Disclaimer: I don't own it. I shouldn't have to say that before every single frickin chapter...
Last time on LGG:
"You find me more desirable than Harry?" Pansy was about to laugh and say something along the lines of 'hardly'... but something made her look Ron over. He really wasn't all that bad... and, complimenting could put him under her control... yes...
"Oh, very much so..." she replied seductively, taking a step forward and running a finger down his cheek. "Meet me in the Astronomy tower... midnight tonight..." Ron visibly swallowed and nodded. Pansy smiled. "There's a good Gryffindor," she said, followed by a sultry kiss to his pouty lips. When they broke apart this time, Ron questioned her.
"What was that for?" She smiled, bringing her lips close to his ear.
"Insurance."
~*~
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN:
On Saturday, a week after they'd arrived back at school, Hermione was sitting cross legged on her bed in the head girl's room, surrounded by text books and pieces of parchment. Slacking off over suspension was proving to be more of a mistake than originally thought. She was just finishing an essay for Herbology when Draco blatantly burst into the room, forgetting to knock. Hermione jumped, started, and looked up. The look on Draco's face caused the impassive line of her lips to curve downward.
"Draco...?"
"Is there something you want to tell me, Hermione?" he asked, voice cold and incriminating. Hermione was, above all, confused.
"Draco, I..."
"Don't play innocent... just... just tell me," he demanded, although his voice lacked power. The cold was still there... but it wasn't as piercing. He sounded as if she had ruined him... cut him deeply...
"Draco, I really don't know what you're talking about..." she replied truthfully, but Draco didn't see to believe her. He turned his face away as if she'd slapped him.
"I can't believe you..." he hissed before throwing a manila folder at her. "I thought you were different." Without even waiting for a reply, Draco left, leaving Hermione to gape after him. Confused beyond reason, Hermione opened the folder, slightly nervous as to see what was inside. When she did see, however, she gasped and covered her mouth. A pile of pictures, all moving, displayed Ron and what appeared to be her in a very... provocative position.
Furrowing her eyebrows with an angry frown, Hermione leapt off her bed and bolted directly for Draco's door. Surprisingly, it was left open, giving her a clear view of him, sitting on the windowsill with one leg hanging outside. Hermione approached him and threw the folder and photos on the floor.
"Don't you have ANY faith in me at ALL?" she asked, but Draco didn't turn from viewing the landscape.
"I used to," he admitted and Hermione gave a frustrated groan.
"How can you possibly believe this? That is not me in those pictures, Draco. It's not," she insisted, and he turned to her, eyes cold, but said nothing. "Think about it. Who sent you those?"
"That's irrelevant. The fact is, you've been caught." Draco shook his head. "I can't even look at you right now."
"We have a lot of enemies, Draco. Among them, Ron."
"Your point, please."
"Another, Harry." Draco said nothing. "The most recent... Pansy." At this, Draco turned to her. "I highly doubt Harry would sleep with Ron, whether it be to hurt me or not... but Pansy, on the other hand." Draco shook his head, lips pursed and eyes narrow.
"What are you trying to do, Hermione?"
"It doesn't take an idiot to figure out what's going on here. If you take one second to look past the surface, you'd see it too."
"All I see, is what I see. Coupled with your past, it's unsurprising." At this, Hermione slapped him. Draco teetered a bit, but caught himself before falling out the window.
"How dare you," Hermione hissed before turning and stalking out of the room. Draco watched her go, ignoring the prickle in his cheek, and then opened the folder again. He felt a familiar stab of heartache as he looked upon the evidence. There was no denying it. That was Hermione... the girl even had the same twist of erotic pleasure in her face.
Surprisingly, Hermione burst back through his bedroom door a minute later, with her wand pointed directly at him. Draco lifted his eyebrows, slightly scared.
"Finite incantrum," she said, then lowered her arm. She'd realized that Pansy wouldn't be as smart as she'd originally thought, and would have forgotten to make her charm unbreakable. Hermione opened her mouth to speak again, but stopped herself and shook her head before turning back and storming down the stairs.
Draco was left confused. He'd really thought she was about to curse him... or at the very least, obliviate. With a sigh, he looked back down at the picture in his hand.
"Gah!" he quipped, dropping the photograph as if it had been aflame. The bronze and shapely Hermione Granger had morphed into none other than Pansy Parkinson, dark with artificial tanning charms and substantially less enthusiastic about the sex than the pseudo Hermione had been. Draco snapped his face back toward the door. "Oh, dear god..."
