Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Draco allowed two days for Hermione to cool down before he put on another performance. He wasn’t going to give up, no matter how many lectures he had to endure from the Head Girl. He never thought something so ridiculous could get him so much attention from the opposite sex. All over school, girls kept stopping him to tell him they couldn’t wait for their Valentine, while the men looked on enviously. All except Blaise, which made what Draco was about to do all the more enjoyable.

“Eat it,” Draco said in a low whisper.

“But—” Gregory Goyle stammered, staring fixedly at the mangled blob of sweets he had hidden behind his propped up book, out of the prying eyes of the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Paloma Popper. She was like a woman version of Snape, only she favored the Gryffindors over the other houses.

Draco had gotten on her bad side during their very first lesson together. She had overheard him giving a vivid description of the slip-and-slide style sex the ‘Pimple Popper’ and Snape would have, and deducted 30 points from Slytherin. Draco’s attempt to redeem himself by saying that he was only marveling on the fact that fate could bring two greasy vultures together, didn’t appease her. In fact, it earned him a months worth of detentions.

Needless to say, he was not in a hurry to push her buttons again. He would have chosen a different class to present his poem in, but his two buffoon sidekicks hadn’t made it in to most of the classes he was taking, and they were necessary for a distraction. Snape had already warned him that he was not to be caught making any more scenes in the Great Hall and embarrassing his house. The old git obviously had no sense of humor.

“Don’t do it Goyle,” Blaise snarled from the other side of the table.

“But—”

“Don’t listen to Zabini, when have I ever put you in harms way?” Draco quickly retorted.

“Well—”

“Well plenty of times!” Blaise interrupted, pounding his fist on the table for emphasis.

“Then what’s one more little time?” the blonde asked innocently, putting his hand on his obese friend’s shoulder in a soothing manner. Goyle took the multi-colored candy and held it in his hand, his eyes wide with fear. It was the skiving sweet to end all sweets. A fainting fancy, fever fudge, puking pastille, and ton-tongue toffee, all melded together to form the massive ball that would cause the ultimate distraction. Goyle let out a squeak that sounded like a deflating balloon, bringing the candy to his mouth, but chickening out at the last second.

“Damn it, Goyle! If that candy isn’t down your throat in the next five seconds, I’ll force feed it to you and refuse to hand over the antidote!” Draco growled in his most threatening sneer, withdrawing the candy blob that consisted of the other halves of the skiving snacks from his school bag. Draco had conveniently forgotten to mention that the ton-tongue toffee didn’t come with an antidote.

“But—but if I’ve passed out, how am I even supposed to swallow the other halves?”

“Look, that isn’t important right now. Just stick to what your good at, which is eating, and leave the thinking to me…. or else.”

That had done it. With one last fleeting look at Blaise, who was now pouting in his seat with his arms crossed, turned away from the proceedings, Goyle closed his eyes and swallowed the candy whole.

Dumb people were so easily manipulated.

Draco casually stuck the antidote blob into Goyle’s front pocket, and waited for the show to begin. It wasn’t an instantaneous reaction, perhaps because so many ailments had to fight to show themselves first. It seemed the fever fudge was winning the battle. Sweat started beading on Goyle’s forehead, and flowed down the bridge of his nose. He stumbled blindly out of his seat and into the isle, where he fell to his knees and ended up on all fours.

Then came the puking, and not just any puking. This was the vomiting of a man who ate his weight in food at every meal, so naturally it had the class scrambling from their seats to get as far away as possible. They need not have worried, however. The partially digested cuisine ended up in a neat little pile, as it had exited his mouth down a four-foot long tongue that it had used like a waterslide. How resourceful.

Once the vomiting and sweating had subsided, Goyle shakily got to his feet, feeling around in the front of his robes. Draco immediately started to panic. Goyle hadn’t even had a chance to faint yet and he was going to take the antidote!? No, Draco couldn’t let that happen. Brandishing his wand discreetly at his side, he sent a silent trip jinx, and it hit perfectly on the mark.

At this point, a lot of things happened very quickly. Goyle stumbled forward and slipped on his neat little pile of puke. The weight of his engorged tongue caused his body to spin around, and the tongue followed in pursuit, smacking him in the arse with an echoing snapping sound. He then proceeded to faint, from the candy or the shock of getting slapped in the ass with his own giant tongue, it was impossible to tell, but faint he did. He hit the ground and sprayed the nearby desks with a shower of vomit. A chorus of “Eww” was heard from along the walls.

The professor just stared with one eyebrow raised. That was as much as her expression ever changed, really.

“Mr. Malfoy, if you could please escort Mr. Goyle here to the Hospital Wing.”

No he certainly could not! That would make all his hard work and Goyle’s unfortunate but unavoidable suffering be in vain!

It was moments like this that separated the Slytherins from the rest of the school, and Draco Malfoy was a Slytherin, through and through.

“Goyle! Oh dear God Goyle, what have they done to you!? Why!? Oh Merlin WHY!? He was so… so young... Didn’t deserve… Oh the humanity! Why!? WHY!?” A few more wails of “why” into the ceiling before he was overcome with his fake breakdown, and was reduced to ‘sobbing’ with his head hidden behind his arms on his desk. Though the professor did not look sympathetic, she did wave her wand and levitate the slimy blob of her very worst student.

