Sex, Sex, and (oh yes) Just a Spot More Sex, As Well As Some Spam

Sex, Sex and (oh yes) Just a Spot More Sex, Not to Mention Some Spam

Or

And Now, for Something Completely Different

The insistent, thumping beat of the music filled the smoky air.

"Hey baby... take a walk on the wild side."

A dizzying kaleidoscope of spinning disco balls flashed across the huge room.

"I said, hey baby... take a walk on the wild side."

The lithe dancing boys shook their heads, each covered by a large Afro wig, and wriggled to the song with great enthusiasm.

"And all the colored girls say, da da da da da da da da..."

"Queen" Arthur Kirkby pranced across the stage in plaid miniskirt, silver leggings, black mesh top, and spiky purple wig, a rat on one shoulder, belting out Lou Reed as a DJ spun accompaniment. No wonder he always has such trouble convincing people he's not a real drag queen, mused Draco Malfoy.

Draco leaned over the metal railing around the catwalk where he stood, looking down on the Saturday night scene on the dance floor of the Connection. Acres of hunky manflesh, pretty boys writhing in hot, sweaty clots of still-unfulfilled desire. Illuminated in flashes by the flickering lights. Several tasty girls, too, since more and more hets were attracted to the club by the superlative drag shows and dancing. Strange that America's largest gay bar should be located in Nashville, Tennessee, buckle of the Bible belt. Stranger still that he should be stuck in this godforsaken hick town, stuffed to the gills with SUV's and American rednecks. Still, it had become necessary to break up the global underground house-elf sex slave ring, which, for some odd reason, was located in the basement of the Grand Ole Opry. And who better to do it than Draco? He smirked. House elves were always so properly... grateful.

At the far end of the club, the outside door opened, then closed; he could see it from this perspective, since the angle was so high. A flash of red hair, a certain way of tossing the head. There she was. Unhurriedly, Draco began to descend the steps, pausing halfway to pose insouciantly against the railing. Everyone around him, on the stairs, on the dance floor, in the hallway, paused, and several gasps could be heard, even over the pounding, thumping dance music. He heard them in a mildly pleased, world-weary sort of way. They were only his due. After all, he had a classically perfect face with chiseled cheekbones and a pouty pink mouth, luminously silvery gray eyes, eyebrows to die for, waves of smooth blonde hair, the gorgeously sculpted body of a Greek god, and... certain other endowments, ah yes. He probably would get the same reaction, Draco mused idly, even if he weren't also sumptuously dressed, smoothly spoken, and obscenely rich. The red Ferrari Testarossa probably helped, too.

She was moving past him now, hugging her arms to herself, dragged along by another girl. "Come on, Ginny! You need to lighten up a little," she coaxed.

"I can't believe you got me to come here. I think I've gone mad. I've never even been to a bar before, you know. I've lived such a sheltered life, between Hogwarts and the peaceful, tiny village of Ottery St. Catchpole..." Ginny's words trailed off as she stared in amazement at the stage, where Miss Bianca was now slinking about in a silver lame dress, six-inch heels, and a monstrous pink beehive hairdo, singing "Stand By Your Man." Her mouth dropped open.

Draco leaned over her shoulder and whispered in Ginny's ear. "If you don't close that, something is going to fly in."

She whirled to face him. "You!" she hissed. "I might have known you'd be here."

"Well, you're here too, aren't you?"

"Only because Lurlene, my perky American friend, dragged me out for a little entertainment. Or at least that's what she said! I thought we were going to the Opryland Hotel! Oh, why did I come? What made me come?"

Draco raised an eyebrow. "I don't think you can really answer that question... yet..."

Ginny blushed hotly. "You're disgusting."

He trailed a single finger along her bare arm. Since it was still ninety-nine degrees and one hundred percent humidity outside, robes would have been quite, quite out of the question even if Muggle clothing hadn't been necessary. "Am I?" he asked, a sensual catch in the purr of his voice. "Or is it only that you haven't ever bothered to take the time to find out?"

Ginny swallowed hard. "I've been warned about you," she said, her voice suddenly unsteady. "Everybody warned me." It was true. The memory sprang to her mind clearly. Her family and friends had assembled in the yard of her house at dusk the evening before she left for Gatwick airport, all sitting awkwardly around the picnic table.

