"You— what are you doing here!?" Hermione charged forwards, stopped short a few feet away from Draco, and clenched her jaw to stop herself from screaming at him. Her anger couldn't come just yet, not until she coherently told him what she needed to say.
Draco's eyes flashed to hers for a brief moment before dropping to the ground.
Hermione supposed it'd been a stupid question, because obviously Theo was why they were both here, but she still couldn't help but be irritated by Draco's lack of response. Hermione crossed her arms tightly over her chest, inhaling deeply, hoping the action would help contain the outburst she knew was coming.
Draco still didn't say anything, so Hermione studied the way the sun caught his eyelashes, shadowed the sharp crease between his eyebrows. She chewed her lip, swallowing something heavy and bitter in her throat, and looked away, up into the trees, at the sky, anything — anything was easier than dealing with the pangs in her chest which came with staring at Draco.
Angry tears stung the corners of her eyes as she took a trembling breath and whispered, "I loved you." Something in Draco's face softened, and his stormy eyes widened. Hermione cleared her throat, she needed to sound stronger, more assured. "And you just pushed me away. Again and again!" Her voice became higher with every word, and now the tears were streaming hotly down her cheeks.
"Hermione…" Draco's voice cracked, and Hermione took a step back, shaking her head.
"You never trusted me, did you? Otherwise you would have said something — would have told me—" She faltered, hastily bringing her hands up to scrub at her leaking eyes. When she managed to school her features into a glare, Draco's expression had hardened again. "It didn't have to be this way!"
"What way?" Draco asked lowly, his gaze penetrating and broken.
"You don't want anything to do with me," Hermione was speaking mostly to herself, her voice tight, "and the worst thing is, I still want this — I still want to make this work — but I can't — I can't because you might never trust me enough to tell me the truth! And that hurts, Draco. It hurts a lot. So until you're ready to try — really try — I can't keep waiting around, having my feelings played with!"
Draco was so still in front of her, like a statue carved out of ice, and the look on his face, the look of a hate which was directed at no one but himself, shone out of every line of his body, coiling towards Hermione and making her want close the gap between them and just hold him.
But she wouldn't. Not anymore. She wouldn't be used again. "Three weeks," Hermione said with a resolution she didn't know she had. She smudged the rest of her tears away, tried to keep her breathing steady when the surprise in his eyes met her steady gaze, "You have three weeks to prove to me that you've changed. That you won't hurt me again. Until then we can pretend nothing's happened between us — go about as — as normal. After those weeks are up, and if you've got nothing to say, then — then I'll forget everything I've ever known about Draco Malfoy." Her voice came out as a half-kindled sort of thing, a dying flame, nearly lifeless, and she willed her throat muscles not to give way to the sob which so desperately wanted to escape.
She would not look at his face, she would not. Hermione squeezed her eyes closed, felt them sting and burn, and then she turned to leave, turned to live her life as normally as she could with her heart feeling like some barely-there organ, and her hope fighting to stay alive.
Everything depended on Draco now, she told herself, if he was worth it, worth the sense of loss and longing which would war inside of her for the next three weeks, then so be it. If he wasn't, then Hermione would just have to get over it.
As she took the first step away from him she could have sworn she felt the ghost of a touch against her elbow, and it almost gave her pause, but she wouldn't give in. Not yet.
Three weeks would be a sickeningly long time.
Draco stood dumbfounded in the empty park, his hand still outstretched, as if it'd bring her back, bring her back to fix the gaping hole inside his chest.
But Hermione was gone.
'I loved you.'
Draco felt like gagging, like breaking something, and his fingers were trembling as he reached into his pocket for his cigarette packet.
He didn't take one out, though, he just stared furiously at it, as though conveying every amount of distress and angst into the way he crushed it in his fist. He launched the box across the park, relished in the way it smacked against the slide and fell into the bark, relished in the way his growl of frustration and despair seemed to go unheard in the playground.
Fuck, why? Why did he have to go and fall in love with a girl who they both knew was too good for him?
"Draco…"
Draco whirled around, saw Theodore Nott strolling innocently towards him, and immediately advanced on his friend, grabbing him by his shirt and seething, "You fucking bastard, Nott. You —"
Theo shoved Draco's arm away, took a step back, and indignantly straightened his tie, all the while wearing an angry mask of discomposure. Draco was a little stunned, because not only had Theo, always the calm and collected one, used Draco's choice method of conflict against him — force — he also looked like the bubble of his impenetrable temper had finally been punctured.
"Are you bloody stupid, Draco!? If I hadn't done this then you would've never grown a pair and —"
Draco hit him. Hard. Theo staggered back, and Draco managed to let out a ragged breath before Theo punched him equally as hard.
The blow was something Draco hadn't felt since his father had last hit him, and it was like a wakeup call, knocking him to the side and blurring his vision before it became clearer.
Draco heaved and straightened, eyeing the way his friend was practically panting, his lanky frame unused to the exertion.
They stared at eachother.
Draco cracked first, the corner of his mouth lifting into a defeated smile, and slumped onto the ground, cross-legged. As Theo mimicked him, Draco cupped handfuls of tanbark, watching the brown dust coat his pale fingers. It was a stark contrast, but it seemed to work, and strangely enough it reminded him of he and Hermione.
Draco was going to say something, anything to break the silence, but Theo got there first, his voice soft, almost whimsical, "You left her, Draco — you didn't want her anymore and she was so — so upset. I went up there, fully intending to take her from you, to win her heart — but when I saw her, broken — crying, on the floor like that I just — I couldn't. Because she loves you. And if you don't see that then you're the biggest fucking idiot in the world."
