A/N: Oh. My. Goodness. It's an update. Pigs are flying. Hell is freezing over. I really do apologize for the gigantic gap between these two chapters. There's no excuse for it, none at all. I do maintain, however, that I will finish any story that I start. So, don't worry. There should only be one more chapter, but it will happen! Even if it takes another year...
This chapter has not been edited by my beta, since I don't want to bother her after all this time. Sorry for any mistakes.
This chapter should tie up most of the story into a nice little knot. I apologize if it seems a little sudden.
Disclaimer: If I owned Harry Potter, I'd probably be better at updating on time. Thus, I do not own Harry Potter.
Blaise fell back into the chair Pansy shoved him towards, and smiled amiably as she sat down across from him in a similarly styled green chair. Draco sat beside her, glancing back and forth between them and occasionally allowing his eyes to wander to the paintings on the walls of the common room.
"Start at the beginning," Pansy instructed.
"There's no beginning from which to start from, Pansy dear. I went on a very short date with Weasel. He ran away. I followed him. You arrived. And we all lived happily ever after!" Blaise crossed his arms and grinned.
Pansy raised an eyebrow. "Weasley was blabbering something about you telling him two things, and about one being more correct than the other because she denied it more. What were the two things you told him?"
"As you said, Pansy, he was blabbering. I mentioned something about Potter and Eleanor and he sprinted away."
Draco's voice was quiet, but very deliberate. "How did Harry end up under the influence of a love potion for Ginny Weasley?"
Blaise stared at him, before lowering his eyes. "Miss Weasley brewed a love potion to make Potter fall in love with her, and convinced Eleanor Bradshaw to give it to Potter much in the same fashion that Pansy and I convinced her to give our potion to Potter. And like Miss Weasley, Eleanor administered the love potion freely."
"How do you know?" Pansy took out a quill, and began to rummage in her bag for some parchment.
"I can read minds. I read Miss Weasley's entire plot out of her mind."
Pansy sighed.
Draco raised an eyebrow. "Blaise, whatever happened between me and Harry, you were a large piece of it. You owe it to me to answer these questions."
Blaise snorted. "Ask the Weaselette. You can piece everything together from her."
"Blaise. I'm sure that you know nearly everything that happened. We could try to sort out fact or fiction from the Weasleys' testimonies, but we aren't going to." Draco crossed his legs.
"And if we know everything that happened, Draco and Harry might get back together." Pansy added brightly.
Draco frowned at her, but Blaise nodded. "That's all I wanted, you know. For the two of you to be happy together."
Draco glanced back to him. "So what did you do?"
Blaise sighed. "When Pansy and I screwed up the love potion, it poisoned Potter. You visited him in the hospital wing, and his near death ended up pushing you together, although your relationship was still on shaky ground. So I thought about what I could do to help you out. First, I wanted to eliminate the threat of the Weaselette breaking you up without my permission, so I cast a spell on her diary that would send me a copy of every page she wrote. Then I turned to what I could do to strengthen the relationship you and Potter were already in.
"As I thought about what got you together, a phrase came to mind: 'What doesn't kill us, makes us stronger'. Cheating seemed like the perfect thing that would make your relationship stronger. But considering that I'd already nearly poisoned Potter with my potion-making skills before, I decided that the key would be to put myself under the influence of a potion that would cause me to lust after you, and cause you to cheat on Harry. The Weaselette already had notes on a similar potion that she had described in her diary, so I stole the notes and removed the memory-erasing aspect of the potion. I just lied about not remembering what I'd done. It didn't go according to plan, and you two broke up. The End."
Pansy gaped at him. "Keep talking."
"About what?"
"That wasn't even what we were asking you about. There's got to be more to it. Continue."
"I would prefer not."
"Blaise," Draco gazed at him. "You just told me that you accidentally on purpose broke me up with my boyfriend. I would like to hear the rest of the story."
Blaise lowered his eyes. "Fine. So then I had to get you back together, since it was my fault you broke up. Potter went off dating tons upon tons of girls. You were sulking. Miss Weasley was writing about her dreams of making love potions and administering them through Potter's girlfriends. Pansy, you were acting a little colder towards me, so I cast the same spell on your journal that I had on Miss Weasley's diary. Your protective enchantments on it are not, in fact, that difficult to break through. Anyway. Despite Potter's girlfriends, he still often went to Hogsmeade with Weasley and Granger. I read in Pansy's diary that she was planning to go with Hermione to some Hogsmeade shops for clues the next Hogsmeade weekend. If Granger and Pansy were gone, and I left to go someplace with Ron Weasley, it would leave Potter and Draco alone to hopefully sort out their differences.
"Based on the Weaselette's observations and my own, it was likely that Weasley had a crush on Granger, so I used that information to blackmail Weasley into a date with me the same weekend both Pansy and Granger would be occupied. I lied and said I had information for Granger. I didn't. Nevertheless, it appeared everything was set up for Potter and Draco to at least speak to each other."
