No matter what anyone says—or thinks, for that matter—Hermione Granger does not like Draco Malfoy.
She does not.
In fact, she clings to this falsified truth so vehemently so stubbornly in an effort to make herself believe it. Maybe their peers have a point, and maybe she could like him.
If only he weren't such a prat.
But he is.
A prat, that is.
Still, she finds herself looking forward to patrolling the corridors with him at night, or making the patrol schedules for the prefects. Even if she continues to tell her friends that it's only because they have to work together.
Hermione never expects for it to come to a head, but such is her luck. Minutes after curfew—so late that even they can't get away with it—Filch nearly catches them.
A weak protest passes her lips when he steers them into a deserted classroom, and before she can think—before she can tell him to move—his lips are hard over hers.
It's anything but soft, and her fingers tighten in the front of his robes as his knee presses between her thighs, rising until she's grinding against it before she can process what's really going on.
To Hermione, it just feels like it's taken forever to get here.
"He should be gone." Malfoy rasps.
But still, they stay in that classroom until they lose track of time entirely.
It's a week later that she's spent avoiding him, that Hermione can't ignore him anymore. She wonders if anyone's noticed that she's stopped insisting there's more to their relationship, but she's sure Malfoy has.
The match between Slytherin and Gryffindor is long awaited, and she wears a slip of green ribbon, tied around her wrist.
And maybe no one else sees that, but he does.
She'll talk to him after the match, Hermione decides.
Unfortunately, as she's said for several years at that point, quidditch is a terribly dangerous sport.
A bludger narrowly misses Goyle—who swerves out of the way just in time—and slams into Malfoy as his first hers close around the snitch.
While she knows she did it, Hermione doesn't remember running down the stands. Or reaching Malfoy after pushing her way through the throng of his teammates.
Still, she remembers him lifting his head up, his fingers still closed around the snitch. "Here," he murmurs. "You can have this."
It's cool in the center of her palm. "Malfoy—"
He's out of it, she knows and his head falls to the side when he asks if this is heaven.
"Judging by your presence here, I can only assume it's hell."
"You wound me, Granger. So, I am dead?"
She snorts and her shoulders shake with laughter. "Definitely not. You can't be free of us so easily."
"Ah, so you finally admit there's an us then?"
Punching him in the shoulder—however lightly—probably isn't the best idea.
But she promises to kiss him to make it better.