A/N: An update! Can you believe it? I can't!
Thanks for the incomparable Sunshine Katz who beta'd this chapter and let me pester her with constant Dramione questions.
Leftovers
Chapter 6
Draco's wand vibrated silently underneath his pillow, pulling him from sleep. With a groan, he muttered "Finite" and brought an end to his early wake up call. In the hours it had taken him to fall asleep, he decided he would rather step in a thousand puddles of dog urine than endure another awkward dance of avoidance with said dog's owner. Especially since the last one had gone so disastrously.
The sight of her, hair dripping wet and brushing against his hands, had distracted him. Otherwise, he would have foreseen how perilous it would be to have her sit on his bed. His sheets still smelled like apricots and vanilla, which she either used in her hair products or body lotion. Needless to say, he should have taken a potion for Dreamless Sleep.
He shifted uncomfortably in bed, mortified that his body had betrayed him. Before he'd seen Granger in her indecent sleep clothes and she'd started making nightly appearances in his dreams, he would have thought nothing of it. Just a normal, morning physiological response for a man his age. Now he felt like a pervert. And one in need of a cold bath.
Before getting out of bed, Draco snuck a glance at the witch in question to verify she was still asleep. His regret was immediate. By now the sun was out, and he could easily see her sleeping on her side in her wretched pajamas. The sheet to which she had entrusted her modesty did an abysmal job of concealment, tangled as it was around her calves. He stared at the ceiling, clenching his jaw. Everyone thought Granger so terribly smart, yet she hadn't seen fit to include a visual component to her barriers.
Well, he'd take care of that. He waved his wand in her general direction, but his incantation reflected back from the magical wall with a wave of energy that nearly flung him from his bed.
What the hell?
In his shock, it took him a second to realise what had happened. His modification would have only responded so violently if she'd commanded it to do so. She had made the barrier tamper-resistant. As if he'd...She couldn't possibly...What did she think he was going to do?
He glared down at the stick of hawthorn, forcing himself to release it before he flung it across the room. He flexed his hand, which bore the imprint of the wand's grip.
The nerve of her, to think that he needed to force himself on a girl.
Rising from the bed, he went straight into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him. With a vicious twist, he turned on the cold water and ran himself a bath. He hissed as he lowered himself in the water. The Jacuzzi's jet in front of which he sat gave some relief to the knot he felt forming in his upper back.
As a general rule, Draco liked to keep busy. This was especially true after the war when the reality of his circumstances left much to be desired. His work, while tiresome, was a welcome distraction. It was one of the few things over which he had control.
And for once, they were working on something that actually interested him. He watched the Quidditch Champions League without fail every year, and now he would get to see how it worked behind the scenes, even tour the pitch of next year's final. Maybe meet some famous Italian players. It was the fulfillment of a boyhood dream, and he couldn't even enjoy it. All he could think about was the exasperating woman in the next room.
He rolled his head from side to side and let out a groan.
He had tried all week to pay Granger back for the good turn she had done his family with the Leach case. Had even gone so far as to buy her a birthday gift, but now he didn't want to give it to her. The anger he had felt earlier had deserted him, leaving him with only a queasiness in his stomach. She must have really hated him to think he was capable of doing something so vile. Thought him devoid of every common wizard decency. Beyond redemption.
Draco swallowed the tightness that prickled at the back of his throat.
Well, he wasn't.
It made no sense. Her opinion should have meant nothing to him. Malfoys cared little for anyone but their own. So what if he was Wizarding England's favourite whipping boy, routinely pilloried in the Daily Prophet? As Lucius would say, ignore the rabble. They were mostly stupid anyway.
And if his family deserved some of the censure, well, that was not something he dwelled on. Most of the time.
Draco knew how he was perceived—lazy, privileged, undeserving, racist, evil. He had enough self-awareness to admit he'd been a foolish shit growing up (and still acted like one sometimes), but much of the current vitriol directed toward his person was based on his decision to be a Death Eater, which was really no decision at all. If the most powerful evil wizard in the world had held a wand to their head, and their mother's and father's heads, they'd probably be Death Eaters too.
