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edenfallingWhat I did today: dropped off my time card so I will get paid next week, returned and renewed library books, put away laundry, wrote a little, and repotted Sparky, my new California ivy. (Yes, I name my plants. Yes, I'm kind of weird.)
I didn't manage to finish chapter 8 of 'Apartment Manager' -- though I did come fairly close, and the final scene is plotted -- so here's another bit of 'Paint the Town' instead. :-)
Still rated R, this section probably with more justification than the last one.
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Paint the Town, part 2
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Hermione bit her lip and wished fervently to be anywhere but in this nightclub. She and Ginny were seated near the bar, watching the dance floor -- to ease her into the atmosphere, Ginny said. But the music was bone-jarring in volume, throbbing in her teeth despite the reflective sound baffles that ringed the dance floor, and the pulsing lights and thin haze of smoke were not helping Hermione relax at all. Neither were the dancers; some of them, to her shock, were practically having sex in public.
She was only watching them out of disgust and apprehension. Really. You never knew when some degenerates might decide to strip and be even more shocking.
Ginny had already put away a few shots of something vaguely orange, while Hermione was still nursing her first bottle of beer. It tasted vile, but Ginny had insisted that alcohol was a vital part of the experience, and, resigned, Hermione had ordered the least alcoholic thing that came to mind. She was beginning to wonder, however, if she might not prefer to be drunk. At least then she'd have a chance of not remembering any of this tomorrow.
"Ginny!" a female voice called over the frantic beat and the strange synthesized guitars.
Hermione whirled in her seat and stared, beer forgotten, as Luna Lovegood wove her way through the crowd. The normally sedate girl -- woman, Hermione reminded herself; they were all women now -- was dressed, unsurprisingly, oddly, but in a much different direction from her usual efforts.
She wore a deep purple miniskirt, a neon orange halter-top that left her stomach bare, chains of paperclips in her ears and around her neck, fish-net stockings, and battered pink combat boots. Her eyeshadow was a shocking blaze of sunset colors, drawing attention to her large, pale eyes and the intelligence that swam behind veils of irrationality and blind convictions. Hermione felt the familiar surge of irritation at seeing such potential brilliance wasted on Luna and her idiotic Quibbler, but it was diluted by a large dose of confusion over Luna's presence at Crimson.
"Luna? What on earth...?"
Luna blinked. "Hermione! What are you doing here? Did Ginny bring you?" She stole a chair from a neighboring table and sat beside them, beaming in her vague manner.
"Yeah, I brought her," said Ginny. "She's wound tighter than tight, lately, and I wanted to check this place out anyhow." She leaned forward, heedless of the way she was exposing her cleavage, and stage-whispered, "But Hermione doesn't want to dance, and I haven't got her drunk enough to forget that yet."
Luna frowned at Hermione, who bristled. What right did Luna -- Luna Lovegood, of all people! -- have to judge her?
"We'll have to fix that," Luna said. "Wait here -- I'll get some help. Oh, and watch out for the Tenebrous Skalstock by the loo. They like to collect human teeth, and this one goes after people who pass out in the back rooms."
Hermione turned on Ginny. "What's Luna doing here? Who's she going to fetch? And what on earth is a Tenebrous Skalstock supposed to be?"
"Having fun, probably Harry, and I haven't the foggiest idea," said Ginny calmly, as if seeing Luna Lovegood in a nightclub was a perfectly ordinary occurrence. "Drink your beer before it goes flat."
Hermione gulped the rest of her beer before she realized what she was doing. She eyed the empty bottle suspiciously, and decided just one shouldn't throw her off too badly. Besides, she reminded herself, if she did get drunk, she might mercifully forget all this in the morning.
"Harry and Luna? I know she's his press manager, but this?"
Ginny shrugged. "I don't know if they're actually together. Maybe they just like to watch each other's backs -- you can run into some bad news around here."
"Together? I didn't mean-- Wait a minute, bad news? And you want us both to get drunk? You're mad!"
"Rumors of my insanity are greatly overstated." Ginny grinned at Hermione's consternation. "Sit tight -- I'll get us another round."
