Chapter Six

Margo, Charlie, and I were sitting around a table with our butterbeers in the Three Broomsticks, trying to figure out how I was going to break the news to my parents that I wasn't going back to the States with them. Well, Charlie was trying to help; Margo was trying to make me 'admit' that I was staying because of Draco. I don't know why she was so obsessed with him, it's not like I was obsessed with him or anything.

We were getting nowhere.

"Margo, if you don't shut up about Malfoy I'm gonna hex you into the next century!" I threatened.

"Yeah Margo, this isn't about the real reason she's staying in the UK, it's about the reason she's gonna tell her parents!" Charlie insisted, winking. "I mean, she can't tell them it's for a boy, now can she?"

"Yeah, well, I just think she should admit it out loud to herself, first," Margo defended, glancing meaningfully at me.

"Okay, can we move past him?" I complained.

"You could tell them you're joining the Order of the Phoenix!" cried Margo.

"No, I'm not gonna lie. And I couldn't kill people, Margo."

"True. Grace is a bad Slytherin—she's got a pacifist streak," remarked Charlie.

"Shut it, you! I'm a great Slytherin!" I hissed at her like a snake, and we all laughed.

I wasn't a big fan of going to Hogsmeade—I much preferred relaxing and exploring the castle on my days off—but the other two had had five years to do that, so I went with Margo and Charlie every once in a while. When I felt really nice, and not like sleeping until noon.

It was the middle of October—I remember because I'd gotten a really nice tan jacket that day, and was wearing it contentedly, and because we were talking about fall colors—when I learned that Snape was trying to help Draco on his super-secret, I'll-die-if-I-can't-complete-it mission.

I still wasn't all that good at keeping secrets, so it was just another thing to add the the ever-growing list of things to stress over.

Anyway, I was talking to Margo and Charlie—hissing like a snake—when Snape appeared behind me and asked if I had seen Draco that day.

"I saw him in the common room this morning," I said. "And also at breakfast."

"Are those the only times?" he asked in his normal monotone.

"Yes, sir. If it helps, I haven't seen Crabbe or Goyle either. And Draco ate more than normal at breakfast, so he must be doing something that requires energy," I spoke slowly, recounting what I had noticed about Draco that morning, and hoping vainly that Margo and Charlie weren't noticing how much I'd noticed the boy this morning.

Snape just nodded and went to leave. "I trust you all know better than to talk of this," he said, glancing sternly at Margo and Charlie before he swept out.

The moment he was gone they began to tease me mercilessly over what they dubbed my Draco-obsessive-disorder, while I zoned out, trying to figure out why Snape was looking for Draco. The very fact that he came into the Three Broomsticks to ask the only Slytherin in the bar revealed how important it was that he find him, for Snape was never one to leave the castle if he didn't have to. If he was worried about him it only showed through his inflection; something the other two girls wouldn't have picked up on. I wanted to believe that he was looking for him on a mission for Dumbledore, but I couldn't help feel that that was wishful thinking.

I didn't want there to be any other reason for it, though, so I tuned back into the conversation. Margo and Charlie were fighting over who would pay the tab, and when I said I would pay it Charlie laughing exclaimed, "She has returned from the dead!" to which Margo whisper-yelled, "Zombie!" and we ran from the bar.

"Hey!" I heard as we exited.

I ran back in to pay the tab and apologize to Rosmerta, then chased them out again to the sound of her chuckles.

Later that day, I was lying on my bed reading a letter from my parents, when Draco jumped on, closed the curtains, and cast a Muffliato.

"Well, good afternoon," I said. "Hiding from Pansy again? I didn't think you were such a coward."

He scoffed and ignored me, making himself comfortable, lying with his hands behind his head staring at the few pictures I had Spellotaped to the roof of my bed canopy.

Deciding that he would come out with whatever he wanted to say at some point, I returned to my letter, oddly comfortable in his presence.

"No boys?" he finally asked, gesturing to the pictures.

"Unless you count my dad and that cute little boy to my right in this picture," I replied, pointing to a picture taken of me and the little brunette I had babysat in Maine. "He wanted to marry me."

Draco smirked at me. "He'll be happy you're going back then."

I turned onto my side and stared at him in astonishment. "How do you know my parents want to go back?"

"Read your letter," he stated nonchalantly.

My stare turned into one of indignation, and I hit him soundly on his stomach. "How dare you!"

"Easily. So when are you leaving?"

I rolled back onto my back and stared resolutely at the ceiling. "I'm not."

It was his turn to roll onto his side and stare at me in astonishment, though his was better hidden than mine. "Why not?"

"Oh I don't know, I just don't want to leave yet."

"What are you going to do here, if you don't leave with them?"

"Careful there Malfoy, I might start to think you care about me," I retorted sarcastically, annoyed that he didn't drop it.

"You shouldn't be going against your parents. Family is the most important thing," he replied, anger seeping through his polished tones.

"I agree, and yet I'm going to need to live on my own someday anyway, might as well start now," I commented, sensing that we weren't entirely talking about me anymore. "I can't see spending my whole life living with them, or even near them. I want to be my own individual, and to do that I need to be away from them for a while."

He continued to stare at me for a while, formulating a response. "Well if that's how you feel about it why haven't you told them yet? They still think you're going," he pointed at my letter.

"I haven't figured out how to tell them. They'll be super-mad and I don't want them to worry about me, but they will, and my mom will cry, and I'll probably get a Howler from my dad for making her cry-"

"Okay, okay, I get it," he cut me off. "You're a coward."

"I just don't like causing pain unnecessarily."

"If it's not necessary why aren't you just leaving with them?"

"Because it's what I want. And it's time I start making my own choices," I glanced at him to see if he was going to fight me on this some more.

He looked at me like he had swallowed something rotten and turned back to the ceiling with a sigh.

"So what are you going to do here?" he asked.

"Why do you want to know so badly?" I looked at him quizzically.

"Because Voldemort's alive, stupid. If you don't get out of the country you better have a good plan for hiding from him."

I rolled my eyes and continued to stare at the ceiling, annoyed at his attempt to pry into my life.

"Why are you here, Malfoy?"

"Snape"-he spit the name out with disgust-"found me and said he'd been looking for me all morning, even going so far as to ask you where I was," he stared at me, daring me to affirm his statement.

"Yeah, he came all the way out to the Three Broomsticks to find me. Must have been awful worried about you," I replied, hoping to get a rise out of the boy.

He stared at me angrily. "Snape needs to learn that I can take care of myself," he snarled.

"How much have you eaten today?"

He stared at me, confused.

"That's what I thought. You don't even eat right; how is anyone supposed to believe that you can take care of yourself?"

"It's not like anyone at this school cares about that," he stated nastily.

"Snape apparently does."

"Ha. Snape's just doing what my mother wants him to do. You should hear her letters. 'Snape's a smart man, he can help.' 'Snape might have ideas, you should talk to him.' 'Snape knows more about this than anyone, why don't you ask him?'" he scowled, and continued bitterly. "I'm not an idiot; I know when people think I'm not good enough."

I just looked at him, unsure what to say, but sure that if I said anything it would be the wrong thing. It was odd, realizing that he wasn't as strong as he pretended to be, and even odder wishing I could help him have that strength for real.

I let him sleep in my bed that night, hoping I could provide a place where nothing was expected of him for this boy who slouched as if he bore the weight of the world on his shoulders.