Explanations comfort us by giving the impression that there is an order in things. – Mason Cooley
000
Cake, Hermione was quite certain, was not an acceptable breakfast food. Nor was it acceptable to eat cake for lunch, immediately following several hours later with more cake for dinner. In fact, if she saw one more piece of cake, she was fairly certain she would end up being violently ill in the middle of the kitchen.
"I hope you all know that we can't keep eating cake every day, especially not for breakfast," she informed her companions at the table. She was immediately rewarded with several blank stares.
"Fwhy noot?" inquired Ron in bewilderment, through a thick mouthful of chocolate cake. Apparently, it had never occurred to him that cake was, indeed, not the breakfast of champions.
"I—erm—I don't know…" said Hermione lamely. It just felt instinctually wrong on some fundamental level.
"It's very good cake," offered Harry diplomatically, which Hermione couldn't argue with.
"Do you think you'd be able to conjure up something better?" asked Malfoy, in a tone that wasn't entirely cool or accusatory. He almost looked hopeful, though he had dutifully been devouring cake for the past day and a half.
"Oh, no," she said, blushing slightly. "I'm not a very good cook."
"Granger isn't—good at—something?" stammered Malfoy in mock surprise. "Oh, Merlin, I think the universe is collapsing in on itself…"
Hermione found that ignoring him was usually the best course of action. Hermione had actually tried to teach herself how to cook, in her fervor of SPEW related activities fourth year, finding it unacceptable to be eating food that had been prepared by slave labor. And it wasn't that she couldn't perform food spells…it was just that they required a little more creativity than procedure—and it wasn't even a logical sort of expansion of theory, (she had no trouble with that sort of thing, of course.) It was just…messy. Messy and indefinable and…everything she conjured ended up tasting like…pineapple. She rather liked pineapple, you know—but there was something unsettling about spending a week eating meals that did not remotely consist of any sort of tropical fruit whatsoever, and having then taste exactly like…pineapple. Much to her own dismay—she broke down and returned to the Great Hall, devouring the food of the oppressive class system with a grateful longing that filled her with guilt. But at least guilt didn't taste like pineapples. Yeesh.
Hermione stared at Harry and Ron as they devoured the cake. They were doing it quite cheerfully too, as if it were a rare, delightful surprise that they were eating cake at this very moment, and they had not in fact been eating nothing but cake for over a day.
"So cake it is!" said Ron, as if that resolved it. "Nothing wrong with eating it."
"Yes there is," countered Hermione indignantly.
"Like what?"
"Well—it's not—and what about—and—I don't know….MY PARENTS ARE DENTISTS!" she finished desperately, her voice rising.
They stared at her. "Cake?" offered Harry politely, passing her a plate.
She slumped down in her seat, defeated, eyeing the assembled legions of evil, evil pastries with a resolved kind of misery. She sighed. "Pass the strawberry torte, would you, Ron?"
000
Draco poked tiredly at his slice of cake. He was very sick of eating cake, but there was absolutely no one to complain to about this issue, (at least no one who would be in a position to resolve this crisis) so he continued to consume the cake in a resigned, if not slightly embittered, fashion.
The Golden Trio was leaving in a few hours to go to 'the wedding,' which would effectively leave him alone in the house. It was a bit of a relief to be honest—he had been longing for some peace and quiet. Well—not that his housemates were loud…or raucous, really…actually, he was fairly sure it was just the idea of them there that made him feel suffocated.
Yesterday had been an…interesting day. Weasley had gotten it into his head that they needed to do something "fun" for Potter's birthday, other than stand around and hug and wish him a "Happy Birthday." (They did in fact, wish him a happy birthday approximately 57 times, if Draco's calculations were correct.) Weasley disappeared for an hour and returned with a set of black and glass metal boxes, the origins of which he would not share with Granger, despite the hysterical tone her voice took on when she caught sight of him with the contraptions. Weasley identified them to be a 'tellyvibbon' and 'vid-thingy.' It took Draco a moment to realize that he probably meant a Muggle television, which confused him briefly because it looked nothing like the television in Granger's house.
After a terrific shouting match involving 'ecklecticity,' wires, and the ethics of using stolen ("Borrowed! I borrowed it!") property, they eventually settled down in front of the television to watch a Muggle movie about 'spaceships.' The movie consisted mostly of people running around and screaming, whilst things exploded. The explosions were kind of neat, in Draco's opinion. But he had a hard time understanding why Muggles were so fascinated by the idea of killing each other with shiny metal sticks, or big glowing swords for that matter. It seemed to lack…artistry. A real battle required wits and cunning and power. Not a metal rod that shoots out…
"What are those things again?" Draco had asked.
