Disclaimer: Story's mine. The characters and series aren't. That belongs to J.K. Rowling and other related companies, thank you very much.
Author's Note: I blame Crystal and vanillapuf for this. Not that it's a bad thing ;D This goes out not only to them, but also to all the reviewers of Sinful. Thanks for your feedback; it really helped me. The stuff in italics are what Draco or Ginny are thinking.
- - - -
Ginny stomped angrily into her room, slamming the door behind her. Hot tears poured from her eyes and ran down her cheeks, blurring her vision. She had never felt like this in her fourteen years of life. She wasn't sure whether to cry, stomp her foot, scream, or do all three. She wasn't even sure what to feel - confusion surrounded her. She felt right then a mix of all the emotions anyone could feel. A mix of anger, frustration and sadness filled her. What had happened a few moments before still reduced her to the trembling edge of uncontrollable anger. All right, calm down, she told herself. There was no use in wasting her anger. Especially when it was on him. When the time came, she would hex Draco Malfoy until he lived to regret it. She took slow deep breaths and relaxed, her anger dissipating.
Wait, her mind warned. Giving Malfoy his payback will only make you more like him. Do you want that? To tell the truth, Ginny wasn't really sure what to feel or think anymore. Thanks to him, she was in a spur of confusion and mixed up emotions. Oh, if only she could curse him now! The sight of his never fading smirk and cold grey eyes bought her chills and a sense of prickling annoyance. What was it about him that irked her so much? Was his view on who he was and his stature in society?
She sighed heavily. There was no use in thinking about this so much - it would only cause her anger to rise up again, and become more intense than before.
Oh, just forget about it, she resignedly thought and looked at the clock. "Oh, it's time for dinner!" she exclaimed softly to herself once she saw what time it was. With that she quickly rushed downstairs, her robes billowing behind her. In her haste, and wanting not to be late, she didn't close the door to the girls' dormitory.
- - - -
Draco gazed thoughtfully at his note. Well, paper origami really, but who was being fussy? He wondered when would be the best time to give the note to her. "Her" being Ginny, the fiery, spirited girl that intrigued him to no end. No matter how much he irked her, no matter how much he sneered at her pathetic family, she just couldn't lose her temper with him. With other people she might be set off by a mere comment or more, but with him, it was different. He couldn't explain it; what he could explain was the feeling of insecurity he felt around her. It was an invisible aura that she radiated. And that was what made him curious about her. This girl was unlike anyone he had ever met. And that was saying something.
In short, he didn't know what to do when it came to this girl. She intrigued yet irritated him at the same time. And he knew it was the same for her, except the finding him intriguing part.
He blew out a breath and looked at the note again. Stop staring at it so fascinatingly, you're only prolonging the moment more. His mind reprimanded. He didn't know what to do; what would she do when she found out that he had given her the paper origami . . . thing?
Who says she has to find out. A part of him smirked devilishly. You can be the unknown admirer.
Yet there was a downside to that. What if Ginny's - no, Weasley's, he firmly reminded himself of that fact - curiosity got to be too much and she started investigating, searching for who her admirer was? Maybe admirer wasn't the right word for it, he thought. What was he to her? A pest? A git? An annoyance? Her worst enemy? All of the above?
I shouldn't even be thinking hard about this, Draco thought wryly. After all, it doesn't require much thought.
"Just get on with it," he said aloud, picking the delicately folded crane shaped piece of paper and putting it soundlessly in his robe pocket. Then he left for dinner.
- - - -
After she was done with her dinner and her plate disappeared, Ginny sat back and tried to relax. She was still riled up from earlier; and no matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't shake the destructive anger that she had felt then. Why she was letting him affect her that much she did not know; but she had to stop it, before her anger got any worse than it already was. Okay, take deep breaths, Ginny. She told herself, relaxing her shoulders and breathing slowly in and out. Slowly her body grew less tense and she felt the invisible angry knots in her brain start to untangle.
When she had finally calmed down to the point when she didn't feel any anger anymore, Draco Malfoy chose that moment then to make his appearance. He strode confidently into the Great Hall, ignoring Ginny's ferocious glare on him. He looked as if nothing was wrong, she thought resentfully. Then her anger started to rise up again.
Relax, Ginny. If you continue to let him get to you so easily this way, he'll only think of this as a challenge that he won.
