Chapter Two (rewritten)
Hermione felt her stomach do an unsettling lurch. The water felt colder and all of the fun she had previously had dissipated.
She saw Draco take a big intake of breath and dive under the black waves. The second his head disappeared she could no longer see him.
That is so like him...just leaving me here, she thought bitterly as she tried to stay hidden through the blackness of the night. She started to panic when she saw the Head Boy's wand illuminate.
She gasped as she felt a sharp tug on her left arm, and she was pulled underwater. Despite the blackness, she could barely make out the pale hand dragging her along. Usually, she wouldn't trust him, but he had gotten into so much trouble that he had to be the master of getting out of anything by now.
Hermione felt her lungs screaming for air; she couldn't last much longer without taking a breath. Just as she finished her thought, however, they resurfaced. They weren't outside anymore but in a small, muggy cave that could only be reached by swimming. Hermione noisily catching her breath echoed in the cave, causing Draco to slam his hand over her mouth again. And again, she bit him.
"Quit doing that, I don't want your filth to rub off on me!" he hissed.
"Then quit putting your hand over my mouth! Wouldn't 'shh' be suffice?" she whispered. "And you would be lucky if even just a bit of my filth rubbed off on you," she added.
"Shh, he can still hear us," he whispered.
As if on cue, the Head Boy said, "Who's there? I see clothes, show yourself!" he yelled from outside. They could hear him loudly groan and retreat. Before Hermione could realize what she was doing, she giggled slightly.
"Tip number two," Draco breathed. "Almost get caught. That is how to have fun."
Even though she knew they shouldn't be breaking the rules (as prefects, no less), she couldn't help but admit that the adrenaline rushing through her veins was the most refreshing thing that had happened to her in months. The blood rushing through her cold body made her tingly, and, most importantly, alive.
She couldn't, however, deny the severity of the situation.
"Oh man, am I going to kick your ass," Hermione said as she splashed him. She was a bit shocked that she blurted that out; she rarely swore.
"I saved you, for your information," he retorted and splashed her back.
"Why did you, anyways? You never would have before."
"Well, my clothes are out there, and if he found you he would know there was a guy in the lake, too. He would ask who else was in there, and if you wouldn't tell he would use Veritaserum-"
"-I highly doubt he would use Veritaserum-"
"-And then I would be stuck in this cave for ever- having to eat raw fish for the rest of my life and-"
"-You wouldn't be trapped in here. You-"
"-I mean, I don't even like fish."
"Alright, alright, I get it," Hermione said. "Moral of the story is that all of this was to save your own neck, right?"
"Precisely," he said as he shook his hair blond hair like a dog.
"How did you find this place, anyways?"
"Oh Pansy and I go here all the time," he said with a smirk on his face. "We would-"
"Okay! You can stop there," she said before changing the subject. "I can't believe we almost got caught! Do you know how much trouble we could have gotten in?"
"Do you know how much fun that was? That's the best part, almost getting caught. Remember rule number two."
"It is not! That was insane, we could have been given detentions, stripped of our badges, expelled."
He rolled his eyes. "You need to lighten up Granger, there is much more to life than school. Be a kid, get in trouble, have fun. That's what these 'lessons' are all about. It's not just me wasting some time with a Mudblood, it's your end of the bargain, and you can take it or leave it," he said.
"Though I will admit that was quite a rush, I think it's best to leave it."
He scoffed. "Fine. Have no fun at all in your life. Lock yourself in your room to read and fantasize about Weasel all day long," he said.
"I do not do that!"
"You do too," he said.
"Do not!"
"Are we really going to start this again? You know what I think the real reason you don't want to do this?" he asked, pausing dramatically.
"Go on."
"I think you're scared."
She laughed. "I'm certainly not scared."
He raised an eyebrow. "Really?"
"That's kind of the point of being a Gryffindor."
"Then why aren't you going to continue having fun?"
"Because we could get caught," she said.
"Aha! See, you're scared to get caught!"
"I..." she had no idea what to say.
