DISCLAIMER: I don't own Harry Potter.

A/N: Thank you for the guest/guests who've been leaving me reviews. I really appreciate the time you took to give me your feedback. :)

Muggle drinks, it seemed to Astoria, had insufferably long names. Even the ones at the upscale-looking bar she managed to end up in. She took another swig of the drink in her glass, the name of which she'd already forgotten, feeling her throat burn. Too much alcohol in this one, she thought ruefully. But it was the man beside her who'd bought it for her, which was just as well since she'd completely forgotten about Muggle money. After a couple of hours, she could neither recall how much she'd had to drink.

The man – was it Nicky? Ricky? – had somehow managed to inch too close for comfort, despite the bar stools being fixed on the marble floor. When he talked, she could smell whiskey and tobacco from his hot breath, and his beard tickled against her ear.

"You're a vision, you know that?" he whispered.

Astoria angled her head away as she snorted, feeling light-headed and rather woozy. "I've been told," she tried to say coolly, but she could hear the giddiness and the slight slur in her voice that gave her a relatively good estimate of how much alcohol she'd ingested.

"S'matter, lovely? Hasn't your boyfriend ever grown a beard?" She felt an arm go round her waist, the man's hand resting comfortably at the curve.

"I don't have a boyfriend," she deadpanned, her response automatic. She was tipsy, but not that tipsy. She shifted uncomfortably as she felt the man's hand rising dangerously close to her breast. "And I'd appreciate it if you –"

But the man never heard what she'd appreciate, because suddenly he was on the floor of the dimly lit bar.

"Bloody – 'the fuck was that for?" he demanded, picking himself up with as much dignity as an intoxicated person could muster.

"I would appreciate it if you get your filthy hands off my girlfriend," Draco Malfoy drawled, calmly taking the seat from which he had bodily shoved him. His almost pleasant tone was belied by the threatening look on his face. The man glared at him for a few seconds before turning away, muttering a stream of death threats and swearwords as he went.

Astoria raised an eyebrow at Draco. "And I just told him I didn't have a boyfriend."

Draco considered her for a moment, his normally stoic features displaying the slightest hint of annoyance. "You're actually amused? Or are you too pissed to notice he was taking advantage?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "I could have taken care of myself, you know." She never liked white knights. "I'm not ten," she said, not noticing how she sounded like one. "But thanks, anyway."

Draco Malfoy shrugged and took a sip of his drink. Astoria turned to hers, only to realize that it was her glass Draco was holding.

"That's mine," she pointed out, trying and failing not to sound petulant.

"You've had enough," he replied, draining the rest of the contents of the glass before setting it down.

"Yeah, and you're very much the paragon of good – wait a minute," she stared at him, eyes widening in wonder. "It is you, isn't it?" she reached out a hand to touch his face, oblivious to the fact that he froze under her touch.

"What in the blazes are you on about, Greengrass?"

"What happened to you calling me Astoria?" she asked him, brushing at the shoulder of his immaculate Muggle suit before pulling her hand away. "I'm not sure if I'm really just too pissed, as you so eloquently if not elegantly put it, but I'm assuming you didn't find this place by accident, at least not tonight? And this is actually, really Draco Malfoy in a Muggle bar?"

His eyes narrowed. "You don't know me, Greengrass," he reminded her, a warning in his voice.

"Fair point," she conceded, biting back a thousand questions at the tip of her tongue.

"Besides, I could ask you the same thing."

She looked up at him curiously. In the dimness, his grey eyes shone like moonstones. "If I answer, would you do the same?"

"No."

Astoria sighed. "I just love how open you are," she told him, tone dripping with sarcasm. She cupped her cheek with one hand, propping her head up with her elbow on the table.

"I got kicked out of the house."

"What?"

"Okay, no, not kicked out. I walked out, technically," she amended dryly. "Merlin, I need another drink," she said, summoning the bartender. "But you'll have to pay," she told Draco. He shrugged again.

Draco Malfoy, Astoria later that night discovered, was a very good listener. She suspected he wasn't, in his younger years, but when she told her story he gave her his full attention. If she hadn't been quite tipsy she probably would have felt uncomfortable at the intensity at which he focused.

