Hate me later- read this now. 3 Love you all.

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"You're not telling me someone's asked that to the ball? Not the long-molared Mudblood?"

My words echo in my head as I watch the scene before me unfold. I didn't expect to run into anyone on the back stairwell. I just wanted five minutes to myself. Just five minutes without Pansy's constant nagging in my ear. How to dance. How to speak. Who to talk to at her precious dance- and fucking when. A Malfoy doesn't take that shit from anyone- especially an annoyingly clingy bint like Pansy.

I assumed I'd be alone.

Not alone with Granger after her and Weasel just had words.

She doesn't see me yet- but I can see her. I see the tears begin to fall down her porcelin-like cheeks. She drops to the ground- her layered dress falling around her as she sits on the stairs, crying in a pink, lacy, circle.

I shouldn't be seeing this. No one should be seeing Gryffindor's bloody fucking princess like this. Crying on the stairs and vulnerable.

Someone could take advantage of this. I should be taking advantage of this.

"Fuuuuuck," I mutter softly to myself, before pushing my body off the wall.

"Get up Granger." She jumps at my voice, and turns to me- a glare on her make-up stained face. Muggle make-up. "Someone could see you."

She scoffs at me with a hollow laugh. "Like you? Congratulations Malfoy, here's another one for your arsenal. The stupid Mudblood crying over a boy. Very fucking funny."

Granger starts outwardly sobbing now, and begins to take her shoes off. I'm not sure what to say. I don't think I've ever heard Granger say Mudblood before. Or curse. I think she's actually rendered me speechless.

I take a deep breath and walk over to her. Shaking my head, I kneel down beside her. "Granger."

Slowly, she looks up at me. No malice in her face anymore. She just looks...broken.

"Why don't you just leave me alone?"

I don't know. I can't. I don't knowww. "You shouldn't be seen this way." Is all I can tell her. I should just leave her here. Let her boy-who-won't-die come to her rescue.

But no one else is around. It's just me and her.

"Come on," I tell her, standing. I take a few steps down the staircase and look back to her.

She looks at me skeptically, but stands after a short hesitation, sniffling, but still crying. Silently now.

I turn back around and continue down the staircase. What the fuck am I doing? I'm leading Granger on a midnight stroll through the fucking castle after the Yuleball. She follows me a full paces behind me and I change a glance at her as I turn around a corner and begin up a different set of steps. She must have cast a charm on her face because there's no trace she's been crying other than her eye's visible sadness. Fucking pathetic. All over Weasel.

The steps split in two directions and I turn left. With another minute's of circular climbing we come out inside a tower near the east side of the castle. It's typically not used until 7th year astronomy so it's seldom used by students. Especially as it's a decent trek to get to the top and located off a remote part of the castle. Snape had taken me here once during second year and I've used it for privacy ever since.

And now I'm with the Mudblood Granger.

Bloody hell.

I walk into the tower and sit on the lone bench in its center. I don't have to look behind me to know that Granger's halted at the entrance.

"I won't bite, you know," I tell her, looking out at the clear Winter sky. "I just come here sometimes...to be alone." I stop myself from saying anything else, and just shrug. What am I doing?

It feels like an eternity, but eventually she sits down beside me on the bench- scooting as far away from me as possible.

"You can't blame me, Malfoy," she says after I roll my eyes at her actions.

"Actually I could stand to have you alot further away than that."

"Prat."

For a while we sit in silence, looking out on Hogwart's grounds. The stars are bright in contrast to the black night. My breath is coming out in white clouds in front of my face. Granger is shivering to my right.

Pulling my wand out, I conjure a small fire on the stone floor in front of us and she jumps, glaring in my direction.

"What?" I ask with an amused smirk. "Surely even you has seen magic made fire before."

"You just startled me!" She snaps, looking at the fire and back to me. "You didn't use an incantation."

It was a statement more than a question. "Impressed?"

Her eyes narrow and she looks away from me again. "Slightly."

I almost don't hear her she says it so softly, and I can't help laughing. I swear I see a smile on her face as well before a voice interrupts any thoughts I was having and brings me right back to reality and the fact that I'm alone in an astronomy tower, with the Mudblood, after hours. And clearly not hating every moment of it.

"And what is this?"

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We both jump, but I don't need to turn around to know who that voice belongs to. I doubt Granger does either, but she turns towards the entrance anyway.

Internally, I groan, composing myself before slowly turning towards Snape.

There's a look I can't quite read on his face before he masks whatever he was thinking. "Professor," I say slowly.

"I believe it is long past curfew," he states, looking back and forth between the two of us. "Might I ask what the two of you are doing here?"

Granger looks to me for an answer, but I keep my eyes on Snape, not saying anything.

"Up." He sneers. "Now."

We follow him out of the tower and down its steps. When we get to the bottom he turns to Granger. "Go to your tower. We'll discuss your punishment later."

She nods and quickly makes her way down the hall. Snape waits until she turns the corner before looking down at me- an eyebrow raised in question.

"What?" I ask in return, glaring.

"What," he says, and I can hear his annoyance in his tone, "were you doing alone in a tower with Granger?"

I wish I had that answer. I almost say it out loud, but I have a feeling I don't have to. Snape always seems to be able to read my emotions. "We weren't doing anything," I tell him. "Just sitting."

"You," he says, "were just civilly sitting beside Granger- alone, after hours?"

I purse my lips and look down the hall to where Granger had disappeared. "I have nothing more to say on it."

"Be careful," is all he replies before starting towards the dungeons.

With one last glance down the hall, I follow Snape.

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Love.