Author's Note: I love your comments and feedback, but please be cautious of posting HBP spoilers in your reviews. I haven't finished the book yet, and I know some other people haven't even started.
When Ginny reemerged from her bedroom hours later, Draco was sitting on the couch doing paperwork. Out of sheer frustration, he'd owled the Ministry hoping there was something he could work on at home. Longbottom had gladly handed over some of his work.
He hadn't been near her room – he knew she'd come out when she was ready. And from the state of her disheveled hair and the red mark on her face, she'd been sleeping. "Hey."
Draco put the contract aside and looked at her. "Hello."
She stopped, not sitting on the couch. "I…"
As curious as her husband was, he stopped her. "Don't, Gin. There's nothing left to say."
"Then why do I feel like I hurt you?"
"I'm fine."
The redhead sat on the far end of the couch. "You don't have to lie to me."
"Gin—"
"Look," she interrupted, "I know there's something between us. There always has been. But all it's ever done is hurt us. Do you want that?"
He exhaled harshly. "Does it matter what I want? You've already made up your mind."
"I haven't."
Draco stood and started pacing. "Yes, you have. You want to tease and flirt and play the happily married couple for the press, but when we're here, when it really matters, you shut yourself away in your bedroom. You make decisions for the both of us. I'm not doing this."
Ginny felt her heart squeeze painfully when he started towards the door. "What do you want me to say, Draco? That I'm scared? Well, I am. You were the only one… the only one, and I watched you walk away. If you changed your mind again, I don't know…" she stopped, not sure what to say next.
"How do you know I will?"
"You already have once," she told him.
"At the end of school? I finished! What was I supposed to do, hang around another year, waiting for you to finish? And what do you think I should have done during that year?"
"You didn't have to shag every bloody bint you saw!" his wife yelled.
"You didn't care."
She glared at him. "You bloody prat, you never even asked. You're the one who decided we couldn't see each other. You're the one who broke my heart!"
"It's not like you tried to change my mind, is it?" Draco retorted. He could feel himself grow more and more frustrated by the moment. He knew he needed to get out there before he said something he regretted. Or didn't regret, but still shouldn't admit. "All you had to do was say the words, Gin."
"What words?" Ginny questioned. "I want you? I care about you? Hmmm, Draco? What words?"
"You know—"
"You wanted me to say I loved you?"
Draco felt his heart speed up. "Gin."
The redhead got up off the couch and faced him. "I did. I loved you. There, does that make you happy?"
"No."
"Then what would make you happy, Draco? I don't know what you want from me. And until you tell me, I can't do anything about it."
"I want you!"
"In bed," she said. "You want a bloody shag. I'm sorry, I'm not doing that."
"No, Gin, I don't want a shag. I want you."
Ginny looked up at the tone of his voice. It was soft and he sounded hurt. "This month, Draco. But what about next month when you don't have to be married to me anymore? When someone else catches your eye?"
"That won't happen."
"How do you know?" his wife asked. "How can you be sure?"
"Because I've been bloody in love with you for the last decade!"
She felt all of the color drain from her face. "Draco—"
"No," he cut in. "You want to know how I know? Because I'll tell you." He went to the fireplace, bending down. Ginny watched as he put the fire out. Next, he performed a time-release charm so no one could enter or exit the flat for another hour. "The first time I saw you, when I was twelve, I was a bit fascinated. And disgusted. You were a Weasley, and I was a Malfoy, and it couldn't happen. There was no possibility, so I decided that I'd stay as far from you as possible.
"And then you opened your mouth, Weasley. To defend Potter, of all people. It made me hate him all the more. But I hated you too. For the next several years, I did everything I could to make your life miserable. I stole the Valentine from you and told the whole school. Hell, I cheered when I heard the Heir of Slytherin had taken you down into the Chamber." When she paled, he said, "I didn't know you were the one who opened the thing, Gin. If I'd known … at the time, I might have still cheered. But Father didn't tell me until much later, when he thought I still might join the Dark Lord. He'd bragged about it, and I only hated him more.
