Updated: Aug 12, 2010 8:00 am
Sorry for the incredibly long wait everyone! I know I said I'd try to update once a month and I more than kinda failed in that. All I can say is that life got kinda busy. Not the greatest excuse, but it is the truth and I imagine you can all relate in some fashion.
Anywho, I hope you enjoy this chapter (been so long, I don't even remember what happens here...urgh..should rectify that...). Ciao guys! (and girls)
AM
As Hermione got ready for bed, brushing her hair and teeth, wiping the make-up off and changing into her pajamas, the only thing on her mind was the kiss she'd shared with Draco. And what it meant for their individual futures and the one the, for the moment shared.
Monday was full of classes, meals, homework and planning. Tuesday was much the same. Wednesday on the other hand, turned into a very interesting day.
It was a normal morning that followed a normal breakfast. Lunch however, was when things got started. It began relatively normal, nothing out of ordinary. Everyone was chatting with their friends, eating food, complaining about homework; all very natural in a school setting.
It was interrupted by the very loud slamming of a book and an exclamation of "Absolutely not!" from the Gryffindor table. All heads, including those at the Head table, turned to see what was happening.
Hermione briefly looked up, saw the entire school's eyes on her and promptly blushed a deep scarlet. Giving a meek apology, she ducked her head and began eating.
When everyone's eyes had turned away, she took a ballpoint pen from her bag and scribbled a very large, underlined and emphatic 'NO' under the question and closed her notebook.
The afternoon continued in a similar manner. Draco would send her a question through the notebook; scribbling on her notes; spelling it in charms class.
In Transfiguration, when they were working on living-to-inanimate transfiguration, he managed to get the entire class to transfigure their rodents into a letter and then re-arranged everyone so it spelled out the question.
Hermione gave him a blank stare, turned to Professor McGonagall, and asked if she could go to the Hospital Wing. McGonagall nodded and as soon as the Head Girl had left the classroom and was no longer in the vicinity to see it, her craggy face broke into a small grin.
She spent the rest of the day avoiding Draco, Madame Pomfrey had graciously offered to keep everyone away, by talking to the Medi-witch about being a Healer and getting some more information on needed classes and formal training. But dinner eventually came and Hermione had to leave her sanctuary in the Hospital Wing.
Looking the other way, so as not to meet Draco's gaze, she hurried over to Gryffindor table. Unfortunately for the Head Girl, because she was looking the other way, she didn't see a certain blonde Slytherin coming up on her blind side.
The entire hall paused to see what would happen and Draco had a fleeting thought that the entire school body, professors included, obviously had no life if they were that interested in himself and Hermione.
As he bent down on one knee, the females in the hall gasped; Hermione paled to a sickly white.
'Probably thinks I'm going to propose.' He snickered to himself. Out loud though, he put on a serene smile, took Hermione's hand and looked into her eyes.
Hermione looked at Draco. She did not want to be here. She paled when he went down on one knee. 'What the hell is he doing! He said between his Coming of Age and graduation! Meaning sometime after JANUARY! It's still the beginning of DECEMBER!'
He took her hand. Hermione mentally cursed him a thousand different ways and then some. Looking into her eyes he smiled. Hermione saw a smirk.
And in a voice loud enough for the entire hall to hear, he asked, "Hermione Jane Granger. Will you go flying with me?"
"I don't think so dear. I like my feet stuck on terra firma thank you very much!" Was the impossibly prompt reply.
A few disappointed groans were heard, several laughs were thrown in and Hermione resolved to kill her best friend when he stood up and started chanting her name. Neville, surprisingly, was the next to join in and Ginny stood up not a minute later to accompany the chant.
Shortly after, the entire Gryffindor table was standing on the seating benches chanting her name. Hermione slapped her face with her available hand and groaned. She pulled her other hand out of Dra-Malfoy's grasp to cover her entire face when the chanting spread to the other three tables.
A barely heard 'fine' made its way through Hermione's hands. Draco grinned.
"Sorry, did you say something Darling?" Hermione's hands lowered and she gave him the fiercest glare she could. Which was actually quite fierce and Draco was glad that he had the entire school was behind him at the moment.
"You heard me perfectly fine the first time Malfoy. I will not repeat myself." Her voice was barely heard through tightly-clamped teeth; her hands, longing to throttle the neck in front of them, were clenched into fists.
Draco threw an arm back towards the tables. The chanting stopped. Draco almost turned around in surprise; he was not expecting that to actually work. In all actuality Dumbledore had cast a mass silencing charm on the students and then took it off when they quieted down.
"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. The crowd was really loud. Can you say it once more?" Draco was mocking her and he knew that she knew it. A grin was replaced with a full blown smile; he was absolutely loving this! It was hilarious to watch, and even better to participate in!
