I really like this chapter. I'm looking forward to finishing the next one. I have a test tomorrow and I'm an officer for a new club, so I'll be busy for a while, but I'll try to put it up relatively fast if it gets a lot of views and comments. Review my dears.

Chapter 15

Hermione Granger was laying in her living room on the floor, her small feet slightly above her propped up on the soft cushions of her couch, her eyes scanning the stark white of her popcorned ceiling, her hands thrown haphazardly about, one in an awkward position by her head, then other draped over her tummy, with her wand balancing with little succession a top her nose. As it tumbled to the side and fell on the ground into her halo of hair, she heaved a sigh. It was times like these that she wished she had a puppy, or maybe an old, bossy cat to play with, to ease her mind.

It wasn't that she wasn't comfortable with herself, or her feelings, no matter how groggy they got sometimes in her head. It wasn't that she wasn't bright enough to understand what she was feeling. No, none of that could really be the cause of her melancholy mood. Maybe it was because every day things seemed to get less confusing. That was what scared her, perhaps, most of all.

The fact that she no longer hated Draco Malfoy. The uneasiness she felt around him was the next thing she was beginning to feel fade. Even though she kept quiet around him, and tried not to get too close, she could no longer feel the awkwardness. The reluctance she once felt to even be near him was now gone. Out the window. And with it, so was her grounding. Her foundation. Who was she if she could forgive and forget everything that Malfoy had once said to her just like this? So easily forget who he is. So easily move on?

Has she gone soft? Lost her well-endowed common sense? Surely if anyone would be hesitant it'd be her. If anyone would be clever enough not to play with the thing that hurt you it'd be her. After all, he did hurt her. Over and over again. He'd hurt her feelings more times than she could count, yet she was so easy to trust him, to let her guard down.

Playing with fire? That's what it felt like. It felt like her heart was on fire and such a scary feeling it was.

She sighed and rolled on her side. Her legs dropped to the ground and she curled up in a ball, pulling her knees up to her chest and detangling her wand from her hair, she threw it across the room.

It as there that she fell asleep, on the ground, in her living room, in the middle of the floor, in her knickers and with no blanket.

Hermione pitched up off of the floor with a gasp. She scrambled up to her feet before glancing at the clock on the wall in her kitchen. 6:00 on the dot. Geez! She turned and stretched in one swoop before swaying toward the door, which was the source of her surprising awakening. The loud pounding on the door made her groan. "I'm coming!" She barked at the unknown perpetrator before gazing out the peep hole. She stood higher on her tip-toes, but still didn't see anyone through the slightly dusty glass.

With a yawn, she opened the door, freezing in the process.

"M...Malfoy?" She spat, lowering her eyebrows considerably. He stood at her door with a large smirk.

He opened his arms wide, "I'm home!" He said a bit more loudly than necessary.

Her jaw dropped. "Why are you here?"

He made a clearly disappointed face. "That's rude Granger. I'm here to see an old friend." He informed her, pushing past her and into her flat like he didn't need to ask. "By the way, you look like hell."

She immediately became aware of her baggy, oversized white shirt which was just long enough to cover her knickers. She bit her lip. Grabbing the hem of hers shirt she pulled it down until it hit her mid thigh, and this made her realize that she didn't have her bra on. She blushed before shutting the door, without turning around and exposing her back to him, which she knew that the shirt would expose more of her legs to him.

His silver eyes seemed to be peering just into her own eyes however, which did relegate her stress considerably. "We are not friends."

He shrugged and turned around, making his voice sound very quiet, making her have to step closer to hear him. "Tell me about it." From his front his hand appeared over his shoulder, and in it was a newspaper. She sighed and cautiously took it from him, careful not to touch him. "But apparently, we're very close these days."

She groaned and ran her hand across her face. "That's just great!" At that moment he turned around and snatched the newspaper from her quickly, and took a large step back. She rolled her eyes at him. "Why won't they just leave me alone?"

Malfoy chuckled. "Normally I wouldn't care if you were in the public spotlight or not, sense it seems to be a habit of yours, however they've brought me into your messy life Granger." He said nonchalantly, sighing for a reason she wasn't sure of, before turning away from her again, this time angling himself towards her bedroom, instead of completely the opposite way.

She glared at his side. "So you're saying that you put yourself before me?"

He didn't look her way, but she noticed the slight movement in his shoulders. His voice sounded strange when she spoke. "Generally."

She groaned and in response he smirked. "What's it say this time?"

He opened it and cleared his throat. "As we all know, Hermione Granger, Ministry's blah blah blah...goody goody,"- His eyes scanned down the page as he spoke, making comments here and there- "more bollocks"- he smirked- "Ah, here we are." His tone almost made her laugh as he mocked Rita Skeeter in a very accurately annoying voice. "As we all know, miss Grang'r had been seen about with the charming, brave, not to mention amazingly handsome, and wonderful Draco Malfoy have been gallivanting about for the last two days, who were seen together yesterday leaving Miss Granger's office. The two were allegedly quite cozy...That bint." He snorted and rolled the paper up as if he were going to use it to swat flies, before giving her a dashing smile over his shoulder. "You see, nothing about how evil you are, and they only mentioned the word mistress once."

"Mistress?" She shrieked and he let loose a wolfish howl of laughter. She took a big step towards him with her hand out and swatted him on the arm firmly. At this he turned to face her, putting both of his arms around her shoulders and drawing her into a big and surprisingly warm hug. She froze.

"You should lighten up Granger." He said between laughs with his nose in her hair. Oh dear.