"As you know, I either tormented you or ignored you – until I started hearing whispers between classes about you. Different blokes telling stories about snogging you. I'd never been so jealous in my life. You know how we started at school. Except I never bothered to tell you I intentionally sought you out. I threatened the other boys you'd been snogging, but eventually you stopped seeing them anyway. When I finished school, I thought about asking you to marry me."
"Draco."
"Let me finish," the blond said softly. "But I had nothing. No family, no fortune, no future. My father would have killed us both. I left and it was the only thing I could do. But I never forgot about you. I tried for five years, Gin. That's why I shagged everything female that walked. I had to get you out of my head, out of my heart… I had to get away from you."
"So why willingly walk back into my life?" Ginny questioned. "You didn't have to obey your father. He's in prison, he couldn't have hurt you."
"Never, ever underestimate the reach of Lucius Malfoy. You won't be safe until he's dead."
Ginny knew he was right. "You walked back into my life with all of these feelings? Never felt like sharing them with me?"
"How is it possible you don't know, Gin? Don't you know I love you? That I've always loved you?"
***
"Ginny!" Draco yelled, knocking on the door. "Open up!"
She sat up in the bed and rubbed the heel of her against her face. Had she fallen asleep? "Draco?"
"Open this damn door, Weasley! Your prat brother is here and I'm tired of your sulking."
Her brother? "Draco?"
"Gin, open up."
Ginny got up and used her wand to remove the charm on the door. She pulled the door open and came face to face with her husband. "Sorry, I fell asleep."
"There's a Weasley here, wants to see you."
"Draco—"
He held up his hand. "Talk to your brother. I'm going out."
"Out?"
Draco took his wand out of his pocket. "Out."
Ginny sighed heavily, knowing they needed to talk. She thought for a moment about her dream – was it wishful thinking or just her conscious catching up with her?
Closing her door, she went down the hall. Bill was sitting on the leather couch looking distinctly uncomfortable.
Great. This wasn't exactly what she didn't need. Because what – or who rather – she needed had just Apparated away.
Ginny smiled warmly at her oldest brother. She hoped her expression hid all of the anguish she was feeling from Draco's sudden and unexplained departure. "Bill. I wasn't expecting you."
Her brother looked past her, into the hallway. "Did Draco leave?"
"Yes, he had an appointment…his solicitors, I believe."
Bill frowned, taking a moment to study the youngest Weasley. "You're a horrible liar, Gin. Always have been." He smiled gently at her. "Why don't you tell me what's going on?"
"Draco and I…" she began. Ginny couldn't finish her sentence.
"Is there something wrong?"
"Please don't me nice to me," his sister told him. "You'll hate me once you find out."
"Find out?"
"That…" Ginny stopped, seemingly realizing what she'd almost admitted. Taking a moment, she wiped the few tears that escaped from her cheeks. "I'm sorry. I'm just a mess."
Blue eyes searched brown, as Bill tried to read his sisters' thoughts. There was something she wasn't telling him, but he didn't know what it was. If none of the others did, Bill hadn't missed Ginny not admitting her love for Draco during their visit. She'd only stated she was where she wanted to be, doing what she wanted to do. Which could have a thousand different meanings. "Gin, if I ask you a question, do you promise to be honest with me?"
"Of course."
"Does Malfoy have you under the Imperius?"
"What?"
"Did he put you under an Unforgivable and make you marry him?"
Ginny stood and glared down at him. With her hands on her hips, Bill absently noted she looked like a younger version of Molly Weasley. "I assure you, I was in full control of myself when I married Draco."
"Are you pregnant?"
Her eyes widened. "No."
"Are you sure?" Bill questioned. "Have you checked recently?"
His sister sighed heavily. She took her seat again. "Bill, I'm not pregnant. I would tell you about something like that. I don't plan on being pregnant for a long, long time."
"That's good." The oldest Weasley brother smiled happily at his sister, a weight almost visibly lifted from his shoulders. "No breeding little Malfoys for you. Glad to hear it."
Ginny shook her head. "That doesn't mean there won't ever be little Malfoys, Bill. Draco and I are married. We do…"
Bill grimaced at her meaning. "I'm still trying to get used to the idea that you're married to him, love."