If possible, Hermione's glare got even fiercer and Draco knew that he would be paying for this someway, somehow. But right now, he was having too much fun to care.
"I said, fine." She was practically growling at him.
"Sorry, fine? Fine what? Fine weather? Why yes, considering the season, it is very fine." He smirked; he could hear some students chortling, trying not be caught by the enraged witch they were watching.
Hermione actually had the audacity to growl at him! He hurriedly looked at her nails, suddenly worried they would turn into claws and dismember him in a most painful way.
"I said, fine, I'll go flying with you, you stupid, idiotic, airheaded, illiterate, empty-headed, inane, mentally-deficient, pointless, senseless, useless, contemptible, asinine, feather-brained, frivolous, ignorant, uneducated, rump-fed, pox-marred, dog-humping twat!"
Thunder was in her face and silence filled the Great Hall. No one, with the exception of Harry and maybe Ginny, had ever heard Hermione say such things. McGonagall was staring aghast at her favorite pupil. Flitwick, had anyone bothered to look, seemed to be having convulsions trying to stifle his laughter.
Draco himself was frozen in shock. She had such a dirty mouth! Well, not really, she hadn't sworn or anything, but there were some graphic insults there. He looked at her in puzzlement,
"Did you just use Shakespearean insults on me?" Hermione had the decency to blush, though she didn't avert her eyes. It was Harry, again, who got things going by laughing so hard he fell off the bench he was standing on. In turn, people laughed at him and soon everyone (with maybe Snape as the exception) was crying tears of laughter.
Hermione, still bright, fuchsia red, grabbed Malfoy's hand, yanked him onto his feet and dragged him out of the hall. When she turned right to go up to their tower, Draco stopped and let her lurch as she tried to keep moving.
"What are you doing?" Judging by the way she hissed the words, she was still angry at him.
"The quidditch pitch is in the other direction."
She sneered at him. "Yes well even if I did agree to go flying, I certainly didn't mean tonight. And if by some miracle you got me down to the pitch, you'd still need your broom to fly and that is in your room; in the direction which I was headed."
Draco tossed her a smirk, whipped his wand out and flung out a series of Latin and Greek spells. And before Hermione could do anything, he turned and walked in the direction opposite hers. She stood firm, not willing to submit to the pale-haired ponce walking away from her, and stumbled when a sudden jerk pulled her off her feet.
Draco mentally gloated when he felt the pull. He'd placed a handcuff charm on the two of them, to force her to follow him, but had combined it with a spacing hex. Such a hex was used to force people to stay within a specific range. In this situation, it meant that Hermione had a certain limit of space that would be allowed between them before the magic handcuffs pulled her along.
Like putting a circle of some material over two animals; one will move and the second will sit still until the opposite end of the circle pushes them in the direction of the first.
He grinned. "I love magic." He heard angry footsteps coming up behind him. Undoubtedly his 'girlfriend' had found out that he'd also thrown a silencer into the mix and she could no longer speak her viperish opinions.
Hermione threw a slew of insults at the disappearing back only to hear nothing coming from her mouth. Glaring even harder she stormed after the Malfoy, intent on causing physical harm.
Unfortunately for her, the muscles on his body weren't just for show. He dodged her arm like one would a bludger, and the twirled to capture her hands in his. Hermione bared her teeth and moved to bite the hands that were holding her captive.
"Granger, you stupid cow! What the hell do you think you're doing?"
She mouthed angry words at him. "Oh right. Silencing spell. Okay, if I let go of your hands to get my wand and undo the spell, do you promise not to attack me in any way?"
Hermione huffed but nodded. Draco slowly let go of her hands. When she didn't move to attack him, he reached into his pocket for his wand. Hermione leapt at him while his one hand was indisposed.
She wasn't sure what her aim was, but she knew she wanted to hurt the insufferable git who was constantly humiliating her and had done so for the past seven years. Her mind began playing the memories of the day she'd spent with him just three days prior. She ruthlessly shoved it aside.
Draco was surprised by her sudden attack and his hand was trapped in his pocket as he unsuccessfully tried to yank it out to fend off the crazy witch.
Stumbling back from the onslaught he tripped over his robes and fell backwards, Hermione with him. Draco forced himself not to switch positions so she hit the ground, though she certainly deserved it, and let the angry woman fall on top of him.
Though as soon as he hit the ground, he rolled over and pinned her down. Hermione's arms were pinned against the stone floor by her head, hair spreading around her head and her face was flushed from anger and the fight.
Draco was straddling her body, knees pinned against her thighs to keep her from kicking something of his that was very sensitive.
"What in the nine levels of hell is wrong with you woman?"
She was struggling in his grasp, trying to break free. His hold stayed firm against her.
