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oo Love Sex and a Bottle of Vodka oo

oo Chapter Sixteenoo

Draco dropped his heavy Transfiguration textbook on the table before him and groaned as he eased himself into the chair.

"Please tell me you have some good news for me," he said to the amused looking black-haired boy before him. "Professor McGonagall has gone on a hate crusade and apparently even my own house professor has joined since Snape" -At this point, Draco dropped another heavy textbook onto the table, on top of his Transfiguration book- "Has assigned me with enough essays to last me until next month."

"Maybe they have joined some club," Harry said. "I don't remember getting that much homework assigned."

"That's because you don't do your homework," Draco replied, scathingly. Harry had to smile at that. The hour was late and the students in the Dining Hall were few. There was no one there to trouble them by spreading rumors of why finally in the seventh year, Harry and Draco were deciding to associate with one another with no apparent animosity. Harry welcomed this; he's had people talk of him his whole life and he never quite enjoyed it.

"Well in that case," Harry said. "I suppose I do have some good news for you, Draco." Although Harry expected calling the other boy by his first name strange, his given name came much more easily to Harry's tongue than Draco's surname.

Draco wearily put a hand up to rub his eyes. They were so dry that his tears stung for a couple of seconds. He blinked several times to rid himself the uneasy sensation. Then Harry's words registered.

"Really? Like what? Has Ron gone and hexed himself by accident?" Draco said, brightening.

"No," Harry said, exasperated. "I know you aren't fond of him and he's not fond of you, but honestly, Ron isn't Neville. I can't really imagine him accidentally hexing himself." The other boy busied himself in digging into his fragrant garlic and onion chicken pot pie.

"He might hex you though," Harry said, wryly. "And pretend it was an accident." Draco pretended as though he wasn't listening. Harry could quite imagine Draco making a very good Animagus cat. He already had the attitude down; he shut his ears when bad things were said and did what he pleased no matter what. He answered to no one except himself and...well, perhaps Hermione.

"I know you're hungry, but couldn't you have picked anything else to eat? That smells really foul," Harry commented. Again, Draco chose not to hear what Harry said. Harry carefully stirred his spoon around his creamy soup and brought the spoon to his lips. After thinking his words through carefully, Harry ventured to talk again.

"She doesn't hate you, you know," he said. Draco looked up.

"What?"

"She doesn't hate you," Harry repeated. "She likes you, has taken a liking to you anyway. I'm not surprised; her memories might have been erased, hopefully temporarily, but the initial attraction can't be."

"Just give her another week and she'll start remembering what a fool I was. Or her subconscious will remind her," Draco said. Harry scowled.

"Pessimism was not what we agreed on," he pointed out. "You have a chance, Draco, honestly, and if anyone can bring back her memories of this summer, it's you."

"Do you really think that it's better for her to remember?" asked Draco. "She was unhappy, you know. I made her unhappy. Maybe it's really best if she does forget and starts all over again."

"Stop wallowing in self-pity, Draco, honestly," Harry said. "She might have been unhappy but a larger part, a great deal larger part of her was happy. Exceedingly so. I know you'll do the right thing." Harry stood up and made as if to leave. Draco considered. Hermione was happy, wasn't she? Didn't she say that he had helped her over the summer? Was what they had over the summer, that short fling, really worth saving? Yes.

"Wait, Harry, don't go yet," Draco said. Harry sat back down with a strange look in his eyes. Draco found it harder to interpret Harry's expressions than anyone else but he swore that the other boy looked almost...smug. Of course. As usual, Harry had merely been testing him again. Draco scowled, albeit good-naturedly, inwardly; he wasn't used to being bested in wits and intellect by another.

"Yes?" Harry said.

"So I really have a chance? I don't mean just a chance at getting Hermione back, I mean, a chance at making her happy, really happy?" Harry cocked his head, a grin creeping onto his face.

"You know, Draco, I was beginning to think you were never going to ask that question."

