Disclaimer: I don't own anything! *sob sob sob*
A/N: Okay people, for starters, we're about to do some major shifting in Hermione's background to fit in with a later part in the story. So now Hermione grew up in Australia. The details will be in one of her conversations with Draco later. Now, for next starters I changed a little something in chapter 6 to fit in with the next bit of the story. So instead of Hermione waking up because there was a lot of sun coming through the window, she woke up because there was a very cold breeze blowing through the open window, 'kay? Next things next, it's 20 past 10 at night & I was out last night & didn't get in until 11:30 this morning, & I only got about 3 hours sleep in that space of time, so I'm very tired & probably won't make a lot of sense with spelling & everything this chapter. So, sorry about that. Okay…here goes…
Chapter 8
Hermione stared out the door after Malfoy. She was speechless, and if that wasn't enough, she couldn't think of anything to say! (A/N: tee hee, sorry about that, I couldn't help myself) There wasn't a single thought running around in here head that wasn't oriented around Malfoy, and that was even more confusing. Especially when she considered the surge of hurt and bitterness that had swept through her when he'd told her that he was only trying to win that stupid bet of theirs. And what was with that too? Why the hell had she agreed to such a stupid thing? It was almost as if she'd invited Malfoy to seduce her. Which, Hermione supposed, she had technically. But why did she want Malfoy to seduce her? It wasn't as if he was actually a nice person. In fact he was nearly downright evil. And she didn't even like him! He certainly didn't like her; she knew that for sure. So why was all this happening? Oh, bugger this, thought Hermione, looking out to where the sky was grey and stormy. I need a long hot bath.
As Hermione made her way downstairs to the kitchen, she walked past the long "window hall". Basically, one of the corridors in the house was along an outside wall, and so Mr. and Mrs. Granger had put in large windows so that when they walked past they could look outside and see the beautiful scenery. They weren't done tastelessly, as some people may have had them done; rather, they fit in perfectly with the rest of the house, having big wooden window seats attached to them. Normally, Hermione loved to walk along here, and half the time she even stopped and spent forever just sitting on the benches looking out, and had had to be called quite severely to meals more than once.
Today however, she stared at them as if they were the Grim Reaper come to take her to visit her maker. Through them all she could see was dark grey sky and rain. Which meant she had to stay inside until the rain let up. And by the sounds of it, that wasn't going to be happening anytime soon. Which meant she had to put up with Malfoy. And Malfoy on a normal day was bad enough; but Malfoy on a rainy day when she couldn't escape him and he was bent on tempting her into his bed would be pure and absolute torture.
And so when Hermione finally reached the kitchen she was not in the best of moods. By the time she got there, as well as having discovered the rain, she'd nearly tripped going down the stairs to the main part of the house, and she'd run into a Mister Draco Malfoy as he was coming out of a downstairs bathroom. And the worst part about the morning so far was that he looked hot. Way hot. Which was not a good thing to be thinking as far as Hermione was concerned.
So when Hermione's mother told her at breakfast that she and Mrs. Malfoy were going to drive to the next town to look at galleries, Hermione was not a very happy little vegemite.
"But why? I mean, I like galleries as much as the next person, but couldn't you at least go to one that I haven't seen a million times before so that I could go with you?"
"Hermione dearest, you may have seen the galleries in Shaftesbury many times over, but Narcissa hasn't seen them at all, and there is that darling little wood sculpture I wanted to show her. You know, the one beside that big Botticelli in the window room?"
"Yes I know. But…what am I supposed to do then?" Hermione complained.
"Well dear," said Mrs. Granger with a twinkle in her eye, "you could –shock, horror- spend the day with Draco. He is such a darling boy, and so well behaved too."
Hermione looked across the table to where Draco was sitting and trying to look innocent, but with a big smirk on his face at the same time. "I'd rather rot."
"Oh well dear, it is your choice of course. We're leaving straight after breakfast, and Draco has chosen not to come with us, so I hope you two have a good day, and try not to kill each other in the process," said Mrs. Granger as she got up from the table and picked up her plate. "Ta ta, we'll see you this evening."
After their mothers had left, Hermione looked across the table to where Malfoy was sitting, pretending to be absorbed in reading a muggle comic book, but not comprehending all the politically based jokes. "Well, I don't intent to sit here all day and watch you pretend you understand that book, so I'll be off. Stack your dishes in the dishwasher in the kitchen when you decide to get up."
