For a moment, Hermione was frozen. She couldn't think, couldn't rationalize what was happening, couldn't even begin to sort though all of the emotions that had been raging inside her, until the whirlwind of the kiss swept her up and off into a place where none of those thoughts mattered anymore. All she could think about was his lips on hers, those familiar lips that she had resigned herself to never knowing again. There was something different about the cadence of this kiss. It was gentle, almost sympathetic and somehow she felt reassured and calmer than she had been in a long time. There was a very strange sense of coming home, of belonging.

And then he shifted his head, pressed his tongue into her mouth and they went up in flames that tasted vaguely of firewhisky. The dance had changed, pushed them into an entirely new plane. He moved his hand from her face, to wrap his arms around her and draw her to him, his arms encircling her as she melted into him, head whirling. This was what she had been missing. The loneliness of the last few months that had felt like a stone on her heart was suddenly gone, and she felt light, airy…

Until he suddenly lifted his head.

"Granger" he said, in a gravelly tone unlike any she had ever heard from Malfoy, but painfully familiar as the voice that had haunted her thoughts… the stone of loneliness was back. The crushing realization that even the memories that she had treasured, that had kept her afloat until the time that she could just throw herself back into the world of studying, were broken beyond repair… it had been HIM. Malfoy. And she had just melted into his arms again. Coldness rushed through her veins and she stiffened.

"I'm sorry…"

"Shut up, Hermione."

She was stunned into silence for a moment. Hearing her name, her real name, coming from the lips of the person she had hated so much for so many years, in a voice that was unmistakably Malfoy's. She couldn't think straight. Maybe this was all an alcohol-induced dream.

"If it makes a difference, I couldn't get you out of my damn head," he bit out angrily, still not letting her go. This must be an alcohol-induced dream. Malfoy couldn't be saying this.

Drunken giggles of the women she had made small talk with over the last few days reached her from around the corner of the street.

"We can't stay here," Malfoy slurred.

…

Hermione woke up with a splitting headache. The night's events all came back to her in a sickening rush. Malfoy had been Drew. She had slapped him. They had kissed… he had admitted he couldn't get her out of his head. He had called her Hermione in that voice that somehow gave her butterflies, but he had taunted her with the fact he knew who she was. He was pure evil… wasn't he?

He was Drew, who had been so miserable about his future, and his family's pressures on him. The realization that he had actually taken her advice and found something to do with his life hit her. He was enrolled in a course. At the same place as her. Which meant she was going to have to see him. Often. And listen to him talk in class in his smarmy drawl. Or the voice she had heard him use last night, which was somehow devoid of all of the arrogance she had associated with Malfoy for the entire time she had known him.

She was still wearing all of her clothes from the night before. How had she gotten home? She vaguely remembered walking with Malfoy. Who had seen them? The gravity of that hit her. What would Harry think? And Ron… the bastard. It would serve him right. Thinking about it objectively, Malfoy was much more attractive than she had ever given him credit for. The war had wiped much of the slime off of him, and his eyes no longer held the arrogant, smarmy light they had when they were children, teenagers.

She groaned and opened her eyes, grabbing for the headache potion she had put in her new nightstand for moments like this, mind still whirling. Her hand encountered a glass of water, with a note below it.

Meet me at the hotel tomorrow after class. D

D for Drew. D for Draco.