More Than One Way Home (2/7) - Draco/Ginny
Title: More Than One Way Home
Author: Vesica
Rating: NC-17
Pairings: Draco/Ginny with hints of Ron/Hermione, Harry/Pansy
Summary: It hasn’t always been an easy road for them, but sometimes it takes getting really good and lost to find the way home again.
II. Can I help? (to a stranger)
Goodbyes had been said and the train departed amid a sea of waving hands; the parents trying not to look too teary for fear of setting off their little ones; the students, the first years especially, watching from the train windows as their parents grew smaller and smaller until they seemed to disappear entirely.
The crowd on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters didn’t move as the train disappeared from sight, starting after it for several long sniffled-filled minutes after it could no longer be seen. Slowly, a few parents at a time, the crowd came back to life and started to make their way out of the station.
“Are you alright?” Draco asked, taking his wife’s arm and linking it through his.
Ginny snuffled a bit, and wiped away the few tears that had escaped despite her best efforts. “Oh, I’ll be fine. Just hard to see both of them go off to school…”
“I know, dear.” He patted her arm and quickly changed the subject. “Let’s go see to that shopping you wanted to do while we’re in town.”
They headed off to Flourish and Blotts, still standing after all these years.
Ginny pulled out her list and was soon lost in the stacks, on a treasure hunt for this book and that scroll she’d been meaning to pick up for ages. For every book on her list, she found two or three more than simply had to come home with her.
She’d gratefully sent her second armful of books off with an attentive clerk, when she rounded the corner and saw a positively tiny witch who looked older than the earth itself struggling to retrieve a large tome from the top shelf.
“Here, let me help.” Her husband fished the book out of the tightly packed shelf and held it out to the woman.
“Why, thank you! So few gentlemen around these days.” The elderly witch cooed, beaming up at Draco as if he’d just slain a rabid hippogriff on her behalf.
Ginny couldn’t hear what he said in reply, but the witch giggled like a schoolgirl. His gallant bow produced more giggles and the witch affectionately patted his cheek before tottering off down the row.
She was smiling her way off to find the next book on her list, but inside a cold tendril of emotion uncoiled in her belly, sending a shiver up her spine.
She said nothing about what she’d seen and she was a little surprised when he said nothing about the huge pile of books waiting at the register.
It took her quite a while to get the mountain of books sorted. The clerk found her eclectic mix of novels, children’s fairy stories and history books fascinating and asked her quite a few questions as he rang them up. Watching the stack grow as he brought her various browsing piles together, she decided the small charge was well worth having them delivered by floo the next day, rather than trying to haul them along on the rest of her errands.
Draco waited by the door through all this, staring distractedly out the shop window and nervously tapping his gloves against his leg.
When she finally joined him, he suggested a brief break from her liquidation of their assets for elevenses.
The Golden Newt wasn’t particularly crowded and soon they had a steaming pot of tea and some nibbles set before them. They chitchatted, as long-time couples are wont to do, about various things to be done around the house and letters that had arrived from mutual friends. Basically, they talked about nothing.
Yet, there was a strange energy to the conversation, a frantic sort of drive on both their parts to keep the light conversation going.
As he fished some Sickles from his pocket for the tab, he cleared his throat nervously. “Would you be terribly upset about finishing the rest of your shopping alone? I was hoping to pop into the office this afternoon, there a few little things I should really see to.”
She felt a tiny pang of disappointment but it was lost in the wave of relief that came over her. At least they wouldn’t be straining their brains for nothing to talk about for the rest of the day.
She shrugged as they stepped back out into Diagon Alley. “No worries. And I will try not to spend all our money in one go!”
“Yes, well. Um, the car is at your disposal the rest of the day. See you at home, darling.” With a quick peck on the cheek, he headed off.
Watching him go, the coldness within, impervious to the liter of scalding tea she’d just downed cup after cup of, tightened into a hard stone and suddenly she had a name for these feeling.
Ginny Malfoy was afraid, profoundly afraid.
