Draco Malfoy and His Quest to Sensibility

by cleury

Chapter XVII

"Good morning, Draco."

Draco tried not to wince when he heard the thundering and booming of what he made out to be a voice talking to him. For a few seconds only, he opened his eyes, and Mr. Sun greeted him with a generous blast of light. His eyes flew shut, and he decided that opening them again before the next hour passed would be an hour too soon. He was scared the awakening of another one of his senses would cause his brain to send searing impulses to the other parts of his body. His skull hummed, and he wondered if men could get pregnant in their head. If that isn't a fetal heartbeat, I don't know what is.He wished it would stop, stop and give him a glass of water.

"Good morning, Draco," the voice said again.

He didn't bother replying because he knew anything that would come out of his mouth would be less than a half-grunt half-mumble. And the person who said that was blatantly lying, a morning it might be—if he had passed out until morning - but it was in no way good. Maybe if the mysterious person said "bad morning" to him, he would make an effort to respond.

"Um," said the mysterious person, "I don't want to bother you, but there are a few questions I want to ask."

He didn't want to think. He waved his hand to make a shooing action, but he was overwhelmed by his splitting headache. Maybe if I play dead, the person would just go away and leave me in peace. But the mysterious person didn't , to Draco's chagrin, the person moved his legs—Oh, I'm lying on a bench—and sat beside him. He popped his head up, and looked at the person sitting beside him, groaning, before his head slammed back down. Moving quickly was not an option.

"Hermione," he said. Maybe if he closed his eyes hard enough he would fall back asleep and could convince himself it had all been a dream. "What are you doing out here?"

He could hear the faint smile in her voice. Well, at least someone's amused.He was not happy with his current situation and wished he could just disappear. "The correct question would be: why are you here? You're outside the ward. I was looking for Crooks when I saw you lying on the bench."

Draco winced, sat up, and tried to clear his head by shaking it. Nope, nope, bad idea. "Hermione, can you go and fetch me a bottle of water?" He looked her, trying his best to open his eyes without flinching.

"Why—"

He had thought it'd been obvious. Did he not smell like a brewery? Did she not see the alcoholic fumes evaporating out of every orifice of his body? Draco leaned over to the side of the bench, unable to tolerate the queasy feeling in his stomach. He grimaced, held up a finger and hurled into a row of potted flowers that Ginny and Hermione had planted a few days before.

"Okay, yuck," said Hermione as she bounced off the bench. "You wait here and I'll get you something."

As if I could go somewhere! Draco's only response was to project another stream of bile from his mouth. It burnt like acid in his already parched mouth. He deduced, trying to look at the bright side of things, that Hermione had found and woke him in the early hours of the morning—which meant visiting hours hadn't started yet, so no one was outside. His brain willed his body to stop gagging—it was stupid, why on earth did his body believe that it could rid the alcohol he consumed hours ago?He felt as though his body had been transported to hell. He clutched the sides of the bench for support, gasping at his exertions.

"Here."

Draco found life-giving, fresh, good, beautiful, and glorious water in front of him. He ripped the bottle cap open and swigged its contents, rinsing his mouth and gargled.

"Trying to get the shit fairy out?" asked Hermione, laughing, and handed him a potion and orange juice.

Draco grabbed the items from Hermione's hands, grateful for her help, but annoyed at how much amusement she was taking from this scene."Mind your language, young lady." He swallowed the potion in one gulp, and the orange juice after. "I certainly hope that was a hangover remedy and not poison."

"If I wanted you to die, I'd have left you alone."

Draco looked at Hermione, who was trying to stifle her reaction. She looked like a balloon about to burst. "What? Never seen anyone hung over before?"

Hermione took a deep breath, trying to hold her laughter in as much as she could, but a few giggles escaped from her lips. It was as if that was the trigger,becauses oon she was laughing so hard, she held her sides for support and collapsed onto the back of the chair. "Draco, how did you get here?"

Draco memory of last night was sketchy at best, and he could only just remember the relevant details—Adrian betting him to drink … Adrian egging him to down three shots... the world was spinning, Nott was laughing at him... and then everything was dark. Draco closed his eyes, and decided ignorance was would not ask why Hermione was laughing, clearly at the expense of him. Draco was still a proud man, and wanted to hold his head up high.

"Where are your eyebrows?" asked Hermione.