Hermione tapped her fingers nervously against the table, unaware that she was beating out a syncopation to the current music. This was a bad idea -- spectacularly bad, in fact. It was true that she generally felt better after going out and unwinding with Ron, but Ron's idea of fun was a few hours at one of the Diagon Alley pubs with his fellow Quidditch fanatics, or an evening watching movies on the television Hermione had painstakingly showed him how to work. That was her speed, not this club -- this Crimson -- with its pounding music, flashing lights, and trendy drinks.
She could vaguely understand what Ginny saw in this sort of thing -- the other girl had always been interestingly wild underneath her innocent façade, and she liked to flaunt her independence -- but Luna? Harry? Hermione's imagination failed when she tried to picture Harry on that dance floor, wearing tight black jeans, a green t-shirt that might as well have been sprayed on, chunky silver bracelets...
Wait a minute.
That wasn't her imagination. That was Harry -- Harry Potter, one of her two oldest friends -- wearing that outfit, glistening with sweat, and walking off the dance floor with his arm around Luna's waist. Another man, a slim blond with a blood-red silk shirt and glitter in his loose hair, had his arm wrapped around Luna's other side.
"Granger, what a... pleasant surprise," he said, lips curling in a tiny smirk.
"Draco Malfoy?" Hermione jerked bolt upright, splaying her hands flat on the table, ready to push herself away. Ginny had her wand; she was defenseless!
"Yeah, Draco Malfoy," said Harry easily. "Who works for Luna at the Quibbler, remember? And who isn't a Death Eater, so relax. Hi, Hermione -- haven't seen you in a while. I didn't expect to run into you here."
"I didn't expect to be here," said Hermione, sounding more shaken-up than she preferred; confronting the son of a man you'd helped kill could do that. Yes, now she remembered that Malfoy had left Voldemort before the end -- but what was he doing here, with Harry? Maybe she was already drunk and hallucinating. "But Ginny stole my wand and--"
"Oh, Ginny," said Harry, as if that explained everything. Perhaps it did. "Well, that's three of us she's got now. I wonder if she'll ever manage to drag Ron and Neville along." Harry slid into Ginny's vacant chair; Malfoy snagged another one and sat down beside him.
"Beer all round?" asked Luna. Receiving nods from the two boys -- no, men, remember, men -- she wandered off to the bar, passing Ginny on her way.
"Draco?" said Ginny as she plunked down two beers, one for herself and one for Hermione. "I thought you were still in Egypt. And Harry, stop stealing my chairs." She promptly stole Luna's seat, on Hermione's left, and arched her back with a sigh, which pulled her shirt tight against her breasts and let the lights glint off her navel ring.
Hermione swallowed. Ginny was on first name terms with Malfoy? Wait, forget that -- Harry had been on the dance floor with Malfoy? She was beginning to wonder exactly how much of her friends' lives she'd missed since her promotion and the extended hours that came with it.
Malfoy shrugged. "It turns out we have a photo archive of Egyptian sights -- Lovegood's father had some poor sod down there a while back, chasing rumors of a hoard of blood-sucking mummies -- so I was able to move through my stops faster than I'd expected. Which, in addition to Potter's latest bout of altruism, is why we're out celebrating."
"We?" asked Hermione faintly, taking a large swallow of beer. First Ginny raised the possibility of Harry and Luna, and now... She didn't want to follow that thought.
Harry flushed. "Well, you see... we sort of... that is..."
Malfoy smirked.
Oh, bugger. She'd been right.
"All three? Now that I wasn't expecting -- congratulations Harry!" said Ginny, a smirk of her own replacing the surprise that had washed over her face. She turned to Malfoy as Harry's flush grew almost incandescent. "Harry's always liked Ravenclaws so Luna's not that much of a stretch... but you, Draco? I'd like to hear that story!"
"Oh, Potter doesn't like me at all," said Malfoy. "But Lovegood does -- and I know all their dirty secrets so they can't get rid of me."
"Bastard," said Harry, smiling as he reached over and tangled Malfoy's hair.
"Pot, cauldron. And you'll suffer for that." The bite Hermione had expected was absent from Malfoy's voice, and his eyes twinkled even while his mouth curled in a vicious little smirk.
