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Stopping on Sidewalk

Every year, coming home from summer holiday, I'd brag about the places I went. It was more that Father brought me along on business meetings, handing me some galleons to spend time with in a foreign city. These trips usually lasted from one to four days, and there were never enough of them that I didn't spend most of my summer at the manor.

This summer I seemed to be going on more trips with Father, but they weren't anywhere exciting. I'm not really sure why he still saw fit to bring me along, it's not like there was any place to spend the galleons there.

I heard him and Mummy arguing over taking me places just before we left the first time this year. I suspect he apparatus outside the country and just leaves me places that Mummy would deem "harmlessly muggle." In my house, it sounds a bit contradictory. Muggles were not harmless, except that they were. We had to fear them, but it was because they were pathetic. Of course it didn't make any sense, but I'd long since realized that accepting bizarre logic without question was a staple of living at Malfoy Manor.

Despite having decided that my money would remain in-pocket, I actually spotted a number of shops on my way through Thurrsford that actually looked interesting. I found myself pausing at the windows, and, having found myself in such a state, I wondered then what someone else should think, if they found me, too. They'd think nasty things, probably. If they didn't hate me for being a muggle-lover, they'd hate me for being hypocritical.

I guess I was, a hypocrite. Most of us are, it's natural. Like smiling when you're really beside-yourself angry, or crying at a wedding, or telling someone else to be quiet while producing the sound that silences them.

I picked a shop no one would see me in. I didn't know any muggle children or parents, and I couldn't imagine anyone else ever wanting to enter "Hobbies and Kittens." Well, anyone except me. See? Hypocrite. Anyway.

There toys are like our toys except that they suck. They've got some things we don't have, though. Like these little plastic ducks that make very un-duck-like noises when crushed in your palm. They actually have a whole corner of the store dedicated to kiddie art supplies. Almost cultured of them, those muggles.

"Paint by Numbers." An educational kit on numerology and art? Way to go, muggles.

I'd already decided that this was going to be the thing I bought today when I realized that I don't technically have any muggle money on me. Brilliant, Father, thank you.

Do have my wand, though. Just shrunk it small enough to fit in my pocket when no one was looking. As I walked out the door, this horrible BAAANT sound went off on either side of me. I froze.

"Oh, I guess it just goes off sometimes," called a rather doughy looking blond muggle from the desk. "Sorry about that, champ. Have a good one, eh?"

Champ. What a bizarre thing to call me. I wrinkled my nose at her, but then it seemed that she was still looking at me, and saw my nose wrinkle, and expected an explanation. "They—they don't make these like they used to. Man," I muttered bitterly. She nodded sympathetically and turned to attend another customer as I made my way out the door.

Why would you put some sort of... anti-theft machine in, then ignore any theft? Muggles were mixed up, too. Probably more so. I'd begun to dislike them less and less, though, getting dumped in these random little towns. I guess it's like living in a jungle somewhere and befriending all of the little woodland menaces that anyone in sane company would scoff at.

Maybe having a muggle for a friend would be like having a pet? A dog, or something, who'd always surprise you by alternating between smart and clueless. I need a pet muggle, I thi—

"Draco Malfoy?" If fate's monitoring my thoughts, I asked for a pet MUGGLE, not wizard.

"No. I'm one of his many impersonators. Not as handsome as the real thing, I know." I lifted my chin up, preparing to smirk as I turned to see which classmate I'd try to shame into admitting they liked to visit Thurrsford, Essex (I was dragged here, I had a legitimate excuse).

"It's good that you're at least realistic about your looks, you seem to overestimate everything else."

All the work that'd been put into preparing the smirk was ruined. My mouth opened just a bit, and my eyes widened then narrowed in disbelief. Hermione Granger?

"What are you doing her?" I demanded, taking a step towards her. She laughed.

"I live a town away. I'm muggleborn. They have a library and cafes. What are you doing here?"

This was not good. The normal balance of power was being thrown off. She was too confident. And too... cheerful. It was bizarre and sickening and I'm sure that's why she was doing it.

"My Father is nearby on business. I thought I'd—actually, Granger, it's none of your business." I straightened up, but didn't walk away. Not that I wanted to talk to her, or anything, but for once in my life I genuinely had nothing better to do. If I walked, where would I walk to?

"Really, Malfoy? And yet you wanted to know why I was here?" She raised her eyebrows at me. I wonder if she charms them, or something. They're perfect—she isn't, mind you, just, they are. I think they might have always looked like that, though. But they must have been bushy, like her mane, right? Weren't they bushy?

"Malfoy. You really won't talk to me at all? Staring doesn't give you a monopoly on information. The library's closed, I could interrogate you all day."

"Would you?" I meant for it to sound like a challenge. I'm afraid it sounded a bit like a request. Like, "I could get us some tea, Margerie...?" "Oh, Helen! Would you?"

This worked to my advantage, though, as it seemed to confuse Granger just as much. She fumbled over words. "No? Well, I mean, I hadn't actually meant that, but I guess it was also true, the library is closed..."

