A Tapping on Her Bedroom Window

Ginny was flipping through her new subscription of Witch Weekly: Holiday Edition and looked through the new make-up charms and famous wizard pictures. She cared for none of this, but then again, what was there to do in an empty castle on Christmas holiday? Sure, her brother Ron and his friends Harry and Hermione and a few other students from other Houses were staying for the break at Hogwarts, but no one she wanted to talk to right now.

Christmas was the next day. She should be excited. But why wasn't she? She could never figure this out. She needed something big to happen. Something exciting, drastic, dangerous, anything! The only problem was that she would have to create it and there was absolutely no idea for it forming in her head. If only Fred and George were here, she thought. They'd make this holiday exciting.

She heard a tap at her window. Slightly surprised, she climbed out of her bed and went to the window. There was no one - nothing - at the window. It must've been a tree limb or some other object of the sort. She walked back to her bed and continued flipping through the pages of her Witch Weekly. Her eyes fell upon the article entitled How To Win Harry's Heart This Holiday Season: What Is On His Wish List. Rolling her eyes, she read through the article.

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Draco was sitting in front of the Slytherin fire, which wasn't providing as much warmth as a fire should. The Slytherin dungeons were always freezing, but never as much as it did in the winter. If he were back at Malfoy Manor, he could be lying in his bed up in his room, with all of the warmth he needed.

Instead, he chose to stay at Hogwarts this Christmas. Which, when he looked into it, wasn't that great of an idea since he kept going numb all the time. But he only decided to stay because she was going to stay.

This Christmas was different than the others. Because of Voldemort's rise to power and the war looming on the horizon, students decided to go home for the holidays. Some said it could be the last they spend with them, while others went home because they did it every year. For Draco, this was a perfect time for him to talk to her. There weren't a lot of people left in the castle - the professors, four Gryffindors, three Hufflepuffs, five Ravenclaws, and himself and a Slytherin seventh year. This meant that if he tried to talk to her, no one would know and there wouldn't be total commotion.

That is, if she didn't scream in horror and start shouting it to the entire school. After all, she was a Weasley, and he very well knew what they were capable of. Especially her, after observing her for the past several months.

Draco, getting up and stretching his arms, decided to go flying. Anything can be warmer than this place, he thought as he trudged up the stairs to his dormitory to get his broom and winter clothes.

Once in his dorm, he opened up his trunk and pulled on his winter robe and cloak, his Slytherin scarf, and gloves that provided both warmth and grippers to hold onto his slick broomstick. He grabbed his broom and walked to the nearest window. Unlocking the locks and pushing the window open on its hinges, he straddled his broomstick, and hovered a bit above the ground, and flew out the window into the cold, wintry air.

There was one place he was going to go, and that was to Gryffindor Tower. He knew which dormitory she was in, after flying several nights peering inside each and every window trying to find out. He flew up to her window, and peered inside.

There she was, flipping through a magazine, looking rather bored. He wanted to cheer her up, somehow. But that was unthinkable. A Malfoy? Cheering up a Weasley? It was unheard of. It was just as unheard of as a Malfoy falling for a Weasley. And that had already happened.

He didn't want to scare her though. A bit of amusement shown through his eyes as he pulled out his wand, casting a charm upon himself - the result becoming a shimmer. He was somewhat invisible, but if one looked closely, they would see a slight bent and wave in the scenery in front of oneself, proving that someone was standing (or rather flying in his case) in front of them. He whispered the same charm onto his broom and lightly tapped on her window.

She turned to the window and looked a bit confused. She got up off her bed and walked to it, looking outside. Appearing to see nothing, she shrugged and walked back to her bed, flipping through the magazine once again and finally reading an article. Draco could distinctly see the word Harry written on the top of the article within its title, and a pang of jealous ran through him as if he swallowed fire.

He hoped against hope that she did not have her heart for Potter still. There was no way Potter was going to have her.

Draco decided to take the charm off of his broom. She needed a bit of excitement anyway, by the looks of it.

Once again, he tapped on her window.

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"Harry Potter has many wishes this holiday season and would love it if his fans would send him any of these items on his list. As you know, he grew up with no parents and did not have a loving family. They provided him with nothing, leaving him as a sad and poor child. He hopes that you would get him..." Ginny rolled her eyes and tossed the magazine aside. As far as she knew, Harry didn't take an interview with Witch Weekly and he didn't want sympathy. The latter was a definite. In fact, he never liked his fame and how he came upon it, so why would he want a bunch of fans sending him a load of crap that he never wanted in the first place?