Malfoy looked up at her, momentarily confused. "Dish-washer? Come again?"
"The dishwasher? You know, the thing you put your dirty dishes in and it cleans them?"
"Granger, much as you might hate it, I've lived with a whole bunch of house elves for my entire life. I wouldn't know a dishwasher if it jumped out in front of me and handed me the Golden Snitch."
Hermione looked at Draco in frustration. "Okay then, follow me. You're about to get your first lesson in muggle dish cleaning."
Walking over to the dishwasher (the breakfast table was at one end of the kitchen), Hermione bent over and opened it. "Okay, step number one, open the door." Draco threw her a dirty look, to which she responded with an innocent smile. "There are two racks, top and bottom. Glasses and mugs et cetera go in the top rack upside down, like so." Hermione pulled out the top rack and demonstrated by putting in her juice glass. Draco followed suit, and then moved to pull open the bottom drawer, but Hermione stopped him. "Rule number one, never open both drawers at once, because then the front is too heavy and the dishwasher tips over. And yes, I did find that out through experience," she added with a small smile in Draco's direction. To her surprise he responded with a grin. That scared her – a lot.
"Okay now, plates, bowls and cutlery go in the bottom draw. Cutlery in the little basket," she said, indicating said basket, "handles down, or else the fork prongs slip through the holes. The rows for plates and stuff are spilt into two and so you put the stuff in so it faces the middle. Bowls in the middle, then small plates, then big ones." Hermione drew a deep breath. Sure she could talk a lot, but this was getting mighty tiring. "The dishwasher's full, as you can tell by the fact that we got the last two spaces for our plates, so now comes the fun part."
Draco looked at Hermione unconvinced.
"Well okay, maybe not really fun, but it's more fun than the rest of it." Catching the look Draco was sending her, which now conveyed thoughts that she was crazy, she wrapped up her little talk. "Detergent is kept under the sink. You pour it into this little dish," she indicated the detergent holder, "up to the little line, then close the little lid. Close the dishwasher, then press the little button that says 'economy cycle', then the 'on' button. And voila," she said as the dishwasher began to make watery noises.
"Hmm…okay…I think that –crazy and confusing as your explanation was- I actually get that," said Draco in surprise.
"Fantastic, because now I won't have to do it for you. And on that note, I'll see you later." Hermione started to walk out of the kitchen and down the hall before Draco called her back. Popping her head around the corner, "What?"
"Well…what am I supposed to do?"
"I don't know…didn't you bring anything to study with you?"
Draco's look said it all. Apparently not.
"Okay then, well… the study's in the third door on the right when you go down the right hand corridor from the front hall. There are books in there and not just school books, but reading books too. On everything, trust me. And in one of the cupboards there's paper, pencils and paints and everything if you draw or paint or whatever. And you know where the entertainment room is. So have fun. Knock yourself out. You can use whatever's in the fridge, freezer and cupboards for lunch. Bye" And then she turned around, and walked back out the door, down the hallway and disappeared from sight.
* * * * *
Oh great. This is just fine and dandy. "What can I do Hermione?" He mimicked himself and then added Hermione's voice to the conversation. "You can do whatever you want as long as you stay the hell away from me, Malfoy." Well, he wasn't anxious to get lost again, so a movie in the entertainment room sounded good, if he could remember how to work the stupid machine. Honestly, with all these buttons and everything, muggles really needed to put written instructions on everything.
An hour later, Draco was deeply immersed in the story of some American called Rick, and a quite pretty girl called Evie as they tried to kill a mummy called Imotep that they had mistakenly called back to life. And if he finished this one and liked it, the sequel was in the drawer and was just waiting to be watched.
Two and a quarter hours after that, Draco's head finally decided it was time for lunch. His stomach had been telling him that for the past half hour, but he'd been too wrapped up in (yup, you guessed it) the sequel to the first movie. In this one, Evie and Rick's son had been kidnapped by the re-re-risen mummy Imotep and they were chasing after them and trying to get him back.
So, the moral to the story is he was hungry. Pausing the video at the end of a scene, he strolled out to the kitchen to find himself some lunch. Never having actually made himself a meal before, the experience promised to be enlightening. With visions of horribly burnt meals dancing through his head, Draco bravely entered the kitchen, a domain he'd never before entered with the intention of actually making himself something.
