CHAPTER 1

The Head Prefects dorm, middle of September 1997

Hermione Granger sat with her heels kicked up on the desk in front of her in the Head Prefect's dorm office. She wobbled her toe back and forth as she tapped her wand on the stack of paperwork on her lap. Another joyous Friday night locked up in the tiny hellhole that was her office. Well, not entirely hers. It was shared. Otherwise, it might have even been tolerable, to methodically sort out the papers and dole out the duties in her own calm manner. But she had to wait for her unfortunate roommate in order to begin, and he was late, again. But what should she expect, of all people.

She grumbled to herself as she leaned forward and grabbed another chocolate quill from the box lying on the counter. Absently chewing on the edge, she picked up the first report sheet on the top of the pile.

The joys of being Head Girl. A position she had coveted from the first day she had read of it in Hogwarts: A History. Truthfully, she had cried of joy when she had received the letter informing her that she was selected for the honor. She had shed plenty of tears of disappointment after reading that paragraph. Especially when she had read the lines directly afterwards that proudly listed her partner and year-long roommate, the Head Boy himself:

"Malfoy."

The blond had appeared at the doorway, his book bag slung over one shoulder and his hair wet. "I'm here."

Hermione gave him a look to kill. "You're late. Again."

The Slytherin glanced at his wristwatch. "I'm 14 minutes late. I told you, practice might run long."

Hermione's mom had baked her a cake and everything, back in late July when she had gotten the letter. She had her read it in front of the entire family, Grandma included, and was so ecstatic until she had reached the name of who she'd be serving alongside.

See, it was a complicated situation.

Draco Malfoy was something else. His father had been arrested back in the 5th year for embezzlement, initially, until it was discovered that he was working directly with the Dark Lord to try and commit mass genocide. After Lucius Malfoy was sentenced to the Dementor's Kiss along with the rest of the elite of Voldemort's army, Draco transformed from the school prick to the resident tragic bad boy. And everyone at Hogwarts ate it up.

Hermione considered herself to be alone in the opinion that Malfoy wasn't anything special. In fact, she still thought he was a total prick. Just because his life happened to take a bad turn didn't make up for the fact that he was an insufferable bully for so many years at school. He had never really apologized, just stopped one day. But that wasn't enough for Hermione and the pride she took in that slap back in the 3rd year.

So she had boarded the Hogwarts train with her Head Girl pin on her robes, the normal nervous butterflies in her stomach supplemented by a vague ill feeling of dread at what the coming year would entail. The first few days had been unbearably cold and awkward. There were guidelines to establish, student bodies to address, and paperwork to fill out. At first, they would barely acknowledge each other.

Now she had been living with him for almost a month. They had settled into a sort of rhythm, one where they really didn't interact much save for their office work. They had their respective friends come visit, but their rooms were soundproofed so it wasn't an inconvenience. They were able to live their separate lives, peacefully, within the confines of the dorm and leadership positions they shared.

Enough so, at least.

Malfoy looked down at the desk, his eyes landing on the open box of sweets. "You know, being a few minutes late does not give you permission to eat half of my chocolate quills."

Hermione shrugged indifferently. "The box was open."

"Well, so was your panty drawer this morning, but I refrained from taking anything." Malfoy pushed past her to his own desk on the other side of the room. Hermione was grateful he was walking away and couldn't see the burning crimson of her cheeks.

"Very funny," Hermione quipped flatly to try and hide any embarrassment. Curse that one drawer that never seemed to stay closed when she was in a rush in the mornings. She made a mental note to move her underthings to a different compartment in their shared bathroom. "Anyways, we just have a lot to do tonight and I'd like to be out of here sooner rather than later."

"Tell me why we have to work on a Friday night again?"

Hermione blinked at him. "Because you were busy every other night this week."

"Fine. Well, let's get this done then. I have places to be."

Hermione handed him his half of the paperwork. "First matter is we've got to finalize the schedule, but we've got lots of conflicts this week because of exams."

"Can you believe they're already shoving exams into our faces? It's fucking September."

"We're a month into school."

"Time flies when you're having fun," Draco said dryly, glancing up at her while biting the edge of a chocolate quill.

"Time has never gone slower for me," Hermione muttered. She looked back down at her notes. "Anyways. Once we finalize the schedule, we have citations. Justin Long's missed 2 patrols already, so he'll be on probation. Then we've just got to… file the reports."

"Got it. Well, I'll leave the schedule to you, since you seem to like that kind of thing. Here," he said, scribbling something on the sheet, "are my conflicts. I'll take the later shift those nights if you take earlier. Makes it easier on both of us."