“It seems that I will be accompanying Mr. Goyle to the infirmary. Ms. Granger, Mr. Mal—ah, Ms. Granger, you are in charge in my absence.”

The instant the door clicked shut, Draco’s sobs had ceased and he gracefully leapt to stand on his desk.

“Can I have your attention?” he called out to the class, who were slowly edging their ways back into their seats.

“Malfoy I swear if you say one word—”

“Shush Zambeano you’re better seen not heard,” Draco waved him off. “Granger over here, I guarantee I’m easier on the eyes than the written word!”

Hermione slowly turned in her seat, and she did not look pleased.

“At-at-ah Granger,” he quickly cut her off before the impending speech on ‘right and wrong,’ and a whole other lot of bollocks meant for lesser beings. “Might I point out to you that if you were to hinder the progress of the challenge you presented me, that would be cheating. Which would mean that you’d forfeit. Which would mean that I would reign victorious. So unless you want me to win…” he trailed off for maximum impact. Hermione’s open mouth snapped shut, and she seemed to settle on glowering ominously but silently. Silence was key. He’d won.

Muahaha…

He cleared his throat in his fist, trying not to look too pleased with himself. “Now… where was I before I was so rudely interrupted… Oh yes…Hem, hem.”

He’s pretty. He’s witty. He wipes his own ass.
He’s dirty. He’s flirty. He’ll catch you a bass.

There once was a saying, I know for a fact.
That once you go black, you’ll never go back.

So gentlemen, any men, open your eyes.
With an hour of primping, it’s def no surprise.

Teen dream, drama queen, a diva in the making.
Hogwarts’ own flaming bachelor is here for the taking.

The sausage of sausages, the pick of the meat.
His name is Zabini, he’s surely a treat!

The crowd roared with laughter and showered him with applause… all eleven of them. It would have been thirteen, if Blaise wasn’t so busy shooting daggers with his eyes, and Hermione wasn’t concentrating on rolling hers. Who needs them, Draco thought with a shrug. After all, thirteen was a very unlucky number.

“That’s right, soak it all up you contemptible dickhead,” Zabini growled.

“What?” Draco asked, feigning innocence. “That was some of my finest work. I might have even managed to score you a date!”

“Yes but I’m not gay you big arse!”

“Oh please, you can’t even insult me without using the words ‘dick’ and ‘arse.’ If that isn’t gay, Midgen isn’t ugly.”

Blaise mumbled incoherently to himself for a minute before responding. “I am not gay!”

“Pshh… tell that to your straightening iron,” Malfoy replied with a devious little half-smirk. It was lucky that the professor had chosen that very second to come bustling through the door, because Draco was quite certain that his friend was seconds away from jumping him. He was in no hurry to be manhandled by the man he had just dubbed ‘the sausage of sausages.’

~***~

After classes for the day had come to an end, Draco set off in search of Hermione. Naturally he headed straight for the library, but he hadn’t even made it to the fourth floor before he was roughly thrown into a wall, and he was shocked to see that Granger was his attacker.

“Granger!? What the—”

“Shush, you’ve done your fair share of talking for the day and now it’s my turn. I don’t know how you have managed to take what should have been a horrible and embarrassing challenge, and made it into something people praise you for, but it needs to stop NOW. I don’t want to sleep with you! I—I don’t even know you! This isn’t all fun and games, it is my life you’re messing with!” she finished, her voice starting to crack from the strain. Draco’s face immediately softened, and so did Hermione’s grip on his robes.

“Granger I—err… Look, did you ever think that this is only fun for me because it’s my friends? I’ve sung to two people, who were both in my house. Once I’ve finished off the Slytherins I can guarantee it won’t be so easy for me. I mean what am I going to say? Oh Longbottom, you have no brains? That’s hardly poetry, that’s just common knowledge.”

And this was the woman he wanted to sleep with? This beast of a woman who could make him spout horrible, almost nice sentiments to try and comfort her!? What was the world coming to!?

‘I can guarantee this won’t be so easy for me…’ He shuddered at the remembrance. Greeting cards didn’t even contain so much cheese. The whole ‘being a slightly decent human being’ thing was seriously overrated, and would have to stop before he died of cheesefestation.

I should just ditch the good looks and sex appeal and call myself Potter Jr. while I’m at it.
While Draco was deep in thought, Hermione was trying her best to convince herself that his snarky sarcasm made him even more of an arse, and not someone who’s arse she wanted to snack on. “That’s not very nice, you know,” she said softly, when no other wise words of wisdom graced her with their presence.

“And your point?”

Ah yes, much better.

“Ugh,” she groaned, pushing him into the wall once more, then turning on her heel and storming down the hall. Draco only just managed to catch up with her before she snuck through a tapestry. He slipped his arm around hers and made her turn to face him. He had had a whole two seconds to think about what he was about to propose to her, so naturally it felt like a grand idea. For the time being at least.

“What do you want, Malfoy?”

“I have a proposition for you…”


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THANK YOU ALL sooo much for the nice reviews!! You don’t know what they mean to me as a new author, but I can promise that they really do mean a lot. I hope you liked this chapter as well!

Although I am trying to update as quickly as possible, I am back at school, and it takes up an insane amount of my time. This week was hell already and it was only 3 days of class, and the first week is the easiest. But I do enjoy writing, it is actually a nice stress reliever when there is no due date or grade, so I do plan on continuing all of my stories, as long as you all keep reviewing them : )

-Alexis