TITLE: A Four Saturdays Detention (6/?)
AUTHOR NAME: smoke
AUTHOR EMAIL: tiziana_spano@yahoo.it
CATEGORY : Romance
KEYWORDS: Hermione Granger Draco Malfoy
SPOILERS: All The Books/All Four Books
RATING: PG 13
CHAPTER SUMMARY: A girl and a boy have fun together, but, maybe, they should learn the language of the other one, and his and her life rules.
DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended
THANKS:
THE BETAS
PERSONAL NOTE: I hope you will enjoy this story.
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A FOUR SATURDAYS DETENTION
Chapter 6 - Third Saturday
Some Things Apparently Worse than Death
(Leave me breathless)
el màs pròdigo amor le fue otorgado
el amor que no espera ser amado.
The most plentiful love was awarded
The love not longing to be loved.
They left the Library, budging cautiously.
They wanted to dodge Filch, of course, but the unease, as well: this time both the students were eager to erase the former explosion, but ... how?
Actually, Hermione was glad. Blurting out what she had thought hadn't really left her ashamed. If she might have had to look for the right word, probably she would have chosen "relieved".
She stole a glance to Malfoy, but he was scrutinising the dark corridor.
Surely he was a good punch bag. Probably he had to, after the so many times her friends and herself had defeated him, in their childhood.
She smiled maliciously in the dark.
After some steps, both spotted Filch's growls coming to their direction.
"Oh no!"
Draco bounced, quick and silent, and grabbed Hermione, trying to pull her into a wide room. But she opposed, instinctively. She was scared.
Oh yes, the Basilisk had scared her to death. Well, quite to death. It had happened during her second year at Hogwarts, and only dumb people don't know what the fear is.
But she had moved on rationally, to face him: a simple mirror and she had bargained Death with Petrification.
It was an acceptable risk: Professor Sprout knew how to handle Mandrakes.
And Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape (yes either him, the elitist old bat) and Headmaster Dumbledore, would have done their best to bring back all the affected students. They knew their job.
And all her rationality, and detecting ability, well, of course they couldn't beat the Basilisk, but, sure, they could give time to everybody. Time and chance to find a good solution.
And Fluffy? Oh Fluffy could really scare you, but, at the end? What was this terrible menace? Three heads, some fangs... Just brutal strength, no brain.
But Filch? Oh my! Filch! That little man, that shadow of a wizard, even a squib, maybe... Filch was the School Authority. A much worse nightmare.
It took her a hesitation glimpse. He was pulling her, and she was trying to make out what to do.
A glimpse.
A glimpse is enough to unbalance a little witch.
A glimpse is enough for a crash on a floor.
Noisy? Maybe not so noisy... Well, let's not start believing into chimeras, thanks.
Very noisy.
A glimpse is either enough to drag with you a not so little wizard.
And, after a glimpse, Mrs Norris was staring at them, with commiseration, her enormous yellow eyes maliciously widened. They could hear Filch panting towards them.
Hermione dropped her glance in scorn. Now Malfoy would have teased her with his usual sarcasm. Ok, this time she deserved his words, whatever they might be.
"Did you get hurt?" he whispered.
She looked at him, surprised, "No."
He sneered at her startled glance, "Better, I want to have the privilege to harm you, with my own hands."
"Very, very, very well... I see two students ready for a punishment..."
"Where exactly do you see them, Mr Filch?"
Hermione simply stared at Filch and Malfoy.
She had not the slightest intention to run after their rambling speeches.
Nothing she could ever tell could avoid the worst consequences. An honestly deserved punishment, a whole bunch of embarrassing explanation, very embarrassing.
The disaster was rambling freely now.
McGonagall, probably, would have felt horridly disappointed (oh yes, her own "I-do-not-want-to-end-this-way", or "I-want-to-taste-something-different" , they didn't appear, suddenly so proper. Now, having to choose between trasfigurating matches into needles for the rest of her life, or being expelled... well she knew perfectly she would like the most).
Ron, oh well, Ron probably would have said something sarcastic and witty. Fraternising with the enemy was dated now, an abused sentence of their fourth year. Now he had gained life experience, and surely a bunch of new interesting verbs. A tartwitch?
Bah! She would have known it soon. Or she would have tasted again the silence treatment.
As to Harry... Well Harry was kept. He would have probably just looked at her in disbelief.
She brought her hands to the mouth. Oh no! A sudden thought stabbed her with unexpected violence: Draco Malfoy was simply a Hogwarts student, just an annoying Slytherin cad. For her he was only the one who called her "Mudblood", nothing less, but nothing more as well.
