freakyfairy - I like your reviews, especially because I look forward to
getting reviews on the chapters. I can depend on you.
blueamber - think about it, this is Malfoy. . . hehehe, baited breath? Just don't hold it, because I think you'd turn to BLUEamber for real.
Jelli Bean - Ohh, thank you so so so so much!
willowfairy - dundun dundun dundun. . . Maybe.. You'll learn something else in this chapter. . .
Chapter 7
The thought of Malfoy actually being nice to her haunted Hermione's thoughts all night. Why had he been nice to her when he had been working all those years to build up the insurmountable hate between the two of them? Was he doing this just so that he could get his normal appearance back?
Although she was inclined to believe that was the reason, the nasty voice that frequently haunted her mind told her that there was no way pretending to be nice would fool a spell. It had to be genuine, and that scared Hermione.
Why would Malfoy have been truly nice to her, even if he gained his regular appearance back, it wouldn't be worth it to him. His reputation and pride would be gone, and she knew, from experience, that that was all he cared about was his appearance, reputation, and pride. He never had anything else and he never needed anything else, because his needs were fulfilled by the Gringotts account full of gold that he gloated about at every chance she had.
Although she didn't want to admit it, least of all to herself, she was beginning to wonder what it would be like if Malfoy were nice more. She found herself imagining him smiling and not cursing her with every single word that dropped from his mouth. She chased the thought from her mind as quickly as it had come. These sort of thoughts were informally BANNED from her mind.
She glanced over at the other beds in the room and glared at the one diagonal from her. Its occupant was so unpredictable and so - so - Hermione couldn't find the word. Well, actually, she probably could, but it would also cost her a week of detention to say it.
Deciding that it would be best if she left the dormitory before Malfoy, ParkinCow or the other Slytherin, whose name Hermione hadn't bothered to learn, woke, Hermione changed and left to go take a walk around the Hogwarts grounds. She wouldn't be in trouble for walking, especially since it was Saturday. She would be able to be alone, alone to think her thoughts and pretend that she could travel back in time to when she had been much happier - before her dad was sick, Harry and Ron had 'dumped' her, and before she had decided that she didn't need to have any relationships with anyone whatsoever.
Despite what she told herself, she knew that she was slowly sinking into some weird sort of depression, but instead of being steadily sadder and sadder like everyone assumed she would be, she was gradually disconnecting herself with anything that caused her pain, which was pretty much everything that she had been so used to having in her life. She broke off of relationships with any person that she knew, blowing them off and feeding them random lies that were obviously fake. But she couldn't help it.
Whenever she looked at Ron, she thought of the perfect family that he had waiting at the Burrow, waiting for him to come home, to be happy and smiling and hugging every time they saw each other. It didn't matter that Ron always complained about them, because it was completely obvious that he loved them even though he never said it and she hated that about him. He complained about the family that he had, and he couldn't see that it was wonderful, while he said he wished he had Hermione's family, which she was sure he wouldn't if he knew what it was really like for her to live with her family the way it was.
And the, to top it all off, when she looked at Harry, she knew that he was as good as Ron's brother, because the Weasley family and their house was like the home Harry never had, and she was jealous despite how much she tried to deny it. The Weasley's sat there with their doors open as though they were waiting for Harry to come, she had gone to the Weasley house too, but the Weasley's hadn't seemed to have taken to her as they had to Harry, which served to make her more jealous.
She remembered how they had looked at her when Ron had first introduced her to his family; the memory haunted her now as she recalled it. They had smiled and been extremely nice enough, but how could she have ignored the signs? The over exaggerated kindness, the looks the gave her, the whispered conversations she passed when she was with Ginny waking past Mr. and Mrs. Weasley's room.
She felt a surge of anger coarse through her veins and it blinded her temporarily as she remembered the times that she had suffered through, pretending that she didn't notice. How could they?
Was it her fault that she wasn't famous? Did her parents have to be murdered for them to accept her? Did she have to suffer more pain than she already had before someone would stretch out their hand and help her through her pain? Did she have to be ready to kill herself before someone would feel that they needed to make sure she could have help? How could nobody notice that she wasn't really here anymore despite the curtain of perfect-ness she hid behind? Didn't anyone care about her enough to even notice that she wasn't the Hermione Granger everyone had known earlier? Didn't they know she wasn't alive inside anymore?
