I Can't Stand It

Back in Hogwarts, I hadn’t given Luna Lovegood a second glance.

Two years later, sitting across from her, I thought that maybe I should’ve. At this point in time, I had been working with her for about two weeks. I was rather annoyed at first, having to work with Looney Lovegood. I had hoped that that week would go by as fast as it had came.

But being with her wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.

“Hello, Draco,” she greeted me in her light, dreamy voice, “Long time no see. I am very glad that The Prophet has agreed to do some work with the Quibbler.”

I shook her hand, “It really has been too long,” I said as I looked into her big, blue eyes that I had never noticed before.

Her pale cheeks turned a light pink as she slowly let go of my hand. Then she turned on her heel and led the way back to the conference room. I couldn’t help but watch her curvy body sway in her skirt suit. She was even wearing sneakers. Black ones to be exact with the white laces tied sloppily. I smirked to myself as I followed her.

“So, what kind of partnership was the Prophet thinking of?” she asked as she pulled out a binder that was full with papers, “I was thinking, perhaps, advertisement. We will run an advertisement about The Prophet, if you will run an advertisement about the Quibbler.”

“That sounds,” I couldn’t find the words to speak anymore.

She was just, what is the word? Oh, yea. Cute.

“Are you okay, Draco?” she asked as she raised an eyebrow up at me, “Is your head full of nargles?”

I smiled, not smirked at her like I would’ve back at Hogwarts. I would’ve found that annoying that she would ask questions about creatures that didn’t even exist, but I found it cute at that moment. You would’ve thought that she would’ve let go of those childish qualities after everything that happened at Hogwarts, but she didn’t change.

I guess that’s Luna for you.

I cleared my throat, “No, my head isn’t full of,” I paused, “nargles.”

“Oh, that’s good. They can cause permanent damage to your brain tissue, you know?” she smiled at me.

“Actually, I knew that,” I smirked, “I read it in the last Quibbler. It ran a special on nargles, I believe.”

“Yes, we did,” she looked impressed.

Her lopsided smile was cute on her beautiful, pale face. My eyes then trailed from her lips to her eyes, to her eyebrows, to her long, flowing, blonde hair. It complemented her very well. At Hogwarts, I could’ve sworn that she was ugly. How could I have not noticed someone so gorgeous?

“Um, Draco?” she mumbled, “What are you looking at?”

“You,” I grinned, “You are beautiful.”

The light blush had returned to her pale cheeks. She looked away from me and out the window. The sunlight seemed to give her skin a certain glow that just enhanced her features. She leaned back in her chair and put her feet up on the table to hide her face. I moved over a seat so that I was sitting at the end of the table and could see the back of her head. That’s when I noticed it. The drawing on her shoe.

It had a boy and a girl stick figure on it with a broken heart looming above their heads. I then saw a red marker sitting next to her binder that she had used to scribble some notes in the bundle of paper that was inside. I picked it up and grabbed her foot.

“What are you doing?” she asked quickly but didn’t move.

I filled in the space that made the heart broken so it was whole again.

I looked down at her from my half-standing pose. She looked up at me too. That was it. She was just so cute, so beautiful. One look at those lips, and I was leaning in.

I couldn’t stand it.

Her lips were so soft and thin. They moved perfectly with mine as we kissed. I opened my eyes a little to see her expression. She had her eyes closed from what I could tell. So, I closed mine again. As soon as I did, I felt her pulling away. I looked into her eyes as both of our eyes opened.

“Draco?” her melodic voice chimed my name.

She stood up and slowly backed away from me. I followed her of course. She had a panicked look on her face as she was walking backwards and into the wall. I put both of my hands on the wall above her head and looked down at her with a huge grin on my face.

“We are supposed to talk business,” she said nervously.

“I don’t want to talk business. Not with you.”

“Draco,” she said it again.

“Who broke your heart?” I asked.

I had to admit that I was being nosey, but I was curious about why she was acting like this and about the drawing on her shoe. I felt like I had to know. I felt like I had to fix her.

“How did you know?”

“The drawing,” I replied, “plus they way you are pulling away. I’ve broken enough hearts to know what it does to a girl.”

“Oh,” she looked up into my eyes, “Neville Longbottom. It was during my last year a t Hogwarts. He was out in the real world, where he found another girl to love. He’s the one who drew that on my shoe. I just took white-out and made the heart broken when I heard.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said, and actually meaning it.

Seriously, I think that war fucked me up, made me soft. Otherwise, I don’t think I would have found Luna so attractive.

“It wasn’t your fault,” she said as I saw her eyeing my lips, so I kissed her.

“Can I see you again?” I asked after we parted.

She nodded, “Pick me up tonight. Here at 6, sharp.”

I nodded with a lopsided grin of my own.