Disclaimer: Despite spending about as much time on this chapter as JK Rowling spends writing an entire book, the similarities stop there. I'm not JK Rowling and my life otherwise quite sucks.

A/N: Look who it is! Yes yes, it's me. My trial version of Microsoft Office ran out, so I was at wit's end about what to do for a while. I found a crappy replacement, but it's not actually motivating me to write. -sighs-. Nevertheless, Chapter 21 is here. It's very different, though, because I had to get different points of view to get the plot to work.

----

Chapter 21 // The Plan

"Did you see her?" Ron asked casually – perhaps too casually – as Harry took his seat by the desk opposite him.

"Yeah," he answered quietly, keeping his gaze fixed on a spot on his messy desk, so very unlike the one in Hermione's office.

Ron frowned at him, waiting for a more in-depth answer, only to realise Harry was deep in his own world. He waved a hand in front of his co-Auror, getting no response.

"Hey!" he exclaimed, making Harry's head jerk up. "You alright, mate?"

"She wasn't doing too well," Harry reluctantly revealed. "When I came down there she was pretty much in tears."

"Harry, I didn't do anything, you have to believe me. I just met her and if anything she insulted me..."

"Oh, don't flatter yourself," Harry bit, looking disbelievingly at Ron. "You honestly don't think she was crying over you after all this time."

He refrained from revealing that he had thought that himself for a fleeting second, and grinned when Ron had the decency to blush.

"I hope you're not trying to get back on that train, cause it has definitely left you standing behind looking pretty bad."

"Oh thank you, mate, that's so nice of you."

Ron looked slightly uncomfortable, and his gaze fell to the desk leaving Harry to eye him in disbelief.

"Oh bloody hell, Ron, you can't be serious!"

"I just don't know if I made a mistake that's all," Ron whined, throwing his hands up. "I don't love her, and I don't think I want her back, but sometimes it feels like one huge mistake."

"Don't go there," Harry warned, suddenly looking a tad more murderous than normal. "Her department has gone to the Hippogriffs, she's swamped with work that should've been done while she was gone and she's had a hard time since she came back. You will not dare to make this harder on her."

"Look, it may be my only chance to see if I really made the right call," Ron begged, but sealed his mouth shut when he saw Harry's eyes darken dangerously.

"You cheated on my best friend, and because I have to work with you and because I know that deep, deep, deep down under all that idiocy and insensitivity you're somewhat alright, I have decided to let it go and try to be normal. But if you rip open the wounds again, I will hurt you."

Ron looked gobsmacked.

"She's over you, Ron. You broke her heart and she got past it, and you will not put us all back to square one," he hissed, and when Ron made to speak he held up his hand. "You don't love her. You don't want her back. The only reason you're regretting this is cause you've just seen her again after all this time, and that's bound to be a bit confusing. But you know that you don't love her, and she doesn't love you either anymore, so spare us all the damn pain."

"Has she found someone else?" Ron asked, his expression not giving away any emotions.

"If she had she's in her full right. You're not together anymore, remember?"

"You're not serious are you?! She's with someone else already?" Ron shrieked, several of their colleagues turning their heads.

"You enormous git, you started dating before you broke up with her. You don't have anything to say on the matter."

Ron was prohibited from answering when Tonks passed by their desk and threw a folder of paperwork in front of Ron before turning towards Harry.

"Zabini's here to see you, Harry."

She continued on to her own desk after Harry said his 'thank you's, and Ron eyed him suspiciously.

"Why just you? We're on that case together."

"I have no idea; I haven't talked to him yet, remember?" Harry replied, maybe a bit too flippantly.

He left his enormous git of a friend at the desk sighing over a folder of meticulous paperwork and headed for interrogation room 5, where he knew Zabini was waiting. He paused outside the door, wondering if he was actually doing this. Telling himself firmly it was not for himself, he took a deep breath and opened the door finding Zabini sitting straight in his chair. He looked up, his eyebrow arching almost unnoticeably at Harry.

Harry closed the door and made sure it was safely locked.

"You called for me, Potter?" he drawled lazily, but Harry could see the flicker of worry in his eyes as he sat down opposite him. "I was under the impression my father and I were in the clear."

Harry swallowed, knowing he was using ministry business for his own gain.

"It's not about the case," he muttered, meeting Zabini's look of shock. "I need your help."

"You need...my help," the Slytherin said, his jaw dropping slightly.

"Will you promise me this gets out to no one?" Harry said intently. "If you help me and tell this to no one, there will be no more follow ups on your father or you."

Zabini looked at him wide-eyed, and then after a moment's consideration he nodded.

Harry took a deep breath, knowing he had some explaining to do.

