Disclaimer: Incidentally, last night Little Bunny Foo-Foo came and bopped me on the head and I am now magically the owner of everything Harry Potter. If you believed that….you might be a red neck…

Restless tonight
Cause I wasted the light
Between both these times
I drew a really thin line

I sprinted down the deserted Charms hallway trying desperately to get to Dumbledore's office before the meeting was over. Glancing at my watch for a split second I realized that I was now eighteen minutes late. Cursing under my breath I urged myself forward.

I was beginning to worry myself. I was now procrastinating, running late on occasion, and even forgetting to do my assignments the day they were first mentioned. I was slowly slipping into a black hole that I had created for myself.

Someone was bound to notice sometime. Professor McGonagal was already shooting me curious glances during class. She at least noticed that I wasn't taking the usual feverish notes that I usually did. I did my notes only halfheartedly.

As usual the way I wanted things to turn out and the way they did turn out were two entirely different things. In fact someone did notice that I was slipping into despair. Not someone that I cared deeply about or anything but something that surprised me.

A loud clunk sounded somewhere behind me and I turned to investigate. Somehow or another my defense against the dark arts book had fallen out of my pack, along with my favorite quill and most expensive ink. Turning around I gathered up my stuff and wondered how it had fallen out.

Sometime between lunch and care of magical creatures I had gotten a hole in my pack. 'Just great,' I thought. 'Another thing to put on my to-do list.'

"Excuse me," I heard the voice say. I looked up from my bag and saw no one. Standing up slowly, I turned around to find that no one was in that direction either. Doing a complete circle looking for the source of the voice I still found no one there.

"Ah, I'm losing it," I said, smoothing out my robes and glancing at my watch again. Twenty one minutes late.

"Excuse me!" The voice repeated growing impatient. This time I listened for the direction of the voice and turned toward the wall.

"Oh," I said. What was I supposed to say? This didn't happen all the time. "Do you need something?" I asked trying to sound like paintings randomly talked to me all the time.

The girl in the painting smiled down at me. She was very pretty. I guessed that her age was around seventeen or so. My age. She had long silvery blonde hair that flowed in curls down to her waist. She was very well kept and had a neatly pressed uniform. I noticed that she proudly wore a Slytherin badge on her left breast pocket.

I then noticed that there was another occupant in the painting. A boy, around the same age as me and the girl, stood there also. He had brown hair plastered haphazardly on his head. He was very tall and very well kept too. His hands were resting in his pockets and he looked around the painting looking rather bored. I noticed that he, unlike the girl, had a Gryffindor badge on his uniform.

"Yes," the girl answered smiling. "Are you Hermione Granger?"

"Um, well, yes I am." Another glance at my watch. Twenty three minutes now. "Is there something that you need, because I'm in a hurry, I'm late for a meeting."

The girl nodded her head slightly. "No need to hurry. You are not late for the meeting." I stared at her for a moment. She laughed and continued. "Dumbledore told me to tell you that the meeting has been canceled for now. He said that there was a matter with misbehaving children that he had to tend to. He also said that he's sorry for any inconvenience."

"Oh." I replied feeling increasingly stupid. The girl walked over to a bookshelf toward the left part of the frame and busied herself into alphabetizing the books there. The boy smiled an all too familiar sneer and said in a slow drawly voice so foreign to Gryffindors, "There is also another message."

I didn't say anything. I waited patiently for him to continue. "There is?" the girl asked coming over to the boy and placing a hand lightly on his shoulder. He looked at her hand for a moment and then continued, "Yes, from a Mr. Malfoy."

I exhaled a breath I didn't know I was holding in. "What does he want?" I asked rolling my eyes.

"He wants to meet you in the library. He said it was something about duty arrangements."

"Arrangements? Isn't Dumbledore supposed to arrange all of the duty times?" I asked more to myself than to them. "Strange."

"Apparently he met with Dumbledore. He was early for the meeting," The boy said smirking. How can a kid like this end up in Gryffindor? I wondered.

I would have said something, but the girl beat me too it. "Derek!" she said hitting him somewhat hard in across the chest. He looked down at his chest after she hit him and rubbed it slightly not being able to admit out right that it had hurt him. "That was very rude." She continued, putting her hands on her hips. It was then that I realized that I didn't know their names.

"Sorry," Derek muttered under his breath. He didn't meet anyone's eyes while saying this so I knew that he was only saying it to get the girl off his back.

The girl however seemed pleased with herself. She smiled a little to herself and backed away from him heading back to the book shelf. Halfway there she stopped and looked at me with wide eyes. "Oh my!" she said a blush rising on her cheeks. "We haven't introduced ourselves yet! How rude of us!"

I didn't know what to say. I didn't want to be rude and say that she was true in saying that. So I just smiled trying to get the message 'don't worry it's ok, I have other things on my mind' across to her. I think she understood and continued talking anyway.

"I'm Tara Carson. Head Girl. Or use to be." She said waving, since she couldn't reach her hand out for me to shake. I smiled and waved kind of shyly back. Derek made no sudden move to speak. Tara cleared her throat and he seemed to sense that she wanted him to speak for himself.

"What a pair." I thought almost laughing.

"I'm Derek Shneeble. Former Head Boy," he said nodding his head at me.

"And I'm Hermione Granger. Current Head Girl." I said smiling at them.

"Well, Hermione, it was very nice to meet you and I hope you stop by sometime again. We don't get much company other than each other. And sometimes it's nice to have another woman to talk to. If you understand." Tara said smiling.

I nodded my head. Tara seemed like a nice person. "It was nice to meet you too, and I'm sure I'll stop by sometime." In fact I wasn't sure If I was ever going to come back down this corridor again, and if I did I didn't know if I would talk to them. But I said it anyway. Possibly another lie to add to my growing count.

