim at seeing him, but he swiftly changed faces to Snape. In another blink, she was dancing with Lucius Malfoy, then the vampire, then it changed to Draco Malfoy.
Sure, in real life she hated his guts, but that didn't seem to matter in this dream world that seemed oh so real. Now, all she cared about was being away from all of the others, and being with someone she knew
He smirked at her as they waltzed, and leaning in closer, he whispered softly in her ear in a rather romantic manner. "Virginia," he said, his voice no more than a whisper. She practically melted, and leaned in to kiss him (the sane and rational part of Ginny almost fainted at this, but that's not the point). She shut her eyes, and was barely an inch away, when there was a gust of cold wind, and a sudden jolt that caused Ginny to snap her eyes open.
And what she saw in front of her caused her to stumble backwards with a scream.
It was Tom.
Not the sickly vision of death that was Voldemort, or an evil ghost feasting off others. No, it was just Tom Riddle, her Tom.
"No," she said softly, then repeated it, louder and louder till she woke up in her own bed in Hogwarts screaming.
"NOOOOOO!!!!!"
While Ginny was still getting her bearings, the girls sharing her dorm room were just waking up to see what the commotion was. Aimee was the first up, and she raced to Ginny's bed, scrambling to her side to try and calm her sobbing friend.
"Ginny, Ginny, it's me, Aimee, you're at Hogwarts, wake up Ginny, wake up," she pleaded desperately.
Finally, Ginny opened her eyes slowly, and breathed a sigh of relief as she saw it wasn't Malfoy, or Tom, or anyone. Just Aimee. She raised a hand to wipe her eyes, and shuddered slightly as she felt some wetness at the corners of her eyes. Noticing Aimee still looking at her with a frightened expression, and the other half-asleep girls making their way to her canopy bed, she forced a smile at them.
"It's alright, just a nightmare," she told them reassuringly. Aimee gave her a searching look, but she just looked innocently back and Aimee dropped it with a shrug. The other girls complained a bit about the wake- up, but went back to sleep rather quickly.
"Hey Ginny," someone said from a little behind Aimee. It was Tina, a shy, studious girl that rarely ever spoke to Ginny or anyone else. Since Tina, Ginny and Aimee were the only girls in their dorm not concerned with boys and fashion, she had felt a sort of kinship to this girl, so occasionally they talked or did homework together. She smiled at Tina, waiting for her to continue. "Sometimes I get bad dreams, but I've found it really helps to go to bed tired. Work really hard at a sport or homework right before bed, I promise it'll help," she told the redhead. Ginny nodded along with this, before she said goodnight to her and she went to her own bed.
When she was gone Ginny looked down at her hands still clutching the covers and snorted. "Fat load of help that'll be," she muttered to herself. After her first year, nightmares of this type had been rather expected every night. Ginny had tried everything, but to no avail.
Aimee heard her muttering, and guessed the reason with a wry smile. They had been friends ever since Ginny had woken up from a nightmare in her second year, screaming and sobbing. Aimee had been very calm, soothing her quickly and explaining that it was just a dream. They had been best friends ever since.
Now, Aimee, began to get up. "Ginny, try to get some rest. You can tell me the dream in the morning, but remember what I told you a while ago. He's gone, gone for good," Aimee told her firmly and walked back to her own bed. Ginny could hear her softly snoring within five minutes. Everyone else was long asleep.
And suddenly she felt so very alone.
***
Finally, though, Ginny managed to get back to sleep, shoving all thoughts of vampires, Malfoys, Tom and other demons from her mind. Unfortunately for her, the other dream was still in the back of her mind, so she kept replaying it as she slept.
When she woke up again, it was morning and she had sweated through her pajamas. Throwing the covers off herself, she stood and took a sideways glance at the clock.
And shrieked upon seeing she had fifteen minutes to get to Potions.
She literally jumped in the shower, turning on the water with on hand while the other scrambled for shampoo. She washed her hair and was out and drying herself off in the record time of two minutes. Hoisting a towel around herself, she raced back into the deserted dorm room and to her trunk, throwing random belongings behind her till she found her uniform and underwear. Ginny performed a drying spell on her hair and her body, then changed quickly, before grabbing her outer robe, school bag, and jumping into her shoes as she raced out the door.
And in her mind, all she could think the entire time was, Shit shit shit.
***
Draco Malfoy was also having a less than satisfactory morning. He too woke up with only a quarter of an hour to get to class, though he was going to Transfiguration not Potions.