"So, when I didn't show up that night for dinner, my mother was naturally furious, because I put her name on the line -"

"How about your father?" he interrupted.

"My father?"

"Fathers are usually more protective of their daughters than their sons, I've noticed." There was the merest trace of bitterness to his statement that she almost missed, but didn't. To Astoria, it sounded very much like an explanation to more than his question.

"Quite," she agreed, choosing not to voice out a new inference in her head, "and I always thought I was my father's favourite," she smiled fondly. "But he died, you know… just as the war broke out. Nothing war-related; he was very ill. So… so it's quite understandable that you - that a lot of people have missed the fact."

Draco suddenly looked as though he wished he didn't bring the topic up.

"Anyway," she said a little more animatedly, covering for the awkward pause. "My mother's a very traditional witch. Sometimes I think she should have been born in the eighteenth century. She was furious when I didn't show up after she's gone all the way to arrange this dinner with what's-his-face because - well, because of a lot of things, I suspect, but chiefly because of pride and because I was being an obstinate bitch. She's never had to deal with Daphne that way, you see," she paused, taking another sip of her drink.

"She was furious, but I was livid. I'm not really in the habit of yelling at people. I usually have a very calm disposition –"

"I noticed."

"– but I think my voice rose with my temper a couple of times when we rowed. I – you noticed?"

"I'm very observant. So you rowed?" he prompted.

"We did. She was actually angry because she had to reschedule the stupid date, and all the while I was thinking, why do old people love going about plotting their children's lives for them? It's not like they're the ones who'll be suffering the consequences. It's downright stupid and pathetic. Honestly," she drank some more, not registering that Draco shifted a little bit closer, his interest having been piqued.

"It was probably the first time in years when I thought of how I really, really, fucking loathe being born into this Pure-blood shite. Merlin. But no, I get born into the illustrious Greengrass clan – it's not even a pretty surname, mind – and so I have to dress like so and act like so and then make friends with so and so and apparently fucking marry like –" she caught Draco looking at her with an unreadable expression on his face.

"I'm babbling, aren't I? I've had too much to drink," she said apologetically.

He shook his head, and then she noticed a crease on his forehead. But he prompted her again to continue, so she did.

"Well, I was so furious that I told her I'd marry a Muggle if I wanted to."

"Would you?"

She raised her chin. "Yes, Draco, I would." she said defiantly, and then sighed. "If I fell in love, anyway. Although – and this has nothing to do with prejudice – that might be a little too extreme. Too many things to adjust to, you know? It's not the most practical arrangement. But I probably won't mind marrying a Muggle-born."

"Neither would I." He said it so quietly that Astoria wasn't sure she heard him right. She looked at him, working very hard to keep her face expressionless. The last thing she wanted was to look like the opinionated Ravenclaw that she was.

"Probably," he added, and she smirked.

"But not likely?"

He ignored her question. "Go on," he pressed.

"Where was I? Ah, yes, so I said that and she got as livid as I was. She threatened to disinherit me, so I dared her to get on with it, et voila, here I am," she finished.

She drained the remainder of her glass, and suddenly wish she hadn't. She was dizzy. "I think I'll call it a night," she said, sliding down from her seat rather ungracefully. She slipped and staggered forward, but Draco had stood quickly and caught her by the arm before she fell.

Astoria straightened up, finding her face just a little more than two inches away from his. She felt her pulse racing, her heart pounding in her ears. Draco stood rooted to the spot, his eyes boring into hers. In that moment, she wanted nothing more than to lean in and kiss him, and it was such a strong and unreasonable urge that she literally had to pull her head down to a bow to stop herself.

"Are you alright?" he asked, sounding nonplussed.

"I'm fine – just a bit dizzy," she admitted. She stepped backward, and he hesitantly let go of her arm. She felt herself sway, and instinctively clutched at Draco's shoulder.

"I'll take you home."

She gave him a dark look. "Did I not just spend the past hour ranting about home? I'm about to be disinherited, remember? Don't bother, honestly. I'll find a hotel. Something."

