Please Be There If I Remember

Chapter Seventeen: Meetings

Draco haphazardly knocked someone's shoulder on the way, carelessly wandering his way through the shroud of people to reach the Great Hall for supper. Echos of the chatter from the mingling crowd that was lingering in and around the door helped to distract him from his thoughts and he shouldered through until he was at the door and around the crowd. The hall was filled with a sprinkle of students—Ravenclaw's table full of people reading or talking amiably to each other, Gryffindor loudly shouting to each other even though the person they were talking to was right beside them, and Hufflepuff in a kind of conundrum as classmates from a few of the other houses seemed to find it the calmest table and were laughing away at their company in a blur of colours.

He headed over to the Slytherin one in the farthest corner where it was almost a mix of all three; some people reading, some simply sitting there and eating, and others were arguing with heated hand gestures.

He ambled up to Blaise and Pansy, who were clearly a part of that last group.

The two were deep into debate, almost knocking over food from the table in their haste to exclaim their points. They were talking too fast for Draco to even attempt at trying to figure out what they were saying, and he sat down beside Theo who was staring exasperatedly at Blaise and longingly at Pansy like he wanted her to be fighting with him instead, if only to have her eyes turned on him.

Draco stepped back a moment at that. Well that was a new development.

Shaking his head, he sat down beside his friends and reached for the arrayed variety of food on the long table in front of him. He grabbed some and placed them on his plate that appeared when he sat down and bit into a green apple that was resting in a weaved basket. It was an extra juicy one and he grumbled in embarrassment as a spray of juice shot up onto his cheek.

Thankfully, no one had noticed and he hastily wiped the wetness off his face with as much careless superiority that he could muster in case anyone looked in his direction.

He sighed and tuned out the fight that was happening across from him.

Lifting his gaze up from where he was scanning the food on the table, he glanced up to the opposite side of the room where the Gryffindors were sitting. He let his eyes drift along, taking in the sight until it rested on a certain black-haired boy.

Green Eyes was sitting beside his two friends—Hermione and Ron as Draco now knew them—as they chatted away to themselves, much like Blaise and Pansy. He raised his eyebrow at him after peering over only to see that Draco was looking back at him too.

Draco made sure to initiate some kind of facial conversation before he could turn away, and Potter tilted his head in confusion as if to say, What?

Draco snorted at his face and gestured in fake exasperation to Pansy and Blaise who were now hissing insults and altogether ignoring each other while simultaneously sending sharp glances at the other person.

Potter gazed at the Slytherin table curiously, his eyes first lingering on Theo who was avidly ignoring them both by reading a book, until he noticed the two arguing and seemed to laugh a bit to himself before motioning to Ron and Hermione.

This time, it was Draco who was confused until he saw Potter's two friends who were quite literally Blaise and Pansy but with red hair and Gryffindor robes. He chuckled slightly at the extremely similar exchange, and Theo was distracted enough at the sound that he lifted his head up from the potions book he was reading to look at Draco oddly.

He stared back at the boy and Theo shrugged at him, brushing it off, before turning back to his studies.

Draco turned to look back at the Gryffindor table but was disheartened to see that Potter had already turned away with a dejected look on his face.