ferret boy | draco malfoy imagines [✔]

#13 - Handshakes

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Summary: before going to Hogwarts, you're a Potter twin and you're shopping with Hagrid at Leaky Cauldron.

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"The Leaky Cauldron!" announces Hagrid.

"What do we do here?" I ask. We're standing in front of a wooden shop which looks like it's been squeezed in between two shops. The sign is almost falling off the head board of the shop.

Hagrid enters the shop without answering my question.

The inside of the shop seems a lot bigger than the outside as if someone put an elephant inside the shop which stretched only the inside of the shop and not the outside. The inside is also very well lit and I can see that there are lots of people in there.

And all those people seem to have stopped in time. They just stare at Harry and me, sometimes their gaze flickering to our scars.

I really wanted to tell them to get back to their own lives, that we were just two normal magical tweens. I probably shouldn't have got so irritated so fast but I happen to be an irritable person. So deal with it.

"Are you the Potters?" asked a mousey man with a purple turban on his head. He waited for our answer.

"Yeah, I guess so?" ventures Harry.

"We are," I say, receiving a sudden wave of confidence.

Which dilated the moment everybody turned to stare at me. Like they hadn't noticed me before.

The thing is that Harry is more of an extrovert while I'm more of an introvert. So it often happens that people don't realize that I'm there even though I'm standing right next to them.

Rather like a cat. You'd never know if a cat was sitting right beside you, unless it let you notice it.

The man in the purple turban introduced himself, his name was Quirrell. He shook my twin's hand and I could see Harry scrutinizing him, sizing him up.

"He's going to be your teacher at Hogwarts," Hagrid said.

The man in the purple turban came forward to shake my hand. He took hold of it and I felt a searing wave of pain generate from my snowflake scar. I jerked my hand back. He gave me a queer look but I swear I saw blisters appear on his hand before he hid his hand under the sleeve of his robe.

I looked back at him with the same expression.

Neither Hagrid nor Harry seemed to notice however. But I knew my eyes weren't deceiving me. I have really good eyesight and when I look around in the dark, I can actually see things. That is a trick of my eyes.

Hagrid tapped on some particular bricks on the left wall of the Leaky Cauldron with his pink umbrella and I thought he was going mad until the wall opened like sliding doors and I thought I was going mad.

Harry probably thought so too, by the expression on his face. But when he saw me looking, he gave me a reassuring smile and for once, I was glad that he was the older twin. By one minute, mind you.

Hagrid led us through the wall and into a large street. It was like an entirely new world. They didn't wear jeans or t-shirts or any normal clothes, instead they wore flowing robes, even the children. As if that wasn't bizarre enough, the shops had weird names like Ollivander's Wands, Madam Malkin's Robes, Magical Menagerie, Magical Mouth, Magical Fun and others. The word 'magic' seemed to be everywhere; on the a poster on the lamppost, on the signs on the footpath, basically everywhere.

Harry is looking like a frog with his large green eyes popping out, trying to take everything in but not quite managing.

Hagrid says, "Well, lets go to the dress shop, shall we?"

I nod for both Harry and me because Harry is incapable of any kind of response.

As we enter the shop, all I see is clothes. And more clothes. AND more clothes. Until I see Madam Malkin who is also covered in clothes.

She says, "Let me just keep these and I'll attend to the two of you."

But I am not paying attention because I just saw someone blonde disappear within the shelves. The blonde hair was the same color as the hair of the boy in the park. I tell Harry to wait a minute and move towards the white-blonde locks of hair.

The boy turns towards me before I can duck behind a shelf and I feel like a deer stuck in the headlights.

The boy however showed no surprise or any emotion at all. He just looked and asked me, "Why are you following me?"

I said, "Thank you for that day in the park."

His expression changed, if only slightly, and became one of curiosity. "It was you?"

"Yes, if we're talking about the same thing," I said.

"But your supposed to be a Mudblood!" he exclaimed, now obviously surprised.

"What's a Mudblood? I'm human," I said, knowing nothing of wizarding insults back then, and let me tell you, ignorance is bliss. "Anyways, thanks for saving me."

"No problem."

He held his hand out, "Draco, Draco Malfoy," he said.

I shook his hand hesitantly, expecting pain again, but his hands were only rather cold. As if he were made of snow. "Ashlyn Potter," I said.

"Potter?"

Draco's eyes went wide and he pushed me into one of the shelves. "Did I just here Potter?" asked the same voice.

"No, Father."

"Well, you know that you mustn't have anything to do with them," said Draco's father.

"Yes, Father."

I heard Draco's father's heavy footsteps and Draco's light footsteps make their way towards the lobby of the shop.

It was only then that I crawled out of the shelves and gazed at their retreating backs, pressing the hand Draco shook to my cheek.