He wasn't even twenty yet and sometimes it felt like his life was already over. His family had chosen poorly, and he would pay for it forever.
But he wasn't entirely without hope. He couldn't forget Dumbledore's offer of help at the end of his wandpoint. Or how his godfather and headmaster conspired to spare him the burden of committing murder. Even his mother's lies to Voldemort. Small acts of defiance, moments of love and mercy on his behalf in the face of an evil that turned out not to be insurmountable.
He'd pressed on. Got an honest job by honest means. Took the first steps in starting his own family. Kept his head down and his nose clean. The wizarding world may have cast him as an irredeemable villain whose only attractive quality was his family's money, but these actions proved they were wrong.
And things were going just fine (well, fine enough), until they weren't. His carefully laid plans destroyed, and by Ronald Bilius Weasley of all people. But for whatever reason, it wasn't his superficial ex-fiancee running off with the Weasel that had him contemplating his pathetic existence in a tub of cold water.
What did it mean when Hermione Granger, the girl who found good in everyone-house elves, werewolves, cheating ex-boyfriends—couldn't find any in him?
But that wasn't always the case, something reminded him. She was more than willing to befriend you just two weeks ago.
Until he'd broken into her apartment. But it wasn't that, or even Stupefying her over-amorous house pet that had set her off. The coin that had collapsed the dragon's lair was his demand for the Leach file. He still couldn't figure out why.
Suddenly, more than anything, he wanted Granger to stop being angry with him.
Deep down, he knew she had legitimate reasons to hate him. He wasn't even thinking about what had taken place between her and his family in the Department of Mysteries and in his home. Or the years of racism he'd subjected her to at Hogwarts. That...that was too much for him to tackle now.
But the bit about him making her miserable at work simply because he was a miserable person, that he could do something about. After she'd come through for his family with the Leach case, Draco had made some half-hearted steps, and already her resolve was crumbling. He could do better. Much better. She didn't have a heart of stone. It was only a matter of time before Granger forgave him.
And then what?
While he tried to dismiss the thought, he knew it couldn't hurt to have her in his corner. Hobbes had seen it, and now that he wasn't so eaten up with his pride, he could admit it. Perhaps he could rehabilitate his family's image.
But it wasn't his principal inducement. He wasn't doing this for his family. Or even for her, much as she probably deserved it. It was for him. He had changed. Everyone was wrong about him, and this would prove it.
Decided on this course of action, he emptied the tub and proceeded to get ready. Well, as ready as he could without any clothes, which were still behind Granger's barrier. He ran his hands through his now dry hair, then secured a towel around his waist.
Draco opened the door to find Granger staring at him from across the room, with her sheet pulled all the way up to her neck. The instant their eyes met, she averted her gaze to the closet. He did not, which meant he saw her in all her rumpled glory.
The humidity had wreaked havoc on her hair; the curls, which always seemed to draw Draco's attention, spilled around her shoulders in tighter than usual corkscrews. What he could see of her skin glistened, damp from sweat and the vapour in the air. And her cheeks were flushed in a shade of pink he associated with his mother's prized roses. What little relief he'd received from his bath evaporated.
First order of business, get a bottle of Dreamless Sleep aid. He couldn't afford this hormonal...distraction born of nothing more than proximity, her unwitting attractiveness, and Blaise's stupid comments. That was all it was. But he didn't need suggestive dreams making him question his intentions, which he knew to be above reproach.
He paused at the threshold. "Thought you'd still be sleeping. In any case, I need to get my robe and clothes."
Her mouth moved, but she made no sound. Right. The barrier. She must have figured it out at the same time he did. With a flick of her wand, the ambient sounds returned.
"What did you say?" she said.
"Thought you'd still be asleep."