"Ginny dear," said her mother, "we know that you're going to be working with that dreadful Malfoy all during the summer. And we know you'll be staying in the same hotel room due to those reservation mixups. The one with a single king-sized vibrating bed and a heart-shaped Jacuzzi."

"And it does get so hot and sweaty and steamy in the American South, you know," said Hermione. "I researched it. Sultry nights with barely a breath of fresh air... tight halter tops... Daisy Duke shorts... perhaps only one air conditioner..."

"I'm going to pack a rabid kobold in your luggage," growled Ron, "and if that stupid git tries anything I want you to use it, do you hear me?"

"Really, I think I can protect myself from Malfoy!" snapped Ginny. "Now that he's working in the Ministry, I'm sure you don't need to worry about him attacking me or something."

Harry cleared his throat. "Er--that's not exactly what we're worried about, Ginny."

"He spoke to me," she whispered to the ground, wiping away an errant tear. "I'll write about this moment in my diary tonight, with little pink hearts drawn all round it."

"What did you say?"

"Nothing--nothing--" Ginny placed the back of her hand on her forehead in dramatic fashion. "Well then, what are you worried about?"

Harry looked down. "This isn't exactly easy to say."

Hermione took a deep breath. "What Harry means is that you're the last one."

"The last one what?" asked Ginny.

"Well--" The other girl looked at her interlaced fingers.

"Oh, let's just come right out with it!" exclaimed Fred. "What she's trying to say is that you're the last one we know who Malfoy hasn't shagged yet!"

Ginny covered her ears. Ron picked her hands away. "I reckon you'd better listen, sis."

She stared at them all with wide eyes, her horrified gaze going round the table. "You can't mean--" she whispered. "Hermione? Harry?" Both of them nodded, their own eyes fixed firmly on the picnic table. "Ron?" Her brother's face went bright red, but he, too nodded. "Fred-- George--oh, surely, not Bill and Charlie and Percy, too!" Everyone at the table found somewhere to look besides her face. She turned furiously to her parents. "Ooh, how could you have let this happen?" But her mother seemed to have trouble meeting her eyes, as well.

"Well, you know, dear, young Malfoy can be quite, er, convincing. He has a certain way of putting his arguments...."

"Mum! No, oh no! How could you?" wept Ginny.

"Don't judge your mother too harshly, Ginny," said Arthur Weasley tiredly. "You haven't yet faced the temptation."

"Dad! Not you, too!" Ginny broke down in a torrent of tears. She dropped her head to the table, reaching out towards Crookshanks on the bench for a bit of comfort. The cat, however, avoided her, a distinctly guilty look on its furry face. It shot a glance at Hedwig, who suddenly seemed inordinately fascinated by the process of sharpening her beak on a stone.

And then Ginny remembered all the strange looks she'd seen and hushed whispering she'd overheard in the past week, ever since gossip about the upcoming assignment had started filtering through the offices of the Ministry of Magic. She'd caught Professor Dumbledore and Mad-Eye Moody standing near the water cooler once, discussing something sotto voce that immediately ceased when they saw her. She'd seen Neville Longbottom sitting in the cafeteria one afternoon, absently stroking his toad Trevor and saying, "There, there, now. I understand how it is. Believe me, I do. We won't let a little thing like this come between us. Well, actually, it was rather a big thing, but it's best to forget that part of it." And she thought she understood, now, why Harry had refused to bring the entire Chudley Cannons team to their house for tea and crumpets that Sunday afternoon. "I think we would be wise to avoid any possible talk," he'd said to Mrs. Weasley out of the corner of his mouth when he thought Ginny couldn't hear. He jerked a thumb in her direction."You know. Little pitchers have big ears, and all that."

Now, Ginny raised her head and dried her eyes. She looked solemnly at her family. "I don't think I'll have a thing to worry about." She pressed her hand to her heart. "The innocence and purity of a maidenly soul will protect me. Virtue is its own reward, you know."

"Funny, that's what Malfoy said one time when he had me hung upside down with a ball gag in my mouth," said Fred musingly.

"I should know, you twit," said George. "I was the one with the cat o'nine tails, remember?"

"So you've been warned, have you?" Draco's voice broke into Ginny's memories. He moved closer to her, his eyes suddenly dark and tragic, his face set in lines of pain. "But did they tell you everything?" She suddenly had trouble catching her breath. She could feel the warmth of his hand on her wrist, a light, caressing sensation that sent shivers down her spine. He brought his lips to her ear.