But Lucius Malfoy, the student's father, belonged to the inner circle of Voldemort's Death Eaters. As far as she knew, Lucius might have been one of those intimate fellows who planned the details of Voldemort's visit to Godric Hollow, that day Harry's mother died and he was gifted the lightning scar.
She felt her stomach contract.
No, facing Harry wouldn't be that easy.
Well, the only thing that, probably, would make her smile, could be Mrs Weasley and her Scarlet Women.
Smile?
Her stomach had a new jump.
No, she couldn't smile, neither for the sake of her life.
Had she forgotten anything?
Oh yes... her roommates' whispered gossips, and those of their gang of nail-files junkies. In the whole a gang of brain beggars, eagerly craving a renewed discovery of moral rigour.
Their discovery, of course, and her moral, obviously.
Well, she didn't care about them; she could easily handle their crawling gossips.
With time.
Lot of time.
She sighed and leaned against the wall, ready to endure everything stoically. Even the simple invention of an excuse (and what excuse then?) made her sick.
She looked back to Malfoy and Filch. What were they talking about? She had lost half of the conversation, she had spotted only the words "torture", "chains", "thumbs". A classical Filch style speech, of course, what else?
Draco was standing against the rocky, with his usual lazy attitude. "So, Mr Filch, you are charging me and the... Mudblood, of what? What exactly?"
Well he was doubtless elegant, even during a shipwreck. Hermione looked at him closely, he was a lot of nasty things, but she had to acknowledge him his aplomb.
More, she was observing his lifted eyebrows and lack of distress: Malfoy had a cosmic shamelessness.
"The questions are up to me, Mr Malfoy. What were you doing in the corridors? Exactly I mean."
Draco sneered with an exasperated glance. "Very well, I am going to be utterly sincere. I had the wish to bring her with me to the Astronomy Tower. Obviously. A good place for a witch and a wizard wishing to share intimacy, believe me, but she opposed... she isn't so ready to make up her mind, and I was trying to push her a bit."
Hermione blushed furiously "What are you saying?" then she covered her mouth. Silence was better than everything.
Filch took Hermione's arm and stared her attentively.
"I do not buy this seductive date of yours, Mr Malfoy. And Miss Granger doesn't look so eager to wander to any Tower with you."
"Because she doesn't know what she is missing."
Hermione suddenly started giggling. The whole situation was simply ridiculous, what was she charged of? What was she guilty of? What exactly?
Let's look at the facts. Well the blatant facts: she had only fall down on the floor, and it was Saturday afternoon.
She had the holy right to fell down on every single rock of this damned school floor, in any bloody school corridor, if she wished it.
About her intentions. First, if every girl who had kissed a boy had to be expelled, this school would have lost quite half of the students. And the other half were the boys, who had to be expelled too, can you hear me, sexist HeadMaster?
Secondly, but not less important, her intentions were only up to her. She blushed.
All right, let's stick to the facts, and nothing more, anyway. And, let's try with cosmic shamelessness as well.
She tilted her chin and took her usual expression of when she knew the right answer to a question.
Filch looked at her suspiciously.
"Mr Filch, I simply fall on the floor. Anyway it is Saturday afternoon, and it is a decent hour, I dare say, to take a walk through the corridors.
Right in this moment I could be in Hogsmeade, having fun in more than one silly way, but I usually prefer to spend my time, here at the Castle, doing something more useful. Till now I was in the Library, where I spend most of my spare time; and now I was leaving the Library, using this corridor, the same corridor I happen to use more than once day by day.
And I can't remember being questioned about my right of trampling on this old floor," the usual Top Of The Class superciliousness was permeating every single word of hers. "I have to assume I must ask for a special permission every time I wish to leave the Library? And to whom must I submit my requests?"
Filch seemed ready to explode, but something was retaining him. The girl was not completely wrong, and she was not acting as a trapped guilty little pet.
Draco interposed, and, respectfully added: "Hissing Parseltongue... Granger looks more and more like Professor McGonagall... Mr Filch, it is just Saturday afternoon. She was leaving the Library, I was in the corridor. And we fall down. Nothing more. I don't wish to do anything forbidden with McGonagall's pet."
Filch thought for a while.
Was it the hauteur of the little witch?
Was it a flash of this same witch, far in the future, like Professor Granger? Or, either, HeadMistress Granger?
Was it the secure laziness of Malfoy?
