Many Encounters, None Pleasant

"Happy to see me, babe?" Ace asked, smirking from his place in the doorframe.

"Do I look happy to see you?" Hermione replied, rhetorically. "What the hell are you doing here, Ace?"

"Wow, what's with the hostility?" Ace asked, feigning surprise. "And here I thought that you would be thrilled to see me."

"What ever possessed you to think that?" Hermione retorted, still shooting daggers at Ace's smug, arrogant self.

"Just the fact that I remember you being extremely taken with me." Ace replied, cockily. "I can't believe that one little thing could make you change you're opinion of me so drastically."

"One little thing?" Hermione asked, her voice rising. "ONE LITTLE THING! You fucking spiked my drinks so that you could have sex with me, Ace! That was some lying, deceitful, manipulative shit you tried to pull off! What is wrong with you?"

Ace smirked as though what he had done was actually funny. "You had fun that night, Granger. Just admit it. If you hadn't gotten drunk then the night would have been a total bore for you. And if I can recall, you wanted to sleep with me."

Hermione's eyes widened in disbelief. "I was drunk! By YOU! Are you that stupid that you honestly believed I wouldn't be the least bit angry? If Draco weren't there, I don't know what I would have-" Hermione suddenly went quiet. Draco. He had saved her from making the biggest mistake of her life that night. How ironic was it that she would end up having sex with him instead only a few months later?

"Draco, eh? Yeah, I read about him." Ace said.

Hermione stayed quiet. Ace knew. Was that why he was here? To rub it in?

"I have to go." Hermione suddenly said, staring longingly at the exit.

"But wait!" Ace cried, now standing straight so that he could block the doorframe. "Don't you want to hear what I read? It's really interesting, actually. Draco Malfoy, the dude who apparently 'saved' you, seems to have killed a guy. Have you heard? How silly of me, of course you have! You were in the article!"

"Ace, move out of my way." Hermione said, her voice calm and steady and yet still not having any impact on Ace.

"Yeah, you were mentioned. Bit of a love triangle there, eh? You, Malfoy, and the dead guy. So you were actually dating Malfoy? I thought that after me you would have had at least some taste." He grinned for a moment before continuing. Hermione glared at him with disgust. "So is the story true, then? Malfoy barges in on you and that guy and then out of jealousy he kills the guy?"

"You know absolutely nothing." Hermione said, angrily.

"I'm kind of insulted, really." Ace continued, faking a hurt expression. "You won't have sex with me, but you'll fuck two other guys a few months later. Was I not good enough for you?" He smirked, his expression clearly saying that he not being good enough for her certainly couldn't be the reason.

"Who the hell are you to presume that I was sleeping with Draco and Will?" Hermione cried, now officially pissed off. "For your information, I never once slept with Will!"

"Ah." Ace said, grinning. "Okay. Question answered. Thanks."

What is wrong with you? Hermione scolded herself. Why wouldn't you say that you didn't sleep with Will and Draco? But secretly, Hermione thought that she might know the answer. Maybe she wanted Ace to know that she was no longer a virgin. Strange.

"Fuck you. I'm leaving." Hermione said, heading for the exit.

Ace placed both hands on Hermione's shoulders to stop her from leaving. Stupidly, Hermione did not fight him.

"I still haven't said why I'm here." Ace pointed out, looking into Hermione's deep, chocolate brown eyes.

"And I'm assuming you're going to tell me." Hermione replied. "And you can do so after you remove your hands from me."

Ace rolled his eyes, grinning as he lowered his hands and folded them across his chest, leaning back onto the doorframe. "Well, partially it's because I got expelled from Durmstrang."

"How shocking." Hermione replied with absolutely no enthusiasm.

"I know. Who'd have known that putting a couple cherry bombs in some of the toilets while the Headmaster was sitting in the next stall would have made him so angry? It was all in good fun." Ace smiled, most likely reminiscing about the moment that the cherry bomb exploded and caused his Headmaster to fly up with the stream of water like a cork flying off of a shaken wine bottle.

"Yeah, who'd have thought?" Hermione replied, sarcastically. "Does McGonagall know that you're back?"

"Nope." Ace replied, casually. "I'm sure she'll be as thrilled to see me as you are."

"I'm sure." Hermione answered. "Why would you come here of all places?"

"Well, I had a proposition for you." Ace said, grinning.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "I'm not going to sleep with you, Ace! Not now, not ever. Got it?"

"Don't flatter yourself, babe." Ace said, still smiling. "That wasn't my proposal. Although I wouldn't decline it if that's what you want."