"So no introducing sex into the equation just yet?"
"Ginny!"
She grinned at him. Ginny took his hand in hers and smiled. "I love you because you care. But I know what I'm doing. I didn't wake up Monday morning and decide I wanted to marry Draco Malfoy. This… thing between us has been going on since Hogwarts."
"Hogwarts? You and Malfoy were together at Hogwarts?"
"Not together in the way you're thinking," she assured him. "I care about him, Bill. I have for a long, long time. After I got over the silly crush I had on Harry, I fell hard for Draco."
"You married him because you wanted to, didn't you?"
Ginny nodded. "Yes."
Bill stood then. "That's what I came here to find out. I needed to be sure."
His sister stood and hugged him tightly. "Thank you."
"I didn't do anything. I was only being a brother. You know you're the only sister I have."
"Don't ever forget it, either."
Bill slipped on a black leather jacket. "I should go. Mum's expecting me. It's time for her weekly lecture about my hair."
Ginny grinned at him. "You know you love it."
"I do," he admitted. Leaning down, Bill kissed her forehead. "And I love you."
"I love you, too." Ginny followed him to the door.
"Tell Malfoy I said to take care of you."
"Draco. And I will."
Bill pulled the door open. "Draco."
"Thank you." When he was gone, she pushed the door closed. Ginny let her forehead rest against it for a moment, replaying the conversation in her head. She was slightly taken back by realizing she hadn't lied to Bill once.
She did care about Draco. Had cared about him for a long time, no matter the distance between them. Since the moment she'd first kissed him, Draco Malfoy had taken up residence in her heart. At that point, he'd stopped being a Malfoy and was just Draco.
She was falling in love with him all over again. Ginny looked down at the platinum rings on her left hand, and they suddenly felt like they meant something. She was married to him and he liked kissing her. He'd wanted to shag her earlier, before she'd called things off. Draco was attracted to her, that much was obvious.
For the rest of the afternoon, Ginny worked on different things in the flat. Thoughts of Draco and love consumed her mind, so she worked on rearranging the living room. Once she was satisfied, she went to the kitchen. Using her wand, she switched the contents of the drawers around. Next, she took all of the plates out of the cabinets and moved them to different cabinets.
Ginny worked her way through the rest of the flat, changing things to suit her tastes. She was too busy analyzing different aspects of their marriage to think if Draco would like the changes or not. In the living room, she transfigured two extra chairs into matching end tables and placed pictures of their families (she'd found pictures of Draco and his Mum in his room) on them. Above the fireplace, she left several empty frames. Those would need to be filled up with pictures of them.
In her room, she changed the colour scheme. Instead of the Slytherin green from before, Ginny went with a neutral cream colour, accenting it with dark red. When she was finished, there was a desk (that was once a night table) sitting at the far end of the room, looking out over the cliff. The blinds were removed in favor of natural light and she'd done a cleaning charm on the carpet. After she'd finished all of this, Ginny set about unpacking all of her things. She hung the different robes from Madam Malkin in the wardrobe, put her clothes away in the drawers, and spread her things over the surface of the room.
When she was finished, she put the only picture taken of them together while at Hogwarts on the table by her bed. It was perfect. Ginny left the room, shutting the door behind her. She glanced out the window and frowned. It was after dark now, and Draco still wasn't home.
The redhead considered her options carefully before crossing the hall and opening the door to Draco's bedroom. For the next few hours, she busied herself with transforming his bedroom as well. Again, she changed the colour scheme to something cream-based. This time, however, instead of red she chose a dark green. Ginny knew any self-respecting Slytherin – particularly Draco – would refuse to sleep in a bedroom with red walls. But at least this way, it wasn't so obvious. She could manage with cream and green – just no silver and green, the way it'd been before.
When she was finished, Ginny noticed it was after midnight. Still no Draco. She lay down on his bed, knowing he'd come home eventually. Ginny would just wait for him. She crossed her legs at the ankles and pulled the Falmouth Falcons throw from the bottom of the bed and covered herself with it.
