To most it had seemed like the first month of the school year had passed quickly, but to Hermione it had been the longest four weeks of her life. She was exhausted from a lack of sleep and the amount of homework. Harry and Ginny were annoying her now more than ever because of their ignorance and it physically hurt her now to be around Ron. She half wanted to make things right again with him but she was also afraid that things would only continue getting worse with Ron and then she would feel even more trapped than she did now. The worst part, Hermione thought, was the only person who seemed to be paying the slightest bit of attention to what was going on with her was Draco Malfoy and Hermione knew he didn't actually care. He'd gotten even more distant with her over the past week, though occasionally he would hear Ron say something rude and he would say something. She missed her parents more and more each day, though all she could do was pester McGonagall about whether or not they'd been found. It had been months and they were still missing; she was beginning to get worried. Well, more worried than she had been in the past.

Every now and then students would come up to her, complaining about something or another. At the weekly meeting with the Delegates Hermione would explain what little she could actually remember; not sleeping messed with her memory. At least she had someone coming up to her though; every student in the school avoided Malfoy unless they were trying to pick a fight. She'd witnessed that plenty of times, though she didn't want to sound bossy so she always walked away. She told herself that if their situation had been reversed, he wouldn't defend her either. God knows he would probably join in just to make sure she knew he didn't like her all that much. At this point in time Ron would probably join in too, picking fun at her hair, her frown, and her breathing. He hated that she still did that; breathed. He hated that she was still speaking and that her heart was still beating in her chest too.

Hermione blinked and set her fork down; Harry, Ron, and Ginny had been in the middle of a heated yet playful argument about quidditch teams and she hadn't listened to a word they'd said. All she wanted to do was finish her dinner so she could go to bed; she'd been fighting to keep her eyes open all day. Yet they were staring at her expectantly and Ron was beginning to look irritated. "Don't tell me you've gone dumb, Hermione," he said, a smirk on his face that could rival Malfoy's. "Your brain was the only attractive thing about you,"

"Oh shut up you shitty excuse for a human being," Hermione nearly choked on a sip of water she'd taken at the sound of Malfoy's voice. So much for him not defending her all the time; she was almost sure she should have expected him to hear a comment like that.

Ron's ears quickly went red and Harry and Ginny tensed; another fight was sure to come if Malfoy didn't walk away. Hermione knew that no matter what happened she would be left feeling awful; the only thing she could think to do was rest her elbows on the table, her head in her hands, and her shoulders slumped. She desperately wanted Malfoy to walk away because she knew how much Ron would yell if he thought Hermione was even talking to him regularly. "Don't tell me you find her attractive, Malfoy," Ron sneered. Hermione wished, briefly, that Harry or Ginny would stop the impending argument in its tracks, though she knew that wouldn't happen.

"I never said I did," Malfoy muttered; Hermione knew that a smirk was growing on his face by his tone; he always smirked when he sounded like that. Faintly she could have sworn he'd said, "Though I never said I didn't either," but Hermione couldn't be sure. She went red anyway. "Plenty of people find her attractive though, Weasley. You should hear the way people talk about her. Damn, Granger looked hot today," he said mockingly. "What I wouldn't do to get her in my-"

Hermione was horrified at his words; no one actually said that, did they? But no one was as horrified as Ron. "You shut your mouth about her!" he yelled, standing up from his spot at the table.

"Why, so you can say worse things?" Malfoy challenged.

"I would never say anything that bad!"

"You've wished her dead you stupid-"

Hermione looked up in time to see Ron lunge across the table; she scrambled out of his way as he punched Malfoy in the nose. Malfoy swore loudly and shoved Ron away from him. Ron pulled his wand out of his pocket and directed it at Malfoy and for once Malfoy didn't look so confident. Ron wasn't that bad with spells and he'd improved a lot before the battle. Hermione took Ron's slight hesitation as an opportunity to whip out her own wand and shield Malfoy with a simple spell. So much for her not defending him either. "Will you two stop it!" Hermione said angrily, well aware that McGonagall was standing up and preparing to storm over and yell at the three of them. But Hermione wanted to get her words in too; she wanted them both to know how sick of their behavior she was.

