Disclaimer
I do not own any of the characters in this chapter, except Sniffy, but I got the idea of a genie from the book. I also used a song by Michelle Branch, "Everywhere", towards the end of the chapter. And remember, read and review!
In the previous chapter
Draco pulled back from the one-sided hug and knelt down before her. He wasn't ready to give up now, even if she was. A million thoughts about why Hermione was suddenly so afraid of him ran through his now scattered mind. Then, illogically, he picked the most ridiculous and unlikely one.
"I wouldn't hurt you," he ventured slowly, knowing for sure that he had certainly gone in the wrong direction.
Before he could switch directions, Hermione's face gave her away. God's truth, it was the most ridiculous and unlikely conclusion that was the truest.
"I really wouldn't. Trust me." And that was it. He had said the two words that he thought always meant nothing to him. He swore never to use those useless words; he had given an oath under his father's name and his only witness to that oath was his father himself.
Hermione's heart warmed at the last two words. 'Trust me'. She looked up at those gray eyes and tried to see the warmness in it. She could definitely see it. But the fact that intrigued her was that she saw another dark shadow lurk behind the brightness of the optimism.
So, instead of saying that she trusted him, which was true, she said nothing and placed a feathery touch on his chest, where his heart was situated at.
"Trust yourself, Draco," she whispered.
Everywhere
She had fallen asleep in his arms beside the waterfall. As he heard the sounds of the water plunging into the plunge pool and felt the steady rhythm of Hermione's breathing, he closed his eyes in all tranquility of it.
He felt totally at ease and his mind consciously wandered back to previously, when Hermione had said nothing about trusting him and instead, had asked him to trust himself. It was the most peculiar thing he had ever encountered. He had never had anyone try to contradict him. Now, there was just too much distractions to contradict him.
When Hermione didn't say anything about trusting him, he thought that his heat might somewhat just tear apart. Then, he suddenly thought about the shyness possessing Hermione, and it might be that she was just too embarrassed to say she did trust him. That thought brought his mind rest and peace, and brought his unsettling soul hope, too. He kept repeating that thought in his head, as if to convince himself totally. He almost did. But he knew that he still needed to hear the words himself. Yet Draco would not force her into saying something that she might not even want to say. He refused to let himself think that way. The possibility of that being true was just too great, and there was the other possibility to think about: his heart might just give way.
After harboring these thoughts, he gently carried her in his arms and walked back to the beach. It was actually late evening now. He couldn't imagine that they had spent half of the day together peacefully. Months and years ago, he would have thought that it would be impossible. Now, it didn't seem so unreachable anymore.
Hermione hadn't even stirred in her sleep as Draco carried her to the beach. She had slept peacefully. She did sense movement, though, but was unwilling to budge or move out of her comfortable position. In her subconscious mind, she reminded herself that she was in Draco's arms, and in the past, she would have shouted an unholy blasphemy right in his face. Now, she just wanted to whisper sweet nothings in Draco's ears. And hoped that Draco did the same to her.
It was a willful wish, she knew. That would never happen. It was almost impossible, she thought. The both of them were just too stubborn and set in their own ways. To comply with each other, one of them, or even the both of them, might have to bend. But Hermione knew deep inside that she was an unbending person, and that Draco had as much capacity in him as her to bend to other peoples' wills.
Hermione didn't know how long had she been sleeping for, but as she slowly opened her eyes, the first sight that greeted her was so beautiful that she thought she was still dreaming. She opened her eyes to see the beautiful sunset. The horizon, amazingly, was red and gold blended in the most unusual way. Usually, it was red, orange and yellow, and in that order, too. Now, it was red, gold and bright yellow, all together and looked like a mixed pastel color. Hermione smiled at the sight before her and turned to find Draco sleeping beside her. Actually, his head was resting on her shoulder. Hermione was just too fascinated by the wonderful sight to notice the weight of his head on her right shoulder.
She started tapping his shoulder slowly and gently. He didn't respond to her soft touch. Hermione tapped his shoulder once more, and Draco finally awoken and turned his full attention to her. Hermione's face flushed again as she saw Draco's face just inches away from hers.
"I-"
"Shhh…" Draco put a long finger to her lips and realized that her lips were shivering, as well as her body.
"Cold?"
