The day was over, and the two exhausted teens plopped ungracefully on one of the leather couches that adorned the interior of the Slytherin house. It was a better looking house to be in than anything Gryffindor could come up with. Cool temperatures as the heat was blocked by slabs of concrete stones that made up the walls and floor, silver and green tapestries that lined the walls and draped from the ceiling, flickering light from wall torches and a large fireplace, and much more elegant furnishings that made up the commons room and dorms.

It always felt more soothing to be in the dungeons then in the high warm tower of the house she had chosen. Sometimes she would let her mind drift between sleep and consciousness. What would have been different had she chosen Slytherin like the Sorting Hat had wanted her to? When she would wake up the next morning she would know she had picked the right house for the moment. If she had chosen Slytherin, who knows if the house would be now free of Riddle as their leader. Would she have been tortured and killed because she was against the mind rapist, or would she have broken in fear and joined him?

"Do you want to go to Hogsmeade with me?" A velvet voice broke through the silence.

"What?" Sounding both confused and puzzled.

Draco turned his head enough to look at her, an emotion flirting in his eyes as he gazed at her. It wasn't an uncomfortable look from her side of things, nor did she have a problem with whatever emotion she could only guess to imagine behind it.

"Go to Hogsmeade with me? We can have some fun, get away from the castle for awhile."

The Great Draco Malfoy was asking her out, and he was being shy about it? This was one thing to remember for the rest of her life and tell her kids. Let's make him embarrassed shall we?

"Like...on a date."

He was squirming like he had to go to the loo, and floundering like a guppy for things to say, "Well, I guess. You don't have to if you don't want to. We could stay here and study or..."

He must really like me if he's this uncomfortable with asking me. Ah, the fear of rejection, I know thee well. I guess I should take him out of his misery.

"Draco." Apparently his name wasn't going to get him to quiet his nonstop rambling, time for desperate measures. With a quick slap to the back of his head, Draco was glaring at her with a vengeance and all she did was smile back at him like it was a perfectly acceptable behavior.

He was rubbing the back of his head, smoothing down the ruffled hair strands that, Merlin forbid, actually move like it should, "Woman, why the hell did you hit me?"

"Well you wouldn't shut up so I had to do something before you made a complete idiot out of yourself. Now, as to your question about Hogsmeade, the answer is yes."

His eyes got a shade lighter than normal and they were doing that twinkling thing that Dumbledore's always did. Note to self: Remind me to tell him this when it could embarrass him completely, preferable in front of his mother, Pansy, or Blaise. Mentally chuckling to herself, picturing Draco's normally pale complexion turning into a red that could almost match her brother's, and the stuttering, lord Merlin, the stuttering.

When she got thrown out of her little world, Draco was giving her a look of confusion and was waiting for her to answer something, "Could you repeat that? I completely missed it." She caught the annoyed and exasperated look that was thrown her way, but he complied anyway.

"I was asking you if you wanted to have dinner with me today in the hall?" His look pleading with her to answer "yes" and she couldn't think of one reason to say "no".

"Sure, why not? Not like I'm missing anything at my table."

"Great. So you ready, or do you need to go to the tower?"

She was wondering where this all new Malfoy came from? Most of the time they bickered, and there were the flirt fests that drove the rest of the house crazy with the sexual tension that would build, leaving one or the other breathing heavily. Maybe he's just nervous that this is what I'm expecting out of a potential boyfriend. Well, we're just going to have to stop that train of thought right now.

"Draco, why are you acting like this?"

She could see the defensive change behind his eyes, "Like what?"

"Like how my other boyfriends used to act. Being nice, caring, and polite. If you think that acting like this will get you anywhere you are on the wrong thought train. There were reasons that I broke up with them, and you're really starting to remind me of them." She took a cheek into her hand and slapped him lightly with it, "To quote a weird movie: 'Snap out of it'. Now come on, if we're late the ogres are going to eat it all."

"I can't believe you slapped me," he said indignantly.

"Oh you big baby, it was merely a tap."

He continued to rub his cheek, a small blush of red lit his face, "Still stings you bint."

She laughed lightly at how childish he was sounding, "I thought all you men were supposed to be tough. You got into a fist fight the other week with Harry, and yet little ol' me wounded you?"

"Don't let it go to your head Nevra. I didn't say you wounded me, I said it stings."

She turned to him with a raised eyebrow at the nickname, "Nevra?"

He shifted uncomfortably from the lower step looking up at her, "Yeah, it's what I've called you in my head since your second year. I didn't think 'Ginny' was appropriate after what happened your first year. I thought Nevra sounded more mature."

She looked thoughtful before she turned, continuing up the stairs, "I like it, but only you can call me that. I don't think it would mean the same from somebody else."

He gave her an admiring look before mumbling under his breath, "Like I'd let anyone else say it. You're mine now."

She gave him a look over her shoulder before smirking at him at the doors to the Great Hall, "I'm yours now am I? We'll just have to see about that."