~*~*~*~
Draco looked for hours, but found no sign of Hermione. He checked the kitchens, bribed a first year to let him into the Gryffindor common room, and even resorted to knocking on the Heads' door. When Harry answered wearing only boxers, with hair mussed, no glasses, and lipstick smudged all over his face, Draco had turned and fled without another thought. After this, he'd checked the library, asked any passing ghosts, and sat by the lake for hours, just in case she'd decided to visit Arviragus. At about midnight, he called it quits, climbing back up to the loft and checking her room. The door was wide open, her homework still strewn across the bed, and everything else untouched. She hadn't even returned after he'd left. Feeling entirely guilty and put out, Draco climbed into bed and stared at the ceiling. Never had he more wished she was next to him.
~*~
"Hermione," asked the Ravenclaw prefect as she exited the bathroom she shared with her boyfriend, drying her short red hair with a hand towel. "Are you going up to breakfast?" Hermione gave a quiet laugh.
"No," she said bluntly from her cross-legged position on a desk chair that was situation right in front of a window. Mandy sighed.
"Do you want me to bring you back something?" Hermione cocked her head to the side, eyes still on the landscape.
"Just some toast would be great," she replied dreamily, and Mandy nodded sadly before grabbing her wand and starting toward the door. "Mandy," Hermione said again, turning around this time. Mandy stopped and turned back, autumn eyebrow arched over her black framed glasses. "Thanks. For letting me stay and... everything." She gave her classmate half a smile.
"What are friends for, right?" Hermione smiled. "What I said last night still stands, though. I don't know what you're fighting about, but I know you guys were practically written in the stars. Whatever happened couldn't have been that bad." Hermione turned back to the window.
"You don't know the half of it." Mandy shook her head and left the winery, expecting Morag to be asleep for quite sometime more. She closed the door behind her and started to breakfast, pondering the fight which she had been informed had broken out between the other prefects. They'd seemed so in tune with each other... it was a surprise they fought at all, much less separated because of it.
When Mandy reached the Great Hall, she was unsurprised to see Draco sitting at the very end of the Slytherin table, which was closest to the doors, and sighed at the eager look upon his face at hearing the door open. He seemed disappointed, but nonetheless stood from his seat and approached her. Being a loyal friend, Mandy pretended not to notice and started toward the Ravenclaw table.
"Mandy, wait," Draco called after her and she sighed, but turned around anyway. She couldn't very well ignore the boy. "Please tell me you've seen Hermione," he pleaded, and she frowned.
"Sorry, Draco." Mandy started away, but he gently caught her arm.
"Wait... do you know where she is? You don't have to tell me where," he asked again and, unable to resist helping him, Mandy sighed.
"Yes, I do... but I promised not to tell, and I intend to keep it," she reminded him, before wrapping two half-bagels and two pieces of toast in a napkin and starting back toward the doors.
"Is she writing?" Draco asked as she passed her, and Mandy stopped, turning back with a confused look about her.
"What?"
"There's this black leather notebook... does she have it? Is she writing in it?" His voice sounded panicky, as if it were there was a life hanging on her answer. Mandy slowly shook her head.
"No, not that I know of," she admitted, which greatly relieved Draco. In fact, he visibly slumped his shoulders and closed his eyes. "Draco, what happened?" He sighed.
"Well, I... I sort of... accused her of something she would never do, and...well... I messed up..." Mandy gave him a lopsided smile, as if she felt sorry for him.
"She can't avoid you forever, you know. We've got class tomorrow." Draco nodded.
"Yeah... I guess you're right." Mandy left him with that, and returned to her room. Draco thought better of going after her, and simply suffered out the rest of breakfast, before returning to the common room. He was no fool; it was obvious Hermione was in the winery. So, Draco staked fort. In the common room. With a perfect view of the downstairs entrance. Hermione didn't come up; she spent all of Sunday down there. Mandy brought her food, but that was all the evidence to her presence there was. Draco slept in the common room that night, simply because he fell asleep while on watch.
When he woke on Monday, it wasn't quite light yet. Deciding against going back to sleep, Draco ventured to the loft once again, but stopped dead when he breached the stairway. Hermione's door was closed. She had to have come back... Without another thought, he approached the doorway and knocked. There was of course, no answer.
"Hermione?" he called and knocked again, but was replied with only silence. With a sigh, he cracked the door open. Her homework was gone, as well as her bag, and Hermione was nowhere to be seen. Draco shook his head and closed the door, then retired to his room to ready himself for a surely hell filled day.
~*~*~*~
Draco purposely skipped breakfast in order to make an early appearance in potions. Hermione would have to be there at some point... and she would have to sit next to him. However, he didn't expect to see her the moment he entered. At six thirty on a Monday morning, Hermione was in Potions, her books stacked neatly on her desk and essay on the table and ready for handing in, while she knelt over the chair in front of her.
"Hermione," Draco said, coupled with a relieved sigh. She pretended not to hear him. Draco dropped his bag by his seat and stepped toward her, but Hermione stood and moved to the other side of the table, but Draco stepped in front of her. Ignoring him, she tried to maneuver around, but he caught her arms gently. Hermione turned her face toward his, eyes narrowed.
