Author's Note: I would just like to take this opportunity to respond to a few of my reviewers:
hermionegarner: Hmm…I take it you are not a Draco/Hermione fan? LOL. Well, I'm glad you like my story anyway. Don't worry, the mushiness is coming to an end! Even though I'm a D/Hr fan, I like it so much better when they can't stand each other. As for having her get together with Ron…well then I would have to change the character categories, hehe. But don't worry…I'm sure you will get your R/Hr fix in the actual series. ;)
FlairVerona: I'm not sure how much longer this story will be…probably just a couple more chapters. This was originally supposed to be a three-parter, but I always seem to have a hard time making a long story short…
prin69: I totally agree with you. Boys can be so st00pid sometimes!
Fluffyfledgling: Don't worry about being nitpicky – you were absolutely right about Snape being OOC in the last chapter. I thought the same thing after I reread it after posting. :)
And thank you to everyone else who reviewed. :D
Disclaimer: I'm not creative enough to come up with the Harry Potter series. In other words, I do not own it.
The next morning in the Great Hall, Harry and Ron were unusually giddy, which Hermione found to be quite odd.
"How did detention go last night?" she asked them.
"Bloody wonderful!" Ron exclaimed. Harry nudged him in the ribs and gave him a look that warned him not to sound so happy. But luckily, Hermione figured that Ron was being sarcastic, so she just shrugged it off.
"Well, it serves you two right for cheating." She shook her head. "I have never been more disappointed in you two."
Ron rolled his eyes. "Right. So sorry. So how did your little girls' night go?" He looked over at Ginny and studied her. "Neither of you look made over."
"They were temporary spells, Ronald," Ginny said. She glanced over at Hermione in anticipation. The two girls had not had a chance to talk this morning, because Harry and Ron had been quick to interrupt their discussion. So Hermione had told Ginny they would discuss it later, when and if they found an opportunity to ditch the boys.
"Yeah," Hermione said. "I made Ginny into a blonde. She looked like a more attractive Pansy Parkinson."
Ginny glared at her for that. Hermione responded by grinning at her.
"Well, sounds like you two had about as much fun as me and Ron here," Harry said. "Or perhaps a little more."
"Yeah," Hermione said with a sigh. She glanced over at the Slytherin table and noticed that Draco was already looking at her. When their eyes met, they both blushed and smiled and looked away.
Harry noticed their little moment and grunted. He could not wait to slip her the anti-potion. But when would he be able to do it? Surely he couldn't just pour some into her pumpkin juice right in front of her without her questioning it. And then there was the even harder task of slipping it into Malfoy's drink.
Suddenly, as if to make everything easier for Harry, Hermione stood up and said, "I, um, left something very important in my dorm. I'm going to go retrieve it. I'll meet you two in class." And she was off.
At the same time, Harry noticed that Malfoy had gotten up and was following Hermione out of the Great Hall. "We need to act fast," he whispered to Ron.
Ron nodded and reached over and grabbed Hermione's abandoned goblet full of pumpkin juice. Harry, meanwhile, reached over and retrieved Neville Longbottom's goblet.
"Hey!" Neville cried. "What are you doing? I was going to drink that!"
Without thinking, Harry grabbed Ginny's goblet and placed it in front of Neville. "Here, drink hers."
"Hey!" Ginny cried in protest.
The two boys did not stick around to explain. They grabbed their own goblets and bolted out of the Great Hall as quickly as possible, hoping that Hermione and Malfoy were nowhere in sight. They lucked out – the hallway was completely empty.
"I wonder where they are," Ron mumbled, glancing around.
"One thing at a time, Ron," Harry replied, setting the goblets down on the floor. He muttered a spell and refilled the nearly empty goblets with more pumpkin juice, then took the vial out of his bag and divvied up its contents between the two goblets they were going to give to Hermione and Malfoy. After he was done, he handed them both to Ron and picked up their own goblets himself.
"Okay," he whispered to Ron. "So here's the plan…"
The "something very important" that Hermione left in her dorm was the ring Draco had given her the previous night. She couldn't believe she had forgotten to put it back on the second she woke up, and she'd almost had a heart attack at breakfast when she realized it was not on her finger.
Of course, when she had come to this realization, she abruptly stood up from the table and told everyone that she had left something in her dorm and that she would meet them in class. She was pretty sure everyone assumed that it was just a book she had left behind, because nobody (not even Ginny) knew about the ring.
Minutes after rushing out of the Great Hall, Hermione found herself panting in front of the Fat Lady, mumbling the Gryffindor password.
"Why the rush?" asked the Fat Lady as she opened the door.
"Forgot something," was Hermione's abridged explanation.
"Must be something mighty important," said the Fat Lady cheerfully.
"You have no idea," Hermione said with a grin. She sprinted through the portrait hole and ran all the way up to the girls' dormitory. When she found the ring, she breathed a sigh of relief as she placed it on her finger. It was weird – she'd only had the ring for a few hours, yet she already didn't feel right if she was not wearing it. She smiled to herself as she held her hand up to the window, noticing how the ring caught the light in a breathtaking manner. "She gave it to me and told me to promise to one day give it to the woman I love. And that woman would be you, Hermione…"
Draco's words played over and over in her head, and she felt like the luckiest girl in the world. Draco had chosen her to give the ring to. Not Pansy Parkinson, or any of his other many admirers. She grinned at this thought. She was his, and he was hers. It couldn't get any better than that.
