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On their first date, she insists on paying for her own food.

"Come on, Granger," he begins, but the look she shoots him silences him, and he throws his hands up in surrender and lets her fish four Galleons out of her coin purse.

"I just don't want to owe you anything," she says, tracing the rim of her half-empty Butterbeer.

"Granger, when the man offers to pay—"

"I don't care if you offer to buy me a house. I'm going to pay for my own things, and that's the end of it."

He fixes her with a steely glare. "Still as stubborn as always, I see."

She tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. "What did you expect?"

"I dunno. I've been gone a long time, I thought maybe you'd learned to loosen up, or—"

Hermione actually laughs, drawing a few glances from the other patrons of the Three Broomsticks. "You spend a year in Azkaban, and you think I'm the one who's going to be changed when you return?"

He sighs and pushes a hand through his blond hair. "You've changed at least a bit," he says. "You agreed to come out to dinner with me."

She doesn't say anything for a moment. "A lot of people think I shouldn't have. But I believe in second chances. Or fifteenth chances, in your case." She lifts her Butterbeer to her lips and takes a small sip. "How have you changed, Draco?"

He smirks. "I asked you to come out to dinner with me."

"Obviously." She wipes the froth from her upper lip. "But why?"

He bites at the inside of his cheek. "I don't want to be like them anymore," he says finally. "It's dangerous nowadays, now that You-Know-Who is really gone. And what's the one thing you can do to distance yourself from the Death Eaters?"

"Be a Muggleborn."

He rolls his eyes. "Yes, well, I haven't exactly got that option."

"Date a Muggleborn, then."

"Exactly."

She gives him a long, appraising look. "So you're using me."

"Trying to, yeah." He shrugs. "It's difficult when you won't let me pay for your bloody meal."

She looks down at her Galleons on the table. "So you haven't changed a bit."

"It's not exactly easy to change your entire way of life," he snaps. "You try joining the Death Eaters, see how easily you're able to adapt to that."

She closes her eyes briefly. "At least you've realized you've got to put some distance between yourself and them," she says, meeting his eyes. "Even if it's just for publicity reasons, at least you're making that effort."

"Thank you." He sits back heavily in his booth.

An odd look flickers across her face. "So you chose a crowded restaurant," she says, gesturing at the people filling the tables around them, "and asked me to come to dinner in hopes that everyone would see you being friendly with a Muggleborn and assume you'd reformed?"

He looks slightly suspicious. "That was the plan, yes."

"And did you invite the paparazzi photographing us through the window, or is that just a happy coincidence?"

Draco keeps his eyes locked on hers. "If you could let me pay for dinner," he says in a low voice, "I would greatly appreciate it."

Hermione's mouth twitches, but her eyes give away nothing. "Fine," she says, looking pointedly at the check in front of her. "Be my guest."

He raises his eyebrows as he leans across the table to snag the check. "Really? You'll go along with—"

She cuts him off by seizing his lapels and pulling him in for a kiss.

There is a blinding succession of camera flashes from outside.

"Granger!" Draco pulls back and scrubs at his mouth, eyes wide with horror. "What the hell—what was that?"

She smirks. "I'm helping you with your little plan."

"By assaulting me?"

She tilts her head toward the photographers outside, who are all climbing over one another trying to get the best view. "By getting you the front page of tomorrow's Prophet."

"Granger." His face has gone white. "My father is going to see that."

"More than just your father, I'd imagine."

"Granger—"

"Don't you want to distance yourself from the Death Eaters?" she asks in a simpering voice. "Or was that all just an excuse for you to take me out to dinner?"

He narrows his eyes and crushes the check in his fist. "Hope you're prepared to move in together," he says, dropping a handful of change on the table, "because the moment this gets back to my father, I'll be kicked out of the house."

She shrugs as they stand and gather their coats. "I'm living with Ron at the moment," she says, reaching for one last sip of Butterbeer, "so unless you'd like to sleep on the couch—ah!"

She yelps as one of the photographers, who has been lurking inside trying to get a closer shot, bumps into her shoulder. The Butterbeer slips from her hand and spills down the front of her sweater.

"Here," Draco says, handing her a white handkerchief with small strawberries embroidered around the edges.

Hermione looks at him as if he's offered her a live snake. "Or I could use my wand," she says, pulling out the wand in question and charming her sweater clean.

"Oh." Draco reddens and shoves the handkerchief back into his pocket. "Right."

"Nice touch, jumping straight for the Muggle way of cleaning things," she says as they exit the restaurant together. "Was that for the cameras?"

He shakes his head. "Just not used to having a wand again, I suppose."

The surprise on her face is evident, though she tries to cover it. "Oh," she says quietly.

"S'pose I have changed, just a bit," he says, and she doesn't have a response.

"Hermione Granger, are you out of your absolute mind?"

Hermione doesn't even look up from her desk. "Ginny."

"Dating Malfoy?" Ginny comes into Hermione's office and shuts the door. "Are you bloody insane?"

"It's a publicity stunt. Dating a Muggleborn is his way of showing the world he's reformed."