~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~
Something was very wrong with Draco Malfoy. It was so obvious to Ginny, once she started paying attention, and she marveled that no one else seemed to see it.
Everyone knew he’d had something to do with the terrible events of last year, but no one knew just what. The first few weeks of school the rumors had been flying about why on earth the Headmistress had even allowed him to return to Hogwarts.
And not just return, if the talk was to be believed. It was said he’d never left, staying at the castle all summer, in hiding from his father and agents of the Dark Lord.
Three quarters of the school continued to avoid him because he was Slytherin and they’d always avoided him. This newest information only confirmed what they already knew - that he was rotten to the core and would off them all without hesitation if he was given half a chance.
But she was surprised to see that most of Slytherin was avoiding him as well. There were a few who would sit with him at meals or walk with him to classes, but most of his Housemates looked right through him, pretending he wasn’t even there.
She wasn’t quite sure what to think - doubly so since he had taken to dropping by her previously solitary corner of the library.
Often, he said nothing, simply wandered past with a polite nod in her direction. Once or twice he had wished her a good day and on one very unusual occasion he had inquired, in an almost affectionately teasing manner, if the loaned quill was behaving itself or if he needed to have a stern chat with it.
She didn’t think much about his little visits and it wasn’t as if there was a particular pattern to his appearances, so it was safe to say that Malfoy was the furthest thing from her mind that November night when once again, she was frantically trying to finish up a Potions essay.
Try as she might, she had no idea what to say about opinions over the last 400 years about the most effective applications of ginger in potion crafting. She was surrounded by books, nearly drowning in books, and not a damned one of them was helping.
“This is hopeless,” she groaned, collapsing face-first into the volume in front of her.
“I suppose I’ll have to take a job selling ice pops at the shore. Surely they won’t care I failed out of sixth form Potions.”
She jumped at the soft, sad, silvery voice she was getting to know all too well. “That seems a bit dire. Perhaps I can help?”
She looked up, not bothering to hide her confusion. “How can you help?”
“Well, I am rather brilliant at potions…”
“And so modest too,” she sniped, her words coming out a bit more mean-spirited than she’d intended. She kept her tone carefully neutral as she rephrased her question. “I meant why would you help?”
“I don’t have any pressing engagements. Besides,” he shrugged, “if I go back to the dungeons now, my housemates will only spend the next two hours throwing Exploding Snap cards at my closed door. Might as well wait until they go to bed.”
He offered the information without a flicker of embarrassment or sadness, simply stating the fact with a sort of tired resignation.
She found herself feeling rather embarrassed on his behalf and only managed a rather lame “Oh” in reply.
“So - what’ll it be? You want me to bugger off or are you going to shove over and let me help?”
Still a little wary, she moved aside and let him pull up a chair beside her. He turned the parchment towards him to read the topic she’d carefully penned at the top, the only words she’d managed to write in the last hour.
“Oh, ho. Ellsway IS evil. She’s actually using Snape’s syllabus. He tortured us with a similar question last year.”
If he noticed her wide-eyed stare, he gave no sign. It was almost like…like he had a sense of humor, which everyone knew was totally impossible.
Scanning the books she’d pulled from the shelves, he fished out a few. “This one has a rather good section on the Nature movements of the late 1770’s - bunch of nonsense about only using the sorts of local and native ingredients used by the witches and wizards that came before. Might have actually accomplished something if they could have ditched the misty-eyed nostalgia in favor of actual logic…”
He handed her the book, now open to the correct page and flipped through another.
“You have to include something about the anti-ginger traditions of the Eastern Europe, stemming from a hundred-year disruption in trade routes from the Near East because of two warring provinces. It was something like 800 years ago and they still almost never use ginger. She won’t be expecting any of you to know that and it’ll impress the Hell out of the old bat…”
As Ginny watched him find passages in half a dozen books, chatting pleasantly the whole time, her thoughts returned to her favorite topic of the last few weeks.
