CHAPTER 9

"What's up with you?" Parvati shot Ginny a curious look when the distressed redhead sighed for the nth time that night. They were all sitting around the fire in the nearly empty (save for the three girls and their friend Hermione, who was reading a book in the other side of the room) Gryffindor common room, after a very satisfying supper in the Great Hall.

"H-huh?" Ginny looked up at her friend's searching eyes sharply and shook her head quite roughly, sending her read hair whipping around her face. "Nothing, nothing! Everything's perfectly fine."

Lavender cocked a brow at her friend, a habit that she had attained from spending too much time with her Slytherin husband. "Really? You seemed really bothered during dinner. You stared at your plate the whole time, and you hardly even touched your food." She cocked her head to the side, furrowing her brows. "Yes, that's very weird behavior, coming from you." She added as an afterthought.

"Say, does this have anything to do with Draco? You were acting normally before the bonding session." Parvati said, a suspicious look dawning over her face.

"No, no. Of course not!" Ginny replied a little too quickly.

Now it was Parvati's turn to cock a brow at her friend. "Have I told you that you're a terrible liar?"

Ginny paled. "Fine." She huffed. Her two friends looked at her expectantly, then she huffed again. Before she could huff a third time, Parvati intervened.

"Spit it out already." Her arms were crossed across her chest, and she had assumed her no-nonsense face. Lavender mirrored Parvati's actions.

Ginny shot her two friends a look that was a cross between irritation, indignation and helplessness. Resigning to her fate, she replied. "Malfoykissedmeandicantbelieveilikedit."

Lavender and Parvati did a double take. "Pardon?" They asked simultaneously.

Ginny let out a shuddering breath. "Malfoy kissed me." She said slowly. "And I can't believe I liked it." She added a bit later. She transferred her gaze on her hands to her friends. "Why don't you two looked surprised or disgusted or… both?"

"Gin, why on earth would we be disgusted? It's Draco Malfoy! The Slytherin sex god! The hottest boy in the British Isles!" Parvati seemed to feel the need to remind her friend of just how perfect Draco Malfoy was.

Ginny shut her eyes. "I am going to pretend that you did not just say that." She opened her eyes again. "You don't find this surprising at all?"

Lavender shrugged. "I guess I expected that it would happen sooner or later."

"What?!" Ginny shrieked, feeling terribly offended. What was that supposed to mean?

"It's not that you're like every other girl who has no immunity to his charm and utter sexiness, Gin. It's just that everyone who's smart enough to admit it knows that you two are perfect for each other." Lavender didn't appear to be joking, but Ginny shot her friends an incredulous look anyway.

"What in the name of Hermione's granny knickers are you talking about?" She spluttered. "We are not perfect for each other!"

"Hey!" Hermione yelled defensively from across the room. "Granny knickers are comfy!"

"Yeah but, whatever!" Ginny quickly dismissed the older girl. "We are not perfect for each other!"

"Yeah so obviously, you aren't smart enough to admit it." Parvati rolled her eyes.

"I am smart! All of you are just…mad! Completely, insanely mad!"

"We are not mad, Ginny. It's ridiculously obvious, really." Parvati said in a way that seemed like she was telling a four-year old that the boogey man did not exist, which it so obviously did. Only in the wizarding world, they were called Boggarts.

"Oh, you're mad. You're all just too bonkers to admit it." Ginny replied hotly as she furiously stormed up her room. She expected even just a smidgen of sympathy from her best friends, but obviously, she wasn't about to get any. They all seemed particularly gleeful about her predicament and it pissed the hell out of Ginny.

"Well, you look bothered." Blaise commented a bit offhandedly as he lounged on a green sofa in the Slytherin common room. The three boys were the only occupants, as there was a party in the room of requirement, and most of the Slytherins were already there. The three boys decided to lounge in the common room by themselves before heading for the party. Pansy, on the other hand, had curiously vanished after dinner, and the three boys didn't even want to think about where she might've gone, or rater, who she might've gone to.

Dave's eyes flickered briefly from his book to his friend, then back again to what he was reading. "Yeah, Draco. You do." He confirmed Blaise's statement in the same nonchalant tone.

