Author's Note: The infamous detention scene at last! I think I like it better this way...no, there weren't any real big changes made, just a sentence here and there as always. Thank you very much, all of my patient readers; I'll start work on chapter seven right after posting this, and it may be up tonight (depending on how it goes). I apologize for the delays, I recently bought The Sims 2, and one of my friends got Guitar Hero, so...my soul is being eaten daily. :) Enjoy!

They were kneeling on opposite sides of the room, occasionally looking up from their work to shoot angry glares at each other. The steely glares perfectly expressed that neither of them thought they belonged there, and that they would rather be doing almost anything rather than spend the night locked in a room with the other.

The glares said everything that they were thinking; neither of them spoke a word. The silence in the room was so thick, so tense, as to be almost tangible, and neither would admit to feeling, or being bothered by, the atmosphere. The silence remained.

Hermione felt his gaze as a tingle on the back of her neck and tried to ignore it, as she usually did. After a while, though, the sensation still had not lifted, and she knew he was still staring. Eventually she looked back up at him, meeting his cold gaze with one matching in intensity, hoping to stare him down so they could get back to their detention and leave sometime this century. She found, however, that he was just as stubborn and determined as she, and neither of them would look away for even a moment.

It was a silent battle of wills between the two; their work had been forgotten in their determination to prove themselves the stronger. If they had been cleaning instead of fighting, they would have heard footsteps coming down the corridor. But they were too wrapped up in their power struggle to notice anything except each other.

So when the door swung open and Professor Rosier walked in, they both jumped in surprise. "Still not finished, I see," he said in a stern voice. "You are aware of the fact that you've been here for more than two hours, aren't you?" They nodded, looking vaguely apologetic but still not talking. "Then I'm sure you understand why I must give you each another night's detention. Next Thursday, the second floor prefect's bathroom. I would suggest that you work a little faster next time.

"You may return to your dormitories when you are done here. Which I expect will be soon," he said pointedly before leaving the bathroom and closing the door behind him.

The room remained silent until his footsteps eventually trailed down the hall and completely out of earshot.

"You incompetent fool!" shouted Hermione at the tope of her voice, moments after casting a silencing charm on the room. "You got me another detention! With you! I hope you're happy!"

"I did no such thing! If you hadn't spent the entire time staring at me, we would have been done hours ago." He paused. "In fact, I bet you got us detention on purpose," he accused, rising to his feet haughtily and looking exceptionally pleased with himself.

She sprung to her feet in reply, too irritated with the situation – not to mention life in general – to mimic his calm action. "You are nothing more than a self-centered, arrogant jerk!" she shouted, "And I would rather spend a week locked in the astronomy tower in the dead of winter than endure one more night in your unpleasurable company!"

"So you've heard the stories, of course. Elizabeth it must've been, that nosy girl. Yes, I'm sure that's exactly what you want everyone to think: that you can't stand me, that you think I'm some kind of pathetic demon or something!" He lowered his voice to barely above a whisper and took several steps towards her. "But what do you really think about me? How do you really feel, not how should you feel? It's just you and me now. No witnesses, no interfering 'friends' trying to protect you, threatening to outcast you. Tell me the truth."

She was surprised by the seriousness of his voice. It sounded concerned, not mocking. "I don't know," she said as she realized it. As much as it worried her that she could not honestly say that she hated him, it worried her more that she couldn't bring herself to lie right now. He was Lord Voldemort, for God's sake! The bloody Dark Lord! She was supposed to hate him, supposed to stop him from killing countless people. But then, he was supposed to be a repulsive creature, not a real person she could take to, yell at, know. He had always been a hideous demon in her mind, a faceless monster, the embodiment of pure, unadulterated evil.

She wanted so much to scream at him again, but couldn't find a reason other than that he didn't make her want to scream. Instead she got back onto the floor and started scrubbing furiously, determined to get out of the room as soon as she could.

"What's wrong?" he asked, concerned about her sudden drop to the ground. It looked like she had collapsed.

"Just – don't talk to me, alright? Let's just get to work on this stupid bathroom – we'll be finished within an hour – and we can go to our rooms and forget all about this, okay?" she suggested, hoping he would agree. She couldn't talk about this now; she needed a chance to get her head sorted out, to remember what she was there for, to be able to lie to him again, to hate him again, or something bad was going to happen.

"I don't want to forget about it!" he said, raising his voice slightly. "I want to talk about it!" She stayed silent, still scrubbing the floor and pretending he wasn't there. "Why won't you talk to me?" he asked. "Why won't you look at me?" She recognized somewhere in her mind that she was actually managing to frustrate the Dark Lord, just by ignoring him; but she couldn't think about that. She needed to think about cleaning the bathroom.

"I told you already! I just don't want to talk about it!" She was confused, and she was alarmed; she couldn't talk about this right now, couldn't even think about it. She couldn't admit that there was anything she was avoiding talking about, or she would go mad and ruin everything. Damn it all, why wouldn't this floor shine?

"Not talking about it isn't going to make it go away," he warned. "You'll just keep thinking about it."

"But there's nothing to think about! We're just two people, that's it! There's nothing more to it than that!"

"Honestly, Jane. If there wasn't anything to it, you wouldn't be so worked up about it.

"Why won't you tell me how you really feel? Why can't you admit you have feelings for me – other than anger and repulsion like you pretend? I know how you look at me; I can feel it, Jane."

She answered without much thought. "Because I'm afraid, Tom." He didn't seem to understand. "I'm afraid of what you would do to me. I'm afraid of getting hurt." She was surprised at her ability to admit to that, and that she hadn't completely broken down yet. She felt tears beginning to form behind her eyes, and she held them back, willing herself to keep control. "I've been hurt by too many people – people I cared about, who cared about me. I don't want to get hurt again, Tom. I don't want you to hurt me." And if I do my job correctly, you won't ever have a chance. She praised herself mentally for keeping that thought in her head.

"I wouldn't –"

"You say that, but we both know it's not a guarantee." She sighed. Honesty, especially partial honesty, where she couldn't explain anything but had to say it all, was tiring. "Look, I answered your question. Now can we just drop it and get to work? I don't fancy staying here all night. We have classes tomorrow, remember?"

She could tell that he didn't want to drop the subject, but he realized he had already pushed his luck. He got to his knees and started scrubbing.

When they walked out of the bathroom a little over an hour later, sore from being on the ground for so long, the floor and fixtures inside were almost blindingly white. Hermione looked quite upset and tired. Tom, however, looked quite pleased.