Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I do own three odd socks though.

Chapter Six: Nose biting is no fun.

Hermione awoke the next morning, any problems or worries had not yet hit her so she lay face down on her bed without opening her eyes, not wanting to think about anything just yet.

It was odd though. Her pillow smelled musty and old, Hermione was pretty sure she had changed the sheets last night. In fact, now she came to think about it, she was very sure. She was also sure that she had fallen asleep in her own bed.

Her eyes flicked open and she sat up on what she had assumed to be her bed.

But it wasn't.

It was the sofa.

Hermione struggled to get disentangled from the mass of old sheets that she had put on the sofa for Draco to sleep under. She landed with a resounding thud on the stone floor for what had to be the third time that week.

By the time she had made it across the floor to her former bed, her hair was even more unruly than it usually was and she was extremely pissed off.

She scrambled up and stood over Draco for what also had to be the third time that week wondering what to do.

She grabbed one of the heavy pillows from the sofa and returned to the side of the bed.

"MALFOY (Whack) YOU IRRITATING, (Whack) SLIMY (Whack, whack) BASTARD! (Whack, whack, WHACK!)"

Draco woke up almost immediately, frowned and attempted to open his eyes but being constantly hit by a heavy pillow rendered this action almost impossible.

Hermione, seeing that he was awake, hit him once more for good measure and straightened up, glowering at him with her hands on her hips.

Draco stretched out and smiled infuriatingly at her.

"You swore." He said accusingly.

"You kicked me out of my own bed!" She retorted in the same tone.

"And..?"

Hermione hit him again with the pillow.

"Irritating, slimy bastard with bad hair!" Hermione ranted again, accentuating every word with a harder hit to the stomach with her pillow.

Draco pushed her pillow away and sat up.

"What's wrong with my hair?"

"You must use a tub of gel a day, doesn't your hair glue itself to the pillow?"

"Well at least I don't look like I stuck my fingers in an electric socket."

Hermione suddenly changed the conversation surprising Draco. "How do you know what an electrical socket is?"

"I'm not completely ignorant about the Muggle world, ignorance is a weakness."

"And putting too much gel on your hair is bad for your health!" Hermione grinned, doing the one thing no one had ever dared to do, she reached across and ruffled his hair.

In one fluid movement Draco stood up and snatched up one of his own pillows, and flashed an evil smile at her. But Hermione had already darted across the room, clutching her pillow and sticking her tongue out at him in reply.

He lunged at her, she tried to dodge his blow but his pillow caught her right on her back. She turned around and gave him a square hit around the face.

"Right, you're for it now." He growled, she yelped and ran across to the bed, jumping on it and putting herself in a defensive position. She grinned at him, daring him to come near her.

He sprang across the room and landed standing on the bed facing her. Hermione managed to get a few early hits in before Draco retaliated. They both smacked each other with the pillows in silence for a little while, making faces at each other, when Draco's pillow suddenly burst.

Feathers rained down on them, covering their hair and shoulders, Hermione couldn't stop herself from bursting out into laughter.

Much to her surprise, Draco burst out laughing as well. She had never heard him laugh properly, she wasn't aware he was actually capable of laughing when it wasn't at someone else's expense. She thought he should do it more often.

Hermione frowned unexpectedly; she had been having a pillow fight with Draco Malfoy, she looked at her opponent and quickly looked away again, Draco Malfoy in only his boxers and her in her pyjamas.

Draco stopped laughing and looked at her curiously, she had spaced out again, except this time she had gone red and it looked like there was something wrong. He looked at his feet, but realised he was only wearing his boxers.

The two teenagers both made 'argh!' noises, Draco dived for his robes and Hermione ran into the bathroom.

Hermione leant against the closed bathroom door, she attempted to compose herself and her overactive imagination, and she also attempted to get the vision of Draco Malfoy in his boxers out of her mind.

Hermione emerged a little later, washed and dressed, to find Draco sitting on the sofa reading 'Potions, Grade 6', fully clothed.

Hermione couldn't ignore the tiny part of her that was slightly disappointed.

"I've been thinking." He remarked not taking his eyes off the book.

Hermione bit back a remark that went along the lines of, 'that's got to be a first', sensing it wasn't the appropriate time to make sarky comments. She instead concentrated on controlling the blush that was threatening to rise up her cheeks.