I said my goodbye to them and continued on my way. Slowly I walked to the library where I knew Malfoy would be waiting for me. I no longer felt the need to hurry. If Dumbledore wasn't there I didn't need to be polite to Malfoy. I was almost enjoying the fact that I was going to see him.

Almost. I remembered right away who he was and where he came from. I knew what he represented and I knew that I wanted nothing to do with the sort.

Now I seemed to be regretting going to the library. Mark that one in the books.

It's nothing I planned
And not that I can
But you should be mine
Across that line

If I traded it all
If I gave it all away for one thing
Just for one thing
If I sorted it out
If I knew all about this one thing
Wouldn't that be something

I entered the library immediately heading toward the back. I knew no one ever used the back of the library because one, that's where the restricted section is located and two, because the farther back you go in the library the more information you get from the books. No one but me liked the back part of the library. I knew Malfoy would go back there. No one would see him meeting with me.

As I got farther and farther away from human civilization, the books got dustier and older. I loved this part of the library. I passed my favorite section, the section about the early Hogwarts, and came into the section of early wizard battles.

Finally, though I spotted him in the corner. He was sitting at a round table his elbows propped up. One hand was lazily scribbling over some doodle someone left into the table. The other was shading his eyes, so no one would know it was him. "Like anyone wouldn't know it was Malfoy." I thought. He stuck out like a sore thumb, his platinum blonde hair and the fact that Malfoy was never seen in the library.

I promise I might
Not walk on by
Maybe next time
But not this time

I walked slowly up to the table and sat down across from him. I placed my bag quietly on the floor next to me and pulled out my daily planner and my quill. I set these out and organized myself as much I could. During this process Malfoy never once looked up from the table. I noticed that he was tracing a design someone had left in the table. It at first seemed like a circle, but upon closer examination I noticed that was a flower. I beautifully made flower to be exact.

I coughed loudly, trying to get him to sit up and pay attention. But he continued to sit and trace the flower. "So," I said a little loud, trying to get him to acknowledge my presence.

"Ya," he said sitting up a little and suddenly acting business like. "Dumbledore wanted us to work out our schedule with out him. Since I was there early we decided that he wasn't really needed to create a simple schedule." He said. I glared at him.

"Sorry, I have other stuff to tend to first." I said through gritted teeth. I really need to try the count to ten method.

"Making out with Weasle doesn't count as an excuse, Granger." He said with a smirk.

It took all I had to just reply with a somewhat composed answer. "I wasn't doing anything with Ron, Malfoy."

"Oh, sorry," he said sarcastically. "Let's see its Monday...it's Potter's turn around isn't it?" he said his smirk growing wider.

With the growing anger I had inside me I had finally reached a boiling point. I snapped.

"Malfoy! You prat! Would you get your brain out of the gutter and get it through your tiny little brain that I don't have a thing for Ron or Harry or any boy in the Gryffindor house or Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff and definitely not Slytherin?" I shouted at him. I half expected the books around us to have dust flying and us be totally enveloped in a dust storm. My throat hurt from yelling so loudly and suddenly at him.

"Oh, then it must have been Krum." Malfoy said enjoying me getting all worked up.

I slammed the table with my fist. "Malfoy! No! I am not going out with anyone! I had other stuff to do alright?" I shouted. I was seeing spots. I had never been this angry before. Why was I so mad at this? It was something I got all the time from Malfoy.

"Ya, I guess you're right. I'm giving you too much credit. You couldn't get a boyfriend with your looks." he said lazily seizing me up with his eyes. I suddenly felt very self conscious and looked down at the table. I hated the way he looked at me. How dare he!

Before I could attack my prey Madam Price came back to our table. "If you two would kindly keep it quite, others are trying to study. And I must say you are setting a bad example being Head Boy and Head Girl." She said trying to contain herself. I had never seen her this angry before. Usually when she was mad at loud students in the library she would turn red and yell at them a little. She was now beyond mad. A vein was throbbing in her head and she was now a deep purple color.

"Yes Ma'am." I whispered feeling very ashamed of myself. I really must learn to control my anger.

After she was out of ear shot Malfoy rounded on me. "Great going, Granger. Now you got us in trouble."

"Me?" I said disbelievingly. "How was it me who got us in trouble? If you didn't say a bunch of snide remarks about my friends I wouldn't have to make noise, but no you have to see how far you can go before someone snaps!" I spat. I took a few deep breaths trying not to notice that Malfoy was smirking at me. "Let's just get this done with. The sooner I get away from you the better."

"Fine. I work on Sundays. You work the rest," he said standing up.

"What?" I said in a whisper not believing he would even suggest that. Maybe as a joke but he looked dead serious.

"You heard what I said," he said looking at his perfect nails.

"No way! It has to be even."

"There's no way it can be. There are seven days in a week. Seven isn't divisible by two. Therefore one of us has to work over time. Honestly Granger, I thought you were supposed to be the smartest witch of our age. You seem to be slacking on the job if you ask me."

"Well, I didn't ask you, Malfoy." I sighed. "Fine, we'll each do three days a week and have the seventh day to share duties."

"Sounds good. I'll do Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday. You'll do Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday," he said and started to walk away. He stopped however and turned toward me. "Don't tell anyone that we met here." he said looking around making sure that no one had seen us together.

"Like I would. I don't want people to know that I'm hanging out with you." I said defensively, crossing my arms over my chest.

"Good," he said and I thought he was done talking. "I appreciate it," he said before turning on his heel and leaving me in the dusty section of the library completely rooted to the spot.

"Was he being nice?" I thought. "Something is definitely up. I need to find out what it is." I thought with determination. "I also need to stop procrastinating."

Even though I know
I don't wanna know
Yeah I guess I know
I just hate how it sounds