A/N: So... This is an attempt to find my Christmas Spirit. I really really really hate holidays and I wanted to do something fun in order to distract myself.

Summary: After the war ended and Voldemort lost, Draco has been trying to achieve atonement. And he's doing a great job with everyone. But, a certain Gryffindor girl, is being a little difficult to be persuaded about his change of character. 4 years later in a Christmas Ball at Hogwarts Draco, finally, gains a chance to ask for forgiveness.

Warnings: EWE. characters might be OOC. Dramione pairing, written from Draco's P.O.V.

Disclaimer: I do NOT own any of the characters. They belong to JKRowling. The plot belongs somewhat to me, although it's not terribly original so I cannot properly claim it.

Note: italics in single quotes ( ' ' ) are thoughts, without quotes they are spells and/or something I wish to punctuate.


I scowled at my reflection inside the mirror.

I was wearing dress robes of emerald green velvet with a high collar, which, in my honest opinion, made me look like a vicar. An ocassion such as a Christmas Ball, had that affect on many people, I mused. Particularly on those who weren't comfortable in their own skin, to begin with.

Drowning my desire to tussle my hair until they are hanging off of my head in lifeless knots, instead I combed them neatly, making a parting to the left which seemed to make them scream 'I'm a pureblooded prat, and my mother styled my hair tonight'. My scowl deepened.

With a whispered celare imperfectiones*, used as a camouflage to cover the extensive black circles, I managed to make the skin under my eyes to not look as if it had been blackened with charcoal. Being awfully pale by genes though, I couldn't do much to also add some healthy color on my face. My lip quirked upwards in amusement, as a flash of a 14 year-old Hermione Granger, claiming she had had proof that Draco Malfoy was in fact an albino, jumped through my memory line.

The smile on my face faded. Last time I had seen Hermione Granger, 4 months prior, when we had accidentaly crossed paths in Diagon Alley, she had only spared me a nasty glare, turned on her heels, and fled as far away from me as possible.

I had mend my relations with everyone after the war had ended. And the statement included one Harry-The-Saint-Potter. The only person that refused to even give me a chance to apologize formally, was the boy-wonder's trusted sidekick, Hermione-bookworm-extraordinaire-Granger. And by refused to listen, I mean jinxing me on the spot, demanding -and I quote- to 'stay the bloody hell away from her, if I value my well-being'.

The last, and only, person I truly wished to be forgiven by, for my behavior and actions at school, and a large part of the war, wished to forget my existence. And, if able, bury me alive deep inside Oblivion so that no one would ever be able to find me again.

Her presence will grace tonight's ball. And her glares, will burn holes through my face. Again.
'Oh what a lovely evening, I am preparing myself for.'

With that thought in mind, I secure my wand in my pocket, for defensive purposes solely, and with a last glance at my reflection I make my way to the fireplace. Once inside, I take a deep calming breath and I floo to Hogwarts for the 4th Annual Christmas Ball, a newly adopted tradition since Voldemort had been defeated.


The Great Hall hadn't change, and I internally shuddered, remembering how my late Headmaster Dumbledore used to stare me down, like he knew every last one of my secrets.

The decorations this year were in traditional Christmas colors. Red, gold, green and silver.
A fact that I percieved as ironic and so I let a chuckle under my breath.

I cannot help the look of wonder that spreads on my face as I look at the Christmas Tree. I have been seeing it 4 years in a row, and the size will probably never seize to amaze me. It is, by far, the largest, tallest, with the most thick branches, tree that I' am ever going to see. Heavily decorated with balls, angels, bells, ribbons, swirling lights and every other thing Christmas-y. Even candy.

"Hello, Draco. Merry Christmas." I heard a soft, gentle, voice behind me and turned to rest my eyes on Luna Lovewood. Standing in front of me, in the most outrageous dress-robes ever made. They were puffy, fluffy and frilly, red and green taffeta, and some other material I couldn't name.

Any other girl in that room, would look disgustingly hideous in this dress. Luna being... well Luna, looked simply stunning.

"Well, hello there little weirdo. Merry Christmas to you too. And, how are you this fine evening?" I replied with a slight bow and a cheesy grin.

