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By Friday evening of that week, Hermione had seven people lined up for inspections the following day. She was quite surprised with the response she had received, particularly as Lavender had complained to her over a phone call that she couldn't find the ad to show her partner. Hermione had told her to learn to use a computer before she recited what she had written in the ad.

Lavender was still put off as she had wanted to show Seamus the picture of her 'flashy' apartment, but had laughed along with Hermione about the cats thing and agreed £300 was a fair price for a furnished room, even though that was the rent she paid for an entire house.

Hermione had made plans with Pansy and Ginny for that night to meet for end of week drinks, but Ginny had pulled out at the last minute because her son had fallen ill. When Hermione had knocked on her neighbour's door, Harry had answered looking worse for wear as he had explained that James- their son- had been vomiting all afternoon.

Hermione had winced and told him that it was no problem that Ginny could not make it; they could make plans for any other time. Ginny had yelled from the background that she was sorry, and Hermione had hollered back that it was no problem before Harry shut the door and she set off to meet Pansy.

Pansy was already at the bar sipping from an orange concoction in a martini glass. Ordering a simple vodka and orange for herself at the bar, she wondered over to her friend who was examining something at the other end of the room.

"That man has been staring at you from the moment you walked in," Pansy said by way of greeting.

Hermione looked off in the direction that her friend was looking and made eye contact with a stranger. Mildly repulsed by what she saw, she turned back to Pansy with a look of disgust. "Pansy, please! I'm not that desperate!"

Pansy shrugged her shoulders and took a sip from her straw. "So? He's a guy and has the right equipment."

Rolling her eyes Hermione took a sip of her own drink. "Again, I don't need to get laid tonight."

"Everyone wants to get laid Hermione."

"Yea well, maybe another night. I just want a quiet one tonight."

Pansy snorted. "You act older than me woman."

And it was true. Pansy had a partner and a child, while Hermione only had her cat. Both women worked full time, yet it seemed like Hermione was the older of the two with the way she acted. She rarely got drunk and rarely bothered with one night stands. With interviews the next morning for prospective housemates, she did not want to be floating around on some sort of post-coital cloud. Or if the guy was bad in bed, grumpy that she didn't get a decent lay.

"So tell me about your plans for tomorrow."

"I need a plan?" Hermione panicked.

Pansy laughed. "No, of course not; you're only showing them your house. I mean like, what are you going to wear?"

"Why would my clothing choice matter?" Hermione asked with an eyebrow raised questioningly.

Pansy snickered. "You have men coming to look at the house, correct?"

Hermione nodded.

"Well, there you are then. You don't want to greet the men wearing daggy track suits or with no make-up on."

Slightly offended, Hermione spluttered at her friend's words. "I never wear daggy track suits. And why should I wear make up? If I choose a guy, he's going to see me without makeup."

"Yes, but by then he will know your personality and will find you totally unappealing."

Hermione leant over and smacked her friend across the arm. "Hey, that hurt!"

"You know I love you," Pansy chortled. "But seriously, look presentable at least tomorrow."

Hermione sighed before responding. "Pansy, I do have some self-respect. Of course I'm going to look decent. I'll even be carrying Crookshanks." At Pansy's raised eyebrow, Hermione added, "Or will that make me look like a batty cat lady?"

"Batty cat lady," Pansy smirked as she took another sip of her drink.

For a short while the two women sat in companionable silence as they people watched. The Hogshead was a regular bar for them and they knew many of the patrons who frequented the place. They were approached by a couple of people and both girls allowed themselves to get caught up in conversation.

After Hermione's work colleague walked away, Pansy was still conversing with a middle aged man. Leaving them to their own conversation, Hermione sat back and watched the live band play. They were a group of young girls all dressed in black who called themselves The Weird Sisters, but whether they were sisters was a mystery to Hermione, and despite them being regular performers, she still did not know if they were related.

Sucking on her drink, Hermione thought about the following morning. She was slightly nervous to be inviting someone new into her beloved apartment, but it was as good as any other time to take that step. Her trip to France was booked and she was hoping the housemate would be okay with looking after Crookshanks for her. Having Harry and Ginny as neighbours was good, but she often felt like she burdened them too much with her pet.

Pansy's loud laugh caught Hermione's attention. Based on experience, it was her 'get me out of here' laugh, which usually required Hermione to interrupt and save her friend from whatever suffering she was experiencing.

Really, what were girl friends for if not to save you from creepy old men?