Ginny was asleep within minutes.
When Ginny reemerged from her bedroom hours later, Draco was sitting on the couch doing paperwork. Out of sheer frustration, he'd owled the Ministry hoping there was something he could work on at home. Longbottom had gladly handed over some of his work.
He hadn't been near her room – he knew she'd come out when she was ready. And from the state of her disheveled hair and the red mark on her face, she'd been sleeping. "Hey."
Draco put the contract aside and looked at her. "Hello."
She stopped, not sitting on the couch. "I…"
As curious as her husband was, he stopped her. "Don't, Gin. There's nothing left to say."
"Then why do I feel like I hurt you?"
"I'm fine."
The redhead sat on the far end of the couch. "You don't have to lie to me."
"Gin—"
"Look," she interrupted, "I know there's something between us. There always has been. But all it's ever done is hurt us. Do you want that?"
He exhaled harshly. "Does it matter what I want? You've already made up your mind."
"I haven't."
Draco stood and started pacing. "Yes, you have. You want to tease and flirt and play the happily married couple for the press, but when we're here, when it really matters, you shut yourself away in your bedroom. You make decisions for the both of us. I'm not doing this."
Ginny felt her heart squeeze painfully when he started towards the door. "What do you want me to say, Draco? That I'm scared? Well, I am. You were the only one… the only one, and I watched you walk away. If you changed your mind again, I don't know…" she stopped, not sure what to say next.
"How do you know I will?"
"You already have once," she told him.
"At the end of school? I finished! What was I supposed to do, hang around another year, waiting for you to finish? And what do you think I should have done during that year?"
"You didn't have to shag every bloody bint you saw!" his wife yelled.
"You didn't care."
She glared at him. "You bloody prat, you never even asked. You're the one who decided we couldn't see each other. You're the one who broke my heart!"
"It's not like you tried to change my mind, is it?" Draco retorted. He could feel himself grow more and more frustrated by the moment. He knew he needed to get out there before he said something he regretted. Or didn't regret, but still shouldn't admit. "All you had to do was say the words, Gin."
"What words?" Ginny questioned. "I want you? I care about you? Hmmm, Draco? What words?"
"You know—"
"You wanted me to say I loved you?"
Draco felt his heart speed up. "Gin."
The redhead got up off the couch and faced him. "I did. I loved you. There, does that make you happy?"
"No."
"Then what would make you happy, Draco? I don't know what you want from me. And until you tell me, I can't do anything about it."
"I want you!"
"In bed," she said. "You want a bloody shag. I'm sorry, I'm not doing that."
"No, Gin, I don't want a shag. I want you."
Ginny looked up at the tone of his voice. It was soft and he sounded hurt. "This month, Draco. But what about next month when you don't have to be married to me anymore? When someone else catches your eye?"
"That won't happen."
"How do you know?" his wife asked. "How can you be sure?"
"Because I've been bloody in love with you for the last decade!"
She felt all of the color drain from her face. "Draco—"
"No," he cut in. "You want to know how I know? Because I'll tell you." He went to the fireplace, bending down. Ginny watched as he put the fire out. Next, he performed a time-release charm so no one could enter or exit the flat for another hour. "The first time I saw you, when I was twelve, I was a bit fascinated. And disgusted. You were a Weasley, and I was a Malfoy, and it couldn't happen. There was no possibility, so I decided that I'd stay as far from you as possible.
"And then you opened your mouth, Weasley. To defend Potter, of all people. It made me hate him all the more. But I hated you too. For the next several years, I did everything I could to make your life miserable. I stole the Valentine from you and told the whole school. Hell, I cheered when I heard the Heir of Slytherin had taken you down into the Chamber." When she paled, he said, "I didn't know you were the one who opened the thing, Gin. If I'd known … at the time, I might have still cheered. But Father didn't tell me until much later, when he thought I still might join the Dark Lord. He'd bragged about it, and I only hated him more.
