Shades of Green

There were other things besides the keeping quiet rule that she had learned from her parents. Mostly by observation. Things like how one must always address someone of lesser importance by their last name. And how house elves weren't worth two seconds of attention. And who to make friends with - the imporant and the powerful. Whether you really liked them or not. She could stand the first two, but something about that last rule, it never quite sat right with her.

- - -

"Oy, Ev!"

Draco shouted to Everly from behind in the crowded, noisy hallway. She turned around and smiled, waving with a mittened hand.

Months had passed since their first conversation and their friendship had slowly grown. They began sitting near each other during meals. That progressed to taking their Hogsmeade trips with each other. It quite baffled many of the students. Everly was known for her quietness and Draco for the complete opposite, but if one wanted to find Draco, it was said to just look for Everly Hudson, and if by chance Everly needed to be found, one might say to just find Draco, because she would be there too.

Everly couldn't say what it was that brought them together as friends, but when he started to ask her own opinion instead of just telling his own, she realized they had similar views. Their views was just one thing they had in common. She soon learned their upbringing were not all that different, too. The two personalities just meshed, as she thought of it.

He hurried to catch up with her, pushing his way through a cluster of third year Ravenclaws.

She shuddered as a cold gust of January air blew through the open window beside her and she pulled her green and gray scarf tighter.

He joined her and she poked his chest jokingly before grabbing his arm and leading him quickly away from the cold.

They both automatically turned a sharp right down an uncomfortably narrow hallway, and down another wider staircase. The walls were lined with pictures depicting everything from Salazar Slytherin himself to famous Quidditch players. At the end of that hallway there was a tall, wide drapery with an embroidery of the Forbidden Forest on it.

"Forked tongue," Draco said.

The drapery pulled aside as a stage curtain would and revealed the green-themed Slytherin Common Room. Jovial laughter and shouts echoed off the stone floors and walls. Slytherins lined the walls and sprawled themselves over the furniture. There was a high ceiling with low-lying lamps hanging down over sleek leather couches. A large, ebony medieval-styled table stood in the back, near a fire which had dwindled down to glowing embers. Seated out it were Pansy Parkinson, Crabbe, and Goyle.

These were Draco's friends.

Now Everly's friends, too.

Once she had become friends with Draco, it was almost automatic that she started hanging out with his friends. She felt like she didn't get much of a choice - it just happened.

"Draco! Everly! Over here!" Pansy yelled.

Everly socialized with them, but she never completely let her guard down. She always felt they could not be trusted.

They sifted their way through the crowded room and found seats at the table. Pansy was flipping through an issue of Witch Weekly while Crabbe and Goyle snacked on Chocolate Frogs and traded cards.

They were soon joined by Blaise Zabini. He strutted across the Common Room and took a seat near Draco, stifling an excited grin. Blaise was another one of those Slytherin males whom the younger girls swooned over. He had tanned skin, tousled light brown hair, brown eyes to match, and high cheekbones. If there was a picture of physical male perfection, Blaise would be it.

He was a bit moody though, Everly soon noticed after spending some time with him. One minute he would be very quiet, and the next he could be as boisterous as the Weasley twins. He also tended to be rude to younger Slytherins or out-of-house schoolmates.

She didn't like the way he looked at her, either. He seemed perpetually confused by her. Like he expected her to leave them any moment - that she was there temporarily. Everly suspected Blaise thought she was just there because she was Draco's temporary love interest. After all, Draco was partially known because he always seemed to have a new girl at his side when he was having a falling out with Pansy. This was, of course, not the reason she was there. They were just friends. Blaise seemed the only person to think otherwise.

Everly watched his mouth twitch. He was in one of his better moods. He seemed unable to hold something in.

"Did you get it?" Pansy asked. Her glossed pink lips formed a smile.

He nodded enthusiastically, and then pulled out a Quidditch magazine to read, still glowing.

"Get what?" Draco questioned, rather loudly. He hated to be left out of things. They all knew that.

"Shush!" urged Pansy, although it didn't matter much. In the incredible volume of the Common Room, there wasn't much of a chance someone overheard. "Just never you mind for now."

