Chapter 6 – Basking In Confusion

Hermione arose the next morning feeling less-than-stellar. She dressed more slowly than usual, evidently she was trying to put something off, but it appeared that Hermione herself had no idea what is was.

She sat on her bed for a good twenty minutes debating whether or not to make an appearance at breakfast. Surely all the Gryffindors will have heard about her fight with Harry and Ron, and she wasn't quite in the mood for hostile glares and death threats. But she knew that if she didn't show up that they'd know why, and that'd just give them all the more reason to mock her. She was unable to choose so she withdrew a galleon from her pocket and threw it in the air, heads she'd go to breakfast, tails she'd stay in her dormitory. It landed on heads. "Damn it."

She picked up the galleon and made her way into the common room. Hermione pushed her way through the portrait hole and made toward the Great Hall, most of the students were on their way their now.

She had expected whispers and snide comments to follow her as she walked through the corridors, and she was not disappointed. The boys leered while the girls glared and Hermione couldn't help but want to scream. But she didn't.

She kept walking and she finally made her way to the staircase which would bring her down to the Entrance Hall, and eventually into the Great Hall. As she reached the foot of the stairs she found that a great number of students were still standing outside the Great Hall, postponing their entry. Hermione found this bizarre, as most students were inside the Great Hall eating their breakfasts there were some who were loitering outside, as if waiting for something. She was about to tell each of them to shove off when her thoughts were interrupted.

"Whore!"

Hermione turned to seek out who yelled the obscene word and found herself looking at a fifth year Ravenclaw girl. The girl just glared at her.

Hermione immediately figured that this was a product of Parvati and Lavender's gossip engrossment. Apparently they'd spread the news of her fight with Harry and Ron around school.

"Whore!" the girl screamed again. Hermione was about to tell her that she should head up to the library and find out the meaning of the word, because surely there were more appropriate ones for this situation.

But Hermione never got the chance. Other students started repeating the remarks of the girl and she found that even Slytherins were included in the mix.

Now she really hated Harry and Ron, no doubt they'd gone back to their common room looking upset and all the other Gryffindors had asked what happened, and they'd shared, except, Hermione thought, they'd embellished a little.

Yes, this had to be about what happened with Harry and Ron.

"The Head Girl is a whore!" someone screamed, and Hermione felt like dying. They could at least be accurate. "Hermione Granger gets around!"

Now her head was spinning. She looked at their faces and was even more confused. She must've looked quite stupid as they all continued to shout their insults at a rapid pace. Hermione was Blaise come out of the Great Hall and as he worked his way through the gathering crowd he shouted, "Sod off, you gits!" He pushed a person aside, "Bloody hell, people! How hard is that to comprehend? Leave her alone!"

He reached her as the crowd dispersed, many of them going into the Great Hall for breakfast. Hermione was still feeling quite confused.

As he pulled up beside her he put his arm around her waist, he smirked in a very Malfoy-like manner, "Hello, love." Then he kissed her.

It was only then that she realized that in all likelihood this incident had nothing to do with Harry and Ron.

hr

Draco Malfoy couldn't help but laugh to himself as he overheard the commotion in the Entrance Hall.

After seeing Blaise sneak out of Hermione's room he'd considered whether or not he should tell anyone about it, at first he'd decided against it, for his best friend's sake. But after Granger had made her "twitchy ferret" comment he'd changed his mind. Before breakfast that morning he'd let it slip to Pansy that he'd seen Blaise coming out of Hermione's room.

And, of course, in true female fashion, the news had reached the ears of more than half the student body by breakfast.

Draco had hoped that Blaise would be able to handle the fallout from the potentially damaging information he'd leaked, but his doubts were erased the moment Blaise had approached the large group of people in the Entrance Hall. But what came next almost gave him a coronary, Blaise had kissed the Mudblood. Now certainly Draco could deduce that they did this in private, but it never really clicked for him.

He watched as Zabini led the confused looking Mudblood away. ' Heh. She's probably wondering why the bloody hell everyone knows about her nightly escapades. '

He smiled and entered the Great Hall, he had his mind on a croissant, apparently scheming made him hungry.

Hermione was trying to get her head straight. None of this was making any sense, and if anyone had the brain power to make sense out of it, it'd be her. She found herself being led down a dark corridor by Blaise, and she seemed to have no idea why she was following him, but she did.

She soon found herself in the Slytherin Common Room. Descriptions that Harry and Ron had given floated back to her all the way from second year, but she banished the thoughts as quickly as they'd come, for they addressed topics, or people rather, that she didn't wish to think about again.

Blaise led her up a staircase, surprisingly without much protest from the Gryffindor princess. It was only then that she noticed they were in his dormitory, for she'd been batting away thoughts of Harry and Ron.

"I'm finding this situation highly inappropriate, Zabini."

He smiled, which made her uneasy, "That may be so, but I believe that if you give the people reason to believe exactly what it is they want to believe, they tend to be less hostile."

She gave him a pointed stare, "That's hardly true." She frowned, "What the bloody hell is going on?"

The quirky smiled reappeared on his face and she found herself wanting to slap it off, but, thinking that unwise, she just took a step back. He spoke, "You know, Draco can be a good bloke sometimes; and when he is, I'm glad he's my mate."

She looked at him trivially, "I'm sorry, Zabini, I don't speak psycho, you'll have to translate."

"Now, now, Hermione. Insulting the one who possesses the information you seek is not the way to gain said information."

She glared and bit back a response similar to "Yes, mother."

He sighed; apparently he'd have to tell her, damn her stubbornness. "This morning I saw Pansy telling one of the Patil twins - don't know which one, I don't pay attention to blood-traitors," at this Hermione glared once more, "plus I could never tell them apart, anyhow – anyway, Pansy told her that I'd been in your rooms last night. And," he waved his hands dramatically, "let the rumor-spreading commence."

"You're joking."

"Oh yes, this is all just a big giant joke which I configured to embarrass you." He rolled his eyes, "I even paid that girl to insult you."

Hermione smacked him across the back of the head with her palm for his sarcasm.

"Fine, fine. It's not a joke."

"So basically you kissed me in order to feed the ever-growing rumor-fire?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose. It was fun to see your face, I must admit."

She dearly wanted to hex him now, but as she ran through the library that is her brain for an appropriate (and oh so painful) hex, she heard Blaise speak again, "Now I'm guessing that Pansy got her information from Draco – actually, I'm sure she did. So he saw me come out of your rooms and saw this as opportunity to ruin you."

"I bet he was retaliating."

"For what, exactly?"

"Well, I came into the common room and slammed the portrait as I did so – I was in a bad mood – and Malfoy jumped clear off the couch." She broke into a grin, "I called him a twitchy little ferret."

"Well, that explains it."

Blaise walked to his trunk and searched through some things inside, coming up empty-handed.

"Well, Hermione, Malfoy just solved our previous dilemma."

"And what was that?"

"Twitchy ferret, he may be, but I now have a reason to spend time with you."

"I'm failing to see why I would want to spend time with you, Zabini."

Author's Note: Ugh, guys I'm sorry. This chapter was written so much better the first time around but my sister, being the brain that she is decided to do some spontaneous computer cleaning, which left me with nothing. That's right, I had THE WHOLE CHAPTER written and part of the next and now it's all gone and this version of the chapter is horrible, in my opinion. It flowed and worked out better the first time.

Yes, I realize that was a bizarre place to end it, but it seems if i went any further it'd get out of control. Not to mention this chapter was long enough for me already, with all the stress. Heh.

Please review, maybe I'll stop being annoyed.