Saturday morning dawned grey and drizzly.

She had two hours before the first person was scheduled to arrive, so she took her time to shower and dress. Opening the door so that the steam could escape and turning the fan on to help evaporate the condensation, she padded from her ensuite straight into her walk-in-robe. She decided to dress for the weather, and chose a pair of black skinny jeans and a simple red tank top. Pansy had told her to dress up but personally she thought it was a bit silly to dress up.

Anyway, the jeans made her ass look amazing, so really she was primping herself a little.

Once she was dressed, she walked back into her bathroom and towel dried her hair as best as she could. It was a messy birds nest of curls, but with some deft wrist movements, she created a simple- albeit messy- bun.

Deeming herself appropriate for showing guests through her house after applying some mascara and a bit of foundation powder, she made her way into the kitchen for a cup of tea and toast.

Breakfast only took her ten minutes and so she spent the rest of the time before 11am cleaning up. She wasn't a messy person, but Crookshanks shed a lot of fur so there was always something that needed to be vacuumed or dusted.

At five to eleven, Hermione's buzzer went off. As she looked up from rearranging her book shelf, she heard a male voice: "'Sup. This is Dean. I have an appointment at eleven to look at yo room."

Hermione approached the box set against the wall next to her door and pressed the button completely miffed about the use of 'sup' and 'yo'. People used that language? Deciding not to judge until she had met him, Hermione responded, "Hi Dean. I'll be down in just a moment."

Dean Thomas turned out to be a dark skinned man who wore his pants too low and his hat backwards. Hermione was glad to see he wasn't sporting good chains; that would have really fit the cliché stereotype. With a smile she introduced herself and walked him to the elevator. Dean seemed to be in his late twenties, maybe the same age as her.

He was prattling off questions about her apartment before they even left the elevator and to her amusement he took his hat off when she opened the door and invited him in. "Yo, this is a sweet crib dude."

Slightly raising her eyebrow at the use of the word dude- she hadn't been called that in, well, ever- Hermione gave him a tour of the house. Crookshanks made his way out from under the table to twine around her legs while she was showing him the view from the glass windows.

Dean looked down and said, "'Sup cat?"

Hermione picked up Crookshanks and smiled as she heard him our deeply. "This is Crookshanks. Do you like cats?"

Dean was looking at the ginger animal with some trepidation but he still nodded his head in confirmation. "They the bomb man." It was clear to Hermione though that he had little interest for her pet.

After she had led him back outside the apartment block, Hermione sighed in relief. Well, that was one down, and she hoped that no one else was like him. If she had to hear the word 'Yo' or 'Dude' again, she would likely surrender herself to the nearest psychiatric ward.

For a twenty nine year old man, he seemed rather childish in Hermione's opinion. She knew that some men dressed and talked like that- it was hip or something- but she had no interest in having a 'hip' person as her housemate.

She wanted someone simple, someone quiet and who wouldn't talk her ear off with words that shouldn't be used out of Hollywood movies.

It was another hour before the next prospective housemate arrived. To Hermione's relief, it was a woman who spoke decent English when she introduced her arrival with "This is Millicent Bulstrode. I'm here to check out the room."

When Hermione went downstairs to greet Millicent, she was met with a large woman standing in front of a tall willowy looking man.

Unsure if the woman was Millicent, Hermione opened the door and asked, "Hi, I was just buzzed. Are you Millicent?"

The big woman beamed at her even as she reached behind her and dragged the tall willowy looking man to her side. "Yup, that's me! And this strapping fellow here is my boyfriend. We're here to look at the room," she boomed.

Was today full of clichés? Hermione wondered. But first, she needed to rectify something. "Oh, I thought it was just one person looking at the room. I'm not sure if I am ready to have two extra people living with me."

Millicent let out a hoarse laugh. "It's not for us woman! It's for me, but Percy here will most likely be with me most nights, so we decided to come together."

Hermione frowned slightly but stepped back and allowed them into the foyer. She led them to the elevator and pressed the button for level 4. She gave the couple the rundown of her apartment as they ascended. In her mind though, she had already decided that Millicent was a no. She had only ever intended one person to be in the room.

Actually, she hadn't considered a housemate having a partner. She had been out of the dating loop for too long it seemed since partners would obviously come and stay the night.

Gods, finding a housemate was so much hard work! She could be working on cracking the mystery that was Bellatrix Lestrange right now!

