Thanks for the reviews! I'll try to update as often as I can!
Disclaimer: (forgot to write it in the last chapter! Sorry!). I don't own Harry Potter. Sad, but true. Eventually I will own some story or other but, for now, I'll borrow of the creative minds of writers far better than myself and hope they'll excuse my imposition of my own thoughts onto their work.
Chapter 2: (Draco's Point of View)
"That damn woman!" snarled Draco Malfoy at his group of friends as he paced their cabin back and forth. Crabe and Goyle continued as if nothing had happened while the ever cocky Blaise Zabini granted his ragging friend a grin. "You should have seen her, writing on her precious book and ignoring me, Me, as if I was barely in the room!" He refrained from stating that the silence had been due to his inability to come up with a proper retort to her insult. How he hated that infuriating woman! As much of a nuisance as she'd been in his classes, he'd always known exactly how to push her around. But in the past year, she'd been untouchable, too aware of her own good sense to let his jibes pass. Worst, she knew exactly what jibes bothered him and exploited them mercilessly. And when in anger, he never knew what to say. At the moment, everything he could have said came to mind but all too late. Swearing to himself, he stormed out of the room and away from Blaise's all too amused grin.
He entered their cabin again and returned to his books. One last year, that's all that was left. One last year and he could move to the other side of the world if he wanted and never see these people again. Never see his family again. Never hear of the workings of wizard London again. The idea was all too appealing.
And then he saw it, as he was about to decided to take a nap, his eyes caught the perfect little notebook on the mudblood's side of the room. Ah! The perfect way to get back at her. Careful to lock the door first, he propped himself onto her side of the room and placed the notebook on his lap. It was clear the thing was normally heavily jinxed for it bore the marks of many spells. But she had left it unattended and unguarded, nothing but the simple lock to keep him away. Careless, Granger, he thought to himself while smiling and muttering the blessed spell: 'alohamora'.
The book flew open almost immediately and he noted how it returned to the last written page, much like when she had opened it. He considered starting from the beginning but there was so much written the wisest answer would be to start from the last entry and try to keep reading until he found something to bother her with. Her last entry was a series of bullet points, 7 in total, each with a different thought. The first mirrored such thoughts as those he'd experienced but a few moments before:
There is something about who I am at Hogwards that makes me want to wish the year was already over. Granted, I love the place and will miss it dearly. But it is my time to move on. I already have offers in the states and all across the world as the Valedictorian of our class. Why stay? What could possibly be more appealing than leaving wizard London and the very expectations it carries behind? And though I will miss my Ginny dearly, I have no doubts that we shall still be friends years from now. As for Harry and Ron, I could be gone for three years and come back and know nothing had changed. Harry will still be the golden boy. Ron will still be a clueless goof-ball. And I will be their designated homework buddy and smart side kick.
Her thoughts disturbed him more than he cared to admit. How could anyone so unlike him be so completely attuned to his exact thoughts? He felt himself reflected in her revelations and the bitter sweet parting that would occur at the end of the year. Though perhaps he thought he'd probably have a greater reason for wanting to vanish from this side of the world once school was over. After all, having a lord Voldemort on your tail would not be pretty.
He was about to put the book away, some vague semblance of guilt kicking in at having read something so delicately private, but something in the very last bullet point caught his attention. His name: Malfoy. The entry read as follows:
For though there is much to dislike in someone so vain and standoffish, I can say but one thing in his favor. There is too much pride in that one to become anyone's lapdog, because above all else and what Voldemort might threaten to do, this one is a Malfoy and, unlike his father, such a simple title means something.
Almost instinctively, he slammed the book closed, placed it quickly where he'd found it, and returned to his side of the cabin. It had been a bad idea to read those pages. If there was one thing he didn't need was to know that Hermione Granger, one of the persons he hated the most out of the entirety of Hogwarts, not only held him in a higher opinion than most of his pears, but also understood him far better than his best friends and family combined.
'Don't think about it. Don't think about it'. He repeated to himself, trying to ignore the many thoughts that plagued him. He should have never read that book for he knew that, regardless of all the awful things he'd done to Hermione, he had just breached something unforgivable. If she ever were to find out what he'd read, whatever good opinion he had somehow manage to gain before her eyes would be lost forever. And for some inexplicable reason, he dared not loose that, not for all the world. Wrestling with these thoughts, he eventually fell asleep, welcoming the merciful dreamless rest that took him away from the latest revelation.