"How about not, and you just tell me?" he said, with some sort of finality. It was less of a question and more of a demand.

"Fine," Pansy sighed. "Blaise got his older brother to send us some Firewhiskey!"

She squealed and flashed a toothy smile at Blaise, who winked back.

Draco seemed utterly disgusted at the interaction between the two. "Again? So what?"

"So what?" Blaise asked. "So what is we're all going to have a lot of fun tonight."

"Oh, see... I thought we were past the getting-pissed-and-passing-out-on-the-Quidditch-pitch-at-three-in-the-morning-to-then-wake-up-and-vomit-our-guts-out-until-five-in-the-morning-phase. I was obviously mistaken," he muttered and picked a fleck of dirt out from beneath his otherwise pristine nails.

They disreguarded this comment but gabbed excitedly, planning out the night's events.

Everly's friend Daphne Greengrass sidled over to the table and sat down next to her. Daphne was a pretty well-liked girl among the Slytherins and Pansy invited her to their outing.

The next couple of hours passed rather quickly. Crabbe and Goyle, lost in their own little world, played countless games of Exploding Snap while stuffing themselves with candy. Blaise and Draco poured themeselves over the Quidditch magazine, and Daphne and Everly worked on their Transfiguration homework to get it out of the way.

Nine o'clock rolled around, and the awkward band soon found themselves outside, traipsing through the dusting of snow in the biting January cold. There was just enough snow to barely cover the grass and they crunched their way towards the pitch in the darkness, careful not to make too much noise. They were not far enough from the school to do that yet.

Everly was not sure why she was joining them for this adventure. She'd done it four times before with them and really had no desire to do it again. Perhaps it was out of boredom. She wondered for a minute why Draco was joining, if he was so sick of it.

When they reached the center of the pitch, and were clearly out of view of anybody looking out of school windows, Blaise sat down against one of the hoops and opened his clinking bag. He pulled out two large, red, shiny glass bottles.

"Er, I'll skip this one," Everly mumbled as he offered her a bottle.

"C'mon, have a go!" he urged. "What are you, Hudson, scared?"

"No, I'm meeting my parents for breakfast early tomorrow morning in Hogsmeade. I can't."

This was true; they had written her two days before with a date for breakfast this Saturday. Something she was not particularly looking forward to.

He shrugged and took a swig.

Everly sat down cross-legged and took her green and gray striped hat out of the cloak pocket. She pulled it over her head and rubbed her hands together for warmth. Why did I even bother coming out here tonight?

Draco slumped down next to Everly after taking a couple sips of his own. He straightened out the fronts of his cloak and retied his scarf, though slightly clumsily.

They sat a little set apart from the rest of the group, watching, while Draco commentated and chuckled and made fun of what they were doing. Nearly ten minutes later, Crabbe and Goyle were sloppily tango-dancing with each other.

Draco doubled over in laughter watching the two and Everly covered her mouth as she giggled.

"Oh, oh," he began as he calmed down a bit, still watching the drunken boys dance, "this is so good it just has to be fattening. I wish I had my Omniculars so I could record this."

Daphne, Pansy, and Blaise began to sing a Quidditch chant for the Chudley Canons as they did a sort of tribal dance to go with it.

Everly racked her brain for an excuse, any excuse, to get away from the madness. "Sorry, Draco. This isn't exactly something I want to see," chuckled Everly as she stood up. She dusted the bottom of her cloak off.

"Definitley not wise to watch before bed," he agreed. "Might give you nightmares."

"I'm going to head off. Early morning tomorrow."

"Wait up," he began, and pushed himself off the ground. She gave him her arm to help him up. "I'm going inside, too. It's freezing."

"Hey," Pansy whirled around and almost lost her balance. "Hey, you guys! Where're you off to?"

Draco just waved a hand at her and merely pulled Everly away. Pansy didn't even wait for an answer before turning back to Daphne. The two huddled away from the Quidditch pitch and into the open air again, where the wind whipped their hair around.

"You look bloody tired," she noticed as she steadied him.

"And I bloody well am," he muttered, then paused for a second. "But maybe I should head back. Merlin knows what Blaise is going to do with Pansy there. Drunk."