Hermione kicked a rock and watched it hurdle across the sweeping lawns and come to a stop near the Forbidden Forest as she thought about this. How could she have expected them to understand? How COULD they understand? Everyone else had this image that she had been forcing into his or her heads for years. The simple image that her life was absolutely and completely perfect and that she wasn't in any pain. She had forced this belief into everyone's heads long ago, to avoid talking about things, but now she needed to talk to someone, and she couldn't bear to admit that she had been lying to them for years.
She thought about the lies she had been feeding her friends and felt horrible. Nobody even knew that her father had cancer. She had told them that he was fine, and when they noticed that he didn't look good at Diagon Alley, she had fed them a pack of lies about having the flu. Somewhere in her heart she had always told herself that if she denied it and didn't tell anyone that the pain and problems would disappear. She told herself that if she ignored it, it would simply go away, even though she knew it wasn't true she still pretended.
She felt tears sting her eyes but she didn't bother to wipe them off because more would just replace them and the flow would become worse. It bothered her to think that she was starting to act like the airheads that she saw all over the school, crying over every little thing that didn't go her way and she tried to console herself by telling herself that, unlike the girls she saw all over the school, she had a very good reason to be crying her eyes out - her life was falling apart.
She ran as fast as she could to the far end of the Hogwarts grounds. She ran as though it would make her problems disappear, or maybe she could run so far away that they would never be able to catch up with her and she could live in peace. She wanted to be as far away from the castle as she possibly could. When she could run no more, she just simply collapsed on the slightly damp grass and sat there, her robes swirling around her in the wind which chilled her to the bone and made her shiver while she cried and cried. She didn't know exactly why she was crying, perhaps it was a mixture of everything that had been bothering her for the last year or so, or maybe she just needed to cry. All she knew was that she felt alone.
She felt so alone that she felt alone when someone was with her. She closed her eyes wishing that she could be by the warm Gryffindor fire, sitting in armchairs with Harry and Ron, laughing about the fact that they had failed another Divination test and listening to them talking about Quiddich as though it was the best thing since sliced bread. She wouldn't have minded doing their homework for them if that was the cost for having their friendship back. At this point, she would do anything to have their friendship at the moment.
She closed her eyes, remembering what it had felt like when the three of them had been sitting together in one armchair when Fred and George had ruined the others. All three of them were sitting there, Hermione in the middle, and they had promised to always be friends.
Hermione laughed scornfully. Friends? Them? Forever? Like they had fulfilled their promise. Either they had broken their promise or forever had come too quickly. More tears welled up in Hermione's eyes and she hung her head lower in order to hide them from non-existent friends.
"Peie courivere," Hermione whispered, remembering the ancient French term she had used to describe their friendship.
"Always changing." She continued, using the English translation, and despite herself, laughed a hollow laugh.
"And we saw just how much it would change." She said sarcastically as tears fell down her face. They were now tumbling down her face and there was nothing that she could do to stop them, she just let them fall.
What she would give to see them smiling, to hear them talking to her, to feel their friendly touch -
Hermione stiffened suddenly when she felt someone's arms around lock securely her. She didn't look at whose they were; she just sat there, with the person's strong arms locked around her, feeling safe and warm in their embrace. She was almost afraid to look at who the person was, she afraid that when she looked they would melt away and leave her alone again, here to cry as her life died.
She debated whether she should look, and argued silently with herself as she cried into the person's shoulder.
When she finally got the courage to look at who it was, she turned her head slowly and didn't dare to open her eyes for a few lingering seconds. When she opened her eyes, she let out a squeak of surprise at the sight of the person that was there, holding her as though it was natural.
Hermione found herself staring into the face of Ron Weasley. Although she suddenly felt uncomfortable as she remembered their fights and disagreements, she didn't make any move to leave his embrace. In fact, it felt perfect to be sitting here. If she closed her eyes, she could almost pretend that they were friends again, and that he didn't hate her.
If he hated her, why was he sitting here, holding her while she sobbed into his robe like a leaking hosepipe? Hermione felt herself trying to speak, trying to find the right words to say, but none of the words came out of her mouth despite how much she tried to make them come out. The closest she got was when she let out a low croak, but a small smile crossed Ron's features.
