Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot, everything else belongs to J.K. Rowling.
Hermione threw herself down on the couch, out of breath from their little race. Draco stood over her breathing hard and laughing. She looked up, "What are you laughing at you miserable little cheat? Didn't think that you could beat a girl without playing dirty?" She tried to maintain a stern expression. It was really difficult, there was a smile just below the surface just dying to get out.
Draco smirked at her and then bent over her, and started to tickle her sides. "Come on Hermione don't smile now. I know that you don't want to smile. Stop smiling, I can see you. Now you're laughing, you are completely blowing this fake anger thing." Draco gasped as Hermione threw herself forward into him and started tickling him back. "Your wasting your time Granger, Malfoys are not ticklish." He tried with all of his might to keep a straight face, but couldn't hold in the laughter any longer.
"Ha! I call your bluff, it looks like at least one Malfoy really is ticklish. I propose a truce, on the count of three we both stop. 1...2...3." They both stopped tickling each other at once and tried to catch their breath. "You may have beat me at the race, but I do believe that I beat you at the tickle war."
"I don't think that you did, you called it off, you lost, I win again. Trust me, I always win."
"You are a giant prat you know that? You are the most annoying, cheating prat I have ever–." At that moment Draco pressed his lips to hers silencing her. She gave in to the kiss fully and was more then willing to offer his tongue entrance. Draco slowly laid her back on the couch, never breaking the kiss. Hermione wrapped her legs around his waist, and began running her fingers through his hair. She had never felt happier, or more comfortable with anyone in her life. She pushed herself closer to him deepening the kiss even more. She wanted to be close to him more than anything. She ran her hands from his hair down his back, moaning into the kiss as she did so. Draco pulled away slightly, giving them both a chance to breathe. Hermione pulled him back down to her instantly, she didn't want him to move away.
Draco was holding himself up on his hands above her. He loved the feel of her hands moving through his hair and along his back. She felt so perfect and so right beneath him, but he knew that they needed to stop. He didn't want anything to happen that they would regret later. He wanted them to be able to take things slow and let things happen naturally. "Whoa...whoa Hermione. I really think that we need to stop. If I don't stop this now, then I'm not going to be able to, and I really think we should stop."
"Why, what's the matter?" Hermione looked up, her eyes were blurred and she was breathing really heavy. "Draco I don't understand, I don't want you to stop."
"Believe me, I don't want to stop either, but if we don't... Hermione trust me, I don't want to do anything to hurt you, or to mess things up between us, but I really think we should stop. Maybe we can work on our Diplomacy project or something."
"Are you worried that you can't trust yourself with me? I don't want you to feel like you are taking advantage of me Draco, I want to be with you to. Your right we should stop, but I don't want you to think that you need to be different with me. I may be inexperienced, but I'm not a little girl. To tell you the truth, I'm glad that you stopped it there, because I don't think that I could have trusted myself to stop it. I've never felt like this before. You bring out all of these feelings in me that I never knew that I had. I've already told you, the only boyfriend I've ever had was Krum, and how much did that count? I'm sorry, I'm babbling aren't I? I babble when I get nervous. I'm just going to shut-up now." Hermione had turned a bright shade of red, and she reached up her hands to cover her face.
"Hey, don't be embarrassed. You don't have to feel embarrassed to tell me stuff. I want you to open up to me. I'm sorry if I put you into a situation that you didn't feel that you could control. I know that you said that you want to wait for the right guy, and you don't like situations where you might lose control. I'm sorry Hermione, it won't happen again. I promise." Draco reached up and pulled her hands from her face so that he could look her in the eye.
"It's not your fault, I helped instigate it. I just got a little carried away, and I just felt...so... I don't know the word for it... right? I just didn't want to lose that feeling, you know what I mean?"
"Yeah I know what you mean. Come on, lets try to get some work done." Draco sat up and straightened his robes, and patted down his now messy hair.
"I don't think that I can concentrate on work right now. Does it seem a little hot and stifling in here, or is it just me? Maybe we could go for a walk or something."
