Chapter 7

A/N: This chapter was exceptionally hard to write in the beginning, I don't know why. Sometimes in this chapter, Draco is referred to as Draco or Malfoy, and sometimes as Mallory, it depends on the person who is using the name, and occasionally it's there just as a reminder that he doesn't look like he should, the same goes for the pronouns describing him. It seems that the word count on Microsoft Office and the word count here never agree...

Disclaimer:

"Remember, be nice." Hermione felt it necessary to remind 'Mallory', he was starting to scowl already and they were still far enough away from the Weasleys that they hadn't been noticed yet. He was muttering something under his breath that Hermione was pretty sure would make her angry if she were to hear, so she elbowed him in the ribs and reminded him to smile.

Draco flinched and rubbed his side; the girl had very pointy elbows it seemed. The smile he tried to stretch across his face felt unnatural and uncomfortable; if Granger's grimace at him was any indication, she thought even less of it then he did.

"Hermione dear!" Draco watched in fascination as the Weasley matriarch hugged Granger tightly, she didn't seem to mind though; it looked as if Granger was hugging back just as fiercely. "And this must be Mallory!" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed, catching sight of Draco.

To his horror and Hermione's amusement, he was swept up in a hug almost a fierce as the one Granger had just experienced. Draco didn't know what to do, people just did not hug him like this. He awkwardly patted Molly on the back and then stepped back from her, giving her an uncomfortable smile. "Nice to meet you," he told her politely; Hermione was the only one who noticed the few seconds of hesitation before he said the word nice.

"And it's lovely to meet you too dear," Mrs. Weasley responded with a genuine smile. Looking around at her family and honorary family, she yelled "All right everyone, let's head home!" Her declaration was met with a rowdy cheer and a flinch from Draco; he was pretty sure he died a little on the inside.

Draco looked around the room her was to share with Granger and the younger she weasel, disturbed at the minuscule size of the room he was to share with two other people; at home, his closet was bigger than this. He must have said the last part out loud because Granger whacked him over the head with what felt like the biggest textbook she had and then started to apologise to Ginny.

"I'm really sorry Ginny, she comes from a rich family that apparently never bothered to teach her manners," Hermione glared at Draco as he sat on the floor, muttering about concussions.

"That's all right, my room really is small," Ginny agreed, looking at the small room that barely fit her bed, dresser, and an inflatable mattress on the floor for the guests.

"Wait." Draco, realizing that there was only one bed and one mattress in the room and three people to sleep in them. "Are you expecting me to share a bed?" He sneered. Hermione and Ginny looked at him in disbelief – Hermione because he had been at the Burrow all of twenty minutes before he was back to being himself and Ginny because Hermione's new friend was remarkably unfriendly, to everyone.

They were interrupted by Molly calling from downstairs that it was time for dinner. Ginny walked ahead while Hermione pulled Draco aside, "Listen Malfoy, you are now in a house of people who hate you, if you keep doing stupid things like you just did in Ginny's room, you will be exposed". She spoke very slowly for him because he seemed to be having trouble understanding things that should be glaringly obvious to him. "I think that dye's soaked into you head," she told him as she walked faster to catch up to Ginny, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

Dinner was traumatising for Draco. The table it took place at was a quarter of the size of the one that resided in the Manor's dining room, and five times the people were crammed around it. He was seated between Granger and the she Weasel and across from the twins; both of whom had been staring at his chest since he'd sat down – this being a girl thing was scary sometimes.

"So Mallory, why is your hair green?" Fred asked out of nowhere, not taking his eyes off Draco's chest; he was surprised Fred had even noticed his green hair.

"Horrible potions accident, it was very tragic," Draco responded, hoping they would just drop it. He heard Granger mutter something beside him the sounded a lot like 'drama queen'.

"You know who has hair almost the same colour now?" George asked. He was interrupted by the mashed potatoes that splattered right in the middle of his face. Everyone looked at Hermione across from him, potato covered spoon still in firing position.

"It slipped?" She tried sheepishly, not fooling anyone. Instead of the verbal lashing Draco was expecting her to receive, she instead got a large serving bowl of peas upturned on her head. George set the bowl he had just dumped back on the table, looked around at everyone, and yelled: "Food fight!" Chaos ensued.

Molly had her head in her hands, moaning "every time we all sit down for a meal... Monsters! I've raised monsters." Draco took a second to assess his surroundings trying to decide what to do. A hand interrupted him, tugging him under the table where he found Granger.

"Malfoy," she hissed, too quietly to be heard by anyone. "Let's get out of here!" She turned and started crawling down the table, towards the kitchen door. Draco shrugged; following her would keep him from getting covered in food, so he was actually inclined to listen to the girl for once.

They managed to get out of the kitchen and then out the front door without anyone noticing that they were gone in the chaos. "What are we doing out here, Granger?" Draco demanded.

"We're going to officially start the pranking," she told him, bending down in the garden. The gnomes started to gather around her, curious; possibly about the peas she was still wearing. This was where Draco came in; he waved his wand and conjured up a crate, then started grabbing armfuls of the gnomes and throwing them in the box.

Garden gnomes were particularly susceptible to suggestion because they functioned based on a hive mentality – what one does, the others will follow. Hermione and Draco only had to give them a few instructions and then cast a minor attention span charm on the to keep the focused – garden gnomes could do great things if they could focus on one thing for more than three seconds at a time.

