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The realization took a while to hit. First, there was the odd angle that the light filtered into the room, softly falling at the foot of where Hermione lay, eyes barely open, arm slung over her forehead. Then there was the weird feeling of the sheets on her skin; they felt…different, somehow, unlike her usual blankets. And the pillow: it was flatter than she preferred.

And why was the room so dark? Even with the sun shining through the window, there was a certain harsh aura to the space in which she presently resided.

Her eyes finally seemed to process that there was something wrong, and they blinked themselves awake. Once they'd focused, she was horrified and confused to find that they had somehow managed to not notice that this was a boy's dorm room.

Yes, she definitely was not safe in her bed in Gryffindor tower.

Hermione shot upright, hand flying to her mussed-up hair that sat atop her pounding skull. Merlin, her head throbbed worse than ever before; what had happened?

For the life of her, she couldn't remember. There was a gaping hole in her memory, as if someone had cut open her brain and stolen a chunk of it.

But she had been sleeping in a guy's bed, though the guy was currently absent. And obviously if she couldn't remember anything from before, then she'd been drunk the previous night. Anything could have happened.

Hermione swallowed. This wasn't good.

Throwing the emerald sheets off her legs, Hermione stood, albeit unsteadily, her arms wrapping themselves around her shaking body. What had happened? She wasn't sure if she even wanted to know. Most girls didn't wake to find themselves in a strange bed for good reasons.

She had to face this. Behind her as she left the room, snow fell softly past the grimy and unwashed window and a clock distantly chimed seven times. The door closed softly, as if making a ruckus would somehow make the situation all too real and throw Hermione into a chaotic frenzy.

Her fuzzy socks dampened the sound of her footsteps on the damp and musty stairwell. If she could, she'd leave this place without waking anyone or causing a commotion. She'd never been one privy to gossip or drama, and this could ruin her if anyone noticed her presence in what was clearly not her own house.

She didn't need to enter the common room to have figured out that she was in the Slytherin quarters of the castle. The abundance of dark green and menacing black was enough to tip her off, along with the fact that she didn't really have any guy friends in Ravenclaw of Hufflepuff. Where else could she have been?

But the confirmation that this was, in fact, Slytherin wasn't exactly comforting. This was the most rebellious house, the house most prone to do whatever they wanted, to party, to drink, to get crazy. Her suspicions grew into a frightened ball in her stomach, tangling themselves around until she was sure that she'd retch.

The room looked empty, which relieved her slightly, but she wasn't excited to face Malfoy later. Obviously he had to have known about this. What would he say? What would he—

Stop. Think. She needed coffee. Maybe then her mind would stop running at a million miles an hour. It was too early for this, to be thinking, even for Hermione Granger herself.

Looking around, she saw a coffee pot along with tea and milk in the corner of a counter, one close to the entrance to the common room. She'd grab a cup and quickly leave; every moment she was there, Hermione grew more weary and jumpy.

Still shaking, she slumped over to the counter, grabbing a mug with quivering hands. The black coffee fell into it, splashing quietly into the bottom and raising painstakingly slowly to the brim. Usually, Hermione wasn't one to drink coffee without at least a little sweetener, but that day was different. She felt like she deserved the bitter taste on her tongue; she was a despicable human being.

She took a tentative sip, half relishing and half abhorring the spice of the burn on her tongue. This was an awful day already. She needed to get out of here.

But it seemed that fate would have it another way.

"Granger?"

Hermione jumped, yelping in surprise and hissing as the coffee in her mug went from the cup to her own bare hands. She barely caught the coffee cup before it shattered on the floor below her feet.

Setting the mug on the counter and wiping her scalded hands on her shirt, Hermione turned to face Draco. Her pathetic state wasn't exactly helped by doing so.

The last time she'd seen the Slytherin sixteen-year-old without a shirt on, he'd been severely burned all across his chest and a good amount of it had been covered by various bandages and ointments meant to relieve the pain. Now was quite a different instance. He was in no way injured on that early winter morning, actually managing to look quite the opposite.

She attributed her loss of breath to the sudden heat from the coffee and not the sudden heat rising to her face.

She only had half a moment to take in his exposed chest, which—she couldn't help but notice—was much more well-toned than she'd have expected. N-not that she'd thought about it. Why would she have? No, the idea was preposterous.

She only had half a moment because she forced her eyes up to his face. He was rubbing his face with one hand, the other running through his hair, which was pleasantly ruffled. Didn't even look that bad.

It took a while for her brain to process all of this, and then realize what he—shirtless—could possibly mean. Maybe it was how he always slept. Or maybe something crazy had happened, as she'd assumed. Oh no.

"M-Malfoy," Hermione finally greeted, voice a good bit weaker than she'd have liked. Could he read her awkwardness in the simple way she stood? She somehow didn't doubt it.