"I don't think I can concentrate either. Where would you like to walk to?" Draco was relieved that she suggested a walk, he didn't think that sitting here alone in their common room on a couch was a good idea. They needed to get out and blow of some steam.
"I would suggest Hagrid's, I haven't been to see him yet, but I know how you feel about him, so...how about the gardens?"
"Good idea, I think the nice cool air will do us some good. We'll go outside, clear our heads, and then get a little work done before bed. Deal?"
"Deal."
They spent just under an hour walking through the gardens, hand-in-hand. They didn't talk much, they just enjoyed the fresh air, and each others company. They passed by Ginny and Blaise, who were sitting on a bench in the gardens talking. They chatted with them for a while, and then went up to get some work done.
"I think that we should do the paper on unity. Not just unity between the houses here at school, but unity between all wizards. I mean, pure-blood, half-blood, muggle-born, all wizards. This separation is ridiculous. We are already separated from the muggle world, should our world be divided as well?" Hermione was pacing back and forth in front of the common room fire chewing the end of her quill.
"I agree it is a good topic, but it is going to be hard work coming up with a strong argument. It isn't going to be easy, but it's an important issue and I'm willing to put the time into it. Now we've got a topic, how do we go about gathering information?" Draco was laying on the couch twirling his quill in his hand watching Hermione pace the room.
"That's simple, I know that they have a ton of information on this subject in the library. That's the first place to look, but using old information is only going to be part of the battle, we need to add to it, but how?" Hermione stopped and started tapping her foot, biting her lower lip in thought.
Draco couldn't help thinking that Hermione looked sexy when she was deep in thought. He couldn't take his eyes off of her. The way she was biting her lip. Draco shook his head, he needed to stay focused. "We could conduct interviews of people from each group and find out how they feel that they are affected by the way that they are treated in our society."
"Draco you're a genious. That's perfect." Hermione scribbled something down on her parchment, and then sat down heavily on the couch by Draco's feet. "I think that's enough work for tonight. We'll come up with a list of people to interview tomorrow, and hit the library."
"I can't tomorrow, I have quidditch practice, remember. We'll get it done, don't worry we have loads of time, it's not due til end-of-term." Draco yawned and rolled over on his side. "What do you want to do, it's still to early to go to sleep?"
"We could...watch a movie."
"What? Isn't that a muggle thing? We don't have anything like that here."
"I do, I have a dvd player and a tv. I shrunk them down so that they would fit in my trunk. What do you say?"
"What kind of movies do you have? I'm very picky."
"You don't strike me as the type to watch movies, like you said, it's a muggle thing."
"Wizards need entertainment too. I actually love going to the muggle theaters. Movies are kind of a secret passion of mine. I like a little of everything. Name some that you have, and I will tell you if they are acceptable."
"How about it's my dvd player, and my tv, and I'm going to put something in, and you will watch it whether you like it or not."
"We'll see about that. If I don't want to watch it, I'll just go to bed and read."
"Trust me, you'll like it. Just let me run up to my room and grab it. I'm going to put on my pjs too."
"I might as well go get ready for bed too. You better pick something good Miss Granger, or I'll go to bed, and I won't even let you kiss me goodnight."
"Is that a threat Mr. Malfoy?"
"Yes, actually it is? Are you scared?"
"Terrified. Meet me down here in ten minutes, I promise you'll love the movie." She smirked and ran up the stairs to her room. She rummaged through her trunk, found her tv and dvd player, and her favorite movie, The Notebook. She knew that Draco would love it, because she had seen him reading the book. She then went over to her dresser to get her pajamas. She chose a pair of green boy shorts, and a black tank top that showed her tattoo. She went over to Dragon's cage and got him out, she then grabbed the tv, dvd player, and dvd and went down to the common room. Draco was already there, he was wearing his boxers, red satin. She smiled and went down to set up the stuff. There was no plugs at Hogwarts, but she had studied a spell over the summer that would allow them to work without electricity. She could feel Draco watching her as she got everything set up. She turned around and walked over to the couch where he was laying, and sat down next to him. She turned on the movie, and layed down. Draco laying against her back with his arm around her. Hermione used her wand to summon her blanket from her room, and she laid it over them.