'It's not my fault the looney girl is adorable.' She had always been gentle with me, even though I had been bluntly mocking her since the moment I met her. After the war, of course, she became the closest thing I have to a friend. Well, except Blaise and Pansy, that is.

"A bit distracted actually. A difference is approaching us, and I must admit I'm confused about the result. I have faith it will be for the best though." she said in her, ever, eerie tone and I frowned my eyebrows terribly disorientated.

"I'm doing very well myself, thank you." I assured her at my usual manner. It's a thing between Luna and I. We never talk about the same subject, yet there's always a mutual understanding. I have no idea how we manage that.

"Save a dance for me, later, will you?" I asked her with a smile, and tilted my head to show her Blaise and Pansy that had just made an apperance through the Great Hall's heavy wooden doors.

She looked thoughtful for a second. "You won't be availiable later, Draco." she smiled dreamily and fled towards the refreshment tables, probably to locate Longbottom, before I had the chance to ask her what she meant.


"Merry Christmas, mate!" Blaise yelled inside my ear enthusiastically. 'Ever count on this bloke to piss me off.'

"Blaise, when I'm standing this close to you, what is the point in raising your bloody voice so much?" I hissed through my teeth arching an eyebrow.

"Oh, Drake. Stop scolding him. It's Christmas!" Pansy responded instead of him, leaning briefly to my side, to peck my cheek, with a large smile on her face.

I huffed and took a step back. Scrutinizing them both from head to toe, I decided that they looked like they had been shagging, up until the moment they opened the doors to enter the feast. Their matching outfits, formal robes in black and silver silk, were slightly askew. Their faces flustered and their hair subtly tusseled.

Shaking my head in amusement, I voiced my suspicions, delighted when Pansy's face turned a crimson red and Blaise cursed under his breath, punching my shoulder.

"Why, Merry Christmas, my dear snakes!" the playful remark, and a clap on my back, informed me of the presense of the Potters. Oh yes, that's plural. Harry grew a pair and poped The Question to Ginny a year ago.

"Pothead, Weaselette. Always a pleasure. Happy Christmas." I laughed as Ginny corrected me about the fact she's no longer a Weasley.

"I am aware, Ginevra. Potterette isn't catchy, though. Now, is it?" I required and she giggled.

As Pansy allured Ginny in a conversation about their dresses I tuned them out. Blaise, claiming he had spotted Theo and Greg, left to fetch them. Thus, I found myself staring inside vividly green eyes having no idea how to voice a question, that seemed to burn my tongue, from the moment Potter and that little wife of his entered my visual ray.

"So, how is... The Weasel? I haven't seen him recently." I asked nonchalantly having changed my mind at the last minute and having decided to go for this the sneaky way. Well, in my case, the usual way.

"Ah, you know Ron. He's head over heels with his team. Always on a pitch practising for 'Puddlemere United'**. He's doing quite well so far." he replied and I could hear a subtle proudness in his voice, for his oldest friend's achievements.

"Oh, how nice." I nodded my head and mentally slapped myself for the pathetic answer.

He sighed. "Hermione is behind you and to the left. Talking with Dean Thomas and Seamus Finiggan. See her?" he asked as I jerked my head to said direction, before I had the time to stop myself. 'So much for a subtle approach on the matter.'

'Merlin.' My breath hitched in my throat and I gasped. Indeed there she was. Dressed in a red silky dress that rested just above her knees. It had long sleeves, and showed no cleavage, but her entire back was exposed. She looked like Santa Claus's little helper.
'Sweet Circe. So beautiful. What? No, no. Draco Abraxas Malfoy. What are you thinking boy?'

Shaking the naughty thoughts from my head, I turned to Potter, who eyed me with a knowing smile on his face. 'Nice.'
"And you're handing me the information of her location, why exactly?" I asked, calmly inspecting my nails.

"Well, when I think of Ron, I automatically think of Hermione also. It's a reflex really, after spending all these years with both of them, it's almost as if they are one person inside my mind." He explained, and I wasn't certain of the reason his answer made me want to growl.

