What is right and what is easy (Book 1) [A Draco Malfoy Love Story]

Dragons

The prospect of talking face to face with Sirius was all that sustained Me over the next fortnight, the only bright spot on a horizon that had never seemed darker. The shock of finding ourselves as school champions had worn off for my brother and I, and the fear of what was facing us started to sink in a great deal more. The first task is drawing steadily nearer; I feel as though it is crouching ahead of me like some horrific monster, barring my path. I have never suffered nerves like these; they are beyond anything I have ever felt before a Quidditch match, not even our last one against Gryffindor, which had decided who won the Quidditch cup. I'd been finding it hard to think about the future at all, I feel as if my whole life had been leading up to, and would finish with, the first task.

Harry had wrote back to Sirius, explaining that he had promised to see Hagrid a long time ago, meaning that it was left to me to speak to our godfather alone. In the meantime, life has become even worse for me and my brother within the confines of the castle, for Rita Skeeter had published her piece about the Triwizard Tournament, and it had turned out to be not so much a report on the Tournament, as a highly coloured life story of Harry and I. My friends, with the exception of Pansy, had been by my side the whole time; I never spoke much. I merely walked the corridors silently with all of them by my side. If anyone spoke a word to me about the lies the article had told, my friends would be there, wands drawn. The article had appeared ten days ago, and I still got a sick, burning feeling of shame in my stomach every time I thought about it. Rita Skeeter had reported me saying an awful lot of things that I couldn't remember saying in my life, let alone in that broom cupboard.

"I suppose we get our strength from our parents, I know they'd be
Very proud of us if they could see us now... Yes, sometimes
At night I still cry about them, I'm not ashamed to admit it...
I know nothing will hurt us during the Tournament, because
They're watching over us..."

But Rita Skeeter had gone ever further than transforming Harry's "er-"'s into longs sickly sentences: she had interviewed other people about us too.

"Harry and Chloe have at last found love at Hogwarts. Their close friend, Colin Creevey, says that Chloe is rarely seen out of he company of one
Draco Malfoy, a stunningly handsome Pureblood boy who makes a perfect match for the amazingly pretty Half- Blood Chloe Potter."

From the moment the article had appeared, I had to endure people - Slytherins who weren't my friends, mainly - quoting it at me as I passed, making sneering comments. Most girls from almost every house had been furious about Mine and Draco's false romantic interest the Rita Skeeter had concocted; No matter how much you hated Draco for his personality, every girl wanted a chance with the "Slytherin sex God" every girl except me, of course. But above all, Harry had taken it worse... He hated Malfoy, and the thought that we were together made him even more furious and refused to believe it as a lie.

"Want a hanky, Potter, in case you start crying in Transfigurstion?"

"Since when have you been pretty, Potter?"

"Hey- Chloe!"

"Yeah, that's right" I found myself shouting, as I wheeled around the corridor, having had just about enough. I never spoke to anyone, besides muttering to my friends and Harry every now and then, or when a teacher purposely asked me to answer a question; the only teacher who never asked me questions and left me alone was Snape, and he'd take away house points from whoever tried to make a remark to me when he was around. "I've just been crying my eyes out over my dead mum, and I'm just off to do a bit more..."