Ginny slaps the front page of the Daily Prophet down on the desk, where an entire half-page is devoted to a moving photograph of a black-and-white Hermione pulling a black-and-white Malfoy into a ferocious kiss. "And you decided to jump his bones because you were just so convinced?"

"I didn't—oh, for Merlin's sake, Ginny, I was acting." Hermione finally looks up. "If everyone thinks he's changed for the better, then he'll be under constant pressure to act better." She eyes the photograph in the Prophet before carefully flipping to a new page. "And the world could use a little decency from the Malfoys, even if it's all faked."

Ginny shakes her head. "That's idiotic."

"Thank you, Ginny," Hermione says sarcastically.

"Not the plan. It's a perfectly valid plan, especially if you rub off on him. I just don't think you're capable of pretending to like Malfoy."

"Oh, no?"

"Not with his supermassive ego." Ginny sits down opposite Hermione and crosses one leg over the other. "I give it a week before you're at each other's throats."

"I'm a bit stronger than that."

Ginny smirks. "Whatever you say, Hermione. Does Ron know it's all fake?"

"Of course." Hermione goes back to her paperwork. "I warned him about everything last night."

"How'd he take it?"

"He doesn't like it, obviously, but so what? He's not my boyfriend. We only share a flat for convenience."

"Even though you know the real reason is his undying love for you."

Hermione rolls her eyes. "Yes, well, he's never mentioned undying love to me, so—"

"You never tell a girl you like her, it makes you look like an idiot."

"—so until he tells me," Hermione says over Ginny, "I don't need his approval for anything I do."

Ginny snorts. "Nor do I, but I still think it's a bit harsh to pretend to date his worst enemy."

"It's all for the greater good," Hermione says.

"Greater good?" Ginny repeats.

Hermione feels her face warm up. "I didn't mean—"

"Sounds like Malfoy's already rubbed off on you."

Hermione clenches her jaw. "If you don't mind, Ginny, I've got a lot of work to do."

"I'm going, I'm going." Ginny grabs her copy of the newspaper from Hermione's desk and opens the door. "If you need someone to help you hide his body, let me know."

He shows up on her doorstep the next day.

"Told you I'd be kicked out," he says when Hermione answers the door. He steps over the threshold without being invited and drops his leather bag in the entryway. "Where's my room?"

Hermione raises her eyebrows. "You aren't living here."

"Then where the hell am I supposed to go?"

"To a cousin's house. To a friend's. To a hotel."

"To hell," suggests Ron from the kitchen, where he's banished himself ever since Draco's letter had arrived an hour ago explaining the situation.

"Nice to see you, too, Weasley," Draco says under his breath, and then, in his normal volume: "One night, Granger. Please. The photographers are downstairs."

Hermione sighs. "You don't know any other Muggleborns who would take you in?"

"Not Muggleborns I'm supposedly dating, no."

Hermione looks at him for a long moment. "One night," she says finally.

"No," says Ron, storming in from the kitchen. "Absolutely not."

"Merlin, Weasley," Draco says, "what've I done to displease you this time?"

"Oh, let's count the ways," Ron says sarcastically. "One: you spent seven years bullying my family."

"I dunno if you've missed the point of this entire plan, but I've changed since we were in school."

"Two: you snogged my best friend in public."

"It was her idea, Weasley. I don't think you fully grasp the situa—"

"Three!" Ron is yelling to be heard over him. "You! Are! A! Malfoy!"

He pounds his fist for emphasis, forgetting about the open bottle of firewhiskey in his hand. The drink splatters all over the floor.

"I've got it," Draco says, pulling out his white handkerchief and dropping to his knees to mop up the mess.

Three seconds of silence, and then Ron bursts out laughing. "A cloth?" he says. "Are you a wizard or aren't you?"

"Ron," Hermione says quietly while Draco stares stupidly at the stained handkerchief in his hand.

"What?"

Hermione looks at him pointedly. "Give it a rest."

He yells in his sleep.

Something about Dementors, and Crabbe, and his father, and something burning his arm.

Ron makes fun of him the next morning.

Draco rolls his eyes and shrugs it off, but Hermione sees the embarrassment in his eyes.

"I'll find my own place today," he promises, and Hermione quietly wishes him luck.

It's the middle of June when Draco asks her to stay at his place.

"Paparazzi would love it," he says as he leans to move her hair off her shoulder. They're in the park, sharing a pumpkin juice on a bench while the photographers snap photos from across the street. "'Granger Leaves Malfoy's Flat in Last Night's Clothes.' I can see the headline now."

Hermione purses her lips. "After only three months of dating?"

"I slept at your flat the very first day we started this thing. They already think we're having sex."

Hermione winces. "There are other ways for you to show the world you're not a Death Eater anymore, you know."

Draco shrugs. "This way is the easiest."

"I didn't realize you were so lazy."

He pecks her on the cheek. A camera flashes. "Come on. I've got those crisps you like in my pantry. Went to a Muggle store just to get them."

"Tempting," she says flatly.

"I know it is. See you at ten?"