"As you know, I either tormented you or ignored you – until I started hearing whispers between classes about you. Different blokes telling stories about snogging you. I'd never been so jealous in my life. You know how we started at school. Except I never bothered to tell you I intentionally sought you out. I threatened the other boys you'd been snogging, but eventually you stopped seeing them anyway. When I finished school, I thought about asking you to marry me."
"Draco."
"Let me finish," the blond said softly. "But I had nothing. No family, no fortune, no future. My father would have killed us both. I left and it was the only thing I could do. But I never forgot about you. I tried for five years, Gin. That's why I shagged everything female that walked. I had to get you out of my head, out of my heart… I had to get away from you."
"So why willingly walk back into my life?" Ginny questioned. "You didn't have to obey your father. He's in prison, he couldn't have hurt you."
"Never, ever underestimate the reach of Lucius Malfoy. You won't be safe until he's dead."
Ginny knew he was right. "You walked back into my life with all of these feelings? Never felt like sharing them with me?"
"How is it possible you don't know, Gin? Don't you know I love you? That I've always loved you?"
"Ginny!" Draco yelled, knocking on the door. "Open up!"
She sat up in the bed and rubbed the heel of her against her face. Had she fallen asleep? "Draco?"
"Open this damn door, Weasley! Your prat brother is here and I'm tired of your sulking."
Her brother? "Draco?"
"Gin, open up."
Ginny got up and used her wand to remove the charm on the door. She pulled the door open and came face to face with her husband. "Sorry, I fell asleep."
"There's a Weasley here, wants to see you."
"Draco—"
He held up his hand. "Talk to your brother. I'm going out."
"Out?"
Draco took his wand out of his pocket. "Out."
Ginny sighed heavily, knowing they needed to talk. She thought for a moment about her dream – was it wishful thinking or just her conscious catching up with her?
Closing her door, she went down the hall. Bill was sitting on the leather couch looking distinctly uncomfortable.
Great. This wasn't exactly what she didn't need. Because what – or who rather – she needed had just Apparated away.
Ginny smiled warmly at her oldest brother. She hoped her expression hid all of the anguish she was feeling from Draco's sudden and unexplained departure. "Bill. I wasn't expecting you."
Her brother looked past her, into the hallway. "Did Draco leave?"
"Yes, he had an appointment…his solicitors, I believe."
Bill frowned, taking a moment to study the youngest Weasley. "You're a horrible liar, Gin. Always have been." He smiled gently at her. "Why don't you tell me what's going on?"
"Draco and I…" she began. Ginny couldn't finish her sentence.
"Is there something wrong?"
"Please don't me nice to me," his sister told him. "You'll hate me once you find out."
"Find out?"
"That…" Ginny stopped, seemingly realizing what she'd almost admitted. Taking a moment, she wiped the few tears that escaped from her cheeks. "I'm sorry. I'm just a mess."
Blue eyes searched brown, as Bill tried to read his sisters' thoughts. There was something she wasn't telling him, but he didn't know what it was. If none of the others did, Bill hadn't missed Ginny not admitting her love for Draco during their visit. She'd only stated she was where she wanted to be, doing what she wanted to do. Which could have a thousand different meanings. "Gin, if I ask you a question, do you promise to be honest with me?"
"Of course."
"Does Malfoy have you under the Imperius?"
"What?"
"Did he put you under an Unforgivable and make you marry him?"
Ginny stood and glared down at him. With her hands on her hips, Bill absently noted she looked like a younger version of Molly Weasley. "I assure you, I was in full control of myself when I married Draco."
"Are you pregnant?"
Her eyes widened. "No."
"Are you sure?" Bill questioned. "Have you checked recently?"
His sister sighed heavily. She took her seat again. "Bill, I'm not pregnant. I would tell you about something like that. I don't plan on being pregnant for a long, long time."
"That's good." The oldest Weasley brother smiled happily at his sister, a weight almost visibly lifted from his shoulders. "No breeding little Malfoys for you. Glad to hear it."
Ginny shook her head. "That doesn't mean there won't ever be little Malfoys, Bill. Draco and I are married. We do…"
Bill grimaced at her meaning. "I'm still trying to get used to the idea that you're married to him, love."
