THE BOY I ONCE REMEMBERED ▸ [ D. M A L F O Y ]

four

A/N: Hello! I'm super excited for you guys to read these next two chapters (things are starting to get actually interesting), but I'd first like to thank you guys for one thousand reads! That's something I've dreamed of ever since I started writing like three years ago, it seriously means the world!

I'd also like to thank my beta reader, @estrpk, for being absolutely wonderful and beta-ing these chapters. 

Enjoy!

The rest of the day at Hogwarts was relatively uneventful. The feast went the same as always, but I definitely couldn't say I didn't miss the food. Even with the same spread every year, full of comfort foods from every country, there was always so much to choose from that you couldn't get sick of it.

I currently had an assortment of things piled on my plate, my missing of the sweets trolley on the train fueling the immense hunger inhabiting my stomach. I bit into a warm chicken leg, a small moan escaping me as the flavor filled my mouth.

"Down, girl." Neville grinned from next to me, wiping some sort of red sauce from the corner of his mouth. I hit him playfully in response, before turning back to face my plate. Catching my eye, however, was a pair of silver eyes from across the hall.

I met Malfoy's glance, but as soon as I did he dropped his stare, turning back to hear whatever Blaise Zabini was saying next to him. At the table in front of him I saw Cedric again, who sent me a cheeky smile when he noticed my staring. I blushed, my heartbeat raising ever so slightly. Suddenly I was extremely eager to get my schedule for the year and see if a certain brown-haired Hufflepuff shared any of my classes.

After we'd both finished changing, Cedric and I had hung around an empty cart for a few moments, talking about numerous things, from our favorite movies to which teacher we disliked the most. He'd even insisted that I owed him my copy of Pride and Prejudice after I'd spent five minutes straight ranting about how incredible it was(I'd recently developed a soft spot for the classics)

Which is precisely why I had brought the topic up again once more at the Sorting Feast, after I'd overheard Hermione Granger speak of muggle literature. It was delightful, having another person so eager in talking about the subject. Cedric had been interested, sure, but he had nothing to contribute as he'd dabbled very little outside of Wizard/Witch work. I didn't blame him for it- I hadn't known of Jane Austen, Shakespeare, or any other non-magic authors prior to my arrival at Hogwarts either, seeing as my parents had avoided any talk of the subject.

"Titus was one of the first Shakespeare plays I've read!" Hermione said brightly, sharing my enthusiasm, "Not one of his best works, but I enjoyed it nonetheless."

I grinned, "I have to admit, after I got further into it I had to stop. It was much too brutal for me, though I'm sure if I read it now I wouldn't mind if-"

A throat cleared from the direction of the teacher's table, and I brought my attention towards the speaker instead. Albus Dumbledore, the headmaster, stood once more at his podium.

"So!" said Dumbledore, smiling around at them all. "Now that we are all fed and watered,
I must once more ask for your attention, while I give out a few notices."

He continued to speak of Mr.Filch's dreaded yet unsurprising new rules and prohibitions, warned us for yet another year about the standard forbidden forest rules, and moved briefly to speak about Hogsmeade for the new third years.

It was the same as always, and if I was being honest, the mango on the tip of my fork held more of my interest. Not that Dumbledore wasn't brilliant, but I'd heard the same speech go on every year since I'd first arrived at Hogwarts, and my housemates seemed to think the same. Neville was aimlessly scooping through his robes, a telltale sign that he'd once again lost something. Seamus and Dean were playing Chopsticks under the table, and doing a horrid job at hiding it, and even Hermione Granger looked as if she was thinking about something else.