"Nay." She shook her head and smiled. She didn't want to admit that she was cold; she was afraid that Draco would make her go back to her hut. She didn't want to leave these beautiful scenery just yet. This was ridiculous, she knew, as in her hut, she would see the exact sight displayed before the both of them now. But, somehow, she knew that it would feel a different way.
"Yes, you are." He smiled as he moved closer to her. Eventually, they were sitting together so closely that their hips touched. Draco suddenly turned and hugged her tightly. He thought he was being crazy, but he didn't care.
Hermione let out a gasp of surprise and after a moment of hesitation, she draped her arms around his slender neck and sighed softly.
"What's wrong?" Draco asked gently.
"Nothing." Hermione shook her head, brushing her hair against Draco's face as he breathed in the scent of her hair. He thought it smelt of rose-petals but didn't tell her so.
Hermione suddenly thought about what happened the other day and shivered when she thought of how close Draco came to hitting her.
Draco noticed her shivering and asked her if she was still cold.
"No… I-I just thought about the time… when you were about to hit me…" she couldn't finish her sentence, saying that she knew for sure that he wouldn't hit her before she felt him tense up. The muscles in his neck were so tensed up that she could almost see the veins. He suddenly pulled back so quickly that Hermione felt that her arms were going to be detached from their sockets.
"I don't hit women," he said, tone hard and cold. His eyes were back to being as cold as the slab of stone they were both sitting on now.
"I-I didn't mean to…" Hermione started, knowing for sure that she had said something wrong to make Draco so angry at her or whatever she said.
"Just shut up and go back to your hut." Draco snapped and walked back to his hut. Just like that; Hermione felt as if history were repeating itself. She felt like someone had just poured a whole bucket of cold water on her.
"I will not cry." Hermione told herself repeatedly, as she struggled to get down from the high rock. How did I ever get up here in the first place… when I can't even get down now? She thought dejectedly. Then she remembered that she didn't even get up there by herself. Draco had carried her up there. That thought was not comforting.
Finally, she got down, and sprained an ankle. Still, she managed to keep the burning feeling at the back of her eyes to herself. She kept her chin up and walked back to her own hut, trying to retrieve and maintain whatever pride she had left. She tried to sleep, by tossing and turning, but as soon as one tear escaped from her eye and rolled down her cheek without her notice, she began sobbing once again.
The next day, Hermione felt it difficult to even look Draco in the eyes. She had thought it over during the night. Why should she cry for this stupid, brainless person? It just wasn't worth it. She should just live her life the way she used to live it.
She also thought about the mixed feelings she felt and was sure that Draco felt the same way. She figured that it was most probably because they were the only two people on the island, if you didn't include the dumb genie, who had hid in his bottle the whole time yesterday since morning. And since they were both of different sexes, it was only natural to have these kind of mixed feelings towards the other partner.
Hermione also felt something else; she couldn't walk properly that day. She remembered spraining her ankle yesterday night but she never thought that it would hurt so much the next day.
For most of the day, she just simply hobbled and when Draco tossed a casual glance at her as she was hopping on one foot. She simply refused to admit to him that she had sprained her ankle.
She didn't know she had such a strong character, or rather, stubborn character, as she hobbled around that day, collecting foods like breadfruits and fruits like bananas. The island seemed to have plenty of them.
She also ventured further into the sea in the late afternoon when she saw a big brown thing floating on the sea foams. It was low tide, so she decided that it was safe going out into the sea. She saw that the big brown thing she saw was actually a trunk. A big brown trunk. She pulled it in with all her might and didn't care if she got wet. The trunk was so heavy, she nearly collapsed with fatigue after she moved the trunk onto the shore, even with a bit of help from the swashes of the sea tides.
"Oof!" she said as she heaved the heavy trunk onto shore. "Finally…" she muttered. She observed the trunk carefully and found that it was locked. She wanted to scream in frustration.
It looked like a Yale lock; she tried picking it with her hair pins and tried every other way of getting the lock open, but it still wouldn't budge. The lock was so damn heavy too, so heavy that Hermione swore that most of the weight of the trunk she had endured came from the lock.
From a fair distance, Draco saw the stubborn headed woman finally give up and walk over to her hut to get the bag of necessities. She looked as if she was going for a bath and Draco swore that she took a bath for at least five times a day. She wasn't even dirty, for God's sake.
