The last few days of summer leaked by without incident, as Draco was left to wander his home alone. The next time he saw anyone but a house elf was when he found himself being dropped off at platform 9 ¾. His father gave him the usual lecture about pure blood and the Malfoy honour at Hogwarts and he was set loose for another year. Pushing his trolley before him, his eagle owl perched on the top. He made his way to the back car, where the prefects had a private car to themselves. Shoving his case under a seat, he brought out one of his favourite books and began to read.
A few minutes later he heard Granger, Potty and Weasel outside the door. "Wait a minute, Ron, I have to sit in the back car." Granger's shrill voice sounded out.
"Ugh, rather you than me, Malfoy's in there." Weasel's voice was full of disgust.
"Thank you very much, I'm sure I'll be fine." Granger sounded so pretentious, he could imagine her chin lifting and a look of superiority on her face. He shook his head.
"Look, if he tries anything…" Potty said quietly.
"He won't." The door slid open and her trunk came in, pushed by the two boys, who scowled at him then, stored it under the seat.
Granger came in next, and smiled at them. "We'd better find seats; the train will be going soon." Potty told her, and with one more scowl at Malfoy, they left.
Hermione sat in the seat the furthest away from Malfoy. He just sneered at her and continued reading, not looking up at her as he spoke. "So, you became a prefect then, Mudblood? Well, can't say I'm surprised, you do spend all your time in the library." He sneered and turned the page. "Can't say I blame you, if I was friends with Potter and Weasley I would spend all my time hiding from them too."
"Oh, drop the act, Malfoy." She glared at him.
"What?" He looked at her suspiciously. What act? He would hide from those two idiots. Although he did spend a lot of time hiding from Crabbe and Goyle, too.
"You may act like a jerk, talk like a jerk and look like a jerk, but I know you're not that bad really."
Putting down his book, he glared at her. That was probably the nicest thing anyone had ever said to him. "What makes you say that?" He drawled.
"Well, come on, you were perfectly nice outside Gringotts." Granger said in a matter-of-fact way that annoyed Draco intensely.
"I…" He let out a frustrated sigh. He was insulting her! Why did she have to make everything to difficult? "Wait, I look like a jerk?" He ran his fingers through his perfectly gelled hair. "In what way do I look like a jerk?"
She looked at him calculatingly, "It's your hair." He was about to ask what was wrong with his hair when the other prefects filed in. He just sneered at her and carried on reading his book. He did notice, however, that Justin Finch-Fletchy was the Hufflepuff Prefect and Padma Patil had made prefect for the Ravenclaws.
He was still wondering about his hair when that fat old witch came in with the trolley. As he never bought anything from the trolley, he just ignored her. Slowly as the day wore on, the prefects petered out of the car, in search of friends. As the only friends he had were Crabbe and Goyle, and he treasured the time he spent away from those freaks, he stayed where he was, calmly reading his book.
The book was about a witch, who had tried to unite the muggles and wizards of France to conquer the English, but instead was kidnapped by the English muggles and burnt on a stake. After this, she settled down with a muggle. A ridiculous story about an upstart Mudblood.
Pretty soon, there was only one other person in the car. Granger had her nose in one of the books they had been set. "What about my hair?" He demanded. The question had been nagging him since she had said it, and he again touched his head.
She jumped, and then looked around, seeing him glare at her. "Oh, it's you." She closed her book and looked at him with her head on one side. "Well, when you slick it back like that, it looks, well, evil and jerk-like." She shrugged and returned to her book.
He suddenly got angry with her. "Why aren't you going to see your friends, Granger? They can't have both knocked you back." She flushed red and then smiled knowingly.
"Well, I liked the peace and quiet of this car, but if you insist on trying to engage me in a conversation, I would much rather go speak to my friends. Why don't you go speak to yours, Malfoy?" She smiled winningly at him then left.
His face went red and he kicked the seat. So what if he didn't have any real friends? "Who needs them?" He said loudly to himself. Then he returned to his book for the remainder of the journey.