"I know." He said, and she found that in these two words that he really didn't understand what she was going through, but he was trying and that was enough for her. It was all she wanted.
Hermione glanced over his shoulder and saw a lone figure, leaning against a large rock, watching, and she had a strange suspicion about the person. With the fiery red hair it must be Fred or George here to spy on their brother and Hermione.
She was drug from her thoughts when Ron spoke once again.
"I'm sorry." He said, and warm relief spread through her body from her heart to the very tips of her fingers completely making her forget the person watching. She had a friend again. She had Ron. She had her brother, her companion, her crying pillow. But she didn't feel like crying now, she just sat, in his arms, and laughed. She didn't know why, but she couldn't stop. She was laughing as she looked at Ron.
And somehow, in that moment, she knew that everything would be alright. It didn't matter that everything else in her life was wrong, this was right.
Ron was back.
~+~
Hermione stumbled into the Advanced Transfiguration room, blind with happiness. Her and Ron had spent the past few hours talking and laughing just like nothing had happened, and he had told her things she never would have guessed. Apparently when he "dumped" her and told her he didn't like her it was an excuse to cover the fact that he was scared.
Her heart felt a lot lighter to think that Ron didn't hate her now and was willing to spend hours, holding her while she cried and laughing with her when they talked about stupid things they had done.
Even though Ron had told her that Harry didn't want to face her after the things they had said to her, he said that they were both as sorry as the purple slippers Neville Longbottom frequently wore.
Hermione was so happy that she didn't notice that there was a lone figure sitting on the widow ledge, their legs dangling out of the window so that one push could send them hurdling down toward the ground.
She was humming to herself and she couldn't hide her smile. Despite the fact that her image was horrible altered, Hermione felt at perfect peace with herself and the world around her, as though her life truly was perfect like she had been trying to convince people all along.
In fact, it came as a shock when she looked up and saw the person leaning against the wall of the window sill, now standing, and facing the Hogwarts grounds, their robes and hair blowing in the wind.
She couldn't help but notice that Malfoy looked horribly lonely and seemed to be as miserable as she had been hours before. She began debating whether she should say something to him, and almost decided against talking to him, but made up her mind that she undeniably owed herself and him at least one more chance.
She walked quietly behind him and when she spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper, as though she was afraid that he would strike her.
"Malfoy. . .?" she said tentively, and when he didn't answer, she spoke again, almost quieter than before.
"Are. . . are you okay?" he still didn't answer and she wondered whether he was ignoring her or if he couldn't talk, like she had felt for so long. When he didn't answer, she tried to make him talk one last feeble time.
"Do you. . . wanna. . . talk?" she asked and he whipped around to face her, a sneer across every feature on his face and she knew that nothing good would be tumbling out of his mouth with this look on his face.
"Even if I had anything to talk about, I wouldn't waste my breath on a meaningless worthless Mudblood scumbag like you." Hermione was surprised by the harshness of the words used, even though she hadn't expected him to be happy to see her, she hadn't expected him to speak as though the words that he said had the ability to kill her.
Hermione didn't even bother to glare at him; she just shuffled away, and nearly tripped over her own feet. She looked down at them, and realized that she had tripped over them because they were about a foot and a half smaller.
She had completely forgotten about the curses, and she was happy that her feet were back to normal, but she was sure that her hair was going to be forever green, because it had used every last ounce of her strength to not blow up in Malfoy's face when he had given her his death glare.
She hated him and that was all there was to it. She was never going to waste her time trying to make him feel better again. He was a cocky, conceited, jerky, selfish, self-centered, rude, snide. . .
~+~
After successfully venting all of her anger on the thought of Malfoy, Hermione slid into her seat at the Gryffindor table between Ron and Harry. They had had a long talk and both of them had apologized to her for every little thing that they had done, and she realized that they remembered everything that they had said to hurt her as much as she had remembered every remark, which made her more willing to forgive them than she had thought she would ever be.
She kissed each of them on the cheek and reached for the mashed potatoes, failing to realize that she had rendered both of the speechless and immobile. They were staring at their plates, not moving, much less breathing, and Hermione was beginning to worry slightly. What was wrong with them? Had she done something completely wrong, or were they getting stupider as she watched?
