A/N: This was fun to write! Also, I hope it isn't too confusing with the way I wrote this. It's a Reincarnation AU with a tiny twist. Please review and enjoy! :)

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry: Magical Mundane and Literature: Shakespeare and Needle of the Bard - Task #1: Write about two 'star crossed lovers' and the trials and tribulations they endure to be together. Prompt: slipper and coma

Word count: 1,821

Disclaimer: Nope Never Have, Never Will.

Best Thing I Never Had

It's like one of those annoying catchy pop songs that people won't stop singing and humming because they love it so much and don't you? (Even though all they can remember is the chorus.) It's one he's tired of listening to and just wishes would stop and let his ears rest for once. But he doesn't know how to turn it off or get the universe to stop singing the same damn tune over and over again so it stays stuck in his head. It's annoying to the point of death. Better yet, it's annoying to the point that she keeps on dying.

There was this one time where he considers it to be the absolute worst. He had just finished his part time of job at this coffee shop and was walking out the door when he watched her body fly through the air until gravity took over and her body plummeted to the ground, making the ground a beautiful red. He heard the screams of horror and the screeching sound of the truck's brakes on the gravel. Like every other time, it was too late.

He is too late. (Was it the hundredth time that he had to see her die without being able to save her? He isn't sure; he lost track somewhere along the sixtieth.) He hadn't even spoken a word to her. The first time he saw her in this specific lifetime is when she began to fly.

Honestly, he wishes she wouldn't do that. He wants her to stay grounded. He wants to make sure she's at peace whenever it happens. (More like he wants it to not be so painful. Why couldn't her death be peaceful most of the times?) He just doesn't want her to leave this world anymore. Or, and this is a clear suggestion to the universe if anybody even hears his prayers up there, he wishes he wouldn't remember her every time she died.

Unfortunately, the people granting these prayers or wishes entirely ignore him because he remembers every moment of every life they ever shared. The universe, like the cruel goddess that she is, brings them together only to tear them apart. He finds her in every lifetime. Wherever they are, whoever they are, against all odds, Draco and Hermione are somehow linked.

Yet only he remembers. (It isn't fair. You hear that universe? It isn't fair one bit.)

.

"You don't have to be so mean," she snarls, quickly coming to Neville's aid who is currently backed up against a wall by three Slytherins in a corridor. She gives Neville a empathetic look before narrowing her eyes and crossing her arms as she turns to them. "He didn't do anything to you, Malfoy."

Draco doesn't like her for many reasons. That filthy, interfering muggleborn trying to be a little good doer. He growls menacingly, trying to get her to go away. "Stop sticking your nose in everything."

"He's my friend," Hermione retorts, the disgust obvious in her face. She nudges Neville and that seems to be the second year's clue to run away. "Not that you'd know what friends are," she points out, glancing pointedly at Crabbe and Goyle

Draco scoffs, itching to cast the jinx he was about to cast on Neville on her. Instead he settles for calling her mudblood as he bumps his shoulder into hers jerkily when he stalks away.

Why does she have to turn up in everywhere? It's enough that she makes an appearance in his dreams. So Merlin help him, but he's exhausted of those damn dreams plaguing him. He knows it's Hermione who appears every day in those nightmares. (Even before he officially met her which scared him upon actually seeing her somewhere that was not his dreams.) Maybe if he hates her enough he won't feel anything when she dies this time.

.

Of course, he wants these memories to go away. He doesn't want them. Why would he want to remember someone he'll lose anyway? He doesn't know what horrible crime he committed in his past lives for this to happen to him. (The answer is: none. He remembers all his lives. Sure, he's been some awful people, but the first life he remembers is when they're just village children promising they'll stay together forever, that is, until she gets too sick and he stays at her bedside day after day, waiting for her to bounce back and scold him for worrying. Inevitably, she gets worse and worser until he's quietly reading to her one sunny afternoon when she reaches out and squeezes his arm and takes her last breath right before his eyes.

Though his fifteen year old self then couldn't quite understand she left the world. Eventually, her mother had to pry him away from her body because he wouldn't stop shaking her tiny frame. That's the first time he cried.

It wouldn't be his last.)

.

