Hermione stood motionless as Draco Malfoy pressed his mouth deeply onto hers. Malfoy was kissing her. Against all common sense and logic, Malfoy was standing in front of her and he was kissing her.
She instinctively pushed against him, using her hands on his chest as leverage, but somewhere during the past few years she'd lost track of how much bigger he'd gotten. Her own strength and hands seemed so feeble against his. He pressed himself into her and pushed her backwards against the bars of the owl cage, moving and dragging his body against hers. She attempted a stronger push, and he caught both her wrists and caged them behind her back.
His mouth was bruising, his tongue invading and his strength paralyzing. She flicked her face to the side to catch a breath, but he made a sound and captured her mouth again. He seemed to be enjoying her squirming against him but Hermione was vibrating from rage, unable to let this go on. She did everything humanly possible to try and get him off her. She tried to knee him, but he brought his own between hers at the exact moment. She bit him painfully on the lip but he seemed to get off of it.
She didn't know how much time had passed when suddenly there was a flurry of snowy wings and a loud girlish scream left his mouth. A giant boulder seemed to have been lifted off her as she saw him back several feet away from her, clutching at a bleeding finger. Looking sideways into the cage, she saw it was Hedwig who had come to her rescue.
"…thank you…Hedwig…I'll give you a treat for that…", she promised, catching her breath and wiping her mouth, "or a ferret."
He was pressing his shirt onto the wound, having completely forgotten her for the moment, making that scrunched up, crybaby face which was his signature.
She pulled her wand from her pocket, aiming it towards him. "Locomotor mortis!"
Yelping, he fell sideways onto the filthy ground. Wasting no time, she marched up to his form, drew her fist as far she could and socked him right in the middle of his face. Gods, that hurt, but hell if she was going to show it on her face.
"You-are-a-vile-disgusting-turd-and-a-pervert!", she punctuated every word by hitting every square inch of him that she could find.
He attempted, rather poorly, to ward off her attacks considering how utterly powerless he'd made her feel just seconds ago…and the thought only served to make her more outraged, so she doubled the frequency of her fists.
"Stop it!", he wailed, "You're assaulting me, woman!"
She threw her head back and laughed, "That's RICH! What do you think you were doing just now?"
Her chest was heaving from all the effort, her breaths fogging the chilly air around them. They were silent as they stared at each other, trying to come to terms with the situation. He looked drugged and a little unhinged, and she realized that this was probably the first time they'd been so close to each other. His eyes were deep set and steel grey, his bottom lip was split and his usually pasty face was alight with colour.
"You should consider it a compliment," he rasped.
He was definitely unhinged.
"What the heck have you been smoking, Malfoy? Or did someone spike your pumpkin juice?", she asked, quite seriously.
His face darkened with anger.
"I don't need to explain myself to the likes of you. It's all your fault anyway!"
"MY fault?!" she screeched, "How is it any of my fault? You just snogged me! And were it not for Hedwig, you would still be assaulting me!"
"So the beast has a name…" he muttered.
"Malfoy!"
"Let it go, alright! I wasn't thinking clearly. But I'm not going to apologize for it." He pulled out his own wand and undid her leg-locking spell, before imperially dusting his robes and standing up to his full height.
He stepped forwards, seemingly without a thought, and she whipped out her wand again.
"You'd bloody well stay where you are, ferret. Don't you dare cross with me."
He smirked slowly. "Or what?"
"Or I'll…I'll tell everyone what you just did. I'll tell everyone that Draco Malfoy snogged me without my consent."
He paled, and despite her placing emphasis on 'consent', she knew that wasn't the part bothering him anyway. It was about his pristine, pureblooded lily-white image, that would undoubtedly be sullied if any way connected with her mudblood name.
They stared at each other, fuming silently.
Despite their hostile stances, Hermione couldn't help but wonder at their predicament. What had possessed Malfoy to do it? And why was she standing here bargaining with him? She hadn't done anything wrong. All she had to do was report this to McGonagall, or even Snape…and let them deal with him. What more did they have to say to each other?
He seemed to be thinking along the same lines.
"You would do that anyway, Granger. The first thing you'd do after getting out of her is blather about it to you nitwit friends. And half of them would believe you..or a third , depending on their gender, of course…but it wont affect me in the slightest."
Hermione was shaking with suppressed rage.
"You unimaginable bastard, I'm going to report it to the teachers. I want to see you expelled and humiliated, as I can't stand the sight of you."
He walked up to her slowly, towering over her and using their height difference to his advantage.
"This isn't the muggle shithole you crawled out of. Here teachers don't sack boys for kissing poor little mudbloods like yourself. Like I said before, consider it a compliment."
She fisted her hand, and swung it towards his face. His palm swallowed it mid-strike, but the way his smirk dropped made her feel strangely satisfied.
"Careful, Granger. Or I'll do it again. And I don't give two shits about you, or Potter."
She could see how he was high on the fact that he could physically subdue her anytime now. He imagined himself a big, tough man now who could do whatever he wanted with her. The days of schoolyard bullying and taunting were long past, he thought he'd found a new way to entertain himself.
With great difficulty, she managed to contain herself. He was right about one thing, though. This wasn't the muggle world with its anti-sexual harassment cells and molestation charges, no women's helplines or even a pepper spray. And with Voldemort's return, it was going to become an even less civilized one with rodents like Malfoy destined for the top.
She bit the inside of her lip, her eyes trained beyond him, thinking. The school had barely started, and she couldn't let Malfoy gain the upper hand.
He was staring at her, with that same unrecognizable expression which creeped the hell out of her. His head was slightly tilted to the side, his hair tousled and incandescent from the sunset.
Wordlessly, she turned her back at him and picked up her letter lying on the floor. She whistled at Hedwig, who'd been perched at the ledge watching their exchange with half-closed eyes. He flew swiftly towards her, extending a claw. She'd tried her best to maintain her composure but her hands were still unsteady as she tied the letter. Despite everything, angry tears formed beneath her eyelids as she watched the arc of Hedwig's snowy wings scale the pink skies.
She'd expected him to slink away, but when she turned, he was still there…just like the last time, watching her. Not deeming him worthy enough for any final words, she walked right past him, thinking she'd die before letting him have the upper hand.
She'd play dirty if she had to.