"Lasers," said Granger. "It's a laser gun."
"What's a laser? I thought Muggle wands spewed out little bits of metal." That was, in Draco's opinion, even sillier, but those were Muggles for you.
"Muggles don't really have laser guns," said Granger, not taking her eyes off the screen. "It's a special effect."
"What's a—"
"Would you shut up and watch the movie already?"
Fine. Whatever. As if he cared about silly Muggle things anyway. The hero of the movie was self-righteous and kind of whiny. Draco found himself reminded of Potter.
Tap. Tap. TAP.
Draco was pulled from his series of not so fond memories by noise that sounded like it was coming from the window. He looked up from his cake. Weasley had heaved open the window, allowing two solemn looking owls to soar into the room and make a few slow laps around the ceiling before dropping two packages of letters onto the table.
Potter lifted one of the four letters and stared at it for a moment, a slight frown tugging at the corners of his mouth. "They're from Hogwarts," he said finally.
"Are they?" Granger's eyes lit up almost hungrily, and her hand darted out to snatch up one of the letters. "Ooh, I—" She paused when she saw the rather closed look on Potter's face. "—wasn't planning to go back anyway, of course, but you know—" She trailed off with a nervous laugh, and the somewhat awkward silence was broken by the sound of her eagerly tearing open the envelope in her hands.
000
"Dear Ms. Granger," said the letter, in blank, overly formal script. The text was squeezed onto the first two inches of parchment, leaving a vast empty space on the rest of the paper, full of unanswered questions. "In light of recent events, the Board of Governors for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has unanimously elected to indefinitely suspend all academic pursuits for this matriculating year. No students will be permitted onto school premises until certain issues have been resolved. Sincerely, Headmistress Minerva McGonagall."
She stared blankly at the paper, rereading the same phrase several times without looking up. It didn't matter, of course, not to her—not to any of them. But there was something meaningful in knowing it was there, waiting for them to return. That the halls were alive and full of students, that they weren't cold and dark and empty and hopeless. Too many places in the wizarding world were, it seemed, nowadays.
"Guess we won't miss anything, eh?" said Ron, optimistically, but his encouraging look quickly faded when he locked gazes with Hermione.
"It's gone," she said in a small voice. "He took it."
"It's not gone," said Harry, probably with more fierceness than he intended, for Hermione almost started at his sudden outburst. "He has not taken it. Not really. That's what counts." He seemed satisfied in this knowledge, his eyes burning with a restrained heat. Ron nodded supportively, and said something else to Harry, but Hermione wasn't listening.
"I have to go finish packing," she said in a slightly strained voice, standing up.
"Are you OK?" asked Ron, a look of quizzical concern on his freckled face. "You look a bit…bothered."
"Yes," she forced a smile. "I'm just dreading Fluer's wedding vows. Ginny said she wrote them herself and they're dreadful."
Ron winced. "Urg…"
She grabbed her not entirely empty envelope, and, still clutching the letter in a fist, hurried out of the room as quickly as possible without seeming suspiciously upset.
000
"I want you to keep this, Ms. Granger. Merlin knows you deserve it, and I can only hope that it will be here waiting for you when you return. In times like these we all do as we must, and I believe you are called to do very great things indeed. I know that you have answered that call at great personal cost, but the bonds of friendship are often the most complicated and rewarding connections we make in our lives, and I am quite certain that you do not take such commitments lightly. Please believe me when I tell you that you are one of the finest students I have had the pleasure of instructing in some fifty odd years of teaching, and I do not give such compliments lightly. Good luck to you, Ms. Granger, in all of your pursuits. Yours sincerely, Minerva McGonagall."
The second letter was folded neatly behind the first letter, both signed neatly by the school's acting Headmistress. Sitting cross-legged on the floor of her bedroom and leaning on her trunk, she carefully set both letters down on her leg. The envelope was empty now, except for the hefty weight of something stiff and uneven stuck in one of the corners. She tipped the envelope into her palm, and something shiny and golden spun in the air and landed in her hand, glinting in the shafts of early morning sunlight that were cascading through the window.
She turned it slowly in her hand, feeling its cool weight, watching it glitter in the light, until she could read the lettering. A part of her already knew what it said, but her heart skipped a beat anyway—
"Head Girl."
