I Thought Hufflepuffs Were Supposed To Be Nice
"Hello Luna," Draco stiffly sat down next to Leo and across from Luna. "Hello Leo,"
"Hey Draco," Leo smiled.
Draco took out his textbook for his magical beasts class. He had an essay on nifflers he had due in two days.
"Oh nifflers? They are quite cute," Luna spoke, looking over at Draco's book. "I have this wonderful book on nifflers if you'd like to read it?" she offered.
Draco looked up in slight shock. "That would be nice, thank you," he smiled.
"I can give it to you tomorrow," Luna softly smiled.
"I knew you two would get along," Leo had a mischievous smile on his face, his head was propped in his hands.
Draco flushed bright red. "Leo! Don't make it sound like that!" Draco hissed.
"Yes you are usually right about these kinds of things," Luna spoke absentmindedly while searching through her small stack of books.
"I am aren't I?" Leo beamed.
Draco rolled his eyes at Leo's cockiness. "Maybe this time, don't get used to it,"
"You're just mad that I was right," Leo closed his eyes, giving a look of innocence, accompanied with a sweet smile.
Draco angerly grumbled and aggressively opened his book. Luna chuckled lightly and went back to searching through her small stack of books. Leo softly smiled at the scene before starting his potions essay. The three spent the rest of their time in companionable silence, every once in a while a small conversation would break out before it fizzled back into comfortable silence.
Over the next few days Draco and Luna would have small conversations with each other. Draco felt as if he could call Luna a friend, and he could.
Luna had a soft voice she was far from soft spoken. She was very opinionated and spoke her mind. She spoke of facts and creatures that others thought were weird and lies. But Draco thought that she was right about all of it, Luna was a ravenclaw, they don't lie about that kind of stuff. Ravenclaws had a hunger for knowledge, Draco thought that Luna wouldn't lie about the things she spoke about. She was his friend. He didn't know what to do the first time someone called her "Loony".
"Draco! What are you doing with Loony Lovegood?"
Draco's head snapped up to see some nameless Slytherin looking at him and Luna, who was stood next to Draco with her nose in a book. "Excuse me?" Draco stared at the boy in shock. He knew the Slytherin was in the year above him but Draco didn't know his name.
Luna didn't even acknowledge the other Slytherin, simply burying her nose in her book and leaning against Draco's side. Draco had no idea how to respond to a friend being called a name, thankfully he didn't have to.
"Oi! The fuck are you doing?!" a girl stormed up to stand besides Luna. She was the same height as Draco, she had straight purple hair that was mid neck length, dark brown eyes, and a lip piercing down the middle of her lip.
The Slytherin flinched back slightly at her yell. "I was just-"
"Who the fuck do you think you are?!" she glared the Slytherin into submission. "That's right Fucker, get to walking," she shooed him away. She turned towards Draco and Luna. "Don't let people treat you like that," and with that she walked away.
Draco and Luna looked at each other in shock and awe.
"She's really cool," Luna whispered.
"Yeah," Draco wondered when people stopped wearing the school uniform, he could never tell anymore what house people were in.
Walking into potions the next day, Draco was annoyed that they were being assigned their potion partners and that they were going to be people in other houses in order to promote unity as the other schools had arrived. He was less annoyed when Abigail White, his partner for they year, sat next to him with purple hair. It was the girl from yesterday.
"Hello Abigail," Draco smiled kindly.
Abigail scrunched her face up in disgust. "Never call me that again. You can call me Gail, Malfoy,"
"Okay Gail, you can call me Draco,"
Gail looked at Draco in shock of the easy acceptance before smiling. "You know what Draco? I think we're gonna get along just fine," her smile turned into a mischievous smirk.
Draco felt a little nervous as he hesitantly smiled back. "Yeah, I'm sure we will,"
Gail and Draco worked seamlessly together as they mixed their potion, they actually finished theirs first. When Gail held up her hand for a high five Draco momentarily panicked. What did she want? Gail, having noticed Draco's panic and confusion, grabbed Draco's wrist and made him slap her hand.
"You're so sheltered," she laughed.
Draco wrenched his hand away. "I'm not sheltered," he poorly defended himself.
Gail smirked. "Sure," she dragged the word out.
"I'm not!"
"Whatever helps you sleep at night,"
Draco grumbled as they walked out of the potions classroom, Gail giggling at his side.
"I'll see you next class Lil D," Gail smiled, waved, and ran off.
"We're the same height!" Draco yelled as he heard Gail's laugh fade away as she ran down the hall.
"This is the dumbest, most reckless plan ever!" Sebastian hissed as Oliver and himself snuck into the Defense classroom.
"Yes yes Seb, I know. Now hurry up" Oliver slunk into the classroom, closing the door once Sebastian entered. "you check the desk and I'll check the bookshelves,"
Sebastian nodded and walked over to the desk, he cast a simple scanning spell and immediately had something. "Oliver,"
Oliver walked over to the desk and peered at the remnants of the spell Sebastian had cast. "Already? Didn't really try to hide it did he?" Oliver pulled put a small notebook and wrote down what he observed from the spell. "Alright lets get out of here,"
Just then they heard a set of footsteps in the hall. The duo froze, wide eyes trained on the door.
"Oh no," Oliver whispered.
A hard weight slammed into Draco's side, he barely managed to prevent himself from slamming into the wall. His head whipped towards whoever had ran into him, the sharp retort died on his tongue once he saw who it was. "Gail!?"
Gail threw an arm around Draco's shoulders and pulled him into her side. "Hey Lil D," she smirked.
"I thought I asked you not to call me that," Draco grumbled, glaring at Gail.
"And I thought that I didn't care," she smiled.
"I thought Hufflepuffs were supposed to be nice,"
Gail laughed and slapped Draco's back as she withdrew her arm. "Only to those that deserve it! Which isn't a large amount of people actually," she hummed in thought.
"Am I one of the few people deserving of a Hufflepuffs kindness?"
"I don't know, I'm still deciding," Gail beamed, her hair turning a dark blue.
Draco's eyes widened at the sight. "You're a-"
Gail's smile dimmed a bit. "Yeah, I am,"
Draco wrenched himself away and leveled an accusing finger at Gail. "Oi! Is that even your natural height? Are you actually shorter than me!?"
Gail stared in shock before doubling over with the force of her laughter. After a little bit she started to calm down, still giggling sporadically. "no no, this is my actual height. All I do is change my hair color, and change into Professors to make sneaking out easier,"
"I'm not sure I believe you but okay," Draco shrugged.
Gail looked at him in slight confusion before speaking. "You know, you're different than I thought you'd be,"
"What were you expecting?"
"An asshole," Gail bluntly stated.
Draco startled a bit before sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. "Well to be honest, if you had met me a couple weels ago your assesment would've been correct,"
"What changed?"
He couldn't say it was because of some strange book he found in the library. "I met someone," there, that was close enough to the truth.
"Oh! You met someone huh?" Gail had a teasing grin on her face.
"What are you grinning like that for?/ I just, I finally made an actual friend. Someone who's not afraid to call me out, who doesn't talk to me because of who my family is," Draco's voice got quieter as he continued to talk. He shyly looked over at Gail, unable to decipher the look on her face.
"Well now you've got two,"
"Actually you'd be the third, I became friends with Luna after I made my first friend,"
"Hah?! I'm the third!?"
"Sorry," he chuckled.
"You're not sorry at all!"