She nodded, turning her head to the door as he walked over to the closet. "I just woke up a few minutes ago. Do you think you-" she yawned loudly, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "Sorry. Could you finish getting ready out here while I shower?"
He gave a stiff nod. "I just need to get my clothes."
When that was done, he made a point of walking all the way around their beds, so that he was near the room door. He'd learned his lesson from the last time. Before she could ask him to, he faced the other way. The room was so quiet, he could hear a sheet drop and bare feet smack against the marble floors.
Once she shut the door behind her, he transfigured his bed back to a chair. It was the work of a moment to pull on his robes. With nothing else to do, he could no longer procrastinate. He brought Granger's birthday gift out of the hidden compartment in his garment bag.
With the box resting across his lap, he sat in the chair. Until he heard the shower turn on.
His misplaced attraction for Granger was mostly based on proximity, he reminded himself. So, if he wasn't in the room adjacent to a naked and drenched Hermione Granger, any misguided feelings would vanish. Right? Only one way to find out.
He looked at his watch. Just as he suspected. Breakfast time.
Leaving the box on her bed, he made a quick exit.
Breakfast was served in an outdoor courtyard. He perused the table, and though there wasn't much on offer, he took his time making his selections. And he took even longer eating them. And then even more time getting food for her. He didn't want to return to a less than fully dressed Granger and a less than fully opened present.
But of course she ruined that.
He found her standing over her bed, enfolded in a terry cloth robe eyeing the untouched box.
"I didn't curse it, if that's what you're thinking," he said.
Granger blinked, then looked up at him. "But why is it on my bed?"
Draco breathed in for a count of six before exhaling through his nose. "Because it's intended for your use."
"Oh. I didn't realise it was for me."
"Well, it is. And so is this." He gestured with his head, indicating the food and cup of coffee in his hands. "I wasn't sure if you'd finish getting ready before breakfast was over, so I brought some up." That seemed plausible. A much better explanation than I fled from the room when I heard the water running over your bare skin, and I apparently have zero self-control over my imagination.
She made no move to get her breakfast, so he set it down on the desk. He sipped his coffee, bracing himself for another fight. He would not be the one to start it.
"What is it?" she asked.
It almost beggared belief, how she made everything harder than it needed to be. Always.
"If you opened it, you would find out."
Granger glared at him, but grabbed the package. He hadn't wrapped it, so she pried off the top in seconds. A barely audible intake of breath escaped her lips, and her fingers darted out to trail over the silvery grey silk of a new set of robes. "So soft," she said under her breath, but he'd heard it.
Draco cleared his throat. "There's more underneath."
His voice broke her out of whatever trance she'd entered. Two creases appeared between her eyebrows as she rifled through the box, frowning down at the four other dress robes and black dragonhide ankle boots he'd purchased for her to wear while they were working in Milan. "Why did you get me these?"
He almost snapped out an irritated You're welcome, but bit the inside of his lip instead. If he had ever bought clothes for Pansy, she would have slobbered all over him in the hopes of getting more (which was precisely why he'd never done it). Credit to Granger, she was not a galleon-digging materialist, but a simple "thank you" would not have gone amiss either. Especially since she liked the robes, which he'd known she would. She was not immune to the allure of a pretty dress (or five), and he had excellent taste.
Of course there were other reasons for her hesitance in taking his gift. Like when he said her wardrobe had as much charm and appeal as that dullard Neville Longbottom. Hopefully she didn't remember that, because if she had, her acceptance of the clothes would be tantamount to admitting he had been right. Granger was too proud for that. Or perhaps it was her dislike of him that prevented her from accepting.
But he didn't want to think about that. It didn't matter. What mattered was finding the proper motivation to get Granger to accept. And unless he was mistaken...
"It's for work."
"Right, because my robes are dowdy and dumpy. The height of unprofessionalism. An international incident waiting to happen."
"You said it, I didn't," he said, trying not to smile.