Harry -- Harry, who'd spent seven years hating Malfoy's very existence! -- smirked back. "You keep saying that, but I don't feel any pain."
"One day, Potter, one day. I'm just waiting until your guard is down."
Hermione discovered she'd finished her second beer. "I'm getting another drink," she said. "Excuse me." She had a feeling that getting pissed and embarrassing herself was going to be the least of her worries in the near future. And she really, really hoped she didn't remember any of this in the morning.
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"Weasley, are you bloody insane?" Draco asked, as Granger walked unsteadily toward the bar. "Why the hell did you bring her here?"
Ginny grinned at him, a surprisingly evil expression for a former Gryffindor. Then again, she was the one who'd helped him refine his Stare of Ultimate Contempt. "Because I felt like it," she said. "Why do you care?"
"She'll tell your brother, and he'll kill us all!"
"Who'll kill us? I thought the war was over." Luna deposited the beer, stole Granger's chair, and looked quizzically around the table.
"He means Ron," said Harry, "and Ron won't kill us. I think. He should settle for throwing a few curses and yelling a lot -- then he won't speak to us for a week."
"Yes, and then he'll come murder me in my sleep, thus making a clean sweep of the Malfoy line." Draco pouted when he realized Harry and Luna weren't taking this seriously enough. "You don't believe me."
"I never believe you -- why should I start now? The worst that can happen is he'll never speak to us again." Harry took a swallow of his beer, looking upset at the thought of losing Weasley as a friend -- Draco couldn't see why that was a bad thing, but then, he'd never understood what Harry saw in Weasley in the first place.
"That's why I didn't want to tell him," continued Harry, "but it had to come out sometime, right? And maybe it's best for Hermione to tell him instead of me. That way I won't be right there when he explodes."
"I don't think Hermione would want to watch Ron explode either," said Luna. "They are friends, and she doesn't like blood."
"He'd be exploding metaphorically, Luna -- it'll still be messy and painful, but no blood should be spilled," said Ginny. Then she smiled the sadistic smile of the uninvolved observer. "You do realize, though, that even if Ron doesn't kill anyone, he's going to tell Mum."
Harry blanched. "Mrs. Weasley? But we're not even... we don't... we just..."
Draco smacked Harry for being an idiot and asked, cautiously, "Is your mother that scary, Weasley?"
"Yes!" said Harry. "Hang on, I need something stronger to face this." He walked off in the direction of the bar.
Draco watched as Harry stopped next to Granger, who was perched on a barstool and appeared to be working her way through a line of garishly colored cocktails. Harry leaned down and spoke into her ear -- well, Draco thought that was what he was aiming for. It was hard to tell through all that bushy hair.
He turned back to Luna and Ginny, frowning. "People we know are going to know about us. I don't like it. We haven't even worked out exactly what 'us' is."
"Don't worry," said Luna, resting her hand on his. "Mrs. Weasley managed to survive seven children; I'm sure you won't be any more shocking than the twins."
"That's what you think," muttered Draco, weaving his fingers through hers. "They'll all be after me for corrupting their precious hero, never mind that they spent years thinking he was insane or dangerous, and never mind that I managed to get away from the Dark Lord without doing anything too depraved."
Draco sank briefly into contemplation of that dark period of his life, when he'd learned what war really meant and what lengths Voldemort would go to. He still thought Muggles were more dangerous than most wizards realized -- particularly the ones with magical relatives, the ones who knew what they were missing -- but he had to admit they ran some interesting nightclubs. You never found anything like Crimson on Diagon Alley.
"Stop moping," said Ginny, poking him in the nose. "It's not pretty on Harry, and it's not pretty on you either."
"I don't want to be pretty. I'm not a girl."
"But I like your hair," said Luna. Draco blinked; that was less of a non sequitur than her usual tangents. Was she losing her touch? "You're losing glitter -- turn so I can fix it."
Draco grumbled, but acquiesced; there were certain things not worth arguing about when Luna was involved. "No color-change spells, Lovegood."
"Mmm-hmm," said Luna, pulling her wand from her boot and transfiguring one of her paperclips into a comb. "Stay still."