"The Notebook? I didn't know that they turned this into a movie. Good pick Miss Granger, I suppose I will stay, and you can have your goodnight kiss."
"I knew you would approve." Hermione smiled and turned towards Draco.
Draco looked into Hermione's eyes, and reached up to brush a strand of hair from her face. He had never noticed just how beautiful her eyes were. He lifted her chin up and kissed her. She rolled over so that she was laying facing him, and leaned into the kiss more. Draco pulled away and looked into her eyes once more. "Hermione...will you...um...be my girlfriend...officially I mean?" He looked away, he could feel the color rising in his cheeks and he hated that feeling.
Hermione couldn't believe what she had just heard. Draco had asked her to be his girlfriend. She had never felt so happy in her life. She was so stunned she couldn't answer right away. All that she could do, was grab his face and pull him in for another kiss. She hoped that would be a good enough answer. At the moment she didn't think that she could talk. She deepened the kiss and pulled Draco closer. She wanted to make sure that he could feel all that she was feeling in that kiss. She felt Draco push her back and felt his weight move on top of her. She suddenly became very aware that neither of them were wearing much clothing. She pushed herself up against him, and wrapped her legs around his back again. She moved her hands up and down his back. She could feel herself losing control, and she wasn't worried about getting it back. Right now, all she wanted was to be close to Draco. She could feel her heart pounding in her chest, she felt like she was going to explode.
Draco's arms were started to get weak, he didn't know how much longer he could hold himself up. All of that self-control that he had shown earlier seemed to have left him. He lowered himself to his elbows. He couldn't stop himself from moaning into the kiss. He didn't know how she could make him feel this way. He had never felt like this with anyone before. He felt Hermione pull away from the kiss, but just long enough to roll him over so that she was on top.
She now sat straddling his hips. She looked down at him with lust in her eyes and kissed him again. She was rubbing her hands up and down his chest. She could feel him moving his hands up and down her sides, and her back. She could feel his erection forming through his boxers, and she knew that they should stop, but she couldn't pull herself away from him. She felt like if she moved away now the distance would be unbearable. She decided that pulling away was the last thing that she wanted to do. She made the decision that now was the time. She wanted Draco to be her first. She felt his hands slip under the sides of her tank, and she sat up and held her arms up so he could lift it off. At that moment, there was a knock at the portrait door. Draco and Hermione both jumped. They were trying to calm their breathing, and decide if they should open it or not.
"'Mione? Are you there? It's Ginny. I wanted to tell you something important." Ginny could hear voices and movement, from the room, so she knew someone was there.
"Just a sec Gin." Hermione tried to collect herself a little, and summoned her robe from her room. She rolled off of Draco, and paused the movie. Draco stood up and whispered that he was going to go take a shower and give them time to talk. Hermione gave him one last kiss, waited for him to be through the bathroom door, and then opened the portrait hole. "What is it Ginny? Did something happen?"
"It's just Harry and Ron. They are really upset Hermione. I heard them talking, and I think that they might try to do something to Malfoy. Can I come in, or is this a bad time?" Ginny looked curiously at Hermione's disheveled appearance.
"No it's fine Gin. Come on in. I was just watching a movie." Hermione tried to compose herself as she shut the portrait hole door.
"Are you sure? Where's Draco? I didn't interrupt anything did I?" Ginny's face turned as red as her hair.
"It's really no big deal Gin. Draco's in the shower. Sit down, and tell me what they said." Hermione sat down on the couch facing Ginny and waited for her to begin.
Sorry guys I'm going to leave it there. Bit of a cliffhanger. I'm sure some of you are disappointed that things didn't go farther for our couple, but I don't want to rush things too much. There will be plenty of time for things to get hot and heavy later. I hope you all enjoyed it, please read and review.