As the Gryffindor common room began to fill up, Hermione, Luna and Neville had cossetted themselves over in the corner at a table positioned right next to the staircase up to the girl's dormitories, away from the chatter of the first years and the loud third years talking about the next trip to Hogsmeade. Hermione didn't feel much like doing anything, and certainly not homework – at least she was up to date with everything that needed to be handed in for the next couple of days, she could afford a night off. Luna and Neville were less organised, they were both working on a defence against the dark arts essay; however after completing the first couple of paragraphs the two of them seemed to have given up and decided that talking to Hermione was more important tonight. Ginny still hadn't arrived back from quidditch practice yet, and secretly Hermione was glad. She didn't know how she was going to react to Ginny, not with the knowledge that Ginny could have been the only one who could have told people about her and Draco. She felt annoyed, betrayed; she had always known that Ginny didn't agree with her being friends with Draco, but she thought Ginny would have, at least, respected her privacy on the matter. She couldn't avoid Ginny forever, but it would still be a while until she joined the three of them for the night – and by that time perhaps there would be less people in the common room to witness the potential argument. Hermione shook her head gently, trying to rid the feelings of anger that were running through her mind. She felt as though she was being deflated… Before, with the knowledge that she was going to the ball with Draco, and that he liked her, and she had felt really good; she was enjoying her seventh year and being with her friends, and her classes, it had all been going really well! But now she felt as though someone had made a hole in the middle of it all and everything seemed to be falling into the hole, leaving an empty feeling behind… She rubbed her hand across her face, aware but not listening to the conversation that was going on between Neville and Luna.

Over in the corner of the common room there was a small group of first years who appeared to be climbing up onto one of the higher armchairs, Hermione's eyes were drawn to the small boy who was teetering on the edge of toppling the chair over with him on top of it. The higher he got to the top of the chair the more precarious he looked; it seemed like he was trying to reach the high window ledge, but he was just too short to actually grab hold of it. The third time the boy tried he nearly lost his balance and something in Hermione kicked in, she jumped up from her seat and shouted across the common room: "Hey, what are you doing?" The boy who was on top of the armchair turned his head and at the same time over balanced, falling to the floor with a clatter. Some other people turned to look after Hermione had called out and saw the boy fall; she rushed over and stood above the boy who was now getting up from the floor looking rather sheepish. "What were you trying to do?" Hermione asked rather exasperatedly as he stared at his feet.

"Well, you see… Well…" The first year stammered nervously. "There's an owl." He finished quickly.

"An owl? Where?" Hermione asked.

"Up there at the window!" The young boy pointed vehemently up at the window that he had been trying to reach, sure enough when Hermione looked up at the window there was an owl perched on the outside windowsill. "I was just trying to let it in."

"Okay, maybe just point it out to someone taller than you next time…" Hermione suggested, the boy nodded and scuttled off to stand with the rest of his friends. Pointing her wand up to the window, she muttered: "Ascendi." The window creaked open wide enough for the owl to hop inside and unruffled its feathers. It swooped down towards Hermione, who ducked slightly as it attempted to sit on her shoulder. "Go on, go and find who you're looking for." She told the owl and turned to rejoin Neville and Luna who had been watching her deal with the first year; they both were staring at her. "What?" She asked them, as she resumed her seat at the table; Neville nodded to a spot just behind her. She turned her head to see that the owl she had let in had perched upon the top rung of her chair. "Oh come on!" She said to the owl which had a note tied to its leg. "Who is it that you're looking for?" The bird held out its leg as though inviting her to accept the letter, she unfastened the tie which held the letter to its leg and glanced at the front of it.

'Hermione Granger, Gryffindor Tower.' Was written across the front. The owl had taken off again once its leg was free and it swooped across the room then sat on the window ledge next to the still open window and began grooming its feathers.

"Who is it from?" Neville asked, watching Hermione look down at the letter, confused; she unfolded it and recognised the neat handwriting of Draco. Before she could even take in what the first sentence said she had folded it over again.

"It's from Draco." She replied in a small voice, she couldn't decide whether she wanted to read what he had to say or not. Neville was looking at her closely, scrutinising her facial expressions, as though he was trying to figure out what was happening in her brain. Her fingers lingered over the edges of the piece of paper, clearly she was in two minds about reading it.

"Do you want me to read it for you?" Neville asked tentatively, Hermione looked at him as though she wanted to read it but also wanted to see first hand what Draco had to say. She seemed to consider this, then held the piece of parchment out to Neville and covered her eyes, not wanting to see him reading the letter. Neville flicked open the piece of parchment and Hermione could see through the gap in her fingers his eyes scan across what must be writing from Draco, then a small smile flickered across his face.