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Draco was in the library. He didn't know why. In all of the past six years he had been at this school, he hardly took a whiff of the library air nevertheless set a foot in the vast room. But here he was now, settling himself down at one of the empty tables, almost completely hidden from view. Perhaps it was Hermione rubbing off on him. Or perhaps it was just a naïve hope that he would run into Hermione here. Whatever the reason, it had to do with Hermione although Draco wasn't sure he wanted to really analyze his thoughts too deeply on this.

He flipped open his Potions book, wondering why Snape had suddenly become such a stick in the mud. Seven rolls of parchment, was he mad? Draco flipped to the index to look up the plants needed for a temporary levitating potion. As he traced his index finger down the list of ingredients spelled with an I, a shadow fell over him.

"Excuse me but do you mind if I sit here? All the other tables are full." Draco's heart gave a half-excited, half-uneasy turn at the sound of the voice.

"Of course," he said, pushing his book bag down to the floor. He knew he was avoiding meeting her eyes but he couldn't really look at her at this moment. It would unhinge him. He wasn't prepared, he wasn't ready. And if only his heart would stop palpitating!

"Wait a minute," Hermione said. "It's you, Draco. Do you study at the library as well?" There was no way he could really get away with staring hard at the grainy surface of the wooden table any more.

"Not...really," Draco said. His throat had suddenly gone dry. Had he been struck with an infliction all of a sudden? It was entirely possible with his heart gone berserk, his throat gone mad, and his mind gone insane. Draco made a mental note to drop by Madame Pomfrey's for a quick visit.

"But I might start coming more often; I like it here," he said. Hermione smiled knowingly.

"I know. Most people avoid the library like the plague but honestly, I don't mind it at all. It's so quiet here. My best work happens in this library."

"Really?"

"Well, yes." Hermione looked as though she was trying to decide whether or not to tell him something else.

"I met my first boyfriend here," she admitted. "Well, I mean, the reason why Krum came by the library so often was because he saw me here."

"Oh?" Draco said. This was getting a bit painful.

"Anyway, it doesn't matter. It was a silly matter of expectations and societal pressures, you know?"

"You mean you just went out with him because you decided that fourteen was high time for you to get your first boyfriend?" Draco asked. Hermione tilted her head.

"Yes, exactly. How did you know that I was fourteen?"

"Lucky guess?" Draco offered.

"It's not fair that you know so much about me and I don't know a single thing about you," Hermione said. She drummed her fingertips on the top of her own Arithmancy textbook. Her book was full of dog-eared pages and post-it notes sticking out of the top of the book, making markers of what Draco suspected was pages that had useful information. He never had put in that much effort with his own readings and research. Then again, that was what he admired about Hermione.

"You tell me something," Hermione said. A look so devious as to have put Machiavelli to shame crept onto her face. "Tell me...about your first love. That's interesting enough to start with, no?"

Draco had to force himself to plaster a smile that would be appropriate for the light, teasing mood that Hermione had presented the question with.

"She..." Draco was going to make something up, or he was planning to. Or he was going to give a bland, normal answer. Instead, when he opened his mouth, he found he had no control over what he was going to say.

"She took my life by storm," he said. "She's extremely smart; if anyone could best you in an argument, she could. I loved the way she looks when she wakes up on Sunday morning against white sheets with the sun on her face. I felt happy, genuinely happy, for the first time ever when I was with her. I know I love her because I can't live without her."

Hermione didn't look uncomfortable or just plain curious as anybody else would have been. Instead, Draco found something much more complex on Hermione's face.

"What happened?" Hermione said, softly. Draco thanked her silently that she hadn't asked who his first love was.

"I did something stupid. I regret it probably, oh, once every five minutes or so," Draco said, trying to revive the lighter mood of before. He found himself growing serious again. "I lost her and now I think she's completely forgotten me." Draco gave Hermione a crooked grin.

"Funny how some things turn out." Hermione looked surprised and peculiar then and suddenly stood up.

"I...I'll see you later, Draco," she said. She gathered her books in her arms and quickly walked out the door. Draco watched her leave.

"You have no idea how much I regret it," he said, quietly.