It was practically worthless, an empty title to go with an empty building, and yet…it was absolutely everything. She managed a tiny, sorrowful smile, blinking furiously to disguise her own silly sentimentality from the empty room…
"How tragic—the school closes and you have no way to indulge your desire to boss people around. Surprisingly selfish of you, Granger." Malfoy leaned casually against the doorframe, arms folded. He was often in that position, she noticed—defensive—though he leered superiorly, as if nothing bothered him at all.
"As if you're a remotely appropriate person to lecture me on the evils of indulging in selfishness," she snapped back, wiping her eyes sourly with her shirt cuff. "You don't know anything about me."
"You keep saying that." He shifted, tilting his head in such a way that the shafts of warm sunlight reflected in faint pools around his lean frame. He was so pale he seemed to mirror the world around him, she noticed. In the daytime, his light complexion and white blond hair seemed as if they had been engraved out of gold, but at night he shone silver. Silver and cold. "You're upset that you've lost another bit of territory to the Dark Lord."
She frowned. "Harry said—" she began defiantly.
"Bullocks on what Potter said," Malfoy interrupted her sharply, silvery-grey eyes flashing. "You know the truth. He doesn't have to invade the school with Dementors or Death Eaters. He doesn't even have to burn it to the ground to destroy it utterly. It's already gone. That school is his now. So is half the wizarding world, by those standards. He's in every deserted street and alley in Hogsmeade, in Diagon Alley—everywhere. As long as people are afraid of him, he'll keep winning. No one has a chance. And you know it. Potter doesn't see things that way. He doesn't understand like you do."
She stared at him for a moment, utterly shocked by his insight, and horrified at its similarity to the tiny, cynical voice in the back of her own mind. She tightened her fist around the badge in her hand, closing her eyes. "So you're not?" she asked finally.
"Not what?"
"You're not afraid of him," she clarified, opening her eyes and fixing her gaze upon his slim frame. "Is that why you're willing to fight him?"
"I never said that," he said, his eyes narrowing. "You would have to be a fool not to fear the Dark Lord. I think people are right to cower in their homes, but it only delays the inevitable."
"You think defeat is inevitable?" She set the badge down on her trunk with a soft click.
"I thought you must as well," he said, looking almost puzzled in his bitterness. "Surely you can see it." Able to see so clearly, and yet blind at the same time. It wasn't victory that was important in these situations—at least not to her.
"If you believe defeat is inevitable," she pushed the lid of her trunk closed and used the surface to pull herself up off the floor, "then what are you doing here with us?"
"Surviving," he said in a flat voice, shrugging with an air so casual it suggested it had been forced. "I'm not fighting to win, Granger. I'm here because I have no choice. So bullocks to Potter and his grand plan, I'm sure he'll die believing in whatever cause tickles his fancy."
"You always have a choice," she said firmly, refusing to break the eye contact that spanned the air between them with an almost electric force.
He stared at her for a long moment, eyes critical, and still narrowed, as if he regarded her words with the utmost suspicion. Perhaps words, which he was so artful at manipulating, were the most treacherous things of all to him, and believing in anything that sounded compelling was a sure way to end up in the worst possible of situations.
And then, without another word, he disappeared out of the doorframe and down the corridor, having never actually stepped into the room.
000
Draco stole quickly down the hall, suddenly wanting to distance himself from Granger as quickly as possible. (Not that it was the first time he had such an impulse.)
His own Hogwarts letter was tucked hastily within his pocket. He had not actually bothered to open it, entirely unsure as to what he'd find inside—quite possibly some sort of nasty hex. He'd read Weasley's letter over his shoulder, and was satisfied enough with that. Weasley didn't even notice him looking, which filled Draco with an intense desire to swindle him at some sort of card game—maybe Goblin Poker. Not that Weasley had enough money to make him worth swindling...
He hurried into his own room and slammed the door, hopefully right in the face of Granger and her stupid, intuitive advice.
000
"We're going to be late," said Potter, in a concerned voice.
"How can we be late?" asked Weasley. "I don't recall us ever giving them an estimate as to when we'd arrive."
"You know…that's a very good point," Potter said conciliatorily. "Stealthy."
"Do you think Hermione needs help packing her things?" asked Weasley. "She's been up there for awhile."
