1LECELLI - Thanks! Hope you keep reading and reviewing.

ZAN189 - Glad it's surprising you...lol.

KESLER - You've been with this one from the beginning, and I just wanted to say how happy I am you still keep reading!

CHICKADEE-GURL - I don't plan on writing any sex scenes, just sort of hinting at it.

Back to the writing I like to call a story!

Chapter 12: Two Wrongs Make a Right?

Draco was staring at his ceiling, as he often did when he had a lot to think about. Potter's child was dead, but that also meant a part of Hermione was dead, too. And they had confessed to each other that they loved each other...but how would it ever work? She was stubborn and he was insufferable, even he would admit it. They could never change. Could they? He couldn't take anymore of this tension. He summoned Pansy, and she automatically responded to his call.

She was quite fond of him. It was grotesque.

"Miss me, baby?" She purred in what she thought was a seductive voice. Draco didn't answer, because he couldn't lie to the poor girl. But she was good for relieving...tension. He pulled her close and kissed her. She jammed her tongue in his mouth.

'Even that one second kiss with Hermione ruins this one!' He pulled away, leaving Pansy looking somewhat angry.

"What the hell?" She complained. Again, Draco didn't respond. He just left the room. But as soon as he got to the door and opened it, he saw Hermione standing in the doorway. Her hand was raised in a fist as though she were going to knock. Her mouth was open, and her eyes showed how furious she was. She turned around, hitting Draco full in the face with her hair, and went back into her room, not-so-subtly calling him a prick and several other profanities along the way.

'Shit.'

-x-

'The stupid ass! The day after we tell each other that we...feel...strongly towards each other, he goes and makes out with dog girl! Well, two can play at that game.'

Hermione called a Risty over.

"Yes, miss?" Risty questioned in a high pitched voice.

"Can you please lead me to the floo powder? I have a message that must get out immediately." Risty grabbed a smallish flower pot from behind a book on the lowest shelf of Hermione's bookcase.

"Here you is, miss, anything else?"

"No Risty, nothing. Thank you." Risty disappeared, and Hermione threw a pinch of powderin her fire. She immediately stuck her head in afterwards, calling out "Blaise Zabini!" She left her door open, knowing Draco would come to her room soon to make things right. After a minute of the peculiar feeling of her head spinning while her body stayed in place, she was in front of Zabini.

"Hermione! What a surprise...what is it?"

"I was wondering if you would step through the fire. There is something I want to show you." Hermione purred. In an instant, the fool fell for it.

"What did you want to show me?" He was obviously getting excited.

"This." Hermione said simply. She pulled his head down to hers, and pushed her lips on his. It lasted for a minute or so before she pulled away. She was right that Draco would try to fix things. He saw the whole thing.

-x-

'Stupid tart! Getting miffed when I kiss Parkinson, and then turning around and making out with Zabini? What is her problem, anyway!'

Draco was fuming.

"Zabini, get the hell out of here!"

"Man, can't you see that I'm busy?"

Draco's eyes flashed dangerously.

"I suggest," Draco said, dangerously quiet, "That you leave. NOW!" He thundered the last note so that the whole room seemed to shake.

Hurriedly, Zabini left the same way he had come. He knew that when Draco was mad, it was one thing. But when he was as pissed off as he obviously was right now, you do NOT mess with him.

Soon after he was gone, Draco turned on Hermione.

"Well?" He said, seething. The room seemed to be full of his anger.

"Well, what?" She replied, seeming not at all phased by his obvious rage. She only seemed that way, though.

"What the hell was that?" Draco thundered again.

"That," Hermione said tartly, "Was me kissing Zabini." She explained it as though Draco were a 5-year-old, or perhaps an invalid. She knew she probably shouldn't egg him on, but she couldn't help it. It was in her nature.

"Even an IDIOT such as yourself can see that, Hermione! I meant WHY?"

"Well, one might assume," Hermione began, in her same manner as before, "That it was for the same reason that you made out with Parkinson."

Draco felt as if he had been physically slapped.

"You can't do this to me." She said quietly.

"DO WHAT TO YOU?" He thundered, quite the opposite of the hurt way Hermione was talking. Her chocolate eyes filled with tears.

"Do what to me? DO I REALLY NEED TO EXPLAIN? I lose my child, the only source of my happiness, and find a new happiness in you. We said we loved each other. Then the next day I find out that you have KISSED a girl I HATE! IS that crystal clear enough for you, ferret?" Throughout her outburst, Hermione had let no tears fall. But now, one slid down her cheek. "Love is supposed to mean trust, but I can't trust you, Draco!"

Draco felt like he had been slapped again.

"Can't trust ME? I kiss a girl once, and I hate kissing her because she's nothing compared to you, and you turn around and make out with a guy I THOUGHT you HATED!"

It felt as though the air had been sucked from the room. Tears began to stream down Hermione's face. Draco couldn't handle seeing her cry.

"Come on, Hermione, don't...don't do this."

"Don't do what?" She asked, hiccuping as the tears continued to fall.

"Don't cry because of me."

"Well, I guess I couldn't expect anything less of a ferret than to make me cry."

"I guess I couldn't except anything less of a bookworm than to not know when someone is apologizing.

"I didn't hear the words I'm sorry from you."

"I don't recall hearing them from you, either. A Malfoy apologizes to no one."

"You're so pompous."

Once again, they had been moving closer to each other while fighting. Draco reached out and cupped Hermione's heart shaped face in his hands. He wiped away her tears with his thumb. She put her hand over his, and their eyes melted into each other.

Slowly, tenderly, they began to kiss. But it became more. It became a bond, a mutual understanding. They were accepting that they would only kiss each other from now on.

Draco's hands went down to her waist as he deepened their kiss. Hermione put her hands behind his neck as she let him deepen the kiss. This, too, became an understanding. They would hold only each other this way from now on.

Their kiss ended. Hermione rested her head in his collarbone. Draco rested his chin on her head. They stayed together like this for what would seem to anyone else forever. But they didn't care. It just felt so right to be in the other's arms.

Draco finally lifted his chin from her hair, and Hermione rose her face to meet his eyes.

In that one minute, they knew everything:

They were meant to be together, no matter how much they hated each other at times.

No matter how many fights they got into, which would be a lot, they would always love each other.

But the biggest thing that they learned in just that one gaze and the way that their bodies fit together like puzzle pieces was that they needed each other. More than they would ever know.

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