She began shoveling food onto her plate when she looked over at Ron and caught his expression of disbelief and shock, and when she looked at Harry she noticed that he had a quite similar look.
She hadn't seen these looks on their faces since first year when she had come in, introduced herself, and talked far more than she should have. Except, she remembered, Ron's face was more contorted into a look of pure horror and dislike while Harry looked more lost and dumbfounded than anything else.
". . . What?" she asked, and they both seemed to come out of their stupor. Both of them flushed and began taking food.
"What?" Hermione persisted, and they both pretended to ignore her, but she knew that they had heard her perfectly.
"Ronald Weasley," she said, and then she paused, trying to think of what to call Harry, she said the first thing that came to mind.
"Harold Potter," both of them burst out laughing while Hermione watched them with disbelief written across her face. They were so thick.
"What?" she said again and all she succeeded in was making them laugh harder.
"Fine." She said and she pouted. She was sure that they now had some inside joke that she would never understand, but she didn't care. All she cared about was the fact that she now had friends back, even if they were still uncomfortable around her. Harry more so than Ron.
She closed her eyes and remembered how she had felt in Ron's arms. At first she thought she had a crush on Ron, but when she thought about it, she realized it was more of a bond. He was her big brother (literally), there to protect her, although he wasn't as protective of her as he was of Ginny, for this she was thankful.
Harry was like the awkward cousin or something. He always stood out, but he never really seemed to be comfortable around Hermione, but she was sure that it wasn't because he 'liked' her or something, because that had been cleared up with a vial of truth potion.
Maybe he was just uncomfortable with her because he still remembered everything he had said about her and he didn't want to say anything else because he was afraid that he would say something wrong.
Hermione desperately tried to convince herself that this was true as she ate. When she glanced at her watch she felt a pang in her stomach. Another Advanced Transfiguration lesson had been called tonight, and she had five minutes left to get there.
Dropping her knife and fork, Hermione stood up, swore, and ran out of the hall. She would have to run down to the other end of the castle. She took off at top speed, hoping that she wasn't going to be too late or get in trouble.
That was the last thing she needed.
~+~
As Hermione rushed into the room, she was glad to see that Professor McGonagall had not yet arrived, meaning that there was no way she could be late.
The very second that she sat down, Professor McGonagall swept in and Hermione sighed a sigh of relief. A few seconds longer and she would have been in more trouble than she could even begin to comprehend.
"Before we continue, I have a grave announcement to make." Professor McGonagall said, and Hermione listened intently. She hoped it would be any more bad news for her, because she was just starting to regain the ability to smile again and she didn't want to lose it.
"One of our students is going to be asked to leave." Professor McGonagall said, and Hermione felt an odd feeling in her stomach. Maybe Malfoy would be chucked out. That would make things much easier.
"Miss Pansy Parkinson -" Hermione couldn't believe her ears. PARKINSON? This was good news. That meant that there was one less Slytherin taking space in the dormitory.
Hermione tried hard to hide her glee. Pansy Parkinson was gone, which meant another load of stress was taken off of her shoulders. She sighed. Today was making everything much better than she would have ever imagined it would be.
She kept thinking about Pansy leaving as they continued the Advanced Transfiguration lesson.
~+~
That night, Hermione had a restless sleep. She dreamt about two animals, but this time they were different.
A dragon and a golden fox were curled up next to each other, and again this struck Hermione as odd. She tried to walk forward but felt that she could only stumble backward as the fox and dragon slumbered, unaware of her existence.
The dragon's wing was curled protectively around the fox, and the fox seemed to be content to be lying there, under the dragon's wing, completely safe from harm, warm and calm.
Again, Hermione felt herself wondering when the dragon was about to attack the fox, or vice versa, because these two creatures were from two different worlds, complete enemies. . .
. . .
Like her and Malfoy. . .
Draco. . .
She corrected herself subconsciously as she lay, half asleep, think about the dragon, who suddenly had pink eyes and bright red horns. . .
The fox's fur turned green. . .
The two snuggled closer as Hermione drifted further into unconsciousness. She would think about this in the morning. She was too tired. . .
Sleep . . .