"Give him a French braid, Luna," said Ginny, giggling. "He'll look so cute!"
"Weasley, just because I have Potter and you don't, there's no reason to be vicious."
In the corner of his vision, Ginny snickered. "Maybe so, ferret-boy, but I have tons of other insults that need paying back. For instance... I kissed him first. You remember? Back when I was -- what was it you said -- 'thanking my hero traditionally,' I think."
Draco growled. "All right, I was an insufferable little twit. I admit it. Diary-girl."
Ginny flinched.
"Draco, please don't upset people who have the keys to your house-wards and who might decide to test experimental potions on you," said Luna as she tugged and maneuvered his hair. "Things could go rather spectacularly wrong -- no offense meant, Ginny -- and I prefer you alive. Also, immaturity attracts poltergeists and I'd rather not have one following you around the office. Or in bed."
Draco sighed. Poltergeists weren't attracted to immaturity, exactly -- opportunities for malicious chaos would be more accurate -- but Luna was right about Ginny and her potions. She had the Weasley temper in spades and she was a lot sneakier than her insufferable brother; it wasn't the best idea to cross her. "Fine. Weasley, I'm sorry. That was uncalled for."
Her composure recovered, Ginny patted his shoulder. "Yes, it was, from both of us. Now smile -- Harry's bringing Hermione back. She looks a bit unsteady, so you may have a chance to start over and pretend you're not an infuriating bastard."
Draco fixed a grin on his face -- not a smirk! nothing like a smirk! -- and prepared to convince Granger that he wasn't evil, wasn't corrupting her precious ickle Harry-boo, and really wasn't worth getting bloody Ron Weasley to murder him.
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Back to part 1
Continue to part 3
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And there we are. Hmm. In terms of POV sections, we're only 5/14 of the way through. Hermione and Ginny get 4 POV sections each, while Harry, Draco, and Luna get 2 each. And we start with Hermione, then Ginny, and end with Ginny, then Hermione. Occasionally I do try to pin something vaguely resembling a structure onto my stories. (Well, beyond coherent narrative, that is. I always try for that. But I don't usually write multiple POV stories; honestly, I think this and "Restoration" are the only times I've attempted that in HP fanfiction.)
I didn't manage to finish chapter 8 of 'Apartment Manager' -- though I did come fairly close, and the final scene is plotted -- so here's another bit of 'Paint the Town' instead. :-)
Still rated R, this section probably with more justification than the last one.
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Paint the Town, part 2
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Hermione bit her lip and wished fervently to be anywhere but in this nightclub. She and Ginny were seated near the bar, watching the dance floor -- to ease her into the atmosphere, Ginny said. But the music was bone-jarring in volume, throbbing in her teeth despite the reflective sound baffles that ringed the dance floor, and the pulsing lights and thin haze of smoke were not helping Hermione relax at all. Neither were the dancers; some of them, to her shock, were practically having sex in public.
She was only watching them out of disgust and apprehension. Really. You never knew when some degenerates might decide to strip and be even more shocking.
Ginny had already put away a few shots of something vaguely orange, while Hermione was still nursing her first bottle of beer. It tasted vile, but Ginny had insisted that alcohol was a vital part of the experience, and, resigned, Hermione had ordered the least alcoholic thing that came to mind. She was beginning to wonder, however, if she might not prefer to be drunk. At least then she'd have a chance of not remembering any of this tomorrow.
"Ginny!" a female voice called over the frantic beat and the strange synthesized guitars.
Hermione whirled in her seat and stared, beer forgotten, as Luna Lovegood wove her way through the crowd. The normally sedate girl -- woman, Hermione reminded herself; they were all women now -- was dressed, unsurprisingly, oddly, but in a much different direction from her usual efforts.
She wore a deep purple miniskirt, a neon orange halter-top that left her stomach bare, chains of paperclips in her ears and around her neck, fish-net stockings, and battered pink combat boots. Her eyeshadow was a shocking blaze of sunset colors, drawing attention to her large, pale eyes and the intelligence that swam behind veils of irrationality and blind convictions. Hermione felt the familiar surge of irritation at seeing such potential brilliance wasted on Luna and her idiotic Quibbler, but it was diluted by a large dose of confusion over Luna's presence at Crimson.