I nodded sympathetically. By not responding right away, I was giving her the opportunity to make herself look even sillier.

"Fine, Malfoy. I'll interrogate you, if you're that... bored, or lost, or whyever you're really here. But not in the street like this, it's indecent."

Malfoys do not appreciate being called indecent. "How is this at all indecent, Granger? We're talking perfectly civilly, for once, and we're both entirely clothed, and it's perfectly legal-"

My words trailed off as she pointed to someone jogging nearby, cutting onto the road next to us, then returning to sidewalk once they got further on. "We're making people go around, it's not very polite."

There wasn't anything there to object to, really, so I just shrugged. "Where, then?"

She didn't step backwards or forwards, but seemed to shift her weight onto one foot, one hip. When she did this, I couldn't help but think it was a bit of a step forward anyway. I felt closer to her now, but probably only because I was looking at the curve of her hip. Was that always there? Her hip? I can only really remember her face and her hair and her hideous shoes. I guess it's this muggle clothing. Her tea-shirt is rather loose, and it goes right up to the collar bone, but it's so much more fitting that a cloak that it seems almost indecent itself.

"Hmm..." I looked up at her face again. She wasn't looking back at me, so I suppose she was thinking. That's good, wouldn't want her to think, wrongly, that I had been admiring her hip. "Hmm..." she repeated again.

"Hmm..." I echoed. She looked up at me. I expected frustration, readied myself to bask in it, but I got amusement instead.

"Honestly Malfoy, how old are you?"

I help up my left index finger and every digit on my right hand except the thumb. 14.

"Oh, five, then?" she mirrored my hands and counted just loud enough for me to hear. "One, two, three, four, five."

I sniffed. "Fingers aren't transferable like that," I informed her. I switched from holding up my left index to displaying my left thumb. "Watch this," I continued. In dramatic slow-motion, I moved my left hand behind my right, so that the thumb filled the space in there air just behind where my other thumb would have stood. "See? That's the only kind of acceptable transfer. Thumb for a thumb. That's five."

Granger made this strange noise. It was sort of like a giggle, or a snort without the snorting sound, with a piece of Granger's voice in it instead, but smallish and child-like. "Heh." This was new.

Determined to assert this new power I had over her, I continued explaining how finger-counting works. "It just doesn't make sense otherwise," I said, gesturing to her still-raised fingers. "If you shift this one over like this..." I took the necessary step forward and took her right hand in mine. Ignoring how ludicrously soft her hand was, I moved it to a position just in front of the other one, so that her right index filled the left thumb space.

"Two index fingers? It looks ludicrous, Granger. Surely, this is impossible. I must be fourt—oh."

"What?" she asked automatically when I broke off mid-sentence.

"I just realized—I'm fifteen."

"Oh?"

"Since late June," I explained, nodding solemnly.

"Malfoy?" I looked at her curiously and she looked down at our hands. Oh, right. Time to let go. Don't want too much mudblood to rub off. As my hands dropped to my sides, they felt cold.

"How dare you, Granger?"

"How dare I what?" she straightened up, probably afraid that this odd cease-fire had ended.

"You stole it."

"Stole what?" she demanded. This was fun. Granger hates not knowing answers.

"You know what you took from me."

"No, no I don't, Malfoy. But I swear I'll burn it unless you tell me what it is," she threatened.

I laughed. A real one, not the handsome-sounding ones I usually force. No use trying to impress a mudblood, anyway, so who cares. "It's already burning."

She raised her eyebrows on me. "What in Merlin's cufflinks is it that I'm to have stolen?"

"My warmth." I answered simply. "When I took your hands, it made mine warmer, and now that I've let go, they've gone cold. And so, you stole my warmth. How dare you?"

Her mouth opened a little, and she looked absolutely confused. "What are you playing at?"

I crossed my arms, which was delightfully easy to do in this thin muggle shirt. "I'm not playing at anything, Granger. Clearly, for the theft of my warmth, you owe me reparations. I demand..."

"You demand," she repeated disapprovingly, an eyebrow quirked.

"I demand," I restated, "that you pay me back. By purchasing a hot muggle beverage for me."

"It's summer," she pointed out.

"I know. What are you doing stealing people's heart in the summer, Granger? Silly girl." The word girl came out automatically, but it felt foreign when it meant Granger. Usually she was like... some sort of genderless squid of muddiness and know-it-all-tion. Clearly this was her hip's fault, and my extension her fault for making me notice it like that.

"So I can repay them in hot muggley beverages, Malfoy. Obviously. Now, c'mon." It was the opposite direction to the one I'd been headed in, but as I hadn't been headed anywhere anyway, I followed behind her. Did everyone's hips dance about back and forth like that when they walk? Dear Merlin, I hope mine don't.

I made sure to walk very carefully and un-Grangerly as I followed along behind her.

-x-

Note: There will prolly be, at the least, one follow-up chapter. I hope you liked it alright so far. First story I've written in almost a year.