She sighs. "I don't like to share beds."

"So sleep on the couch."

"Draco."

"I'm joking, Hermione. Merlin."

"Good." She takes a swig of pumpkin juice, and she can see the handkerchief in his pocket. "See you at ten."

Ron moves out in September.

"Can't handle having Malfoy over all the time," he says as he gives Hermione a stiff hug goodbye. "I'll be happier at Harry's, I think."

"Right." Tears prick her eyes. "I'm sorry about all this. I didn't think it would turn into such a burden."

Ron laughs. "Right, Hermione. Malfoy. Not a burden."

"He's changing," she says. "He really is. He's much more tolerant now."

"Well, good for him." Ron hesitates, and then leans down to give her a kiss on the cheek. "If we're being honest," he says quietly, "I think I'm a bit jealous of him."

Something in her throat swells. "What do you mean?" she asks, but they both know, and so he doesn't answer.

She tells Draco not to move in, but eventually he puts his foot down.

"If you're going to write me all the time to come see you at such ridiculous hours, I'm just going to start staying here," he says the third time she sends him a midnight owl asking him to come over.

"Sorry I don't like living alone," she snaps.

His hair is disheveled, cloak haphazard around his neck. "Won't live alone, won't share a bed…is there no pleasing you?"

"If I recall correctly, I'm doing you a favor."

"Merlin, Hermione, thank you for pretending to date me. It means a lot that you're carrying out your own bloody plan."

"It's not my plan!"

"You're the one who attacked my lips six months ago."

"Because I wanted to embarrass you, not because I wanted to help you!"

"Oh, you don't want to help me?"

"No, I don't!"

"Then why are you still here?"

Hermione opens her mouth to answer, and then closes it. Ron's I'm a bit jealous echoes in her head. "I—I don't know."

Draco shoves a hand through his hair. "Merlin, don't cry."

"I'm not."

"You look like you're about to."

"Not because of you."

"I didn't say it was." He sits down. "What's the matter?"

She shrugs. "You aren't the only one who suffers from bad dreams."

"Oh?"

She sits on the sofa, as far away from him as she can get. "My parents don't remember me," she says. "I had to Obliviate them at the beginning of the war. For their own safety."

Draco says nothing.

"I tried to find them when it was all over, but I can't—they aren't—I don't know how to undo the spell." She takes a shuddery breath. "So they don't know who I am, and when I wake up in the middle of the night terrified out of my mind from flashbacks to the war, all I want is my mummy and daddy, but I—they—I don't have them anymore."

The first tear slips down her cheek. He pulls out his white handkerchief and hands it to her without a word.

"So living alone isn't exactly my favorite thing in the world," she says, dabbing at her eyes with his cloth.

Hesitantly, Draco puts an arm around her shoulders. "You don't have to pretend to be bulletproof," he says finally.

She laughs bitterly, just once. "Who's pretending? It's not as if I have anything left to lose. Fire away."

He tightens his grip slightly. "My mother gave me that handkerchief," he says. "It's supposed to keep its owner safe."

"It's charmed?"

He shakes his head. "It's a Muggle superstition. It was a gift from her sister, right before she was disowned. There's no magic in it. But Mother kept it anyway, and then she gave it to me before I went to Azkaban. Gave it to my father when he was put away, too. It's not magical, so the guards let me keep it." He takes a deep breath. "It was all I had of her for a year. It meant everything to me."

Hermione hands it back, but Draco shakes his head again. "I want you to have it now."

"Why?"

He shrugs. "It kept me sane through my own nightmares. Maybe it can help you now." He clears his throat. "Since, you know, you won't let me move in."

She swallows as she turns to look at him. "I'm beginning to think this isn't about you reforming anymore."

He looks at her for a moment. "To be honest, Granger, it hasn't been about that in a long time."

Their first kiss away from the cameras is tender and slow and uncharacteristically gentle, and she finds herself craving more.

"Bloody Prophet," Ginny says a year later, rolling her eyes at the photograph of Hermione laughing with Draco that adorns the front page under the headline 'Mrs. Malfoy? Elopement Rumors Fly About Malfoy Heir and Muggleborn Hermione Granger.' "You'd think they'd get bored and move on."

"You'd think," Hermione agrees, not looking up from her paperwork.

"You must be a brilliant actress, keeping up the charade this long." Ginny makes a noise of disgust in the back of her throat. "Dating Malfoy. I couldn't pretend to do it."

Hermione hides her smile behind a curtain of hair. "He's not as bad as you'd think."

In her pocket, wrapped safely in a cocoon of white handkerchief, is the wedding ring that fits her finger perfectly.

Quidditch League Round 9: Shakespeare

Holyhead Harpies, Reserve Chaser 3

Prompt: Shakespeare's Othello (specifically the meaningful handkerchief and the secret relationship, as well as hints of jealousy. Think of it as a prequel to Othello.)

1 (quote) "Never tell a girl you like her, it makes you look like an idiot." - AVPM

5 (song) Titanium by David Guetta ft. Sia

12. (word) Supermassive

Word Count: 2,881