"I'm going to leave in about five seconds if you don't get on with it." Hermione said, shortly.

"Chill, Hermione. It has to do with your new favorite subject. Spew."

"What is wrong with you people?" Hermione exclaimed. "It's SPEW! S-P-E-W! It's not that difficult! And where the hell did you hear about it?"

"I have my sources. The point is, I can tell that you're obviously serious about it."

"Uh, you think?" Hermione replied sarcastically.

"Don't get testy with me Granger, or you won't get what I have to offer."

"What a pity."

"Anyway, I did hear about it, and I thought, 'Damn, that girl is persistent.' But then it came to me: how will she be able to afford such a thing? If you're that serious about it, then you'll obviously need gold. Finance, my dear. The business world is all about finance. And that is why I'm here."

"You're going to pull some gold out of your ass, then?" Hermione asked, feigning a surprised expression.

"Even better. I'm going to pull some gold out of my vault. Just for you, babe." Ace smirked.

"You said it yourself, Ace. This is business. Ten galleons won't get us too far, I'm sorry to tell you."

"Ten galleons? Try six hundred." Ace replied, looking superior.

Hermione's jaw dropped. She quickly covered up her shock, though. "Whatever, Ace. If you don't mind, I really must-"

"I'm serious." Ace said, uncrossing his arms and striding across the Owlery to a vacant chair. "My dad is the new Headmaster at Durmstrang. You'd be surprised at how much gold Headmaster's actually make."

"Then that means you-"

"Yup. Cherry-bombed my Pop. He's given me one too many chances at that school, and I think the whole 'cherry-bomb incident' was the last straw. He expelled me and kicked me out of the house. Luckily, he wasn't too heartless. He gave me a bit of gold to keep me on my feet for awhile. But I figured that if I finance you, I'd be getting profit, too."

"And how did you figure that?" Hermione asked, skeptically.

"I'd want a job, of course." Ace replied, slickly.

"Hell no!" Hermione immediately answered. "No fucking way in hell. Not happening. Nope. Thank you very much for your time Ace, but no. We'll do fine without you and your stupid gold. Good day." Turning to leave, Hermione marched towards the door.

"Yo, Hermione?" Ace called after her, still sitting in his chair with his feet up on a tree stump.

Sighing, Hermione turned around, staring expectantly at Ace.

"Send me an owl if you change your mind. I think I'll be sticking around."

Glaring at him, Hermione replied, "Don't worry, Acelio. I won't."

Watching her leave, Ace smirked. "We'll see about that."

……………………………………….

"Can you believe him?" Hermione exclaimed, raving about Ace to Hannah and Ginny, who both sat in the Head Boy and Girl dormitory listening intently to Hermione's story.

"I can't believe he's back!" Ginny cried. "After what he did to you, I'm surprised he'd even show his face again!"

"I know!" Hannah agreed, shooting Hermione sympathetic glances.

"McGonagall and Dumbledore won't let him stay, though. They can't. They banned him from here after the incident." Ginny continued, trying to lift Hermione's spirits.

"It was such a wonderful thing that Draco was there." Hannah said. "Imagine if he hadn't been-" She suddenly fell silent at the look on Hermione's face.

"So, you're definitely not going to take the money?" Ginny said, changing the subject.

Hermione looked revolted. "What, did you expect me to even consider it?"

"It's just that you're obviously dead-set for this SPEW idea, right? If you want to make an actual 'business' out of it, you need premises, material, all of that stuff. You can't do it with the change in your back pocket, you know." Ginny pointed out.

Hermione sighed. "I know. But I refuse to accept money from that scumbag and give him a position. Lord knows he would probably want something absurd like President or CEO."

Hannah giggled. "Yeah, he probably would."

"Just don't tell Ron about Ace, okay? He'd flip. You know him. He hated Ace. Harry did, too. We don't need either one of them freaking out because Ace is back." Hermione instructed.

Hannah and Ginny nodded enthusiastically. "Don't worry. The only way that Ron will find out that Ace is back is if they come face to face, and I highly doubt that will happen." Hannah said.

Hermione giggled. "Oh god, imagine if they did?"

Ginny laughed as well. "That wouldn't be very good, would it?"

………………………………….

"Shit, I'm late!" Ron cried to no one in particular as he raced out of his dormitory the next morning. Hermione and Hannah were already gone; Hannah had probably wanted to give Ron a few extra minutes in bed, and then took off with Hermione, leaving Ron dead as a log in his comfortable, four-poster bed.