"Granger," he said again. His voice was groggy from the early morning, as if shrouded in sleep's veil. It sounded nice. His eyebrow cocked as his foggy eyes scanned her over quickly. "How…are you?"

"I…" She was grasping for something, anything to say. What could she say? "I, uh, I'm—"

Not even trying to hide the smirk of amusement on his face, Malfoy pulled on a silk black robe, tying the string around his hips as she continued to find words.

His patience was a notoriously short thing. "Spit it out, would you?"

"Malfoy, I—" Her hands flew to her head, as if clutching at the roots of her hair would help to calm her raging headache. "I don't know why I—I'm so sorry, I just—I can't believe…I didn't mean to…It's like this—"

"Woah, woah, woah." Malfoy waved his hands slowly, eyes scrunching up. "Slow the hell down. I can't understand you most of the time, don't even mention when you're talking at the speed of sound. Calm down. Breathe."

She took his advice.

"Now, tell me what you're trying to say."

She let out a breath. "Look, I don't know what happened last night, but…I didn't mean to do anything. I didn't mean for anything to happen. If I did anything, then I'm so, so sorry and I—"

"Wait." Malfoy had moved around the couch and was now leaning against the back of it, but five feet from Hermione and looking right at her, head tilted. "What are you talking about?"

She swallowed. "Uh, last night. And whatever…happened."

His eyes narrowed in confusion. "What do you think happened?"

Hermione bit her lip and could feel her cheeks grow hot. She didn't say anything, just gestured between them slowly.

There was a moment of palpable silence before the boy processed what she was insinuating. It seemed in slow motion that his face lit up into the widest grin Hermione had ever witnessed from him and he bent over in hysterical laughs. His hair flopped over his face and his silk robe fell off his form slightly so that Hermione could easily see down his flat chest. Not that she was looking, obviously. Preposterous.

"You—" He broke off into bouts of laughter yet again. "You…you think…you think we—?" He straightened again, hand against the backrest of the sofa to keep himself steady.

It was several minutes before he had composed himself. All the while, Hermione stood there silently with a dully plain look on her face.

"Granger, no," Malfoy assured, hands rubbing his face again, as if he was trying to physically wipe the smile from it. "No, nothing happened."

It seemed too good. "But…I woke up in your bed. And I can't remember anything! I must have been drunk. Also, you were, you know, shirtless, and—"

He shook his head. "I let you sleep in my bed because you passed out and I didn't think leaving you on the floor would have been appropriate. And I always sleep without a shirt on." He smirked at her. "I like my skin to breathe."

She ignored the comment and nodded, considerably calmed down. "Okay, but I still can't remember anything. Why?"

"Yeah, uh." It was his turn to be awkward. "Things did get a little…tipsy. We played some muggle game called truth or dare and I dared you to drink two shots of firewhiskey. It didn't exactly end well, as you can imagine."

Hermione tutted, fists on hips. "Malfoy, firewhiskey? How could you?"

"I know," he admitted, small smirk on his face. "I don't know why I thought you could handle it when you can't even handle butterbeer."

She rolled her eyes. "I was referring to—"

"Stealing from the elves, I know. You've already chastised me for it."

Hermione smiled slightly. "Well how would I know? I can't remember."

He shook his head in amusement. "You're crazy. But…no, okay? Nothing happened. I wouldn't do something like that, especially if you were drunk. You can trust me."

She let out a breath. "Thank goodness."

There was an odd pause before he said anything more. "So…you don't remember anything from last night? Anything at all?"

Hermione bit her lip and looked at the ground, straining her aching mind. Now that she thought about it, she could think of a few things. "I recall…getting here. And talking about television. And something else, I think, but that's it." At his expression, she shrugged. "Alcohol and I aren't a good mix."

He huffed. "Yeah, I know."

Their conversations seemed to constantly be peppered with awkward silences nowadays. This one was no different, as could be expected.

"Er," Hermione cleared her throat. "Well, thanks, Malfoy. Even though I can't remember most of it, I'm sure I had a great time last night."

He laughed, a short bark of one. "Yeah, you'd probably agree with that statement if you could remember it."

What did that mean? She blinked in subtle confusion. Had something happened that he wasn't telling her? The statement sounded quite broad, but in a way that made it sound like he was hinting at something or not telling her the full truth.

But before she could ask, Malfoy said, "I'll see you around."

"Alright. Bye."

She left, forgetting her mug of lukewarm bitter coffee behind. Hermione didn't feel like she needed it anymore; the morning had been such an odd one that it wasn't necessary for her to be more awake than she already was.

She just wished she'd been soberer the night before so she could remember everything that had happened. She was almost certain that he was hiding something.

But then again, if it was important, he'd have told her. Why wouldn't he? They were friends. There was nothing he couldn't tell her.

That was what friends were for, after all.


2000 words exactly. So aesthetically pleasing.

Go check out The Aspen's Screech! It's pretty lit!

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