"Luna? What on earth...?"
Luna blinked. "Hermione! What are you doing here? Did Ginny bring you?" She stole a chair from a neighboring table and sat beside them, beaming in her vague manner.
"Yeah, I brought her," said Ginny. "She's wound tighter than tight, lately, and I wanted to check this place out anyhow." She leaned forward, heedless of the way she was exposing her cleavage, and stage-whispered, "But Hermione doesn't want to dance, and I haven't got her drunk enough to forget that yet."
Luna frowned at Hermione, who bristled. What right did Luna -- Luna Lovegood, of all people! -- have to judge her?
"We'll have to fix that," Luna said. "Wait here -- I'll get some help. Oh, and watch out for the Tenebrous Skalstock by the loo. They like to collect human teeth, and this one goes after people who pass out in the back rooms."
Hermione turned on Ginny. "What's Luna doing here? Who's she going to fetch? And what on earth is a Tenebrous Skalstock supposed to be?"
"Having fun, probably Harry, and I haven't the foggiest idea," said Ginny calmly, as if seeing Luna Lovegood in a nightclub was a perfectly ordinary occurrence. "Drink your beer before it goes flat."
Hermione gulped the rest of her beer before she realized what she was doing. She eyed the empty bottle suspiciously, and decided just one shouldn't throw her off too badly. Besides, she reminded herself, if she did get drunk, she might mercifully forget all this in the morning.
"Harry and Luna? I know she's his press manager, but this?"
Ginny shrugged. "I don't know if they're actually together. Maybe they just like to watch each other's backs -- you can run into some bad news around here."
"Together? I didn't mean-- Wait a minute, bad news? And you want us both to get drunk? You're mad!"
"Rumors of my insanity are greatly overstated." Ginny grinned at Hermione's consternation. "Sit tight -- I'll get us another round."
Hermione tapped her fingers nervously against the table, unaware that she was beating out a syncopation to the current music. This was a bad idea -- spectacularly bad, in fact. It was true that she generally felt better after going out and unwinding with Ron, but Ron's idea of fun was a few hours at one of the Diagon Alley pubs with his fellow Quidditch fanatics, or an evening watching movies on the television Hermione had painstakingly showed him how to work. That was her speed, not this club -- this Crimson -- with its pounding music, flashing lights, and trendy drinks.
She could vaguely understand what Ginny saw in this sort of thing -- the other girl had always been interestingly wild underneath her innocent façade, and she liked to flaunt her independence -- but Luna? Harry? Hermione's imagination failed when she tried to picture Harry on that dance floor, wearing tight black jeans, a green t-shirt that might as well have been sprayed on, chunky silver bracelets...
Wait a minute.
That wasn't her imagination. That was Harry -- Harry Potter, one of her two oldest friends -- wearing that outfit, glistening with sweat, and walking off the dance floor with his arm around Luna's waist. Another man, a slim blond with a blood-red silk shirt and glitter in his loose hair, had his arm wrapped around Luna's other side.
"Granger, what a... pleasant surprise," he said, lips curling in a tiny smirk.
"Draco Malfoy?" Hermione jerked bolt upright, splaying her hands flat on the table, ready to push herself away. Ginny had her wand; she was defenseless!
"Yeah, Draco Malfoy," said Harry easily. "Who works for Luna at the Quibbler, remember? And who isn't a Death Eater, so relax. Hi, Hermione -- haven't seen you in a while. I didn't expect to run into you here."
"I didn't expect to be here," said Hermione, sounding more shaken-up than she preferred; confronting the son of a man you'd helped kill could do that. Yes, now she remembered that Malfoy had left Voldemort before the end -- but what was he doing here, with Harry? Maybe she was already drunk and hallucinating. "But Ginny stole my wand and--"
"Oh, Ginny," said Harry, as if that explained everything. Perhaps it did. "Well, that's three of us she's got now. I wonder if she'll ever manage to drag Ron and Neville along." Harry slid into Ginny's vacant chair; Malfoy snagged another one and sat down beside him.
