Hermione sat staring out at the grounds with tired eyes. She had aged ten years in just one and she could feel it in her bones. A part of her had never wished to return here, it was a place of pleasant memories that had turned sour. The world today was too dark to try and remember the happy past. The day was cool yet there was a warm breeze which kept her from being chilled. She had left her robe inside along with her wand, she found herself risking being unprotected rather than carrying that dirty reminder around with her. She wondered still if it was her fault. Everyone told her no but then again no one really ever told you the hard truths. They hid it behind glossy half-lies that we're made to 'protect' you from the truth, the devastating truth. Hermione wanted the answers; she wanted what she had had as a child, a naïve child who thought that books could teach her everything she ever had to know. No one ever taught her how to forgive herself. No one had taught her to not let her guilt eat away at her. No one had ever taught her anything worth while.
Hermione knew when someone approached her from behind but she didn't even bother to see if they were a possible threat and even when they stood next to her she didn't try to glimpse them in her peripheral. What was the point? A familiar scent washed over her and she sniffed curious for the first time in a long time. What was that smell? And why did she remember it? She looked next to her and sighed. It was Draco Malfoy, she observed him as he watched her. He had aged nicely, becoming more handsome in an icy way, his eyes dirty chips of ice, his nose was sharp. The only soft thing about him were his lips, she had no doubt that his body was just as hard as his face. Hermione knew that staring was impolite but she couldn't muster enough feeling to be embarrassed, she felt like his face, emotionless and hard.
"Granger, are you going to mope all day?" He asked his voice taking on a quality of his younger years.
"I've forgotten the proper amount of time to mourn." She said truthfully, she wasn't sure of anything anymore.
"Something that the famous know it all hasn't looked up in a book." He said his voice scathing, meant to provoke, but again Hermione could not muster the emotion.
"No I've found books are quite misleading, when it comes to most matters." She said plainly registering no change in his emotions.
"Well at least you've learned something Granger." He said his voice cool, and he seemed to realize the change in her.
"Yes at least I learned something." She whispered quietly staring up the trees letting the sunlight shine in her eyes.
"You didn't have a choice Granger." He said and she looked at him confused. One moment and she knew what he meant, she swallowed suddenly choked up. "I'm not your friend, but no longer am I your enemy. We can't just push our school days away and pretend like we never hated each other. It won't work that way, so we won't try." He said calmly like he wasn't proposing the end of a ten year old private war. Like he wasn't saying that her blood didn't matter to him anymore. Like he wasn't going against all the ideals he had coveted so dearly. "I'm not going to lie to you Granger. I see no point really. You know the truth and I'll confirm it. You made a bad choice. That choice doomed him." He said this slowly yet without caution, he wasn't one to be afraid of the consequences. "Don't think that I don't know how deeply you regret it. I know the guilt eats away at you. I understand you more than those people who are your friends. They won't ever understand us Hermione, so don't expect it." This last part was said bitterly and the fact that he had said her name barely registered, because he understood he knew exactly what she felt. "We're damned people, created by our own actions. You'll never be like you were before, that time is a distant past. Don't even try to hope that the pain will go away." He said his eyes boring into hers his mouth twisted cruelly from his own pain. They stood silent staring at each other understanding mutually the consequences of all the things they had done, and how only one really mattered to them. That choice that had caused such catastrophe, which had changed them so inherently that at times they forgot what they had ever been.
"They're waiting for you, so clean yourself up and let's get going." He said his voice once again detached, but she saw an acceptance in his eyes. Not of her but of what he had done and she knew that one day he would see that same look in her eyes. It might take months, maybe even years but it would come gradually, it would be what was needed to cleanse the shadow from her heart. It would be enough.
A/N: I have more to this story but I feel that it got to cliché. So I'm going to try and fine tune it again and I will just add it on to this chapter but I will put an A/N in a second chapter announcing that I have added on.