"Let me go," she demanded, but Draco simply shook his head.
"Come on, talk to me... please?" he pleaded, then added "I'm sorry," for good measure. Hermione gave a little "hugh" and crossed her arms.
"For what?" she challenged. "For accusing me, ignoring my denial, or making me angry?" Draco winced slightly at the bite in her voice.
"Erm... everything?" Hermione rolled her eyes and pushed past him. "Hermione," he called again, spinning around and watching her lean over the other chair at the table. "I think you're expecting too much from me... I'm just a stupid guy... when I'm sent a picture of my girlfriend... my fiancée... fucking another man, all common sense becomes irrelevant and I believe what I see. I know I'm an idiot."
"Insulting yourself, although amusing, really isn't going to make me feel any better," Hermione said, shaking her head. "You don't even get it, do you? You have no idea why I'm not forgiving you." Draco, still frowning, took a moment to recap before slowly shaking his head. Hermione scowled and stood from her crouch, task forgotten. "Allow me to enlighten you," she insisted. "Coupled with your past, it's unsurprising." Draco's jaw dropped.
"What?" Hermione shook her head.
"Don't even bother, Draco. We both know what you said, what's done is done," she turned back to her chair and fished in her pocket.
"I didn't... did I?" Hermione gave him a sharp glance. "Oh... shit..."
"What would happen if I started judging you by your past, Draco? It wouldn't be all shits and giggles then, would it?"
"Hermione..."
"Really, it shouldn't bother me much, should it? You've insulted me a thousand times before, and frequently with much harsher words," Hermione recalled as she poured a vile of blue liquid over the chair and watched it fizzle and disappear.
"I..."
"But this was different, Draco," Hermione informed as she turned back to him. "This time, I loved you. You can't possibly begin to imagine how much worse that feels... when the person spiting you is the one person you would give your life for. The one person you want to spend your life with. It hurts, Draco. It hurts a lot." Assuming another sorry would be spited, and somewhat inconsiderate, Draco instead focusing on another aspect of her rant.
"Loved," he recited, and she turned her eyes to him.
"What?"
"You said loved. I loved you. That's past tense." Hermione, although she knew exactly where he was going, gave a nod and returned to her seat, right behind the chair she'd defaced.
"Yes, that's true."
"But you still love me... I know you do... we're stronger than this," he said, but his voice sounded much more pleading than insistent. Hermione regarded him with a raised eyebrow. "You're still wearing my ring," he pointed out in one last attempt, and her eyes snapped to her finger. Indeed, the little platinum ring was nestled snugly on her finger. She'd twisted it a good many times over the last forty-eight hours... but never even toyed with the idea of removing it.
"Of course I still love you, Draco, don't be stupid," she said, inwardly smiling at the immense sigh Draco gave. "Now sit down, before Arenz and Gouvas get here." Not needing to be told twice, Draco retook his seat beside her.
"What did you do?" She smirked slightly.
"What were we planning to do?" It took Draco only a moment to remember their plan... the hemorrhoid glue. A slow smirk crept across his face, but disappeared a moment later, only to be replaced by a lifted eyebrow.
"Do you have any more?" Hermione although confused, nodded. Draco smiled and got out of his chair, then gestured to it as if welcoming her to his home. Hermione, who understood but was still completely confused, lifted both eyebrows. "You don't even have to forgive me afterward... just to make you feel better." Hermione laughed.
"You're serious?" Draco nodded. She shrugged. "Alright then." Draco watched as Hermione poured a vial of purple liquid into his chair, which pooled in the center like a puddle of grape juice, and gulped. "Well?" Hermione prodded, amused at the dreadful look on his face. With a small sigh, Draco closed his eyes and retook his seat, much to Hermione's amusement. She laughed out loud, provoked merely by the expression on his face. This made Draco smile, if only because she was happy.
"How long does it take to work?" he asked, realizing he was in no way feeling pain... just a slight dampness... and was perfectly capable of leaving his chair, if the urge should arise.
"Oh," Hermione said, her voice slightly high pitched. "It
works on contact."
"Right..." Draco said, and moved a bit more. Still nothing... maybe it would hit like a whirlwind when he stood up. Best to stay seated.
Hermione kept an amused smile on her face as she watched Draco squirm and look entirely confused. Snape soon arrived to begin the class, and one by one, the rest of the students entered. Arenz and Gouvas, ironically, were the last to step through the doorway, just as the bell tolled.