It didn't take long for Millicent and her partner to walk through the apartment. Millicent seemed enamoured with the kitchen and began talking to Hermione about her various appliances. Apparently her coffee machine was state of the art. Not that Hermione cared- she didn't know how to use it anyway.

Percy started sneezing the moment Crookshanks made an appearance, so the two left shortly after, much to Hermione's relief! Millicent seemed like such a dynamic person- nothing like the calm and quiet person she was after!

At one in the afternoon, she was showing a new woman around the apartment. She had introduced herself as "Hey, It's Astoria. Just wondering how I get in. I'm here to look at the room". At first Hermione had thought she was an alright woman- she was a secretary for a doctor and so was working full time, but eventually Hermione worked out what sort of woman Astoria really was.

It was by accident that she found out really. After the last couple, Hermione decided to question about partners. "So, Astoria. Do you have a boyfriend?"

Astoria had looked at her with her wide blue eyes and had smirked. "Yea I do. And he's leaving his wife for me," she had tittered, clearly proud of herself.

Hermione had stared in shock at the woman.

Really?!

To her horror, Astoria had then launched into a detailed story of how her and 'my darling Severus' had met. She had never met a gold digger before, but this right in front of her was clearly one.

By the time Hermione had managed to kick the woman out of her door with a "Press the elevator button for ground and just walk out"- she had refused to walk the woman out to the foyer- Hermione was in need of a strong cup of tea!

And so it went on. Every person who could possibly be an absolutely awful match seemed to come see her room for rent. The rest of the prospective housemates were males in their late twenties to mid thirties. Two had children and asked if they could have their children to visit. One man had visitation rights every second week- Hermione knew he was definitely out of the picture, especially as soon as he had said he had his children for a whole week!

Absolutely not!

By four o'clock that afternoon, Hermione was quite positively exhausted. None of the people she had seen so far had interested her in the least. That Astoria girl made her want to bang her head against a brick wall. Really, how was someone that dense?

She knew she had two more appointments at four thirty, both men. After the day she had had, she was glad they were both coming at the same time. She was quite prepared to give up and buy another cat.

At four twenty, her buzzer went off for what she hoped was the last time that day. This one was early she noted, but that didn't bother her; she liked punctual people.

As she began to rise from the sofa to go across to the intercom, she was startled as a male voice said, "Shit, how do I use this thing?"

Raising an eyebrow in amusement, she pressed the button on the box and replied, "I think you have it figured."

Silence met her for so long that she wondered if the person was still there. "So, I'm going to come down and get you now, ok?" she drawled slowly into the box.

Silence met her again, so she just sighed and opened her door. Really, how hard was it to press a button and speak?

When she arrived in the foyer, she opened the big double glass doors to greet the next person she would show around. To her surprise, a young man was standing in front of her.

He looked no older than twenty and he was standing there nervously pulling on the cuffs of a long sleeved shirt. He didn't seem to have an umbrella, so he was looking rather damp with his hair plastered to his forehead and dripping down his face. He met her gaze and gave her a nervous smile.

Raising his hand to the back of his head, the man- or was it boy?- said, "Hi, uh, sorry about that. I've never used one before."

Hermione gave him a smile and stepped back allowing him to walk in. "No problems. I'm Hermione by the way. And you are?"

The man-boy- as she had now dubbed him because of her confusion of his age- ran a hand through his hair to get rid of any excess water. "Uh, Draco?"

Hermione thinned her lips in annoyance. He was asking her his name? Really? She let out a muted sigh before plastering a smile on her face. "Great. Well, my apartment is on the fourth floor," and with that, she led the way to the elevators.

Before she could even take more than three steps, the man-boy spoke. "Uh, is there by chance a staircase? I kind of walked in the rain, and well, it's cold."

Hermione let herself show a small smile on her face. Personally she preferred to take the stairs over the elevator, but had been riding the elevator all day because of the coming and going people. Not everyone was as eager to stay healthy as she was.

The man-boy noticed her smile and gave her a watery smile in return but didn't say anything.

"I can get you a towel when we get upstairs so you can dry off, but yes, the stairs are fine. I actually prefer them to the lift," she added as she led the way to the fire escape stairs.

Her guest trailed behind her silently.

Much to her satisfaction, the man-boy was able to keep abreast with her during the trip up four levels of stairs. She commented on his fitness level to which he responded with, "I'm actually in the army; this is easy stuff for me."