"One last thing before I get the Hell out of this uncomfortably tight space with my enemy that doesn't appreciate a single thing I do," Draco said. "You may be a Gryffindor, but you live your life in fear. You need to take risks, if you don't you won't have any fun. Thirty years from now, you're going to regret it."
"Again with the words of wisdom," Hermione said sarcastically.
Draco took his wand out of his pocket. "You are quite infuriating, Mudblood. Lumos," he said, and dived underwater with his lit-up wand. Hermione groaned and rubbed her temples.
Hermione took a deep breath and followed his light under the water. The coolness felt good against her skin and the tranquility of the water made her feel at ease. They climbed out of the water and Malfoy slipped on his shoes and shirt. The wind was now cold on her skin and they parted without saying a word, Hermione shivering.
..
"It has come to my attention," said Dumbledore the next morning at breakfast, silencing the chatter and the clink of silverware on plates, "that someone decided to take a leisurely swim in the Black Lake last night. If anyone has any idea of who that might be, please let me know right away. Return to your breakfast," he said. Before sitting down, Hermione could have sworn his eyes flickered to hers.
"I'll bet it was Malfoy," said Ron as he took a bite of toast.
Hermione locked eyes with Malfoy at the Slytherin table. Ron wasn't entirely wrong.
..
Hermione wanted to cry in frustration as she tried to put the pieces of her microwave together, and Draco's snide remarks weren't helping at all.
"'The Brightest Witch of Her Generation' having trouble with a puny little Muggle object...quite pathetic, actually."
"Nobody asked for your input, Malfoy," Hermione huffed as she cut a wire. Sparks emitted from it, shocking her. "Oww!"
Draco laughed. "Pretty sad, you are. Do you realize that everyone's ahead of us? You need to pick up the slack, Granger. I expect better from you."
Hermione glared daggers at him. "You do it then, if you're so clever," she said as she handed him the instructions and a screwdriver.
"What in Merlin's name is this?" he asked.
"Those are instructions," she said slowly. "You read them and they tell you what to do. You can read, right?"
He rolled his eyes. "Of course I can read; I'm not an idiot. I'm talking about this Muggle tool," he said, looking at the screwdriver.
"A screw driver, it turns screws to fix things."
"...Screw?"
"You're hopeless. Just read the instructions," she said, and shoved the thick book in his hands.
He read about two lines then stopped. "Alright, I got bored," he said and threw the book towards Hermione. "We're wizards, so we do it the wizard way. Instead of spending hours on one stupid Muggle contraption that I have no idea what the purpose is, we simply do this." He pulled out his wand. "Reparo," he said.
The microwave parts assembled on it's own accord and the screws went into their respective places.
"I know how to do a 'Reparo' spell, that's elementary. But the whole point is to do it the Muggle way; that's the whole purpose of this class."
"Well, I think this class is stupid," he said.
"But now we're going to get a bad grade!"
"Did anybody see that? No, I didn't think so. Macmillian is practically inside that, what's it called? A refriger gator? Does it have anything to do with alligators?"
"A refrigerator," she corrected.
"Anyways, he's doing that. Finnigan is setting something on fire, as usual. Burbarge is writing a love letter to a Muggle-"
"-I'm pretty sure she's grading," Hermione intervened.
"Whatever, it doesn't matter. My point is, nobody knows that I fixed it with a spell," he said. "For all they know, I did it with my own two hands and my clever mind," he said and tapped his head.
"But that would be...cheating," she said and whispered the last word as if it were a swear word.
"Rule of fun number three," Draco said as he tucked his wand away.
"Here we go again..." Hermione mumbled.
"Always cheat or find a way to get out of work, so you can spend more time having fun," he said, "I've been doing that since first year, and it's gotten me places."
"Well, did you ever think that maybe I wanted to learn how to fix that?" she asked.
"Oh, puh-lease," Draco said, rolling his eyes. "You were so frustrated you almost smashed that thing into tiny pieces. Well, tinier than they already were," he said.
Hermione sighed. "So what's your point?" she asked, crossing her arms.