"You are 'what's wrong' Malfoy! You're constantly humiliating me! In any way you can! Oh you pretend to be nice, but then you go and do something like this and I hate it!"
In her mind, Hermione knew that he hadn't really bothered her in that last year and a half. And really, the only time he did make fun of her was when she was with Ron or Harry. But in her anger, she didn't care
There were delicate tears pooling in her eyes. Draco eased his grip on her and looked at the witch beneath him. Sighing, he pulled her up and into his arms. He leaned against the wall, his arms wrapped around her petite frame.
Draco cast a disillusion charm and placed a silencing ward around them so no one would see or hear their conversation.
It was one of the very few times he had ever seen Hermione in such a vulnerable state. The first was in their Second Year when her teeth were hit with the enlargement charm.
"Listen Grang- Hermione," His voice was low and apologetic. "I know you hate me, and I realize this can't be easy for you. And I want you to know that I really do appreciate you helping me out. I know I kind of blackmailed you into this and I know I can be a right bastard sometimes. Well, okay, a lot of the time. But I really…"
He paused. This was actually really hard for him. "I am…distressed…for causing you pain…of sorts. And this is an…offer of amends… for the future as well. Because I know that I will forget about your feelings at some point and only think of the end goal. And I'm quite sure I'll end up hurting you somehow…
"I don't really know how to apologize Hermione. It's not something I ever really learned. I was either right, or I had more power and thus it didn't matter if I was wrong. And I don't always know when to stop either. I know I'll take things too far sometimes because I don't know…I just…. I just don't."
Draco sighed and wiped a hand across his face. He felt a slight nod against his chest and the mélange of smugness, anger, and guilt was swallowed by a soft feeling that covered his chest.
"And I know you're going to hate me for this, but we really do have to go flying now… The entire school thinks we're going to, and we can't not without them finding out about our contract…"
His voice trailed off unsure of the reaction from the witch cradled in his arms. The warmth he hadn't known he was enjoying was suddenly gone. Hermione had pushed herself away from him. She used her robe sleeve to wipe her eyes and muttered a few charms so people wouldn't be able to tell she'd been crying.
Draco just stared at her as she walked down the hall, away from him.
"Well, come on then. We need to go put on a show n'est-ce pas?" The grin she wore was still slightly shaky, but it was enough to let him know that she was going to be okay.
"Mais oui, mademoiselle!" He stood and offered her his arm.
The moon was shining brightly and there were no clouds were to be seen as far off as the horizon. The field was covered in layers of thick, fluffy snowflakes and glittered like powdered diamonds under the moonlight.
Draco offered her the option of a school broom or his personal one. Hermione asked what the difference was.
"Well school brooms are more for teaching children how to control a broom and learn to fly. Mine is more of a performance broom."
Hermione looked at him. "Sort of like how you would start a young rider on an older, more experienced horse as opposed to a green horse."
Draco nodded. "Exactly like that. Though some people debilitate on whether the school brooms are really safe for flying. I mean, they'll do fine for just hovering, like you do in your first lesson, but going any higher… I don't actually know how well, they would hold up…"
Hermione's eyes widened in alarm and she quickly voiced that his broom would be fine. Draco smirked and accio-ed his broom to the pitch.
When it arrived, he straddled the broom as it hovered and turned to Hermione.
"Okay, you can either sit behind me or sit in front of me. It's your choice."
"How am I supposed to hold on if I sit in front of you?" There was only the slightest hint of hysteria in her voice.
"Well, if you face forward, you could hold onto the broom and my arms would be guard-rails of sorts as I also need to hold onto the broom. No offense but I don't exactly trust you to control the broom when you are highly distressed.
"Or you could face me and wrap your arms around my middle. Though our legs might get entangled that way…which might have adverse and unplanned effects…But it's your choice really."
"I'll sit behind you…if that's okay." Draco nodded. "Well come one then."
Hermione nervously walked up to the floating broom and swung a leg over. Hauling herself onto the stick, she immediately wrapped her arms around his middle.
Draco wheezed. "Not so tight Granger!" Her grip loosened minutely. A muffled "Sorry." Was said into his back. He rolled his eyes and took off.
Judging by the shriek that filled his ears, Draco decided he took off too fast and slowed their ascent.
He leveled off far too quickly for his liking, and far too late for Hermione's liking. Knowing that Hermione's eyes were still shut tight, Draco flew a few lazy laps around the pitch before crossing the skies, flying over the highest turrets and arrived at the lake.
The water near the edge was shallow enough to freeze into ice. It was too cold for the giant squid to splash around as it had the night they'd collected liquid moonbeams, but the occasional ripple from his movements were still visible.
"Hermione, open your eyes."