Draco shook his head. "You can't even walk straight. You'll likely splinch yourself if you Apparate. I'll take you to my house; you can sleep that off in a guestroom."

She bit her lip and folded her arms across her chest. "I don't want to be a burden."

He ignored her statement and held out a hand. "Take it," he said. And then she did.

It was the strangled screaming that woke her - a resounding cry against the stillness of the night, tearing through the velvet blanket of slumber and jolting her to consciousness. In dazed panic, she fumbled for her wand and disentangled herself hastily from the bed sheets. She could barely make out a thing in the darkness, nearly tripping on a nearby footstool. She stumbled a bit, and muttered, "Lumos."

The screaming stopped abruptly. In its place was the laboured panting of Draco Malfoy, who was now sitting upright on the couch across the bed, the couch where he had been sleeping - and screaming, just a few moments before. He sat staring at his own hands, pale-faced and sweating, the dark circles under his eyes making him look sickly in the wandlight.

But it wasn't his pallor that had rendered Astoria momentarily speechless. It was his expression. If he had looked scared, Astoria might have even laughed and chided him to chase the darkness away. But he looked positively revolted, like what he had seen in his nightmare was about to make him sick. Astoria stared, her own eyes wide. Then she saw his upright stance waver, his upper body sway, and Astoria, unthinking, practically ran to catch him before he collapsed.

He did not collapse - that is, he did not lose consciousness. Because the moment she had wrapped her arms around him he seemed to let go of whatever it was that was holding him together and started sobbing into her hair. She felt the warm tears trickle down her shoulders, but she wasn't sure what was more real - the warmth on her shoulders or the warmth in her chest, an unfamiliar tug at her heart that had a lump dangerously rising up her throat. Not trusting herself to say anything without her voice breaking, she rubbed circles on his back using the palm of her hand.

In the handful of times that she had met him, she had known him to be cocky, unpleasant and obnoxious, and recently, distant, unfeeling, cold. Now, with him crying in her arms, she wasn't sure which she preferred.

After a while, he grew silent, straightening up, and wiping his tears. "I'm sorry you had to witness that," he said hoarsely, not meeting her eyes.

"Don't worry about it," she said softly, folding her hands across her lap. "Would you like to talk about it?"

"It's embarrassing enough as it is. Go back to sleep," he nodded towards the bed. His voice still quivered.

"And hog your own bed while you sleep on the couch? No need to play gentleman, Draco." She offered him a small smile. "You need the rest more than I do - especially if that couch was so uncomfortable it was giving you nightmares."

"I don't think I can go back to sleep anyway."

"Then I'll sleep when you do," she said, picking up her wand again and extinguishing the light. He didn't argue. She suspected it was because he didn't have the strength, although it occurred to her that he was also grateful for the company, for once. That he had deposited her on his own bed than in a guestroom while he slept on a nearby couch confirmed more or less reinforced her theory. His bedroom was huge, and while in daylight it probably looked opulent, in the darkness it was cavernous – and very empty. She sat beside him on the couch, hugging her knees, listening to the silence.

"He died today," he whispered, barely loud enough for her to hear. She didn't know what Draco meant, only that it pained him, and it pained him to say it.

"I'm sorry," she replied, and she was. She took his hand and held it, and they were quiet again.

When morning light finally filtered through the Malfoy Manor's many French windows, Astoria and Draco were finally, peacefully asleep, her head resting on his shoulder as they sat on the couch, both oblivious and uncaring that the horrors of the night had already passed.

Astoria, however, woke up at noon only to find herself alone, lying on an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar room. A small vial of what looked like a potion for hangovers stood on the bedside table, doubling as a paper weight to a note written in a neat, unfamiliar scrawl. It read:

Astoria,

I owe you an apology for not being there when you wake. I've very urgent business to attend to and can't see you off. I hope you don't mind. I'll see you around.

Draco

She folded the piece of parchment, feeling that she ought to be at least annoyed, but wasn't. She was perfectly certain that it wasn't business he had to attend to that morning, but the fact that he showed himself vulnerable to a virtual stranger the night before.