I swallowed thickly. "Naturally. Excuse me while I'm getting myself a drink, will you?" I replied in a hurry and practically stormed away from him, and to the opposite direction of Granger's.


several drinks, a couple of dancings and one disturbingly clingy girl, her name I wasn't familiar with, later...

I came face to face with the woman I've been avoiding all night.

I looked at her scowling face. Always so clearly displeased to see me. I knew it was only fair. None of her memories of me were pleasant after all, the opposite was ever the scenery.

I couldn't help but feel bitter, though. To feel a need for her to understand that I could have been much worse. Yet, I wasn't. Members of my family had hurt her extensively, but I had never touched her. Not for not given an opportunity either. The mere reason was I had never wanted to hurt her. Simple as that. Not with my wand or my hands anyway.

"Granger." I acknowledged in a tone I hoped was strictly neutral. I didn't wish this to be another engagement in a petty, bad-tempered quarrel, for us.

"I heard you were here, somewhere." she stated, arms wrapped protectively around her torso. "Though I fail to phantom the reason." she mumbled under her breath, intentionally letting me listen to her stern comment, which hurt me more than I would care to admit. Her eyes were glaring daggers openly, waiting for a wrong word or move to crouch at defensive mode.

Ever the Slytherin, I swallowed a caustic retort reminding myself, for what seemed to be the millionth time, that I wanted this encounter to end well. For both our sakes.

"Look, I... I wanted to apologize, for all the harm that found you through my aunt's hands. It seemed appropriate to do so in person. I really am sorry, Hermione. I wish there was something I could do, to alter what has been occured."

The words were coming out wrong. I had been playing them in my head for over 4 years, with various alternations, yet when I looked at her, I seemed to block all coherent thoughts. All I could hear inside my mind was I'm sorry playing in a loop, as if my brain believed that if I said it enough times she would forgive me.

To my utter surprise, her eyes opened widely for a second and her mouth dropped to the floor in shock. And then she was laughing. Humorless-ly, bitterly. And the cruel sound was twisting my stomach. 'Or was it my heart?'

"You're sorry? Oh my, Malfoy" she gasped for breath "seems to me you have discovered a sense of humor." her face sobered in a flash, and, if I had blinked, I would have missed the change on her features.

"What are you sorry for exactly, Malfoy?" she demanded and I had never seen such an alarming amount of hate swim inside her eyes.

I tried to find the right way, desperate to not insult her and to make her see my sincerity. I opened my mouth and closed it again. After a couple of times I had done the same, lame, expression and she was still staring at me viciously, less than impressed with my pathetic imitation of a fish.

"Well? Out with it!" she sneered and I paused, and took a moment to be surprised, once more.

In all of our years at school I had never witness such expressions on her face. She would always either glare at me, or huff in frustrated annoyance, or -her personal favorite- storm out of the room without as much as another glance at me, to indicate her disdain.

And there I was, wondering if she had grown tired of me. If this was the one time, that she would not handle the situation with dignity, and she would rush to bite my throat. Not that I wouldn't deserve such treatment, when we were younger, but today I only wished to cast away the ghosts of our past. To give an opportunity to both of us to start this New Year, in a few days, with a cordial approach to each other.

"Can we talk, in private?" I asked curtly and her eyebrows shot so high up her forehead I feared they might get tangled in her hair. "You could hold my wand at all times." I rushed to assure her in an attempt to make her feel safe. And, if I were to be completely honest, I was relying on her wounded pride that she would follow me to prove she wasn't afraid of me.

With a huff, and her head held high she extended a hand to demand my wand, which I reluctantly surrendered. I tried to relax, telling myself she would never use an unforgivable curse. Hexes and jinxes I could survive with.

She bided for me to follow her out the packed Hall and I did so quietly, scanning the crowd as we went through them to make sure we would remain unnoticed.


Granger leaded me to a classroom and entered swiftly. Once inside she spanned around to face me so quickly she gave me the impression that she was feeling vulnerable with her back turned on me. 'Not a good sign.' Hopefully she would relax in my presense through our conversation.

'Now... Where to begin from?'