"To Hermione," He read, "I didn't know how to contact you, I wondered about standing outside your common room, but I didn't know if you would want to see me. I'm sorry. I need you to know that." Neville paused to clear his throat. "Tonight I've acted stupidly and I know I've upset you, and I've realised that I haven't been thinking about you and what you want, but only about what other people think. I've never wanted you to be treated with the same contempt that people treat me, I didn't want you to end up tarred because of your association with me. But I've realised now, and I can't believe it's taken me this long to realise – I don't care what everyone else thinks as long as I've got you… They can point and laugh at me, they can beat me up, they can talk about me behind my back, it honestly does not matter – as long as I don't lose you!" It sounded strange, hearing Draco's words coming out of Neville's mouth. "What I'm saying is I'm sorry, I'm really, really sorry." Hermione had taken her hands away from her face and was looking more intently at Neville. "I don't want to be the reason for messing us up, I know I've made a huge mistake tonight, and I am desperate to make up for how insensitively I've acted tonight. I really hope that you can forgive me Hermione, I don't think I'll ever be able to forgive myself if I let the best thing to ever happen to me – the best person I could possibly imagine – walk away because of my idiocy. Please accept my heartfelt apology, and I hope that perhaps you will still want to go to the ball with me. I'm very sorry (and really trying to make this better). Draco." Neville finished reading, he folded the piece of parchment over and handed it to Hermione, watching her as she read through Draco's words.

"I think…" Neville began very slowly, "That he really is sorry…" A smile had crept onto Hermione's face, and had slowly and surely radiated into a massive beam; she could hardly seem to keep her excitement in.

"Yeah…" She agreed, seemingly unable to tear her gaze away from Draco's letter now that she knew the contents.

"So?" Luna inquired unexpectedly.

"So what?" Hermione responded.

"Are you going to go to the ball with him?" She asked dreamily, with a small smile on her delicate features.

"I think so…" Hermione answered, "I mean, yes!"

"That's fantastic!" Luna beamed with Hermione.

"For the past couple of months all I've wanted him to do is realise that other people might be talking but he's worth more than that – I didn't think that it would take this to make him see that!" Hermione could have almost laughed.

"It's all worked out pretty well then, hasn't it?" Neville commented.

"Yeah!" Hermione nodded, she stared back down at Draco's letter.

Right at that moment, Ginny sat down at the table, looking slightly grumpy and covered in mud; the three of them all turned to look at her – and Hermione was now faced with a mixture of happiness that came from Draco's realisation that he shouldn't care about what other people thought, but still the faint indignation that Ginny must have told other people and broken her confidence.

"What's going on?" She asked, looking from Hermione's grin to Neville's slightly concerned face; Neville glanced from Ginny to Hermione and back.

"Someone let out the news that I was going to the ball with Draco, and he freaked out about it…" Hermione said carefully, wanting to see how Ginny would react to this comment; not unexpectedly Ginny didn't look too surprised by this.

"Was going to the ball?" Ginny picked up on the use of the past tense.

"We kind of had an argument," If Ginny had been a better actress then she might have concealed the smug look that was rapidly expanding across her face. "Because he didn't want other people making fun of me."

"I did warn you that he would hurt you." Ginny muttered under her breath.

"Oh no," Hermione waved the piece of parchment that she was still clutching, "He wrote a letter to me to apologise... And he's finally realised that it doesn't really matter what other people think! So it's actually worked out better because he's finally got what I've been trying to tell him for ages, that he's not a bad person and I don't care what everyone else thinks because I like him!" That statement was the bit that confused Ginny – she blinked several times and then looked even more confused. "So I guess people finding out about us going to the ball together has made him stronger…"

In a way, this manner of telling Ginny what had happened was much better than getting angry at her because she could see Ginny seething as what she had attempted to do had completely backfired upon her.

"I might send him a note back now, just to let him know that everything is alright." She said, "Can I borrow your quill Neville?" Neville nodded, his eyes were wide – it seemed that he was watching this conversation just waiting for the moment that it might descend into a full blown argument. Hermione picked up the quill and ripped a bit of parchment from her roll, and began to pretend to write. There was a very pointed silence for a few seconds and then Ginny said:

"I'm going to have a bath." She got up from the table and stumped away. Hermione looked up from the bit of parchment that she had been pretending to concentrate on, to see Neville shaking his head with a wry smile on his face.

"That… was impressive!" He commented, Hermione smiled at him and shrugged.

"Inadvertently, she helped…" Hermione said honestly. "Without meaning to…"

"I guess." He agreed; she couldn't believe how much her emotions had been bounced from one side to the other this evening. She had been content, then upset and annoyed, then pleased and happy… Now it couldn't get any better!

"I need to write him a message back…" She reminded herself aloud.

'Draco,

Can you please meet me outside the Great Hall before breakfast in the morning? Hermione. X'

Suddenly struck by the thought that she wasn't sure how to deliver this note, she looked up to see that the owl who delivered his letter was still sitting on the window ledge. Waving at it rather awkwardly, it flew down over the heads of most of the students and landed on the table; accepting the note that Hermione was holding and clamping it tightly in its beak, Hermione whispered to it: "Please take this to Draco."

A/N: Thank you for reading so far! I'd love to know what you think of this chapter! :)