Hermione grabbed the sheet from him, scanning it. "You really can't do anything next Saturday?"

Malfoy shrugged, snatching it back from her to scrawl something else down on Friday night. "It's game day."

"So?"

"So? It's Quidditch."

"It's time we could be using on all these hours we have to do."

Malfoy chuckled degradingly. "Is it enough I give my precious Friday nights to you, love?"

Hermione scoffed at his name-calling. As her cheeks filled with color again, she reminded herself that showing him her frustration was only going to encourage him to keep mocking her. "Just let me know when you want to have these sessions next time. Let's try to keep it consistent, though. You know my schedule conflicts by now."

"Fine. Can we do paperwork now?"

Hermione waved him off. "There was nothing stopping you before. Give me that schedule."

As they began on their paperwork, creating alternate stacks in the middle of their desks for the other to review and sign off, Hermione paused for a moment between papers to observe her roommate's state. His hair was slightly damp, most likely from the Quidditch pitch locker showers. It was frustrating that she had to share Head Prefect duties with someone who had prior obligations to a school sports team, but she was glad that it took him out of the room, and consequently her sight, for entire evenings and days at a time. Plus, she thought he looked much less insufferable with his hair loose and unfettered by product, which was his usual look-

But that was completely besides the point.

"Granger?" Malfoy said without looking up from his work.

"What?" she snapped.

"If you take a picture, it'll last longer."

Hermione curled her lip in disgust to hide her humiliation. "I'm making sure you're not doing them wrong."

He looked up. "We literally have to review and sign off on each other's papers. Besides, my record with reports is spotless. But the staring is a little unnerving whilst I'm trying to work."

"I wasn't," she muttered as she quickly returned her eyes to her own work.

"Anyways. I'm wondering… if we could put off the filing until tomorrow," Malfoy said after a moment.

"Why?" Hermione asked, setting another completed sheet down in front of her on the desk, unable to keep down the fluster of irritation rising up in her voice. "You've got a hot date or something?"

A pause. "Maybe I do, maybe I don't," Malfoy responded.

"Is it that Greengrass?" Hermione pried nosily, looking away feigning disinterest. She had seen the tall blonde in the hallway of their dorm numerous times, and it was always a rather uncomfortable experience. Who knew what she and Draco did behind the closed doors of his room.

Malfoy raised his eyebrows as if he were thinking about it, then shrugged. "Maybe."

"Very descriptive."

"May I ask why you care so fucking much?" Malfoy said, leaning forward in his chair to set down his last report sheet on his desk.

"Because you're trying to put off filing the paperwork we're already a week behind in," Hermione said, leaning forward to grab his completed stack and gesturing to the small stack of unfiled paperwork piled up on a box in the corner.

"I don't understand why we have to manually file that shit anyways. They're just going to destroy it at the end of the year. No one looks back at it."

"It's important," Hermione argued. Bureaucracy, the natural order. That was important.

Malfoy leaned back in the chair, twirling his quill. "I say we just add up the paperwork until the end of the semester, and then file it all at once."

"But-"

"What difference will it make? Honestly?"

Hermione scratched an itch on her nose, probably a hive forming from the fury of being in proximity to the ferret. "I think that's a bloody ridiculous idea."

"It's just so dreary. Think of all the setup we have to do with boxes when we file. It could all just be done at once."

"And what if McGonagall asks for a file in the meantime? What if we have to go back to check something?"

"Then we file things then, if that comes up."

Hermione frowned, looking at the stack in the corner. "Are you stupid?"

"Admit it, it's a bloody good idea." Malfoy stood.

Hermione must have hesitated too long, or shown some sort of expression on her face, because Malfoy grinned smugly. "So we'll just keep them stacked over in that corner then." With that, he picked up his already-twice-checked sheets and set them on top of the current pile. Hermione winced.

"Fine," Hermione said, admitting in her own heart that filing reports according to the Head Prefect system was the most dull and meaningless work she had ever been tasked to do. "But if something comes up, I'm telling McGonagall it was your idea."

"Bet," Malfoy said, snatching up his cloak from the back of his chair.

"You still didn't tell me what the huge rush is." Hermione shifted. "No hot date?"

"Wouldn't you like to know," Malfoy said. "Not tonight. But maybe tomorrow," he said, adjusting his cloak around his shoulders.

"You're really not going to tell me," Hermione said.

"No," Malfoy said snarkily before turning around and brushing out off the office, the portrait door to their shared commons clicking closed behind him in just a few seconds. Hermione stared at the unfiled paperwork in the stack in the corner and, sighing, chucked her finalized reports on top of the stack.

It was definitely not the last of bad decisions she would be making this year to compromise with the one and only Head Boy.