"Please, don't leave." She says from the couch, steadily watching him.
He is furious. How does she know this? He is quite literally throwing everything out of his closet and into his trunk that is placed in the middle of the bedroom floor. He is packing… the muggle way.
"There is nothing left for me to do here. You don't love me. You don't want me. You will never want me. I can feel that." He grunts, throwing another pair of shoes into the mahogany and turns back into the closet.
Hermione finds herself wondering just how she ended up in this position. How did she end up begging him to stay with her? How did he end up being the one that was going to leave after all this time?
She is the one that is trapped here, in this forsaken manor, after all. If he leaves… then she can, too.
What will happen to him after they part ways? What will happen to him if he lets the filthy little mudblood go? Will she carry that weight on her shoulders, too?
"I can't let you go…" She whispers… ashamed of the words that are rolling off her tongue without a second thought. There is no time for fighting with herself tonight… he is about to abandon her.
Alone.
He is about to leave her with no place to go. It's not as if she could find Harry and the order quickly after months of being presumed dead.
"You can and you will." He snarls at her, pushing to get his point across, and throws a book into his case.
"No. I can't and I wont." Her tone is defiant.
He struts out of the closet, hands balled into fist.
"You are so fucking stubborn— confusing! You fight me every step of the way. You have been oh so insistent, with your revolting never-ending confidence and trust that you will be saved, by the twatless twosome, so hopeful that I would let you go!" He slams his fist against the arm of the couch and pauses, his breath labored, "So here we are. I'm letting you have what you wanted from the start. You will go." He spits the words as if they are ash on his tongue. His face crumples in agony and he quickly puts his emotionless mask back on.
Hermione forces herself not to flinch. The venom in his voice… the dangerous gleam in his eyes… his emotions obviously hidden just beneath the surface. He's a volcano about to erupt.
She locks eyes with him, pretending to be unfazed.
"I'm not ready."
He's not sure her lips even moved… did she actually say that? Did he imagine it?
"Not ready for what? Not ready to find your precious duo and become a trio again? You're not ready to go back to saving the world? Not ready to save one disgusting mudblood at a time?"
"You can't hurt me like that anymore, Draco. I've seen what it does to you… I've seen what they do to you! You want to get out just as much as I do. You want—"
"You don't know the first fucking thing about what I want, Granger." He gets in her face, voice low, "You. Don't. Know. Shit."
"You think I haven't been watching, is it? You think I haven't seen? Haven't seen the inner turmoil that you battle with every day?"
Draco stills. Of course she's seen the mental and emotional agony that he has been living with for the last few months…
"When?"
"When, what?" She snaps, becoming irritated now because it seems she can't hold back tears any longer.
"When did you figure me out? Hm?"
"I haven't figured you out! That's the problem, isn't it?" She starts to sob, her breath unstable. "Draco… I know that I shouldn't be asking this of you… I should let you go… I should run away from here as fast as I can… I should hope to never see you again… But I'm not ready to loose you. I'm not ready to loose this."
Draco clinches his jaw.
"I'm not ready to hate you."
"You have hated me since you laid eyes on me, Hermione."
She scoffs, more tears rolling down her cheeks.
"One more night… please… I'm not ready to stop lo-loving you…" She chokes the words out, "I'm not ready to stop loving your darkness." She says more firmly, refusing to look at him this time.
A glint shines in his eye and he knows he has her. He has what he wanted all along.
"Give me a reason to stay, Granger."
"I-I just gave you a reason."
"No, that was a reason for you to stay." He steps towards her, "Give me a reason to stay."
"I don't know that I can." Hermione turns her head away from him.
"Sure you can." He whispers in her ear. Malfoy grabs her chin and forces her to look up at him. "You can." He hovers his lips just above hers, waiting for her to kiss him. "And you will."
Hermione gasps for air as if it's her last breath. He wants her to kiss him. Kiss, him. It's not as if she has not thought about it before. Dreamt about it in the mornings when she wakes before him. When he could still be innocent. She just can't bring herself to move… can't make herself kiss him… He should—
"Kiss me."
He has no misgivings because he immediately assaults her mouth with his. Hermione responds slowly at first, stunned, then, keeps up with the pace he has set effortlessly.
His hands climb up from her hips, trailing over her arms, one gently sits on her neck and the other on her cheek.
She finds her hands in the hair on the back of his head, tugging and pulling.
Draco breaks the kiss and pants, "You're going to have to stop that if you don't want things to go any further."
"I-oh," she smiles, "sorry."
"You don't have to apologize, love. You've given me what I want." He smirks, triumphant.
"What does that mean?"
"It means, that I was never leaving. Do you really think that I would leave you? Let you go? I can't let you go anywhere without me. You're with me, Hermione."
Embarrassment boils in her stomach, burns on her cheeks. "I hate you."
"No… You don't. You just had to believe that you were coming to your own decisions. I gave you every out and you refused. I don't play this game the way you do: honestly. No, no, love, I'm much too Slytherin for that."
Hermione jerks her hands from behind his neck and punches him in the nose. "I'll not be healing you, either."
Draco laughs, blood running down his face, and begins walking to the door, "You said you weren't ready to stop loving my darkness… You've seen nothing, yet."