Note: if you didn't read the revised version of chapter 8, go do that first. Otherwise you will be really confused.
Hermione awoke groggily. A slanted ray of sunlight cut across her face, and she quickly threw a hand up to shield her eyes with a groan of complaint. She tried to roll over before remembering that she was clasped tightly in Draco's arms, and settled instead for turning her head to the side. They had shifted during the night: she found that she was staring directly at his neck. The sunlight didn't wake him. He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like her name, and his arms tightened around her. Hermione smiled and gently planted a kiss on his neck. She snuggled closer to him and shut her eyes.
Draco, who was definitely not asleep, allowed a small smile to creep to his lips.
"Good morning."
Hermione gasped, and her eyes flew open. "I thought you were asleep!"
"Nope."
"Oh." She was quiet for a minute. "Good morning."
"Good morning."
"You already said that."
"I know."
Hermione sighed in exasperation. "You're so—so—"
"What?" he asked innocently.
She smacked him on the shoulder. "You."
"What are we going to do today?" Draco asked, completely immune to her repeated whacks.
"Clean the flat."
"Can't wait."
-----
"Ugh."
"I agree."
"I didn't think that it was physically possible for that much grime to exist in one place."
"Apparently it is very possible."
Hermione and Draco emerged, dirty and disheveled, from the kitchen, clutching bottles of magical cleaning supplies and wearing identical expressions of revulsion.
"Ugh," Hermione repeated. "Ugh, ugh, ugh."
"I think I'll take a shower," Draco said, looking down at himself in disgust.
"Can't bear having the taint of my filthy kitchen on you?" Hermione teased. She displayed her dirty hands and waved them dangerously close to his face.
"Sanctuary! Sanctuary!" Draco shouted, mock-seriously, and ran into the bathroom. Hermione chased after him, and was just in time to body-slam into the door as he closed it behind him. She heard the click of the lock as it slid into place.
"Ha!" he said triumphantly. "I win."
"Ow," Hermione responded, hoping to elicit sympathy. She was answered only by the sound of water running. "I get the shower when you're done."
"Who else is going to want it?"
"You are impossible," she told him vehemently, and flounced off to the living room. She was planning on spending her time in a useful way, and was heading over to the bookshelf, but Draco's Daily Prophet caught her eye instead. Eager to catch up on London news, she sank onto the sofa with the newspaper and unfurled it.
"'Ministry of Magic Shocker: New Regulation Stuns Many,'" she read aloud. "They're still bungling things up, apparently." She flipped to the next page and continued scanning the print for interesting-looking articles.
She was reading through the gossip column, chuckling over the news of Dean and Lavender's upcoming wedding, when one of the paragraphs caught her eye:
'Which 'Dream Team' recently split with bad feelings when she left them for a new friend? The two men of the formerly close trio say that her loyalties now lie elsewhere, even after all they've accomplished together. Will she leave her errant ways and return to her forgiving friends?'
Hermione's mouth dropped open. The gossip was so blatantly about her, Harry, and Ron that even someone like Neville Longbottom would realize it. And Harry and Ron's supposed statement was so biased and over-exaggerated that it made Hermione wonder what else was being said about her. She wasn't even a conspicuous figure—why would the public care what she did with her life?
She heard the squeak of the bathroom door and turned towards the sound. "Draco?" she called. "Can you come here?"
He entered the room, shirtless, rubbing his damp hair with a towel. "Wha—oh."
"'Oh'?" Hermione repeated, following his gaze to the newspaper. "Did you also happen to read a certain tidbit of gossip in here?" She shook the paper in his direction.
"Well—I—uh—"
"What else are people saying about me?" she demanded, becoming more incensed with every second longer that she looked at his guilty expression. "Why do they care? It's not as if I'm important to the public eye or anything—why make such a big deal of it?"
Draco sighed. "Please don't, Mya."
"How do you expect me to read something like this and not react?" Hermione said passionately. "They were my friends for my whole magical life. Now they're putting gossip about me in a newspaper that all of England is going to read! And all you can say is 'please don't'?!"
Draco was quiet for a few moments. "They care about you because of Harry," he said finally. "Don't you realize how exposed he makes you? Everyone cares about what happens to him, and right now, that's you."
"But—I don't—" Hermione stuttered.
"If you really want to know," he continued, "this small paragraph is minor, really. Magic Today actually interviewed Harry about it. Witch Weekly interviewed Harry and Ron, and turned the whole thing into a cover-page story. Everyone in London's talking about it."
"What?" Hermione said weakly, certain that her face was turning white.
"Not about me, of course," Draco said with a bit of a smirk. "Harry and Ron don't quite feel up to admitting that they've been upstaged by me yet again."
"What?!" Hermione shot to her feet, outraged, forgetting about her initial shock. "Could you be any more egotistical? How is this upstaging them? And what do you mean yet again? Have you forgotten that the whole reason why I came here was for a job?"
"Wait a min—"
"You haven't changed at all since Hogwarts!" Hermione ranted on. "I thought you were different, really I did, but all you care about is yourself!"
"Hermione."
"I really don't—" She froze as what he had said sunk in, and stared at him. "You—you called me—Hermione," she whispered.
He sighed wearily. "Look, Hermione . . . you jump on me all the time. At least give me a chance to explain myself."
She was suddenly mute.
"What I said isn't what I think," he said quietly. "I was just stating what Harry and Ron think. That's why the gossip columns are making such a big deal about you—because they don't know about me. If I could, I would only let them talk about me."
He took a deep breath.
"I hate to say this, especially now, under these circumstances—but I think maybe we need to take some time off. From each other."
Hermione gaped at him silently.
"I don't want to hurt you," he said hurriedly. "It's not because I hate you—quite the opposite, actually—but I think this will be good for us, really I do. I think we just need some time to really think: for you to think if New York is really the right place for you, since you certainly don't seem happy here; and for me to think if—well—"
"Maybe you should go," Hermione interrupted, her voice so icy that it startled herself. "If you don't think we should be together, then why don't you just get out."
"No, wait, that's not what I mean," Draco tried to say, but she cut him off.
"Leave. Get out. Go away!"
He reached out to her. "Mya—"
"Don't call me that!" she shrieked hysterically, jerking away from him. "Get out of my flat!" No sound came out, but her shoulders heaved up and down with silent tears. "Please just leave me alone."
He was silent. Then, finally, "Okay." And with a loud CRACK!, he disappeared.
Really, really short, I know. Sorry. Next chapter will be longer, I promise.