~+~
Bum BAH! I have finished this chapter; Chapter 8 will be written as fast as humanly possible!!! What do you think? Is a chapter a day too fast? Should I prolong the agony? Anyway, please review.
blueamber - think about it, this is Malfoy. . . hehehe, baited breath? Just don't hold it, because I think you'd turn to BLUEamber for real.
Jelli Bean - Ohh, thank you so so so so much!
willowfairy - dundun dundun dundun. . . Maybe.. You'll learn something else in this chapter. . .
Chapter 7
The thought of Malfoy actually being nice to her haunted Hermione's thoughts all night. Why had he been nice to her when he had been working all those years to build up the insurmountable hate between the two of them? Was he doing this just so that he could get his normal appearance back?
Although she was inclined to believe that was the reason, the nasty voice that frequently haunted her mind told her that there was no way pretending to be nice would fool a spell. It had to be genuine, and that scared Hermione.
Why would Malfoy have been truly nice to her, even if he gained his regular appearance back, it wouldn't be worth it to him. His reputation and pride would be gone, and she knew, from experience, that that was all he cared about was his appearance, reputation, and pride. He never had anything else and he never needed anything else, because his needs were fulfilled by the Gringotts account full of gold that he gloated about at every chance she had.
Although she didn't want to admit it, least of all to herself, she was beginning to wonder what it would be like if Malfoy were nice more. She found herself imagining him smiling and not cursing her with every single word that dropped from his mouth. She chased the thought from her mind as quickly as it had come. These sort of thoughts were informally BANNED from her mind.
She glanced over at the other beds in the room and glared at the one diagonal from her. Its occupant was so unpredictable and so - so - Hermione couldn't find the word. Well, actually, she probably could, but it would also cost her a week of detention to say it.
Deciding that it would be best if she left the dormitory before Malfoy, ParkinCow or the other Slytherin, whose name Hermione hadn't bothered to learn, woke, Hermione changed and left to go take a walk around the Hogwarts grounds. She wouldn't be in trouble for walking, especially since it was Saturday. She would be able to be alone, alone to think her thoughts and pretend that she could travel back in time to when she had been much happier - before her dad was sick, Harry and Ron had 'dumped' her, and before she had decided that she didn't need to have any relationships with anyone whatsoever.
Despite what she told herself, she knew that she was slowly sinking into some weird sort of depression, but instead of being steadily sadder and sadder like everyone assumed she would be, she was gradually disconnecting herself with anything that caused her pain, which was pretty much everything that she had been so used to having in her life. She broke off of relationships with any person that she knew, blowing them off and feeding them random lies that were obviously fake. But she couldn't help it.
Whenever she looked at Ron, she thought of the perfect family that he had waiting at the Burrow, waiting for him to come home, to be happy and smiling and hugging every time they saw each other. It didn't matter that Ron always complained about them, because it was completely obvious that he loved them even though he never said it and she hated that about him. He complained about the family that he had, and he couldn't see that it was wonderful, while he said he wished he had Hermione's family, which she was sure he wouldn't if he knew what it was really like for her to live with her family the way it was.
And the, to top it all off, when she looked at Harry, she knew that he was as good as Ron's brother, because the Weasley family and their house was like the home Harry never had, and she was jealous despite how much she tried to deny it. The Weasley's sat there with their doors open as though they were waiting for Harry to come, she had gone to the Weasley house too, but the Weasley's hadn't seemed to have taken to her as they had to Harry, which served to make her more jealous.
She remembered how they had looked at her when Ron had first introduced her to his family; the memory haunted her now as she recalled it. They had smiled and been extremely nice enough, but how could she have ignored the signs? The over exaggerated kindness, the looks the gave her, the whispered conversations she passed when she was with Ginny waking past Mr. and Mrs. Weasley's room.
She felt a surge of anger coarse through her veins and it blinded her temporarily as she remembered the times that she had suffered through, pretending that she didn't notice. How could they?
Was it her fault that she wasn't famous? Did her parents have to be murdered for them to accept her? Did she have to suffer more pain than she already had before someone would stretch out their hand and help her through her pain? Did she have to be ready to kill herself before someone would feel that they needed to make sure she could have help? How could nobody notice that she wasn't really here anymore despite the curtain of perfect-ness she hid behind? Didn't anyone care about her enough to even notice that she wasn't the Hermione Granger everyone had known earlier? Didn't they know she wasn't alive inside anymore?