"Beer all round?" asked Luna. Receiving nods from the two boys -- no, men, remember, men -- she wandered off to the bar, passing Ginny on her way.
"Draco?" said Ginny as she plunked down two beers, one for herself and one for Hermione. "I thought you were still in Egypt. And Harry, stop stealing my chairs." She promptly stole Luna's seat, on Hermione's left, and arched her back with a sigh, which pulled her shirt tight against her breasts and let the lights glint off her navel ring.
Hermione swallowed. Ginny was on first name terms with Malfoy? Wait, forget that -- Harry had been on the dance floor with Malfoy? She was beginning to wonder exactly how much of her friends' lives she'd missed since her promotion and the extended hours that came with it.
Malfoy shrugged. "It turns out we have a photo archive of Egyptian sights -- Lovegood's father had some poor sod down there a while back, chasing rumors of a hoard of blood-sucking mummies -- so I was able to move through my stops faster than I'd expected. Which, in addition to Potter's latest bout of altruism, is why we're out celebrating."
"We?" asked Hermione faintly, taking a large swallow of beer. First Ginny raised the possibility of Harry and Luna, and now... She didn't want to follow that thought.
Harry flushed. "Well, you see... we sort of... that is..."
Malfoy smirked.
Oh, bugger. She'd been right.
"All three? Now that I wasn't expecting -- congratulations Harry!" said Ginny, a smirk of her own replacing the surprise that had washed over her face. She turned to Malfoy as Harry's flush grew almost incandescent. "Harry's always liked Ravenclaws so Luna's not that much of a stretch... but you, Draco? I'd like to hear that story!"
"Oh, Potter doesn't like me at all," said Malfoy. "But Lovegood does -- and I know all their dirty secrets so they can't get rid of me."
"Bastard," said Harry, smiling as he reached over and tangled Malfoy's hair.
"Pot, cauldron. And you'll suffer for that." The bite Hermione had expected was absent from Malfoy's voice, and his eyes twinkled even while his mouth curled in a vicious little smirk.
Harry -- Harry, who'd spent seven years hating Malfoy's very existence! -- smirked back. "You keep saying that, but I don't feel any pain."
"One day, Potter, one day. I'm just waiting until your guard is down."
Hermione discovered she'd finished her second beer. "I'm getting another drink," she said. "Excuse me." She had a feeling that getting pissed and embarrassing herself was going to be the least of her worries in the near future. And she really, really hoped she didn't remember any of this in the morning.
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"Weasley, are you bloody insane?" Draco asked, as Granger walked unsteadily toward the bar. "Why the hell did you bring her here?"
Ginny grinned at him, a surprisingly evil expression for a former Gryffindor. Then again, she was the one who'd helped him refine his Stare of Ultimate Contempt. "Because I felt like it," she said. "Why do you care?"
"She'll tell your brother, and he'll kill us all!"
"Who'll kill us? I thought the war was over." Luna deposited the beer, stole Granger's chair, and looked quizzically around the table.
"He means Ron," said Harry, "and Ron won't kill us. I think. He should settle for throwing a few curses and yelling a lot -- then he won't speak to us for a week."
"Yes, and then he'll come murder me in my sleep, thus making a clean sweep of the Malfoy line." Draco pouted when he realized Harry and Luna weren't taking this seriously enough. "You don't believe me."
"I never believe you -- why should I start now? The worst that can happen is he'll never speak to us again." Harry took a swallow of his beer, looking upset at the thought of losing Weasley as a friend -- Draco couldn't see why that was a bad thing, but then, he'd never understood what Harry saw in Weasley in the first place.
"That's why I didn't want to tell him," continued Harry, "but it had to come out sometime, right? And maybe it's best for Hermione to tell him instead of me. That way I won't be right there when he explodes."
"I don't think Hermione would want to watch Ron explode either," said Luna. "They are friends, and she doesn't like blood."
"He'd be exploding metaphorically, Luna -- it'll still be messy and painful, but no blood should be spilled," said Ginny. Then she smiled the sadistic smile of the uninvolved observer. "You do realize, though, that even if Ron doesn't kill anyone, he's going to tell Mum."
Harry blanched. "Mrs. Weasley? But we're not even... we don't... we just..."