Granger threw up her hands, and he couldn't help but smirk. One of the few joys of his life was to rile Granger up. That wasn't incompatible with trying to be nice to her, was it? Merlin, he hoped not.
"I know you remember saying those things to me! Don't pretend otherwise," she hissed, wagging her finger at him.
He eyed her over his coffee cup, which he held to his mouth. After a leisurely sip, he said, "Consider it a way of increasing your work productivity. What's more professional than that?"
She set the box on the bed, then immediately placed her hands on her hips. "Explain to me the connection between these robes and my work."
"They're all from local designers, which will show our Italian counterparts our respect, thus making them more cooperative with us. Also," he looked down at his cup of coffee, swirling it in his hand, "they're a thank you for writing the Leach response."
Her brows furrowed even further. "I told you, I didn't do it for you, so no thank yous are needed. Let alone ones that cost this much." It was a rejection, but one lacking any heat. Quite unlike the last time, when she'd insulted his proffered "poncy" handkerchief and said she'd rather work herself to death than have anything to do with him. Progress.
Draco shrugged. "I'm obscenely rich. It means nothing to me. Like buying you a used book."
Her mouth twitched as she bit the inside of her cheek. "Still..."
"Consider it an early birthday present. Or do whatever you need to do, pretend that by accepting them you're freeing all the house elves in the world...just take them. Please."
She reached for the box, trailing her fingers over the silky frocks again. He held his breath.
"Thank you." She lifted the silver-grey robes out of the box and hugged them to her chest. "How did you know it was my birthday?"
Just one of those things he'd picked up over the years without intending to. "Your housemates weren't exactly subtle in their celebrations."
Would she stop staring at him already? "We don't have much time, so unless you plan on going to the Ministry in your bathrobe, you should get dressed."
She picked up the box and was gone for less than five minutes before she reappeared in the doorway in a red set of robes and her new boots. Staring down the length of her body, she alternated between bending her right and left knee a few times. She nearly giggled at how the material at the hem rippled about her knees, oblivious to the way her hips swayed from the movement. He, unfortunately, was not.
As he pondered the effectiveness of obliviating himself versus bashing his head into a wall, Granger walked over to the desk and picked up one of the breakfast items. "I didn't have to use any alteration spells at all."
"Hmmm."
When he'd purchased them, he'd half believed she would alter the robes to make them bigger. He couldn't decide if he regretted that she hadn't. They fit perfectly, and she looked beautiful.
"How did you know my size?"
Because the ridiculously small pajamas you wear every night in my dreams are highly suggestive of many things, including your shape and size.
Was that a piece of lint on his sleeve? Draco brushed away at the possible something. "I may have had help from my mother."
He had not.
"Oh." Granger bit into a roll smothered with butter and jam. After she swallowed, she murmured, "That was kind of her."
He gave her a few more moments to eat breakfast as he checked his briefcase. His favourite quills were still there in tight formation, right next to a fresh stack of parchment, an extra set of nibs, and his silver well filled with a new ink guaranteed to flow smoothly every time.
"You still have the file?"
She patted her hip. "In my pocket."
He closed his briefcase. "We should get going. I want to stop at the front desk and see if they have any updates about our room."
Mercifully, their trip downstairs was uneventful. They had just set foot in the empty lobby when a wolf whistle pierced the silence. Granger nearly jumped a foot in the air. He grabbed her by the elbow to steady her, lest she twist her ankles. The boots he'd provided didn't provide much in the way of support, and he'd learned today that she had very delicate-looking ankles. She looked at his fingers in the crook of her arm, and he quickly let go.
"Buongiorno, bella! You look like a dream. And Signore Malfoy, handsome as ever. I hope your room was to your liking," Vincenzo shouted from twenty feet away.
Granger's face twisted in what Draco assumed was a smile. Through her teeth she said, "I'll just wait for you here. Hurry. Please."