"Absolutely not! I agreed to go flying with you but no one said I had to look, and I certainly don't plan to! We just agreed to go flying. Flying is defined by the passage through air. We could have done a loop around the pitch six feet above the ground! I still would have been flying!"
She was verging on hysterical once again. Draco sighed. "I hardly think that counts as flying Granger. When the Wright brothers were trying to build the aero-plane I highly doubt that a bounce that took them up six feet and forward three would count as flying."
Hermione had no comeback to that. Draco smiled at his victory and got a delicious idea.
"Hermione, I'm going to move forward and you need to come with me okay?"
"Why are you moving forward!"
"Because I'm going to drop off the broom, swing around and land behind you."
"Whaat! No! You can't do that! What if you fall! What if I fall!"
Draco ignored her protests and moved forward, pulling her along as he moved. Holding the broom in place with his legs, he pried Hermione's arms from his stomach and lurched forward.
Hermione felt her arms being pulled and held on tighter. It didn't make a difference in the face of his strength. When only his arms were holding hers, he shifted forward and Hermione had no option other than to grope blindly for the broom handle.
She didn't want to open her eyes and be scared of the dangerous height they were at. Commons sense told her that it was more dangerous to keep her eyes closed as she might lean too far off balance and fall from the broom.
But before she could imagine the last situation through, her hands caught hold on the smooth wood and she held on for dear life.
Draco grinned as she groped for the handle, sheer panic evident on her face. Holding onto the broom with one hand, he flung himself off and used his stomach muscles to help swing his legs back around to land behind the terrified witch.
Hermione felt the sudden weight-loss on the broom and almost shrieked until a weight swung underneath, up and landed behind her. Two strong arms were around her own, keeping her safe. She let out the breath she'd been holding.
A voice breathed into her ear. "Satisfied that I know what I'm doing?"
Hermione shivered at the warmth by her ear. "I should kill you for doing that. You scared me! I thought you fell!"
He chuckled and it wrecked havoc on Hermione's senses. She was going crazy. She wasn't even yelling at him like he deserved. His voice in her ear was making her blood rush through her body and her heart was pounding so loud she was sure he could hear it; he was that close.
"Worried for my safety Granger? And here I thought you didn't care."
Hermione focused her attention on the broom beneath her hands and schooled her voice to be even and indifferent.
"I don't care Malfoy. I just don't want to be blamed if you died; which you would, if you fell from this height."
Draco drew back a bit. Her voice may be indifferent but he knew that she did care, in some small, most likely microscopic, way.
They floated there until the wind blew her hair away and he leaned forward again and pressed a soft kiss to her bare neck.
Hermione's eyes flew open in shock when she felt warm lips on her neck. About to reprimand him, her voice caught as she looked out at the view before her. An excited gasp slipped past her lips and Draco smirked against her neck.
His murmur reached her ears, despite the lowered decibel.
"Finally opened your eyes, huh?"
Hermione turned around to look at him, moonlight glinting off her hair as the wind danced it about.
"It's beautiful up here! Absolutely incredible! I've never seen anything like it. Ever! I've flown in planes before, but that's way up in the clouds. You never see things like this!"
Her smile was as brilliant as the moonlight and Draco noticed, for perhaps the first time, that her front teeth had been straightened and were no longer buck-toothed.
"I told you you'd like it up here." He was acting cocky and arrogant so she couldn't see how much she affected him. He turned his head away to look at the stars, the lake, anything so he wouldn't have to look at her and do something stupid.
Hermione leaned back to drop a kiss on his cheek, but he turned back at the movement and accidentally caught her lips with his.
Hermione's eyes widened, and after a few moments pulled away. Draco looked at her long and hard; she didn't look away or make a move to turn around. He gave a mental shrug and a 'to-hell-with-it' and leaned forward.
Hermione closed her eyes as Draco's face neared her own. The kiss was hesitant and light. Draco pulled away to look at her again. His hand lifted from the broom handle to brush a stray section of hair that barred her face from his vision.
Hermione suddenly turned around pulled herself closer to the front end of the broom. Draco felt a brief pang of disappointment before he smothered it. Of course she wouldn't want to kiss him. Hermione's leg swung around so she was facing him and scooted forward.
It was she who initiated the kiss this time, pulling his face down to hers, one hand tangled in his hair, the other holding onto the broom beneath her.
Draco was surprised at her boldness but couldn't really say it bothered him. He pulled her body closer to his, one hand at her neck, the other on her hip. Hermione pulled back just enough to mutter something.
"If both your hands are on me, how exactly are you holding on to the broom? And how are you steering?"
Draco gave her a mocking glare. "You talk way too much Granger. For your information, I'm holding on with my knees and I'm steering in a similar manner. I've been flying since I was a kid; trust me."
And strangely, she did.
Lemme know whatcha think! (Please, you don't absolutely have to...)