It felt like it was ending the same way it truly began, which was fitting. Hermione liked things when they circled around like that. It reminded her that life was a system of patterns - routine even within the chaos. It made her feel like she had some sort of control, even when it was quite obvious that she had tossed that into the mountain of things she wanted before kicking them into the sky.

Life had a way of surprising people. She didn't know how a circle could be so damn surprising, but it was. Maybe because it never stopped - not even when you could swear by everything that it must. Because the places you say you'll never go to again, are the very places you eventually find yourself. Or maybe it's just because we forget about the things we've done, the people we've loved, the person we are and should be. We don't mean to forget, not always, but we do until we're back again. And then it hurts to remember.

Walking through that floor of the hospital doesn't bring us fear because of a possible attack. It must be because on some level, in all people, we all know we're absolutely, unforgivably, wildly insane - and we're always seconds away from making some big, huge, monumental mistake to prove it to everyone.

It must have been the guilt all over her. It had been bubbling up like fire through her blood, so some of it had to be tearing across her face. Soaking her skin with the sweat of its burning. Her eyes had felt heavy, loaded with emotions and tears. It must have shot right through him. He had always been so quick at analyzing, studying, coming to the right conclusion. Him standing in the middle of the kitchen with a loose grip on his mug, his face gone slack, frozen in his shorts and morning scruff. Her trembling against the door with all that heaviness.

There hadn't been a word she understood. Just a path of devastation to the front door, where he Apparated mostly naked and barefoot. It took him a week to come back, in the middle of the night with a storm on his face. It broke her right in half.

2003

"You know, they're these giant things that start with a tiny little seed…"

Hermione dropped her stack of parchments and files onto the table, pulling out her seat.

"Annoyed for this meeting as well?"

She sat down, looking over at the side of Draco Malfoy's face as he flipped through a folder. His hair was pushed back from his face, but not with the matted down shine that came with too much product in his youth. She guessed that he used some form of a Sticking Charm now to make it stay in place while looking completely natural. In less formal meetings and parties, his hair would be arranged into a careful tousle that looked structured enough to be professional while still maintaining casualness. She hated how he could pull that off. How his clothes and hair were always meticulous no matter what time of the day or night it was.

"As well?"

"You went on a rant for twenty minutes on Tuesday. I was late for my appointment after."

He had probably blamed her for it the past three days. "It wasn't a rant - it was a list of problems that needed to be fixed within their research department, and suggestions on how to fix them in corres-"

"Right." He glanced up at the front of the table as two men walked in, neither of whom represented the start of the meeting.

"Perhaps you shouldn't plan appointments so close to the estimated time of meeting closings."

She hated his fingers as well, she decided. The nails were always short, buffered, and clean, and his fingers were long. Long and…distractingly long.

He shot her a glare, turning another parchment over in the folder. "Or I should stop investing in so many companies you do research for. I'm beginning to think you're stalking me."

She snorted, the sound earning a raised eyebrow from him, and flipped open her own folder. "I honestly question my sanity in making the right career choices every time I see you involved in another company that I am. One of the negatives to working freelance research."

"I actually see it as an upshot." She looked over at him, raising her eyebrows in surprise, and he looked at her like it was obvious. "You're fairly intelligent, Granger. You make informed, good decisions. It's further validation that I made the right choice in investing or joining the board."

"Oh. So you like having my approval on your business decisions?" she asked, and could barely contain the smile at the look he gave her.

"Hardly. You've joined more companies after my investments than I have invested in after you joining. If anyone is seeking-"

"I doubt that. We're both involved in the same…what? Eleven companies?

Twelve?"

"Our entire record? Nineteen. Our current? Nine."

"How do you even remember that?"

"My record keeping is flawless," he muttered.

"Thanks to your secretary. Personal assistant. The-"

"I don't have a personal assistant."

"Roy?"

He looked at her, the corner of his mouth curling as his eyes narrowed. "On a first name basis with my former assistant?"

She glared. "If you're im-"

He straightened up, his eyes rolling up to the ceiling as his tongue darted out to wet his lips. "Ah. The Carlson and Fegg's twenty years anniversary ball- Or, no. The Webshook's annual banquet-"

"You mean the one where Roy was caught with one of the board member's daughters, and nearly got you voted off the board? Until you reminded them that their opinion of your bad judgment of character had seemingly affected your judgment of the-"

"I left the company," Malfoy said gruffly. "By choice."

