Everything belongs to JK Rowling

Even with the silencing charm cast around her four poster bed, Hermione Granger still couldn't sleep. It was the whispers of Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil that led her to cast it, and yet sleep eluded her. She crept out of her bed and slung her school robe around her.

"Ron said he really fancies me today," Lavender whispered.

"Aww," Parvati replied.

"Ugh," Hermione grunted before she tugged the door open and descended the steps.

Just walk a bit and then you'll feel tired and you'll go straight to sleep. Hermione walked throughout the castle without fear of being caught. She ended up in the courtyard, sitting on a marble slab under an archway, looking out toward the Black Lake. The night's music of the soft wind, the hoots of owls, and the chirping of crickets calmed Hermione. A sleepy smile spread across her lips until her eyes met a figure standing by the shore of the lake. She squinted her eyes and saw that it was Draco Malfoy.

Hermione saw that he was fixated on the lake and didn't even flinch when she crept up to him and said, "What are you up to, Malfoy?"

He stood like a statue, and Hermione thought he was trying a new tactic to annoy her, until she saw that he had an empty bottle loosely clutched in his hand. She took it and read a cursive scrawl: Sleeping Draught. She turned the bottle and in a smaller writing it said: May cause drinker to sleepwalk.

"I read that it's unwise to wake a sleepwalker up because it disorientates them. Might cause bewilderment. I wonder if I should test this," she stared at Malfoy staring at the lake. "But you're so much tolerable like this," she said and she took a step closer to him. "You know I never really looked at you, luckily for you you're not as hideous as your personality." Hermione chuckled to herself. "And Harry and Ron think I'm not funny. In seriousness, if you weren't so insolent a lot more people would like you. You might get better friends besides those oafs Crabbe and Goyle. You can't value that friendship right? They're loyal, but so bloody stupid!"

Hermione stood next to the catatonic Malfoy and continued her one sided conversation.

"I'm no longer jealous of Ron and Lavander's relationship. I would say more ambivalent, I only get frustrated because she's utterly insipid, and Ron can't even carry a conversation with her. They just snog!

"I'll get somebody to like me, one day. Krum did, didn't he? And I was just myself, going to library and studying."

She looked at Malfoy, "Any comments? I bet you would say something like, 'You're a dirty mudblood, nobody will like you! I'm Draco Malfoy, blah blah blah, I have daddy issues and I mimic the prat to impress him,' is that accurate?

"Although I sense something distressing in you this year, you aren't making fun of me as often. And I bet you can't sleep and that's why you take this Sleeping Draught. Maybe you feel as alone as I do, and that keeps you up night." Hermione looked at him and believed for a moment that it was possible for the two to share something in common. She poked his hand, "It's tragic that this conversation is making me feel better."

Then an odd impulse took ahold of her. She wanted to embrace Malfoy, and because she knew that this was the only opportunity to do so, she decided she would. She stood in front of him and hesitantly pressed herself against his firm chest, rested her head against his shoulder, and wrapped her arms around him. She closed her eyes as she inhaled the alluring scent of his cologne.

"Never thought that would happen," she said as she retreated from him. "But then again I never thought I would feel your . . . " Hermione looked down at his trousers. "That was an accident, by the way." She felt herself blush and looked down. A pearly glimmer of liquid ebbed and flowed along the shoreline caught her attention. She bent down and touched it.

"Sure, an accident."

Hermione yelped and jerked her head to see a very awake Draco Malfoy.

"And I don't have daddy issues," he stated.

"You were awake! The whole time?" she said.

"Yes."

"And you allowed my soliloquy because . . .?"

"Why not? Maybe you would reveal what Potter is up to, maybe you would embarrass yourself." He shrugged his shoulders. "But I guess all you wanted was to have your way with me," he said as he opened his arms, "Care to embrace again? I'll allow it because nobody is around."

"No!" Hermione said.

"First the kiss in the hallway, the grope in Potions, and now clandestine hugs under the moonlight? If you keep this up, Granger, I might suspect that you like me. Now that I know you only find my personality hideous and not my face."

Hermione backed away from him.

"I thought you took the Sleeping Draught, why did you pour it in the lake? How did you stay so still? I can't believe I didn't notice," she said.

"I had to throw it out, I was getting reliant on it just to close my eyes peacefully," Malfoy said.

"You're going to tease me relentlessly, aren't you, Malfoy?" Hermione asked. He stared at her a moment before he shook his head.

"No, this conversation was the most engaging I had in weeks, and all I did was listen to you. You're right about Crabbe and Goyle, they're atrociously daft. I'll be here tomorrow night if you want to converse with me," he said. He stuck his hands in his pockets and retreated toward the castle.

"Night, Granger," he said.

"Goodnight," Hermione replied. She watched Draco Malfoy walk up to the castle and for the first time in her life felt regret that he was leaving so soon.

A/N Thanks for reading! Please review if you feel inclined! :)