"Your parents loved you, didn't they? Your brothers, too. You don't know what it's been like for me, what it's always been like."

"What, you mean the way you've always had everything handed to you on a silver platter? You're right about that," Ginny said coldly, as if she could deny the heat rising within her at his disturbing nearness, his male presence.

"Well, yes," he admitted. "The mansions... the carriages... the servants... the vacations on the French Riviera with the girls in frilly little maid outfits coming up to the room whenever I rang... but there's more, so much more." Draco grasped her hand. "My mother never loved me. She said that I disturbed her bridge games and put her off croquet. My father beat me with a special wand he used to keep in salt water just for that purpose. Afterwards, he'd rub red fire ants into the stripes on my back. And do you have any idea of the agony of being babysat by Lord Voldemort?"

"Oh, Draco," whispered Ginny, "I never knew--"

"Now you do." He looked down at her hand. "Such a slender little hand, but it holds my heart within its palm." He kissed her fingers, moving slowly up to the sensitive tips.

"But, wait--Draco--" gasped Ginny "--what about all those other girls? And boys? And grindylows? And garden gnomes? And inanimate objects? And--"

"They mean nothing next to you. All my rampant promiscuity was only a flight from myself, an expression of the sheer meaninglessness of existence without my dear, sweet angel, my salvation, my life." Draco kissed her long and slow, forcing her lips apart with his tongue and backing her into a secluded alcove. She slapped his hands away from the buttons on her blouse.

"Feisty, are we?" he drawled.

"I can't succumb so easily," said Ginny. "You don't understand. " She looked up at him through her auburn eyelashes. "I'm innocent and sweet, a paragon of virtue. I don't know if you can breach my maidenly defenses."

"But I need you," Draco said passionately, taking both of her hands in one of his, "to save me from myself, to pull me back from the abyss of my dark impulses, my forbidden desires. I'm sure that Voldemort will be back--er--one of these days, and without your guiding hand, I'll slip into the damned realm of the Death Eaters. Now, you wouldn't want that, would you?"

"Do I have to pull you back from all your forbidden desires?" Ginny murmured in response.

"To put it delicately... so as to avoid staining your virginal, shell-like ears, and very nice ears they are, too--" he nibbled at the lobe of one "--fuck, no."

"Is that a forked tongue?"

"There are some highly interesting ways to find out."

"All right, then," said Ginny happily. "But I'm very innocent, remember, and I drink only Shirley Temples with a cherry in them."

"A cherry, eh?" he growled in her ear. "Not for long, my sweet Ginny!"

They melted into each other's arms, the pounding disco beat echoing the thumping of their hearts. Ginny gave herself up to his demanding lips and roving hands, thinking hazily that later that night in their hotel room she would make the ultimate sacrifice, the one she'd coolly withheld from Neville Longbottom even after he'd filled her room with roses, slain several bothersome dragons, and nabbed the Hope diamond from the Smithsonian Institute. Would it be more appropriate to offer herself for the first time in bed, in the Jacuzzi, up against the plate glass window, or, perhaps, on the ceiling? Hopefully, it was an offer that could be renewed again... and again... and again... and again... and...

Then a horrible scratching noise filled the room. The music vanished as if cut by a knife.

"What the hell was that?" asked Draco, lifting his head.

"I don't know but--ooh, look, I'm scared--" Ginny pointed a shaking finger around the room, flinging herself into Draco's arms, savoring the feeling of his sinuously manly muscles tightening around her. The entire club had frozen in an unmoving tableau. Dancers were stuck in mid-stride. Miss Rita's sparkly purple skirt was swinging halfway up on stage, the folds trapped in mid-air. The bartender held a pitcher of beer, the liquid stream halted before it reached the glass. The very smoke in the air was static. As Ginny and Draco stood in shock, nearly as still as the figures around them, John Cleese, circa 1973, strode up to them.

"This story," he said briskly, "is getting altogether too silly."

""Who the hell are you?" demanded Draco.

"I'm an official representative from the Department of Magical Plausibility." He gave them a smile, affable yet firm. "And I'm very much afraid that this entire storyline is simply going to have to be closed down."

"What do you mean?" asked Ginny quaveringly.