Everly looked behind her where her view of the classmates was obviously obstructed by the Quidditch pitch. "Aw, Draco getting protective of his Pansy Poo? She'll be fine."

"Shut it. I suppose," he muttered. "Bloody bastard. I don't trust him. And I don't get what Pansy sees in him. I think he's gay, anyway."

"Blaise isn't gay, Draco."

"Oh, please. He is so far in the closet he's finding Christmas presents."

Everly resisted a snort and merely frowned at him. "If, I mean, if you don't mind my asking, what's the big deal about Pansy Parkinson anyway?"

"You just don't know her. That's why you don't like her," he said defensively.

Everly tucked a tuft of short black hair behind her ear. "And I'm asking you to explain to me."

Draco raised an eyebrow and brought the volume of his voice down as they neared the castle. "She's a nice girl, Ev. And she's pretty, and, well, my parents had always thought, you know, we'd be a good match."

"Let me get this straight. You've been dating Pansy because your parents thought it was a nice idea?"

"No, not entirely. Just drop it, please."

She left the conversation at that. Everly knew that prodding Draco about his on-and-off relationship with Pansy was never a good idea. Perhaps she had gone a bit too far this time.

They crept through the hallways as quiet as possible, taking all the routes they knew were normally safe for sneaking at night. Well, Draco knew them. Everly just followed.

The two reached the Common Room and pulled off their cloaks. Everly re-pocketed her hat and started down the hall to the girls dormitories. "'Night."

"Goodnight."

- - -

"Did you hear? Did you hear about those two Slytherin goons Crabbe and Goyle?" A second year witch excitedly asked her Hufflepuff friend.

A very tired Pansy had been on her way down to the Great Hall for breakfast when she overheard snippets of conversation. The hallways seemed louder than usual this morning.

Oh blimey, she thought. They got caught. The gits.

Pansy rubbed her hand over her forehead. She had a splitting headache and desperately tried to recall the events of the night before.

That is the last time I'm doing that. For a while.

On turning a corner, she saw Draco strolling down the hall in her direction. He was wearing his black sweater with the black jeans, she noticed, her favorite outfit on him. She smiled vaguely and recalled the time they went to Diagon Alley and she picked it out.

A throb from her headache brought her back to reality.

"Draco!" she called to him. "Did you hear about Crabbe and Goyle?"

"No," he slowly began. "What happen-"

Blaise was now walking towards them, looking quite perky indeed. Pansy looked away from him and instead stared out her feet. Blaise waggled his eyebrows when he saw her.

"Blaise," Draco asked, "What happened to Crabbe and Goyle?"

"Oh, that," he smiled. "The two dunderheads were stupid enough to fall asleep in the stands last night. Daphne came in early. Still sleeping, I think, she is. Anyway, Potter found them when he went to Quidditch practice early. They hadn't even gotten rid of the Firewhiskey bottles."

"I take it you two got yourselves back in time, then?" Draco asked.

"Hey, man, it only takes ten minutes. We were back by-"

Pansy slapped a hand over his mouth and pushed him away. "Don't listen to him. He was drunk. He doesn't remember anything. So- so, where's Everly today?"

Oh, Pansy. What did you do? She shot a threatening look at Blaise, who raised his hands and slowly backed away. She didn't mean to do anything like that the night before, really. The last thing she wanted was to hurt what was left of her and Draco's battered relationship. She did have feelings for him, it was true, but it always seemed like one of them was screwing up. Usually her.

She stared at Draco, whose mouth was just slightly gaped open. He recovered quickly and cleared his throat, "She's, er, in Hogsmeade having breakfast with her parents."

Pansy frowned. "I guess we should be off to the Great Hall, then."

"I suppose."

- - -

Everly shifted uncomfortably in her seat across from her parents. They were all sitting at a small table in the back of the Three Broomsticks, a place which Everly was surprised to hear that her parents chose for their meeting. They usually preferred more refined places.

Her parents were Astrid and William Hudson, current holders of a rather large fortune that had been in her family for over a hundred years. Everly and her parents lived in an upscale house that was unchartable by Muggles in rural Wales. Although nowhere as big as Malfoy Manor was rumored to be, Everly thought, the interiors were probably very similar.

