Draco steered his broom back down to the ground and his feet left the metal holds when he touched down on the grass just in front of where his mother was standing. He'd spent a good part of half an hour testing out his new broom in the large backyard of Malfoy Manor and his mother had watched from the ground with her winter cloak wrapped firmly around her. Draco had put on his own cloak over the button up shirt and trousers he'd been wearing, and his mother insisted on him wearing gloves too. He was glad she had though as the air had been bitingly cold, especially as he flew around at the speeds which his new broom was capable of. When he landed, his cheeks and nose were pink from the cold and his hair was pushed back from the wind. "That was incredible," he told his mother and couldn't keep the smile off his face. His feet crunched on the frosty grass as he dismounted the broom and held it upright.

"I'm so glad you enjoy your present," Narcissa smiled. "Did it fly well?"

"Magnificently," Draco said and nodded. They both turned to climb up the steps onto the outdoor patio and then inside the double doors to the house. The warmth was welcoming and he shrugged off the heavy cloak and draped it over his arm. "It's so lightweight; it was responsive to the slightest turn and it was the smoothest broom ride I've ever had," he started listing off the broom's attributes. "I can see why the professionals are using it more and more."

Narcissa laughed softly at his enthusiasm for the broom. "If only I had enough courage to get on and try," she joked and Draco laughed too because he knew his mother had never sat on a broom in her life and would never try. They got back to the sitting room and then she turned to him. "Have you got any plans for today?" She asked.

"Blaise and Pansy did invite me over," Draco said. "You can come too?" He suggested, his way of asking her if she needed him to stay.

"No, I wouldn't want to intrude; and I already have plans of visiting various of my friends," Narcissa responded and Draco knew there was a small group of women she was friends with whose husbands were also in Azkaban like Lucius, so them meeting up on Christmas had been a tradition that formed over the years. "I was meant to be meeting up with Nora in around hour; can I excuse myself to get ready?" She asked.

"Of course," he nodded. "I might go now."

Narcissa looked at him for a few seconds before speaking. "Draco, spend time with your friends today. I'm worried about you…"

"There's nothing to be worried about, mother."

"No, Draco, there is," she said seriously and lifted her hands up to brush down his collar while he stared at the wall behind her. "You spend way too much time by yourself—"

"I go to work," he interrupted.

"Yes, where you spend your days locked in your office," Narcissa responded and then lifted her hand up to grasp his chin and make him look at her. "I know it's difficult for you, even if you can't admit that to yourself, but you need to try and spend a little more time with the people who are by your side. You can't spend your days in solitude."

Draco had initially looked at her then darted his eyes away after only a few seconds. He stared down at the carpet and nodded. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that she was right and that he should be spending more time with the people he classified as friends, but it was difficult for him to reason with himself why he should. "I'll go to Blaise and Pansy's," he said after a pause.

Narcissa smiled and then gave him a kiss on the cheek and all he could smell was the familiar scent of her perfume that he'd known all his life. "Enjoy the rest of your Christmas," she said and he knew what was coming next after her pause and he tensed his jaw. "I love you."

Over the years, Draco hadn't ever said those words. Not even to Astoria even though she had loved him and he assured her that he cared deeply for her. He did love his mother though, but it was almost like there was something in his brain stopping him from getting out those three words. "And you," he said instead and stepped backwards. "Enjoy your day too," he told her and then gave her a small smile and went to the fireplace. Just as he dropped the floo powder he looked at her and she gave him a smile and waved, but then he was gone.

—

It was just past noon and Draco was sitting in his living room with a mug of coffee in his hold. He'd gotten home from his mother's almost two hours ago but he didn't want to go to Blaise and Pansy's apartment just yet. It had taken him a lot of willpower to open the jar of coffee granules rather than pouring himself a glass of firewhiskey, but he'd managed to do it. Currently, he was watching his television and it was unfortunate that every channel he turned to had some form of Christmas related movie on, except for a channel that wasn't even in English so he couldn't watch it without getting frustrated about not knowing what was going on. He settled on watching one channel that was playing a movie that didn't have any singing in it (from the last half an hour he'd watched) but for most of the time, he'd not been looking at the screen.