"Are you defending that sick bas-"

"Shut up, Ronald," Hermione said angrily. She was far to tired to deal with their pettiness at the moment and while she knew Ron would be furious that she hadn't stood up for him, she didn't care. At all.

"No I will not shut up; you're supposed to be my girlfriend-"

"Am I really? With the way you're acting, I had no idea that we were even still together," she spat venomously, her eyes narrowing as she stared at his shocked eyes. A quick glance at Harry and Ginny told her all she needed to know; they were not going to be on her side for this fight. Their glares at her and Malfoy were already proof that they would side with Ron. "Quit acting like a two year old," She turned her back on Ron then looked at Malfoy, frowning slightly. His nose was bleeding and he was occasionally wiping his nose with the sleeve of his robes; at the same time he seemed to be avoiding her gaze to the best of his abilities. "Are you okay?" she asked quietly, wishing she didn't really care about the blood that was slowly making its way out of his nose.

Hermione barely heard Ron speak, but she did realize that he'd used a spell on her when she went flying over the Ravenclaw table and landed between the Ravenclaws and the Hufflepuffs. There was a furious shout from Professor McGonagall and Hermione stared at the ceiling, feeling nothing but shock and a bit of pain coming from her arm. She was dazed and winded from being thrown onto her back, but all she could think of was that Ron had used a spell on her. Ron had gotten angry and hurt her, on purpose. After what seemed like an eternity, Hermione stood up, her eyes watering as she looked at the boy she was supposed to be in love with. And then she almost laughed.

Draco Malfoy looked absolutely furious and he had his wand pointed at Ron's throat. He was yelling and while he wasn't particularly angry that Hermione had been thrown, he was still angry. "Even I bloody well know not to hurt a woman, hell, apparently everyone knows that but you, you fu-" Hermione tuned Malfoy out for a moment. She knew what word he was going to use and she hated it; it was vile and, in her opinion, shouldn't have ever been invented. "-bet you get off on treating girls like they're nothing, you sick pig-" She stopped listening for another few seconds; she couldn't believe what Ron had just done and by the shocked expressions from the rest of the hall, they couldn't believe it either. Add in the fact that Malfoy was throwing an absolute fit and the rumors were bound to start flying by morning. "-an absolute disgrace of a human being," Malfoy finished, somehow with more anger than when he'd started.

McGonagall finally got to the two boys, but Malfoy completely ignored her furious words and made his way over to her. "Come on, Granger. Now, we're leaving," he instructed, pulling on her sleeve instead of her hand. Hermione knew he didn't want to touch her, but at the moment she was too busy staring at Harry and Ginny's angry glares to care. Her friends were glaring at her, not at Ron, yet she'd been the one to be thrown halfway across the room. Well, maybe not halfway, but close enough. Hermione couldn't even begin to understand why her friends were mad at her but she knew it would have something to do with her and Malfoy; they had to be furious that he'd stood up for her and she'd stood up for him in return.

Malfoy was half dragging her through the corridors and Hermione didn't think to ask where they were going; she was surprised enough that Malfoy was actually attempting to do something nice for her that she didn't speak. The walk felt like it took years because Hermione's mind was too busy replaying what had happened in the great hall to realize that they'd stopped by a painting of a bowl of fruit. Her mind was too busy trying to figure out how she would be able to stay with Ron to put up an kind of protest when Malfoy forced her into a small chair in the corner of the kitchens. She was too busy thinking to tell Malfoy that she absolutely hated coffee when he demanded it of a house elf. And when the hot cup was placed in her trembling hands, she was too busy wondering what in the hell was going on with Malfoy to make him stare at her so intently. "I swear, Granger, if you think this means anything-"

Hermione stood up suddenly, her hands trembling worse as she narrowed her eyes at Malfoy. He blinked in surprise and stared back at her, his lips slowly forming into a sneer. "Leave me the hell alone," she said angrily, suddenly feeling defensive. Ron was the one who had hurt her, yet she was pretty sure Malfoy was the one she was going to fight with. Hermione shoved the hot cup of coffee into his hands and it came dangerously close to splashing onto him. She knew she would feel bad if that happened, but since it hadn't she really didn't care. "I don't know what you thought you were doing, defending me up there or bringing me down here, but it was incredibly stupid,"

His jaw fell open and his eyes narrowed; he looked quite silly in her opinion, but she had no desire to make whatever was about ot happen worse by mentioning it. "What are you talking about? Didn't you hear what that prat was saying to you?"