Hermione kicked a rock and watched it hurdle across the sweeping lawns and come to a stop near the Forbidden Forest as she thought about this. How could she have expected them to understand? How COULD they understand? Everyone else had this image that she had been forcing into his or her heads for years. The simple image that her life was absolutely and completely perfect and that she wasn't in any pain. She had forced this belief into everyone's heads long ago, to avoid talking about things, but now she needed to talk to someone, and she couldn't bear to admit that she had been lying to them for years.
She thought about the lies she had been feeding her friends and felt horrible. Nobody even knew that her father had cancer. She had told them that he was fine, and when they noticed that he didn't look good at Diagon Alley, she had fed them a pack of lies about having the flu. Somewhere in her heart she had always told herself that if she denied it and didn't tell anyone that the pain and problems would disappear. She told herself that if she ignored it, it would simply go away, even though she knew it wasn't true she still pretended.
She felt tears sting her eyes but she didn't bother to wipe them off because more would just replace them and the flow would become worse. It bothered her to think that she was starting to act like the airheads that she saw all over the school, crying over every little thing that didn't go her way and she tried to console herself by telling herself that, unlike the girls she saw all over the school, she had a very good reason to be crying her eyes out - her life was falling apart.
She ran as fast as she could to the far end of the Hogwarts grounds. She ran as though it would make her problems disappear, or maybe she could run so far away that they would never be able to catch up with her and she could live in peace. She wanted to be as far away from the castle as she possibly could. When she could run no more, she just simply collapsed on the slightly damp grass and sat there, her robes swirling around her in the wind which chilled her to the bone and made her shiver while she cried and cried. She didn't know exactly why she was crying, perhaps it was a mixture of everything that had been bothering her for the last year or so, or maybe she just needed to cry. All she knew was that she felt alone.
She felt so alone that she felt alone when someone was with her. She closed her eyes wishing that she could be by the warm Gryffindor fire, sitting in armchairs with Harry and Ron, laughing about the fact that they had failed another Divination test and listening to them talking about Quiddich as though it was the best thing since sliced bread. She wouldn't have minded doing their homework for them if that was the cost for having their friendship back. At this point, she would do anything to have their friendship at the moment.
She closed her eyes, remembering what it had felt like when the three of them had been sitting together in one armchair when Fred and George had ruined the others. All three of them were sitting there, Hermione in the middle, and they had promised to always be friends.
Hermione laughed scornfully. Friends? Them? Forever? Like they had fulfilled their promise. Either they had broken their promise or forever had come too quickly. More tears welled up in Hermione's eyes and she hung her head lower in order to hide them from non-existent friends.
"Peie courivere," Hermione whispered, remembering the ancient French term she had used to describe their friendship.
"Always changing." She continued, using the English translation, and despite herself, laughed a hollow laugh.
"And we saw just how much it would change." She said sarcastically as tears fell down her face. They were now tumbling down her face and there was nothing that she could do to stop them, she just let them fall.
What she would give to see them smiling, to hear them talking to her, to feel their friendly touch -
Hermione stiffened suddenly when she felt someone's arms around lock securely her. She didn't look at whose they were; she just sat there, with the person's strong arms locked around her, feeling safe and warm in their embrace. She was almost afraid to look at who the person was, she afraid that when she looked they would melt away and leave her alone again, here to cry as her life died.
She debated whether she should look, and argued silently with herself as she cried into the person's shoulder.
When she finally got the courage to look at who it was, she turned her head slowly and didn't dare to open her eyes for a few lingering seconds. When she opened her eyes, she let out a squeak of surprise at the sight of the person that was there, holding her as though it was natural.
Hermione found herself staring into the face of Ron Weasley. Although she suddenly felt uncomfortable as she remembered their fights and disagreements, she didn't make any move to leave his embrace. In fact, it felt perfect to be sitting here. If she closed her eyes, she could almost pretend that they were friends again, and that he didn't hate her.
If he hated her, why was he sitting here, holding her while she sobbed into his robe like a leaking hosepipe? Hermione felt herself trying to speak, trying to find the right words to say, but none of the words came out of her mouth despite how much she tried to make them come out. The closest she got was when she let out a low croak, but a small smile crossed Ron's features.
