(y/n) - your name

(l/n) - last name

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

True to his words, Draco came to pick up (y/n) from her Ancient Runes class-which she was planning to drop-to take her to their next shared class which was Care of Magical creatures. They talked about what they learnt in class or how annoying the professor was while they walked out to Hagrids Hut, ignoring the looks from the other students once more. Draco just listened to (y/n) talk, looking down at her and admiring the way the sun made her glow before he held her arm and helped her down the steep steps to make sure she didn't get hurt. 

"Malfoy, why are you helping her?" Marcus pipes up when his group of friends walked next to him and the Hufflepuff.

"That's none of your bloody concern, now is it?" Draco snaps at him, Blaise coming to the rescue. 

Sort of.

"Well I think they're cute together, don't ya think? (y/n) is technically part Slytherin." he shrugs, smirking as the platinum blonde-haired boy glares at him while the group agreed with Zabini. They initially had no problem with the girl, thinking that she was cool but it was the group who was chill with the Hufflepuff. There was a certain jealous girl who wanted Draco all to herself but she isn't important. "See you with your girlfriend Malfoy!" Blaise calls out as he runs down with the others, (y/n) turning red at his words when the boy didn't even deny it! 

Blaise had a feeling about his friend's feelings for the Hufflepuff, having to endure hours of Draco talking about (y/n) to him most nights. Especially after that special Christmas he had with her when she gave him his family's traditional Christmas, and he knew his friend had developed feelings for her from the way he spoke so sweetly about the girl. But damn was Draco in straight denial, Blaise was ready to just push the two's heads together for them to kiss and realise that they like each other more than friends.

Draco helped (y/n) down to the group with the rest of the students, staying near her as she went to stand with her friends. "Hey, guys!"

"Hey (y/n)! Where did you go after Ancient Runes?" Hermione asks, wondering where the girl went after their shared class.

"I was coming here."

"With Malfoy!?" Harry narrows his eyes at the boy who equally sent him the same expression behind (y/n).

"Oh play nice you two. You both do realise you haven't been at each other's throats since last year?" the Hufflepuff states.

"You mean after the Buckbeak situation." Ron rolls his eyes. "He-"

"-wasn't him, it was his dad only-" (y/n) turns to look at Draco and he quickly shakes his head, her pursing her lips. "Anyway, he's acting more civil so you should do the same."

"And why should we!?" the boys exclaim and the Hufflepuff looks at them as her eyes flare red, the boys gulping in fear. "Ok... we'll be nice..."

"As long as he doesn't say any cruel names!" Hermione sneers at the boy.

"I promise, on his behalf Hermione." she nods at her friend's words, the two girls turning to listen to Hagrid with the rest of the class before following him into the forest. Draco went to walk with (y/n), his hand brushing against the middle of her back which makes her almost trip in surprise. 

He easily catches her, tsking at her clumsiness before helping her stand straight. "Do I have to carry you everywhere?" he whispers lowly for her to hear, smirking at the hitch of her voice when he squeezes her waist.

"No! I can walk!" the golden trio watch the interaction between the two, the three of them looking at each other.

"Oh yeah, (y/n) likes him... but does he like her?" their previous theory they had last year and the year before came full force with evidence. It was so obvious that their Hufflepuff friend had a thing for the Slytherin, seeing her blush and stutter around him whenever he was near or held her in some way or another. 

The group of students stop before a fenced meadow filled with crates that had these strange creatures crawling around inside. They could see through the crates of these deformed, shell-less lobsters that were horribly pale and slimy-looking with legs sticking out in very odd places and no visible heads. There were about a hundred of them in each crate, each about six inches long. They were crawling over one another, bumping blindly into the sides of the boxes. They were giving off a very powerful smell of rotting fish. Every now and then, sparks would fly out of the end, and with a small phut, it would be propelled forward several inches.

"Hargid, what the fuck are these!?" (y/n) says as she pinched her nose from the smell, jumping back and bumping into Draco as their tails burst into flames.