"I know you've changed your ways, Zabini. You're probably one of the only ones who have actually seen the error of your previous ways."

The man opposite him gave a slight nod in recognition.

"That's why I need you to talk to Draco Malfoy for me."

Had it not been for the severity of the request, Harry would have laughed at the outright crazed expression on Zabini's face.

"Hermione... Granger, you know. She and Ron broke up and she took a well deserved holiday where she ended up being Draco Malfoy's neighbour," he explained and gave a hearty laugh at Zabini's more and more frazzled expression. "yeah, that's what we looked like too at first.

"Oddly enough... Hermione and furball seemed to be getting along very – very – well."

"Are you trying to tell me Draco and Granger shagged?!" Zabini cried, and then howled with laughter, holding his side as he hunched forwards.

"Yes," Harry said, wincing at the memory of finding that pale git in her living room. "But it didn't stop there either. They've fallen for each other – pretty hard, might I add. It's the only time I've heard albino boy utter the l-work."

"Love?!"

Harry gave short nod, leaving Zabini with his mouth open.

"wow, that's... very unlike Draco."

"He has changed a lot since the last time you saw him."

"I don't doubt that at all, but I've changed too."

"See, that's part of the problem. Hermione had to move back here to get back to her job, and Malfoy the stubborn git is convinced everyone thinks he's still evil and that all his old friends – which I guess is pretty much just you – hates him for betraying them. So he won't go back to London at all, and right now Hermione is working her arse off to get the department back on its feet at the same time as she's completely heartbroken."

"I always was very happy to never have to get involved in the Gryffindor drama," Zabini commented, but then gave a slight grin. "But it does sound kind of amusing, and considering Draco managed to butt his furry, white arse into it..."

Harry gave a snort of laughter, marvelling at how well furry and white described Malfoy.

"I need you to go speak to him, and make him understand he'll be better off coming back to London," he then said in a low voice. "She can't leave the department, it's in a mess, but she really needs him. I can't stand to see her like this, and as much as I hate to admit it they are frighteningly suitable for each other."

"The truth is you have actually helped me more than you think with this proposition," Zabini vocalized after a few moments of silence. "I've been looking for Draco for ages trying to set things right between us."

"Does that mean you'll do it?"

"I'm in."

Harry slid him a parchment with the address scribbled in a scrawny handwriting.

"Not a word."

----

Hermione's third day back at work hadn't shown any improvement in the situation at all. Her so called boss still wasn't doing anything at all to help speed things up, and she had everything piling up on top of her shoulders. Whenever she got something out of the way, something new came in and piled itself onto her with sudden force. She stepped out of the Floo of Harry and Ginny's flat – once again late for dinner – and she sank exhaustedly into an armchair. She had only been seated for mere seconds when she heard angry voices coming from the kitchen.

"- no business going over there and drag her away like you did!"

"She had been there for almost 3 months. It would only get harder if she kept postponing her return."

"Why is that up to you to decide, Mother? She's been in utter hell since she got back, her department in shreds from her incompetent boss, Ron being a git, not having any place to live..."

"She is my family, Ginevra. I don't want her to sit at the other side of the country without any of us in her lives like some shunned criminal."

"But this isn't about what you want! Hermione was happy, mum. She was carefree and content and she was in love"

"In love? She said she'd met someone, but..."

"Yes, mum, in love. She fell in love with her neighbour. Harry and I were over there for dinner several times, and they were doing perfectly. Now she's dealing with her second break up in mere months, and this time she was actually still very much in love with him when she had to leave."

"She's better off here. She belongs here, Ginny."

"She's miserable. She's overworked, heartbroken and homeless."

Hermione didn't hear Molly's answer. She didn't need to, because Ginny was right. She was overworked, heartbroken and homeless. And now she was thirsty. Not caring that the two Weasley women were having a screaming match in the kitchen, she walked right in and headed for the fridge for a bottle of water.

"Hey," Ginny said softly, shooting her mother a warning look that Hermione saw perfectly fine. "I saved you some dinner."

"Thank you so much," she replied with a groan, and flopped down beside the kitchen table.

She took a large sip of her water and then smacked her head down on the table, wanting to sleep right then and there.

"It's not getting any better?" Ginny asked tentatively, finding the left-overs for dinner and heated them quickly with a charm.

"No," Hermione groaned, fighting the urge to cry. "The requests just keep piling in. Once I've gotten one potion out, three more requests come in. I don't know what to do anymore. My staff is working so hard, and I've barely even been out of the office for three days."

"They should hire someone extra; you can't go on like this. It's not healthy!"

