"I'm sorry, what?" said a very surprised Hermione, into Draco's bent-over face. She had leaned back almost as if she could not comprehend what was happening.
Draco moved back. Granted he thought the music is loud. But I was pretty damn loud that time.
He leaned over once more, "I'm sorry, Granger. I was out of bound." He had walked in, and made his first apology with sincerity colouring his features, but now he looked like a misplaced toad somehow.
"What?" Hermione said again, surprised still marring her face.
"Scoot over Granger" He asked, unable to keep his usual gruffness aside.
"Can you stop being so awkward. I'm pretending I can't hear you. Please fuck off."
Draco was far too affronted to do anything except glare at her.
Hermione did not have the good decency to blush.
"Close your mouth, you look like a trout." Then she drank her beer and turned away from his offending form.
Draco suddenly remembered why she was bullied in school. He did the most he could, mumble something about her obnoxious hair and fuck right off. He went and sat with Adrian and Blaise.
Then he went and got himself extremely drunk. He went up to Hermione, and with absolutely no context, pointed his thumb out at her, and said, "Someone needs to give this bitch an orgasm."
It was all far too loud. The few people immediately around her, who happened to include Neville Longbottom and Harry Potter, looked around.
"How do you put up with him every day," Harry slurred to her, barely looking at him.
"A lot of fucking beer." Again she was glaring at him.
"Are you volunteering Malfoy? Because honestly, I prefer masturbating."
Draco blushed hard. She had pushed every button he had. He took a step back, wanting to tear her hair. Then an accidental piece of magic went off, and a single lock of Hermione's hair caught fire. She slammed the only book around on her head, and the fire went out.
Everyone was looking at them. Him and her. Her sitting down, entirely too calm, he crouched over their table roaring about a bit.
Hermione stood up, "Let's take this out." She held him by his arm and pushed him forward, and then yelled out, "I'm sorry Tom."
When they were on the magical side of Leaky Cauldron, Hermione let go of his arm.
"What on earth is the matter with you Malfoy?" She asked, arms crossed.
"Me? You can't be serious." He said to her. "You've been driving me mad all fucking week."
"Me? Well wow. Didn't you try to apologise to me today?"
"In the hopes that you would too." Malfoy spat back.
"What fucking for?"
Draco felt that if he didn't calm down just then, he might flip upside down. He step back, looked away from this idiotic witch, and took a calming breath.
"You're impossible to work with." He stated for her plainly.
"Ahh. And that's why you think you have some kind of birthright to go around talking about my orgasms. Fuck off." She turned right around, taking her first steps back to the bar.
Draco held her arm. He could not comprehend how a witch could wake every violent desire in him, in a way even Voldemort could not. He turned her around.
She shoved him off.
"Look Granger. Enough." He let go of her arm.
"I handing in my two weeks," He said to her.
.
"Look, Kingsley sent me here. To apologise."
"Well then, let's hear it."
"That was it."
"Hardly compelling."
"It will have to make do."
Draco didn't want to push his luck much, so he said nothing for a moment.
Hermione sat down across him.
"We can't go on like this." He said to her.
"Don't pretend it's my fault." She said.
"Some of it is."
He was stood up now, wringing around his arms.
"What the fuck have I done now?"
"Can you just give me fucking chance?"
Again silence.
"When haven't I?"
"Since I got here Granger. You haven't let me do a single thing here."
"You don't want to." She said.
Another silence, their voices were getting less loud.
"Who told you that?" Draco said, truly shocked that she might think this.
Hermione now finally, after weeks of losing her temper at everything Malfoy had dared utter in her presence, she had shut up. She knew she wasn't exactly trying to impress Malfoy, but surely she hadn't been so bad.
"What do you want Malfoy?" She asked, still defensive.
"I want to know why the fuck you hate me, is all."
"Well, catch yourself on, as if it weren't obvious."
It was now Draco's turn to shut up. The Dark Mark that was slowly beginning its fade itched a bit on his left arm.
"Look I know okay. I have been trying to apologise." He said to her, surprisingly sitting down, leaning into her wide face a bit.
"Malfoy, enough. I don't want to hear it. I know you want to apologise. And yeah I believe everything I said at your trial. But I'm not ready for that. That's not what this is about." She said.
"Please come on." Draco said.
"You've basically been treating me the same way you used to in school, minus the mudblood stuff."
"As if you aren't."
Hermione had no response, she hadn't considered herself the aggressor in any of these situations. She could perhaps admit she had rebuked him almost every time he said anything to her.
"Look hey, I get it. It's not your fault. Don't worry, I'll talk to Kingsley. Tell him my resignation is about something else entirely."
Hermione looked like a deer caught in headlights.
.
"I thought you resigned after all," Hermione said, walking into his barely ajar cubicle. She looked like she was trying to make truce.
"I told Kingsley that it won't work. But he insisted on knowing my reasons that he then promptly solved." Draco said.
"Stuck with me after all," he said when she said nothing.
She handed him the manilla folder, "Here's the next object."
Today, she didn't seem curt. She almost seemed apologetic. His irritation waned a bit. Maybe they were finally around for a different day. Generally, she began his day with curtness, which he then exalted with passive aggression until by the end of the day they were both outwardly hostile. He had called her bitch only that time at the bar.