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Hermione didn't know exactly what had happened back there in the library but it was strange. It was an uncanny feeling that had crept over her and sitting there, listening to Draco talk, she felt as though his voice was nearly lulling her to sleep. And as she drifted in that strange in-between stage of consciousness, she found herself in the place of Draco's love.

She could imagine so clearly what it felt like to sleepily open her eyes, her face pleasantly warm, bathed in sunlight. Hermione could even feel how the soft, white blankets around her was warm, having absorbed the warmth from her and Draco's bodies.

No. Hermione shook her head. What was she thinking? It was obvious what had happened. She was falling for this Draco character. She wanted so badly to be that girl that Draco had been passionately talking about so quietly, so confidentially, to her just a few minutes ago, that she had imagined herself in this mystery girl's place.

But it had felt so real. Hermione could even feel the texture of the blankets beneath her fingertips, as though the phantom blankets had imbedded themselves into the whorls of her fingers. She could feel the soft warmth of sunlight kissing her face and then Draco's lips brushing against her closed eyes.

She just couldn't pine after Draco, especially seeing as how he was still not over this girl. He had said she was his first love, right? When had all of this happened?

As much as she tried to tell herself to forget it, that she could never replace this girl in Draco's heart, Hermione couldn't forget the sad, gray eyes. She had never felt such a pull towards anybody before in her life. Hermione didn't want to fight this pull at all but the sensible part of her mind was wondering if maybe she should, for Draco's sake.

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By some raw hope that she might see Draco again, Hermione found herself heading to the back table in the library. She didn't quite know why she wanted to see him again so badly. In fact, she felt that she should be doing the exact opposite seeing as how he was obviously not over that girl he told her about and there was really no room for her in his heart. She was setting herself up for something painful but Hermione didn't care. She just had to see him, one more time, that's all she wanted, and she would leave Draco alone.

She found him there, scribbling furiously on a piece of parchment, a picture of complete concentration. Hermione waited by the bookshelf for a little bit, smiling with an almost motherly love at the boy. When he appeared to have come to a halt in his writing, she let herself known.

"You don't mind if I sit here, do you?" she asked. Was he gratified to see her? Or was he annoyed?

"I'm not bothering you or anything, am I?" Hermione asked. He shook his head.

"No, I was just finishing up an essay. Snape seems to have gone a bit over the edge as of late."

"He's always been quite the charmer, hasn't he," Hermione said, wryly. "Such a way with students." Draco grinned too.

"What homework do you have? As I recall, you didn't do any last time you came here," Draco said. Hermione flushed and looked down.

"I'm really sorry about," she said. "I just..." What was she going to say? Hermione desperately wanted to ask him if there could possibly be a part of his heart left that he might consider giving to her, but how could she ask such a question to someone who was so clearly heartbroken?

"Wanted to give you privacy, to fall back into your memories," she finished.

"Memories." Draco said the word as though it pained him and teased him. He shrugged.

"What are memories anyway? It's unreal. A simple fact can get horribly skewed in someone's mind and with no one else to validate it, it becomes fiction."

"Not if it's what you believe," Hermione said, thinking. "Truth is elusive. It's relative to whoever is judge." Draco smiled, albeit sadly. Hermione watched as Draco seemed to finish his essay.

"What are you thinking of?" he asked. Draco had now given his full attention to Hermione who was sitting across from him. She would have expected those intense, gray eyes to be unsettling but she quite liked the sensation of them looking straight into her eyes.

"Elusive things," she said, smiling slightly. "Hearts." She left it at that. Draco scribbled something at the bottom of his parchment, tore it off and passed it across the table to her. He smiled and silently excused himself and Hermione found herself alone at the table, trying to will herself to look at that innocent piece of parchment before her.

Whatever it is, I will be okay, Hermione promised herself. And I won't bother him any more. He's not mine to have anyway. That thought process halted when she saw what was written on the parchment.

She picked it up and held it close to her nose, then pulled it back, wondering if she had read the words wrong. She felt her heart drop and the earth wobble ever so slightly on its axis. What did this mean? Was it a warning for her to stay away or was it...was it an invitation? In Draco's surprisingly neat cursive, written in a bruised, black ink on the ecru parchment was:

Have you interest in my heart?

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