Chapter 27

Draco was silent for a long time, staring down at his hands in his lap. Hermione didn't know what to say; how could she help him? She felt useless…

"There is something else…I could do…" Draco said quietly.

"What? What do you mean? You have a way to help your case?"

Draco let out a bitter laugh and said, "Case? No, this would most certainly not help my case." He looked up at Hermione, sitting next to him with a questioning look. "I'm talking about running away. Fleeing the country."

Hermione jumped up. "No! You can't do that! Are you completely out of your mind?! When they find you…"

"I just have to make sure the Aurors don't find me. I'll go somewhere far away and hide." He scrunched up his eyebrows. "But, this does leave you with some trouble…you vouched for me, afterall….got me out of prison for the time being…"

Hermione's mouth was gaping open. She couldn't believe he was seriously talking about this. Ok, she could believe it. But it wasn't right.

"Running away will cause more problems then it will fix, Draco! I'm not worried about the implications for me; I'm worried about you being caught!" Inside, however, she was thinking about never being able to see him again…

Draco ignored her and continued. With a defiant look he said, "You could tell them. Tell them about our relationship; make it seem like I was using you all along. Tell them I lied to you…about how I loved you. How could they blame you for being the victim?"

He said this in a sad voice, not looking up at the woman towering over him with a frustrated look on her face.

Hermione was shocked. How could he expect her to do that, to tell everyone she had been duped? To make him seem like the bad guy, when she knew he wasn't?

"I'm not that selfish." Hermione said.

Draco stopped her before she could continue. "Sometimes being selfish can be a good thing; sometimes you need to think about yourself to survive. Sometimes it's ok to worry about your own happiness, just a little."

"But there's no way I could be selfish if it meant I had to walk all over your name." she sighed. "Please, please don't talk about running away on this…"

"I can't go to Azkaban. We don't have any hard evidence, at all, that I don't belong there. Do the math." He grabbed her hips and pulled her closer to him, so she was standing in between his knees. He didn't look up at her at first, just stared at her stomach in front of him. "I'm being selfish- so sue me. Can I make one more incredibly selfish suggestion? I promise you don't have to take it too seriously."

She let out a shaky breath. He was really scaring her. Would he just walk out, now…like she had done before? Only for all the wrong reasons?

"What?" She asked softly.

He met her eyes, looking down at him. "Come with me."

The irony of the situation was not lost on Hermione. This whole scene seemed incredibly familiar. Hadn't she just asked him the same thing? And what had been his answer?

He was just staring up at her, not even breathing, waiting for her answer.

What was she supposed to do? How could he ask her that? It was selfish! She had her life here, and her friends…no reason to run…

But he was looking up at her with such pleading eyes.

She took a deep breath. But she had paused too long for Draco.

He burst out, "Sorry! No, you can't do that. You're not the one in trouble here; you chose the right side in this war! Ignore what I said- it's nothing…" He buried his head in her stomach, his hands snaking under her shirt just a bit so he could feel her skin. His thumbs moved back and forth, caressing her.

"Draco…" She ran her hands through his short hair, holding his head to her. Then she realized why he was hiding his face. He was crying silently, but a rogue sob gave him away. Her voice became soft. "Wait until after Harry comes. Let me try and reason with him. If that fails…let me try and talk with Ron. Let me use up all our options, then…"

She took a deep breath. She couldn't cry too! She steadied herself.

"Then you can escape. And…I'll think about coming with you. I don't want to be away from you. Maybe I'm being stupid and love struck and jumping into everything too fast, but I do love you. If it's between letting you go into danger alone and never seeing you again or following you…I guess I don't have a choice at this point."

Draco laughed into her stomach, in between his tears. "See? Would it have been so hard for me to say that a couple of weeks ago? What an idiot…"

She continued to stroke his hair and let him hold her, thinking about their strange situation.

***

After a while Draco stood up. "I'll be right back…bathroom…" he said, and left the room without letting Hermione see his face.

The front of her shirt was wet.

She sighed, falling to the couch. That's when she remembered the Prophet.