"I am not bothered, you nances. I'm merely contemplating life." Draco replied in a tone that rivaled his two friends' nonchalant ones. He was sitting on his couch, which was adjacent to the fire place. He had spent the last ten minutes staring at the fire, but he immediately turned his attention to the carpet when he realized that the fire reminded him of Ginny's hair. Stupid, stupid Weasleys and their annoying red hair.

"Ah, life. I guess you realized your life isn't worth much, huh Malfoy?" Blaise drawled. He was buffing his nails, and the topic of life didn't seem to appeal to him at all.

"My life is worth much more than any of yours will ever be. My parents aren't death eaters, I'm the heir to a gargantuan fortune, I'm incredibly handsome and smart…"

"Get over yourself, Draco. You've obviously done something that you regret." Dave interrupted Draco's enumeration of the benefits of being him.

"I have done nothing I regret doing." Draco replied hotly.

"Ah, so you kissed Ginny." Blaise's attention piqued at Draco's reaction to what Blaise had just said. So it was true. He put down his buffer and turned to look at his blond friend.

"You kissed Ginny." He repeated. Draco didn't confirm or deny his statement, and a few moments passed as the three friends sat in silence.

"Was she good? Someone as feisty as her must be a really good kisser." Blaise smirked, knowing that saying something like that would definitely get on Draco's nerves.

"Ye-No! Shut up." Draco looked curiously like a four year old. All pouty and indignant, with his arms crossed across his chest.

Blaise and Dave snickered. "So she was that good."

Draco just huffed and turned his back on his friends to look at the fire-again.

"But it obviously isn't just about the kissing." Blaise's self-assured tone pissed the hell out of Draco, but his aggravation was mostly caused by the fact that Blaise was right.

"You like her!" Dave practically yelled (but not too loud, because Slytherins have far too much dignity to go around yelling loudly), the smugness reverberating in his voice.

Before Draco could disagree, Blaise interjected. "There's no use denying it, mate. It's ridiculously obvious. I know this because even Crabbe and Goyle are beginning to notice things."

"What things, exactly?" Draco replied in a dangerously low voice.

"Well, you have been acting a little bit cheerful these days. And you've beaten up two Slytherin 6th years who've had the misfortune of talking about how hot Ginny is with you within earshot this morning."

"Oh, right." Draco replied. He had almost forgotten about the two boys. The fury had gotten to his head, and he had beaten the two boys up before he could even realize what he was doing. That time, he had told himself that he was just acting like a decent husband would, and he was just staying faithful to Trelawny's rule of being as realistic as possible. Now he had that nagging feeling that Blaise might actually be right.

"How are the two fools?" Draco asked, not really caring about their welfare.

"Oh, Madam Pomfrey seemed to buy the story of them crashing down the stairs. They looked pretty battered and pulpy earlier." Dave replied thoughtfully.

"Serves those two bastards right for being so disrespectful." Draco muttered.

Dave and Blaise snickered again. "What? You would do the same thing to anyone who talked about your wives."

"So are you admitting that you like Ginny Weasley?" Blaise wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at the blond.

"I can tolerate her much more than her brother, if that's what you mean." Draco replied evenly.

"No, it is not what I mean. And you know perfectly well what I mean." Blaise rolled his eyes. Really, Draco could be really daft/stubborn sometimes. "In this case though, I think the right question is do you love Ginny Weasley?"

"Draco shot his friends a sharp look, indicating that he wanted to drop the topic at hand. "I think it's time for us to head to the Room of Requirement."

"But things were just starting to get interesting here!" Dave interjected.

Draco's icy glare shut his friend up.

"The Room of Requirement it is." Dave announced, getting up to head for the portrait, leaving Blaise snickering behind his back, and Draco, looking as broody as ever. (But still unbelievably, undeniably hot)

"Do we really have to go?" Ginny whined as her two friends shuffled through their closets, haphazardly discarding rejected clothes over their shoulders. Ginny was sitting down on her bed in her knickers, watching her friends as they scavenged the closets, pouting a bit because her friends were so blatantly ignoring her. After what seemed like a thousand light years, Parvati slowly straightened up and turned to her.

"Yes, Ginny. We have to go."

"But WHY?"

Parvati folded her hands across her chest. "Because. Now hurry up and put this on." Parvati unfolded her hands and tossed something gold and shimmery at Ginny. Something Ginny assumed to be a handkerchief. She caught it carelessly in her hands, and a bemused look settled in her face.

"You want me to put on a handkerchief?"

