Draco Malfoy gets into his dorm and flops onto his bed with a dreamy sigh – not unlike a 14 year-old girl would do. He stares at the green silk that hang from the top of the four-posters, his eyes slightly glazed over as he thinks about her, even though he knows he shouldn't be. He barely even registers when the door to the dorm opens and Blaise Zabini slips in, leaning against one of the posts at the end of his bed with his arms crossed. Malfoy lifts his head to look at him, noting his untucked shirt.

"Who is she then?" The other boy drawls, no emotion on his face.

"Who is who, Blaise?" Malfoy asks, keeping his face blank and his voice bored. He knows exactly how Blaise would react; he would immediately recoil away from him and call him that horrible thing – a blood-traitor.

"The girl you're so starry eyed for, obviously." Blaise isn't as good at creating a blank face as Malfoy is, and so the corner of his lip lifts slightly into a one-sided smirk. "And I know it's not Pansy, so don't try to tell me it is."

Malfoy groans and lets his head drop back onto the bed, the soft mattress making an almost silent thud as his head hits it. "Why can't you just let me be happy?"

"Because you're Draco Malfoy; you're never happy."

"And you're Blaise Zabini; a nosy bastard."

Blaise chuckles, pushing from the bedpost and sitting on his own bed, opposite Malfoy, who was now rubbing at his eyes with the heels of his hands, groaning. He pulls his hands away and rolls his eyes when he sees Zabini now sitting opposite him. "Can't you just bugger off?" Zabini smirks.

"Well, we know she's a girl who probably doesn't like swearing that much – since when did you say 'bugger' instead of just going straight to 'fuck'?"

Malfoy pushes himself up so he's leaning on his elbows, glaring at his friend. "I'm trying to be polite, Zabini."

"So she likes politeness?"

"No, my parents just raised me well, unlike yours." He rolls his eyes again, before quickly adding: "And there is no she."

"You're a bad liar, Malfoy."

Malfoy doesn't answer; he just flops back on the bed, picking up his pillow and chucking it at Blaise, who deftly catches it with a laugh.

"Just tell me who she is, mate."

Malfoy wrinkles his nose. "Since when did you say mate?" He places his hands behind his head, crossing his legs at the ankle.

"Don't try and change the subject." Blaise tosses the pillow back at Malfoy. It lands on his chest, and he wraps his arms around it, hugging it to himself. "You girl – obviously there's someone, or you wouldn't be acting like this."

"You don't know what I act like." Malfoy's voice is muffled in the pillow as he cuddles it.

"You're forgetting we've shared a room for six years now, and I've been with you nearly every day for those six years. But, no, you're right – I totally don't know what you act like."

"How do I act then?"

"Like an annoying, spoilt prick most of the time."

Malfoy lets out an annoyed groan as he pushes the pillow against his face.

"It'd be a lot easier if you just told me."

"Why do you want to know so bad anyway?" Malfoy snaps, flipping the pillow off his face and sitting up. His legs swing over the side of the bed, his boots planted on the floor. "Trying to make a move on Pansy? Like she'd want you."

Blaise frowns, and Malfoy realises he's said something wrong as he sees the anger flicker across his friend's (or maybe ex-friend's) face. "What's that supposed to mean? I'm inferior to you in some way? I knew you hated Mudbloods, Malfoy, but I thought that was too low of a thought for even you."

Malfoy holds his hands up, waving them a bit in a way to say stop, I've messed up! "No, no, Blaise that's not what I meant – I meant that I don't think Pansy is going to move on from me easily." Still wrong; Blaise's fists curl as he glares at the blond boy across from him. "No! I mean-" Malfoy lets out a noise of frustration. "I mean, you know how long we've been together. I mean that I don't think she's going to want to move on so fast. Not that anyone is moving on. Not that we're breaking up, or anything."

"I can't believe that you think you're better than me, over a girl. A girl you hardly show any interest in anymore, at that."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I've seen the way you roll your eyes behind her back. How you look like you're being held at wand-point whenever you hug her. And when she kisses you, you look like you're going to be sick."

"So you're a pervert? Watching couples?" This makes Blaise chuckle, and Malfoy feels the fear in his chest loosen a tiny bit – he might not have lost Blaise as a friend just yet.

"It's obvious to anyone with two eyes!" Blaise reaches across the gap between beds and punches his friend in the arm. "Even Theo's noticed something's up, and you know he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer."

Malfoy sighs and rubs his arm, annoyed that the punch had just reminded him of Granger the night in the owlery, where she'd caught him off guard and 'dead armed' him. "Is it really that obvious?"

"Horribly," Blaise nods wisely. "Now tell me what's going on."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I just can't," Malfoy snaps.

"Do you not trust me?"

"Look, Blaise-"

"Either you tell me, or I start taking notes on how you look at and interact with all of the girls in our year."

Malfoy groans, rubbing his face before running his hands through his hair and tugging on the ends. "I don't want you to hate me."