Draco's hands shot up to his face and touched the area where his brows were supposed to be. Instead of feeling a prickly sensation, his hands met soft and smooth skin. "You've got to be kidding me!" he said, as he realized he had splinched himself and left his eyebrows at the Greengrass party. Do eyebrows grow back? "I apparated here?" It was more of a question than a statement. While it was the only logical conclusion as to why he was so far away from home, and a rational explanation as to why his eyebrows were missing, he couldn't believe he was so stupid as to have done such a thing. Not to mention dangerous. Draco made a note to never get smashed with Adrian again. At least Blaise had the courtesy to shove him into a fireplace and make sure he Floo'd home.

"And one more question," said Hermione, her voice suddenly cracking. "Why are you wearing leather pants like that?"

Draco looked down, and quickly realized two things. One: the potion was taking effect and his body no longer felt the need to reject his intestines every time he turned. Two: Adrian was going to just because of the leather pants, though Draco was a very sore loser and planned to execute revenge on Adrian in the near future, what he saw had signed Adrian's execution. Adrian had yanked Draco's boxers up to his waist and tucked his shirt into them. He made a noise of pure derision and shot a glare at Hermione, who was still snorting at his appearance. He quickly pulled his shirt out of his boxers, trying to savor some sort of decency. "What an incredible morning."

"Oh, don't worry too much about it," said Hermione slapping him on the shoulder. "I mean, it's not like I haven't seen you in anything worse."

"Worse?" he asked, unbelievingly. "You've seen me wearing something worse? What, when? How come I have no recollection of it?" He thought long and hard, recalling everything he had worn near Hermione, and could not think of anything inappropriate. Her clothing, on the other hand, was a mess. Except for that one time when she had worn something decent in front of his mother, Hermione had worn very casual and shabby clothing. It's almost as if she doesn't want anyone to look at her.

Hermione snorted. "Oh, don't look at me like that. Your pajamas! Black flannel! Imagine that."

Draco shook his head, and grumbled to himself. "Can't expect someone like Hermione Granger—queen of track-pants and sweaters - to understand clothes."

Hermione slapped him on the shoulder again. "I am a girl, you know."

"Oh, really?" said Draco breezily. "Could've missed it."He caught the look on Hermione's face, and wished he kept his mouth shut. He blamed the alcohol and his hangover on his slip-up, and made a mental note to himself to never say bad things about Hermione's appearance again. "My bad."

Hermione recovered quickly but she gave Draco a strange look. "Never thought to see the day where you'd apologize so easily."

"People change," hereplied. He looked down, not daring to meet her eyes. She said nothing and they enjoyed a few minutes of comfortable silence. Draco closed his eyes and dozed off lightly. He was not, for all intent and purposes, a morning person. A morning could only be considered good if he had slept the whole of it away. It was a wonder Adrian tolerated him as a co-head of their business, but many of their business partners were late-risers too and they rarely scheduled events or business of any sort before the sun was at its zenith.

Draco could feel Hermione fidget as she saw him doze off, and in his state of semi-consciousness, he wondered if she knew that she had caused him to change his ways and make him want to become a better man. Probably not. Draco smiled slightly and shifted to a more comfortable position. He'd keep that his little secret. Something I know that Know-it-all Granger doesn't, he thought smugly. And he didn't want to lead her on and give her the wrong idea. In retrospect, he was glad that there had been nothing there for him and Hermione. He had problems he had to take care of first and he decided that until he made progress in changing his personality, he didn't want to be involved with anyone.

"I'm here to see Crookshanks," said Draco.

Hermione raised her eyebrow, wondering if she should believe Draco. He looked like he was drunk and had apparated to the place he had first thought of—the psychiatric ward, the place that had been his home for the last fortnight. "You miss him?"

"Yup," said Draco, nodding. He did miss that cat, though only Merlin knew why he held such a strange sense of comradery with the blasted orange toilet-brush.

"He didn't come to my room last night," said Hermione, standing up from the bench. "I think he was looking for you."

Draco put his hand to his chest. "I'm touched."

"But he should be back soon, he never misses his breakfast. Comes at eight in the morning right on the dot, rain or shine," she said as she checked her wristwatch. "If you come with me right now, you should be able to see him."

