Disclaimer- I do not own Harry Potter© or any of the concepts derived from the book series. The book series is the soul property of J.K. Rowling.
To Keep it Simple
Previous Chapter
"Pansy—get out and take your sexual frustration with you. Imagining things will not help you get into my pants," he retorted. She gasped again, her drama queen act cutting at Draco's patience.
"It's that Gryffindor tramp—isn't it? You—of all people! Wait until the rest of the Slytherin house hears about this," she shrieked.
"It's a pity that they already know," he said smugly as he raised his brow. Pansy growled with rage and turned on her heel, sweeping towards the door. She turned around before she left.
"Slytherin knows that you're just seeing that mudblood to get on Dumbledore's good side—but they don't know that you've actually fallen for the little git!" she hollered, slamming the door as she left.
Draco shrugged off the entire dilemma, knowing that the Slytherins would not believe Pansy's words over his. He smirked and looked forward to his next night encounter with Hermione.
Chapter 7- He Wasn't Awake Before
Hermione nervously rubbed the back of her head, the increasing pain searing through her body. Raw muscles screamed with tension and her eyes, though focused, had lost their glossy luster. She flipped through the aged and torn book before her, tapping her fingers angrily against the rough wood of the table. The door to the common room flung open and Hermione jumped in her seat. An excited Harry wearing Quidditch robes bounded over to the familiar face, broom in hand. Ron followed suit, his expression changing from joy to that of sudden worry.
"How was practice, Harry?" Hermione said weakly as her eyes slowly moved from the writing on the pages to her companion. Harry set his broom alongside him and kicked his feet onto the table, knocking over Hermione's bottle of ink. She barely noticed—even as she managed to drag a part of her robe's sleeve through the mess. Harry pursed his lips as he quizzically glanced at her, but continued with what he was about to say.
"You should've seen it! The Slytherins were practicing before us so we all thought we would have a good time and sit and watch them—Draco was like a dead weight. He did nothing—even when the snitch was right in front of him, he didn't see it. That just proves that he probably drinks something before matches to do as well as he does."
Harry turned his head up toward Ron, looking for the reassurance that he needed to prove that Draco, had indeed, faltered during the practice. However, Ron was rubbing the back of his neck, eyes staring unwillingly out one of the many windows. Hermione felt a hazy memory of some sort of pain in connection to Ron, but she couldn't recall what it was. She passed it off as an emotional scarring related to when he'd accidentally boxed her, even though she knew that it wasn't.
"Oh, yeah, great—bloody brilliant," Ron mumbled as Harry cocked his brow. The Quidditch player shook his head in confusion and turned back towards Hermione, his expression immediately lighting up with humor.
"And apparently Pansy's going around calling you a wench for stealing her dear, dear Draco."
Hermione snorted in a mixture of disbelief and confusion, but let the moment pass by. She glanced at Ron and Harry, then placed her things into her bag, still choosing to not acknowledge the ink stain that was covering the book's pages in black fluid. She slammed the book shut and left it on the table. The duo watched her retreating back as she rushed towards the door.
She rubbed her temples as she tried to focus. The past few weeks had definitely flown by to leave her in complete disarray. Her frazzled nerves heightened as a familiar face walked into the library, obviously searching for her. He headed in her direction, a bouquet of roses tucked underneath his arm. Draco was certainly playing the part more then he needed to be.
"For the lady," he said with a raised brow and an all too knowing smirk. Hermione caught the huddled groups of students peering at the scene from behind bookshelves and graciously accepted the flowers. She forced a smile and set the roses down beside her, the petal colors fading from pink to red, and then to a flaming yellow. Hermione despised Draco now more than any other time. If he thought he could keep the charade going by simply buying her gifts that paid her off like he would pay off a prostitute, he had another thing coming. She continued scribbling as he pulled a chair from a deserted table. In a quick movement, he was sitting, staring at her, his arms folded across the back of the seat which was conveniently in front of him.
"I've been thinking about you, Granger," he whispered in a hushed tone after their audience had dispersed. Their daily intake of the main love affair at the Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry had been fulfilled.