"Do you really think he'll stop yelling just because you're over here? I don't know about you, but I'd rather he not announce to the whole lobby that we're sleeping together."
She raised a brow at him, and he felt his cheeks warm at the memory of her saying something similar yesterday, resulting in hot pants being plastered across his face.
"You know what I mean. We are fortunate that right now we're the lobby's only occupants, but how long do you think that will last?"
Granger nodded her head in grim acceptance, and they approached the front desk.
"Good morning, Vincenzo. We were just on our way to work," he said when Granger gave no indication of answering. "We just wanted an update on the room situation."
Vincenzo threw his hands in the air and sighed. "No closer to fixing the rooms, I'm afraid. And no rooms have opened up either." He leaned forward, giving them a wink. "But why would you want another, Signore Malfoy, when you have such a beautiful roommate?"
Draco nodded at Vincenzo, studiously avoiding his beautiful roommate. "Well, if anything comes up..."
Vincenzo laughed. "Oops! Have I embarrassed my reserved English friends? I did not mean to, only..." He moved his hands in the air, as if he were trying to collect the right words. He finally gave up and said, "Stai veramente bene con quel vestito, signorina."
Draco looked over at Granger, who seemed intent on tracing the grey veins in the marble tile with her shoe. "I don't speak Italian," she said.
"You look really good in that dress," Draco said without thinking. Granger turned to him, her eyes wide. Draco hastened to explain, "It's the translation in English."
"Si! It must be said. Such beauty should never go unnoticed," Vincenzo pronounced with a bang of his fist on the desk.
And it didn't. Draco lost count of the number of men who checked Granger out as they travelled the distance from the hotel to the entrance of the Ministry.
If Granger noticed the attention his gift garnered her, she didn't let on. "I didn't know you spoke Italian."
"There are many things you don't know about me."
"When did you learn?"
"I didn't."
She stopped walking. "Then how did you know what Vincenzo said without casting a translation spell?"
"We're going to be late."
When she didn't budge, he admitted, "Blaise flirts with witches in Italian all the time. Now can we go?"
"So Zabini speaks it?"
Draco laughed. "Not unless you count curse words and pick up lines as true fluency. Vincenzo just happened to say something Blaise frequently uses at the clubs."
Granger started walking again. "Does it work?"
"Hmmm?"
"His tactics. Do they actually fall for it?"
"Usually." But Blaise never chose the brightest candles for female companionship.
"And you just stand there doing nothing while he deceives innocent females?"
Draco nearly snorted. His mother would have been horrified. "They're hardly innocent."
"Why should that matter? They don't deserve to be lied to."
"Relax, Granger. They don't like Zabini because they think he can speak Italian. They like him because he has money."
"Not that that in any way excuses Zabini, but what a stupid reason to like someone. It's not like he's going to give them any of it."
"Not everyone has your discriminating tastes when it comes to their choice of a partner."
He didn't understand the offended look she gave him.
"Don't pretend you don't jump at the chance to sleep with them too," she said.
He had paid her a sincere compliment, compared her favourably to Blaise's flavours of the day, and this was her response?
Draco's lip curled in a sneer. "For a woman said to be the brightest witch of the age, you should know better than to believe everything you read in the papers. But then again, you did date Weasley."
"I didn't read about your exploits in the papers. I made a simple deduction based on what I've seen of your behaviour. And here's another: I bet you're excellent at pretending to be fluent in French."
"Your accusations would carry more weight if you didn't sound like a raving lunatic." Draco tilted his head to the side, pretending to study her, "If I wait long enough, will your Polyjuice Potion wear off, Professor Trelawney?"
Granger's hands curled into fists at her side. "How dare you call me by that name!"
"I'm sorry, Sybill. What was that?"
Granger's pointer finger poked painfully into his chest. "It makes perfect sense to anyone with brains. Zabini is an Italian last name, so he pretends to speak Italian. Malfoy is a French last name, therefore you would pretend to speak French."
