Begin Again (George Weasley/Draco Malfoy)

Three.

Pansy insisted on walking Draco to the next class, carrying his book bag for him like a loving servant. I would have loved to do that for him, and I was kind of jealous that I wasn’t. Ron was asking Hermione why she didn’t lie and say she didn’t help Neville when he turned to look at her and she wasn’t there. “Where is she? She was right behind us,” He asked.
   
Harry and I both turned, too, and we saw her at the top of the stairs. “There!” I call pointing her out.
   
Hermione was panting slightly, hurrying up the stairs; one hand clutched to her bag, the other seemed to be tucking down the front of her robes.
   
“How did you do that?” Asked Ron.
   
“What?” She asked, joining us.
   
“One minute you were right behind us, then next moment, you were back at the bottom of the stairs again.”
   
“What?” She asks again, “Oh – I had to go back to get something.”
   
We continued to walk then heading to our first Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson with my father as the teacher. I haven’t told anyone except for Draco and Jude that the new Professor is my dad. I wanted to see how Ron, Harry, and Hermione liked him before I did that. I didn’t want to poison their opinion of him before he had even taught us anything.
   
As we were walking, we were joined by Fred and George, who towered over all of us in height. They snuck up on us from behind saying, “It’s crazy who you run into in the halls, isn’t it, Fred?"
   
“I totally agree, George.”
   
They then snuck in front of us and began to walk backwards so they could look at us as they talked.
   
“So,” says Fred, “Quidditch tryouts are coming up. You trying out this year, Harry?”
   
“Of course,” he says, nodding.
   
“I can’t imagine why Wood wouldn’t put you on the team again,” says Fred. “Considering it’s his last year and all. He’s going to want a winning team.”
   
George brings his brown eyes over to me then, “And what about you, Adelaide? You going out for the Hufflepuff team again?”
   
“I am,” I say, nodding. “I just talked to Cedric about it last night.”
   
“Great,” says George, smiling wide at me. “You know, we never did get to play against you guys last year.”
   
“Yeah, we’ll see if you make the team again, Weasley,” I joke with him, he scoffs, pretending to be offended. I have learned to speak the sarcastic joking style of Weasley Twin long ago. I like it, too. It’s fun to mess around with them.
   
George smirks at me, “For that, I’m sending a Bludger your way when we verse Hufflepuff, Fawley.”
   
“Bring it on, Weasley. I’m not scared of you.”
   
“Alright, alright, leave the trash talk for the Pitch, you two,” says Fred, but he has a big smile on his face.
   
“I’m sure you’ll have no problem making the team, Adelaide,” says George, “Cedric likes to fill his team with the prettiest girls in his house.”
   
With that the twins quickly turn and they’re gone in a flash. I didn’t even get to say anything back to George. Ron spoke up, saying, “Will you two just quit it and make out already? That flirting was painful to watch.”
   
“I was not flirting with George, Ron, that was smack talk about Quidditch. He might have been flirting, but I sure wasn’t.” Then two figures pushed past us, it was Pansy and Draco. Pansy had a big smile on her face, but Draco looked angry.
   
Professor Lupin wasn’t in the class so we made ourselves comfortable while we waited for him. I sat with Jude at a desk and Draco and Pansy were sitting next to us. It made me want to vomit. I ignored them as much as I could, but it was hard. I was jealous. That was my boyfriend, and she’s hanging all over him. It wasn’t fair. There was a murmur of conversations happening throughout the room when he finally arrived.
   
“Good afternoon, would you please put all your books in your bags. Today’s lesson will be a practical one. You will need only your wands.”
   
Pansy, who had worked so hard to set up Draco’s desk for him, had to now put it all away. I watched as Draco tried to grab some things with his good arm but Pansy swatted it away quickly. He wasn’t going to do anything for himself as long as she shared classes with him. At least he got away from her in Ancient Ruins.
   
We followed Professor Lupin out of the classroom. He led us along the deserted corridor and around a corner, where the first thing that we saw was Peeves the Poltergeist, who was floating upside down in midair and stuffing the nearest keyhole with chewing gum. Peeves didn’t look up until Professor Lupin was two feet away, then he wiggle his curly toed feet and broke into song.
   