His house was Scrooge's almost-dream. He didn't have a speck of decoration pertaining to the holiday at all; no tree, no lights, no banners. The only thing he had remotely relating to Christmas were the two holiday cards he'd received — one from his mother and one joint card from Pansy and Blaise — which he placed on top of his TV. It was a stark difference to the Manor as his mother had a decorated tree in the sitting room and various other decorations scattered through the large home. He didn't mind though that his home had nothing. He didn't hate the idea of the day, but rather thought it was slightly unnecessary. The logical part of his brain also tried to tell him that a large part of his discomfort with the holiday was due to the lack of people he could share it with. At Hogwarts it had been a jovial time, full of laughter, smiles and fun. It was hard not to get into the spirit from the decorations and the present giving on the actual day. His Christmases had started to go downhill from sixth year, and had reached a plateau by the time he was twenty.

He glanced over to the window and then down to the old leather trunk underneath it; the trunk that had been Hermione's present to him, containing the old Quidditch balls. His lips curled into a small involuntary smile and before he knew it, he'd stood up leaving his coffee on the coffee table, and went to his study to take out a piece of parchment.

Granger,

I'm sending you this on the assumption that you've still got your wits about you and ability to function after spending time with your extended family.

I'm writing to let you know that I think our meeting should be at ten tomorrow morning. You can come by my office as I have a lot of the documents for the project there.

See you then; from one 'Grinch' to another,

D

He went to his back door and whistled shortly and after a few seconds, his owl appeared from the tree in the backyard and landed on his arm so Draco could take him inside. He tied the note to its leg then sent it on its way and closed the door. A look at the clock made Draco sigh and go to his kitchen table where his other two Christmas gifts for his friends were sitting. He picked them up and went to his fireplace and hoped that the rest of the day would be enjoyable.

—

By ten o'clock that night, Draco, Pansy and Blaise were just a little tipsy… Well, Blaise was a tad more drunk than the other two, but it provided great entertainment. All three of them were in the living room of Blaise and Pansy's very modern apartment with large windows overlooking London's Oxford Street, seated on comfortable white leather sofas. The apartment had been decorated mostly by Pansy who worked in interior design and henceforth practically begged him if she could decorate his own home (his answer was always no much to her chagrin) every time they met up. Blaise's family came from old money and his mother always received a reasonable sum of galleons with every divorce she'd had which she always gave a portion of to Blaise - 'compensation for being absent', Blaise liked to call it. Pansy's family also came from old money, half of which she'd inherited while her mother took the other half to set up a new life in France. The combination of their bank accounts allowed them to afford such an expensive apartment and accommodate Pansy's lavish furniture desires. Draco was currently sunk low into one sofa with his legs stretched out in front of him, bare feet in the white shaggy rug that covered the floor. He couldn't remember taking his socks and shoes off, but Blaise and Pansy were in the same predicament.

Speaking of the two of them, Draco was being rather careful not to glance their way as they sat on the love-seat together. Pansy had her legs draped over her fiancé's and their heads were close together as she whispered things to him. No doubt they were things Draco didn't want to hear. He really didn't care though, they were in their own world and he was in his own, with a glass of strong alcohol to keep him company. Merlin, he'd drank a lot more than he should - granted, all three of them had taken a sobering up potion at around five o'clock when they felt they were getting a little overboard. Draco was mesmerised with the lights outside the apartment and couldn't believe the activity of the city on Christmas night. He'd been standing by the window before and could see groups of people wandering along the pavement and cars and taxis going every which way on the road. He longed to be sitting at a pub window on a busy street right then, so he could watch everyone that passed and resort into his mind and play the 'game' in his mind of constructing stories for everyone that walked past. Stories like, who the person was, what they did for a living, where they were going, what their past was… Solitude suited him and he could handle it simply because his mind was always whirring.

When he'd arrived earlier in the afternoon, it had been just as Pansy was setting the table for lunch. Draco was still stuffed from breakfast but helped her with setting up and Blaise did too. They sat at the table and chatted to make up for the long absence of not spending a good amount of time together, and even Draco was surprised with how much he spoke, smiled and laughed. No matter how much he didn't like to associate with other people, being in the company of his two best friends brought him out of the small cave of his mind he'd placed himself in. They had all exchanged presents, with Draco receiving a very nice cologne from Pansy and, from Blaise, a box seat ticket to the next Falcon's game that he would attend with him. Pansy had loved the earrings Draco bought for her and immediately took out the ones she was wearing to replace them with the new ones. Blaise had joked that he wished he could think of buying such nice things for her. He had been anticipating the arithmancy book, as it was tradition, and thanked Draco for it and added it to his bookcase.