At this revelation, Hermione stumbled. Waving off the proffered hand, she murmured "Wow," before climbing the last flight of stairs in a daze.

Clearly she needed to give him a new nickname. Despite his age, no male in the army was a boy.

Hermione herself had once known a boy in the army. Memories threatened to wash over her, but she held them back by focussing on climbing the last flight of stairs as quick as she could.

Unsurprisingly, the man behind her kept up with her quickened pace like it was a walk in the park.

After they stepped out of the fire exit door on her level, Hermione led him to one of two doors on her landing. Deciding now was not the time to go down memory lane she put on a quirky demeanour as she pointed to her door then to the door down the other end. "This one is mine. The room down the hall belongs to an elderly couple."

Draco nodded his head but remained silent as she twisted the key in the lock and stepped into her apartment. She could see Crookshanks on his favourite arm chair and she quickly moved to pick him up needing some sort of familiar comfort.

With her cat in her arms, she turned back to the army boy. With a flourish of her arm, she gestured around her. "Well, this is my apartment. Right now we are in the living room, where I am happy for you to hang out in if you don't bring a television with you when you move in." She noticed the boy looking around with interest. "I actually work a lot, so I rarely bother to watch it." she added.

Pointing to her right, she indicated the presence of the kitchen. "Do you cook?" she asked curiously.

"SPAM in a can ma'am," Draco said to her with a wink.

Hermione rolled her eyes at the corniness of his words rhyming but she still grinned at him despite herself. Suddenly remembering that he was still wet, she directed him to follow her down the hallway to their left. Her bedroom was the door at the end of the short corridor while the spare bedroom and the 'study' (aka, her junk room) were set on opposite sides of the hallway facing each other with the toilet and bathroom being set next to the spare room.

She grabbed a towel from the bathroom and gave it to Draco who took it and instantly ran it through his wet hair. "I'd offer you some clothes, but er, I don't have guy clothes here. And I don't think you'd want to wear a dress," she said with a smirk.

Draco ducked his head in embarrassment. "I'm okay, really. I shouldn't have even accepted this. It's my own fault for walking in the rain."

Hermione crossed her arms and stared at the younger man. "Yes, well, we all learn the hard way."

At her tone, Draco looked at her sheepishly. Unable to hold the facade anymore, Hermione started laughing. "It's okay," she reassured him. "I've been caught in the rain plenty of times. It happens."

"I was supposed to make a good first impression," Draco grumbled to himself much to Hermione's amusement.

Shaking her head, she walked into the adjacent room. "This is the room that was advertised. Like I said, it's fully furnished with a double bed and a chest of drawers. There's plenty of closet space as well. And the bathroom is yours as I have my own in my room."

Draco walked around the perimeter of the room sitting on the bed and bouncing before opening the cupboard doors. "Sweet," he said as he stuck his head inside the cupboard to check out the large walk in space.

From her spot by the door, Hermione watched him silently. Looking at this young boy- because that's really what he was despite his occupation- in front of her, she didn't know what she should do with him. Of all the prospective housemates she'd met that day, he was the one the sparked her interest the most.

She suddenly found herself getting his attention, "Draco," Draco stuck his head out of the cupboard and leant his body against the frame. He cocked an eyebrow up as she asked her question. "Why did you come here today?"

Apparently confused, he shoved his hands into his pockets and frowned at her. "I mean like, well, why do you need a room? Don't the army do living arrangements on base?" she asked, clarifying her question.

"Oh, right," Draco said as he looked everywhere but at her.

Hermione waited in silence for Draco to start talking again.

"Well, erm, yea the army does accommodation, but I just felt like being free from it. My dad is one of the top tacticians on the base, and I don't want to be shadowed by his name all the time."

Hermione nodded slowly. He was young, maybe he wanted to have some fun and not feel threatened about his father's presence. "Well, that's fair enough," she said as she stood up.

Suddenly, the buzzer went off. Hermione frowned for a moment wondering why someone was buzzing her, but then she remembered there was supposed to be another person coming to look at the room.

Smacking herself in the head for forgetting, she quickly said to Draco "I'll be right back. There was someone else coming to look at the room at four thirty as well. Keep looking around if you want."

As she walked out of the room, she missed the way Draco had stood up straight. She was down the hall by the time he pulled his phone out of his pocket, and out of the apartment when Draco hissed the words, "What the hell are you playing at? I have her!"

And the mysteries begin! Who's Draco talking to? And who's at the door? :O Any guesses?!