reconstruct, drarry ✓

Ch.23

As soon as the two boys walked in deafening silence filled the great hall. Not so much as one word was uttered as the two Slytherin's quickly walked off to the Slytherin table. When they sat down the hall resumed to its normal chatter but all the talk was about Draco Malfoy and how he had changed.

Blaise and Draco sat robotically in their seats, both grabbing food quickly and eating as fast as possible. Blaise was anxiously watching Draco to see if he was going to pounce on anyone, but surprisingly he didn't. If anything was to be noticed by Draco it was as if he looked a lot lighter and happier then he had in weeks. Colour had filled Draco's face as he ate and seemed to glow with contentness at the very least. His eyes no longer looked empty but almost bright and full again. It was both exciting and concerning to see.

While mentally making note of this while he ate his oatmeal with shaved almonds, Blaise let his gaze wander as he saw almost every person, girl and guys, stealing quick glances at Draco. Unable to stop the smug smirk crawling its way to his face he strained his ears as he picked up little snipets of the nearby classmates conversations.

Most of them, as he suspected, were about Draco and his changed appearance. Many of the girls and the ocassional guy, said that he most definitely was the most attractive guy at Hogwarts, after the late Cedric Diggory. Not overly surprised seeing as he knew Draco's partial Veela heritage he didn't pay too much time listening to those sorts of conversations.

He did however listen to a few other ones that were trying to figure out what had happened to the blonde. Most of the Slytherin's and from the few conversations he could make out at the nearby Ravenclaw table, they all seem to think that he had come down with some sort of rare illness. That apparently took three weeks to get over and was similar to the muggle version of something absolutely dreadful called Mono.

Although their were the few Slytherin pureblood's conversations who were slightly considering that maybe Draco had inherited a magical creature inheritance. But of course it was soon shut down by some egotistical male Slytherin saying that it was impossible because of how much Draco boasted and raved about his bloods purity.

Suddenly, Blaise was aware of how Draco's relaxed postion disapeared and once rigid again as he stared straight ahead of the table, completely captivated by something, or more importantly someone. Blaise followed his stare and was not surprised to see it glued to the retreating figure of the one and only Golden Boy of the Gryffindor dream team, Harry bloody fucking Potter.

"Draco?" Blaise muttered just loud enough for Draco to hear him. "You okay?"

In response he simply shook his head and quickly scrambled from the Slytherin bench with Blaise slowly following behind slightly confused. As the two walked out of the great hall, not acknowledging the many stares as they did so, they headed off to their first period of class.

_______

First class as usual was a complete and utter bore to all of the students, seeing as how it was none other then Herbology. Truthfully the class could be exciting on an odd occasion when they were in a more dangerous greenhouse like nine and ten, but for the first two months it was all review to get them ready for NEWTs. So as of right now nearly all the students were falling asleep as they replanted a devils snare, which was indeed very dangerous but baby ones were easy enough to contain if you use a cooling gel that got very hot on your dragon hide protection gloves.

After Herbology, which the Slytherin's had been learning with the brainy and know it all Ravenclaw's, they had Charms and History of Magic with the Hufflepuffs. Flitwich was as usual very bubbly and happy to see everyone arrive, even when the most pathetic of failures happened on first year basic charms according to Draco. It was as if nothing had changed, and nothing had to them at least. All the professors and all the students acted exactly the same as they had before, and it irked Draco. It annoyed and pestered him all the way through those few classes until lunch. Nothing had changed to them, only Draco it seemed had.

Throughout the morning classes Blaise had kept to his promise on not leaving Draco's side and he noticed the few changes in his demeanor. He noticed that whenever they passed a group of Gryffindor's Draco would tense up slightly and then about the span of a millisecond he'd relax and a small look of relief would flash across his face. But, as soon as the look had appeared it had vanished beneath his usual cold and hard stone like exterior.

By lunchtime both the boys were exhausted and frustrated, of course for different things so they sat silently completely wrapped in their own thoughts while eating a small lunch. Well, at least Blaise was eating a small lunch, Draco more or less just pushed his around with a fork not having much of an appetite and feeling a dizzy like sickness.

"C'mon Malfoy, you have to eat something," Blaise tried to coax to his expressionless friend.

"I'm not hungry," he muttered in response pushing the plate away, barely touched except for a few nibbles off the steamed carrots.

"You need to eat," Blaise tried again.

"I told you once Zabini I'm not hungry, therefore I will not eat."

Sighing in exasperation at the stubborn blonde, he quickly finished his pea soup so they could arrive on time to their next lesson, which so happened to be double defence with the Gryffindor's. Fan fucking tastic.

Once finished the two boys started to the second floor classroom in sulky moods with Draco beginning to feel a painful headache about to come on as they walked down the lengthy corridors.