There was something very wrong with Draco Malfoy.
END PART II.
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Author: Vesica
Rating: NC-17
Pairings: Draco/Ginny with hints of Ron/Hermione, Harry/Pansy
Summary: It hasn’t always been an easy road for them, but sometimes it takes getting really good and lost to find the way home again.
II. Can I help? (to a stranger)
Goodbyes had been said and the train departed amid a sea of waving hands; the parents trying not to look too teary for fear of setting off their little ones; the students, the first years especially, watching from the train windows as their parents grew smaller and smaller until they seemed to disappear entirely.
The crowd on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters didn’t move as the train disappeared from sight, starting after it for several long sniffled-filled minutes after it could no longer be seen. Slowly, a few parents at a time, the crowd came back to life and started to make their way out of the station.
“Are you alright?” Draco asked, taking his wife’s arm and linking it through his.
Ginny snuffled a bit, and wiped away the few tears that had escaped despite her best efforts. “Oh, I’ll be fine. Just hard to see both of them go off to school…”
“I know, dear.” He patted her arm and quickly changed the subject. “Let’s go see to that shopping you wanted to do while we’re in town.”
They headed off to Flourish and Blotts, still standing after all these years.
Ginny pulled out her list and was soon lost in the stacks, on a treasure hunt for this book and that scroll she’d been meaning to pick up for ages. For every book on her list, she found two or three more than simply had to come home with her.
She’d gratefully sent her second armful of books off with an attentive clerk, when she rounded the corner and saw a positively tiny witch who looked older than the earth itself struggling to retrieve a large tome from the top shelf.
“Here, let me help.” Her husband fished the book out of the tightly packed shelf and held it out to the woman.
“Why, thank you! So few gentlemen around these days.” The elderly witch cooed, beaming up at Draco as if he’d just slain a rabid hippogriff on her behalf.
Ginny couldn’t hear what he said in reply, but the witch giggled like a schoolgirl. His gallant bow produced more giggles and the witch affectionately patted his cheek before tottering off down the row.
She was smiling her way off to find the next book on her list, but inside a cold tendril of emotion uncoiled in her belly, sending a shiver up her spine.
She said nothing about what she’d seen and she was a little surprised when he said nothing about the huge pile of books waiting at the register.
It took her quite a while to get the mountain of books sorted. The clerk found her eclectic mix of novels, children’s fairy stories and history books fascinating and asked her quite a few questions as he rang them up. Watching the stack grow as he brought her various browsing piles together, she decided the small charge was well worth having them delivered by floo the next day, rather than trying to haul them along on the rest of her errands.
Draco waited by the door through all this, staring distractedly out the shop window and nervously tapping his gloves against his leg.
When she finally joined him, he suggested a brief break from her liquidation of their assets for elevenses.
The Golden Newt wasn’t particularly crowded and soon they had a steaming pot of tea and some nibbles set before them. They chitchatted, as long-time couples are wont to do, about various things to be done around the house and letters that had arrived from mutual friends. Basically, they talked about nothing.
Yet, there was a strange energy to the conversation, a frantic sort of drive on both their parts to keep the light conversation going.
As he fished some Sickles from his pocket for the tab, he cleared his throat nervously. “Would you be terribly upset about finishing the rest of your shopping alone? I was hoping to pop into the office this afternoon, there a few little things I should really see to.”
She felt a tiny pang of disappointment but it was lost in the wave of relief that came over her. At least they wouldn’t be straining their brains for nothing to talk about for the rest of the day.
She shrugged as they stepped back out into Diagon Alley. “No worries. And I will try not to spend all our money in one go!”
“Yes, well. Um, the car is at your disposal the rest of the day. See you at home, darling.” With a quick peck on the cheek, he headed off.
Watching him go, the coldness within, impervious to the liter of scalding tea she’d just downed cup after cup of, tightened into a hard stone and suddenly she had a name for these feeling.
Ginny Malfoy was afraid, profoundly afraid.