Draco however, seemed to be not embarrassed in the least. The pillow fight Draco had been assassinated and the old Draco had taken over again.

"Why don't I just leave during lessons when there won't be anyone in the common room?"

"The Fat Lady has a spell on it that stops pupils from returning or leaving the tower during lesson time."

"Interesting."

"What's interesting?"

"The Slytherin dungeon entrance doesn't have a spell on it."

"Oh."

Hermione preferred it when Draco was insulting her or making sarcastic comments, not when he was being extremely haughty and only talking when he needed to. Usually it was hard to get him to shut up at all. Maybe this was his way of hiding his embarrassment.

The feeling of wanting to punch him made a quick return after taking a brief trip away.

There was a pause. Hermione stood in front of Draco who was staring at the book in front of him. His eyes weren't moving.

"I'll come back at lunchtime and you can do the spell. Ok?"

The slightest nod.

"Bye then."

She went out the door and closed it softly. Draco could hear the click of the lock.

He waited for a few minutes before throwing the book down on the floor. It landed flat on the floor, a few of the pages bent. He kicked it.

Spending too much time with Mudblood Granger was going to his head. They had been laughing together. What next? She would start calling him Draco and he would begin to notice how pretty her eyes were. Not that they were pretty of course, he reassured himself, they were just ordinary run of the mill eyes. Mud brown. Eye-shaped. Boring.

Draco rested his head on the back of the sofa and stared despondently at the ceiling. What the hell was he supposed to do until lunchtime? He was already hungry and he needed something to take his mind off the growing emptiness in his stomach.

She hadn't bothered to get him any breakfast.

And he was a growing boy.

Draco hoped he wouldn't get any taller, in some of the older parts of Malfoy Manor he already had to duck so he didn't render himself unconscious on the top of the door frames.

But then he didn't need doorframes to render him unconscious, he had his father for that.

Stupid curse.

That's what got him into the mess with Granger in the first place.

He lazily watched a piece of dust float down from the ceiling.

His head snapped up. Granger had left him alone in her room.

He smirked.


Hermione shut the door behind her and locked it. By lunchtime it would be over. It would go back to occasional insult swappings in the corridors and glaring contests at mealtimes.

Mealtimes!

She had forgotten to give Draco any breakfast! She shrugged. He'd be fine. He ate enough last night anyway.

She grimaced. He was like an unwanted pet, like an unwanted Blast Ended Screwt.

Seeing Harry and Ron emerge from their dormitory she pushed any thoughts of Malfoy out of her head and hurried over to greet them.

When they sat down at the Gryffindor table, Ron immediately scooped most of the food on to his plate. As much as Ron ate, he always stayed thin and gangly.

"Whoa!" Harry stared wide-eyed at the Slytherin table.

Hermione and Ron craned their necks to see what Harry was looking at. They spotted it.

"What the...?" Ron gaped.

Hermione merely watched in fascination.

Pansy Parkinson was definitely enjoying Draco's disappearance. Not that she was happy he had gone; she was simply enjoying all the attention that came with it.

She had artistically smudged her eye makeup to give the effect that she had been crying, although in Hermione's opinion it made her look like she had swapped DNA with a panda. Periodically she would sniff and dab at her eyes with a frilly black handkerchief.

The three of them caught each other's eyes and burst out laughing, getting a few weird looks from the other Gryffindors.

Hermione glanced at Crabbe and Goyle, it looked like they hadn't even realised Draco was missing.


Draco emerged from under Hermione's bed, coughing from the dust and pulling out a medium sized box. It was dusty under the bed but the box had no dust on it at all. He grinned and attempted to open it. It was locked.

Draco pulled out his wand, "Alohomora." The box sprang open.

"Really, Granger. I expected more from you." He muttered, his grin widening.

He didn't feel quite so cocky when one of the books leapt up from the box and bit him on the nose. He jumped up and danced around the room, waving his hands uselessly at the book and repeating 'ah ah ah!'

He finally managed to prise the book off his nose and wedged it shut underneath one of the sofa's feet. The box was full of books, ("Huh, that's Granger for you.") Draco prodded each of them thoughtfully. When he was sure another attack on his nose was not on the cards he pulled out the book on the top of the pile.