"It's a dress, silly." Lavender giggled a bit at her friend's daftness.

Ginny pinched the sides of the so-called "dress" and let it unfurl in front of her. It was indeed, a dress. A dark gold dress that shimmered in the light. She scrunched up her face a bit at the thought of wearing something so revealing, but she hurriedly put it on anyway. The thin straps showed of her creamy shoulders, and she was relieved to see that it covered at least a third of her thighs. Her friends usually made her wear dresses much shorter.

She looked up at her friends to see that they had changed clothes as well. Parvati was in a little black dress and Lavender was wearing a royal blue one. They had already fixed their hair and make up, so they promptly turned to Ginny to bombard her with beauty spells as well. A few minutes later, Parvati and Lavender had decided that they were ready to go.

The music was loud. There was lots of moaning involved, and the beat was fast and catchy. Draco had concluded that they were playing music by Lianna, a witch whose music almost every teenage wizard and witch found perfect for parties such as this. Draco didn't like it.

It was also very crowded. Everyone was crammed in the dance floor, but Draco didn't really mind, as he had the open bar all to himself. His two friends who had disappeared into the crowd the moment they arrived suddenly appeared before him.

"Witherward has been staring at you all evening, mate!" Blaise yelled to be heard over the loud beats reverberating in the room.

"Who?" Draco asked, not looking the least bit interested.

Dave rolled his eyes and laughed. "You know who. Witherward. The Ravenclaw you made out with before, making Ginny threaten to castrate you among other things for risking your grade."

Draco casually sipped at his third fire whisky. He was getting a little bit woozy.

"Okay." He replied. So what if Grace Witherward was staring at him? All girls (and quite a number of guys) stared at him. It wasn't his fault he was so handsome.

"Knew it." Blaise announced decisively.

"Knew what?" Draco narrowed his eyes at his friend.

But before Blaise could reply to Draco's question, the said Ravenclaw slut squeezed her way through the crowd and into Draco's side.

"Hey Draco." She murmured huskily, smirking sexily at him.

Draco took one look at her dark ebony hair, a color that was completely not red, and decided he did not like her. Before he could tell her to piss off, however, she managed to pull his head down towards hers and crash her lips into his.

When Grace pulled away from him a few moments later, there was a wicked smirk on her lips, and Draco watched her as she tossed a victorious glance towards the door, where Draco spotted Ginny Weasley standing, with her mouth hanging open. For a moment there, Draco thought he might be happier if Ginny were furious not because he might get several points deducted from their grade (which wasn't really possible as there was rightfully no professor in sight), but because she was jealous of Grace.

A fleeting surge of happiness flowed through his veins when Ginny sharply turned on her heel and stormed out the door (she was obviously jealous), but his euphoria was short-lived. Even though Draco Malfoy was only three bottles of fire whisky away from getting drunk, he knew what kind of a mess he had gotten himself into. And it was a big one. A colossal mess, really.

This is the same author's note I posted at the end of the latest chapter of my other story

Hello, everyone! Have you all watched the 5th movie of Harry Potter? Most people found it disappointing, but I personally thought it was okay. By the way, I hate to admit it but movie Draco does absolutely nothing for me, although movie Ginny seems to be getting prettier. But for all of my stories, I'm just going to pretend that they're both drop dead gorgeous, because everyone just loves beautiful people! Haha!

Anyway, I'm sorry this chapter took so long but nevertheless, I hope you all enjoyed it. If you loved it, go ahead and tell me how much by posting a review. It will be greatly appreciated:) If you didn't like it at all, or if you found annoying flaws in my writing, go ahead and tell me. Constructive criticism is also appreciated.

Oh, and P.S., I'm sorry if I stop replying to your reviews, my schedule has gotten a little more hectic, and I've hardly enough time for myself. So, I just want to let you know that I LOVE you all, and I ADORE all your reviews. They're all very encouraging, and they keep me from abandoning my writing.

As for the next chapter, I hope it won't take too long for me to update, but I certainly will, so please don't give up on me! Just review and I will love you all forever. Heehee.

And ONE MORE THING! I have another new story, but it's only a one shot. Not much DG action, but still very sweet. (For me, at least) Now go ahead and read it and remember to review if you want to make my day!:)

I'm sorry for the incredibly long author's note, so I'll just end it here. You all stay lovely and wonderful, alright?

Much love from me!