She cleared her throat and only then I noticed I had been staring at the floor, in front of her feet.

"I..." am in a total loss of words. Smooth, Draco, really smooth.'

"Again, explain to me what are you supposedly 'sorry' for." she demanded twirling my wand leisurely through her fingers.

"I'm sorry for every time, I called you a mudblood. I'm sorry for being a downright git to you. I'm sorry I wasn't smart enough, or mature enough, to realise sooner what it would mean to become a Death Eater. I'm sorry for Buckbeak in 3rd year, for being in Umbridge's Inquisitorial Squad in 5th year, for attacking Potter at Myrtle's bathroom in 6th year, I'm sorry for not helping when you were dragged by Snachers at my house in 7th year."

The words were flying through my mouth, making me feel like an embarrassed child, when I realized how many things I had to ask forgiveness for.

But there was such a relief that flooded my veins. She was, finally, listening to me. After 4 years of trying and being rejected every time. It fell so good to be able to get all this out.

My life had been going well enough since I changed sides, yet there had always been a shadow around me.
I hadn't been able to make things right with the person I had wronged the most. And it was slowly killing me.

"Give me one good reason I should believe you're speaking the truth." she said in a monotone voice that seemed misplaced coming from her.

Instantly my body went rigid but my heart started to hammer my insides.
"I... What?" 'No, no, no. She had to believe me. She had to.'

"Are you daft or deaf? Give me a reason, I shouldn't hex you, and lock you in here, hoping no one will ever find you again." she hissed through her teeth with malice.

'Merlin help me for I do not know what more I can do.' "Please... I'm sorry." I whispered pathetically, going against my Malfoy pride and upbringing. Anything to be able to actually sleep at night again.

I started to recount the last 4 years of my life to her. In a voice that if I had heard it and someone claimed it was mine, I would have been unable to identify.

"I still see you in my nightmares. Writhing from pain on the floor, under the cruelest person I had in my life. I knew what my aunt was capable of. Believe me when I tell you she has done worse to me... To see her torturing you. I cannot describe what that night did to me. I still hear you scream. I still see the blood dripping from your arm. That vile word defiling your skin."

I could see her eyes turning almost black from rage. A rage so big and powerful, that made her whole body shake, with the effort to contain the destructive feeling. Her gaze was glaring daggers. Her hands were closed in fists, so tightly, her knuckles were turning white.

Her words came out from gritted teeth. Her voice the roar of a lion ready to attack it's first meal in a very long time.

"Shut up. Shut up. Shut up! You loathsome egoistic bastard! You have no idea what that night did to me. Your aunt destroyed me. That vile woman branded me with a cursed knife and that 'mudblood' will stay on my arm forever. Molly Weasley said she was grateful that the knife wasn't also poisoned and I didn't have to go through a dark-magic infection."

"The worst part, though, wasn't the physical torture. Her voice will echo inside my mind forever. That awful crude laughter, her degrading judgement to me. Calling me an animal when she was the one that carved my flesh. She diminished my soul, that night. My spirit. Do you know how long it took for me to be able to sleep again? Do you really think I want to hear how my scars gave you nightmares, Draco Malfoy? DO YOU?"

And just like that, her anger vanished. All that was left was her pain. Written so vividly across her face, one would think she was talking about something that happened yesterday, not years ago.

Heavy tears coursed down her reddened cheeks, in an attempt to sooth the burning flesh. The burning soul.

And I saw the little girl again. The one with the bushy hair and the buckteeth, that looked around the Great Hall on the night we were sorted to our respected Houses. She was alone in a world that was new to her.

Unlike then, now, in front of me, she wasn't hopeful and excited. She was lost and broken. And so terribly afraid.
And I didn't know what to do. An urge to comfort her filled my whole existence, yet I was unable to act on it.

"How come, you didn't betray us, that night? You may hadn't recognised Harry, but you knew who Ron and I were the minute you saw us." she all but sobbed, trying desperately to swallow back the offending tears.