It was a stroke of bad luck that the class he was late for was also the one class where the teacher had never accepted his excuses, and he knew McGonagall wouldn't believe he was late because of Head Boy business. With a frustrated growl, he took a rapid shower and changed, leaving his robe unbuttoned and billowing out behind him as he raced down the hall, trying to fix his tie as he turned a corner.
And ran smack dab into someone.
He had been moving so quickly, he fell right on top of her, and they landed on the stone floor with an "Oof!" Draco blinked, and looked down at who he had fell on.
By now, you really should have guessed it was Ginny.
***
Ginny heaved her bag over her shoulder, and set her attention to buttoning up her shirt. Right now, it was flapping open, and looking less than modest.
She was just breathing a sigh of relief (she was going to make it!) when she turned a corner near the dungeons and ran straight into a tall blond figure. He was a good six inches taller than her, so she fell down on the floor with him on top.
She moaned a little at the pain coursing through her head, and fluttered her eyes open. And gasped upon seeing Draco Malfoy.
They both looked at each other with their mouths open for a moment, before they both came to their senses and scrambled up and away from the other. Ginny eyed him with slight confusion. His hair was wet and disheveled, sticking up at odd angles, and his robe was open to reveal an only half-buttoned shirt with a loose tie. In short, he looked a mess.
Ginny noticed Draco's gaze travelling up and down her body, and looked down too. She almost screamed when she saw exactly what he was looking at.
Her shirt was only buttoned in about three places, showing her bra fully, and her skirt was twisted around, hiked up around her thighs. Blushing profusely, she fixed her skirt and started to button her shirt properly. Ginny looked through a curtain of hair to see his face twist into a smirk.
"My, my, Weasley, you just keep getting more and more desperate. I know you want me, but do you really have to throw yourself at me so much?" He asked her with a sneer.
Ginny scowled at the insult, but she didn't have the time or heart to argue with him. Especially after that dream. She flipped her hair out of her face, perfectly ready to flip him off and leave, but before she could, she saw his jaw drop as he looked at her face.
"Merlin, Weasel, what happened to you?" He asked, dumbfounded.
Ginny was confused for a second, before her mind registered fully what he meant. As it usually was after a particularly bad nightmare, her face was pale, making her freckles stand out, and her eyes were bloodshot. She looked terrible.
Ginny ducked her head, and bent to collect her books, which had scattered from her bag. "Nothing," she muttered under her breath, not meeting his eyes. "Just slept badly, that's all."
Draco raised an eyebrow, but didn't question her any more since at that moment the tardy bell for class rang. They both started, before grabbing their individual belongings, and racing past each other, not even noticing that they had each grabbed the other's favorite quill.
***
Ginny stormed to the Great Hall, Aimee and Colin power walking behind her with amused looks on their faces.
"I can't stand that bastard!!! GRRR!!!" She shouted as she practically ran to the nearest bench and threw her stuff down, then herself. Aimee and Colin shot each other looks before walking next to her and sitting down, trying hard not to laugh at her.
It was after Double Potions. For arriving late, not only had Snape given her detention, he had also taken twenty points from Gryffindor. Twenty! Ginny could hardly talk through the unfairness of it all.
Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, she had been called on to brew the potion du jour in front of the entire class. It was supposed to be something to temporarily stop time, called the Maltempo potion, and normally Ginny would have been excited to try something that advanced, but not that morning. She could barely stay awake, and that coupled with Snape breathing down her neck caused her to completely botch the potion. Instead of becoming opaque sky blue and rather runny, hers was a clear gel that when moved, ended up exploding bright purple mist over Snape. She probably would have started laughing hysterically, but the professor quickly stopped that by giving her detention for a week.
Thus, Ginny was now on the rampage, and there was little her friends could do to calm her (though they had thought her potion mishap hilarious).
"There, there Gin," Aimee said sympathetically, rubbing her friend's hunched shoulder. Ginny currently had her forehead on the table and was banging against it with a steady rhythm.
"This has been the worst day of my life," she was about to bang her head again but Aimee had just given Colin a worried look so he slipped his hand under her head and gently pushed her upright.
"What happened?" He asked with slight amazement. Ginny was never usually this self-pitying.
She took a deep breath before launching into a tirade that they didn't really catch. "I had a nightmare about this vampire and this foreign guy who killed the vampire then saw me and said I was a spy then he talked to someone in his head and the scene changed to a ballroom and I was in this super cute dress but I was dancing with the guy then he changed to Harry then Snape then Malfoy's dad then the vampire then Malfoy himself but I was actually happy to see Malfoy and I almost kissed him then he changed to Tom and I woke up," here she took a deep breath, bright red from lack of oxygen and embarrassment.
