Chapter Five: The Lies People Tell

"Hermione, my lovely, I'm home!"

The long-haired brunette snapped her eyes open at the sound of his voice. She sat upright in bed, cuddling the comforter close to her.

"Liam? Liam, is that you?"

At this, the tall male came inside her bedroom and sat on the bed. "Sorry, Hermione. I didn't mean to wake you; well actually, I did mean to wake you. I just figured you might've missed me."

Hermione stood on the bed and put her arms around Liam's neck before jumping up and putting her legs around him. He held her up with his arms and smiled before Eskimo kissing her. "I did miss you! Why did you even leave to begin with?"

"I had something I had to do…"

As he spoke these words, she could smell the sick smell of alcohol on his breath. Hermione stood back on the bed and looked at him suspiciously. "Are you drunk?"

Liam looked absolutely offended by this question and stumbled backwards. "No, I'm not drunk."

"You were out drinking, weren't you? Tell me the truth, Liam."

He rolled his eyes. "Yes, I was out drinking! I don't need your damn permission for every single thing I do!"

Hermione got off the bed and went to grab a shirt but felt herself be instantly grabbed. She looked over at him. "Let me go, Liam."

"No! I won't let you leave just because I'm a little tipsy!"

"Then why don't you leave, Liam! Maybe you coming back wasn't a good idea!"

She tried to break her arm free from his grip but found herself at failure. He brought her closer to him as if he was going to kiss her, but then backhanded her, letting go of her arm so she landed on the floor.

"Maybe you dancing isn't a good idea! How do you like it when I try to control your life? Eh, Hermione?"

She carefully stood up as pain rushed through her cheek. "You told me that you had stopped doing drugs! Alcohol is a drug and you're drunk! You lied to me…"

He lit up a cigarette and blew it in her face. "I had stopped doing drugs, Hermione. I did until I came back here. Have you ever thought that maybe you were the reason why I drank?"

She backed away from the cigarette smoke and from this stranger that she had never seen before.

"Get out, Liam! I didn't cause you to drink! You drank on your own volition!"

He stormed towards her and shoved her hard, causing her to fall into the corner of the table next to the bed. She felt her back be jabbed with the table corner but she quickly found herself getting her balance back.

"Get out or I'll call the fucking cops!"

This threat didn't seem to phase him in the least. In fact, Hermione watched on as he just laughed before taking another drag of his cigarette. "You're mine, Hermione. You found me, you took me, and we both got what we wanted from each other… we used each other, sweetheart, there's no getting around that fact. But come on, a stripper? Was that the best you can do?"

Hermione felt her eyes fill up with tears as he verbally abused her. "Shut up! You have no idea the hell I went through, Liam! You'll never know! Now get out Liam!"

He stared at her for a few moments before putting the cigarette out on the desk table and heading out of the bedroom. Hermione didn't move an inch until she heard the door slam, causing her to jump.

I've made too many mistakes in my life and I believe that letting Liam stay here is a bad idea. How could I be so stupid? I knew what his past history was…

Hermione knew that she had dug her own grave the minute she let him live with her. She was desperate at the time, and need money. She needed someone to love her and treat her nice.

It had all backfired though. She knew full well that nothing gold could stay but she didn't expect the gold to disappear so soon. Hermione decided to take a quick shower before changing into her pajamas. As she was passing the door, she bit her lip, thinking about whether or not she should lock it. Was she just being paranoid? Wait, no… of course she wasn't. He had hurt her twice and he might come back. Would she be stupid enough to leave it unlocked?

She quickly locked it before crawling into the empty bed. As she laid down, she felt the place where the table corner had hit her back and winced a bit.

That goddamn bastard… I fucking hate him. I hope he rots in hell…

A stray tear ran down her face as she forced herself to close her eyes and fall asleep.

The next morning, Hermione woke up feeling bouts of pain shoot through her back and in her cheek, the cheek that Liam had slapped the previous night. She walked into her bathroom and lifted up her shirt in the back and cringed when she saw the ugly purple and blue bruise that looked circular. She took a deep breath and decided to take a shower.

As she slipped out of her pajamas, Hermione took short glances of her body in the mirror. She had the body that she knew other women would die to have, her legs were in portion with the rest of her body, her neck was skinny and she didn't have a turkey flap, she had a beautiful back that showed off her shoulder blades beautifully. Everything about her body was great, but she didn't want to be so skinny and she wished that her hair was calmer. She really didn't think that she was all that gorgeous or sexy. She just had enough confidence to dance for her money, as sad as it sounded.

The young brunette took a nice, warm shower and got dressed in a purple sweater, a pair of matching jeans and her brown faux coat before slipping into her black boots and walking out the door of the apartment complex heading to the club.

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"Nice work today, Granger. You sure know how to strut your shit," replied a cold voice behind her.

Hermione gasped and quickly put her shirt and pants on. She turned around to see Blaise Zabini.

Blaise Zabini was the owner of the club, and he was in charge of "his girls." He called them his because he hired them, and he could just as easily fire them. Hermione was probably more scared of him than anything else. She didn't think of him as a friend, or even an acquaintance. He was her boss and he basically had full run of everything dealing with the club. On top of that, Hermione had heard a rumor that he was involved with the Death Eaters and that he had the Dark Mark on his arm. This scared her because she was a muggle born, and the thought that he could possibly kill her whenever he wanted was a thought she didn't even wanted to think about.

"Well, I got to make a living somehow, don't I?"

Blaise walked closer to her, placing a hand on her shoulder, sending chills up her spine. "Are you unhappy with working here?"

"I-I just didn't see myself working here when we graduated… I saw myself working at the Ministry of Magic. You can't possibly look at me and honestly tell me that you always saw yourself working at this strip club, Blaise."