Ron forced his Hogwarts robes on as he raced out of the dormitory and towards the huge, moving staircase that led up to the North Tower, where the rest of his Divination classmates currently resided. However, in Ron's rush to get to class, he did not even notice the person going down the same staircase that he was going up.

CRASH!

Ron ran straight into the tall, built figure, bouncing off of him like a ping pong ball hitting a racket. He fell backwards, all the way to the bottom of the staircases. His Divination books were all sprawled out around him, and a considerably large bruise was already beginning to form on his elbow as he lay on his back on the ground, looking up at the high, distant ceiling. Suddenly, the figure whom he had run into loomed over him, laughing. The boy's head blocked out the light, causing his face to become silhouetted, but Ron would notice that flicker of brown and blond hair anywhere. It was Ace.

"Watch where you're going, punk." Ace said, still laughing at Ron.

"You!" Ron cried, immediately standing up and instantly forgetting about his pained elbow. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"That, little buddy, is none of your business." Ace said, turning to walk away.

"You wait one moment!" Ron exclaimed, still in disbelief that Acelio McGonagall had the nerve to stand there before him, acting as though nothing had happened. He suddenly withdrew his wand, pointing it directly at Ace. "You deserve to be cursed to hell for what you tried to do to Hermione. Have you no shame? Honestly, you're such a disgusting, vile-"

"Spare me the chat, tiger." Ace replied, obviously intending to piss Ron off by talking to Ron as though he were ten. "It's pretty pathetic that you seem angrier about this then our dear Hermione. She didn't even pull out her wand."

"You've seen Hermione?" Ron asked, shocked. Without thinking, he lowered his wand.

Taking advantage of Ron's hesitance, Ace quickly withdrew his own wand and aimed it at Ron, shouting, "Uforia!"

With a sudden jerk, Ron's hands were instantly bound together up over his head, and he was lifted into the air about two feet off the ground.

Ace laughed once more, clutching his stomach as he once again turned to leave, this time without any interruption.

"I'll get you, McGonagall!" Ron cried from his awkward position in the air. "You wait! You'll wish that the day never came when you messed with Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley!"

……………………………

That evening, Hermione sat in a secluded corner in the library, going over the entire sheaf of parchment that had piled up since the beginning of SPEW. She sighed, staring at all of the numbers helplessly. One number stood out most vividly; premises in Diagon Alley, costing roughly three hundred and fifty galleons. This was not just a booth, however, like Fred and George's joke shop. This was an actual building, smaller than Gringotts but larger than Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. It was just brilliant: large enough to accommodate Hermione, Ron, Hannah, Ginny, Dean, Seamus, Neville, and anyone else who might have decided to work for SPEW. It was a business building, and it would have been perfect. If only Hermione had the money for it. She sighed once more. Three hundred and fifty galleons. Ace had six hundred. That would be plenty for the building plus a lot of gold leftover for any other expenses that they would probably need. No! Hermione told herself. Stop thinking about it! You're not using Ace's gold, and that's final. But all of the ideas that Hermione had streaming through her head would certainly not have come cheap. House-elf homes, clothing, communities… the possibilities were endless. The gold, however, was not. Shaking her head, she sighed for the third and final time. It wouldn't hurt to contact Ace, just to see what he had in mind. Closing her eyes, she silently reached for a piece of parchment and a quill, prepared to write a short, brief letter.

Ace,

Perhaps we can discuss you're proposal. I want to see what you have in mind. Meet me at the Three Broomsticks at noon on the Hogsmeade visit coming up this weekend. I'll see you there.

Hermione

………………………………….

"Oh come on, Aunt Minerva!" Ace cried, staring defeat in the eye. "It did not go down the way they all said it did! No one even bothered to listen to my rendition of what happened!"

"Then what did happen, Acelio?" Professor McGonagall asked sharply.

"I just wanted to have a little fun." Ace replied, quietly. "It was getting boring, hanging out with a bunch of kids. It was all in good fun, honest!"

"Even so, you caused more trouble than you can imagine that evening, Acelio." McGonagall said. "And I just cannot have you returning to the school. I apologize, but Professor Dumbledore will not agree. I shall get you residence somewhere close by until you can get settled in. Until then, please do not come into Hogwarts and please stay away from Hermione Granger."

Ace looked down at the ground, wishing that he could whine and complain like a ten-year-old until he got his way. But he didn't. Professor McGonagall looked at him sympathetically, then strode across the room and took her nephew into a tight embrace.

"Don't you worry, Acelio. Everything will work out in the end, I promise." McGonagall said, holding Ace tightly.

Ace smirked over McGonagall's shoulder. You're damn right it will.