She hummed as she skipped down the stairs leading into the common room. Glancing at her watch, she realized she still had time to rejoin Harry and Ron in the Great Hall before heading to class. She just hoped they wouldn't notice the ring on their finger. But if they did, she already had a story ready to tell them, that her parents had sent it to her as a late Christmas gift. She figured she was safe, though. Boys like Harry and Ron don't normally notice little things like jewelry.
As she neared the portrait hole, Hermione stopped dead in her tracks when she heard Draco's voice on the other side of the portrait portrait, sounding quite irritated. "Please, I need to see her!"
"No!" the Fat Lady bellowed. "I told you, without a password, you are not to enter! I don't care who you need to see, or what you need to do! I don't even care if your precious life depends on it! No password, no go!"
Hermione chose this moment to exit the portrait hole. Draco glanced up at her with a guilty expression as she emerged, but she just smiled sweetly at him. "What are you doing here?" she asked him.
"I followed you," he replied, sounding slightly ashamed. "I wanted to say good morning and give you this…" He leaned in and kissed her softly on the lips.
"Is this young man bothering you?" the Fat Lady asked Hermione.
Hermione giggled. "No, he's not bothering me at all." She looked at Draco. "Quite the opposite, actually." She leaned in to kiss him again, but was interrupted by her two best friends.
"Hermione!" Harry said frantically, running up to her. He most likely wanted to distract her before she could kiss Draco.
She groaned inwardly. "What are you guys doing here?" she asked them.
"We followed you," replied Ron.
"Yes, I noticed," Hermione said with a glare. She glanced down at the goblets in the boys' hands. "What are those for?"
Harry and Ron glanced nervously at each other. "Um…" Harry said, looking from Hermione to Draco, and back to Hermione. "Can we all go in here for a minute?" he asked, motioning to the portrait hole.
Hermione raised her eyebrows in surprise. Did Harry just willingly invite Draco into the Gryffindor common room? "Yeah, sure," she said. She grabbed Draco's hand and followed her two best friends through the portrait hole.
"But he did not have a password!" the Fat Lady exclaimed.
"It's okay," Hermione told her. "Draco is to be allowed here whenever he wants to visit."
"Not without a password he isn't!" the Fat Lady said matter-of-factly.
"Well then I will just tell him the password," Hermione said with a wave, before heading into the common room. The Fat Lady grunted.
Harry and Ron were already sitting on one of the couches, the goblets sitting on a table in front of them.
"What's this about?" Hermione asked, crossing her arms over her chest. She eyed them suspiciously.
Harry motioned for both her and Draco to sit on the couch opposite them. Reluctantly, Hermione and Draco did just that, but not without exchanging a curious glance first. Harry wanted to gag when he saw Draco inch closer to Hermione on the couch and drape his arm around her waist. More nauseating was the fact that it made Hermione smile. And then to top it all off, she took his hand.
Quickly, Harry blurted out, "We want to apologize."
Hermione looked taken-aback. Obviously, this was the last thing she had expected. "Apologize?"
"Yes," Harry continued. "When Ron and I found you two at the Three Broomsticks the other night…we were, to lightly put it, surprised. And that initial shock made us do some pretty stupid things, such as stupefying both of you…"
"Which we are so sorry about," Ron added, even though he didn't really sound that sorry at all. "We thought that Malfoy had done something horrible to you, Hermione. I mean, you can't blame us. Look at the way he has treated you all these years."
"But -" Hermione attempted to interject, but Harry ignored her.
"But we see now. We see that you two obviously love each other, and that this isn't the result of some spell." Harry wondered if he was the only one not believing his lies. "So…" His voice trailed off.
"So…?" Hermione said in anticipation.
Harry sighed. "So Ron and I just wanted to say that we accept this. We accept you and Malfoy. And…we are happy for you."
Ron nodded in agreement. "In fact, we couldn't be happier."
"Right. So…we brought these drinks," Harry said, motioning to the goblets on the table. "I thought maybe we could have a toast. A toast to…newfound love, and newfound friendships."
It sounded like complete hogwash to both Harry and Ron, but Hermione seemed to be eating it up. They both couldn't help but notice the tears forming in her eyes.
"Do you two really mean it?" she said hopefully.
Harry gritted his teeth and put on his most sincere smile. "We really mean it, Mione. We love you and we want you to be happy."
"Oh, you guys!" Hermione cried gleefully.
Ron gave Harry a look that said, Let's get this over with as quickly as possible please.
Harry gave him a slight nod and grabbed the two spiked goblets and handed them both to Draco and Hermione, and then took his own and handed the other one to Ron. He couldn't help but notice Draco looking a little suspicious, but at the same time he seemed pleased with Harry and Ron's sudden change of heart.