Her temper was rising. She closed her eyes and tried to count to ten to calm her down. It's Christmas, you should be happy, she thought. One...two...three...four...

Tap tap tap.

Her eyes shot open. What was it now? And who was playing this stupid, boldly prank anyway? She did not want this - oh no, she did not want this at all.

Once again climbing off her bed and walking to the window, she nearly jumped out of her knickers seeing a broom hovering ever so closely by her window. She rolled her eyes, thinking of how foolish she was behaving, and walked towards the window once more. She unlocked the locks and pushed open the window.

The broom moved away from the window as it opened. Ginny furrowed her eyebrows at this. Something was going on. Curious, she held her hand out to the tip of the broom handle, and pushed it slightly. Oh, yes, there was someone sitting on the broom, because the broom refused to move. If a person didn't operate it, it would've moved backwards. But it proved not to.

"Who's there?" She looked squarely at the area above the broom, where a person should be sitting. There was a ripple in the air where a person would be sitting. Someone was using the Invisibility Charm. "I know what you're using. Show yourself, please."

"After I show you something," answered a low, familiar voice. She couldn't quite place it, but she knew it belonged to a Hogwarts student.

She held a puzzled expression on her face, and feeling rather stupid for not knowing who it was and staring at trees in the background. If someone were to walk in right now, they would think she was insane, talking to a broom. "Show me what?"

After the words barely left her mouth, she was grabbed around the waist and pulled up onto the broom, and the occupant who held her in place flew over the trees and towards the lake, farther and farther away from Gryffindor Tower and from Hogwarts.

She should be scared, shouldn't she? On a broom in the winter, flying with God knows who, and heading to a frozen lake. Oh, and the fact that she was wearing a long sleeve shirt and pants did not help fending off the cold that was biting her skin pink.

The person behind her on the broom was definitely a boy. She was leaning against his chest. And by the way his voice sounded, he was obviously an older student. This should also scare her a bit, shouldn't it? Especially the fact that she still had no clue who the person was.

"Who are you?" she asked again.

She heard the boy breathe in deeply and sigh. "I'm not sure you'd want to know."

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Draco meant every word he said. He didn't want to see her horror-struck face when he revealed himself, he didn't want to hear any nasty comments come from her mouth, he didn't want to feel rejected. Feeling rejected was the last thing Draco Malfoy ever wanted to feel.

"You obviously don't know me, because I do want to know who I'm riding on a broom with," she bit back.

He shook his head. "But I do know you. I know you love chocolate as much as you love your family. I know you prefer not to wear make-up and you don't spend time worrying about your appearance like other girls do. You've seen the Dark but wish not to reveal it." He felt her flinch against him as he said that. "You love the holidays, and you prefer to be at home right now, and yet you wanted to stay at Hogwarts. Your favorite brother is a dragon tamer, and just last year you broke up with your first boyfriend because of his stupidness." He heard her laugh a bit at the word he made up. "I admire that. I admire your strength, your weaknesses, your temper, your sweetness, your kindness, and your willingness to help others. I admire that no matter how silly or dangerous a situation, you stick by your friends and your beliefs. I love the way you make me want to be the nicest person I could ever be, and I hate the way you make me want to be that person. I could never be that person, and if I revealed myself, you would know why."

That was a rather long speech. Ginny was quiet. The silence almost killed him.

"I just want to know who you are," she said shortly.

"You'll regret it."

She turned around to face him, or rather, what she thought was his face, as he was still under the charm. "Just tell me who you are."

Draco sighed. "After we land."

He soared above the lake, circling it a few times before he landed under a tree along the shore. Ginny hopped off the broom and Draco propped it up against the tree. He could see the amusement on her face. It would be a bit funny seeing a broom move all by itself, leaning comfortably against a tree. He smiled, trying to permanently lodge her face and this moment into his mind before it was shattered to pieces.

Ginny looked around, now not knowing where he was. She sat down on the ground. Draco saw her shiver, and he took off his coat and draped it over her body. Once having done this, the coat became un-invisible. Ginny looked puzzled, but grateful nonetheless. He saw her smell it, breathing in the scent deeply. She looked like she was trying to place the scent to a face.

