Unexpected Relationship

CHAPTER 4

Disclaimer: I don't own the character, JKR does.

Another week has passed and it has been an interesting one. Being able to say thank you to Draco, finding a way to get back at Professor Wilter and watching Ron get extremely jealous. But I'll start at the start.

Starting with Ron. Two weeks into the school year and he still hasn't got the courage up to tell Hermione how he feels. Some Gryffindor he is. Even so there has been a spanner thrown in the works. It turns out that someone else is crushing on Hermione as well and Ron is not pleased to say the least. Through the gossip mill (Lavender and Parvati), the tower, minus the oblivious Hermione, found that our Hufflepuff Head Boy likes our dear Hermione and is planning on asking her out on the next Hogsmeade weekend. Hermione not understanding Ron's new insistence on insulting Justin all the time started a fight with him. Now neither of them is talking to one another, leaving, of course, Harry and I in the middle as go betweens. Neither of us is enjoying this so we've been trying to think up a plan to get them talking again but we've had no ideas yet. If only I hadn't made that promise to Ron not to tell Hermione how he feels. Oh well.

On the subject of people liking other people, I have a sneaking suspicion that Harry likes someone. Who it is I haven't quite figured out yet. There are a couple of candidates. Now that he doesn't have to worry about Voldemort trying to kill everyone he cares about, he can finally find a girl. That shouldn't be hard. More than half the witches in the school have crushes on him. I mean even I used to.

Now as for my new found plan to get back at Professor Wilter, who by the way has made me start to dread Charms instead of looking forward to it, is integrated with Draco and my little problem with him.

Seeing as though I knew I would be seeing him at the next prefect meeting I didn't bother to seek him out again until then. So I arrived at the prefect meeting, took the initiative and sat down next to him. I think I shocked him a bit there, but I wasn't going to let him get away again. I was about to say it to him when Justin called the meeting to order. This is where things got interesting. It had been decided that the students at Hogwarts should do something to raise money for those that had been hurt by the war. A fundraiser if you will. And get this, Draco and I were paired up to think up an idea and organise it. How Justin and Hermione came up the pair of Draco and me, I don't know, but we got the job.

So Draco and I made reluctant plans to meet one another after classes that day to start discussing ideas. I got there on time but Draco, of course had to stroll in twenty minutes later than the agreed meeting time. I wasn't really surprised, this was Draco we're talking about, but I was determined to get out my thank-you before we started discussing anything else.

"Draco, I just want to thank you for saving my life. Whether or not you want to hear it, I am grateful and would just like you to know that." There I said it as quickly as possible so that he couldn't stop me. He turned and looked at me for a moment with those gorgeous grey eyes of his, nodded his head in acknowledgement of what I said then "So we had to think of an idea that would make the students willingly give up their money." And that topic of discussion was dropped.

We brainstormed for a while and to my surprise I actually found him to be rather intelligent and funny, whether he was meaning to be funny or not I'm not entirely sure but anyway. Draco's idea of what was a realistic amount of money to expect from the students was very different than mine but finally we came up with a plan. I remembered reading in a Muggle book one day about this Muggle School that wanted to raise money and came up with the idea of Slave For A Day. You auction off students and teachers to other students and teachers to be their 'slave' for a day. This idea had on the plus side that groups of students could pool their money together to make the bids higher. And high they could go if the auctioned person was someone people would pay good money to see acting as a 'slave', for example, Snape. How much would students spend to have him do their bidding for a day without getting in trouble and losing house points? Exactly.

We made a list of candidates of who could be auctioned off and who would make the most money. Snape, though at that time we didn't hold out much hope of that happening, Harry, McGonagall, Ron, Hermione, Draco, Myself, Charlie (for some unknown reason the girls of this school seem to like him), Padma, Pavrati, Lavender, Justin, Seamus and my favourite, Wilter. Now all we needed to do was convince them to do it. Now I was surprised that when I said we would both have to be in it since we were prefects I didn't get the adamant no I thought I'd get. He still doesn't like the idea but as I told him he'd make a fortune because of how many people would love to see him as their 'slave'. He actually smiled at me when I said that.

Now to my immense surprise we managed to get everyone on the list to agree. I don't know how he did it, but Draco actually got Snape to agree. My brothers were easy to convince since I have the three of them wrapped around my little finger. Oh the joys of being the youngest and the only girl. Hermione and Justin agreed since they're the Heads and they couldn't not participate. The girls are vain enough to get up there and so is Seamus. McGonagall wasn't enthusiastic at first but I talked her around. And Wilter, since I know she hates me, I made Draco convince her. He did. I'm going to make sure that I have enough money to buy her. I already have all these plans for her, making sure that afterward she won't treat Ron or I unfairly again. But I'll reveal them later.

So now Draco and I are meeting at least once a day to get this whole thing organised so it can go ahead in three weeks time. We're actually getting along reasonably well considering, but it's only been three days so far. He can convert between nasty Malfoy and intelligent Draco in an instant. I have to be on my guard because if I'm not he'll get in a shot when I'm not expecting it. Ron's a bit concerned about me working with him on this, he still hates and distrusts Malfoy and I still haven't told him why I can't too.

TBC