Draco sat on an armchair, watching them and feeling extremely bored, head resting on his knuckles. Probably modeling that stupid badge in the mirror, he though to himself, sneering idly. The thought of walking in on her engaged in any sort of narcissistic activity was rather amusing to him, particularly because of all the new and exciting ways he could mock her as a follow up, and he set off up the stairs without a word to Potter and Weasely.
They were busily engaged in a debate as to whether or not knocking on the door would violate some kind of girly boundary, mostly because the stairs wouldn't turn into a slide on knock them on their arses the minute they tried to walk up to her door. They actually had to make the judgment based on their own decision making skills—horror of horrors.
Draco thought they were doomed in all instances, if that was the case. He also thought idly that the stairs to the girls' dormitory in the Slytherin dormitories made no such effort to keep boys out. If there was one thing Salazar Slytherin was in favor of, it seemed, it was the conception of pureblooded children.
Draco ignored Potter and Weasley, as he went up the stairs, and they ignored him. This was part of the silent contract they seemed to have made when they decided to "trust" or at least tolerate each other. It was rather boring sometimes, but if he was really bored and wanted to torment them for his own amusement—it wasn't as if the option was closed. They were within hearing distance of his mouth, after all.
He made his way down the hall, knocking on Granger's door. No one answered.
"Still admiring that stupid badge?" he smirked. He pushed lightly on the door, and it swung open with a rather vocal creak. "Granger?" he said questioningly.
He stepped inside, his eyes sweeping the room, until he spotted her sitting on the bed, knees pulled glumly up to her chin. Her head snapped towards him, but she looked rather cross when she recognized him.
"Oh," she said in voice that was tired and strained but not entirely disdainful. "It's you."
"You flatter me," he said dryly. "Try to contain you excitement."
Her eyes were red and swollen. She looked as though she had been crying. "What do you want?"
"The rest of your merry little band is downstairs, growing rather restless," he informed her evenly. "Are you actually going to leave, or are you going to sit here all weekend? Because honestly—I sort of had my hopes up that I would be rid of all of you for awhile." He smiled charmingly.
"Oh…" she looked around the room, probably for a clock. "Did they send you up here? Oh, bother…"
"No," he said, looking around idly. "I just came." He ignored the sudden, rather perplexed look on her face. "So what have you been doing up here?" he inquired. "I thought you might have spent the past few hours admiring your reflection in that badge…" He smirked. After all, that was what he had done with his first Prefect badge. He was so enamored he almost forgot to go down for supper.
A pang of sorrow seemed to cross her face as he mentioned the badge, and she turned away from him, gazing out the window and partially hiding her face.
"Is this about school?" he asked finally. There was a terrible battle going on inside of Draco. Part of him, naturally, wanted to laugh in her face, and the other part wanted to stop looking like a giant had just eaten her pet cat. But—he had promised to be civil towards her, and civility probably meant that he should not laugh in her face while she was in no state to tell him off, however amusing it might be.
She paused for a moment, sinking down further behind her knees, and drawing her shoulders closer to her face. "Yes," she said in an even voice, not looking at him. He didn't say anything. "Aren't you going to tell me everything is going to be alright?" she asked softly, the barest hint of bitterness whispering at the edge of her words. "That we'll all go back someday, together, and everything will be fine?"
"No," he said lightly, shrugging. "That would probably be a lie."
"It might not be." She looked at him, then looked away again. "That's what Harry or Ron would say."
"I think you'll find that I am neither Potter nor Weasley," he said, wrinkling his nose in disgust. "And what an unflattering comparison."
"Do you have some aversion to lying that we're all unaware of?" she asked him, her voice still tired. She quirked an eyebrow at him.
"I don't lie," he informed her arrogantly. "Though I do on occasion…omit certain things."
"Why not?"
"I should think that was obvious," he grinned, self-satisfied and wicked. "Why bother lying? The truth is so much nastier."
"Or what you believe to be true," she said, more to herself, it seemed, than him.
"It's a highly functional system when you're always right," he pointed out imperiously.
Her lip quirked for an instant, and something amused flashed briefly in her eyes, but she didn't share whatever she had intended to say. Probably something quite cheeky. Draco found himself feeling rather cheated. Bickering with Granger was sort of… entertaining… you know… sometimes… She looked away, frowning.
"Why are you still here?"
He didn't answer her. He really wasn't entirely sure he owed her an answer. That was far more than he ever promised. "Why are you? I'm not the one who's running late."
"That was not an answer," she pointed out.