And she didn't want that. There was no point in forcing herself to relax, so Ginny breathed slowly and felt her anger dissipating.
She saw the weird looks upon her then and blushed to the roots of her hair. Damn them, she thought, not thinking for a moment about the fact that she had cursed. Even if it was in her thoughts.
She blew out a breath. This situation with Draco was affecting her more than she had imagined.
At that moment a voice interrupted her thoughts. "Oi, Ginny, you better watch out for your head!" someone warned. Ginny forgot who it was. When she turned away, thinking all the time to herself disgustedly what a gullible fool she was, she barely caught a look at a flying piece of paper before it landed into her outstretched hands.
She blinked. Not in amazement, just in shock, with a bit of surprise mixed in. What was it? Ginny looked at it; it was just a piece of paper.
It's not just a piece of paper, her mind reasoned. It's something besides a mere piece of paper. For one thing, it's folded into the shape of a crane -
IT'S A NOTE! A part of her screamed. A BLOODY NOTE! It has no symbolic meaning! There's nothing significant about it! Might as well open it and get it over with . . . and ignore the curious and nosy stares . . .
Ginny opened the note, folded the creases over and read it. Her breath hitched. Judging from the not quite straight but not quite crooked handwriting, and the clearly written signature at the bottom of the note, she had a feeling that she wasn't going to like what the note said.
Just because you hate the sender doesn't mean that you'll hate the note too.
Damn conscience.
She fought back a grumble and read the note, her eyes following every straight/crooked word.
The entire note reeked of biting sarcasm and fake sincerity. So like him.
Weasley,
Wrote this to tell you how sorry I am about insulting you and your family. But just because I'm a Malfoy doesn't mean that I'll have the heart and nature of one, too.
You already have the nature and heart of one, she thought, shaking her head slightly as she read it.
This isn't the only reason I wrote you this. As stupidly cheesy this sounds - something happened between you and me today, Weasley.
Ginny resisted the urge to roll her eyes. But what if he really means it? Her mind asked.
Oh, shut up.
She continued to read the note. Surprisingly.
- - - -
After Ginny was done reading the note's contents, she put it away in her bag and sighed. He's making this more complicated than it already is. She thought, her brow furrowed.
Well, there was no use grumbling about this. She'd just have to confront him about it.
- - - -
Before she had even opened the note, Draco had a suspicion that she would, once she knew it was him (damn his conscience for being so bloody self-righteous and moral), confront him about it.
And honestly, what was left for him to say? He insulted her, had shamelessly apologized (damn his conscience again), and after she confronted him he would deny it, despite his suddenly sprouting morality, they would go back to hating each other again.
Except, oddly . . he didn't want it to happen that way.
He wanted something else. While he had been writing the note to her, he was thinking about what exactly they should be. All Draco knew was that no matter how much he enjoyed their bantering, how much he liked riling her up - there was a whole different edge to their hatred now.
How could he explain it? It couldn't be put into words - he himself couldn't explain it. Maybe it was one of those things that you just couldn't explain, no matter how hard you tried. There was no definition, explanation for it. What that something he wanted was, who knew.
A sharp jab in the arm interrupted his thoughts. "Ouch! Weasley, what do you think you're doing?" He hissed quietly, hoping that no one heard him. (Thankfully they didn't, since they were busy stuffing themselves with food. Pigs, the lot of them were.)
"Just hush up and you'll see," she said, dragging him by the arm. And thus forcing him to follow her.
Oh, he'd never be able to live this down. Honestly, a Malfoy following a Weasley? When does anyone see that happen?
Would anyone believe it with their own eyes?
This is no time for the pettiness that you got from your father, his mind snapped at him. Unfortunately.
He smirked and saved his comments for later.
- - - -
Ginny had surprised herself when she had dragged Draco, of all people, by the arm and forcing him to follow her. She surprised herself even more now since she actually enjoyed it. Imagine, a high ranking, egoistic snot like him, following a regular, lowly commoner like her.
You really need to get over that, Ginny. It's not going to help anything with what you and Draco already have.
She stopped that train of thought. What did they have? Oh, sure, they weren't like Ron and Hermione, forever sniping at each other's throats until the aforementioned pair got sick of it themselves. Ginny herself wasn't sure what she and Draco were. Another Romeo and Juliet? She groaned mentally at the thought. Yet, in a twisted way, it was true. She couldn't see that happening, though. Her and Draco proclaiming their undying love for each other? Ha! As if that would happen.