When he opened the refrigerator though, he found a plate with cling wrap over it and a note with his name on it pinned to the cling wrap. Carefully removing the plate from the fridge, he placed it on the bench and the read the note.
Malfoy,
I took pity on you when I remembered that you've never cooked before. It's called a sandwich. Unfortunately we don't keep pumpkin juice or butterbeer on tap here, but there's coke and lemonade in the fridge, so pick one. Or you could just mix them together & drink what you get from that. Quite tasty actually. Anyway, there's tea, coffee and Milo in the cupboard above the stove.
Hermione
Draco took off the cling wrap and then inspected the fillings on the sandwich. And laughed. "Peanut butter and sprinkles???" Not exactly gourmet, but its not as if he'd be able to make anything better, and he supposed he should be grateful to Hermione for at least making the sandwich for him.
Grabbing a can of lemonade from the fridge (he wasn't brave enough to try mixing it with coke – who knew what might happen?) Draco returned to the entertainment room, unpaused the video, and re-immersed himself in the story of Rick and Evie.
* * * * *
Hermione was bored out of her mind. She'd tried to do some homework, but for the first time in her life she couldn't concentrate on it to save her life. She'd then tried to read, but as much as she loved her romance novels, she wasn't really in the mood to read one that she'd already read before a million times. So there went that idea. Next she'd gone down to her studio and started to cut out the materials she needed to build the cabinet she'd designed during the term, but she couldn't get into that either.
Finally it was lunchtime, and out of sheer boredom she'd made Dra- Malfoy's lunch as well in an attempt to waste time. She would have given nearly anything to have seen his face when he realised what was on the sandwich, but that would have defeated the purpose of avoiding him, so instead she'd fixed her own lunch and retreated to her room for attempt two at reading. This time, she tried one of Meg Cabot's recent books, which usually captured her interest immediately. But not this time. She just couldn't concentrate.
There was only one thing left she could think of to do. Watch TV. Which was exactly what Malfoy was doing. Well, I suppose it won't be so bad if I just sit there and ignore him. And that was how Hermione came to be standing in the doorway of the entertainment room, watching both the movie and the back of Draco's head. She was wondering where to sit (there was only one couch facing the TV and Draco was on it) when, as if sensing that she was there by ESP, Draco turned around and looked at her.
"Are you going to sit down or what? Because you just standing there is starting to piss me off." Draco looked straight into her eyes, and for a moment Hermione blushed before she remembered that she was in her own house, and could stand if she wanted to. But she didn't.
"Okay, okay. Shove over will you?" Hermione sat down on the opposite end of the couch to Malfoy, and curled her feet up beside her. She soon became engrossed in the movie as well.
* * * * *
Throughout the rest of the movie, Draco watched as Hermione laughed when Evie's brother did or said something silly, buried her face in her knees when someone came to a not-so-nice end and nearly cried alongside Rick when Evie died. It was at that point when Draco moved closer to her –unable to watch tears make there way down her cheeks and not do anything-, wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against his chest, surprised when she complied wordlessly.
They sat like that for the rest of the movie, with Hermione sighing with relief when Evie's son brought her back to life, and tightening her grip on his arms during the final fight scene. But it was at the very end of the movie that Draco finally drew Hermione's attention back to him. It was when they'd all been rescued from the self-destructing pyramid, and they were safe again. It was when Evie promised to show her husband what Heaven was like, and Rick bent down and kissed her.
It was then that Draco noticed the look of longing in Hermione's eyes, and gently tipped her head up so that she was looking at him. Her eyes revealed her surprise as he lowered his lips to hers, but there was none of the objection in them that he had come to expect. As he gently nibbled on Hermione's bottom lip, her lips parted slowly and allowed him access to the hidden depths of her mouth. Drawing her closer still against him, Draco groaned softly against Hermione's lips as she brought her hands up to rest at the nape of his neck and started to lightly play with the hair there.
A/N: oooooooooooooooooh aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah *sighs* I wish…. Unfortunately I don't think I'm going to be kissed like that in the foreseeable future. In fact… I don't think I'm going to get kissed at all in the foreseeable future *sighs* oh well…I hope you liked that chapter.