Draco eventually tucked into eating lunch too, and by the end, all three of them were stuffed with good turkey, vegetables and champagne, adorning paper crowns on their heads and laughing at the stupid jokes that had come out of the bonbons. Carrying on through the afternoon, Blaise had retreated to his piano (possessing the skill to play it which Draco had always envied), and played Christmas carols that Pansy insisted he learn. She was a big fan of Christmas too, she had discovered after the war, and always had a magnificent time preparing for it and enjoying the day. She sang along to the carols (very out of tune) thanks to her already confident persona with a little help from the champagne she'd consumed. Draco sat on the sofa and watched his friends with a stupid smile on his face and would laugh any time Pansy hit a note in a particularly awful way. He was very glad he'd come. After the piano fiasco, all three of them played a variety of card games and had taken the sobering up potion at this time but Blaise had also brought out his strong whiskey. Pansy opted out of that for more champagne but Draco and Blaise were happy with the strong stuff. The card games lasted for much longer than expected, and here they were then, all in the living room.

When Draco heard the sound of Blaise and Pansy kissing, he grimaced and sat up. "Right," he announced, breaking his silence and the two of them looked at him. "I best be off, I have to work tomorrow."

"Thank you for coming," Pansy gave him a smile.

"Don't be a stranger either. Come over whenever," Blaise slurred and rest his head back against the couch.

Draco chuckled but didn't say anything in response. "Goodbye," he farewelled them and used their fireplace to floo back to his own home. Stepping into it was a harsh reminder of the lack of Christmas spirit he had, but that thought was soon replaced with the need to undress and get into bed, which he did very quickly and fell asleep what felt like instantly.

—

When Draco went to his kitchen for breakfast the next morning, he spotted his owl out on the windowsill. He opened the window to let him in and took the note from his leg and got him a treat in the meantime. The note was from Hermione confirming that ten o'clock would be a good time for their meeting, and he slipped the note into his back pocket and busied himself with making breakfast. Forty minutes later, he was in his office with a stack of papers he had to review, and after that, a lot of floo and phone calls to be made to check with clients on the cases he was assisting in. He hadn't finished by ten and knew that after his meeting with Hermione, he'd have to make more calls which would most likely take him the rest of his day to do.

It didn't surprise him that she was right on time for their meeting and he used his wand to open the door for her when she knocked. She came in with a smile and two coffees in her hand and placed one in front of him before she sat at the chair across from him on the other side of his desk. "Morning," she greeted.

"Good morning," he said and pushed his chair around to get out the files he'd gathered on their project from the cabinet he had behind his desk. "How did your day turn out yesterday?" He asked her when he set the folder down in front of himself on the desk.

"Surprisingly okay," Hermione responded and took a sip of her coffee. "My, shall we say least favourite, cousin spent the day with her husband and his family. I was surprised how nice it was without her there."

"Glad to hear," Draco said and opened up the folder and gave her a stack of papers.

"Did you go to your friends?" She asked.

"I did actually," he nodded. "It was good, even though I had to leave early otherwise I would be even more hungover than I am right now," he smirked.

"Tut-tut," Hermione joked with a smile. "That's good though, that you went."

He didn't like the serious tone her voice took at her last statement and he glanced up at her but quickly looked away. "Right, well if you look at the third document there, you'll see the outlines for applying to have a meeting with both Durmstrang and Beauxbatons…"

—

Two and a half hours later, Draco and Hermione both came to a mutual agreement to take a break from the project, and concluded the meeting for that day. The time had been well spent with hardly any breaks of talking, mainly suggestions. Draco brought out some books he'd had on international education and how Wizarding law adapted into that ("I don't know who in their right mind would want to sit down and write a book about this," he'd said sarcastically which made her laugh), and the two of them read over the sections that would help with designing an exchange program that would adhere to all regulations of the countries and schools that would be involved in the exchange program.

Hermione wrote several pages of notes with reference to parts of the books Draco brought out. He even booked an appointment to visit the storage room of the law department that contained transcripts of all cases heard in England by the Ministry, but would help direct them to past test cases of the same topic from both England and other countries. He had a list of many things that they would have to do, both individually and together, to set them up for a few long weeks after the New Years of working. Their goal was to get the exchange program implemented by September - what may seem like a reasonable deadline to some, but with Draco's workload and Hermione's duties as department head, they would be stretched for time.