Maybe it was just the thought that the school was full of easier preys to catch?
Anyway, he let go of the two students.
Hermione headed to the Gryffindor Common Room.
Draco to the Library.
After a couple of corridors corners, she felt a hand grazing her arm.
"I saw you so Gryffindor, so icing... There must be frost on your tongue." He was teasing her, as usual.
"And I saw you very Slytherin, and very... sincere. A twisted truth anyway."
Both burst out laughing, and took a lateral corridor.
They were unconsciously hurrying.
Draco's legs were longer, of course (it wasn't too difficult, anyway). Inevitably they started running. A game.
They climbed hastily the steps to the Astronomy Tower.
He was faster, of course, but she had fun thwarting him, not letting him surpass her.
And when he succeeded overrunning her, he waited to let her try again to cut in.
The staircase was small, it was mostly a game of springs, and feints, sudden crashes and casual strokes.
On the last steps, Hermione was able to pass Draco, she flung off with a triumphant cry, but he grabbed her waist, and they slithered on the shabby floor, together, laughing.
"I was first!"
"I don't think so."
"Slytherin cheater!"
"I didn't break any rule."
"Of course you didn't: we didn't state any."
"You came to the heart of the matter... if you were eager of rules, you had to state them clearly."
Hermione shook her head, but didn't stop laughing. "I am breathless!"
"It takes so little to leave you breathless, Granger?"
He hurled her the pillows. The room was cold: October was near, it had kept raining all day long and yes, you could feel it easily.
The girl was lightly shivering. The rain was still falling down, impossible to enjoy the view: everything was fuzzy and distorted, like being short-sighted.
Draco sat quietly near her.
Hermione, suddenly felt mischievous and glared him upwards: "And you? What does it take to make you feel breathless, Malfoy?"
He smiled to her, amused "I have to worry?"
"No, you shouldn't. You stated so clearly you wouldn't do anything forbidden with MacGonagall's pet."
"Maybe my definition of forbidden isn't the same as yours. Surely it isn't the same as old chap Argus'"
But now she wanted to lead the play.
She started caressing his face.
He let her do. His breath, however, was quite imperceptibly faster. Quite.
Amused by this change in their roles, she gently kissed his neck, hesitantly.
Her lips traced a tortuous path to his shoulders, just where his muscles jointed. She felt him hold his breath.
Draco's hands slowly went up her back.
When he had completely enveloped the girl, gently pressed her to his chest.
She sighed.
Draco let himself lay down on the pillows, bringing the girl with him.
Now she was cuddled on him. Her hair on her shoulders, like a strange curtain cloaked her. It was caressing her face. It was caressing his face.
She smiled out of pleasure. She could feel his arms wrapping her, his hands had reached her shoulders. Warmth was irradiating from his body to hers, through the thick tissue of her uniform, and through all the different layers of tissue she was used to wear. She really enjoyed the feeling of being sheltered.
His right hand was fondling her neck, his fingers rhythmically sinking into her hair.
Beautiful. She would have liked to stay this way, for hours. Now she could really understand Crookshanks and his purrs. Really.
He murmured her something, but she wasn't listening to.
She felt his fingers follow, slowly, so slowly, the track of the sinews of her neck.
Instinctively she moved to ease him to please her, arching her back.
He talked to her again. A question? But she couldn't really listen to his words, trying to follow his reasoning. She didn't want to reflect on anything. She wasn't there for meaningless chit-chat, this thought somehow popped into her brain, making her smile.
She leaned her hands on his chest, and her chin on her hands. And staid there quietly while he was squeezing and rubbing her, like she was a cat, or another family pet.
She felt him lift her chin with his fingers. Their eyes met for a while, she noticed Draco knitting his brows.
She dropped her eyes and kissed his throat, feeling ashamed to use her tongue so freely. Yet, somehow, she was too curious to taste his skin.
She felt him laughing silently.
Suddenly they rolled on the pillows. Now she was under him, surrounded. She was sinking into the cushions, and he was on her. But his weight was not crushing her. With her hands she caressed his hair, unsure. She could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin, his mouth was following the line of her jaw, his hands... his hands?
Suddenly she felt scared.
She stiffened and tried to push him away.
Her hands fought suddenly against his chest, but he was heavy. Until now she hadn't been aware of how taller he was, how stronger too, maybe.
Surely.
Hermione felt herself panicking, and fought to take a breath.
To be continued
Next Chapter: An eternity of an impossible tragic escape
(Am I beautiful for you?)
