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Hope you all enjoy!

Chapter 3

Classes were terrible. Whispers followed them everywhere. It seemed by the time they left the Great Hall, everyone had read the article. Almost every girl and many guys would shoot Harry and Ron sympathetic glances, while glaring at Hermione as if she was some type of horrible vixen.

The Slytherins, on the other hand, were having a field day. They quoted the article, as always. They adopted the "Boy-Who-Loves-Getting-His-Heart-Broken" phrase and used it any chance they got. And worst of all, they made snide and crude comments about the pictures, most of them from the Slytherin boys, about Hermione's body.

These comments always ended in a fight of some kind, usually losing them house points in some form or another, angering the other Gryffindors and adding to the rumors.

Harry and Ron could admit that Hermione had indeed changed a lot since first year, filling out in all the right places, and growing into a very pretty girl, but they'd be damned if they were going to let those lousy Slytherins talk about her like that.

"Lowering yourself to a mudblood was one thing, Potter. But sharing her with a Weasley?" Malfoy let out a low whistle. "That's—"

Malfoy didn't get to finish his sentence, because within seconds Hermione had her wand out and pointed it directly at Malfoy's throat.

"Shut up! Just stop it." she grit out, glaring at him as if she could bore holes into him.

Malfoy froze, standing as rigid as possible, eyes darting to and fro.

"Get. Now." she demanded.

And he went, giving her one last wide-eyed look; he turned and ran off to his next class, Crabbe and Goyle following close behind.

Hermione sighed as she let her arm drop down to her side.

"You know, that's the second time we've watched Malfoy run away from you." Harry said gently, coming up next to her.

"Yeah," Ron agreed, moving to stand with them. "I bet he's afraid of you!"

"Of a mudblood? I doubt it." she said with a shake of her head. Before they could protest she added, "Come on, we've got potions next and we're going to be late."

They were late too, coming into class just as Snape stood to explain their potion for the day. He smirked as they came in and quickly went to the empty seats in the back of the room. "That'll be five points each from Gryffindor for being late." he said nastily. "Oh, and I'll take another fifteen for the inappropriate rule breaking one can only assume you three were partaking in." he added with a cruel smile.

Snickers were heard throughout the Slytherins while their fellow Gryffindors groaned at the thought of losing more house points.

Hermione's head snapped at the insinuations Snape made. She opened her mouth to speak, before closing it again with an audible snap.

"A wise decision, Miss Granger, a wise decision." Snape said with a cold look, before he continued speaking to the rest of the class. "Now, before I was so rudely interrupted, today we are going to brew a simple but precise camouflage potion. The instructions are on the board, you have the rest of class to finish, pair up."

Harry and Ron paired off while Hermione began to move to work with Neville. However, Snape interrupted them. "I think you two've shared enough for right now." he said with an evil smirk. "Weasley, work with Parkinson. Potter, you're with Zabini. Granger, you work with Malfoy."

They groaned to themselves as they moved to work with their new partners.

Pansy smiled, if you could call that a smile, widely up a Ron and patted the seat next to her. "That's right; bring your cute little pureblooded self right over here. Don't worry, Weasley, I won't bite." she said, before adding provocatively, "Unless you ask me to."

Ron paled and looked incredibly frightened as he walked stiffly up to her. "I won't." he muttered as he placed his things on the desk.

Pansy pouted at that before brightening again. "That's alright, if you like it sweet and slow the first time around; I can deal with that."

Ron looked like he was about to puke.

Harry laughed, before quickly turning it into a cough as Ron glared at him fiercely. Harry quickly turned away from his friend and went up to Blaise Zabini and put his stuff on the table.

"So, you and Granger, huh?" Blaise started.

Harry just glared at him.

Blaise continued on obliviously. "I guess I can see where you're coming from though. She definitely doesn't look anything like she did first year, that's for sure. If you can ignore the hair and get her to shut up for a bit I'd say she's actually quite pretty, for a Gryffindor that is. Who'd have thought she actually grew breasts! You know I'd never really noticed that until those pictures this morning, always wearing school robes and all, they don't show much, but now, yeah I can definitely tell she's got a lot going for her. But I suppose you know all about that now don't you?" Blaise grinned and jabbed Harry in the stomach with his elbow. "Yeah from everything that's been going around today, I'd definitely say you know all about it. So, tell me, how is she in bed?"

It took all of Harry's self-control to not take out his wand and hex Blaise Zabini into a million pieces, and then hex those million pieces into oblivion. But he knew that Snape was still watching him, so instead, Harry just grunted and took his aggressions out on chopping his mug root into very tiny pieces.

Blaise seemed to finally realize that he wasn't going to get any information out of Harry and just nodded. "I see, don't wanna let it be known how good she is, wanna keep her to yourself, I see, I can understand that." he said, then he looked over at Ron and added, "But I guess it's a bit late for that now, isn't it?" he laughed at himself and continued to grin as he added some dried newt power to his cauldron.

Harry just glared at him and brooded over his potion. He glanced over at Hermione to see how she was handling Malfoy. He saw her sitting there stirring her potion and reading the next ingredients while studiously ignoring Malfoy who was whispering something to her. Harry had to applaud her; she was doing very well about ignoring everything and just trying to get through the day.

Then he saw her take her spoon out of her cauldron and hit Malfoy over the head with it while Snape's back was turned.

Okay, so maybe not ignoring everything.

A/N: So, what do you think? Please read and review, you guys don't know how much it means to me! :)