Hermione's eyes widened in surprise as she felt Draco Malfoy's lips press down on her own. Yes, there was no denying that Draco was gorgeous – his chiseled features, broad shoulders and silvery blue eyes made him seem almost God like, and that, combined with the Malfoy fortune, had made him one of the most sort after bachelors at Hogwarts – but he was also one the most hard-headed, intolerable, bigoted wizards Hermione knew. And now, after six years of taunting and cursing and loathing, he, Draco Malfoy, was kissing Hermione Granger between the book shelves in the back of Flourish and Botts.

"What is he doing?" she thought in vain, desperately trying to find a reason for his sudden action, "We're supposed to hate each other." Her mind was suddenly cloudy as she felt his tongue slip deeper into her mouth, making the already warm and passionate kiss a lot more intimate. As she felt his hands roam up her shirt, she was suddenly bought back down to earth - this was farther than she had even gone with Viktor, and she certainly was not going to let Malfoy out of all people be the first to feel her up! Hermione jerked back, pushing his well formed chest away from her.

"Wh-what's wrong?" He panted, out of breath. Hermione took a moment to compose herself, finding it hard to be stay angry as she looked at his face, his eyes wide with confusion and his blond hair tousled in exactly the right places. Silently pleading with herself to remember that he was the same Malfoy who tried to make her life a living hell for the past six years and who hated her best friends, she continued.

"What's wrong? What's wrong?!?" She asked, her voice rising slightly with each word. "I'll tell you what's wrong, Malfoy," she continued, her face reddening significantly, "You, are Draco Malfoy, the bigoted pureblood Slytherin prefect and Quidditch captain. We hate each other, we have now for six years. You are cruel and unkind, and you have tried to make my life hell. And now, now, the one time I think you've changed just a little bit, first with your apology, and then with what seemed to be genuine concern about why I was upset, you go and take advantage of me. It's my fault I guess, I mean, why would I ever think you had actually changed. How could I have thought you had changed?" She stood up quickly, her skirt swishing around her and her face matching the color of her bright red shirt, and stormed out from between the shelves and left the store leaving a very hurt Draco.

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The next two weeks at the burrow were awkward, to say the least, for Harry, Hermione and Ginny. Hermione had apologized to both Harry and Ginny for her sudden exit at the Leaky Cauldron, saying that she had eaten some rather questionable chocolate frogs right before meeting them, but she knew that Ginny had suspected the real reason, and, judging by the awkward way Harry acted with Hermione when they were alone, she had probably informed Harry of it too. Ron, on the other hand, was completely oblivious to most of what was going on around him, and spent his days in his room writing to and pining for Lavender, who, judging from the hourly owls, seemed to be missing him just as much. Hermione, unable to spend her time with the couple (who spent every spare moment out of Mrs. Weasley's site caressing and kissing each other), and Ron (who was never quite 'there'), spent her days exploring the country side around the burrow.

It was on one of these walks that Hermione began to think of the kiss she and Draco had shared that day in Diagon Alley. It was, as she grudgingly admitted to herself, probably the best kiss she had ever had. True, she had only kissed two other boys before, one being a Muggle boy on a dare when she was 11, and the other being Viktor, but, despite her lack of experience, Draco's kiss seemed to be perfect. He was gentle, yet forceful. He was warm and comforting and safe and familiar, yet he wasn't boring. At this time, she tried to remind herself that the person she was thinking so much about was indeed, Draco Malfoy, and that, she, Hermione Granger, couldn't possibly have feelings for him, but after a while, she began to realize that half of her attraction to him, was due to the fact that he was Draco Malfoy. Maybe he had changed, she reasoned, after all, hadn't he apologized for calling her a mudblood right before he kissed her? And hadn't he been understanding when she had told him about Harry and Ginny? But then, she asked herself, had he meant the kiss? Or was it only to take advantage of her when she was vulnerable? Hermione pushed these thoughts to the back of her mind as she entered the house from the back door, she would just avoid Draco as much as possible – if she didn't see him then she wouldn't have to deal with any awkwardness that kiss may have created.

"Mione, is that you?" called Mrs. Weasley from the kitchen, "There's a letter from Hogwart's on the table for you dear."

Hermione's heart fluttered as she picked up the letter addressed to her on the hall table – she was almost certain that it would contain her first head girl duties in it as well as the identity of the head boy, please be someone I can get along with, she thought. She ripped open the back of the envelope and pulled out a single piece of parchment. She read it silently, only pausing to curse as she read the last line over and over again:

Instructions for your first duty will await you and the Head Boy, Mr. Draco Malfoy, in the head train compartment of the Hogwarts' Express.