| Murtlap
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 56
| 
Chapter Thirteen:
“Ok Harry. I am trusting you with this because I think you can handle it.” Harry glanced side ways at Ginny as they walked around the lake.
“What’s the big secret? And why are you being so, protective of it?” Ginny shook her head, “Well, I don’t really know exactly what is going on, but it has to do with Ellie and… and Malfoy.”
Ginny half expected Harry to start ranting on how Malfoy was a complete idiot, and that he deserved to be turned into a slug, but he didn’t, he just said evenly, “So, what about them?”
“Well, you’ve seen it, I know you have. Like that thing with Ellie and Ron? And How suddenly Malfoy is, nice?! It didn’t make any sense. Then Ellie got this letter.” She took the letter in question out of her pocket and handed it to Harry. “She wouldn’t let me see it, and then I… er… borrowed it form her.”
Harry hid a smile as he un folded the parchment, and started to read. His eyes got big almost immediately. He finally looked up, dumbstruck.
“What douse THAT mean?” he questioned, rather loudly, and Ginny had to shush him down. After he had calmed down a bit, he continued. “She invited MALFOY to Christmas? Not you, or me, or something?” Ginny shook her head.
“So what is all this about?” Ginny asked “I gather you don’t know any more then I do.” Harry shook his head. “Let’s figure out.”
All the rest of the day, neither Harry or Ginny could find Ellie, and when Ginny finally went up to bed, she saw Ellie asleep, with a slight smile on her face.
Ginny half felt like waiking Ellie up, but then thought better of it. Ellie was not a happy person late at night when she could be sleeping.
“Whatever, I’ll just catch her in the mourning before she leaves.” Ginny said out loud, and dropped into bed herself.
* * *
The next mourning Ginny woke with a start. She opened her eyes, but then closed them again quickly because the sun was shining right in her eyes.
She grumbled crossly. It was the first week of Christmas vacation, why was she awake so early? She rolled over so she could open her eyes without the sun in the way, and saw Ellie’s bed. It was empty.
“No! I was gunna… ahhh! This is REALLY starting to frustrate me!” She jumped out of bed. Maybe Ellie hadn’t left yet? Ginny looked at the foot of the bed. Ellie’s trunk was gone.
Ginny raced down the stairs, to see a few students who were awake. Most who would be leaving for home soon.
“Have you seen Ellie this mourning?” Ginny demanded from Hermione, who was just lugging her trunk down the stairs.
“No, I haven’t. I think she was going to leave really early.”
“So she’s gone?! Already?” Hermione nodded, with a questioning look.
“Why do you need to talk to her so bad?” she asked
“It’s… It’s nothing, I just really need to talk to her.”
“You could send her a letter.” Hermione suggested.
“Well, I kind of want to have a conversation, Hermione.”
“Oh.” They both sat for a moment, and then Hermione’s face lit up.
“Do you want her phone number?” Ginny looked at Hermione like she had lost it.
“Her… what?” Hermione sighed, rolling her eyes.
“Seriously, you’ve never heard of a telephone?” Comprehension dawned on Ginny’s face.
“Oh! She’s got one? How? I didn’t know her parents were muggles.”
“Well, there not, but her moms mom was, so her mom grew up with a bunch of muggle things, and they have a phone, and a tv, and stuff like that.” Hermione explained.
“Oh, what’s a tv?” Ginny asked
“It’s like this little… look, do you want her number, or not?” Hermione said, slightly loosing her temper. “I have to be on the train in, like, ten minutes, and I haven’t eaten anything yet!”
“Gosh, yeah, I want the phone number, don’t spazz at me!”
Hermione a Quickly jotted down a few numbers on a scrap piece of parchment.
“There, your dad should know how to use the phone. And don’t yell into it, just talk normally, k’?” Ginny nodded, pocketed the piece of parchment, and sprinted back upstairs. She still needed to pack for the trip back to the burrow.
Ellie sat on her trunk, waiting. The cab wasn’t there yet, but neither was Draco.
“They’ll come, eventually.” She muttered. As bundled up as she was, it was still freezing. She was wearing at least four layers on the top, and her most cozy pair of pajama pants over her jeans. It felt weird, but it was better then having from your waist down go numb. Her eyes were practically the only part of her face that were showing. A large fuzzy hat consumed the top of her head, while a scarf was rapped around her neck, mouth, and nose. She had three layers of gloves, and two layers of woolen socks over her boot clad feet.