At that moment, Draco was leaning back in his chair and looking at Hermione doing the same thing across from him on the chair in front of his desk. She was currently telling him about her day previous. "…Then I visited the Burrow just after they had all finished eating dinner. Merlin, I still wonder how Mrs Weasley does it every year with everyone that comes?"

"That many people?" Draco asked.

"Well, there's Mrs and Mr Weasley's kids that go, and every single one of them has a partner. Ginny, Bill and Percy all have kids of their own, so there was five children around, and then there was the extended family." She sighed and shook her head. "I really could only stay for a couple of hours before I went back home. I should be used to it after all these years, but it gets a bit…" She trailed off.

"Overwhelming?" He offered.

"Yeah," she nodded. "That's the perfect word to use."

"It seems you got a lot done yesterday, then."

"I went to the same amount of places that you did," Hermione laughed softly. "I'd hardly call it 'getting a lot done'. How did it go at Blaise and Pansy's?" She asked.

"Better than I thought it would," he said honestly, not afraid to tell her how it really was. He realised that even though their relationship was more of a work one, they were still able to talk freely to each other, something he never thought would happen. When he'd agreed to work with her, he didn't expect such a friendship (yes, he begrudgingly called her a friend now) to spawn from what they were doing, and he could bet that she felt the same. "We had lunch together then spent the rest of the night in the company of cards, champagne and whiskey," he snorted.

"Sounds like a good night," Hermione said and gave him a smile. "Did you get any presents?"

"Cologne and box tickets to the next Falcon's match," he told her and saw her vacant look. "Quidditch," he smirked.

"Ah, right," she laughed. "I can only remember the Canons and Harpies, if I'm honest."

"I'll have to enlighten you to the world of Quidditch then," he joked.

"We could spend time together in much more enjoying ways than that, Malfoy," she rolled her eyes.

"I'm sure we could," he chuckled and quickly shut out the part of his mind that was trying to get him to think of very inappropriate ways of spending enjoyable time together.

"What are you doing on New Year's Eve?" Hermione asked him after a few minutes of quiet between them, and he was taken aback by her question.

"Nothing," he said. "I haven't seen midnight of New Year's Eve for about seven years," he shrugged.

"I must do something about that then," she smiled and sat up in her chair. "Do you want to come with me to the Burrow?" She asked. "George puts on a great fireworks display and there's always great food courtesy of Mrs Weasley."

Draco looked down at the desk in front of him. "Won't your friends assume…?" He trailed off.

"No," she shook her head and he missed the blush on her cheeks. "They welcome all visitors, it wouldn't be a problem."

He picked off a piece of lint from his trousers and thought. He didn't have anything against the Weasley's anymore. Long gone were his views of them being nothing more than poor blood traitors, and even though he hadn't had a lot of conversation with them individually (or together for that matter), he knew that if he did go, he'd be able to talk to Hermione and Potter at least.

"You don't need to give an answer straight away," Hermione said and when he looked up, he saw the slight flush on her cheeks. It was almost as if she was asking him out, but he wasn't silly enough to assume that she was. They were friends and she was just trying to make him get out and involve himself on yet another holiday he couldn't care less about.

"I'll let you know tomorrow," Draco said eventually. "I'll see if my mother wants company or not first," he lied, knowing that his mother was going to be at a New Year's Ball hosted by one of her friends.

"Speaking of tomorrow," Hermione said, "When would you like to meet?"

"I can fit it in at any time," he told her because he'd only be doing his normal work as he had been doing today. "Are you free the same time as today?"

"I should be," she nodded and then stood up from the chair and rolled her shoulders back after being sat in the same position for so long. "I will see you then," she said and gathered up the things she had brought to the meeting and gave him a smile.

"Don't look forward to it too much," he smirked and she smiled and shook her head at him. She turned and walked to his office door and his eyes dropped down to the figure hugging pencil skirt she was wearing but his eyes quickly averted back up to her face when she stopped and turned. If she knew that he had been staring at her arse, she didn't show it.

"Bye, Malfoy."

"See you, Granger."

A/N: A shorter chapter, I know, but I felt like it has been too long since I last updated. This has been just as much as a filler as the previous chapter, hope none of you are pissed at me for the smaller Christmas scenes, but let me tell you, New Years will be much more exciting ;) Hope you enjoyed, please review!