Draco's heart clenched painfully.
'I loved you.'
"'M not so sure," he muttered.
"Oh, spare me the self-pity, mate. You'll make me nauseous," Theo's tone was light and playful, but behind it Draco could detect a faint trace of misery.
"You like her, then? Hermione?" Draco asked softly, fearing the answer.
Theo hummed, stretched back on his arms, "'M not so sure," he said eventually.
Draco glared at him, "Prat."
"Hermione is a wonderful person. And you're a very big masochist," Theo told him honestly, his lips curved slightly as if it were amusing.
"Got that already. And?"
"And, you shouldn't let her go."
"I've only got three weeks," Draco said dejectedly, throwing pieces of bark out onto the grass.
"Three weeks can be an awfully long time."
"Bullshit."
"Yes, you're full of it," Theo laughed quietly at his own retort, and after a few moments of nothing he continued, "I'm a selfish person, Draco. I wanted to see what was so special about the girl my best mate had eyes for. I didn't expect to like what I saw. She was smart, honest, down to earth, but not quite my type."
"Oh?" Draco perked up after being glad and offended at the same time, "you have a type?"
Theo gave him a tight smile, looking up to the sky that so matched his eyes, and nodded slightly.
"Care to elaborate?" Draco prodded, gazing at his friend curiously.
Theo's eyes flickered, searched Draco's for several seconds, and at length replied, "I like boys, Draco." Draco blanched, his eyes widening, but Theo pressed on, "And before you ask, no, I'm not in love with you."
"But — but I thought you just said you wanted to win Hermione's—"
"I like girls too," Theo stated simply, "But I prefer males."
"Right," Draco murmured, then, turning to his friend, asked exasperatedly, "How come you never told me before?"
Theo shrugged, "I suppose I thought you'd react negatively."
Draco shook his head, frowning into the crisp morning air, "What? And lose the only friend I've managed to keep in years?"
Theo grinned, before schooling his features and saying, "I think the reason that's true is because we never talk about feelings, Draco."
Draco snorted, ignoring his friend's warning, "So is there — er — any guy you fancy, then?"
Theo stood, stretched his limbs, "Maybe. But I'm not telling you."
"Why not?" Draco asked, affronted, as he got to his feet too.
"Because, you'd take the Mickey out of me if I did." Theo began to walk away, his hands in his pockets, but turned at the last minute and said, "Draco? Remember to pick up that cigarette packet and put it in the bin when you leave. We don't want some poor child finding it and following your example."
Draco smiled, and surprisingly, he found it was genuine. "Whatever," Theo gave him a nod of departure, and continued walking. Draco's shout came before he could stop it, "Hey — Theo — thanks!" His friend didn't say anything, but Draco saw the lines of his shoulders shake with unmistakeable laughter.
Hermione waited behind the school gates, hugging her books to her chest and licking her dry lips. When they finally arrived, one head of ginger and the other black, just like yesterday morning, Hermione walked up to them with grim determination. She didn't stop when Harry said good morning to her, or when Ron cast his eyes away and blushed bright red, she only moved right up to them, slapping Ron squarely across the cheek.
A few passing students gave them astonished glances and proceeded to whisper behind their hands, but Hermione took no notice. "Good morning, Harry," she said, without looking away from Ron, who she told, "I'm glad you found yourself a girlfriend. You two are pretty much perfect for eachother."
Ron blinked stupidly at her, mouth opening and closing, until he said, "I'm really sorry for what I said, 'Mione."
"Good," she clutched her books tightly, forbidding herself from feeling guilty. "You should be. Now that's out of the way, let's get to class." Hermione swivelled, her hair trailing after her like an afterthought.
Ron gave Harry a sideway, bloody-hell-although-I-suppose-I-deserved-that kind of look, and then sped up to walk beside Hermione, offering to take her books. Hermione only shook her head fiercely, telling him she didn't want him to drop them, even though her lips tugged smugly into a smile.
Hermione petulantly ignored Theo's friendly greeting as she sat down between Harry and Ron in the Art room, sighing as she got out her visual diary and scrounged around in her bag for a pencil sharpener.
"What's up with you and Nott? I thought you were friends?" Ron whispered to her.
Hermione raised her nose, replying snappishly, "We are."
Ron looked like he was about to argue, but was thankfully stopped when Pansy Parkinson strutted into the room, and his face was overcome with a disgusting, worshipful look as he watched her pass.
Sickened, Hermione rolled her eyes and sharpened her pencil, childishly sweeping the shavings onto Ron's side of the desk, even though he didn't seem to notice, as he was too busy drooling over Pansy's ass until she took a seat at Theo's table.
Hermione felt like stabbing Ron in the hand with her lethally pointy pencil, if only to get him to pay attention to what Mrs Trelawney was going on about, when the classroom door swung open for the third time, and Draco Malfoy came in, his uniform neat and immaculate, and Hermione felt her mouth go dry.
He didn't look at her, in fact he moved right past where she stiffly sat, and up to the teacher, who looked both intrigued and perplexed at being addressed by him.
"Sorry I'm late, Miss," Draco said casually, and the whole class had just about frozen, because Draco Malfoy never apologised to anybody, especially teachers, and Hermione didn't know what was stranger, the fact that Draco was here at all, or the fact that Harry was sympathetically squeezing her hand beneath the table.
All Hermione knew was that her heart was fluttering uncontrollably, and the hope which she'd previously feared for now sparked to life with a vengeance.
A/N: Sorry that was so short, but yay, an update! The next one will be quicker, I promise. Thanks for reading, and as always, hope you enjoyed! :)