"And apparently, so has Pansy," she sneered in reply. The quill that she was writing with was no longer writing in her usual legible penmanship. Draco reached forwards and placed a hand over hers.
"Let's leave this dusty cave," he suggested, ignoring her icy remarks. "I can already see the cobwebs forming on your shoulders."
Hermione ducked her head and refused to make eye contact, putting up a good show of reading her text book. She copied ingredients and words onto her parchment, even though it wasn't an assignment. To be frank, she had completed her work hours ago after having tried to get her mind on other things. Now, her plan was threatening to shatter because of the presence of one annoyingly alluring Slytherin.
"Come on, Granger, playing hard-to-get only works with muggles. The sooner we talk, the sooner we'll have this all behind us and the sooner we won't have to worry about it, the sooner we can get back to our normal, average, un-touched prefect lives."
She nearly burned holes into the book's pages with her glare. So he did want to forget about the entire ordeal and make it seem as it had never happened. If he wanted to pretend the moment in time they had shared had been wasted, then so would she. It wouldn't be that hard, since he was already adding wood to the fire by saying all the wrong things. She placed her things back into her bag for the second time that day and pushed back her chair as she moved to stand up. Draco raised a brow as he glanced to the roses still left on the table. Hermione copied his expression and moved her body so that her bag knocked the bouquet onto the floor. She stepped onto the flowers, crushing the petals beneath her shoe's high heel.
"How clumsy of me," she innocently said with an index finger placed seductively at the corner of her lips. He sarcastically winced as she brought back memories of previous conversations, but was quick to shrug it off.
"Mobilarbus," he calmly said as he aimed the wand's tip at the destroyed flowers. The bouquet raised and then dropped in the nearest waste basket. Luckily, the students were still not observing. Hermione walked to the other side of the table and ignored Draco's outstretched hand. He took in a deep breath and followed her.
"Would you like to pay your whore any thing else, Draco? I'm sure that I could use it to buy tapes to help me improve my skill," Hermione hissed as they took cover behind one of the many large trees on the grounds. Less than 24 hours ago, they had been content, lying side by side, but now they faced each other, spitting rude insults and despising one another—or at least Hermione saw it as so. Draco raised both brows as he casually tucked his hands into his pockets.
"So it's Draco now? Not Malfoy?" he replied, catching her off guard. Hermione let her bag slide off her shoulder, the extra weight having been an obnoxious threat. She placed her hands across her chest, her legs terse and placed like tense soldiers alongside one another.
"Stop trying to change the subject, you git," she said angrily. Draco sighed and turned to lean against the large trunk of the tree.
"The faster this is over with, the faster I can get back to working the street corners," she stated sarcastically.
"I'd like to see that—goody-little-two-shoes Hermione Granger, a prostitute. The day you do that will be the day that any of the Malfoys are put in a house other then Slytherin."
Hermione rubbed her temples as Draco watched. A feeling that he imagined was worry boiled inside of him, but it could also have been his sexual drive. Emotions were too far of a complicated thing to exist in a Malfoy.
"The fact of the matter is that—that—you are trying to pay me for—" she started.
"For what, Granger? Say it, but you know damn well that I'm not and if you try to manipulate the gifts that I give you into a form of payment, then you might as well be a whore. What I wanted to ask you was if you were doing all right with Weasel hovering over you like a mother hen," he snapped. Hermione wanted to slap him, but she held her chin up high and looked past his tasteless comments.
"I'm doing perfectly fine with Ron, thank you very much," she replied. "Why do you ask?"
"Are you sure? One hundred percent?" he said with a raised brow. Hermione nodded slowly, then reached down to grab her bag. When she stood back up, Draco was standing behind her. She froze as he wrapped his arms around her waist from behind.
"Positive?" he growled into her ear. Annoyed, Hermione shoved both elbows into his sides, knocking him several steps back.
"Yes!" she barked back. "
Draco smirked as he quickly recovered, reaching forward to brush away a strand of her hair. She turned her face to the side to avoid his touch and then quickly pivoted, intent on heading back to the castle.
