Hey everyone; this is something a bit different for me! Set after the battle at Hogwarts, assuming that Hermione, Ron, Harry and Draco return to Hogwarts to finish their final year. For now, it's a one shot, but I might continue it if people like it. Rated T for language.

He fucking hated her. He hated everything about her! Why did she make his blood boil the way it did? Potty and the Weasel were bad enough, and the thought of them made him sneer with contempt, but when her angry, flushed, wild-hair framed face popped into his mind, he would always feel a hot surge of… fury.

He sometimes couldn't help but look at her in lessons, contemplating how it was possible for a person to be so sickening. Right now, they were in potions together, and his aversion to her was really making it hard to concentrate. The fact she was in the classroom at all was abhorrent. He suddenly felt angry that she was so close to him. It was disgusting that he had to be near to her, metres away from her in the dimly lit classroom, the flicker from the fire under her cauldron highlighting reddish streaks in her wild tangled curls. His mouth curled as she closed her eyes in thought, her eyelashes splaying on her cheeks and her pink lips moving as she muttered what was no doubt a passage from the text book.

Fucking know-it-all, he inwardly jeered; the fury was back again, making his whole body tingle. He continued to stare at her, hating everything he saw… her big, round, brown eyes that would always narrow when she looked at him, the faint freckles spattering across her nose, her small stature that meant she had to stand on tip toe to reach the potion ingredients on the shelves, the fact that she wore her school skirt too long on her legs and the way her head girl badge was perfectly aligned above her left breast. He hated every detail, down to the dimples that only appeared when she smiled.

He had hated her on principle as soon as he had found out her blood status back in his first year, but the hate had grown with time. She just thought she was so bloody perfect. Getting full marks in every subject, never bothering to do her hair and make-up like all the other girls, hanging around with the fricking heroic Harry Potter and generally being the bane of his life. In his opinion, she was partially responsible for Lucius ending up in Azkaban a couple of years ago. She was so sanctimoniously pure. She was golden in everyone's eyes. She could do no wrong, and hadn't. Her virtuous nature made him want to retch. It was especially hard to swallow currently, as most people now regarded him like a burst bubotuber. It wasn't fair.

Now, her blood status didn't really matter to him anymore. Since The Dark Lord and his followers had lost the war last year, he had been forced to consider the fact that he had been on the wrong side; and he now believed he had been. There was a lot he was beginning to question about his upbringing, and he had to admit every minor realisation stung his pride. But he was so angry about how he was thought of now. It wasn't his fault. He had been brought up being religiously told that The Dark Lord was good and mudbloods were bad, and that wealth and status meant everything, and that he was above everybody else as a member of one of the oldest and most esteemed pureblood families. How had he been supposed to help his beliefs?!

What had happened to him in sixth year had just been bloody unfair; entrusted – no, blackmailed – into the impossible task of killing Dumbledore. That had been when he started to consider that there was something wrong with everything he had ever been told. But by then it was too late; those with the Dark Mark cannot back out of the group. The year of the war had been horrific; his whole family being the butt of every joke and The Dark Lord had constantly taunted them with suggestions of cruel and vicious punishments for their mistakes and cowardice. He had found himself silently praying that Dumbledore's lot would hurry up and win. When those three had ended up in his mansion, he really hadn't wanted to hurt them (although that's certainly not to say he liked them) – he had wanted them to get away… that's why he had stalled Bellatrix. It hadn't been well done, but it had been noticed by Potter and Granger. That, and the fact that his mother had saved Potter in the Forbidden Forest during the final battle, had secured Draco's family a free future, even if they were still viewed with disgust by the wizarding community at large.

Yes, he knew now that his father had been foolish to get involved with The Dark Lord to begin with, and he wished he hadn't been dragged down with him. None of these realisations meant he was a Saint, he told himself vehemently – refusing to behave like a bloody Hufflepuff, it had been a selfish realisation as much as anything else. It would have been better for his own skin if he had been on the side of Dumbledore and his trusty Golden Trio. It didn't mean he liked them though; as he'd just been thinking – muggle born or not, he still hated Hermione Granger. Hermione 'Whiter-than-snow' Granger.

He tried to pinpoint when exactly she had started to be able to illicit this fire coursing through his veins. Yes, he had always hated her, but it hadn't always felt like this. There had been flashes of it throughout his adolescence, but now it was constant. He had first felt it when she had slapped him in the face in third year. The way she had looked then, her eyes flashing and her cheeks rouged with rage, and the sheer bravery and defiance of it. He had felt it strongly then; all the characters were so sickeningly Gryffindor; and she had cowed him well and good. No one got to do that to him.

The second time was at the Yule Ball in fourth year. She had glided into the room on the arm of Viktor Krum, looking… he had to admit it…. Beautiful. Granted, it was probably only the effect of endless potions and makeup products, but she had no right to look like that, or be on the arm of an international quidditch player. And there she was, strutting around in that blue dress that clung to her upper body just enough to stay classy, and that swayed around her legs as she walked. When Krum span her around on the dance floor, the whole skirt lifted and swung around her waist, granting those who might be looking the quickest flash of thigh – the most flesh he had ever seen her bare. He couldn't stop looking at her, and he hated her for that.

But what had really set this feeling to constant was something that happened in sixth year – something he didn't think anybody knew about except him and her.