"My point is that you still have much more to learn on the art of having fun. Our next meeting will be today at lunch, in the library," he said as he picked up the microwave to bring to Professor Burbarge.
"Certainly not," Hermione said. But either Draco ignored her, or he didn't hear her, because he didn't reply.
..
Draco held up a random book on the genealogy of dragons to cover his face. Only his eyes were visible and they were surveying the library for targets. Hermione mimicked this action, so the only thing the students in the library could see were two sets of eyes.
"Those second years are watching us," Hermione whispered apprehensively.
"They're only second years, they probably don't even know who we are. They won't spread anything," he said.
"If you say so," Hermione said as they reluctantly put down their books.
One of the second years (a Ravenclaw) gasped.
"Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy together?" one of them whispered in agreement.
"Oh, I can't WAIT to spread this around!" another chirped.
"How long have they been together?" the other girl asked.
Hermione stared in horror, then picked her enormous book up to cover her face again.
"I told you!" Hermione hissed.
"Wow, she's so lucky, he is so hot!"
"Though you speak nothing but the truth in that last statement, do you realize we can hear you?" Draco said as he glared at the girls, all of them blushing profusely. "And before you get too excited, we're working on a project. So you can keep your comments to yourself," he added. One of them nodded in fear. "Second years..." he mumbled, before putting his book back up. "Now, let's get back to our real targets," he whispered, staring at a group of third years that were out of earshot. He turned to Hermione, who wasn't looking over her book.
"Oh, come on, Gryffindor," he said. "Look up."
She looked up to see the group of girls giggling amongst themselves.
"You see that cute one?" Draco asked.
"The one with the brown hair, glasses, and freckles?" she whispered.
"That's the one. And in a second, she's not going to be so cute," he said and ducked his head so he was no longer visible to them. He pointed his wand at her from under the table and shot a non-verbal spell at the girl.
In seconds, thick, purple boils sprouted all over her face, causing her friends to shriek.
"What?" the girl demanded frantically. "What's wrong?"
"Your face...your face!" the girls said, jumping around wildly.
"Rule number four," he said behind their book wall. "Laugh at the misfortune you've caused," he said.
"Malfoy, that's just plain mean! Make it stop!"
"It's alright, Pomfrey will; it's easily fixed. They'll stay on her face for three months, tops."
"Three months?! That poor girl! Change her back, change her back!" Hermione panicked.
"Relax, Granger, I'm only joking. You're so gullible. They'll only stay for about an hour. But isn't it funny to see her friends jump around like dolphins?"
"No, it's not, it's just plain cruel!" she said.
"Hey, it gave me an incentive to learn non-verbal spells so it's not completely a bad thing," he offered.
Hermione opened her mouth to respond but was cut short.
"Who did this?" one of the girl's friends, a Slytherin, yelled. Her nostrils flared and to say she looked angry would be an understatement.
Madam Pince shushed her but that did not stop the fire in her eyes.
"Act natural," Draco whispered out of the corner of his mouth. Hermione sat up unnaturally straight and pretended to read a book with her legs sprawled across Draco's lap.
"How on Earth is that natural?" he asked incredulously. "We hate each other." He pushed her legs off of his lap and pretended to read as well with a more relaxed face and demeanor.
"Well sorry," she whispered frantically. She could feel the blood pulsing through her veins. Even though that girl was four years younger than she, she was much bigger.
"Oh, just read your book and pretend like we were doing that the whole time," he said underneath his breath.
The Slytherin approached and studied them.
"Can we help you?" Draco asked, annoyed.
"Yeah! Don't mind us, just working on our project!" Hermione said a bit too cheerfully.
Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Did you do that to her?"
"Do what? What do you mean, did somebody get hurt?" Hermione asked in a bad falsely-innocent voice. Draco kicked her under the table.
"Sorry, she's a bit slow...under the effects of a potion gone terribly wrong. It should wear off in a while... Hey! Those second years look pretty guilty!" He said, pointing towards the group of girls.
With the flame still in her eyes, she walked over to practically strangle the girls.
Even though Hermione felt bad, she looked at Draco and laughed behind her book.