"Watch your back, Granger," he called after her, an expression of mixed emotions splayed on his features. Half of his face was lit up in delight due to the pleasure he still felt when his taunts and insults worked, but the other was still questioning his loyalty and where it lay. Hermione tossed a glance over her shoulder at the loitering Slytherin.
"You're doing enough watching for everybody," she sneered. Draco cocked a brow and walked away in another direction.
The evening rituals of having Slytherins greet Gryffindors was progressing as planned. The sessions were soon to end, though it seemed highly doubtful that they would—perhaps in another month's worth of meetings. The conversation quickly drew to a close and the first years rushed to return to their own matters. Draco stood up casually as the Slytherin first years rushed to escape the Gryffindor confines—the red and gold curtains had been blinding them for quite a while. Hermione followed Draco but managed to feint all of his flirtatious motions or intentions. She brushed off his movements as if they were nothing and it seemed that way because Draco moved so slyly.
"Go ahead to the Slytherin common room," Draco ordered, motioning with a wave of his hand. The first years hushed and quickly ran down the hall back to their quarters, believing that Hermione and Draco needed some rather romantic time alone. However, that was quite the opposite of what Hermione had in mind.
"What do you want?" she bit out, glancing nervously from side to side. When ever they did not act like a couple, she always felt that some student was bound to turn the corner and see their little broken charade.
"Ron is going to do something," he whispered calmly, "I just don't know what."
"That's wonderful, Draco, really, it is," she said sarcastically, averting her eyes from his face. He sighed and took a step closer. Hermione took one back. He took another step and she in return, copied his action like a dance and moved another step back. Draco finally grabbed a gentle hold on her shoulders and held in her place. She instinctively struggled to get out of his grasp.
"Just listen to me and stop dancing around like a deranged animal," he hissed between clenched teeth. Hermione balled her hands into fists and managed to lower her blood pressure minutely.
"I've been having dreams about you—" he began, but before he could finish, Hermione's eyes had already widened and she was reading his words completely wrong. She wriggled her shoulder out of his grasp and swung her hand back, unleashing her palm against his cheek. His face immediately began to redden, a contrast against his somewhat light skin. She pointed a finger accusingly at him as she took several steps backward.
"Oh—don't you even start with me, Draco—I know this little bit—but it's not going to work because I already know all those aces you have up your sleeve. Let me tell you—you are not getting anywhere near my room tonight so don't even try to sweet talk me into believing that it's all just a little mistake and—"
"Bloody hell, Hermione—I don't "sweet talk" or have any "aces up my sleeve"—your muggle sayings are by far the most obnoxiously uninterpretive words I have ever heard—I was trying to tell you that I've been having dreams about you and Ron—about your safety level dropping when around him," he spat out. His cheek was still a dark red and seemed to glow even more with each passing second. Hermione was more worried about his safety than hers. She sighed and shook her head.
"I don't know if this is some trick you're pulling or if it's just some awkward Malfoy trait that skips generations or something—"
"Granger," he said roughly, grabbing her shoulders again. However, he released her just as quickly when he focused on the look she was directing towards him. "You just have to trust me on this one—I don't know how and I don't know when but he will try to do something and you have to be prepared—"
"For goodness sakes, stop sounding like such a boy scout," she said furiously, refusing to acknowledge the look of puzzlement that she received from Draco to her reference about boy scouts—no doubt in the wizarding world they had wizard scouts. "I'm perfectly fine being around Ron and I have been for the past 6 years of my life. There's nothing that makes this year different from the rest."
"Do you always have to be so stubborn—" he began, but quickly stopped because of the voices they heard coming down the corridor. The two froze and as the voices neared, Hermione turned towards Draco. What if the students walking down the hall were first years? They could pass off the arguing as a lover's quarrel, but Draco's flaming cheek and her rumpled clothing from her moving around so much would not exactly support their theory. She furrowed her brow and without warning, leaned forward and caught Draco's cheeks in her hand. She tried to cover his wounded cheek with one hand while pulling down on his face with the other. Their lips made contact just as whoever was walking down the corridor turned the corner.