She heard a crunching noise behind her. The sound of feet walking through freshly fallen snow, and turned (well, tried to turn. She hardly could in all her winter stuff) to wave at Draco. He dropped his trunk down next to hers, and sat on it as well.
She glanced over at him. He only had a light jacket over his clothes, and thin gloves, but he wasn’t even pink in the face.
“A…aren’t you f…f…fr…freezing?!” she demanded.
He looked slightly thoughtful for a second “No. Are you?” he answered.
“Of course I am! It is sooo cold out here!” He just laughed at her.
“Well, this might help.” He drew out his wand, and rapped her smartly on the head with it.
“Hey!” She cried. She had hardly felt it through her hat, but the cold made her sensitive.
“What was that fo…?” She stopped. Starting from her head, she felt a change. It was strange, like a bucket of warm water had been poured over her head, but it traveled more slowly, like an egg, or something, warming her whole body.
“How did you do that?” She demanded “And technically, were out of school, so I thought you weren’t allowed to use magic!”
He shrugged. “I turned seventeen during the summer, so I’m not underage any more!”
“Oh,” Ellie mumbled. She was starting to sweet under all her clothes, and started to peal of layers, one at a time, until like Draco, she only had a light coat on, but she kept on the gloves. Her hands got cold easily.
They sat and talked about what had been going on in school until a taxi pulled up. a short, slightly pudgy man stepped into the snow, decked out like Ellie had been.
“How did you kids get out here?” He demanded “And in the middle of winter? All I see is an old run down castle. You live here?” Draco shrugged at the man.
“We like the cold. Good skiing in the mountains, two.” The man raised an eyebrow. “Well, whatever floats your boat, I guess.” He muttered as he started loading up there trunks.
Ellie let her cat, Leo, out on the long drive to the airport. Ellie and Draco still talked, but there were awkward pauses when they noticed they had been about to say something about magic, and it was obvious that the taxi driver was listening to every word, because in these pauses, Ellie could see the man raise his eyebrow in the mirror.
When they arrived at the airport, Ellie handled the money, while Draco put there trunks into carts.
The airport was surprisingly quiet for it being so close to Christmas. Ellie looked around, and when she was sure no one was around, she turned to Draco.
“Ok, we need to make sure that if anyone looks in our trunks, they don’t see our school books and stuff, or else they’ll know something weird is going on.”
Draco nodded, but then stopped “How do we do that?” He asked.
“Well, you have to do it, because you can use…” she paused and made sure no one was anywhere close. “You can use magic.” She whispered.
Draco almost laughed at how she was going about all this, but then decided she wouldn’t appreciate it.
“Ok, but how do I do it?” he asked her.
“It’s a very simple charm. Just tap the trunk, and say ‘muggleize’ (stupid name) then do it to the second trunk, and the carry on bags.” Draco nodded. That was simple.
He tapped each thing, and muttered ‘muggleize’ under his breath. Then he opened his trunk.
“But everything looks the same!” he cried. He threw down the lid, and was about to tap it again, when Ellie stopped him.
“Duh! That’s because your, a, you know what, and we already know what it should be, but everyone else, they are expecting to see normal stuff, and that’s what they’ll see.”
“You’re sure about this?” and when she nodded, “Ok, then. I trust you. Where do we go now?”
An hour latter, Ellie and Draco were sitting comfortably in the first class section of the plain.
“This is soooooooo cool! I have never been in first class before!” Ellie was ecstatic. She looked over at Draco, who was gripping the arm rests so hard, his knuckles were white.
“What is up with you?” Ellie demanded
“Um, let’s just say I would prefer to use a broom. Is there water anywhere?” He turned his head, to look for someplace with water, but suddenly, he jerked his head down.
“Ellie, don’t look now, but I think I see a fellow Slytherin.” Ellie’s head jerked around.
“Where?”
“Shut up!”(sorry erin!) Draco hissed at her. “If they see us, what are they gunna think?”
“Sorry.” Whispered Ellie. She casually looked behind her, and spotted a girl, who looked to be a fourth year, settling into a seat, four seats back.
“I don’t think she saw us.” Whispered Ellie. A couple sitting across from them was looking at them strange. Ellie strained a smile, and nudged Draco to stop shooting looks behind them.