She remembered. Once Malfoy pulled his investments, Webshook cut everywhere they could without severing anything vital. Hermione lost her research contract with them less than two weeks after they lost Malfoy. Not that she would tell the git that.

She would remain silently bitter, as she had been for the past four months. She could, perhaps, understand the circumstances. After all, she had been working with Malfoy in some capacity for three years. It was the only time he pulled out of a company for a reason they all didn't see coming.

"A topic that brings annoyance is typically a nice subject change for distraction, but I'm not a typical man, Granger. You still didn't answer how you're on a first name basis with my former assistant. Unless I should take your silence-"

"I didn't? Oh, that's right - it's because you're nosy and the answer isn't any of your concern."

"Sure it is. I should be aware if you attempt to seduce all men you come in contact with through professional situations."

He sent her a look that might have been coy, and her cheeks flamed despite her adamant inner demand for her blood to remain calm. The slow smile she gave him must have been at complete odds with her blush, but she forged on.

"I can barely remember the faces or names of most men I work with, Malfoy, let alone want to seduce them."

He raised an eyebrow. "And yet you remember mine."

She shrugged, licking her lips, and might have imagined the flicker of his eyes towards her mouth. "Don't take this in a good way, but you're a bit hard to forget."

It had taken many fights, hard revelations, and seeing one another several times a week over the past three years to reach this point with Malfoy. It was very odd to sit comfortably next to Draco Malfoy, to have an almost easy "relationship" with him, but only when she stopped to think about it now. The sad fact was that she likely saw and interacted with him more than she did her friends. Ron always said only tragic things could come out of working so much.

But it wasn't tragic - at least she didn't think so anymore. In fact, she had come to look for his familiar face at meetings, would bicker with him almost daily as her normalcy, and sought him out at functions. She contemplated witty comebacks for when she would see him next, silence had stopped being awkward, and she no longer found it strange to lose track of time when she was argu- er, discussing things with him. He still annoyed her into eye twitches, and rarely could anyone inspire anger and frustration in her as quickly as he could, but they had put away the violent, raw hostility over a year ago.

There was also that other tiny, small, nearly meaningless thing. If she was being horribly honest with herself (and only horribly because it pertained to this, as Hermione strongly approved of honesty in most cases), she was rather attracted to the man. And judging from her wayward looks, accidental flirtations, suggestive thoughts, and drunken smirking at him, he probably knew it. It had started like a mosquito that would creep up every so often and she would have to swat at - the more it kept attacking, the more manic her swings became. Then it was something like a soft drag of a magnet, luring her gently. She was grabbing onto anything around her for survival soon after that, but a wicked look with a crooked grin had her flying at that magnet like it held world peace.

She had started a battle of defense that resulted in a month of backtracking, denial, and claws-out anger to distance herself. But then she embraced that insanity with a better plan. Embraced it with a thudding heart, racing blood, sudden hot flashes, and uncontrolled ogling. She decided that sleeping with him was the best option. She would get it out of her system, concentrate on whatever weird faces he pulled, and then make every encounter thereafter obnoxiously awkward. She would regret it, feel objectified, and cement her theory that sex only resulted with good things while in a relationship. A few weeks later and she would be a free woman.

She thought for sure that he must have been…er, a bit…easy to convince of a logical, meaningless, sexual encounter. He did his share of dating pure-bloods and Muggle-borns alike, in between his business endeavors and philanthropy. He was right about her decisions being researched and well-informed - she knew he did his best to right the sins of his youth and had changed his moral structure, and Hermione was never wrong. This was why she was more inclined to believe he found her as attractive as a house-elf rather than being repulsed by her blood status. Sure, he returned her subtle flirtations, stood closer than necessary in the lift, and had stared at her legs more than once. But it was something like trying to adamantly hint to a stone wall that she wanted it to move. Some rocks might tumble off when she brushed against it or pushed, but she could throw herself at it and it still wouldn't move.

Not that she had tried the whole throwing thing. Not that she would.

"And still, silence. We might have to put you on the watch list, Granger."

"Excuse me?" She might have got a bit distracted with memorizing the line of his jaw with her eyes to hear anything he had said before that.

"The list of people to be monitored for potential sexual harassment." He gave her a significant look.

"Ha! Know that list well, do you?"

His lips thinned for a moment, but when her leg pressed into his, neither one of them moved away. She looked over at him as he blindly reached for his coffee, flipping another parchment, but he didn't seem to notice.