As soon as he saw that she had gone to the waterfall, he walked out to the trunk and observed the lock. He smirked as he found that the lock was almost similar to the locks on the trunks in Hogwarts. He knew exactly how to unlock it. One could see the smirk on his face even if he was standing from a hundred miles away. It was that big.
Draco walked away from the trunk, deciding not to open it yet. Let the woman try, he thought to himself, she had enough guts and strength to bring it in; she should be able to open it.
That night, before they settled down for dinner, Hermione let the genie out. She didn't want just the two of them for dinner.
She took out the corkscrew and looked into the bottle through the opening. "Are you coming out or what?" she said impatiently.
"As soon as you move that piece of chocolate," the genie replied, with equal impatience.
Hermione wondered what he was talking about and finally realized that he was referring to her eyeball.
She smiled and moved back. A mist of purple and yellow smoke emitted from the opening and Sniffy came out of the bottle.
"What is it that you want?" his voice had a bitter edge to it, probably because Hermione didn't let him out for a day or two already.
Hermione frowned and said, "I have a good mind to put you back into the bottle, Sniffy."
Sniffy sniffed. "Humph. See if I care. Just DON'T call me Sniffy anymore."
Hermione shrugged. "Already did." Then she sat down by the campfire and asked if Sniffy needed to eat at all.
"No. I don't need to eat anything."
"I wish you would talk as much as you ate." Hermione grinned.
"Humph."
"Now… does Humphrey sound nicer than Sniffy?"
Sniffy gave Hermione a good glare before saying, "Please put me back into the bottle and don't call me out unless you have a wish for me to grant." Sniffy sniffed.
"All right, all right. You don't have to be so unaccommodating. I was just looking for someone to talk to…" Hermione grumbled.
"Fine. We have talked. Please close the bottle tightly after I leave. Thank you."
The genie returned back into his bottle and Hermione closed it tight. And that also meant that dinner would only consist of the two of them once again.
Draco had gone to bathe again. In order not to have any more awkward moments between them, she took her share of bananas and breadfruit and sat down on a spot on the sand quite far away from the campfire.
After a few minutes, Draco came back and was drying his hair with the GREEN towel when he saw that Hermione was sitting out there on the sand with her food. She had already started eating.
Draco sat down by the campfire and started eating as well. He knew what she would do if he had sat down beside her. She would suddenly jump out and run away. And to his utmost surprise, Hermione could run fast. That was one of the things he had learnt about her after living with her on a deserted and isolated island for a few days.
The silence was overbearing and Hermione was sure that Draco was already back from his bath, even though she did not turn to make sure if he was there. She just assumed and hoped she assumed right. Although she hated that guy, she didn't want anything to happen to that pigheaded ferret.
Draco knew he was at advantage as he could eat and watch her all the time, without her knowing it. She couldn't do the same, though. Draco also knew that that girl had too much pride to turn around and see if he was back from his bath. He learnt so when he saw today that she had sprained her ankle and hobbled everywhere.
She had finished her dinner and was about to get up from the sand and take another bath, she saw another amazing sight.
On the eastern side of the water, every few seconds, there was a group of porpoises arcing one by one over the glassy sea, making white, foamy sea spray when they hit the water.
Draco remembered the fist time he'd ever seen a school of porpoises leap from the sea like that. These was something sobering about it; the realization that other things lived on the same earth, an awareness that humans weren't the only things trying to eke out a life. Some long-buried part of him had reacted in awe.
Watching them now, he relished it because he hadn't felt that way for so long. Too damn long a time.
He sat there, soaking up the freedom to do whatever the hell he wanted. He watched the porpoises, something that in the past few years he's forgotten existed.
With an overwhelming sense of bitterness, he wondered what else his father had stolen from him. In the distance he could hear sea auks crying from the cliffs. Their keening didn't sound like the call of birds but rather the cries of people that had been tortured under his father's hands.
He thought about what happened the first time he caught sight of porpoises. His mother had brought him to the beach and he had seen it, feeling the same awe he feels now.