"Blast-Ended Skrewts! Bred them myself!" Hagrid says, looking quite proud of the new species of animal he created.

"And what the bloody hell are we doing with them!?" Draco asks, equally as disturbed as the other students.

"Raise them of course!"

"And why would we want to raise them!? I mean, what do they do!? What is the point of them!?" he asks, stepping away from the fence and pulling (y/n) with him.

"That's next lesson, Malfoy. You're just feedin' 'em today. Now, you'll want to try 'em on a few different things. You'll be doing this in pairs-" the students quickly went to go find their best friend but Hagrid stops them. "-I'll be pairing you up to look after a crateful of these beauties." the students groan out, letting Hagrid pair up the students and pointing them to which crate will be there's. "Malfoy and (l/n), that's your crate." the two sigh in defeat, carefully walking over to the crate by the corner end of the fence, looking through the gaps to look at these creatures.

"Oh for sure these things are going to be very violent and kill each other off when they grow up. I mean look at them! They're fucking dangerous!" (y/n) points out, the fiery blasts burning other Skrewts in the vicinity as its skin boiled.

"They smell horrible too..." Draco gags, pinching his nose as his eyes teared up from the pungent smell.

"Ok students, I've never had 'em before, so I'm not sure what they'll go for. I got ant eggs and frog livers and a bit of grass snake. Just try 'em out with a bit of each." Hagrid says as he passes the animal bits to each pair, Draco and (y/n) stepping away from the body parts.

"I don't want to do this..."

"You think I want to!?" the Hufflepuff exclaims at the Slytherin who tried to escape but she pulls him back by his hood. "Or no you don't! You're not leaving me alone here!" she hisses at him, tugging him back and shoving him to the animal parts. "Which one first?" 

"Eggs?" Draco mutters out questionably and (y/n) nods. "Do we need to note down what happens?"

"I think so? I'm not great at drawing-"

"-I can do the note taking." the girl raises a brow at the platinum blonde haired boy as he quickly grabs his notebook and a pencil, going to work quickly before showing her.

"You know how to draw!" she gasps lowly, impressed by his skills and that warms his cheeks in appreciation. "Draco, this is amazing! I didn't know you knew how to draw."

"It's not that important-" he takes his notebook away, (y/n) quickly cutting him off.

"That's bullshit! That's an amazing skill! I can't draw for shit to save my life! Do you draw or journal-"

"-no! No, I don't..." Draco lies, not wanting to reveal that he does.

"Well, ok then. I'll feed them and give you details and you can do the theory stuff." he nods, sitting down on the ground sitting crossed legged while (y/n) went to the animal parts. 

His eyes followed her everywhere, the way she crouched down making her skirt flutter around or the way she bent over the crate to feed the Skrewts. He drew her in every way possible in front of him, reminding himself to do the actual work but he would flip to the back of his notebook to draw how she stood with her nose scrunched and her hands on her hips. Draco let himself fall deeper for (y/n), his attention entirely on her as she took her cloak and jumper off to roll her sleeves up. 

He blushed heavily seeing her skirt rise up over her plush thighs when she bent over into the crate headfirst since she was short, trying to count how many of the Skrewts were there while using her powers to make that task easier and biting down on her tie so none of them crawled up it or set it on fire. He leans his head to the side to admire her while nibbling on his pencil, making sure no other guy was looking at her but he quickly looks away when the wind flips her skirt over a little. He heard her yelp as she quickly jumped out, her face beet red and she looked over at the boy to see him focused on his book as she pulled her skirt down. She was thankful for that, hoping no one else saw anything even though she was wearing shorts underneath.

"There's like 11 in that crate."

"What?" Draco blinks, (y/n) looking at him with her brows furrowed.

"The Skrewts. There's 11 total in the crate."

"Right..." the boy notes this down plus the date, the Hufflepuff walking over to him after she fed the creatures and sitting down next to the Slytherin against the fence. Despite this being the most disturbing class Draco would ever have this year, he was looking forward to spending time with (y/n) being his partner to raise these foul-smelling Skrewts.