Sunrise Goodbye

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The time was 12:27 AM, and with the ferocious gales of wind that accompany this particular November night, Draco Malfoy was doing what anyone with functioning sensory and the ability to register 'bloody freezing cold!' to mind. He was keeping himself warm.

Of course, not every member of the Hogwarts student body would consider an embrace of tangled limbs and frenzied lip-locking as sources of heat.

Of course, not everyone can be Draco Malfoy. If there was ever a purpose to his existence, it was to make absolutely sure that he stood out and well apart from the rest. Distinctiveness was key if he truly intended to rise above this world that was chock-full of plain, underachieving, boring, waste-of-space wizards. There would be a carved place for him in history – preferably a big, lustrous, gold plated, and never diminishing place – along with best-selling books documenting every aspect of his illustrious life.

If he was going to have to dip his feet, and perhaps his hands too, into the depths of the Dark Arts..

If blood and gore and mercilessness had to be involved to lead him to wizardry greatness..

Then so be it.

The intensity had shifted over to Draco's thoughts, and he was almost completely passive now to Dinah Something Or Other's kisses. He pulled away, and Dinah began to look around the stretch of corridor quickly.

"What? Do you hear someone coming?" she asked, an edge of panic in her voice.

"No. I just think maybe it's time you headed back. It's getting late, isn't it." Draco wasn't even looking at her anymore. Sure, this girl had surprised him by being bold enough to initiate this little bonding session at Randomly Chosen Corridor, and there was none of the hesitant shyness he had come to associate with Hufflepuff girls. It was rather interesting indeed, but fifteen minutes was certainly stretching the novelty factor too thin. And so...

"Good night. Off you go now." He gave the slightly puzzled girl a gentle yet firm push to start her walking. A moment later, he headed off in the opposite direction, in need of a walk.

Passing by the windows, he caught a glimpse of rumpled hair on the glass panes which made him stop in midstride. It had to be fixed right away. There was no chance he wanted his crowning glory to have even the tiniest resemblance to Harry Potter's messy hairdo. The Boy Who Lived To See Another Day And Then Another Day Without A Comb. The tragedy. It was a calamity that Draco did not wish to share, thank you.

"There." Now not a single blond strand was out of place. A smile touched his lips as he surveyed the rest of his reflection. He always knew he had it good in terms of his looks, and it was more obvious than ever now that he was in the sixth year of being a Hogwarts student. His eyes remained a cold blue-grey, unaffected by the smile. Unaffected by anything.

The sound of a wheezing cough knocked Draco out of his pensive moment. Filch! Must not get caught. Even though Draco was hardly a Gryffindor Goody Goody, he still avoided any reasons for Filch to get his hands on him, simply because Filch was top notch in choosing the most tormenting forms of punishment for rule breakers, never caring whether they were actually legal or not.

It wasn't too hard to recall a night not too long ago, when he led a group of Slytherins to capture Mrs Norris, Filch's dearly (as difficult as it was to link his name to any sort of affection) beloved (again, disbelief) cat, performed a Petrificus Totalus, and placed the unmoving kitty in a cauldron with water enchanted to bubble continuously, though not actually boiling. Soon enough Filch found the cauldron, waiting for him in one of the classrooms, and he collapsed into epileptic-like fits when he thought that precious Mrs Norris was being made into cat soup. Yum, yum.

Naturally the Slytherins wouldn't think of missing a single moment of it. They had gathered outside of the classroom, watching and trying their best to contain their laughter... Damn Goyle had to expose their presence with an extra loud snigger though. What was it that Filch had threatened to do to them? They were all basically making a mad dash to escape Filch, so it wasn't very clear what he was shouting about. Something to do with slow and painful slicing off of important body parts? Yes, probably.

Draco didn't really want to know for sure what Filch had in mind. So here he was again, running to hide from Filch. Draco went around a few corners, then up a staircase, sprinted some more, and finally came to a stop, catching his breath. He had to be far from wherever Filch was by now.

Or not.

Footsteps were advancing from the corner, which wasn't that much distance away. The echo of a predatory-sounding meow confirmed it – Filch, and cat, were closer than ever.

Quick as lightning, Draco slipped into a doorway and found himself in... a bathroom. Eh? How was he going to bloody hide then, throw himself into one of the toilet bowls?

It could all be pegged as rotten luck, but Draco still felt someone should appear right now so that he could yell at the person for doing this to him.. leaving him with no apparent way out of surrendering to Filch's filthy clutches. And how could that be? Whose fault was it? He was a Malfoy, for Salazar's sake – the blame had to go to somewhere or it just wouldn't be right. He couldn't actually point the finger at himself. That, unquestionably, wouldn't be right.

Still, it would be quite silly to stand there and be indignant, irate, incensed, infuriated, et cetera. Draco made his way to the farthest stall, and then continued to be indignant, irate, incensed, infuriated, et cetera.

"Ahem... Who are you and what are you doing here?"

It was spoken almost no louder than a whisper. What was really surprising was that the voice had come from above Draco. And when he looked up, there was another shock. It was a girl – no, a ghost of a girl, seeing as how she had the same semi-transparent, misty silver quality about her as he had seen in other Hogwarts ghosts. Oh, and the fact that she was suspended in mid air, too.

And did she really just ask him who he was? That was possibly the biggest blow. This outrage of a girl really needed to bring herself up to date, how could she not have heard of Draco Malfoy and recognize him in an instant? Never mind that she wasn't alive anymore..

He gritted his teeth. "A little help here? Filch is on my trail, get him off it."

"Wha –"

"Please." He practically had to spit the word out. Draco wasn't very good at grovelling, for lack of practice obviously.

But he hoped against hope anyway.