Chapter Text
“Oh Pansy!” Draco exclaims while peaking through the forest.
“What is it now?” Pansy groaned as she quickly appeared behind him.
“Look,” he says , pushing branches out of the way so they could get a better look.
Between the trees is a large patch of grass with a pond right in the middle. The water is a clear blue color with bright fish swimming around. Deer walk through the trees and birds chirp overhead. There are all sorts of flowers and rocks surrounding the pond.
Draco talks the first step forward. He steps on a twig and it snaps. The deer turn their heads towards him before quickly prancing away.
“You scared them away!” she pouts.
“You were going to scare them away with all that whining regardless” he retorts.
Draco continues to walk forward with Pansy following closely behind him. The pair finally get through the trees and stand at the edge of the clearing.
“Do you think we're the first ones to find this place?” Pansy asked as she looked around.
“Probably” Draco said with a shrug.
Pansy stands at the edge of the pond, she can see a gaggle of tadpoles swimming by the rocks. Draco stands behind her.
“I know!” He exclaims. Pansy looks at him with a curious look, “let's swim in the pond!”
Pansy frowns while Draco begins removing his shoes and socks.
“I can't swim,” Pansy says solemnly.
“Really?” Draco looks at her with his shirt in his hands.
She nods softly.
“That's surprising to hear. I learned to swim when I was three, how old are you okay?”
“Five” she mutters under her breath.
“You’re five and you can't swim? You really are a baby I thought everyone knew how to swim at five.”
“I’m not a baby!”
“Yes you are, I'm six so I would know what a baby looks like.”
“You turned six a week ago and I’ll be six in a few weeks!”
“Being six is much better than being five because six is practically a grown child and five is still a baby!”
Pansy leans down and picks up a clump of dirt. She winds her arm back and flings the dirt at Draco. The dirt lands in the middle of his bare chest.
He stood there for a moment completely stunned by what she had done. Draco takes a step forward and shoves her angrily.
Pansy falls flat on her back with a small thud. Tears immediately start welling in her eyes. She pulls her knees close to her chest and buries her head between them.
Draco is shocked by what he has done. He hadn't meant to push her that hard. He sits down next to her.
“Pansy I’m sorry.” He pulls a flower from the ground and holds out his hand to give it to her.
She looks up at the flower and smiles.
“I'm sorry too I won't throw dirt at you anymore.”
Draco smiles and wraps his arms around her.
“Don't worry I’ll teach you to swim,” He whispers in her ear.
Pansy giggles and wraps her arms around Draco. He stands up and extends his hand to her. She takes his hand and he pulls her up.
“I haven't got anything to wear,” Pansy says, looking down at her dress.
“That's alright you can use uh,” Draco’s sentence trails off as he looks around for something she can wear instead.
He spots his shirt about two meters away and quickly rushes toward it.
“You can use my shirt” He picks up the shirt and happily offers it to her. Pansy smiles and takes the shirt out of his hands.
“Thank you, but won't your parents be upset?”
“Maybe but they can always just buy me a new one,” Draco says with a shrug.
“Okay if you're I’d hate for you to get in trouble because of me”
Draco turned around as Pansy removed her dress and put on his shirt. He turned around after she was done changing. The shirt was so big on her it looked like a dress. He wasn't surprised even though Pansy was five, almost six she was about the same size as a four year old. While Draco wasn't exactly tall for his age, he was still slightly above average.
“Ready?”
“Ready!”
He takes her hand and guides her over to the water. He figures it’ll be easier in the shallow water instead of taking her to the deep end immediately.
“Can you go underwater?” He asks, Pansy nods her head.
“Alright, well try it,” he says.
Pansy glances at the water nervously, she thought she could go underwater but now looking at it she wasn't entirely sure.
“What if I drown?”
“Don't worry I’ll hold onto you” Draco says as he wraps his arms around her waist.
Pansy holds her breath before submerging her head underwater. She was only underwater for about ten seconds before she resurfaced.
“I did it!” Pansu exclaims.
“You did better than I thought!” Draco says he swims over to the side of the pond. He grabs onto the side and floats on his stomach and begins kicking his feet.
“Now try doing this just like floating on your stomach and then kick your feet really hard,” he says.
Pansy walks over to him and grabs onto the side of the pond next to him. She begins mimicking his movements. Draco is quite proud of how fast she's learning, most of what they've done so far is very surface level but he's proud nonetheless.
“Okay yea good, you're learning fast!” Draco says, Pansy smiles at him. Draco can feel his cheeks burning he’s convinced it's just the sun burning his face.
He flips around so his feet are resting on the ledge of the pond.
“Now you're going to move your arms like this,” Draco says while moving his arms around in a circular motion. Pansy copies his moves.
He swims back over to the shallow end, waiting for her to follow him.
“Now just do it all together, that's practically all there is to swimming,” Draco begins to swim around before he emerges from the water and looks back at her.
Pansy looks back at him. She looks down at the water again. It didn't seem that daunting to go underwater but moving around in it was a different story. Draco swims back over to her.
“I won’t let you drown,” Draco says while looking at her.
“Promise?” Pansy looks at him and holds out her pinky.
“Promise.” Draco says as he wraps his pinky around hers.
He stands over her as she ducks her head underwater. Pansy kicks her legs and moves her arms. Pansy doesn't swim elegantly; it looks more like she's flailing around rather than swimming.
She gets about a meter away from him before she stops and lifts her head. Pansy turns back to Draco with a huge grin on her face.
“I did it! I swam!” Pansy says enthusiastically.
“You did it!” Draco responds with equal enthusiasm.
They spend the next hour or so swimming back and forth across the pond. Pansy grew tired and took a spot on the edge of the pond. She sits with her feet in the water. She watches Draco do “tricks” in the water.
Pansy notices the sun is beginning to set, she waits for Draco to reemerge from the water.
“Draco it’s almost sundown we’ve got to head home” Pansy exclaims.
“You're right!” Draco looks over at the sun. He jumped out of the pond. He clumsily put on his socks and shoes. Pansy picks up her dress and also puts on her shoes.
The pair take one last look at the clearing before heading back into the forest. Draco whacks away branches while Pansy follows closely behind him trying not to get hit. They make it out of the forest and back into the park.
Pansy wraps her arms around his neck and stands on her tip toes to kiss him on the cheek.
“Thank you for teaching me to swim Draco,” she says before she runs back to her house.
That was the moment Draco Malfoy knew he was going to love Pansy Parkinson for the rest of his life.