After Potter had attacked him using dark magic he had no business knowing, he had spent a couple of nights in the hospital wing; he had to take anti-scarring and blood replenishing potions, but Madame Pomfrey had suggested the extra night to help him recover from the 'shock' – not knowing the real reason for his gaunt appearance and withdrawn persona. The whole thing filled him with a feeling of nauseating humiliation; Potter had seen him cry and sent him to the hospital wing. But he had to admit, even his anger towards Potter had taken a back seat to his feelings of fear and self-pity those nights in the hospital wing. He had refused guests, although Pansy and Zabini had tried to visit him. He was too distraught at the fact he was failing his formidable Master to see anyone. He had spent his hours in the hospital wing hiding behind the curtains, staring hopelessly into space, and blinking away scared tears. He cringed at the memory, had he, Draco Malfoy, really been so pathetic?! Urgh.

He shook his head as if to fend off the memory. It was a moment of weakness… forget it. And so he would have done, if a certain nosy, bushy haired bookworm hadn't seen him at his most vulnerable, meaning he couldn't just pretend it never happened.

She had come to the hospital wing late one evening, he had been – he winced at the memory – crying, and she came in. He had heard her voice through the curtains, and had hastily brushed away the tears, just in case she caught a glimpse of him.

'Madame Pomfrey?' She questioned in that slightly hushed voice that people tend to use around sick people.

'Oh! Hermione, dear, what are you doing here? Are you alright?'

'I'm fine, Ma'am, I just have some homework for Professor Snape on healing potions, and I was wondering if I could get some help from you?'

Draco rolled his eyes. Of course, homewo… but, he had suddenly realised, Snape hadn't set any homework on healing potions. What was she up to?

'Yes, of course dear! What is it?'

'Well the textbook lists the basic ingredients for bone repair potions, such as skele-gro - here…'

There was a pause and Draco heard the rustling of pages.

'… but Professor Snape said that you can alter and add ingredients to customise the potion, like to reduce the pain in bone regrowth, or to strengthen the bones in older patients…'

'Yes that can be done…' Came Madame Pomfrey's voice, 'But you have to be very careful, mistakes can cause… rather gruesome effects… that's why not many people attempt it.'

'Yes, so I was wondering if you customise your skele-gro… and if so, how do you do it?'

Madame Pomfrey chuckled. 'I've never met a student who put so much effort into her homework… I do have my own recipe, as a matter of fact, but I will need to find my notes on it to tell you what it is, I haven't made a batch in quite some time.'

'Oh, please could I see them, Madame Pomfrey?' Said Granger, in a voice alight with interest, 'I don't mind waiting…'

'Well… alright… just wait there then, I'll be back soon.'

He heard Madam Pomfrey walk off towards her office, and for a second everything was quiet, until…

Hermione suddenly stepped through the curtains to his left, and past his only defence. After the initial shock of seeing her form mere feet away from him, he reacted with fury.

'What the fuck, Granger!? Get out!'

'Malfoy… I just want to talk'

'What the Hell makes you think I would talk to you?' He sneered, 'Can't you and your bloody idiotic boy toys just leave me alone!?'

Why was she here!? Fucking bitch. Could she see the evidence of his misery? Were his eyes pink? Was his face blotchy? His stomach churned in embarrassment.

'GET OUT!' He yelled, hoping against hope that Pomfrey would hear him and get her the hell away from him.

'Malfoy,' she said, in a soft tone that he had never heard her say his name in before, it was… kind. He was so shocked that he stopped seething for a second. 'Are you alright? You look awful.'

He came back to himself quickly, and affixed the scowl back on his face.

'What do you fucking expect!? The Boy Wonder sliced me up well and good, didn't he? And I'm supposed to be the evil one…' he muttered resentfully, before remembering who he was talking to.

'What do you care how I am? Coming here asking me stupid questions… for the brainiac of the century you can really be a sodding idiot, you know?'

She winced at the venom in his voice.

'What do you fucking want, Granger? Tell me, and then piss off.'

'I want to know if you are alright, Malfoy, and I don't mean after what Harry did to you.'

'Whatever he told you, it's a lie!' He snarled. The thought of Granger knowing he'd cried was, for some reason, worse than Potter seeing it.

'He didn't tell me anything…' she said quietly, 'but I can tell something's wrong… you've been looking awful for weeks, Malfoy.'

'You've been looking awful for years, and I don't come and pester you about it…' he spat.

She cringed again, and he felt a ripple of something that felt horribly like… guilt.

'Malfoy, tell me, maybe I can help you… whatever they are making you do, there must be a way out… I don't think you're really a bad person, Malfoy, you're just… scared.'

He blinked, thrown off by the depth of her insight, but quickly regained his angry façade.

'You're talking a load of shit, Granger,' he sneered, 'you don't know anything about me, and I don't want you to!'

She sighed. 'Alright Malfoy, I just wanted you to know someone had noticed. And I wanted to apologise for what Harry did to you.'

'Fat lot of difference any of that makes, considering you mean nothing to me.'

She looked sadly at him. 'I know that Draco, I just wanted you to know that you mean something to me. I don't like you, but I don't want you to get hurt… especially because I think there's more to you.'

'Bollocks. Now Get. The. Hell. Out.'

She left, and two minutes later she was talking to Pomfrey about Skele Gro again.

Ever since that night, he had hated her with a strength reserved for only her. She had seen who he really was; she had seen something underneath all the nastiness.

And that terrified him.

Thanks for reading! The review box is right there… :p