The Mysterious, Disappearing Mistletoes

Disclaimer: The world of Harry Potter doesn't belong to me, sadly. It belongs to the wonderful woman, J.K. Rowling.

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Draco was running out of options; he was determined to get her under the mistletoe in some corridor, any corridor. He had not yet succeeded, and not for his lack of trying, either. He had gone through their shared route—for they both took the same corridors to get to the same classes—and made sure there were multiple mistletoes above, even if he had to be the one who placed them there.

He would walk ahead of her, though they usually walked together, Magick up a lone mistletoe and pretend to lace up his trainers, conveniently finishing up just in time to walk under the mistletoe at the same time she was. Every time, through some unknowable force out to get him, the mistletoe managed to somehow disappear just as they walked under. He would curse softly under his breath but continued to talk to her normally, paying no heed to her bemused stares, not wanting to let her in as to how disappointed he truly was.

Granger never seemed to notice the lack of mistletoe in their route. How could she possibly not? he would wonder, every other corridor in the school was horded by mistletoe; every few feet, someone would be snogging. It infuriated him, how she didn't seem to care that they could possibly have to kiss; wasn't she hoping to get under a mistletoe with him just as much as he was wishing to get under one with her?

After the fifth time that week that the mistletoe he placed somehow managed to disappear, he decided he needed a new tactic. Simply hanging the mistletoe himself wasn't working; how did it manage to disappear seconds afterwards? He went to the library, searching for new ideas. He still thought placing it himself might work; he just needed it to stay there, just long enough for him and Granger to get lost in a lip-lock. He even contemplated asking the baboons she called friends but decided that if he, Draco Malfoy who was considerably smarter than both of them combined, couldn't think of a solution, why would he think they might be able to come up with something? No, it was better if he continued to scour the library in hopes of finding an answer.

On the second night of his dutiful research, Draco came across the perfect solution to his problem of vanishing mistletoes; he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of it earlier.

A simple Permanent-Sticking Charm would do the trick and, placed strategically, he would be sure to kiss Granger before they left for the break. He decided to practice; though he could perform the charm quite easily, he had to make sure it worked as well on plants as it did on paintings and such.

A walk around the grounds had him finding a handful of spring flowers, whose stems poked through the frozen ground a whole season early. He charmed them so they stayed permanently on banisters and the wall corridors and, when he was completely satisfied, moved on to practicing the charm on the horrid mistletoe, a plant he had grown to hate, as they couldn't seem to hang above his head at the right place and time.

He had already decided where he was to hang the offending flower; since the corridors on their way to their lessons weren't much luck, he decided that the doorway that led to their shared Heads dorm was the best place to hang the mistletoe above. He didn't care about the future Heads, who would be forced to kiss come Christmas every year, all he cared about was him kissing Granger as much as he wanted to for the rest of winter.

The next morning, after Granger left for breakfast, already holding her books for her morning classes, Draco hung the darned mistletoe with the Permanent-Sticking Charm right at the center, just above the portrait hole that allowed them to enter their dorm. He then made sure the charm worked properly, trying to Vanish it and then using any spell he could think of to try to take it down, even resorting to hands as if somehow brute force would be able to dissipate the charm placed on it. Satisfied when it hadn't moved an inch, even after half an hour's worth of mistreatment, he grinned and left for breakfast.