"Why do you keep doing that?" He leapt to his feet suddenly wanting to be as far away as possible from her and those damn eyes staring so calmly at him. "Why do you always have to know everything? It's bloody unhealthy." He paced in a quick circle around the room, throwing up his hand so he wouldn't have to look at her placid, tearstained face. "Here you are—sitting here—and—" He made an exasperated noise. He could still feel her eyes boring into him. He caught sight of the door on one of his rotations about the room, and practically lunged towards it. "—I'm leaving," he said in the same sputtering breath.
"You think that you owe me something, but you just don't know what. You want things to be even between us again so you can stop thinking about it." She spoke softly and he froze on his trajectory towards the door. "Some sort of conciliatory form of honor that you've fallen back on, because of all the things you've ever been taught, it's the only thing you have left right now."
He was able to turn, slowly, and look at her, because her gaze was turned away, staring out the window into the soft, warm light of the late afternoon.
"I'm upset, and you think if you can fix that you don't have to worry about your obligations in this whole ridiculous situation anymore, because I did the same for you in that cave. The only difference is…you were trying to do it without lying to me…" She gave a small, bitter smile. "Maybe that's why you aren't succeeding."
Lying to him? Of course. Why not? His eyes were narrowed and calculating again. "If you know already," he said, his voice as taunt as a plucked string, "then why bother asking?"
She hugged her knees toward her chest, staring glumly at the bed spread. "It's not my place to know everything," she admitted quietly. "Besides…it could have been any number of possibilities. It didn't fit at first…"
"Oh?" he said, though gritted teeth. That bitch! He hated her, he remembered now… "And why is that?"
"Because when I try to think of you as a person…motivated by, say—an iota of human empathy—it's rather hard to make sense of things…" she said. She stared down, with something that could have been shame, but her eyes flicked up towards him for an instant.
He could see in her face that this was her attempting to be honest with him, but in that instant, he was too angry to care. He had been taught to hide his anger, to push it away into something constructive—like tormenting Longbottom—but here he had nothing to channel it into. It occurred to him that it had been a very long time, maybe most of his life, since he had felt strongly anything that wasn't anger or fear or jealousy, and he realized just now that he had been lacking those feelings—only slightly— until this instant.
He turned and stalked out of the room, furious, and slammed the door with a resounding bang that rattled every doorknob in the hallway.
000
"Do you need any help with that?" asked Harry, as Hermione trotted down the stairs, a few nights clothes and a bridesmaid gown stuffed into her school bag and slung hastily over her shoulder.
"No, I'm alright," she said evenly. The bag could fit quite a lot of things in it, and rather easily. She had put an Internal Expansion Charm on it, following the several occurrences of it bursting and its contents spilling out all over the corridor during third year. She reached the bottom of the stairs and paused. "Are we Flooing in?"
"Yeah," said Ron. "Ready?"
"Yes," she said. "Sorry it took so long…I was reading…and I got distracted…"
"Typical Hermione," said Harry, grinning at her. She gave him a weak smile in return.
They walked over towards the fireplace. Extending her hand slowly, she picked up a quantity of Floo powder from the jar by the mantle and slowly enclosed it in her fist, because she was perfectly capable of picking it up herself, just like she picked herself off the bed upstairs and forced herself to stop being silly and come downstairs. And she did it all by herself and without encouragement, because when you know the truth about almost everything it's very easy to debate things without anyone else's opinion, restating what you've already considered. And she knew that it was sometimes lonely not to need anyone like that, but it had worked fine before, and it wasn't as if she wasn't close her to friends—she loved them fiercely—it was merely the nagging idea of connecting to someone who, though he seemed to understand what no one else she knew quite could, still had so much growing up to do. It was really the problem of comprehending everything about certain important matters except for your own feelings.
And then, perfectly autonomously, she threw the Floo into the fireplace and called out the name of the place that had become like a second (or even first) home to her over the years, and in a flare of green, she was gone.
"The Burrow!"
000
AN: I know I promised that this chapter would contain many more things, but I'm really busy with school stuff and I wanted to get something posted before you all think I've dropped dead. I intended for it to be MUCH longer, and take place at the Burrow…but…er…
Think of this as a two part chapter, OK? Yeah…all the stuff I promised will pop up next time! The wedding, Ginny, the Weasleys, Fluer's weird family, Lupin, Tonks and all that good stuff coming up next, I promise. Yay!
PS: Sorry to leave you on that angsty note, lol.