Chapter 1

"All that you desired, when you were a child
Was to be old,
Now that you are here, suddenly you fear
You've lost control,
Do you like the person you've become?"

It had been a tough day in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and Hermione Granger was completely drained of energy. The Investigation Department, where she worked, was flooding open with new inquiries of dark magic being used more than usual and Hermione and the rest of her department were working closely with the Aurors to find out the reason for the attacks and more importantly, who was carrying them out.

After hard days at work - which was basically every day at work - Hermione would head off to The Three Broomsticks to have a calming drink and sort through leftover work. The Three Broomsticks wasn't quiet on week nights and was a whole lot better than the Leaky Cauldron. She was seen as a regular there by the staff and everyone else there was pleasant to her as well. She was sitting sipping on her butterbeer, reading through statements of people who witness these new dark arts attacks when she here's a very familiar voice ordering at the bar. She looked over her shoulder for a peak and saw Draco Malfoy, leaning on the bar, head down. She turned back around and went back to her work.

Draco took his drink from the bar and looked around the pub he had once came to in his youth. In the corner at the back, he saw a bush of hair. He knew that bush from anywhere. He walked over and sat his drink down on the table and took the empty seat across from Hermione Granger who looked up at him, surprised.

"Do you mind if I sit here, Granger?" Draco asked her with a sly smile.

"Well I don't have much of a choice do I, Malfoy?" Hermione spat. Interruptions were her pet hate, especially when it was people she wasn't particularly fond of.

"Oh don't be like that," he said. "I thought we sorted things out after the war, no?"

Hermione looked down and nodded. "Sorry."

"It's okay, I can see you're working."

"Yeah," she put the documents back into a folder. "It's so much work it's hard to handle sometimes."

"Hermione Granger, the brightest witch of her age, has too much work? I never thought that was possible!"

Hermione laughed and Draco smiled. She relaxed back into her seat and took a sip of her drink.

"So what brings you here?"

Draco's face suddenly goes dark and Hermione fears she's hit a nerve.

"Everything is a little bit of the mess at the moment, that's all," he admits and takes another drink of his firewhiskey. "I thought that after the war and being trialled and what not that everything would be okay but it's far from it."

"You work for the Aurors though, surely that's good?"

"See that's the thing, you're right. I work for the Aurors but I'm still not an Auror. They still don't trust me and it doesn't help that all of these attacks are happening again. A lot of them are starting to suspect me yet again and I swear, Granger, I've not done anything. I let that stuff leave me a long, long time ago."

Hemrione nodded but was sceptical. A report she read did mention a blonde male being apart of an attack. They sat in silence for a while, taking sips of their drinks.

"So how is everything with you, Granger? Part of the Golden Trio, life must be going good."

Hermione shrugged. She didn't expect him to ask her anything about herself. And the funny thing was, he didn't say it with spite, he said it with genuine interest. Yet, she wasn't sure to trust him.

"It's going alright," she lied.

Nothing was alright. Her parents stayed in Australia so it was hard to get to them easy, Harry and Ginny were busy with work and each other so she had not too many to turn to when things with Ron got bad. Which was almost all the time. Ron hated how much Hermione worked and he wanted them to be more than partners, he wanted to get married but Hermione cared too much about her work at this time to worry about creating a family. Her and Ron just didn't have the same love and care they did. She still loved him as a friend but her true love for him was fading.

She noticed Draco studying her.

"I'm not sure I can believe you, Granger ," he replied with a smile. "But I understand if you don't want to tell me anything. I understand, I'm still the enemy."

"It's not that," Hermione said quickly defending herself.

Draco laughed, "It's fine, Granger, really."

A few hours went by where Draco and Hermione just reminisced and spoke about their lives now. Hermione still never really opened up about how much of a disaster her life was too. Draco was more open with her than she expected, however. He told her about how hard it was to get a normal life, how people would walk away from him, his Father dying, his fiancé, and his Mother both living under the same roof. He told her almost everything and Hermione found it difficult to blame it on the drink as it wasn't even half way finished.

"I really am sorry about everything, Granger," he said as the clock edged towards nine o'clock.

"I know, Malfoy, it's fine. Everything's okay now."

"But it's not," he half laughed. "It wasn't my choice to do anything I did at Hogwarts. My parents, they were the ones that influenced how I acted towards your type and just my attitude. I didn't mean to be like that. I'm not like that anymore. I'm just so very sorry on how I treated you."

"Draco," Hermione smiled, mainly at his shock of her calling him by his first name. "It's alight, I forgave you a long time ago."

"Thank you," he smiled back.

First chapter!

I've been on fanfiction for a long time and I always start stories and never see them through but this one feels different. I've actually wrote a plan for this one so I am super excited to write it! I hope you all like it!

Abbey x