"Yes, I knew... But I saw the girl from the train, our first day in Hogwarts Express, that searched everywhere for a toad a boy, she had just met, had lost. I saw the girl that guided Hagrid to take me to the Hospital Wing, when Buckbeak stepped on my arm, even though she hated me. I saw the girl that fought my father and Dolohov, among others, at the Department Of Mysteries, and came back to school with a broken body but an intact spirit. I saw the girl that refused to bow at my feet, that fought me every step of the way, that punched my bloody nose when I deserved it."

I replied truthfully, with a fond smile at the memories.

"I saw you. And despite our differences, you were so familiar, and I was so proud of you. I saw you standing in my house, knowing your fate and being calm and composed, while I was almost at my knees from anxiety and nerves."

A nervous laughter escaped my lips, and I was positive that pink painted my cheeks.

"I saw you fighting with a fierce passion at the Second Wizarding War and you managed to come through it, still innocent in your soul, as you were when we were 11 years old. And I cannot explain how you did all this and managed to remain the same bookish know-it-all, but I envy you for it."

I finished panting for breath by the force of everything that came out of me. Looking straight inside her eyes, I prayed to Merlin one more time, to make her understand I meant every word.

"You want to learn a secret, Malfoy? You want to know why I was such an 'insufferable know-it-all', as Professor Snape had said once, when we were at school?" she required with a gleam in her eyes that made me want to create a protecting shield in front of me.

Curiosity and a tiny dose of hope, that maybe I could still have the result of our meeting change in my favor, drove me to arch an eyebrow and motion with my hand for her to carry on. And when the first sentence left her mouth, mine dropped on the floor from the surprise.

"Because of you." She whispered softly, almost fondly, though I had a suspicion that my mind was playing tricks at me.

"Because when you called me 'mudblood' I decided to always be better than you. Even if it was solely in academics. My goal, every year, became to top your grades. Don't get me wrong, of course I loved studying, mind you I still do. But there was such a great satisfaction I gained from beating you in every subject. And that was petty, but every time I saw you sneering at me in the hallways, I couldn't help but stare you down. Always thinking that you deserved that I was first and you were second."

By the time she finished her speech she was staring at the floor. Making me think, that she was in a way, ashamed that she had taken pleasure in such a sinister way.

But all I could do was smile. She had been thinking about me, constantly, in all of our 7 years at Hogwarts.
And, even though, I realized that her reasons was hate and loathsome and a need to outdone me... I couldn't find it in my mind to feel pathetic, for being happy about the fact that there wasn't a single minute that she had ignored me.

I never had. Thoughts, about the contrast of her abilities and her status, where swirling in my mind. And I was forever restless, for not being able to explain the fact that a muggle-born witch was more talented and intelligent than the majority of her pureblooded counterparts.

Hoping she wouldn't hex me, or shrank away from me in fear, I cautiously closed the distance between us and raised my hand under her chin, to gently tilt her head upwards.

"Apart from studying, Granger, it was your talent that made you stand out. Charms, Transfiguration, Potions... We had many classes together, I should know. You were brilliant, in everything. I know you won't believe me, but I admired you for that." I told her, with all the sincerity I could master.

And then it happened.
My very own, Christmas miracle.
She smiled. A small and hesitant kind of smile. Her first one though, ever, that was aimed at me.


A/N: *'celare imperfectiones' is latin for 'hide imperfections' - it's not an actual charm, I made it up.

**Puddlemere United is a Quidditch team that plays in the British and Irish Quidditch League. They were founded in 1163, making them the oldest team in the league. Their robes are navy-blue robes emblazoned with two crossed golden bulrushes. Their location is possibly somewhere on the River Piddle in Dorset. The team has won the League 22 times and the European Cup twice. Oliver Wood joined as a reserve after graduation from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

This fic is based on the song 'The Nicest Thing' by Kate Nash.

The lyrics just screamed to me that they would fit well from Draco's point of view, because... well, Hermione is the nicest little witch ever so...

yeah. I'm rambling :| I do that a lot :-_ anyway...

You know what to do if you liked this, or if you have to point out any mistakes or give me some tips, anything... I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions.

Also, if there's affirmative response I might write a sequel... :_

Oh! And Merry Christmas everybody! :)