Then his father had ruined it all by coming to the beach and dragging the both of them back home. If that was what home looked like. On the way home, he said nothing to Draco's mother, but kept yelling to Draco that he should stop seeing these sort of stuff, that these creatures, "beasts" he had called them, were useless things and the less Draco saw of them, the better.
Back home, his father gripped his mother's arm so hard that Draco swore he could see the bruises forming. Not only that, but his father had dragged Draco's mother down to the dungeons and Draco heard his mother's anguished cries as she got whipped by his father.
At that time, he was only seven.
Now, he was in seventh grade, old enough to know what went on in his father's bedroom at night when he passed by; old enough to realize that his mother had been tortured since he was born, if not longer; old enough to know that nothing lasted forever, not even marriage. And their marriage had been seen under the eyes of God.
Turn it inside out so I can see
The part of you that's drifting over me
And when I wake you're never there
But when I sleep you're everywhere
You're everywhere
He had grown up to be a bitter person, a bitter son. He knew better than to involve himself into any relationship. In school, girls had thrown themselves to him, just because of his family wealth and his looks. Nothing more. They never knew what was underneath the façade, underneath everything.
Just tell me how I got this far
Just tell me why you're here
And who you are
'cause every time I look
You're never there
And every time I sleep
You're always there
Now, as he watched Hermione walk over to the waterfall for the fourth time of the day, he suddenly felt scared and vulnerable. He feared that this would be the only person, the only girl, that would unveil his mask, the mask he has been putting on successfully for years to come. He wouldn't let anyone do that, least of all, her. He just couldn't make himself convinced that she might be the only one that made him believe that he wasn't alone in this world.
'cause you're everywhere to me
And when I close my eyes
It's you I see
You're everything I know
That makes me believe
I'm not alone
I'm not alone
Yet what he didn't know was that Hermione had already crept up quietly and entered his heart without his notice.
I recognize the way you make me feel
It's hard to think that
You might not be real
I sense it now, the water's
Getting deep
I try to wash the pain away from me
Just as Draco was thinking more about the past, he heard a scream. And it came from the waterfall. He ran like the wind and cursed himself for not being to run fast enough, fast enough to get to Hermione in seconds.
From a distance, he saw Hermione struggling for awhile in the water and picked up speed. His legs pumping, he reached Hermione, panting, as she reached the edge of the water and was clutching onto a rock with a death grip. Her face was whiter and grew whiter as she saw Draco near her.
She screamed and Draco tossed her the pink towel, and turned around as she put it on. In the water.
"Are you decent now?" he decided to bait her a little.
"Barely." Hermione panted.
Draco turned around, though, and felt his smile disappear as quickly as it appeared on his face when he saw Hermione's look of fear and saw her struggling to make it to the pile of rocks.
Draco didn't care if she was dressed; he quickly rushed over to help her out. She didn't decline his offer to help, either. She was in too much pain to care much about her appearance. Once he got her onto land, she winced at the pain that shot through her body. It seemed to come from her ankle.
Luckily, she already had her towel wrapped around her. She had managed to wrap it around her body in the water. She didn't care if it was wet; she would just dry it during the night. She stole a quick glance at her clothes and to her utmost dismay she saw that her underclothes were visible; they were right above her other clothes. Although they were clean, she blushed furiously when she thought about Draco would react to seeing her underclothes laying like that on a piece of rock.
Draco raised his eyebrows as he saw Hermione blushing. That girl could blush anywhere, anytime, he thought amazingly.
He followed her gaze casually, and felt his own face flush as he saw her underclothes. Her bra and well, her, pants were right on top of every other clothing of hers.
He quickly turned his attention back to her ankle as he felt a blush creep up to his own cheeks.
He slowly rubbed the ankle back and forth. "Does it hurt?" he asked softly, wondering if his efforts to rub her sore ankle were too strong.
Hermione shook her head, amazed at how gentle he was with her ankle. She thought all guys used brute strength in everything.
After awhile, her ankle felt better and not so sore anymore. She thanked him quickly and rushed over to her clothes. By the time she had folded her clothes neatly and managing her blush at the same time, Draco had already left with his own blush, just that she didn't know it. She was too busy with her own clothes to notice his face.
'cause you're everywhere to me
And when I close my eyes
It's you I see
You're everything I know
That makes me believe
I'm not alone
I'm not alone
'cause you're everywhere I see…
Do you see me…