Draco nodded and followed her back into institute and they walked up the stairs and into the reception. He frowned, sensing there was something completely out of place but couldn't quite figure out what it was. She moved through a myriad of corridors before eventually opening a door. The room was more spacious than Draco's previous room and there was only one bed inside, along with a desk and bookshelf. "How come you get such a nice room?"

"Because I'm a permanent resident here?" she said, turning away from Draco to shut the door. "And I'm a glorified war heroine; they give me what I want."

That was what had struck discord with Draco all along. Why was Hermione allowed to move in and out of the hospital?"So they're giving you special treatment because you helped defeat the Dark Lord?" That didn't make sense at all. Though Hermione wasn't dangerous to other people—as long as they didn't insult her too much, the idea of giving someone who needed to stay permanently in the psychiatric ward free access in and out of the institute made no sense.

"Oh, Crooks! Look who's here to see you?" crooned Hermione when Crookshanks suddenly appeared on the window ledge. The cat purred in delight when he caught sight of Draco and immediately pounced into his arms, demanding for affection.

"Oh, Brutus!" said Hermione dramatically, throwing her hands up in the air.

"What?" Extremely confused, he looked around the room. As far as he was concerned there was no living or ghost in the room that could possibly be a Brutus.

Hermione giggled at Draco, and shook her head. "Never mind, inside joke with Ginny. Feed Crooks before you play with him or he'll start scratching my furniture." She pointed to the tin of cat food on her desk and she walked over to her bookshelf and selected a thin paperback, Orpheus. Climbing onto her bed, she began to read. "Don't mind me, I'll be reading."

That clearly was a dismissal. Draco took the tin from Hermione's desk and opened it, wrinkling his nose from the oily fish smell. There is no way in hell I'm going to touch that with my hands. He grimaced, and dug around in his jacket was sure it'd be there, he had made it a habit to carry it with him at all times... Draco pulled out the spork he had stole from the first night at dinner, and used it to extract the jelly-like meat from the tin.

"Here you go," he said as he placed the saucer down onto the ground. Crookshanks looked up at him once, as though expressing his thanks, before consuming his breakfast.

"Can I ask where you got that from?" asked Hermione, looking up from her book and staring at the spork.

Draco grabbed a tissue and wiped the spork clean. "Got it from here, it as a 's a good luck charm of sorts." He pocketed the spork back into his jacket pocket. He pulled out the chair from underneath Hermione's desk and sat on it, facing her bed. "It's been with me through a lot of personal trials."

She giggled and closed her book, shuffled to the end of her bed so she sat close to Draco, their knees almost touching. "Imagine a spork becoming a Malfoy heirloom!" She laughed and rolled in her bed hysterically.

"Good thinking. Sporks are quite durable. This device is made out of plastic, isn't it? If I remember Muggle Studies correctly, I heard these things take almost a century to decompose in a landfill. If my descendents and I take care of it, it should outlast most of the other heirlooms."

Hermione sat back up again, this time cross-legged on her bed. "How many heirlooms does the Malfoy family have?" The Malfoy family tended to be quite private in regards to the finer details. They feared that someone would be able to analyze and figure out a weakness within their family so paranoia dictated their actions—the less people knew about them, the better.

Draco looked up at the ceiling as he tried to count. "The walking stick, family crest, paper-weight, the Manor, mother's wedding ring—" he shook his head, giving up, "—too many for me to remember and list. But just believe me when I say, if I decide to add the spork to the Malfoy collection, it wouldn't be the strangest thing there."

"Oh?" said Hermione, leaning forward earnestly. "What's the strangest?"

Draco smirked at the memory of the object. "Try and guess."

The two of them were so absorbed in their conversation, they neglected Crookshanks. Being a seriously jealous cat, Crookshanks pounced onto the window sill and stretched lethargically with its claws extended and its tail high up in the air, trying to show off and remind his master and male mistress his awesome and most important existence that demanded attention and worship. He made a low-pitched yowl and his ears flattened when they ignored him. There was a rustle in the bush outside the window. Crookshanks turned his attention to the more immediate and interesting attraction. He hissed when he heard a click and pounced outside like a jaguar in the jungle.

"What's Crooks doing?"

"Probably got bored of us."

I'm not entirely sure what happened. But it seems I forgot to upload this chapter. So now I have another one to upload. That one is coming shortly. Please review!