“Loony loopy Lupin! Loony loopy Lupin! Loony loopy Lupin!”
   
Peeves never usually made fun of the teachers like that, he usually saved the insults for the students. We all looked up at my dad to see how he would take this, and he was smiling at him. “I’d take that gum out of there if I were you, Peeves, or Filch won’t be able to get to his brooms.” Peeves paid no attention to my dad’s words, instead he blew a raspberry at him. My dad gave a small sigh and took out his wand.
   
“This is a very useful little spell,” he told us over his shoulder, “Please listen carefully.” He raised his wand to shoulder height and said, “Waddiwasi!” and pointed it at Peeves. With the force of a bullet, the wad of gum shot out of the key hole and went straight down Peeves’ nostril.
   
“Cool, Sir!” Exclaimed Dean Thomas.
   
“Thank you, Dean,” said Professor Lupin as he put his wand away. He continued to lead us down the corridor again and stopped right outside of the staffroom door. He opened the door and held it open saying, “Inside, please.” We all shuffled into the empty staff room one by one then. Professor Lupin closes the door and begins his lesson, walking over to the wardrobe where the teachers sometimes kept some spare robes. He stood next to it and began talking again as it gave a wobble.
   
“Nothing to worry about,” he assures us, “It’s just a boggart in there.” Most people in the room felt like that was something to worry about. Neville gave him a look of pure terror, and Seamus Finnigan eyed the nor rattling door knob apprehensively.
   
“Boggarts like dark, enclosed spaces,” said Professor Lupin, “Wardrobes, the gap beneath beds, the cupboards under sinks. I’ve even met one that had lodged itself in a grandfather clock. This one moved in yesterday afternoon, and I asked the headmaster if the staff would leave it to my third year class to get some practice. So, the first question is, what is a boggart?”
   
Hermione’s hand was in the air in an instant.
   
“Yes, Miss Granger.”
   
“It’s a shape-shifter,” she said, “It takes the shape of whatever it thinks will frighten you the most.”
   
My dad gives her a smile, “Couldn’t have said it better myself. So, the boggart sitting in the darkness within has not yet summoned a form. He does not yet know what will frighten the other person outside of the door. Nobody knows what a Boggart looks like when he is alone, but when I let him out, he will immediately become what each of us fear the most. This means that we have a huge advantage over the Boggart before we even begin. There are so many of us that he won’t know what shape it should be. He will become confused.
   
“The charm that repels the Boggart is a simple one, yet it requires force. You see, the thing that truly finishes off a Boggart is laughter. What you need to do is force it to take a shape that you find assuming. We will practice the charm together without wands. After me, please…Riddikulus.”
   
“Riddikulus,” said the class together.
   
My dad smiled at us, “Very good, but I am afraid that is the easy part. The word alone is not enough, and this is where you come in, Neville.”
   
“M-me?” He asked, stuttering with fear.
   
“Yes, you, Mr. Longbottom,” My dad places a hand right in between Neville’s shoulders and leads him to the wardrobe. “First things first: What would you say is the thing that you fear the most?”
   
“Professor Snape,” replies Neville, shakily.
   
“Alright then,” says my dad, nodding, “And Neville, you live with your grandmother, right?”
   
“Yes,” says Neville smiling, “But I don’t want that thing to turn into her, either.”
   
“No, no, it won’t,” Professor Lupin assures him, “I just want you to think of her clothes. Just her clothes. No need to tell us out loud, but just think about it, okay? When I open the wardrobe, the Boggart will pop out, and it will assume the shake of Professor Snape, and then I want you to raise your wand and shout Riddikulus while concentrating hard on your grandmother’s clothes. Now, if Neville is successful, the Boggart will likely shift its attention to each of us in turn. I would like all of you to take a moment now and form a line and think of the thing that scares you most, and imagine how you might make that comical.”
   
We formed the line then, I was behind Harry. I had no idea what scared me the most, failing out of school, maybe? But how could I make that comical? I had no idea.
   