On the first page, was written,

"Diary. 1997 (First Year, Hogwarts)"

The grin returned to his face.

There were only five books in the box, from first year to fifth year. The evil nose biting book was probably this year's diary, but he wasn't going to brave that again.

Well he was in Slytherin; bravery wasn't an option.

He flicked through some of the pages; it seemed that, judging from the entries, the Dream Team wasn't quite as glued to each other as they were now.

An idea hit him, he rummaged through the box till he found Hermione's third year diary. He thumbed through the pages.

"What date was it? Ah yes here we go."

Malfoy is an insufferable git!

"Nice beginning."

He is so irritating! I could just punch his lights out! Oh no wait, I did!

A look of indignation crossed Draco's face. "She did not punch me! She merely slapped me! This account is biased! Biased I tell you!" He looked up and remembered that there was no one else in the room and nobody but Hermione would be reading this anytime soon – well, bar him.

He got his daddy to get Hagrid fired...

"I do not call him 'Daddy' I call him a manly 'Father'!"

...and was making snide comments, doesn't he have anything better to do?

"Well actually I... no, she's right, I don't have anything better to do."

Harry and Ron looked like they were about to punch him, but before they could do anything I slapped him, hard, around the face! Hah! Stupid Malfoy. I could see the surprise and shock in his eyes. He does have rather nice eyes come to think of it...

"Hah! She thinks my eyes are nice!"

...It's a shame they're wasted on him though. Harry's eyes are nicer anyway!

"Why does Potter win every time? My eyes are much nicer than his! Argh! Indignation!"

Draco threw down the diary in annoyance and picked up her fourth year diary instead, he flipped through the pages until something caught his eye and he grinned maliciously.


Fate liked to torment the Gryffindors by pairing them with the Slytherins for Potions every year. Hermione stood outside the Potions dungeons with Harry and Ron, waiting for their Potions master to arrive.

Maybe it was Snape that made sure Gryffindors and Slytherins were partnered so he could mock them in full view of his house.

Or maybe he was actually giving demonstrations that he could refer to in the Slytherins' weekly meetings. Hermione grinned at the memory of Draco's face when he realised he shouldn't have told her that specific piece of information.

"Well, well, well. What have we here?"

Hermione, Harry and Ron all looked up to see Crabbe and Goyle leering at them. Hermione almost laughed when she saw Crabbe's left hand clutching a flashcard by his side.

"If it isn't Potter and the Golden Team." Crabbe was putting on his best drawl, it didn't come anywhere near Draco's, he was the master of drawling – it came naturally to him.

"Um, I think you mean Dream Team." Harry said mock innocently, Ron sniggered.

"That's what he said." Goyle bristled, trying to stare Harry down.

"No he didn't, he said 'Potter and the Golden Team.' There's a difference." Ron replied, Hermione had to look away so she didn't laugh at Crabbe and Goyle's bewildered faces.

"Yeah, if you're going to insult me at least get it right." Harry said, coughing to try and mask his laughter.

"Your mothers must have been apes to make you so stupid." Ron said, glancing at Hermione and winking.

"Yeah, well, your mother ate... um, so many cakes and stuff that she... uh..." Goyle stuttered, attempting to think of an insult.

"Got fat and stuff!" Crabbe said triumphantly, Goyle clapped him on the back and the pair wandered off congratulating each other on their amazing wit.

The three Gryffindors laughed and Ron remarked.

"I hope Malfoy never comes back, it's much more fun like this!"


Meanwhile Draco was memorizing parts of Hermione's diaries for later use.

It always helped to be prepared.


A/N: Wouldn't you know it, this chapter is longer again!

I have to say, usually I get bored with the stories I write and stop writing them, but I'm enjoying writing this story and probably won't stop writing it until I've finished it or I am blown away by a freak whirlwind.

Bakuraisho-ur-cute – Woo, I had barely put up Chapter Five when you reviewed it! Thanks!

Miss W D Halliwell – There's no need to sleep talk when there is diary reading on offer! Good idea though.

Mikasa Wormhole - Now, is that a good interesting or a bad interesting?

Emily – Yeah, I know what you mean, I always find Harry and Ron hard to write. I didn't like their bit in the last chapter, hopefully this one is better!

Anyway, read and review!

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