She rather liked her house, with it's narrow passageways and secret rooms. Each room had a story to tell. She loved the dark, dank, sweet rotting smell of the dungeons and often escaped there to find peace and quiet.

Among many of the decorations were Dark objects and books, hundreds of them, inherited from ancestors. They were things her Death Eater parents regularly used.

"So," Astrid Hudson cleared her throat as she pulled some gold out of her purse. "I suppose the next time we'll be seeing you is when school is over."

Everly nodded.

Her father began to speak in a low voice, only audible to Everly and her mother. "And we really want you to think about, and I mean really consider, what we told you about. You're getting older and it's time you made this decision."

She nodded again.

Her parents stood up and walked their daughter to the door. Astrid bent down and kissed Everly on the forehead. "Bye, dear."

"Bye mum, dad."

They marched outside and with two pops, Astrid and William Hudson had Apparated back to the warmth of their manor, while Everly stood in the white-dusted cobbleroads of Hogsmeade. She pulled the hood of her cloak over her head and climbed into the horse-pulled carriage that had been waiting outside. The driver nodded and tugged on the reins. The carriage began to move forward as the horses hooves clacked on the ground back towards Hogwarts.

She crossed her arms in the carriage and frowned.

How am I supposed to make a decision like this?

- - -

When ten o'clock at night came, Draco escaped the noise of the Common Room down the hall to the Prefects bathroom. Usually on weekends this time it was empty. The only people that seemed to use this bathroom used it in the morning.

His footsteps echoed off the tile as he locked the door and grabbed a towel off of the nearby pile. He set up his usual bath in the enormous tub, undressed, and climbed in. Up to his chin in bubbles and steaming hot water, Draco layed back on the shallower end and closed his eyes.

He was enveloped by the pleasant aroma and drifted off into peaceful sleep before waking up abruptly to a famliar female voice ten minutes later.

"I knew I'd find you here."

Draco opened his eyes to find Pansy standing on the tile staring down at him.

"Pansy. What do you want?"

Not her here, not now. The last thing I want is her interrupting the only time of day where I get peace and quiet.

"Ooh, pink bubbles. Manly."

"What do you want?"

She sat down cross-legged on the floor and dragged a hand through her wavy, dirty-blonde hair. "I needed to talk to you."

"Here? Now?" He asked in desparation.

"You're always busy, Draco. That or you're with other people. Yes, I want to talk to you right here and now. Oh, rearrange your bubbles."

He ignored her. Nothing she hasn't seen before, anyway.

"I wanted to apologize," she began, "because of what Blaise said. Because, I mean, we had all downed a lot of alcohol and I really didn't mean what I did, and it just happened."

"Haven't we had this conversation before? Too many times, if you ask me, Pansy."

He stared her down. She looked so innocent right now as she fiddled with the tattered end of her shoelace and frowned. She spoke in her girlish voice.

"Can't you at least accept my apology? Don't you want to save the last shred of a relationship we have?"

No, Draco, don't. Not this time.

"I can't. No. I've done that too many times before. And look where it's gotten us. Pansy, I just don't want to see you anymore," he mumbled.

"Oh, oh," she stood up and placed her hands on her hips. "And you're trying to tell me that when you and Everly snuck off last night nothing happened?"

"What?" he sat up in the water. "Is that what you think? No!"

"Draco, bullshit! That's what everybody thinks. And it's the honest truth."

"Don't talk to me about truth, Pansy," he began, gritting his teeth. "You have a lot of nerve to stand here and lecture me about truth and honesty."

She threw her hands up in frustration before marching out, slamming the door as loud as possible behind her. It echoed for a solid ten seconds against the tile-covered bathroom after she left.

Draco tried to calm down a bit and leaned his head against the tile. He attempted to relax but the blood was still pumping fast through his veins.

His relationship with Pansy was beyond repair. She was a traitor, and he loathed traitors. This was the last straw. He never wanted to see her or Blaise again at that moment. Not if he was in trouble and they were the last people on the planet that could save him.