"I know." He said, and she found that in these two words that he really didn't understand what she was going through, but he was trying and that was enough for her. It was all she wanted.
Hermione glanced over his shoulder and saw a lone figure, leaning against a large rock, watching, and she had a strange suspicion about the person. With the fiery red hair it must be Fred or George here to spy on their brother and Hermione.
She was drug from her thoughts when Ron spoke once again.
"I'm sorry." He said, and warm relief spread through her body from her heart to the very tips of her fingers completely making her forget the person watching. She had a friend again. She had Ron. She had her brother, her companion, her crying pillow. But she didn't feel like crying now, she just sat, in his arms, and laughed. She didn't know why, but she couldn't stop. She was laughing as she looked at Ron.
And somehow, in that moment, she knew that everything would be alright. It didn't matter that everything else in her life was wrong, this was right.
Ron was back.
~+~
Hermione stumbled into the Advanced Transfiguration room, blind with happiness. Her and Ron had spent the past few hours talking and laughing just like nothing had happened, and he had told her things she never would have guessed. Apparently when he "dumped" her and told her he didn't like her it was an excuse to cover the fact that he was scared.
Her heart felt a lot lighter to think that Ron didn't hate her now and was willing to spend hours, holding her while she cried and laughing with her when they talked about stupid things they had done.
Even though Ron had told her that Harry didn't want to face her after the things they had said to her, he said that they were both as sorry as the purple slippers Neville Longbottom frequently wore.
Hermione was so happy that she didn't notice that there was a lone figure sitting on the widow ledge, their legs dangling out of the window so that one push could send them hurdling down toward the ground.
She was humming to herself and she couldn't hide her smile. Despite the fact that her image was horrible altered, Hermione felt at perfect peace with herself and the world around her, as though her life truly was perfect like she had been trying to convince people all along.
In fact, it came as a shock when she looked up and saw the person leaning against the wall of the window sill, now standing, and facing the Hogwarts grounds, their robes and hair blowing in the wind.
She couldn't help but notice that Malfoy looked horribly lonely and seemed to be as miserable as she had been hours before. She began debating whether she should say something to him, and almost decided against talking to him, but made up her mind that she undeniably owed herself and him at least one more chance.
She walked quietly behind him and when she spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper, as though she was afraid that he would strike her.
"Malfoy. . .?" she said tentively, and when he didn't answer, she spoke again, almost quieter than before.
"Are. . . are you okay?" he still didn't answer and she wondered whether he was ignoring her or if he couldn't talk, like she had felt for so long. When he didn't answer, she tried to make him talk one last feeble time.
"Do you. . . wanna. . . talk?" she asked and he whipped around to face her, a sneer across every feature on his face and she knew that nothing good would be tumbling out of his mouth with this look on his face.
"Even if I had anything to talk about, I wouldn't waste my breath on a meaningless worthless Mudblood scumbag like you." Hermione was surprised by the harshness of the words used, even though she hadn't expected him to be happy to see her, she hadn't expected him to speak as though the words that he said had the ability to kill her.
Hermione didn't even bother to glare at him; she just shuffled away, and nearly tripped over her own feet. She looked down at them, and realized that she had tripped over them because they were about a foot and a half smaller.
She had completely forgotten about the curses, and she was happy that her feet were back to normal, but she was sure that her hair was going to be forever green, because it had used every last ounce of her strength to not blow up in Malfoy's face when he had given her his death glare.
She hated him and that was all there was to it. She was never going to waste her time trying to make him feel better again. He was a cocky, conceited, jerky, selfish, self-centered, rude, snide. . .
~+~
After successfully venting all of her anger on the thought of Malfoy, Hermione slid into her seat at the Gryffindor table between Ron and Harry. They had had a long talk and both of them had apologized to her for every little thing that they had done, and she realized that they remembered everything that they had said to hurt her as much as she had remembered every remark, which made her more willing to forgive them than she had thought she would ever be.
She kissed each of them on the cheek and reached for the mashed potatoes, failing to realize that she had rendered both of the speechless and immobile. They were staring at their plates, not moving, much less breathing, and Hermione was beginning to worry slightly. What was wrong with them? Had she done something completely wrong, or were they getting stupider as she watched?