"Can you tell me who you are now? We've landed" She looked around the lake hopefully.

Draco sighed. There was no getting out of this.

He raised his wand and chanted the counter-charm.

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Before Ginny's eyes, she saw a figure liquefy from thin air, taking the form of a solid person. Her eyes widened in horror. Draco Malfoy?!

"Malfoy?"

She saw his face go from expectant to hurt in a flash. She had never seen emotions on his face until then. She almost regretted having a look of disgust on her face. Almost. This was, after all, the boy who tormented her and her family and her friends for years. She was never going to forgive him for that, not even for apologies. It would take much more for her to forgive him for what he had done in the past.

"That's right." His face went as cold and hard as stone. She could tell he regretted bringing her here.

"Why'd you bring me here? What's going on?" She became a bit panicky, and threw his coat reluctantly onto the snow. Once again, she saw hurt cut through his eyes before being replaced by cold hatred they were always filled. "Whatever you are planning, I don't want to be a part of it."

His hands clenched to fists. If there was one thing he forgot to tell her while they were flying, it was that he knew how to handle her temper. "I'm not planning anything! What I told you was the truth!" He slowly composed himself and stood up straight, his arrogant smirk smacked onto his face. "I thought you were the accepting type, you Weasleys. I guess I was wrong about you."

Ginny shook her head. "We're not accepting to those who torture us and insult for every little thing we do or say!"

Draco strode over to her and towered over her. She nearly forgot how tall he was. It was intimidating. "Look, what I did was wrong. It's just the way I am, the way I've been brought up. If you're asking me to change all of that, then I'd die. I rather like the way I am. And I like that I like you."

He liked her? Ginny mentally smacked herself. Of course he liked her! Everything he said on the broom ride was proof!

Ginny and Draco stared at each other for the longest time ever, not knowing what to say or refusing to say anything. Ginny began to review everything Draco had ever done to herself specifically. Sure, there was her first year on Valentine's Day, but that was only once. Any other time was her family or Harry. Now that she looked back on it, she noticed that Draco had been acting a bit nicer to her. She remembered on the first day of term earlier in the fall, her bag had ripped open and her books, parchment, and quills fell to the floor. Instead of laughing at her or making 'your too poor to get a new bag' comments, he had picked up her last quill, handed it to her, and walked away without saying a word. There were other little incidents that she never looked into. That is, until now.

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Draco sighed, shook his head, and walked to the tree to grab his broom. He began to mount it, but he paused. He had to take her back to Gryffindor; he couldn't just leave her here. He looked back at her. She was slowly picking up his coat, and walking towards him. She quietly whispered to him to take her back to her room. He made her sit behind him, and he kicked off into the air.

The ride back was quicker than it was going to the lake. And it was dead silent. Draco was cold with anger, rejection, and hurt. He should've known that she wouldn't accept him. He hadn't changed his personality, and there was no way he was going to do that for a girl. He rather liked how he was. If she didn't, that was her problem.

He reached Gryffindor Tower, and spotted her window - not that he didn't know where it was already. He wanted to forget everything he learned about her. He wanted to forget her. Period.

She climbed off his broom and stepped inside the window into her dorm room. She turned around with a small smile on her face. It slowly changed to a sad frown, and she looked down at the floor.

Draco couldn't stand this. He wanted to get away. Turning around to fly back to the Slytherin dungeons where he belonged and felt wanted, he felt a tug at the back of the broom. He whipped his head around. Ginny was leaning out of the window, holding out his coat.

"Thanks." She gave him a small smile, and nodded at the coat, urging him to take it. He reached out slowly and took it out of her hands.

He merely nodded. Turning away once again and beginning to fly off, he felt another tug. Irritated, he threw his head around. "What?" he snapped.

"Er," she looked taken aback, "er, well...I was wondering if you wanted to go down to the kitchens tonight? For Christmas Eve dinner?" She looked shy, and she was blushing a bit.

He grinned. He felt so light and wonderful. "That would be great. Seven o'clock."

Ginny nodded and smiled once more. She began to close her window, and waved him good-bye.

Draco flew away back to his dorm. He had never felt like he had accomplished something more than he did this afternoon.