Neville’s attempt worked, and he was able to put Professor Snape in a dress. And then we all got to take care of it, one by one, until Harry went. When Harry, who was in front of me, got up to the Boggart Professor Lupin stepped in front of it, turning it into the full moon and made it turn into a balloon and it flew around the classroom until it landed back into the wardrobe. Then he dismissed us, telling us for homework to summarize the chapter on Boggarts to be handed in on Monday and he let us leave class early.
   
Harry, Hermione, Ron, and I all left the class together and headed for the courtyard. “So, what did you guys think of Professor Lupin?” I ask them. I wanted to know how they felt about him before I told them that he was my dad and all.
   
“He’s great,” says Harry, beaming.
   
“Yeah, he’s awesome,” agrees Ron.
   
“Well, we’ve only had one lesson with him,” says Hermione, “But he seems like he’s going to be the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher we’ve had yet.”
   
I smiled at that, it was nice to hear my friends seemed to like my dad.
   
“Well, there’s something about him that I have been meaning to tell you guys,” I say, and I am now nervous. I take a deep breath before I say anything else. “Professor Lupin is my father.”
   
“What?” Asks Ron, sounding very surprised.
   
“He is?” says Hermione.
   
“He is,” I say, nodding. “I’ve known since the first night here, but I waited until we had class with him to see how you guys liked him first before I told you. He wants to be a part of my life now, and I think I’m going to let him. I haven’t fully decided yet.”
   
“Wow,” says Ron.
   
“Did you tell your mum about this?” Asks Hermione.
   
“I did,” I say nodding, “And she’s fully supportive of what I decide to do.”
   
Hermione speaks up again, “Adelaide, I don’t know whether to be happy for you or not, since you don’t know what you want to do yet.”
   
“Yeah, I don’t know if I’m happy about it or not yet, either,” I admit, “I think I’m just going to give it some time and get to know him, and then make a decision later.”
   
“I think that would be best,” agrees Hermione.
   
“So, he knew my parents then,” says Harry. “He was friends with them.”
   
“He was,” I say, nodding to him, “He knew both of them very well.”
   
I can almost see the wheels turning in his head. He knew he could talk to my dad about his parents, hear good things about them for once, unlike what he heard at his Muggle Aunt and Uncle’s place. For once he could actually hear how great they were, and how brave they were, before they died.
   
Later that night I met Draco in the library in our usual spot by the restricted section to do homework. When he sat down, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut. “I’m surprised Pansy let you out of her sight.”
   
He detects the jealousy in my tone, and he gives it right back to me.
   
“Yeah, and I’m surprised Weasley let you out of his.”
   
“What are you talking about?” I ask, confused. “Ron has Hermione to do his homework for him.”
   
“No, not him,” says Draco, “the brother, that one twin,” When I give him a confused look he continues, “You didn’t think that I did hear what he said about you being the prettiest girl in Hufflepuff house? Because I did.”
   
I sigh, understanding now, “Draco, I don’t like George like that. He’s a friend, that’s it.”
   
“And Pansy is just my friend.”
   
I was not about to sit here and let him disrespect George like that. George said I was pretty, that was it. Pansy has been following Draco around like a lost puppy since he got out of the Hospital Wing. “Yes, but George knows when to leave me alone,” I remind him, “He respects my boundaries. He flirts every once in a while and yes, I’ve caught him looking at me a few times, but that’s it. That’s way more than you can say about Pansy. She wouldn’t know to give you personal space if you literally blew her into the wall with the Repando charm. I’m surprised she doesn’t follow you to the bathroom to help you wipe.”
   
He stays quiet, because he knows I’m right.
   
“I’m sorry,” I say, more calm now. “it’s just, she won’t stop, and it’s annoying me. I’m your girlfriend, not her, I should be the one helping you out like she is.”
   
“I wish it were you, but then everyone would know, and that would spoil all the fun that we have when we’re alone. And all of your friends hate me, they would hate you for dating me no matter what you told them. It’s just for the best that we stay secret for now.”
   
“Yeah,” I sigh, “You’re right. I know. It’s for the best.”
   
He smiles at me, and plants a quick kiss onto my cheek, “That’s my girl.”

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Here's part 3!

It's still crazy to me that I'm posing this story since I wrote it so long ago.

I never thought that I would.

Crazy.

-Emily Winchester.