"Of course I heard what he was saying-"

"Obviously you weren't listening very clearly, Granger-"

"I heard what he said," she protested angrily. "I hear it all the time from him and I don't need you to start-"

"If you didn't notice I was saying that he was wrong-"

"I don't give a damn what you were saying," Hermione said, frowning deeply. "Just because you've got some odd thing this year about making sure Ron's not incredibly rude doesn't mean I need you calling him names or acting like you actually care about me,"

"I wasn't-"

Hermione laughed coldly and narrowed her eyes. "I don't need you lying to me, Malfoy. Did you honestly think you could say I wasn't acting or whatever was coming to you mind and I wouldn't be able to see through you in a matter of two seconds?"

Malfoy was silent for a moment and he stared at her, his pale cheeks turning pink as his own eyes began to narrow. "Why I ever try to do anything nice for anyone-"

"Oh, was this supposed to be nice? Getting into a fight with Ronald and then bringing me down here, telling me that if I thought your actions meant anything then I was going to be sadly mistaken?"

"Well what else did you expect, Granger? You hate me, why on earth would I want to try very hard with you?"

"I told you last week that I didn't hate you; if you think that then it's not my fault!"

"How the hell am I supposed to believe you, Granger? You've never done anything to-"

"Well I trusted that you wouldn't make a complete ass of yourself and you didn't give me any reason to think that either!"

"Oh, I made a complete ass of myself? Your bloody boyfriend was the one who punched me and he was the one who sent you flying across the room. What did I do? I told him that he was wrong-"

"You made him angrier than he already was!"

"That didn't give him the right to throw you across the room, Granger!"

"As if you actually care!" Hermione yelled back, feeling desperate as she stared wildly around the room. The only thing that kept her from crying and screaming at Malfoy that he was right was the fact that she'd just locked eyes with a house elf with bright green eyes and was instantly looking at a dying Dobby. She blinked and saw Bellatrix Lestrange's cruel smile. Hermione whimpered loudly and pulled up her sleeve; she was sure an invisible person was carving into her arm and she swore there was blood again and all she wanted to do was scream. She looked at Malfoy, who was looking at her in confusion, because she was hoping that he would keep her grounded again. But that wasn't going to work. Because he was there, the night it happened. Draco Malfoy was there the night Hermione had almost lost her life to Bellatrix and staring at him only made her tremble in fear. She didn't know why, as she didn't blame him for that night at all, but logic wasn't coming to her at the moment.

"Granger what's-" Malfoy asked, his tone confused and without the anger it had held a few moments before. Faintly, Hermione began to hear Ron's screams for her, and she fought to ignore them. She couldn't pretend that Ron still cared about her like he had back then, not after the way he'd been treated her. Bellatrix's cold laugh rang in Hermione's ears as she looked around the room for the quickest exit. Malfoy was blocking her path, though she was sure she could shove past him if she used most of her strength. "Shit," Malfoy whispered, dropping the hot coffee on the ground and reaching out as if to grab her shoulders, but he stopped himself rather quickly.

Hermione almost wanted to agree with him. Yes, that was the perfect word to utter at that moment. She was about to have a full-fledged break down in front of Malfoy. She hadn't ever felt like this on the rare occasions that Harry, Ron, or Ginny was around for one of her hallucinations. Why did it have to happen around Malfoy, of all people? She'd rather be with Neville; he would at least try to comfort her and make her realize that none of it was real, that the battle was over, that pain wasn't filling her body because Bellatrix Lestrange was torturing her. But Malfoy? He seemed to be struggling with a lot of different things in that moment that Hermione couldn't think about. He wouldn't try to make her feel better, not at all, in fact despite his behavior on the matter in the past four weeks she was half sure he would laugh at her. "Please, I-" she managed as the fake Bellatrix came to stand right at Malfoy's shoulder with her wand raised. And in a weak voice Hermione whispered words that she hadn't heard herself say for months. "I didn't take anything, please,"