~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~
Something was very wrong with Draco Malfoy. It was so obvious to Ginny, once she started paying attention, and she marveled that no one else seemed to see it.
Everyone knew he’d had something to do with the terrible events of last year, but no one knew just what. The first few weeks of school the rumors had been flying about why on earth the Headmistress had even allowed him to return to Hogwarts.
And not just return, if the talk was to be believed. It was said he’d never left, staying at the castle all summer, in hiding from his father and agents of the Dark Lord.
Three quarters of the school continued to avoid him because he was Slytherin and they’d always avoided him. This newest information only confirmed what they already knew - that he was rotten to the core and would off them all without hesitation if he was given half a chance.
But she was surprised to see that most of Slytherin was avoiding him as well. There were a few who would sit with him at meals or walk with him to classes, but most of his Housemates looked right through him, pretending he wasn’t even there.
She wasn’t quite sure what to think - doubly so since he had taken to dropping by her previously solitary corner of the library.
Often, he said nothing, simply wandered past with a polite nod in her direction. Once or twice he had wished her a good day and on one very unusual occasion he had inquired, in an almost affectionately teasing manner, if the loaned quill was behaving itself or if he needed to have a stern chat with it.
She didn’t think much about his little visits and it wasn’t as if there was a particular pattern to his appearances, so it was safe to say that Malfoy was the furthest thing from her mind that November night when once again, she was frantically trying to finish up a Potions essay.
Try as she might, she had no idea what to say about opinions over the last 400 years about the most effective applications of ginger in potion crafting. She was surrounded by books, nearly drowning in books, and not a damned one of them was helping.
“This is hopeless,” she groaned, collapsing face-first into the volume in front of her.
“I suppose I’ll have to take a job selling ice pops at the shore. Surely they won’t care I failed out of sixth form Potions.”
She jumped at the soft, sad, silvery voice she was getting to know all too well. “That seems a bit dire. Perhaps I can help?”
She looked up, not bothering to hide her confusion. “How can you help?”
“Well, I am rather brilliant at potions…”
“And so modest too,” she sniped, her words coming out a bit more mean-spirited than she’d intended. She kept her tone carefully neutral as she rephrased her question. “I meant why would you help?”
“I don’t have any pressing engagements. Besides,” he shrugged, “if I go back to the dungeons now, my housemates will only spend the next two hours throwing Exploding Snap cards at my closed door. Might as well wait until they go to bed.”
He offered the information without a flicker of embarrassment or sadness, simply stating the fact with a sort of tired resignation.
She found herself feeling rather embarrassed on his behalf and only managed a rather lame “Oh” in reply.
“So - what’ll it be? You want me to bugger off or are you going to shove over and let me help?”
Still a little wary, she moved aside and let him pull up a chair beside her. He turned the parchment towards him to read the topic she’d carefully penned at the top, the only words she’d managed to write in the last hour.
“Oh, ho. Ellsway IS evil. She’s actually using Snape’s syllabus. He tortured us with a similar question last year.”
If he noticed her wide-eyed stare, he gave no sign. It was almost like…like he had a sense of humor, which everyone knew was totally impossible.
Scanning the books she’d pulled from the shelves, he fished out a few. “This one has a rather good section on the Nature movements of the late 1770’s - bunch of nonsense about only using the sorts of local and native ingredients used by the witches and wizards that came before. Might have actually accomplished something if they could have ditched the misty-eyed nostalgia in favor of actual logic…”
He handed her the book, now open to the correct page and flipped through another.
“You have to include something about the anti-ginger traditions of the Eastern Europe, stemming from a hundred-year disruption in trade routes from the Near East because of two warring provinces. It was something like 800 years ago and they still almost never use ginger. She won’t be expecting any of you to know that and it’ll impress the Hell out of the old bat…”
As Ginny watched him find passages in half a dozen books, chatting pleasantly the whole time, her thoughts returned to her favorite topic of the last few weeks.
There was something very wrong with Draco Malfoy.
END PART II.
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