He remembered how every potions lesson he fixed his face into a grimace.
He remembered her.
He remembered how whenever she came his way, he grunted uncontrollably.
He remembered her.
He remembered how all of the boys had hated the look of her in their first year- with her unruly bushy hair, and big front teeth.
But he had loved her. Every inch, from that first boat ride.
She was in the boat ahead of him, on the small trip on the boats to Hogwarts. Next to Neville Longbottom, Ron Weasley and that stupid Harry Potter.
The talk for all his years was that Hermione and Harry were an item. He still thinks about if they're together now. He thinks that if he had shown his true self to Hermione, that maybe she'd see past all of her prejudices, and maybe she would've liked him.
Maybe even loved.
In Slytherin, everyone knew him as part of the trio- in Gryffindor there was a Golden trio, and s
Slytherin, there was a silver trio. It's all about the balance, you know? If you'd see them when they walked past, you wouldn't point out and whisper 'look its the silver trio!' because that would draw attention to you. But a little marauder's map would appear in your head, keeping tabs on them, where they were behind you.
This is what he did for Hermione. Revolving around her.
This Slytherin youth was good at acting nonchalant, and dismissive, and naive. But that was only an elaborate facade.
Finally, someone who could openly admit the same passions with someone. Finally, someone to talk to, other than his two best friends. Two male best friends.
Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle were a set.
He'd helped her in some ways that still to this day, she doesn't know about. He was the one that made a noise in the Library when the basilisk was afoot- startling her enough to make her root through her pockets for her pocket mirror. He'd stayed close, clutching a bookshelf, as he saw her, motionless, a horrified look in her eyes on the floor. He would've run if he had the guts to run when the Basilisk listened to the sound of him after the bloodlust, but he was petrified by something different this time- fear or leaving her. Fear of leaving her undiscovered. Alone. So he kept his eyes closed, and counted to ten thousand. He held her rigid body in his arms, inhaling her signature Hermione smell. He alerted Dumbledore- the first time he'd ever talked to him in person- and hurried to the dungeons, deep, yet shallow breaths.
In the Battle of Hogwarts, he'd used some Polyjuice Potion he had left in a flask from his sixth year. He snuck into the castle and used every charm and curse to protect Hermione from the barrage of Death Eaters. When he saw her battling Bellatrix, it took everything in him not to use Avada Kedavra on the deadly woman, or rather, it took the idea of Hermione looking at him in disgust (or looking at him at all without a burning hatred in her look) that stopped him in his tracks. At which point he escaped from the castle, bewildered.
He had really, truly fallen for her. Truly.
His eyes avoided the least yellow of the paper clippings, the words still ringing loudly in his mind anyway.
'Hermione Jean Granger, marries Ron Weasley'.
He closed his book. He took off his reading glasses. The myriad of clippings of Hermione Jean Granger smiled at him, some pictures moving, some blurred, and some non-moving attempts of using a more discreet muggle camera. But no smiles, not even from Hermione herself could budge the stabbing, acid burning, bubbling feeling in the pit of his stomach.
There was no escaping it; Gregory Goyle loved Hermione Granger.