"I can't force them to do anything. I've already given Harry permission to write an application for an extra position on behalf of me, but I doubt it'll work. They rarely ever give permission to such things; cause getting behind is usually the department's own fault."

Ginny nodded quietly, and then caught Harry standing in the doorway.

"Just eat," she urged, and watched as Hermione attacked the meal with vigour.

Molly sat down opposite Hermione, watching as the exhausted girl shuffled her food down. Ginny, stepped over to Harry and gave him a suffering look, just to arch her eyebrow as she got a grin in return.

"What are you so pleased about?" she asked in a hushed voice, but Harry put his finger over his lips and pulled her backwards into the living room.

"I called Zabini in a few days ago, and we got to an agreement," he told her in a whisper, watching her eyes grow big. "He's going to go talk to Draco, and hopefully that will make him think about returning to London. He left today, I just saw him off."

"You did that?! You fixed that?" she asked in awe. "You got that idea all on your own?"

"I dare say I did," he said proudly, and she flung her arms around his neck.

"You're a genius," she whispered, kissing him softly on the lips.

"Let's just hope it works."

----

Draco sat in the chair by the fireplace with a book on his lap, his entire demeanour frozen as he looked at the person stepping out from the sea of roaring green flames. He would hardly have recognised his former best friend in a crowd and it was definitely eerily surreal to have him stand in front of his chair looking down on him with an unreadable expression.

"You owe me money," Blaise said in his deep voice, an eyebrow arching perfectly on his forehead.

Draco looked at him wide-eyed, putting his book down with an almost mechanical movement.

"Excuse me?"

"You owe me money," Blaise repeated calmly, not moving from his spot.

"I certainly don't owe you a damn Galleon, Blaise."

"I beg to differ," his friend commented, and then to Draco's surprise his stony mask cracked to give way for a mischievous grin. "I seem to remember a certain prediction I gave that you absolutely refused and bet a total of twenty-seven Galleons, three Sickles and eleven Knuts that no such thing would ever occur. "

Comprehension dawned on Draco's face and he couldn't help but give a lopsided grin.

"Mate, that was in Fifth Year!"

"The bet had no time-limit. I specifically remember you saying that the odds of it 'ever, ever, ever happening was as good as you and Potter shaking hands' at which you added 'which is never in a million light-years'."

"Fifth Year, Blaise. I couldn't possibly have foreseen –"

"I foresaw! I told you in Fifth Year that one day you'd end up shagging Granger, and you did! Now fork over the Galleons."

Draco glared and leaned over to the mantel to get his bag of Wizarding money.

"Here," he said sourly as he gave Blaise the requested amount. "Now since you obviously just came to collect your prize, you may now leave."

Blaise rolled his eyes and ignored Draco's command, sitting down in the available arm chair instead.

"Charming place," he commented, blatantly ignoring the stormy grey eyes scowling at him from his left.

Draco didn't reply. He didn't know why, but he felt defensive. He felt like this was the end of the road for him and Blaise – the final confrontation he had hoped would never come.

"I never resented you."

"Liar," Draco said with a sad smile.

"Well, it's obvious that I did resent you when I tried to kill you, but it's been a long time since I realised if anyone had the right to feel betrayed and angry it was you. We were – are – best friends and yet I didn't trust your judgement and I wouldn't listen. You may not believe me, but I forgave you a very long time ago."

"I wasn't aware forgiveness was a Slytherin thing," Draco commented dryly, trying to cover up how much the admission rattled him.

"It's not, but we were put into houses because we fit some of the characteristics not because we're supposed to become the house stereotype. And even so; I've changed, Draco. What you did was right and I wish I saw that sooner."

An awkward silence settled over the two as they both sat deep in thought. He hadn't seen Blaise for years, and yet here he was – looking every bit as changed as he proclaimed to be. It was his best friend coming here to say everything was fine; that they were okay. Draco would have blushed if anyone knew what he felt at that moment.

He barely noticed Blaise standing up from the chair, but raised his head slowly and looked up into the drastically more mature features of his friend.

"Everyone that counts knows you did the right thing, Draco. Staying here and shutting out everyone in your life isn't doing anyone any good. She needs you."

Blaise held out a piece of parchment for him and he took it in confusion, seeing the Ministry seal at the very top of the scroll. His eyes flickered over it for mere moments and his brow furrowed as he took in the contents.

"Why are you giving me this? I don't get it, why do they need extra staff?"

"Everything was utter chaos when she returned. She's barely been out of her office and the entire Ministry is at its wit's end as none of them are getting the potions they need."

His face fell slightly, but it was just enough for Blaise to notice.

"Still, what does it have to do with me?"

"I seem to remember there was only one person who could match Granger in that class," he simply answered, gathering Floo powder in his palm and closed his fingers around the fine sand.