He leaned his mouth close to her ear and smiled. "You don't always get what you expect to from life. You just have to deal with what happened. By the way, there's someone here that wishes to see you."

Hermione raised an eyebrow and walked over to her coat before she put it on. "Who is it?"

A part of her prayed that it wasn't Liam. He had scared the shit out of her last night and he was the last person she wanted to see. Her hands shook as she zipped up her coat, waiting for Blaise's answer.

"It's Draco. Oh how the times have changed. He wanted you dead in school and now he wants to talk to you…"

Hermione chose to ignore the last part of his sentence. "Did he say what he wanted?"

"The only thing he told me was that he wanted to discuss something. I'm just as in the dark as you are."

"Well, don't let him in. I don't want to speak with him."

"Alright, I'll send him in…"

Hermione shouted in exasperation and stomped her foot. "No! Blaise, don't you dare send him in here…"

She took a frustrated sigh and wrapped her scarf around her neck when she heard footsteps. Hermione faced away from the person and folded her arms in front of her. In the mirror she could see the shaved head of Draco Malfoy and she could smell his cologne as it lingered in the air.

"Hermione, come with me. We should talk."

"What's to talk about, Draco? This is my life," Hermione said turning around, throwing her arms up. "I'm a stripper. I can't go anywhere else. I need money, food, a place to live… this is who I am!"

Draco looked exhausted, trying to fight her on this. "Just…take a walk with me. We can talk…"

Hermione looked at him for a long time before grabbing her bag and following him out of the club. Outside, the snow was gently falling and people were decorating in hopes of lightening up the city.

"So what do you want to talk about?"

Draco walked along side of her. "You're better than a strip club, Granger. You're better than this."

Hermione rolled her eyes and looked to the side. "This is all I'm here from you, Draco! I'm better than this, I'm better than a strip club, well tell me then… what the hell makes me so much better than it?"

"I don't know what happened to you but I know that you didn't plan to work in a strip joint the second you graduated from Hogwarts. Something bad usually happens to a woman before she decides to fall back on her back up plan. Tell me what happened to you."

Hermione shook her head as she continued to walk towards her apartment. "No, because it's none of your business and you don't care."

Draco grabbed her arm and dragged her towards the coffee shop. "If I didn't care, do you really think I'd be here trying to persuade you out of stripping?"

She thought for a bit. He had a point there. Why did she have to be a bitch about everything, to everyone?

Once Draco got two coffees, he led her to an empty chair a few feet away from a garbage can, still inside the shop. He waited until she sat down when he handed her the hot beverage.

He sat down across from her. "So, tell me…"

She felt so pressured and felt as if she would crumble from the rocks that were being thrown on top of her. Hermione nursed her coffee and sat back. "My parents died in a car accident when my brother and I were young. My dad was driving drunk, flew past a traffic light and crashed head on into a semi. In my third year, my brother left me alone in our old house," Hermione looked down at the coffee cup, not really wanting to relive the past. There was a long pause after that. "I got into a relationship with this guy, not the man I'm with now. It was a different guy… he was abusive and I was scared to death of him. He was controlling half the time and the other half he ignored me. If you know anything about being with a woman, ignoring her is the worst thing you could possibly do," Hermione looked up at him with big sad eyes as she thumbed her drink.

Draco looked at her, intrigued. He leaned in so she didn't have to raise her voice over the music. He understood that she probably didn't want anyone else to hear her life story.

"So how'd you get out of it?"

Hermione shrugged, taking a small sip of her coffee. "Well, he went to work and he never came back to where I was living with him. I just kind of… left. I saw him the next week with another woman. I just found an apartment, got a job, and here I am now with my boyfriend Liam."

When she looked at Draco's stone eyes again, she swore that she could see some disappointment. "Liam, eh? Does he make you happy?"

Hermione quickly looked away as she thought about the previous night's events, how he had slapped her and pushed her. She bit her lip to hold back tears as she thought how she just wanted to pour herself into Draco's arms… oh Merlin, his strong arms…

"Umm… yes. He makes me happy," Hermione lied. She looked back at him and could instantly tell that he didn't believe her, but he didn't say anything else on the subject.

There was a quiet silence between the two individuals as they stared at each other for what seemed like ages. Hermione took casual sips of her coffee as she examined his body and his movements. Draco looked built but he also looked a bit underweight. She tried to attempt to mentally guess his age.

He looked a lot older than what he really was. She knew how old he was. It had always been at least five months after her own birthday. He was 19, and she would be the same age in three more months. She looked at his hands and his long fingers, oh how she wondered how soft they were. Hermione scolded herself for feeling like this towards him. He probably had a girlfriend, fiancé, wife somewhere with three kids in a large house. Draco most likely didn't feel any feelings for her whatsoever, regardless of his "changing."

"Any other questions you want to ask me, Draco?"

He relaxed in his chair and leaned back. "No, none that I can think of. Leave if you want," he replied.

Hermione looked at him curiously and sighed. His voice sounded as if he just didn't care about her anymore or what she did. His voice just sounded full of regret and remorse that she felt guilty when she stood up with her coffee.

"A-Are you sure? I mean, if you still want to talk to me, you can…"

"No, it's alright. You have a boyfriend, go back home to him. He probably misses you."

Hermione looked down at the floor. "Right, I'm sure of that," she remarked sarcastically, but not loud enough for him to clearly hear her.

"What'd you say?"

Hermione spun around but began to walk slowly backwards. "What? Oh, I just said, yeah, you're probably right. Thanks for the… the coffee. I'll see you around."

Right before she opened the coffee shop door, she thought she heard the faint voice of someone saying, 'Wait, don't go.' She didn't stop to turn back once she left the shop, coffee in hand. It was probably just voices in her head…