She wondered how she got herself into this shitty situation as she stared out the kitchen window while she sat at the dining table and Draco Malfoy stared at her. She hadn't looked at him since he'd asked a question he already knew the answer to, but she knew he still stood defensively on the other side of the kitchen staring at her, filled with anger. His presence demanded her attention, and she knew he knew that she knew, but still she refused to look at him, refused to answer. Knowing he knew her silence meant yes, but determinedly refusing to admit it aloud.
Finally, he sighed and she could almost feel it as he deflated, giving up fighting about it. She felt it when he shook his head and looked at the floor; disappointed, angry, sad, torn, heartbroken, breaking. It was so silent she heard the movement of his head turning to look at the wall beside him. Shaking his head, he whispered, but in the silence she heard him clear as day, "And still you take him… Merlin knows I don't want to compete." Another sigh. "And still… Still I sleep in the same sheets he's been in don't I?" Here, his voice rises to normal and he finally looks at her again, and though she's not looking at him, she's drinking in the feeling of his eyes on her. "Hermione. I can't keep doing this anymore. Send him back, please, because I won't share the trap you have me in. And if you won't do that..." he looks around, anywhere but at her until he's looking over his shoulder at the door, unable to look at her as his voice drops back to a whisper "I can't stay anymore. I won't come back."
And here, she closes her eyes as they flooded with tears. But they don't start running down her cheeks until after he's walked over, kissed her head, and whispered he loved her into her hair for perhaps the last time. She knew he knew she was silently crying but still unable to force herself to face him, watch him as he walked to the door, as he hesitates for a moment before harshly grabbing the doorknob and slamming the door behind him. She knew he'd bury all his hurt in anger and drink himself into oblivion, punch every wall, and throw anything that would bring up any kind of memory of her up until he got to his room and saw the little things of hers scattered about; a hair brush on the dresser, a night shirt in the corner, her favorite lipstick on the bathroom sink counter, and then he'd slide down his door and cry and punch the ground, the wall next to him.
Just like she would later that night, when Ron came back raging drunk and wanting her, and her utter forgiveness, her utter forgetfulness, her everything. Not picking up her subdued aura, not understanding when she starts sobbing as his hands touch her arms and she sees the flowers Draco left her on the table, when she runs from him and locks herself in her room. And not knowing Draco Malfoy was the man she loved now, the man that loved her. Not knowing she was tearing her own heart and Draco's because she couldn't figure out how to not swallow the Ron pill that was making her choke and stealing her soul.
She needed to figure this out. She had the potential to lose the three most important people in her life forever; Draco, Ron, and herself. She just needed to figure out which one of them it'd be, if it was even just one of them, and if she could still live, still be happy with the choice. But the decision could wait until the next day. And with Draco's question and the memory of their relationship's beginning playing on repeat in her head, Hermione Granger allowed exhaustion take her.
"Is he still coming around? Like an injured bird needing a nest, a place to rest his head?"
