When Love and Hate Collide

~*~* Chapter Five *~*~

They'd had a heated discussion on where to have dinner. Draco wanted to stick to his normal haunts (i.e., expensive, wizard restaurants) but Ginny wanted a more informal, Muggle dinner. In the end, they decided to flip a coin. Ginny won. (She'd had a lot of practice with her brothers).

"Have you been in here before?" Ginny asked Draco, as they stood in front of a pizzeria that was on the way to The Living Room.

Draco shook his head. Ginny grabbed his hand and dragged him into the restaurant. They found a booth in the far end, and settled comfortably.

"Not too bad, is it, Malfoy?" Ginny asked mischievously.

Draco looked about him. Actually, the place was not bad, really, once you get used to the music. A jukebox stood in the corner and was playing some Muggle music Draco had not heard before. A woman was asking someone to be her dream lover, and asking him to rescue her. Whatever, he thought, shaking his head. These Muggles...

He saw that Ginny was singing to it under her breath.

"You know this song?" he asked her incredulously. These Weasleys, he thought. They were more Muggle than wizards.

"Ye-es. It's a Mariah Carey, only one of the more famous Muggle singers to date! Every one of her singles reached number one in the charts," Ginny said. From the way that Ginny was describing this woman, Draco surmised that this singer is one of her favourites. By this time the waiter had already passed them both menus, and they were perusing it.

"Why don't you order for us Virginia?" Draco said, finally.

"OK," signaling to the waiter. "We'll have the Manager's Special, regular, an order of garlic bread... and some of those divine chicken wings if you have any."

"Very good, ma'am," said the waiter, scribbling down their orders in his little notebook. "And what will you have for drinks?"

"I'll just have a Coke, thanks," Ginny said. "What about you, Draco?"

"Err... I'll have whatever she's having."

"OK. Let me repeat your order..."

After the waiter left, Ginny turned to face a scowling Draco. "Why'd you do that to me, eh?" he asked furiously.

"Do what?" she asked innocently.

"Ask me to order my drink, as if I knew what kind of drinks they had in this restaurant..."

Ginny smiled. Insecure, are we? "Really, Draco... you really need to broaden your horizons a bit. Look at this world we have here, full of things to be explored! Before, we were just reading it in our books and now... don't you ever pay attention in Muggle Studies?"

"Nope. I didn't even take that class!" he said. "And by the way, what's that drink you ordered?" he asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"Coke? It's a fizzy drink, which is just delicious; just wait till you taste it. There's really nothing like it in our world to describe it to you, but it's best taken cold, preferably with some ice cubes in a glass," Ginny explained. "Speaking of which, here it comes now!" The waiter deposited two Cokes and the garlic bread at their booth.

*

Harry and his date, Michelle Williams of the Ministry, arrived at The Living Room just before Hermione and Brian, her friend from work. There was no sign of Ron and Luna, however. Hmmm... I wonder what's keeping them, Harry thought. As far as he could remember, Ron's not one to be late or break a date without notice.

"Shouldn't we go in, d'you think?" Harry asked Hermione in an undertone.

"Yeah, well, Ron's not here yet... should we wait for him?" she asked.

"Well... OK. But only for ten more minutes, if he's not here by then we're going in. Look at the queue!!" he said, nodding towards the entrance. "We won't be able to get our usual seats at this rate..."

And so the four friends waited. Harry kept glancing at the line, hoping to catch a glimpse of the tall red head that had been his best friend since their first train ride to Hogwarts. Michelle kept trying to get his attention back to her by giving him the blow-by-blow of what happened at work, to which Harry replied 'Yeah', and 'Really?' at the appropriate moments.

Finally, when it was clear that Ron was not going to show up, the four decided to enter the club anyway. Just as it's name, the club was set up as a typical Muggle living room - sofas and settees were aplenty. There were TV sets too, which sometimes played sports channels. There were also several small, round tables that were close to the dance floor, and three pool tables that you had to 'reserve' before playing. The bar was right in the middle of the club, stocked with plenty of Muggle drinks.

It was at the bar that Harry saw something he wasn't about to forget in a long while - dancing in full view, to Santana and Rob Thomas' sexy song Smooth, was Draco Malfoy and little Ginny Weasley, their arms around each other, bodies pressed close together and looking as though they belonged to each other.

For a while, all Harry could do was gape at the couple. What the hell does she think she's doing with Malfoy?!? was the first thought that came to his head. He was still gaping at them, open mouthed, when Brian told them that their drinks were ready.

*

Across the dance floor...

"Do you think Harry fell for it?" Ginny asked Draco anxiously. They were still dancing to the slow song, bodies still pressed close together. While Ginny could feel her heart pounding, she didn't know if it was because she was nervous about Harry, or because of...

"I think so. He's still looking like he didn't believe what he was seeing, and by the way his friend had to drag him away from that bar there, I'm thinking he'll report this little incident to Granger, who I'm pretty sure is around here somewhere," Draco said, giving Ginny an account of what he thinks will happen.

"Really? And how do you know that?"

"Because, my dear Ms Weasley, here she comes now," Draco said, his breath on Ginny's cheek, giving her body the tingles that she could feel all the way down to her toes.

"Uh-oh. What shall I tell her?" Ginny asked, murmuring into his shoulder.

"Just tell her that we came here to dance," he said, mischievously.

"Excuse me," said Hermione, to Draco. "Do you mind if I talked to Ginny for a while?"

"No, go ahead. I'll meet you by the pool tables, darling," Draco told Ginny, giving her a soft kiss on the forehead.

"Alright, Draco. See you in awhile," Ginny said, finally loosening her arms from Draco's embrace. Turning to Hermione, she said, "This better be good."

Hermione watched Draco walk away. Grabbing Ginny's hand, she took her to the girls' bathroom, where it'd be quieter. Leaning against the sinks, she asked Ginny, "What are you doing with Malfoy? Have you gone mad? If I didn't know any better I would think that you guys had something going on... do you?"

"Well there's nothing to talk about. Couple of days ago I went to see him at his office to ask some questions for the Daily, then next thing you know we were talking about ourselves. That's when I found out that he loved dancing, and so do I, and you know that whenever I come here with you guys I'm always fifth wheel, or seventh, (Hermione looked slightly guilty at this) so we decided to come here..." she trailed off. Looking hard at Hermione, she said, "Not that it's any of your business anyway."

"Ginny! You know I didn't mean to offend you... just that, well, it's weird to see you with Malfoy that's all... "

"It's OK, he's really good company, Minny - slipping into her nickname for Hermione - you don't worry about anything, alright? And anyway I'm a big girl now, I can take care of myself," Ginny protested.

Hermione still looked dubious at this. Ginny could tell that she was looking for something else to argue about. "He's still a Malfoy, Ginny, I just don't want to see you get hurt..."

"I won't, I promise you that. Now, if you can excuse me, my date's waiting," Ginny said, striding out of the bathroom, obviously signaling the end of the discussion.

*