Draco sat in his chair looking lost, the parchment resting limply in his hand.

"Grow up, Draco. I have."

"You sure have. I never pegged you as Potter's errand boy."

Blaise rolled his eyes but gave a slight grin nonetheless before disappearing into the same flames he had come from, leaving Draco with a piece of parchment that could change his life.

----

"You did what?!"

Hermione stood rooted to the floor, her arms hanging limply by her side and her mouth open in a less than attractive pose. She was certain she had heard him wrong. Not even he could be that dense.

"I volunteered our department to lead the set up of the Ministry Charity Dance," he repeated, his hands locked behind his back as he peered out the enchanted window.

He hadn't looked at her since she came in, and she had done nothing but stare at him since she entered. Had he gone completely barmy?

"You have got to be joking. Tell me this is your sick version of a prank," she squeaked, her voice high-pitched and on the verge of giving out.

"You have 4 days to set up decorations and make a speech to open the Dance. That should be plenty of time for you and our entire staff," he simply answered, tipping his weight onto the balls of his feet.

At that moment it felt like a vain in her head popped, like all the pressure suddenly gave in over her head and hit her square across her shoulders.

"You volunteered us for more work, without consulting any of us?!" she cried, her eyes nearly popping out of her head. "What is wrong with you?! We're drowning in work, still weeks and weeks behind on orders!"

"It's nothing you can't handle."

"Oh, I'm thrilled you have such faith in me, Mr. Merewood," she bit, her voice sharp as a knife through the air, "but we're not catching up. We're not functioning. I've been working around the clock for days on end, and so have everyone else but you. It's not working. We're not doing our job."

"I have already told the Minister we will do this to make up for all the trouble we've caused and I have assured him it is something we can handle."

He still hadn't looked at her once, just kept staring out that bloody enchanted window as if he was actually going to see something worthwhile in a magically programmed view. She fumed. The nerve he had. He hadn't done a single thing since she came back (or before she came back, for that matter) and now he was volunteering them for more work on top of everything else she had to deal with.

She bit back all the foul nicknames she would enjoy more than anything to throw at him right now and practically ran out of the office in a desperate hunt for some relief from the endless adding of responsibility. Adam tried to stop her on her way out, asking what was wrong, but she was on a mission. She would not take this any longer.

No one was able to stop her on her way to the top floor and she only slowed down when she reached the assistant's desk.

"I need to see the Minister momentarily," she exclaimed purposefully and was met by an incredulous look.

"The Minister is very busy, Mrs..."

"Miss Granger," she offered vacantly, before turning around. If she wasn't entirely mistaken, the Minister usually came back from his lunch appointments just about now.

"Miss Granger, you can't –"

Hermione ignored her as she saw the Minister right down the hall followed by his usual horde of guards and she set off towards him, ignoring the calls from his assistance and the warnings from his guards.

"Minister, may I please speak with you as soon as possible?" she asked, her face twisted in a nervous grimace, her mind mentally going over everything she had to do. "It's about the Ministry Dance."

This seemed to lessen the objections from their bystanders, and the Minister confirmed her request reluctantly, urging her to be quick as he led her into his office. When the guards made to follow, he turned towards them with his eyebrow raised.

"Miss Granger is a decorated war hero; I very much doubt she's going to overthrow the Ministry."

She smiled gratefully at this as he closed the door, and she bit her lip nervously as he rounded the desk sitting down to face her.

"Are you having any issues with the Dance, Miss Granger?"

To her own despair she felt hot tears once again gathering behind her eyelids. She had cried more this past week than she had in her entire life put together, exhaustion causing her to nearly fall apart.

"The department is a mess," she said honestly, letting her breath out as she fought the tears. "I returned from my vacation and next to nothing had been done in my absence. As you know we're incredibly behind on our deliveries to the other departments and we're not catching up. We've been working around the clock, but we're not covering enough ground during the time we have. And now Merewood just told me he had volunteered us to manage the Ministry Dance. I can't do it, Minister. I'm working more than I'm sleeping at the moment, and for the first time in my life I'm going to be brutally honest about a supervisor: Mr. Merewood is not doing a single thing to get the department back on track."

«Could your staff confirm this piece of information?» he asked after an excruciating moment of silence.

She nodded jerkily, not knowing how she had ever ended up doing this. She would never have turned in a supervisor under normal circumstances. Despite everything he had done, it almost felt like betrayal.

«These are very serious accusations, Miss Granger,» he reminded her, only to recieve another nod. «Fortunately, there is a solution at hand.»

A/N II: Thanks for your patience everyone. I really appreciate it!