Hermione did not want to admit it—ever—but the simple physical chemistry between them charged her veins with an energy she had never felt before. It was an interesting and relieving experience—knowing that Draco would somehow be there to hold her up when her knees turned to jelly was always a satisfying feeling. Draco, like the snake he was, eagerly moved to wrap his arms around Hermione's waist, pulling her in for even closer contact. Hermione swore that Draco's own snake was aching for some attention—but the feeling wasn't uncomfortable. She was about to deepen the kiss when she heard staggered footsteps and another set of running ones coming down the hall. Afraid that it wasn't first years at all coming to get a closer look, she pushed Draco away.
"Holy 'ell!" they heard a rather uncontrolled voice say. "Wha' in the bloody world is you two be doin'?"
Hermione's nostrils flared as she saw the image of an intoxicated Ron Weasley before her. Harry and Sean rushed around the corner, hurrying to catch up their escapee.
"We tried to stop him but he doesn't know his own strength when he's had a little too many drinks," Harry said with an innocent shrug. Hermione sidestepped as did Draco when the raging redhead, unable to be held back by companions, rushed at Draco. The Slytherin protectively held Hermione around the waist and to the side, which caused even more tension. Ron hollered out some sort of drunk stupor war call and rushed towards the blonde haired boy again.
"You slimy snick, take your hands offa' 'erme-oh-nee," Ron said as he ran, with flailing arms, towards the blonde haired intruder. Hermione followed Draco's movements as they moved to the side again and allowed Ron free space to travel into a suit of armor. A large crash was heard as the entire suit collapsed atop a very unsuspecting drunk. Harry and Sean rushed to pull Ron out of the mess before the suit rebuilt itself—with Ron inside.
Draco turned to look at Hermione with all too knowing stare. She shook her head and furrowed her brow.
"He's just had a little too much to drunk and you being here is provoking him," she said angrily. Draco raised his hands offensively and shook his head.
"Are you sure that's it, Granger?" he asked, intent on making her rethink where her friendships truly lay. His manipulative manner was not going to trick her again, though.
"Yes, I'm sure, now get out of here before you cause even more trouble," she said while ushering him towards the end of the corridor. He smirked and without so much as a little bit of effort, stood still, causing Hermione's brutal realization of how her strength measured up to his. She stopped trying to move him and turned to look up at his suddenly serious expression.
"Just be careful," he said roughly as his eyes turned to look towards Harry and Sean try to shove Ron into the common room.
"Sweet dreams," she said with a hint of malice in her voice. He winced, much to her dismay, but suddenly pulled off a rather unexpected smirk.
"After that kiss, I will," Draco quickly replied with a wink. Hermione's jaw dropped, but before she could come up with any witty retorts, Draco had already shuffled down the hall's corner. She turned on her heel and rushed back to the common room.
"What was that?" she nearly shrieked as she burst in, watching Ron struggling to stand up correctly. He turned towards her and raised his hands in success.
"You're alive!" he said rather animatedly.
"Of course I am," she slowly replied. Harry shrugged as he always did when he was clueless as to what his friends were saying and turned back to his game of wizard's chess with Sean.
"Draco was about to eat you—y'see, thas' why I had to save you," he said with a cheesy grin. Hermione furrowed her brow and headed to her room to sleep due to the immense confusion Ron was piling atop her. She would ask him about his raging drunk stupor when he was sober and not liable to hurt himself by running into inanimate objects.
Hermione had taken Draco's advice, much to her dismay, and had locked her door. She had nearly dozed off into a deep slumber when she was awoken by a scratching from somewhere in her room. Her heart began to beat non-stop, wondering if Draco had been right and Ron really was going to hurt her. Fear bubbled up inside but when she finally peaked out above her covers, she caught the sight of Draco's silhouette against the window. She quickly clambered from her bed and rushed to the window, pulling it open. Draco immediately rushed in, but instead of grabbing Hermione to hug and kiss and caress, he dropped his broom and pointed his wand towards the corner of her room by the door.
"Petrificus Totalus," he hissed in a tone above a whisper. A very stunned Gryffindor tumbled from the shadows, limbs held together by an imaginary glue. The very angry Harry Potter glared up at Malfoy from his awkward position, a knife in his hand.