The next day between History of Magic and Potions, she told her friends to go on without her. She yanked Malfoy away from his crowd of friends and near a wall away from the crowd of students rushing to classes.
Hermione explained that she told Professor McGonagall of his horrible condition and she decided to let them have a week off.
He was not pleased that she went behind his back and conspired against him. His flair for the dramatics caught the attention of passing students.
"I don't have to be Hercules to pluck Daffodil's, now do I?" he hummed rhetorically. "You'll revoke your request, thank you."
"I think I'm alright," she nodded at him like she had contemplated his "request".
"I'm completely fine," Malfoy snapped. But his eyes were drooping, and he inched closer to the wall so he could lean against it.
"Your obviously not," an incredulous laugh barked out of her throat.
He didn't seem bothered by her mocking tone or the whispers of their peers. He leaned his head back against the wall and stared at the ceiling, his golden hair glided away from his upturned face. "I'd prefer if we don't skip a week. Hopefully, your Rhadamanthine ethics will allow it," he said in a clipped tone. Once again, she was reminded that he was not used to asking for anything.
"Unfortunately... it won't. You could try talking to Professor McGonagall yourself though. I have to warn you, though, you're walking evidence for my case," she gestured to his feverish flush with a lazy hand.
He sighed dramatically through his nose and glared at her from half-lidded silver eyes. Quick as the strike of lightning, a cunning look flashed across his face. Spending her days surrounded by friendly and expressive Gryffindors, she was unnerved by his wolfish grin.
He stepped away from the wall and inched closer to her. Her hand loosely fiddling with the shoulder strap of her bag clutched it. His hand shot up and grabbed one of her curls, twirling it between his fingers. The back of his hand softly skimmed the knuckles of her own, she could see his silver ring in her peripheral vision as a grey speck.
His head leaned closer to her conspiratorially, "You could fix this undesirable vacation you've afforded me, and then we can go see about that stone path you were practically salivating over last time."
Hermione liked to think she had more self-discipline and restraint to not succumb to his manipulations, but she found her head lifting to nod in agreement. Flustered, she quickly shook her head, stumbled back with the grace of a newborn cow, and straightened the strap of her bag. His hand was frozen in the air where it had been fiddling with her hair, a wicked smirk grew on his face.
She broke away from the tense bubble his overwhelming charisma sucked her into. "Talk to Professor McGonagall yourself," she said walking backward with a raised eyebrow before spinning around and heading to class.
Later, when Ginny so graciously brought it up at the dinner table, Hermione brushed it off. It wasn't hard to convince them that the rumor was mindless gossip, that Draco Malfoy would ever flirt with her.
Year: 1992
Grade: Second Year
Location: Infirmary
There are two tales necessary to explain the careful brewing of contempt between Draco Malfoy and Madam Pomfrey. This is the first.
The hallways were too dark and cavernous to feel comfortable sneaking about. The torches were unlit, the framed portraits snored and slumbered, the night air filtering through the halls was clear and crisp.
Draco Malfoy crept along stone walls covered in tapestries and shadows. He ducked behind suits of armor and statues of Greek Gods. It was so quiet that he could hear his slippered footsteps scuffing along the cold stone brick floor.
The large overarching windows presented paintings of stars and a moon, it was beautiful but he didn't glance at the night sky for more than a second. He was on a mission.
He heard a commotion near the infirmary doors and pressed against the wall. His hands were trembling. His muscles, wound taut and locked in place.
When the noise subsided, he slipped away from the wall but the neck of his jumper yanked him back. He freed it from the protruding stone brick before creeping through the large gaping doors of the Infirmary.
Like a thief in the night, he crept along the row of cots, some filled with sleeping and petrified students, most were empty. The light in Madam Pomfrey's office was out. He thanked whatever higher power existed that Goyle had finally got something right.
Like a ship beckoned to a lighthouse's glow, he found Hermione Granger with moonlight shining in her hair and pouring down the contours of her face.
They placed her on the cot right beneath the window, a fool's mistake. Anyone would know she preferred dark, warm corners to the outdoors. She practically lived in the library.
He had been slow and stealthy the entire course from the Slytherin dorm to the infirmary, careful to control the swish of his pajamas. But as soon as he saw her, he charged over to her petrified form as if Voldemort himself was chasing his heels, ready to snatch him back.
He didn't know what he had been expecting, but the frozen state of her features made an uncomfortable feeling settle deep within his bones. His heart rattled and his blood trembled, he wasn't shaking but he felt like his entire body was moving and racing.
Draco didn't plan for what he would do once he saw her, he hadn't thought that far ahead. In the three days she had been frozen, his hearing had been obstructed by her siren song, calling him to come and find her. He thought it would have quieted now that he'd seen her, the irresistible call manipulating his rationality.
But it persisted. He was not satisfied. And it was louder than before, if anything, now that he knew what her petrified state looked like.
The sympathetic furrow of her eyebrows was gone, the curious flash of her wide brown eyes absent. Her resident pink flush dissolved, the honey hue to her skin washed away. Even her wild curls seem to have lost their spirit.
There was a quiver to his breathing like someone punched him in the stomach. He left and went back to his room.
Like a Greek tragedy with its inevitable, tragic end, he couldn't resist returning the next night. His thoughts were plagued with images of colorless lips and dull eyes. He could hardly focus on anything else.
Gradually, he began to spend longer and longer standing there and staring at her. It was a week before he spoke to her.
"I read the book about Werewolves. It was incredibly dull. I don't know why you read things like that, but I think it's because you want to sound smarter than everyone. It's too bad that you're…" he stuttered, "the way you are, right now. Because I know just as much as you now. Could probably overwhelm you with my knowledge..."
She remained petrified. He felt stupid for talking to a frozen girl, one who didn't even like him. One who probably hated him, actually. But it broke the tense atmosphere he and the silent infirmary had fostered His shoulders sagged, the ropes and wires of his body uncoiled.
He carefully lifted the wooden chair beside her bed and nudged it closer before sitting down and settling in.
"Your friends have gotten increasingly annoying and out of control, now that you're...occupied," he said, glancing at her out of the side of his eye. There was no response.
"I think they're on edge because they miss you. So, if that makes you feel any better about being a vegetable right now," he offered.
"Back to the Werewolf book though," he sidetracked, "What did you think about the part that said that long ago, people wanted to be bitten by a Werewolf because it increased their abilities to hunt and provide for their families. Especially women," someone stirred in their sleep a few cots over.
He lowered his voice, "I couldn't believe it! I bet you were surprised too. I also thought the part about—", he rambled on. Discussing various aspects of the book he liked and disliked.
Before he knew it, the moon's glow in her hair was replaced with the sun's golden caress. He left with a hasty, "Goodbye", patting the sheets by her leg like he was patting a friend on the back.
Draco came back every night. He told her about the classes she was missing, funny things his friends said, or things that annoyed him that day. He told her about the books he was reading, bragging that he was going to know more than her if she didn't wake up soon.
He even told her about the swingset, his mother, and his father.
Violet pastel half-circles formed under his eyes, his head sunk onto his hand in classes —a poor excuse for a pillow. Yet still, he could not resist going back.
The reading began on a rainy day. He was in the library, trying to do his Potions essay but his head was full of cotton and warm water. Draco couldn't focus. The dulled hum of Pansy and Theo talking clouded his ears.
As if he was in a trance, he got up from the wooden table and headed for his favorite sections. He pulled a variety of titles from the shelf, some he recognized and some he didn't. The spines were threaded in gold, shapes of stars and planets glinted on their hardcovers.
"Woah, is there a test in astronomy or something?" Theo asked, leaning back in his chair so that the front two legs were off of the ground.
"Something like that," Draco replied.
He lugged a new book with him to her bedside every night. He read them out loud until his throat ached and his eyes drooped. He read her page upon page of Greek myths, origins of constellations, astrology, and astronomy.
If there ever was a book to make her curious enough to wake up, he was sure it would be A Wanderers Guide to the Sky. He found a constellation with her name, though frustratingly enough the last pages of the chapter were ripped out. When he read the chapter title aloud, "Hermione", he gasped dramatically like he hadn't skimmed its table of contents before checking it out of the library.
His stomach sunk when he looked at her frozen face, unphased and unchanged, her arm still frozen in the air like it was reaching for something. He read the entire book to her that night.
He awoke to sunbeams kissing his face and a bony hand shaking his shoulder. He was assaulted by the smell of dusty parchment, peppermint-scented bedsheets, and warm vanilla.
His face crushed into the open pages of his book that rested open beside Hermione Granger's thigh.
He started and shot back in his chair. Madam Pomfrey glared at him. Her mouth was pinched and the lines of her aged face hardened.
Once he mustered his bearings and blinked a few times, he glared back at her.
"What is the meaning of this ," she snapped, a hand on her hip.
He had no clue what the meaning of this was.
"The standard of care in this infirmary is abysmal," the last was a word he had read describing the care of Werewolves in modern society. He had mentally bookmarked it for later use in conversation. He hoped he said it in a way that was not like when someone swore for the first time: clearly misused and out of place.
Madam Pomfrey huffed, the irritation in her eyes inflamed, "Excuse me?"
"If I am injured or sick, am I expected to suffer under these conditions? This operation —and I hesitate to even call it that— is practically a war crime. Towels and hay for beds, little to no supervision of patients." He didn't really have a problem with the infirmary, but the way he usually weaseled out of situations like this was by complaining and then flaunting his status.
Her eyes flashed in warning, "Care less about the state of my infirmary and more about what will happen when I tell your head of house that you were out of bed the entire night and sleeping here next to !"
If she was surprised at the situation, she didn't show it. There wasn't an ounce of bewilderment directing her facial features.
It was his own fault, he had been terribly stupid and idealistic last year, before he realized the full scope of his father's hate via his incineration of a muggle swingset. Perhaps Madam Pomfrey was closely associated with Professor McGonagall, who had filled her in on their meeting. "Their meeting", also known as the most difficult stop to erase on his paper tail to Hermione Granger.
"I wasn't here all night, why would you think that?" He sneered back at the older woman.
"You fell asleep on a book!" she huffed, "You were here all night, ."
"No, I was waiting here while you mosied on around, taking your time. It's not my fault you took forever and it's early in the morning," he lifted his nose in the air.
"Oh really? That's what you were doing," she said and Draco didn't like the glint in her eye. It was too Slytherin.
"Yes," he said, suddenly hesitant.
"Why are you in your pajamas then," she sneered which, might he add, looked ridiculous on her frail face.
"Sorry, I didn't know it was illegal to wear pajamas in the morning," he taunted, though it didn't have the same bravo as before. She thought she found the upper hand and he didn't know why.
"Fine. I suppose you were just catching up on some light reading and liked the sunlight by 's cot?" She had the same cunning tone his father employed when he wanted to catch Draco in a lie.
"Exactly, you and I are on the same wavelength." Madam Pomfrey's left eye twitched.
"What I'm puzzled by, , is why are you holding Ms. Granger's hand?"
Draco looked down at his hand, "What the fuck!" He jumped up, knocking back his chair and possibly waking up everyone in the room.
Hermione Granger's hand had, indeed, been encased by his own. The blood in his right arm was prickly from the awkward way it had been bent all night.
"Language, ," Madam Pomfrey said with a smug undertone to her voice.
"My apologies, I assumed a seasoned nurse who dealt with blood and gore could hand a simple 'fuck'. I'll try to hold myself back in the future," he said solemnly.
"That's it. Come with me, I'm taking you to your head of house. See how Professor Snape will find this predicament I stumbled upon." She made to grab for the back of his shirt and haul him down to Snape's office.
He leaped back, "No! Why? I haven't done anything wrong. You admitted yourself."
"You…" she nearly growled, lost for words with her fist-shaking. She turned, stomping into her office and slamming the door.
That night, when he tried to sneak back in, the light to her office was on. Its dim glow floated past the open doors and into the hallway. A white-gold ward, meant to expel blonde boys who carried books on horoscopes for 1992, with the pages concerning Virgo's and Gemini's bookmarked (not dog-eared).
And thus, the animosity between Draco Malfoy and Madam Pomfrey was born.
"Draco, look, the Mudbloods woke up," Pansy nudged him. He had been trying to tune her out all of dinner, tired of hearing her slurp mushroom risotto.
He bit the inside of his cheek, "Do you think I care," he said. But his eyes wandered to the Great Hall doorway.
The twitch of his lips was too overpowering, he tilted his head down to hide his face.
She ran down the length of the Gryffindor table to hug Potter and Weasley.
He felt his face slacken and a somber wave washed over him, so strong, that he had to leave the room.