In his surprise to see another student from Slytherin, Draco had forgotten about his fear of the airplane. Suddenly then were being told to buckle up, and they were taking off.
Draco turned for the hundredth time, to see if the Slytherin girl was looking at them.
“Draco! Cut it out. She’ll notice you soon if you keep doing that.” Ellie said again.
“Fine, fine.” He looked out the window, and jumped slightly. “Since when did we get so high in the air?” He demanded, his voice slightly squeaky. Ellie couldn’t help but giggle.
“We’ve been flying for at least half an hour, you were just to worried about her.” She said, jabbing her finger backwards. This didn’t seem to comfort Draco at all.
“Look, how about you watch some t.v? since we’re in first class, we get our own individual t.v.”
“What is a tv?” he asked.
The rest of the plain ride, Ellie showed draco how to use the tv. He was so fascinated by it, he forgot where they were, until the captain told them to buckle up. they would be landing in Chicago in just a few minutes.
“Chicago? I thought we were going to Mi… Minne… that place.” Draco said.
“Yeah, but we stop in Chicago. Some people get off, a few get on, then were off to Minnesota.” Draco turned to look backwords.
“Oh, good. She’s getting off.” Ellie looked around, and sure enough, the Slytherin girl had grabbed her carry on bag, and was out of the airplane. Draco was much more relaxed on the rest of the trip.
* * *
Ellie almost lost her luggage, but they finally found it, and moved towards the clear sliding doors.
“Ok, so my parents should be here to pick us up soon. It’s a silver mini van.” Draco nodded, and again they sat on their trunks. The warming spell draco had used wore off on the plain, and they were again bundled up.
The airport had been decorated for Christmas, and it was the same outside. There were two Christmas trees, flanking the doors, cheep little green and red balls.
They didn’t talk much. Ellie always got tired from long trips of sitting down. Plains seemed to be the worst, and Draco had almost talked himself horse from everything on the plain.
The t.v’s, the shows he had watched almost constantly, the cd player that Ellie had brought along, and the cd’s, and finally a few muggle books. Draco had laughed himself silly with one that Ellie had found.
It was a book about wizards, but all the stuff it said, it was ridiculous. Ellie had to tell him to shutup a few times, he was talking so loudly. Stuff like,
“Ellie! Hey, ellie, this guy says that all wizards and witches have one blue eye, and one black eye, what’s with that ellie?”
He had acted like a little boy in a candy shop. It had made ellie laugh. Now she yawned. The delay in Chicago had lasted a while, and it was now 10:00. Usually Ellie could last until 1:00 in the mourning, but she had waken early, and wanted nothing more but to go to sleep in her bed.
She watched as a van pulled up. it was silver. It looked familiar. Draco was jumping up and down in his seat. He had drank 11 cans of mountain dew. He had never had it before, and he thought it was delicious. Ellie liked it too, but 11 cans? That was just crazy.
“Is that it, Ellie? It’s silver, and It looks like a mini van, is it Ellie? Is it?”
“YES! It’s them Draco, now shut up!”
“SOMEones cranky. You should have had more mountain dew, Ellie, It makes you all hyper! And I’m not even tired!”
“That’s called caffeine, you idiot! You are never going to get to sleep.”
Draco didn’t seem at all put off by this, but stood up, and pulled Ellie up as well. Ellie could see her mother getting out of the car, and looking around. Her father was in the captain seat. He was fast asleep.
Ellie couldn’t help but smile a little. Typical dad. Ellie waved to catch her mom’s attention. It did, and her face split into a huge smile.
“Ellie! Oh, I missed you so much!” When Ellie didn’t say anything, her mom pulled away.
“You’re not angry, are you?” she asked, a very worried expression on her face.
“Oh, no! I’m not mad, I’m just tired, is all. Unlike captain Caffeine, over there.” She pointed at Draco, who was rocking back and forth on his feet, jumping a little.
Her mom smiled, and held her hand out to Draco.
“Hi Draco! I’m Ellie’s mom, Kristine. It’s very nice to meet you.”
Draco took her hand and shook it vigorously.
“It’s really nice to meet you to!” He said, rather loudly.
“He’s usually not this hyper, mom. He had 10 mountain dews.”
“Actually, 11!” Draco said.
Kristin laughed, and led them to the van. They loaded everything up, and got in.
“I’ll wake your father when we get home. He’ll just fall asleep again if I wake him now.”
“Give him a mountain dew!” Draco said. |