Draco woke up the next morning super early. He thought about Hermione and how strong she must be to get through what had happened. He noticed how her eyes never watered but her jaw tightened with every mention of Ron, not that there were many within their conversations. He wondered whether Ron had always been that crazy. He realized within that thought that he had never really paid much attention to the actual dynamic between the trio.

'That's kind of pathetic' he scolded himself. He had spent so much time ridiculing the three friends and making them miserable, but never once stopped to notice how often they fought. 'I was not as smart as I thought I was' he said suddenly realizing that if he really wanted to make them miserable he would have made the original fights worse. Then again, he never truly wanted to hurt them in any way, he was just jealous.

When he noticed his thought pattern going off track, he forced himself to sit up in bed. It was times like this where he thought working with Hermione was extremely hard. He never thought she would invade his thoughts like she has. Although the thought were innocent he often felt like they were something to be ashamed of. He couldn't help remembering the good part of the night before. If you could consider them good that is. After he got beat up and before they got attacked, the two were getting along quite well.

'That just sounds so sad' he mumbled. 'I better not say that out loud. Oh yea, after her best friends beat me up and before her best friend sent people to attack me, we were having a great time together! Pathetic, just pathetic.' He fought with himself while shaking his head. He suddenly realized that he had been thinking for way too long and it was time for him to get dressed and go to work.

He walked into his bathroom, which was located directly next to his room, it was quite a large bathroom, considering it was only for one person. Draco was constantly visiting his mother at the Malfoy Manor but he had purposely gotten his own small flat for the simple fact that he no longer felt at home in the manor. Although he would never try to convince anybody that he was a changed man, there were a lot of his past beliefs that just weren't so important after the war. One of those being the size of one's house or how much money they had.

Draco walked down his small hallway, stopping at the closet to grab his coat. He walked through the kitchen, living room and dining room passing the spare bedroom and walked out his front door. He walked about ten blocks to the telephone booth that led to the Ministry and headed into work. When he arrived he ran into Blaise who stopped him to chat.

"All right mate?...blimey what happened to you?" It was then that Draco remember that he didn't even looked in the mirror before he left.

"Potthead and Weaselbee"

"Bloody hell!?" Draco then began to explain how it all happened, including the attack at dinner.

"Well you look like that happened." Blaise said causing himself to laugh at his own joke. Draco glared at him and bid farewell as he needed to get to work on the case. He walked down the hall until he got to Hermione's office and stormed in saying

"Don't say anything about my face, just get me a mirror so I can see how bad it is." Hermione head snapped up from fright and her expression changed to worry very quickly. She pulled a small mirror out of her pocketbook and walked it over to him.

"Well, good morning to you too. Do you want coffee, I made you one." Draco was so absorbed in the mirror and how black his eye looked; along with how swollen his mouth was that he didn't answer. After a minute he put her mirror back on her desk and sat down in the chair across from her.

"Yes thank you." She handed him the to-go cup and he sipped it gratifyingly. "Three sugars and milk, how'd you know?"

"I didn't, just a guess that's how I have mine too." He fell silent, that was a bit strange but nothing to be worried about.

"Gran- Hermione."

"Yes?"

"We need to talk about yesterday." Her eyes met his and she sighed.

"Honestly, I meant what I said." She shuffled through the papers on her desk nervously. When he didn't respond she elaborated. "I like you, or at least, I like getting to know you." Draco couldn't help but feel a bit happy about this.

"Same here. It's been an interesting experience." He winced "But I meant we need to talk because I don't know how you are okay." He found himself getting uncomfortable, noticing that this was sounding more and more like a relationship.

"Like you care." She folded her arms and got up.

"Don't insult me like that Granger, if I didn't care you really think I would even be here?" His voice was hard but he couldn't help it. Just that morning he was admiring the good moments of yesterday and how they felt like such a good team, and now she just shut him out.

"I'm….sorry. I'm stressed and I really rather just focus on my work. Okay?" She moved her hand to cover his and he smiled, going on with another day of work.

About a week passed and still Hermione received no apology from anyone other than Ginny Draco's face was completely normal again which was good, but she was still upset about her friends. She was expecting at least Harry to come to his senses, but then again he never really had any when it came to Draco. Harry had this obsession that Draco was evil to the core, he always had. Hermione understood completely that Draco was not always the nicest person, and for years he tormented the three of them. She is also very aware that Draco had been especially mean to Harry from the moment they met. Although Harry never thought she did, Hermione truly did understand that. It was just the fact that she was able to see from both sides, not only just her friend's. The case wasn't going anywhere. The partnership actually seemed to be going pretty smoothly. There two of them tended to stay very late each night. One of the reasons was because they spent all day interviewing the women and trying to get their memories back. With more than half the work day gone, they would come back and go over every last detail. This is what they were doing right now, at about 8:00pm.

"Oblivate wasn't used to erase their memories!" Hermione said excitingly.

"How do you know that?"

"Because..." She drifted not knowing how to explain it. "Because I've used it and I would know how to reverse it, no matter how well done it was." She expected him to ask who she used it on but he didn't.

"Well than what was used?" Draco found it hard to look her in the eyes. As they were rebuilding after the war, rumors flew around about how Hermione Granger had took away her parents' memories. Many people were admiring her courage and dedication, but some feared she wouldn't be able to undo it. He didn't have to know her well to know that whether she did or not, would not be a good question to ask.

"I'm… not sure" she bit her lip.

They continued like this for about two hours. Draco searching spell books and Hermione rereading the interviews. It seemed like it took forever to even find one piece of evidence. Suddenly, Draco shut the book.

"We are looking in the wrong place." Hermione gave him a questioning look. "If these are former death eaters…" He put great emphasis on former. "They wouldn't have learned spells from these types of books."

"We need books on dark magic."

"Exactly, luckily my family still has a bunch in our library."

"Library! You have library in your house?" Her eyes twinkled with enthusiasm.

"Leave it to you to ask that question with admiration. Yes they do, it's not my house anymore but she won't mind if I use it." Hermione raised her eyebrow. "My dad is in Azkaban so it's just my mom there now."

"Why don't you still live there?" She saw how uncomfortable he had gotten. "You don't have to answer that."

"I don't want to leave my mother alone, but that house carries too many of my demons." Hermione smiled broadly at him, making him feel uncomfortable again. "Anyway, it's 10:00pm, I can bring some in tomorrow." He saw the look of disappointment on her face. "Unless you want to come by tomorrow and see it for yourself." Her face brightened.

"Can I please?" He nodded and chuckled at how much of a child she sounded like. He started to pack his things, she did as well. They gave each other parting hugs, and went their separate ways.

When Hermione got home she had suddenly realized what is was she just agreed to. 'How in merlin am I going to step foot in that house again?' The memories of her torment starting to run through her mind like a personal horror movie. She absentmindedly ran her fingers across the scar on her arm. She had done a pretty good job of keeping it hidden in public. Not because she was embarrassed, but because she didn't want pity. That being said, there was a reason she didn't use magic to remove it. She wanted to remember how strong she once was, it was a reminder that she could get through anything. 'Well I guess we will have to see how it goes.'