Cleese flipped through several envelopes and drew several folded sheets of paper out of one of them. " 'Dear Sirs: This continued emphasis on shagging and snogging is providing a grave disservice to my peace of mind, in addition to aggravating my lumbago dreadfully. I will be contacting my solicitor if it is not halted at once. Most sincerely, Mr. Sniggly Pennybridge of Land's End.' And then there's this. 'I have had a bellyful of bizarre locations, thank you very much. Draco and Hermione trapped at the North Pole and forced to kill a polar bear with a sheet of looseleaf paper may have been one thing. However, the fiction I accidentally found that featured Draco and Harry on the Mir space station along with several cages of experimental chimpanzees who then landed on the Planet of the Perverted Apes was simply beyond the pale. Yr Most Obedient Servant, Baroness von Orczy of Loch Ness, Inverness.'"

"What do I care what some moronic twit writes in a letter?" said Draco furiously.

"Oh, but I'm very much afraid that you do need to care, Mr. Malfoy. We've stacks of them down at the Ministry... stacks and stacks, we've had to hire a special secretary just to handle them."

"Malfoys don't give a rat's ass for public opinion," sneered Draco.

"But you see, Mr. Malfoy, you're facing several citations as well." John Cleese picked a folder from the pile of papers and began reading from it. "Seven counts of excessive smirking... nine counts of unwarranted drawling and sneering...thirteen counts of quite uncalled for brooding and moping about... dear, dear me, three hundred and ninety-two counts of uncritically shagging every character in sight."

"Nobody ever told me anything about this! I didn't know!" wailed Ginny.

"I shouldn't take quite that tone of voice if I were you, Miss Weasley. You're also wanted for excessive demureness, giggling repeatedly without a license to do so, and aggravated eyelash-batting without sufficient provocation."

"But that's my only line," she sniffed.

Draco wheeled on the older man. "See here, Cleese," he said angrily, "they can't simply send an agent to arrest us this way. We weren't warned. It's not fair."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't!"

Cleese checked his watch, hummed, and looked vaguely at the ceiling.

"I say it isn't!" insisted Draco.

"Five Knuts for another ten minutes of argument," said Cleese.

"But that wasn't arguing! It oughtn't to count. Contradiction isn't argument."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it --wait." Draco looked at Cleese with a crafty gleam in his silvery eyes. "Then why were you arguing?"

The humming intensified. Ginny recognized it as a Locrian variation of "The White Cliffs of Dover." It was quite extraordinarily unpleasant. "Look," she said, "what do you want us to do?"

"Well," said Cleese, "a few options do exist--"

"Let me handle this," interrupted Draco. He moved closer to Cleese, one eyebrow raised, his voice lowering to a purr. "You know, sir, I've always wanted to see the--ahem--full boxed DVD set, Parrot Sketch Not Included. Do you think you could show it to me? A private screening perhaps?"

"I do apologize, Mr. Malfoy, but that sort of thing simply won't work with crossover characters."

"I suppose it's all over then," sighed Ginny. "D'you think this means Azkaban?"

"Probably not," replied Draco, "but we'll doubtless end up in the Copacabana Prison for Small-Time Yet Annoying Criminals. No dementors, but they do pipe Barry Manilow through the loudspeakers twenty-four hours a day."

Ginny shuddered. Then she turned to Cleese. "Tell me," she said, "is there anything else we can do?"

He nodded. "If you come with me--quietly, mind--this entire scenario will become nothing more nor less than a Monty Python sketch."

She and Draco exchanged glances. "All right, then," he sighed. Slowly, they all filed out of the club.

"Cheer up!" said John Cleese consolingly. "It's really not so bad. True, we're forced to wear these appalling early 1970's fashions, but on the bright side Carol Cleveland's quitting soon to form a lesbian comedy collective. We could always use another girl about to brighten up the place."

"You never know," said Draco reflectively. "I might discover an unexpected flair for comedy myself. Say a nun, a rabbi, a tart, and Pope John Paul II all walk into a bar--"

Thankfully, the closing credits music swelled over them all then. As they marched onto the soundstage, John Cleese began singing along, and soon Ginny and Draco had joined in, their voices swelled by an unseen chorus.

"Spam, spam, spam, spam, lovely spam, wonderful spam, spam, spam, spam..."