Yet she found herself wanting for that to happen. For something that no one had ever dreamed of to come true. For the impossible to happen. Ginny laughed at herself for that thought. The impossible becoming possible? She was going stark raving nuts. A loon. She wasn't thinking straight. Silently she willed herself to stop thinking about her and Draco and instead focus on what was going to happen next.
She led them as far away from the Great Hall, making sure that they were inconspicuous the entire way.
- - - -
They soon stopped at a door at the end of the corridor, a little far from the Great Hall. Draco left himself to wonder what this was all about. He soon got his answer.
Taking a pin from her hair, Ginny inserted it into the lock and twisted the pin around a little bit. A soft click was heard. She sighed, a smile of relief on her face. Then checking to make sure that no one saw them, she yanked Draco into the room with her, locking the door after her.
"All right. Will you mind telling me what all this running and hiding was for, Weasley?" A familiar drawl asked behind her.
She turned around and found him leaning against a table, arms crossed. "Watch out, you may fall over any moment," she warned.
"Do I honestly care about that? Just get to the point. There's no use wasting my time here with a so called Pureblood like you."
Her eyes flashed. "If you'll shut up for a moment and quit whining, then I'll tell you and then you won't have to stay with me any longer."
"Fine." He waved an arm. "Go ahead."
I can't believe he's treating this so lightly, Ginny thought, trying very hard to control the raging fury she felt with each passing minute. "First, the note. Why did you bother to ask for a proposition between us?"
"So we won't have this `love and hate' thing. You know how it goes. I insult, you answer back, and it goes nowhere. Except when you lose your temper, maybe -"
"All right, all right." She held up a hand, silencing him. "And of course the reason why we banter is because we love each other." She stated matter-of-factly.
"Ugh." He shuddered. "Don't bet on that happening, Weasley."
She sighed. "You might want to stop calling me that. It only proves further that you love me."
"What?" Draco's eyes narrowed. Then he pursed his lips. "Fine. Anything else?"
"Yes." And Ginny did something that she had never done before - she walked over to him and kissed him right smack on the mouth.
Draco was torn between wanting to yell bloody murder and pushing her away. Honestly, he had never expected this -
That's the whole beauty of it, his mind mocked. You were supposed to be caught off guard.
Ginny pulled away and moved away from him as far as possible. His reaction was one to be seen - the astonished but flashing grey eyes, a firmly closed mouth, an aura of disbelief radiating from him.
"What - the - hell - was that?" He asked, shocked.
Oh, she had shocked him big time.
"Oh, that?" She answered primly, trying not to grin. "That was the answer to your proposition."
"I wasn't being serious, Wea -" he stopped. "Ginny." He had to practically force it from his throat. Damn the stupid truth. If it hadn't been true, he would have never had to call her Ginny.
"But what if it was a real proposition? What then? As you said yourself Draco, there's something between us. Something happened today that you and I both know is there. It won't be so bad to be at least civil and honest, would it?" She winked and left.
Draco was left openmouthed and stunned. Not because of Ginny winking at him - although that was a surprise in itself. Her words had struck something in him - he didn't know what, and he wasn't sure if he liked it or not . . but he knew something had changed. And he couldn't change it back to what it was before.
He pondered it. Not insulting Ginny? Being civil to her? And even more - liking her?
Oh, if his father could see this. Draco quickly scratched that thought once it ran over in his mind.
It didn't sound too bad. He didn't have anything to lose, and - as much as he hated to admit it, he had to - he did like Ginny. Sort of. A little bit. Okay, maybe more than a little bit. Maybe a lot.
He sighed. Now that he had laid out the proposition on the table, and she had said everything for him . .
Well, there was no use just standing there in a dark room and thinking about it when you could be actually doing it, was there?
He didn't even think it over again for a second before he left the room.
- - - -
Draco found her standing right outside the room, much to his surprise. "Blast, Ginny, give me a heart attack, why don't you?" Her name slipped easier out of his mouth now. He liked saying it - it had a different flavor, sound to it. Much better than Weasley.
She laughed. "So you finally made up your mind. Took you long enough."
"Well," he said, taking her hand in his, "let's just say that rejecting the proposition would have been a mistake."
Much like not opening the note would have been, Ginny thought, entwining their fingers together.
This wasn't bad at all. It was rather good.
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