Colin and Aimee's jaws had dropped long ago.
"Oh my god, that's horrible! No wonder you woke up screaming! How awful, Malfoy!" Aimee exclaimed. Colin and Ginny shot her a look, and she frowned. "What? Malfoy's a huge git!"
Shaking his head, Colin turned his attention to Ginny. "She's right though, it sounds like a horrible dream. No wonder you're so edgy!"
Ginny snorted. "That's not even half of it. I woke up late this morning, and when I was rushing to class, ran into Malfoy-literally. I was looking rather messed up, so of course he took the opportunity to insinuate tons of crap about how I was desperate, then he saw how pale I was and acted like he cared, then I went to class. And you guys know the rest," she finished, before remembering something else and pouting. "And oh yeah, I lost my favorite quill."
Aimee and Colin looked at each other with their eyes widened. Ginny put her head in her arms laying on the table and continued to talk to them.
"But honestly, I'm waiting to see how this day will end. What do you want to bet that I'll get tons of homework, or my detention will be really hard, or, hell, I can just imagine Malfoy finding out I had a dream with him in it!"
Suddenly, Ginny heard a drawling voice behind her, the one voice she didn't want to hear. "You dream about me Weasley? Now that's pretty sad," Malfoy said.
Ginny fainted dead away.
***
Draco's day had almost paralleled Ginny's in bad events. He had arrived at Transfiguration almost ten minutes late, and as predicted, McGonagall had not taken too kindly to his excuses or complaints or even observations.
Who knew remarking that the middle-aged witch looked like a Hippogriff when angered would land him in detention for a week?
So, he had realized he was treading on thin ice, and had backed off, agreeing to detention and taking his seat with only a medium-strength glare at the professor. They had learned some trivial malarkey about transfiguring specified things like a book with exactly two hundred and thirteen pages, or a Dalmatian with only fifty-six spots. Draco could have snorted at these easy tasks. He started when the Professor glared at him, so he made a show of rummaging around for his quill and a piece of parchment.
Well, actually, he was looking for his favorite quill, the black one with the monogrammed nib. He had gotten it as a gift a long time ago, and had never lost it. But now, since all he could find was a light pink one, he began to get worried (well, worried and angry at the Dream Team behind him sniggering about the quill color). Where could it be?
Then he realized. Weaselette had it.
They must have accidentally exchanged quills in the scuffle to get their own belongings that morning when they were both late. He paled at the thought of a Weasley touching /his/ quill. Oh great, now he'd have to burn it.
They left the class two hours later with a foot and a half long parchment roll due the next Monday, but while others (mainly Scarface and Weasel) were complaining about the workload, his mind was thinking back to the incident in the hallway with the littlest Weasel.
He frowned. What was with her? Normally she always seemed up for a good verbal battle, but that morning she just hadn't been into the fight. And she had looked so sickly, wait a second, was he actually /worried/ about her? He shuddered at the thought. At that moment however, he was stopped from mentally killing himself by the fake tanned arm of Pansy slipping through as she sidled up to him.
"Hi Drakie," she simpered with a flutter of glittery eyelashes. Draco's lip curled in disgust but she didn't appear to notice. "I didn't get a chance to talk to you last night. How was your summer? You'll have to tell me all about it (he prayed her next words were 'sometime, maybe' but no such luck) over lunch," she said as she steered him towards the Slytherin table. He looked about him wildly for some route of escape, and the perfect idea hit him.
"Sorry Pansy," he said coolly, retracting his arm, "but I'm afraid I have to go find my quill. That idiotic Weasley girl bumped into me this morning and took it by accident. I'll just be a minute," he told her, mentally crossing his fingers at the rather blatant lie.
She pouted, but he swept off towards the Gryffindor table before she could really protest. He was just behind the redheaded girl when he heard her say something that almost made his heart stop.
Apparently she had been complaining about something to her friends before he showed up. He heard just the last part of what he guessed to be a rant.
"But honestly, I'm waiting to see how this day will end. What do you want to bet that I'll get tons of homework, or my detention will be really hard, or, hell, I can just imagine Malfoy finding out I had a dream with him in it!"
He started at the mention of a dream, before training and experience took over. "You dream about me Weasley? Now that's pretty sad," he sneered at her.
She turned slightly, before he watched her doe-brown eyes roll back in her head and she sank off the bench to the floor with a slight moan.
He certainly hadn't been expecting that.
***