"Right, so…" Harry held up his goblet. "To Hermione and Malfoy. May you two have a long, happy relationship full of love and…" He couldn't think of anything else to add.
"…fun relationship stuff," Ron finished for him, grinning.
"Amen!" Hermione said as all four of them clanked their goblets together.
Harry's heart rate accelerated as he watched both Hermione and Draco take sips from their goblets. He didn't really know anything about this potion. How long would it take to kick in? Would it kick in? From the looks of things, it hadn't worked yet after their first sip; the two of them were still snuggling on the couch.
"You know, Potter, Weasley," Draco said, acknowledging them both with a nod. "This was very big of you both. I mean, I know it must be hard to accept the fact that Hermione and I are in love." He tightened his grip around Hermione's waist when he said this. "I can't say as if I blame you for having your suspicions, doubts and concerns. But you are doing the right thing. And I know that we will never be friends, but I hope we can at least be civil to one another, for everyone's sake."
Malfoy wanting to be civil with Harry and Ron? That didn't seem right. Oh no, Harry thought in a panic. What if I gave them the wrong goblets? What if Ron and I are drinking the anti-potion? Or worse, what if they did drink the anti-potion but they still love each other? All of these thoughts and more ran through Harry's head as both Draco and Hermione finished off their goblets of pumpkin juice.
"Harry?" Hermione asked in a concerned voice. "Harry, are you alright? You look like you don't feel well. You look like…" Her voice trailed off as if something had just caught her attention. Slowly, she looked down at her hand, which was entwined with Draco's, and she let out a small gasp; a look of confusion found its way to her face.
Draco, meanwhile, went from looking at Harry as if he were mad, to looking down in horror at the same thing Hermione was. "WHAT THE HELL?" he exploded. He promptly let go of Hermione and jumped up from the couch.
Harry tried so hard to hide his pleased smile. It appeared as though the anti-potion had finally started to work.
For a brief moment, Hermione and Draco looked at each other with expressions filled with perplexity and dismay before finally all hell broke loose.
"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?" Draco demanded.
"There was a love potion -" Harry began calmly.
"LOVE POTION!" Draco yelled. He glared down at Hermione. "You bitch! You gave me a love potion!"
"I most certainly did not!" Hermione squealed, jumping up from the couch. "YOU! You did this!"
"WHAT? There is no way in hell I would give you a love potion, you stupid mudblood!" He looked repulsed at the thought.
"And there is no way in hell that I would give you one either!" Hermione cried. She looked over at Harry and Ron and said in a shaky voice. "What's going on, Harry?"
Harry took a deep breath before attempting to explain again. "A barmaid down at the Three Broomsticks spiked your butterbeers with a love potion the other night. You two have been completely smitten with each other ever since. We knew something was amiss, so we investigated. When we found out what the barmaid had done, we had her make up an anti-potion, which we slipped into your drinks…" His eyes darted to the goblets on the table.
Draco suddenly looked very ill, as the memories of the past couple of days flooded his memory all at once. "Bloody hell. Bloody fucking hell. Oh Merlin - will somebody please, PLEASE obliviate my memory?" he groaned. He began to pace back and forth, his hands grasping tightly at his hair, almost as if he were trying to claw through his skull to his brain to pluck out the memories by hand.
While Draco certainly looked ill, Hermione actually felt ill. The memories were flooding her brain as well, and all she could concentrate on were the memories of her kissing Malfoy. "I made out with a ferret," she said quietly, not really realizing that she was speaking aloud.
Draco heard her. Fuming, he yelled, "And I made out with a filthy mudblood!" It wasn't until he'd said it out loud that Draco realized he had, in fact, made out with a mudblood. This realization was too much for him to handle. After glaring at each and every member of the Golden Trio, he quickly made a beeline for the portrait hole and disappeared.
Awkward silence filled the common room. Neither Harry nor Ron knew what exactly to say to Hermione, but they knew they had to say something.
"Welcome back, Mione," Ron finally said. He got up and threw his arms around her.
Hermione didn't hug him back…nor did she hug Harry when it was his turn. She just stood there in a state of shock, disgust and…another feeling she couldn't quite place.
"How much do you remember?" Harry asked softly.
Hermione shrugged. "I don't know," she whispered. "Everything, I suppose."
"Are you going to be okay?" he asked, giving her a comforting pat on the shoulder.
"I'll be fine," Hermione said with a nod. "I just…need a minute alone here, to let everything sink in."
"Absolutely," Harry said. He motioned over to Ron. "Ron and I will just head to class now. We'll see you there, okay?"
Hermione nodded again and put on her best fake smile. "Yeah, sure."
After casting sympathetic glances her way, Harry and Ron disappeared out of the common room. The minute they were gone, Hermione collapsed on the couch. The events of the last few minutes and the memories of the past two days mixed together and made her head start to spin. She was suddenly overcome with a feeling of intense loathing where Draco Malfoy was concerned. However, there seemed to be one other feeling deep down that she could not quite identify, but that closely resembled...emptiness.
All Hermione really knew was that all of a sudden, she wasn't feeling so happy anymore.