They snuck back in, went upstairs and upended the crate in the hallway, vanishing the crate when all the gnomes were out. "Do we really have to sneak back in?" Draco whined, "I might get food on me".

"Whatever would you do then?" Hermione asked sarcastically; she had peas in her hair, Malfoy deserved to be covered in food too.

Draco got splattered with a stray scoop of turnip in his eye the second he entered the kitchen, Hermione was spared from this because she dove behind him. "I'm not your human shield!" he hissed at her, reaching behind him and pulling her in front of him in time to intercept peas that were about to hit him.

"I hate peas," Hermione complained as she brushed them off of her shirt. She reached for the nearest bit of food and jumped into the fray, Draco not far behind – he focused his food based attacks on Potter, the one he hated the most in the room.

"ENOUGH!" Molly yelled, finally coming back into the kitchen to take charge of her family again. She took out her wand and scourgified the whole room before sending all the children (even the ones who weren't young anymore) to their rooms for the night.

"Ahh, home," Ginny sighed happily as she, Hermione and Mallory got back to their room. "Vacation hasn't officially started until someone started a food fight at dinner and we all get sent to our rooms early."

Before Malfoy had a chance to close the door behind him he heard a commotion from the room across the hall. He glanced back over his shoulder at Hermione, who shared a quick amused and knowing look before they, along with everyone else in the house, made their way to Fred and George's room.

In the middle of the room, surrounded by the Weasley clan and their guests was what looked like every pair of underwear in the house shaped into a large gnome nest. The garden gnomes were still in the room, guarding their nest fiercely.

George managed to get close enough to the nest to pick up a particularly racy pair. "Hermione!" George exclaimed, holding a pair of underwear that were little more than a few tiny scraps of lace, "I never would have thought you were the type to wear thongs."

"I'm not," she responded, amused because she had a pretty good idea who they belonged to judging by the size of them.

"Those are mine, dear," Molly said, blushing slightly. Everyone in the room (except maybe Arthur) looked horrified by this revelation; George dropped them like they had burned him.

"I'd really rather not sleep with this shrine to underwear in the room with me," Fred said, shuddering; George was too shaken to comment at that point, but the look on his face said he was in complete agreement.

Later that night, Fred and George – sleeping in the living room until someone could disarm the gnomes long enough to disassemble their nest – were trying to figure out who would want to get revenge against them.

"So, in the past month," George said, reading over the list they had compiled, "We've pranked everyone in this house at least once."

"Everyone except Mallory," Fred reminded, as if this automatically made her the culprit – she was, but that was beside the point and he didn't know that.

"I really don't think it was Mallory, she has no reason to want to prank us..."

"Well, we just have to figure out who wasn't at the food fight," Fred said, doing a mental check of everyone who was throwing food.

"Everyone except mum was there," George sighed, dropping his head into his hands.

Fred looked at him in shock at the same time George's head snapped up to meet his twin's shocked look with an identical one of his own. "You don't think..." Fred said.

"Indeed I do, brother," George told him.

"Well, what are we going to do about it?"

"I'm not sure yet..." George responded ominously.

"I think the underwear incident might have been enough humiliation for her," Fred reminded as he shuddered.

The next few days passed relatively uneventfully for Hermione and Draco, they were finalizing their next prank; kamikaze pies, charmed to throw themselves in the face of whoever got into their path. Christmas was rapidly approaching and Draco was getting more and more jittery; this happy family environment was really starting to get to him, they were just so... happy; it was downright disturbing.

Everything was going as planned, until Draco got a letter in the mail. It happened just as he and his two roommates were getting ready for bed – Draco for the bed, the other two for the mattress on the floor. A tapping on the window drew their attention, Hermione and Ginny looked at each other in confusion; almost everyone they exchanged owls with was staying in the house with them, so who could this one be from?

Ginny opened the window and reached towards the owl, but it wouldn't let her touch it, instead it flew over to Draco and landed on the arm he had stretched out when he noticed it was coming towards him. He carefully unrolled the letter as the owl flew away, apparently having been told not to wait for a response.

Draco went completely white as he read the contents of the message, dropping it to the floor. Hermione cast a silencing on the room in case Malfoy started the girly screaming thing he seemed to do when he was really surprised by something, like his newly green hair.

As Draco sat heavily on the bed, Ginny picked up the letter and read it, going as white as he had been before, looking from 'Mallory' to the letter and back again. Hermione snatched the letter out of Ginny's hands and read it over herself, feeling her stomach drop as she read the few lines on the message.

Draco,

You parents came to visit today, and they found out you're not here. I got quite the lecture from both your father and my mother, you owe me, green hair debt or not. I don't know where you are, but I recommend hiding, I'm not sure it's a good idea for them to find you when they're this mad.

Blaise

"Okay, what's going on?" Ginny asked, looking from Hermione to Mallory and back again, taking in their pale complexions and anxious expressions. Mallory's green hair suddenly made a lot more sense and a horrible realization dawned on her as she continued to look between the two, waiting for an answer.

"Mallory is MALFOY?" She yelled in horror, running to the other side of the room to put as much distance between herself and the Slytherin as she could.