She began shoveling food onto her plate when she looked over at Ron and caught his expression of disbelief and shock, and when she looked at Harry she noticed that he had a quite similar look.
She hadn't seen these looks on their faces since first year when she had come in, introduced herself, and talked far more than she should have. Except, she remembered, Ron's face was more contorted into a look of pure horror and dislike while Harry looked more lost and dumbfounded than anything else.
". . . What?" she asked, and they both seemed to come out of their stupor. Both of them flushed and began taking food.
"What?" Hermione persisted, and they both pretended to ignore her, but she knew that they had heard her perfectly.
"Ronald Weasley," she said, and then she paused, trying to think of what to call Harry, she said the first thing that came to mind.
"Harold Potter," both of them burst out laughing while Hermione watched them with disbelief written across her face. They were so thick.
"What?" she said again and all she succeeded in was making them laugh harder.
"Fine." She said and she pouted. She was sure that they now had some inside joke that she would never understand, but she didn't care. All she cared about was the fact that she now had friends back, even if they were still uncomfortable around her. Harry more so than Ron.
She closed her eyes and remembered how she had felt in Ron's arms. At first she thought she had a crush on Ron, but when she thought about it, she realized it was more of a bond. He was her big brother (literally), there to protect her, although he wasn't as protective of her as he was of Ginny, for this she was thankful.
Harry was like the awkward cousin or something. He always stood out, but he never really seemed to be comfortable around Hermione, but she was sure that it wasn't because he 'liked' her or something, because that had been cleared up with a vial of truth potion.
Maybe he was just uncomfortable with her because he still remembered everything he had said about her and he didn't want to say anything else because he was afraid that he would say something wrong.
Hermione desperately tried to convince herself that this was true as she ate. When she glanced at her watch she felt a pang in her stomach. Another Advanced Transfiguration lesson had been called tonight, and she had five minutes left to get there.
Dropping her knife and fork, Hermione stood up, swore, and ran out of the hall. She would have to run down to the other end of the castle. She took off at top speed, hoping that she wasn't going to be too late or get in trouble.
That was the last thing she needed.
~+~
As Hermione rushed into the room, she was glad to see that Professor McGonagall had not yet arrived, meaning that there was no way she could be late.
The very second that she sat down, Professor McGonagall swept in and Hermione sighed a sigh of relief. A few seconds longer and she would have been in more trouble than she could even begin to comprehend.
"Before we continue, I have a grave announcement to make." Professor McGonagall said, and Hermione listened intently. She hoped it would be any more bad news for her, because she was just starting to regain the ability to smile again and she didn't want to lose it.
"One of our students is going to be asked to leave." Professor McGonagall said, and Hermione felt an odd feeling in her stomach. Maybe Malfoy would be chucked out. That would make things much easier.
"Miss Pansy Parkinson -" Hermione couldn't believe her ears. PARKINSON? This was good news. That meant that there was one less Slytherin taking space in the dormitory.
Hermione tried hard to hide her glee. Pansy Parkinson was gone, which meant another load of stress was taken off of her shoulders. She sighed. Today was making everything much better than she would have ever imagined it would be.
She kept thinking about Pansy leaving as they continued the Advanced Transfiguration lesson.
~+~
That night, Hermione had a restless sleep. She dreamt about two animals, but this time they were different.
A dragon and a golden fox were curled up next to each other, and again this struck Hermione as odd. She tried to walk forward but felt that she could only stumble backward as the fox and dragon slumbered, unaware of her existence.
The dragon's wing was curled protectively around the fox, and the fox seemed to be content to be lying there, under the dragon's wing, completely safe from harm, warm and calm.
Again, Hermione felt herself wondering when the dragon was about to attack the fox, or vice versa, because these two creatures were from two different worlds, complete enemies. . .
. . .
Like her and Malfoy. . .
Draco. . .
She corrected herself subconsciously as she lay, half asleep, think about the dragon, who suddenly had pink eyes and bright red horns. . .
The fox's fur turned green. . .
The two snuggled closer as Hermione drifted further into unconsciousness. She would think about this in the morning. She was too tired. . .
Sleep . . .
~+~
Bum BAH! I have finished this chapter; Chapter 8 will be written as fast as humanly possible!!! What do you think? Is a chapter a day too fast? Should I prolong the agony? Anyway, please review.