Blaise groaned. "And then it all went to hell. Do you need to hear that, too? No, don't answer that," he added as Pansy opened her mouth, "for you'll guilt trip me because I spelled your journal. Never mind.
"The Weaselette must have been too busy brewing the love potion to write in her diary. She didn't write the whole week leading up to this weekend. And then, early this morning, she wrote that she had finished her love potion and would administer it through Eleanor today, and that Eleanor Bradshaw was Potter's new girlfriend who he was going on a date with this afternoon. She got the time wrong, and it appeared that Draco and Potter would still have some time to talk despite the date. The love potion she described was a stupid choice. It was too strong to be unnoticeable, and an antidote would probably be administered soon after he went under its effects."
Blaise paused. "Actually, it worked similarly to how I intended. The date was too early, and I doubt you had much time to talk with Potter, Draco. Sorry about that. On my date with Weasley, he revealed that the date was early enough that the little of my plan I revealed to him wasn't going to go as planned, so I cut the date short. As my 'information', I decided to tell him about his sister's plan in the hope that he could save us a little trouble by preventing Potter from drinking the potion. I also told him that she was the one who gave me the lust potion, so that he might realize that despite her denial of giving the potion to Eleanor, she denied that action more vehemently with more evidence. I forgot his lack of intelligence. It was quite funny to watch the whole thing play out, though."
Blaise blinked. "And that's it, isn't it? Then you dragged me in here and demanded a confession of my crimes. And I've confessed. Am I forgiven?" He smiled and looked up at Pansy and Draco.
Draco stared at him in wonder. "You're mad. You're completely and totally mad. You did all of that, with the intention of helping me, and yet none of them helped me in the slightest."
Blaise frowned. "You didn't even have a small conversation with Potter today?"
"Not a civil one, at least. Because you broke us up, remember?" Draco's hand began to creep towards his wand.
"I really am sorry about that, you know. I was only trying to help."
"And yet, rather than throwing up your hands and saying, 'oh, I guess I can't really help out here, considering how all my plans keep failing miserably', you continued to form more idiotic plans."
"I was trying to correct my mistakes," Blaise muttered. "Miss Ginny Weasley and Miss Eleanor Bradshaw are the ones who screwed it all up."
"And now you're blaming other people-"
"Boys," Pansy admonished. "No fighting, please. Blaise," her eyes rested on him, and he met them steadily, "You did a lot of really idiotic things. But I will forgive you under the following conditions. You will write out the entire story, and give a copy to all of the involved Gryffindors, especially Ginny Weasley and Harry Potter, and you will write a letter of formal apology to Draco, me, Ron Weasley, and Potter, and also deliver a formal verbal apology to Potter. You will also give a copy of the story to Professor Snape, and he can assign you detentions and/or punish you for the school rules you've broken as he sees fit. You will also remove all spells you have placed on my journal, and will change the spells on the Weaselette's diary so that I receive copies of her entries as well. Agreed?"
"No formal apology letter to the Weaselette?"
"She had her own things she did wrong. The only thing you did to her is invade her privacy, which I fully approve of."
Blaise shrugged. "Then agreed. I would rather not be punished by Snape, but I assume that you are substituting a school-based punishment in exchange for you not hexing me?"
"Correct."
"Again, I agree to your terms of forgiveness." Blaise looked away from Pansy to watch Draco, who appeared to be carefully observing the floor. "Draco? Your thoughts?"
"You're mad," Draco said, "Absolutely fucking mad."
Blaise grinned. "I thought we established that fact first year?"
"We did. You're mad in an entirely new way now."
"But do you forgive me for the deeds driven by my madness? Or is my madness a deed unforgiven?"
Draco snorted. "Whatever. I'll mostly forgive you under one condition. That you never interfere in my romantic or sexual affairs again."
"I won't, I swear."
Draco looked up and held Blaise's eyes. "Would you sign an unbreakable vow?"
Blaise's response was without hesitation. "No."
Draco paused, and then nodded, extending a hand. Blaise shook it, smiling.
"At least I know you're being truthful again," Draco murmured.
"I'm a Slytherin. I don't sign unbreakable vows if I can help it, especially not ones so open as that. After all, what if I became your boyfriend or lover at some point? Wouldn't that be interfering in your romantic or sexual affairs? But if it's with your permission, does it count as breaking my vow?"
"How much do you think it would sell to the Daily Prophet for?" Pansy asked.
"How much would what sell for? My unbreakable vow?"
Pansy rolled her eyes at Blaise. "This whole story. About Potter's love affair. After everything's resolved, you know? How much would it sell for?"
"A lot." Blaise nodded to himself and turned back to Draco. "And would selling a story of your love affair count as breaking my vow?"
"Shut up about your vow, Blaise," Pansy snapped. "I'm thinking family fortunes here."
"You're not selling this to the Prophet, Pansy," Draco said.
"What if I have Rita Skeeter on standby?"
"Pansy..." Draco sighed and looked away. The fact that she shouldn't sell his love life shouldn't be hard to understand.
Especially considering what people's meddling in his love life had done so far.