Draco smacked Harry for being an idiot and asked, cautiously, "Is your mother that scary, Weasley?"
"Yes!" said Harry. "Hang on, I need something stronger to face this." He walked off in the direction of the bar.
Draco watched as Harry stopped next to Granger, who was perched on a barstool and appeared to be working her way through a line of garishly colored cocktails. Harry leaned down and spoke into her ear -- well, Draco thought that was what he was aiming for. It was hard to tell through all that bushy hair.
He turned back to Luna and Ginny, frowning. "People we know are going to know about us. I don't like it. We haven't even worked out exactly what 'us' is."
"Don't worry," said Luna, resting her hand on his. "Mrs. Weasley managed to survive seven children; I'm sure you won't be any more shocking than the twins."
"That's what you think," muttered Draco, weaving his fingers through hers. "They'll all be after me for corrupting their precious hero, never mind that they spent years thinking he was insane or dangerous, and never mind that I managed to get away from the Dark Lord without doing anything too depraved."
Draco sank briefly into contemplation of that dark period of his life, when he'd learned what war really meant and what lengths Voldemort would go to. He still thought Muggles were more dangerous than most wizards realized -- particularly the ones with magical relatives, the ones who knew what they were missing -- but he had to admit they ran some interesting nightclubs. You never found anything like Crimson on Diagon Alley.
"Stop moping," said Ginny, poking him in the nose. "It's not pretty on Harry, and it's not pretty on you either."
"I don't want to be pretty. I'm not a girl."
"But I like your hair," said Luna. Draco blinked; that was less of a non sequitur than her usual tangents. Was she losing her touch? "You're losing glitter -- turn so I can fix it."
Draco grumbled, but acquiesced; there were certain things not worth arguing about when Luna was involved. "No color-change spells, Lovegood."
"Mmm-hmm," said Luna, pulling her wand from her boot and transfiguring one of her paperclips into a comb. "Stay still."
"Give him a French braid, Luna," said Ginny, giggling. "He'll look so cute!"
"Weasley, just because I have Potter and you don't, there's no reason to be vicious."
In the corner of his vision, Ginny snickered. "Maybe so, ferret-boy, but I have tons of other insults that need paying back. For instance... I kissed him first. You remember? Back when I was -- what was it you said -- 'thanking my hero traditionally,' I think."
Draco growled. "All right, I was an insufferable little twit. I admit it. Diary-girl."
Ginny flinched.
"Draco, please don't upset people who have the keys to your house-wards and who might decide to test experimental potions on you," said Luna as she tugged and maneuvered his hair. "Things could go rather spectacularly wrong -- no offense meant, Ginny -- and I prefer you alive. Also, immaturity attracts poltergeists and I'd rather not have one following you around the office. Or in bed."
Draco sighed. Poltergeists weren't attracted to immaturity, exactly -- opportunities for malicious chaos would be more accurate -- but Luna was right about Ginny and her potions. She had the Weasley temper in spades and she was a lot sneakier than her insufferable brother; it wasn't the best idea to cross her. "Fine. Weasley, I'm sorry. That was uncalled for."
Her composure recovered, Ginny patted his shoulder. "Yes, it was, from both of us. Now smile -- Harry's bringing Hermione back. She looks a bit unsteady, so you may have a chance to start over and pretend you're not an infuriating bastard."
Draco fixed a grin on his face -- not a smirk! nothing like a smirk! -- and prepared to convince Granger that he wasn't evil, wasn't corrupting her precious ickle Harry-boo, and really wasn't worth getting bloody Ron Weasley to murder him.
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Back to part 1
Continue to part 3
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And there we are. Hmm. In terms of POV sections, we're only 5/14 of the way through. Hermione and Ginny get 4 POV sections each, while Harry, Draco, and Luna get 2 each. And we start with Hermione, then Ginny, and end with Ginny, then Hermione. Occasionally I do try to pin something vaguely resembling a structure onto my stories. (Well, beyond coherent narrative, that is. I always try for that. But I don't usually write multiple POV stories; honestly, I think this and "Restoration" are the only times I've attempted that in HP fanfiction.)