"Ah, Miss Gouvas, Mr. Arenz. Thank you ever so much for taking time from your busy schedules for potions. Take your seats, and ten points from Gryffindor for being late," Snape said, before turning back to the blackboard he was listing instructions on. Nick and Claire grumbled obscenities as they took their seats, but it was covered by the snickers from the Slytherin side of the room. As their skin made contact with the chairs, a sizzling was heard, followed by the smell of burning flesh. Nick just looked surprised, as if he'd sat on a broomstick, but Claire screamed and stood back up. As planned, the chair stood with her.
The class erupted in laughter, even the Gryffindor, which made it alright for Hermione and Draco to laugh along with them. Hermione was nearly beside herself at the sight, but Draco simply looked confused.
"Arenz! Gouvas! What is the meaning of this?" asked Professor Snape in outrage, but neither seemed composed enough to answer. Claire was in tears, sobbing uncontrollably, and Nick had a pained expression on his face while he stuttered unrecognizable words. "Alright, to the hospital wing with both of you. And fifty points from Gryffindor for class disruption! Settle down, everyone." It wasn't until the double bubble duo had left that the class finally did settle down, and Snape went back to writing ingredients. "Alright everyone, begin." Draco made to get up, but Hermione stopped him.
"I'll get it," she insisted, still suppressing giggles, and made her way to the supply closet.
~*~
What was that? Was the note Draco slipped to Hermione only moments after their potion had begun simmering, and she smiled.
Exactly what we planned it to be. She replied, smirking.
But what about me? He asked and Hermione shook her head.
If you were observant, you'd have realized it wasn't the same potion before you even sat down. Draco stared at the words for a moment, then brought his quill back down.
Then what was the potion you gave me?
Laundry detergent. Now your bum smells like Jasmine and Chamomile. She added with a smirk, and Draco couldn't help but laugh. He covered it with a cough, but it didn't save him from a glare from Snape.
Why?
"I could never do anything to harm that precious Malfoy asset," she whispered, smiling, and Draco feigned flattery. Surprisingly, Hermione kissed his pouty lips before standing up.
"Where are you going?" he asked, still in a whisper, much drowned out by the mumbles around the room.
"We need lacewings, love," she said, before returning to the supply cupboard. Draco watched her with admiring eyes as she made her way over, and then returned to her seat with a two-ounce jar. "Just so you know," she said, "I forgive you anyway." Draco looked confused.
"Why?"
"You gave yourself boils for me... I think that's a quite adequate payment for forgiveness." Draco shook his head.
"I didn't really. I sat on laundry detergent for you, after I brutally insulted and berated you. I think you should still be mad."
"Yes, but you didn't know that," Hermione reminded him. "I don't have to be mad if I don't want to."
"Something you wish to share with everyone, Miss Granger?" Snape asked from his desktop perch in the front of the room. Hermione smirked.
"Only if the class wishes to learn of the specific mechanics of my own personal experience with the human menstrual cycle, Professor Snape. Draco was quite intrigued to learn of my trials with PMS. Should I compose a lecture for next class?" she offered sweetly, and was replied by groans of disgust from all men in the room, including the one beside her, glares from the Gryffindor girls, and giggles from the Slytherin. Professor Snape, however, sighed.
"That is quite enough, Miss Granger. Please conclude your potion as soundlessly as possible," he said, voice soft and tired, as if he had just simply given up. Hermione, as well as most of her classmates, stared at the man in shock. He hadn't even taken house points.
~*~
After Hermione had graciously dried Draco's Camomile bum, they handed their essays directly to Professor Snape, and left the class room.
"Was that the oddest thing that has ever happened, or was it just me?" she asked suspiciously as she hoisted her bag onto her shoulder and took Draco's hand. He grinned.
"Are you kidding? That was bloody brilliant! If I didn't know better, I'd say Snape sort of... fears you."
"Well, I did make him snog McGonagall. That's enough to terrify anyone." Draco laughed and squeezed her hand, pulling her gently toward McGonagall's classroom.
"Hey, Granger!" called a voice from behind them, and Hermione spun around in alarm. A nameless forth year Slytherin, whom Draco would later inform was named Marvin, trotted up to them. "My brother told me what you did in there... it must have been amazing! Is it true, you bested Snape! Not even Potter's ever done that!" Hermione just watched with wide eyes as the scrawny boy pledged his undying worship to her.
"Yeah... erm... thanks," she offered, completely taken aback. The boy grinned.
"I've gotta go... Divination... I just had to come and see for sure. Wow..." he said, then backed away, making it about twenty feet before turning and dashing down a staircase.
"Alright," Hermione said, turning back to Draco. "So that thing with Snape is now the SECOND oddest thing that has ever happened." Draco laughed.
"Hey, you said people would never forget you."
"Yeah," Hermione said, but sounded put out, as if her foot itched to be stomped in disappointment. "But I wanted my own war... not a stupid fanclub." Draco shrugged.
"You can always work your way up."
A/N: