A/N: Thank you all so much for your reviews, favorites and follows! I know a lot of you were wondering what's been going on with Max, so enjoy his POV. You can follow me on tumblr (nauticalparamour) where I post sneak peeks, story updates and answer questions.
Please let me know what you thought of chapter fourteen and be on the lookout for chapter fifteen soon!
Max had his head completely buried in the most helpful book he could find about the theory of forward time travel, looking for anything that would point him in the right direction. He couldn't forget about his ultimate mission here - getting back to his correct time. If everything went well, he was going to make sure his parents got together and then he would ride his time turner off into the sunrise of the future, with no one the wiser.
He wanted to have some more progress to share with Headmistress McGonagall, too, the next time he met with her. Max felt some irritation that the Headmistress so clearly doubted his skills. Already, he had repaired the time turner, hadn't he? Eventually, he had to be able to figure it out.
Of course, he needed to get it perfect, though. He was somewhat nervous to jump forward in time, even just for a few seconds. That was where things could be horribly wrong.
"That is not a book about Quidditch," Malfoy's smug voice pulled him out of his research.
Max shut the book, the noises of dinner filtering back in. "Damn," he said, with a frown. "I think you are the only person who noticed the charm." He was a bit disappointed that Draco would be able to see through his work disguising the cover of his book.
"No one cares enough about sports to write a volume that large on it. Try the Goblin Wars next time," Malfoy said with a smirk. "What are you so focused on anyway? Time travel?"
Feeling his blood run cold, Max tried to read Malfoy's face to see how much he knew. "What makes you think that?" he questioned, cautiously. He pressed his hand protectively against the cover of the book.
"Well, I've only just put two and two together when I was talking to Granger before dinner," he said with a smirk. "You two have the same nose, did you know that? And the same habit being desperately distressed when you don't understand something."
"What are you suggesting?" Max asked, feeling his heart pound away in his chest. Malfoy was too close.
"I'm suggesting that you've traveled through time. And that your mother's name rhymes with Mermione Branger," Malfoy said with a laugh.
"Keep your voice down!" Max insisted, looking around, hoping that no one else heard him. Casting a quick muffliato charm, he still couldn't even let himself relax a bit. He needed to keep his wits about him when he teased out what Malfoy actually knew. "How do you know?"
"I told you, it was her nose," Malfoy explained. "But I didn't put it all together until I was just talking to her and she mentioned that Adrian Pucey had asked her about me too. I couldn't figure out why you were so interested in the pair of them, but now it seems clear to me. So, am I right...Max Pucey?"
Annoyed that he'd been figured out - by Malfoy no less! - Max scowled. "You better not tell anyone, Malfoy," he said with a sneer. "Or I will make you very sorry."
"Assuming you have your mother's right hook and your father's strength, I tend to believe you," Malfoy answered, still looking exceptionally smug to have figured everything out. "But you could help keep me quiet by telling me about my own future. I assume Astoria is involved, since you told me she isn't just a passing fling."
"Me telling you anything about your future could mean that it won't end up happening," Max said with a roll of his eyes. "But yes, since you've already figured it out, you will end up with Astoria."
"And are we happy together?" Malfoy asked, suddenly on the edge of a seat, looking rather like a little boy.
Max was struck by the vulnerability that the Slytherin was showing. For the first time since he'd known Malfoy, it seemed as if the blond truly wanted something so simple - to be happy with the witch he undoubtedly loved. He knew he could give him this little bit of assurance. "Yes, you are very happy with one another."
Malfoy relaxed, seemingly satisfied with his answer. "Good," he said with a small smile on his face, before he looked back up at Max. "So, Adrian must finally realize he's been panting over Granger for the whole year, huh?" he quipped. "Or else you wouldn't be around."
"That's the idea," Max snapped back. Even though he wanted his parents together, he really didn't need to think of the physical aspect of their relationship.
"Well, I've probably at least helped push him in the right direction," Draco said with a shrug of his shoulders.
"And how did you do that?" Max questioned, wanting nothing more than to be done with this conversation. Malfoy already knew too much about him and that made him a liability.
"I kissed Granger," he said, offhand. "Adrian saw and left in a jealous fit."
"You kissed my mum?" Max asked, his nostrils flaring. He felt a surprising amount of anger bubbling up inside of him when he thought of the blond's ferrety little face next to his mum. "That was not a part of the plan!"
"Oh, so there was a plan was there?" Malfoy asked. "Would have been nice of you to fill me in on it."
"You were just supposed to make him jealous from seeing you talk to her," Max said, shoving his book into his bag, knowing that he was going to have to go do damage control now. Who knew how his father was going to react to it. "Kissing her was not part of it. What will Astoria think?"
"Already talked to her," he answered, leaning back into his seat. "She said it was the most pathetic looking kiss she'd ever seen, but she understood when I explained I was just doing it to get Pucey's head out of his own arse."
"You told someone else?" Max fumed, wondering how Draco Malfoy would have thought that would ever be a good idea. Did he even understand how many variables he was introducing to the equation? Obviously not.
"Well, yeah, I had to tell her why I did it," he said. "And after all, she thinks Granger and Pucey are cute together."
"My parents aren't fodder for gossip, Malfoy," Max said firmly, possibilities running through his mind. "Why couldn't you just talk to her like a normal bloke?"
"Hey, I was just trying to help," he insisted, putting up his hands in a gesture of contrition. "And in any case, it seemed like it really worked. Adrian was in a snit when he saw us and stormed off. I'm sure he's in a downward spiral of realization right now. He's probably already planning on how to win her back."
Max stood up from the table abruptly, throwing his bag over his shoulder. "Just do me a favor and stop helping for a bit, alright?" he said, his mind whirring, wondering just how he was going to fix this. His first step, though, would be to talk to his father.
"Where are you going?" Malfoy called after his retreating form. "Dinner's not over yet!"
"Damage control," he shouted back over his shoulder, before leaving the Great Hall.
The castle was empty, with all of the students eating at the feast, so Max made it back to the corridor that housed his room quickly. He stopped off in his apartments to drop off his book bag - he didn't need any more questions about why he was researching time travel.
He tried to prepare himself to face his father. Max didn't really have a good feel for how he would be feeling at that moment. There was a possibility that he was quite angry, mostly with himself for letting another wizard take his witch right from under him. Or, he might be quite upset, mourning the possibility of a relationship with Hermione. But, mostly, Max thought his father was going to be very embarrassed that he hadn't even realized what his feelings were until it was "too late."
How could he let the older wizard know that it wasn't too late with Hermione? Maybe he could lie and say that Draco and Astoria had some kind of fight, so he just walked up to her and kissed the unsuspecting Gryffindor and she'd been too shocked to respond? But then, how would Max explain having all this additional information?
It was complex, and he didn't like flying into a situation with so many unknowns, but he knew he had to try, if only to save his parents relationship.
Marching over to Adrian's portrait, he knocked forcefully on the door. Straining his ears, he listened for any sign of movement, but all he could hear was a bit of rustling. So his father was in at least.
Max knocked again, and this time he heard a great thump and what sounded rather like a giggle. Furious whispering followed, but with the portrait muffling everything, he couldn't make sense of who was talking or even how many people were in there. Had he invited his Quidditch buddies over to commiserate and didn't want to get caught?
He knocked a third time. "Um, Adrian, it's me Max," he said, tentatively. "Do you have a few minutes to talk?"
It felt like an eternity of shuffling feet, the portrait door finally swung open, revealing an irritated looking Adrian. Max looked his father up and down. Well, he didn't look like he'd been crying...
Adrian was slightly rumpled looking, with the top two buttons of his shirt undone. His hair was a bit mussed, too. Perhaps he'd been napping and Max had woken him up? Had he fallen off of the settee?
But no, that wasn't quite it either. His lips looked almost bruised, too. And he was slightly flushed, like he'd been exerting himself. It just didn't quite add up in Max's mind. This wasn't what he'd been preparing for at all.
"What did you need, Purney?" he asked, staring at him expectantly. His voice was graveley and deep, making it sound like a growl rather than a question. And when he shifted slightly, Max noticed a red mark on his neck, peeking out from behind his collar.
Sucking in a deep breath, Max was horrified to realize that his father might have had a witch over! Was he just drowning his sorrows over Hermione's new "romance" with Malfoy with someone else? Trying to show her that he wasn't hurt by her? That is the kind of false bravado Max could expect from a young wizard, but he thought his father would be smarter than that.
Panicked for a moment, Max tried to look around his father to see if there was any sign of the witch. "Uh, sorry, Adrian. Did you have company?" he asked, looking at the room. There was a dwindling fire in the hearth and the pillows on the couch were haphazard and some were on the floor, abandoned. "A witch maybe? Am I interrupting anything?"
Adrian scoffed. "If you don't have anything to ask, Purney, I'm going to have to ask you to leave," he said. "I'm not in the mood for your company tonight."
Before Max could argue any further, the portrait door was shutting in his face. He felt his stomach drop in horror, wondering if this was the horrid fate that Headmistress McGonagall had been alluding to whenever she warned him off of meddling with his parents' life. What if in trying to push them closer together, he'd actually wrenched them apart? Everyone seemed to think that they were interested in one another, and perhaps he should have just let them be.
But, he hadn't winked out of existence, yet, so that seemed to suggest that there was still some hope for him. He'd been thinking that making Adrian jealous was the right way to get him to realize his feelings for Hermione, but maybe he'd been going about it the wrong way.
Maybe making her jealous was the key.