At first, in this identity, he was super confused and couldn't believe what he was dreaming. He understands now what all those dreams mean. He has to change the future. It isn't an option of waiting for Hermione to die again. It doesn't matter that in all of his past lives every attempt to change fate went unsuccessful. All he knows is that he doesn't want to relive those moments again.

Procrastination is his worst habit. He sighs for what seems to be the umpteenth time as he dips his quill in the ink. The library is silent since most of the students are out emoting the sunny day and are not stuck like him indoors. Draco actually likes the quiet compared to noise but this is the stifling kind of silence. It's the kind of silence which makes him want to yell and shout because it's suffocating.

He doesn't. He knows it'll get him kicked out, and he actually wants to finish Umbridge's annoyingly long essay. Of course, it's not like he actually wants to but more like he has to. Or else the nasty old witch would tell his parents and that'll get him in a heap of trouble and lecturing that he rather not hear.

"Oh, no." Draco immediately stiffens because he knows that voice anywhere. He knows it like he knows he back of his hand. He glances up and sure enough the fifth year Gryffindor girl is staring at a book in his pile. "Why did it have to be him?"

"Need something, Granger?" he asks, cutting through her muttering. There's a flash of annoyance in her face before she smiles too big to be real.

"Actually, Malfoy, I do. The book at the bottom of your pile is one I highly need to read. If you could let me borrow it for a bit that would be great." Hermione grins and tilts her head.

"I'm using it," he says back slowly, looking down at his own work. "Well, I will be using it in a bit."

Hermione sighs, her spirit deflating. "Oh, darn it. I'm pretty sure Professor Umbridge's horrid assignment can be written faster with the book."

That piques Draco's interest instantly. He arches a brow. "You haven't finished homework yet? You know it's due tomorrow, right?"

"Of course, I know," she snaps, surprising him by taking a seat in front of him. "It was simple but too simple that it forgot to register in my mind."

He chuckles and grabs the book to slide it across the table. "Well, use it."

"No, what about you?" Hermione asks, taken aback by his gesture, and slides the book back. "I couldn't possibly just take the book."

"This is just like you," he remarks, forgetting that she has no idea what he means because she doesn't have these memories floating in her mind. "Take the book, Granger, before I change my mind."

She glances at it suspiciously, but he can't really blame her either. He would be on alert if she was nice to him. "Thank you."

They work in silence from then on, only asking question to each other occasionally for clarification. Unlike the previous silence, however, Draco likes this comfortable silence.

.

She always surprises him in every life. Whether it be by her death or by her personality. He remembers each sweet word they whispered into the night or every word they exchanged filled with hate. He should be used to seeing her die, right? In a way, he has become used to her death, and in another, he has not.

The time where Draco was part of the mafia and saw Hermione get tortured to death because her family couldn't pay the debt, he hadn't even flinched. The time where they had been school rivals until she died because of a mass school shooting, he had been devastated. The time where he had stumbled across a mermaid and quickly befriended it before his father found it and he watched the greedy men kill Hermione for her blood, he cursed humans. The time where he had caught a flash of a familiar face on the tube then he saw her mangled body on the morgue in front of him as victim number ten of the homicide cases, he had mildly felt guilty before pushing it away. The time where she was had been in a coma and he was the doctor to pull the plug, he did so with regret. The time where he accidentally dropped his slipper onto her balcony and they became good friends just for her abusive boyfriend to kill her, then he cried bitterly.

He remembers, and he doesn't want to feel sad or feel nothing next time she dies. He agrees that she won't be dying next time which is why it comes naturally for him to push Hermione away in the midst of the battle of Hogwarts far, far away from the jet of green light. He didn't warn her away fourth year from the Death Eater's during the Quidditch League just to watch her die again. He is at peace. She will be safe, and he will have had a part to play in it. Even if it's not with him.

He feels his body fall on the floor, and he cries in pain. Is death supposed to feel like he took a face plant to the ground? He realizes quickly that no, he is not dead. His heart stops in place. Was . . . he too late? All of a sudden he feels himself be pulled up face to face with a grinning Hermione Granger. He blinks and opens his mouth just to close it.

"Did you think you can just die in front of me? Don't be an idiot!" Hermione laughs at his stunned expression. "We're both making it out of here alive!"

He blinks again and wants to cry. It feels like the universe, being the cruel mistress that she is, finally decides to change radio stations.