Hermione was excited to be going back for her 5th year at Hogwarts. She would miss her parents terribly, but she was used to that by now. Besides, how could she focus on that when she was about to start another exciting year back at school? She was at
King's Cross with Harry, Ron, the rest of the Weasleys, Mad-Eye Moody, Tonks, and Sirius getting ready to board Platform 9 and 3/4. She was talking to Ginny about the upcoming school year when she caught a glance of a certain blond haired Slytherin.
Hermione realized how much better-looking Malfoy was now than he had been only two months ago. She was about to mention something to Ginny when she realized this was the boy that had constantly bullied and harassed not only her, but also her friends
for the past four years. She looked back at him and right when she realized she was staring and was about to look away, she made eye contact with him. She hurriedly looked back at Ginny,and blushed with the idea of being caught looking at him.

Ginny noticed the heavy blush in Hermione's face and asked, "Um... Hermione? Are you okay? You're face has gone red all of a sudden."

"What? Oh. Yeah, I'm fine it's just really hot out."

It being a fairly cool 70 degrees outside, Ginny knew Hermione was lying, but decided to let it go anyway.

"Oh okay. Well we better get on the train soon."

Hermione still had to put her trunk on the train, but asked Ginny to save her a seat next to her. Before she turned to walk to the trunk compartments, she glanced one more time at Malfoy and caught him smirking at her. She knew that was weird, but decided
to shake it off and forget about it. She struggled lifting her heavy trunk onto the train for a few minutes then finally managed to get it in all the way. When she entered the compartment that her friends were all sitting in she immediately noticed
the awkward tension. At first she was confused about it, but when she sat down next to Ginny, she noticed a dirty-blond haired girl sitting across from her with an upside-down magazine covering her face. She looked at Ginny questioningly and Ginny
answered her unasked question.

"This is Luna Lovegood. She's in my year, but in Ravenclaw." Upon hearing her name, Luna put her magazine down so the others could see her face. She was pale with a slightly vague look on her face as if she wasn't concentrating on any one thing, but rather
looking through everything around her. If that didn't put the others sitting near her off enough, she also had her wand stuck behind her ear. Though no one but Ginny had heard of her until then, she seemed to know everyone there, even Neville. She
seemed nice enough, but a bit odd for Hermione's taste.

-JUMP TO WELCOME FEAST-

At the welcome feast, the students met their new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Umbridge. She interrupted Professor Dumbledore and even though that one action confused and even slightly irritated the students and staff, what really caught
Hermione's attention, and even enraged her quite a bit, was that everything Professor Umbridge said, made it quite clear that the Ministry was interfering at Hogwarts. She forgot about it, however, when she started gossiping with Ginny over which
boys they thought were attractive. While listing a few boys, Hermione caught herself unconsciously looking at Malfoy over at the Slytherin table. As soon as the realized this, she looked away hoping that Ginny hadn't seen. However, luck wasn't on
her side. When Ginny saw who Hermione was staring at, she gasped loudly. The people around her all stopped talking and looked at her curiously. If she hadn't been so focused on Hermione, she would've been embarrassed. At that particular moment, however,
she didn't care. The eyes looking her way did remind her that there were people within hearing distance, though, so instead of talking at her usual volume, she whispered.

"Hermione! How can you like that disgusting excuse of a human being?! He has bullied you, harassed you, embarrassed you, insulted you, called you slurs, even made you cry a couple of times! And you like him? Malfoy? Come on! You musn't be serious!" Neither
of them realized it, but Ron who was on the other side of Ginny had heard everything and at the word Malfoy, his body visibly tensed . He was about to say something but then heard Hermione's retaliation.

"I don't like Malfoy, Ginny! I wasn't even looking at hi-" When Ginny gave her a are-you-kidding-me-right-now-look, she paused. "Okay yes. So I was looking at him. It doesn't mean anything! I don't like him I was just realizing that he looks better as
the ferret Moody turned him into last year. That's ALL. Calm down!" This, of course, was a lie. In reality, she was realizing how mysterious his gorgeous grey eyes were, and how they lit up when he smiled, but she was also reminding herself how much
she and him hate each other.

At her response, Ron's tense body noticeably relaxed, but both Ginny and Hermione were both too caught up in their heated conversation to see.

A/n

So what do you think? This is my first time writing a story so I would appreciate reviews and constructive criticism, but I will ignore any blatant insults that are meant to just tear me down rather than to help me. Anyway, thanks for reading and I hope
you enjoyed it!