By now they had both stopped walking and were having a standoff in the middle of the sidewalk. Not the best place, considering everyone was rushing to work. The Muggles were too busy to give them too much thought, though a few spared a glance or dirty look as they passed by. They were jostled closer together till Granger had to put her hands on his chest to maintain even a small distance between their bodies.
They were in public, arguing on a Muggle street. He had enough presence of mind to lower his voice before he spoke. "For the record, my French is impeccable, and I have never slept with any of Blaise's so-called admirers. Not that any of this will change your mind, because you are the most stubborn witch in the world and are determined to think the worst of me. And one more thing, since we're clearing things up, just because I was a Death Eater doesn't mean I'm some kind of sexual deviant who would force himself on a defenseless witch while she slept."
She stared at him, her mouth agape. "Wha-? I don't think that! Whatever gave you that impression?!"
"Call it a simple deduction based on your previous behaviour," he parroted back to her.
Granger pressed her lips together. She opened her mouth, then closed it. Finally she said, "Malfoy, I think there's been some kind of breakdown in communication. I don't know what you're talking about.
"Why did you modify your enchantments? I nearly broke my-," he spoke even more quietly, lowering his head to speak into her ear. "I nearly broke my wand when whatever defense mechanism you placed in that barrier between us practically threw me from my bed this morning."
"Clearly I needed to, because you tried to change my specifications!"
"Not because I'm some kind of…sex fiend! I did it so I didn't have to see you sprawled on the bed wearing next to nothing!"
Granger turned as bright red as her dress. She dragged her hand down her forehead and over her eyes. "You saw me?! Oh my gods...It's just so hot in the room, I didn't want to transform my pajamas. I thought the sheet-"
"Scusi, scusi, scusi!" interrupted a loud voice accompanied by equally loud clapping.
Draco turned to find an older man glaring at him. "May we help you?"
"This is no place for your lovers' quarrels," he chastised in heavily accented English.
Granger shook her head so hard her curls nearly hit him in the face. "We are not lovers."
Draco wrapped his fingers around Granger's wrists and pried her hands from his chest.
The Milanese meddler muttered something else in Italian, accompanied by a rude gesture, before shaking his head and walking away. Draco blushed at his advice. He wasn't exactly sure, but it sounded like a much more graphic version of "kiss and make up already."
"We don't have time for this." Using his longer legs, he stormed ahead, determined to put as much distance as he could between him and Granger.
"Malfoy, wait!" Granger called out after him. He could hear her running over the cobblestones, but he made no effort to slow his pace. The only reason she caught up with him was because of the damned crosswalk signal turning red. Not being flattened by a car was only slightly more preferable than continuing this conversation.
"I did it because I was sharing the room with a...man, and one that I hardly know. And we don't exactly have the best working relationship with one another. It's just prudent. Constant vigilance and all that." She grabbed at his sleeve, yanking him back to face her. "Good Godric! Malfoy, if I even for a second thought you'd do...that, I wouldn't have crossed the threshold of that hotel room, let alone have shared the same sleeping space with you. I'm sorry that something I did made you think otherwise. Truly."
He wasn't used to receiving apologies. He didn't know how to answer her.
"And as for the other thing, I thought it was a simple case of, you know, birds of a feather."
He raised a brow. "That makes no sense whatsoever."
The signal turned green and they were carried along in the large crowd of early morning commuters and tourists.
"It's a Mug—it's a phrase used where I'm from. It means that people with similar personalities or backgrounds or values gravitate toward one another. Like attracts like. In any case it was wrong of me to assume that just because Zabini acts one way, you would too."
Draco wasn't interested in her nonsensical muggle aphorisms, but the apology did mollify him a little.
They'd crossed the street and were now standing in front of a large fountain. In the background a red-bricked fortress, Castle Sforza, loomed.
"Let's just change the subject," Draco offered. "We're here."
To Be Continued
Thanks for reading!