"So no introducing sex into the equation just yet?"
"Ginny!"
She grinned at him. Ginny took his hand in hers and smiled. "I love you because you care. But I know what I'm doing. I didn't wake up Monday morning and decide I wanted to marry Draco Malfoy. This… thing between us has been going on since Hogwarts."
"Hogwarts? You and Malfoy were together at Hogwarts?"
"Not together in the way you're thinking," she assured him. "I care about him, Bill. I have for a long, long time. After I got over the silly crush I had on Harry, I fell hard for Draco."
"You married him because you wanted to, didn't you?"
Ginny nodded. "Yes."
Bill stood then. "That's what I came here to find out. I needed to be sure."
His sister stood and hugged him tightly. "Thank you."
"I didn't do anything. I was only being a brother. You know you're the only sister I have."
"Don't ever forget it, either."
Bill slipped on a black leather jacket. "I should go. Mum's expecting me. It's time for her weekly lecture about my hair."
Ginny grinned at him. "You know you love it."
"I do," he admitted. Leaning down, Bill kissed her forehead. "And I love you."
"I love you, too." Ginny followed him to the door.
"Tell Malfoy I said to take care of you."
"Draco. And I will."
Bill pulled the door open. "Draco."
"Thank you." When he was gone, she pushed the door closed. Ginny let her forehead rest against it for a moment, replaying the conversation in her head. She was slightly taken back by realizing she hadn't lied to Bill once.
She did care about Draco. Had cared about him for a long time, no matter the distance between them. Since the moment she'd first kissed him, Draco Malfoy had taken up residence in her heart. At that point, he'd stopped being a Malfoy and was just Draco.
She was falling in love with him all over again. Ginny looked down at the platinum rings on her left hand, and they suddenly felt like they meant something. She was married to him and he liked kissing her. He'd wanted to shag her earlier, before she'd called things off. Draco was attracted to her, that much was obvious.
For the rest of the afternoon, Ginny worked on different things in the flat. Thoughts of Draco and love consumed her mind, so she worked on rearranging the living room. Once she was satisfied, she went to the kitchen. Using her wand, she switched the contents of the drawers around. Next, she took all of the plates out of the cabinets and moved them to different cabinets.
Ginny worked her way through the rest of the flat, changing things to suit her tastes. She was too busy analyzing different aspects of their marriage to think if Draco would like the changes or not. In the living room, she transfigured two extra chairs into matching end tables and placed pictures of their families (she'd found pictures of Draco and his Mum in his room) on them. Above the fireplace, she left several empty frames. Those would need to be filled up with pictures of them.
In her room, she changed the colour scheme. Instead of the Slytherin green from before, Ginny went with a neutral cream colour, accenting it with dark red. When she was finished, there was a desk (that was once a night table) sitting at the far end of the room, looking out over the cliff. The blinds were removed in favor of natural light and she'd done a cleaning charm on the carpet. After she'd finished all of this, Ginny set about unpacking all of her things. She hung the different robes from Madam Malkin in the wardrobe, put her clothes away in the drawers, and spread her things over the surface of the room.
When she was finished, she put the only picture taken of them together while at Hogwarts on the table by her bed. It was perfect. Ginny left the room, shutting the door behind her. She glanced out the window and frowned. It was after dark now, and Draco still wasn't home.
The redhead considered her options carefully before crossing the hall and opening the door to Draco's bedroom. For the next few hours, she busied herself with transforming his bedroom as well. Again, she changed the colour scheme to something cream-based. This time, however, instead of red she chose a dark green. Ginny knew any self-respecting Slytherin – particularly Draco – would refuse to sleep in a bedroom with red walls. But at least this way, it wasn't so obvious. She could manage with cream and green – just no silver and green, the way it'd been before.
When she was finished, Ginny noticed it was after midnight. Still no Draco. She lay down on his bed, knowing he'd come home eventually. Ginny would just wait for him. She crossed her legs at the ankles and pulled the Falmouth Falcons throw from the bottom of the bed and covered herself with it.
Ginny was asleep within minutes.
Leave a Review