She picked it up and riffled through it violently until she came to the page she was looking for. Or, rather, pages. The obituaries were significantly longer, the day after the battle at Hogwarts.

By the time Draco returned to the room, Hermione had lost her resolve not to cry. She was absolutely shaking with sobs as she read about all the deaths of people she loved, people she knew, people she had sat next to in class, and people she had never seen before.

***

She didn't think she could handle all the funerals, but there were a couple she had to go to. Fred at 10, Lupin and Tonks at noon. She hadn't seen their wedding, but she would see their funeral. Aw, Hell…

She was in the process of riffling through her school trunk, trying to find something appropriate to wear in 9 hours…

Draco was watching her from the doorway with his arms crossed, not saying anything.

It was a good distraction, looking for the appropriate dress-robes. She was able to check the tears; force herself away from her sobbing.

There was, however, the very real problem that she had never been to a real wizard funeral…no one she was incredibly close to had died, before. Classmates and comrades in the Order, yes, but not close friends.

"What the hell can I wear? Do wizards wear black? I don't have black dress-robes….or does one not dress formally, at all?"

Draco sighed, and walked over to crouch by her trunk. She had robes strewn all over the floor, all deemed useless for the occasion. She didn't have much other than her school robes, however, so she wasn't even sure what she was looking for. Draco frowned at the less-than-impressive collection.

"This is all you have?"

"Well, I don't spend summers in the Wizarding world, so…"

"Well, you will now, won't you? You should just go buy some things- you'll need proper robes eventually, anyways."

"Buy? Just go buy some? Like everyone just has money laying around?" She snapped. She flung a few more uniforms out of the trunk in agitation and stood up. "I don't have much in the way of wizard money! Or muggle money! I don't have a job! I tapped out most of what I had over the winter, on the mission!"

She angrily strode towards her closet, filled with muggle things. "And now, I have nothing to wear! I have to go to see my dead friends, and I don't even have a goddamn thing to wear!" She threw a few muggle sweaters and dresses about in her fury. But the clothes in the closet had become blurry. Tears, again? Crap…

"What do witches wear to funerals? Would these robes work if I wore this sweater underneath?" She asked, holding up several items pathetically with fresh tears falling.

Draco stood back up slowly. He had a brooding expression, caught between worry and confusion for the leaking female in front of him. He finally just walked towards her and wrapped his arms around her, trapping the clothing she had been holding between them.

He had hoped this would help, but it only increased her crying. She wrapped her arms around his waist and let the clothing fall, her body wracked with sobs. He stroked her hair, her face buried in his chest.

"Er…look, we'll go shopping, ok? Don't cry…I'm sorry…"

She just shook her head and kept crying. What was he apologizing for?

"I know…We all lost people we cared about…I'm sorry…"

Hermione hadn't even thought about who Draco might have lost. He was classmates with many of the dead too, though. Granted, the number of fighting Slytherins had been thin, but one of the cronies he had always hung around had died. For the wrong cause, yes, but he was still just as dead.

She was beginning to be ashamed of the number of times Draco had seen her break down in the past 48 hours or so…

She straightened herself up and wiped away her tears. She was surprised when Draco's thumb brushed across her face, helping her clear away the wetness. She looked up at him, and he looked so sad and puzzled at the same time.

"It's not fair…you won, but you're so full of love and sympathy that you can't help but break down for the loss of others…"

"Do you think it's pathetic, me falling apart all the time?" She sniffed.

"Actually, I think your amazing…" he kissed her softly. "Your so gentle, and kind, and such a good person." He kissed her again. "I certainly don't deserve you…"

She felt embarrassed at the praise. Draco didn't usually compliment her like that…he was flattering her. He was acting so sweet…He must be really worried…

"I'm…I'm fine. Really. Thank you." She said the last part with real feeling, clinging to him once again.

"It's ok…I just really hate to see you crying. I'm at a complete loss as to what to do."

She laughed. "You don't know how to handle a woman crying, huh?"

"Well, there's only one way I've been taught."

She was puzzled. "What do you mean?"

He laughed. "I mean let's go buy you expensive things."