"After your comment earlier, I don't think it's possible to hate you any more than I do already." The smirk on his face says otherwise – which only makes it hurt more. Malfoy held Blaise above the rest, as he was the only one who didn't go around blindly following everything he said or did, and his lack of respect made him admirable in Malfoy's eyes. If Malfoy really believed that Blaise already disliked him, he wouldn't have any qualms with telling him. But instead he knows that if he says he's going to lose one of his closest friends. And he can't even imagine that happening.

"It's…" Malfoy quickly scans his brain to think of a pure-blooded witch that Blaise would approve of. "Daphne."

Blaise's eyebrows shoot up. "Greengrass?" Malfoy nods slowly, internally yelling at himself for picking her. "I'm impressed."

"Yeah, that's… That's her. Daphne Greengrass." He hopes Blaise will see the warm pink tinge spreading across his face as embarrassment of having to admit his childish crush, and not the frustration and anger it actually was at his lie.

"Well, maybe crack on and break up with Parkinson. Then you can be with a girl that doesn't make you look like you're going to break something whenever she touches you."

Malfoy nods again, hoping the way he's pulling his hair isn't noticeable. "Yeah, I'm just trying to think of the right time to do it, that's all." He stands, moving to his trunk and pulling out a black dress shirt and black dress trousers, then a fluffy green towel with an embroidered M along the bottom. He picks up a bottle of shampoo and a bar of soap from a drawer in his bedside table. "I think I'm going to…go in the shower or something." Almost as an afterthought, he grabs his belt from his bedside table before he hurries into the bathroom that connects to their dorm.

He locks the door behind him, dropping his clothes on the counter as he leans heavily against the door, eyes closed as he calms himself down. Reaching over with long fingers, he turns the shower on, undressing as he waits for it to heat up. Before he steps in, he unravels his bandage, biting his tongue to keep himself from screaming when the horrific image comes into view. He throws the bandage on top of his clothes, climbing into the shower and letting the water run down his back, both hands pressed against the tiled wall in front of him, his head bowed. The soft white-blondness of his hair turns darker and heavier as the water soaks it, and he begins to lather it in shampoo until it becomes a foamy mess. He pulls his hair into a mohawk, head banging to an imaginary song (at least a song that doesn't exist in wizard music, because he doesn't know if music like this exists for Muggles – a small part of him hopes it does) as he cleans his body with the bar soap. The water soothes the muscles in his arms and back from the flying; the steam soothes his headache from his fluctuating temper and mood.

His eyes linger for a second too long on the Dark Mark as he rubs the bar up and down his arm. He shakes his head to snap himself out of it, quickly rinsing the shampoo mohawk out of his hair, slicking the now dark blond hair against his head. He steps out of the shower and clears the condensation off the mirror, an unexpected laugh escaping him when he sees his hair plastered back. He's reminded of when he was in first year – using unnatural amounts of product to achieve that style, without realising how idiotic he looked (he had thought he looked rather cool). He aggressively dries his hair with the fluffy green towel, flinging his head back and smiling at his reflection, now with his preferred hairstyle – messy, yet somehow still well-groomed.

Once dry, he pulls on a pair of green boxers (he hates seeing himself completely naked in the mirror), then stands back to look at himself before dressing. He notes the dark circles underneath his eyes from his lack of sleep, and how his cheeks look just a tiny bit more gaunt than usual. He sighs, rubbing his eyes in frustration. This mission was going to kill Malfoy before he killed him.

He shrugs his black dress shirt on, buttoning the long sleeves up first before the actual buttons on the shirt. He won't need the bandage on this shirt – there's no way anyone will be able to see past the cuffs. The shirt is just the right kind of tight and he smirks to himself in the mirror. He doesn't know why he's getting dressed up for this silly –friendly – meeting; he tells himself it's to make him feel good, not for her. The trousers are next, his shirt tucked in as he buttons and zips them. With the shirt tucked in, his slender figure is accentuated, and he feels a little bit better about himself (not that he's self-absorbed – he just likes the way he looks (which is rather self-absorbed)).

He tightens the belt around his waist, then his watch around his wrist. He pulls some black socks on, and leaves the bathroom; the shampoo and bar soap (dried using the hot-air charm) go back in the drawer, the fluffy green towel (still slightly damp) gets hung on one of the bed posts, swapped for a black blazer. He throws his dirty – not dirty dirty, but used – clothes into a chute in the corner, sending the clothes to the laundry. They'd reappear on his trunk in the morning; after six years he still didn't know how they were cleaned.

He picks up his wand and makes for the door before he hears Zabini's low drawl from the bed. "Where are you off, then?"

Malfoy doesn't turn, gripping the handle. "Just…out."

"Well, have fun… Out." Malfoy tries not to pull apart Blaise's tone. He tries not to worry about the insinuation of the sentence.

"I will, thanks." He swings the door open, escaping the dorm and Blaise. Letting out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding, he pulls on the blazer, tucking his wand neatly inside it, before leaving the common room and starting down the corridor. He doesn't know where he's going. The watch on his wrist tells him it's just gone quarter to 6 – he doesn't know where the past few hours have gone, but he doesn't care.

In just over an hour he gets to see Hermione Granger again.

And he can't keep the smile off his face.