1993
Granger, at the start of third year, was skittish. That quickly delved into the manic territory as time wore on. The girl was a frazzled mess, never really stopping in her highly strung deployment from class to class and he did notice she was taking all of them. He thought a lot about her behaviour and wondered if it had anything to do with boobs. He certainly noticed a rather prominent growth spurt in many of the girls in his year, Granger included. Especially her. Did growing breasts make girls this full on? He couldn't really complain though, after all, it was worth the odd behaviour. Still, there had to be more to it than that, surely.
That was the focus of his time passing musings as he gingerly moved his grievously injured arm from side to side hoping that no permanent damage had occurred during the attack. It was careless of him, he knew that, but a giant chicken-horse had no place being on the school grounds as far as he was concerned. The elder Malfoy patriarch was in agreeance and Draco couldn't wait for swift retribution to rain down around him.
Sometimes having Lucius Malfoy openly on your side was a definite win; it was a rarity, so he lapped up the attention with all he had. Dear old Dad had even put a comforting hand on his shoulder during his diatribe about ethicality at Hogwarts and the need for staff reviewal. Lucius was using the situation for political means, but it was still comforting having him briefly there, not that he'd ever tell his father he relished in his affection, or anyone else for that matter.
The artificial affection in front of him served as a welcome distraction at least, and he started to pick his way through the piles of gifts and well wishes, trying to find something of substance. You'd think after three years of companionship, Crabbe and Goyle would've known his favourite sweets, but no, instead there was a half eaten box of licorice wands, red Licorice wands fouling his heavily laden gift table. His nose wrinkled in disgust. Those were headed straight for the nearest bin.
Blaise's gift was his favourite so far. The Italian git had given him a box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, filtered out to only contain every pink coloured confection, and finished off with a rather gaudy looking glittery bow. The note attached wasn't signed but he'd easily recognised his overly dramatic script stating, "rest up, Princess," the 'I' dotted with a heart. He had to chuckle at that, and made a mental note to spend more time with the jokester once he left the hospital wing. Some levity in his life would be very welcome, grunting troll-like guards were severely lacking in conversive skills.
Still, they had their uses.
The rest of the gifts were mediocre at best and as clinical as the room he was contained in. A "Get Well" card here, a vase of flowers there. It admittedly took some hunting under the various assorted blooms to find the good stuff.
And then, there was the intriguing.
Hidden behind the most obscenely enlarged purple Pansy (Three guesses who sent that) was a simple potion phial with a small tag tied around the neck of the bottle with a thin gold cord. Being the Pure-blooded, Dark Arts raised scion of House Malfoy that he was, he wrapped his hand around the blanket, twice, before using it to pick up the interesting gift. The small label contained two statements, each simply written, one marking each side, both as blunt as a butter knife.
It's a calming draught.
You're a twat.
His laughter rang out, echoing around the cavernous room. She didn't hate him!
~0~
It seemed she did, incidentally, hate him.
A lot.
Her screeched words, the wrath of her flying fist, and his swollen face, we're all candid facets of the simple truth. The Hermione Granger, toad savior, basilisk survivor, and recently enlarged breast sufferer truly hated him.
It hurt more than his very obvious smarting cheek, which needed to be rectified immediately. The library was unfortunately quite a distance from the grounds where the assault had taken place, he really could've picked a better location, in hindsight. He used the brisk walk back to catalogue exactly what texts he'd need to erase the evidence as quickly as possible; the greater ramifications of the punch he could deal with later.
He'd shaken off Crabbe and Goyle's shadows with quick instruction to keep their damn mouths shut about the whole incident, not that they'd need a lot of swaying. Their social standing was tied to his, they were lacking in academic learning, but politics they understood well. It was practically ingrained in them from birth, no study necessary.
He still made his way through the halls with his head covered by his hood though; politics aside, having extra assurance was a must when one was intent on one's self preservation.
He allowed himself a very relieved sigh when he finally made his way into the library, quickly descending on the shelves with barely hidden desperation. Healing charms would be added to his repertoire, no matter how long it took him to master them; if he had to remain in solitude for the rest of the day, so be it.
The last thing he wanted right now was to be around anyone, acquaintance or otherwise. A visibly wounded Malfoy was unseemly, and there'd been quite enough of that this year already, thank you very much.
"Stupid chicken," he quietly muttered to himself, almost snapping his quill in his haste to write. He was now onto his third text and so far the results had done little to fade the rapidly forming bruise spreading across the left side of his face.
He took a quick visual break from the words in front of him and a flash of orange caught the corner of his eye as he flicked some more ink across the parchment in an angry scrawl.
His first thought was that some Weasley spawn was crawling around on the floor, it would be fitting behaviour for one of them after all. He slyly glanced towards the colourful flash again and was surprised to find a rather large mass of it, possibly too large to belong to a Weasley head, but he couldn't be sure of that.
The thing moved towards him and he had to admit he was briefly panicked that yet another creature was going to attack him, this time without any provocation on his part. Provocation or no, he would be damned if he'd let one more being, creature or entity abuse his person today. That was his firmly established role to play in the damn castle.
The bizarre mass jumped and landed right in front of him on the desk, tilting it's head to appraise him. It didn't appear to be hostile so he met its gaze somewhat apprehensively before recognition dawned on him.
"Come to finish me off for your Mistress have you, beasty?" he asked quietly, not covering the resignation in his tone.
The creature sniffed at him and then tilted it's neck offering him a package of some sort.
He narrowed his eyes and stared down at the offering debating his next move. Granger's beast twitched and shifted, what he supposed was its face, to an area just past his shoulder before stilling again and giving him some time to react. With the entire situation as odd as the being itself, he decided to just take the package so the thing would leave. He couldn't, in sound mind, trust something that he couldn't classify to a species.
He quickly untied the string and in an instant the beast jumped off the desk and sauntered away. It was an ugly thing but it certainly had haughty down pat. He had to grudgingly respect it for that.
The lone package was plain and wrapped with what appeared to be standard parchment. He furrowed his brow and inspected it with curiosity, weighing it in his palm for a few moments before carefully unwrapping it. Inside was a small glass jar filled with some viscous grey paste that slowly moved to creep along the sides of the container as he tilted it.
He lifted the jar off the butterflied parchment and placed it to the side; he knew what it contained and a small fluttering of hope ignited in his chest.
His gaze shifted back to the parchment, revealing a small note in the very center.
You're still a twat.
He'd never been so happy to be insulted in his life. The small flicker of hope bloomed and he quickly looked around, scanning the library for any hint that she was there.
The tables around him were still bare of student life and silence reigned. It made it easy to glimpse the feminine hand curled around a bookshelf and spot the one eye trained on him, even from a distance. The bushy headed, browned eyed assailant met his gaze and winked quickly before vanishing before he could blink. It all happened so fast he had to wonder if it was a figment of his imagination.
He liked to believe that it wasn't.
~0~
Present day
Draco pulled the note from his pocket, the parchment now so soft and almost cotton-like from the many hours spent unfolding it over the years.
"Still true as ever, Granger," he whispered, delicately brushing his fingertips over the faded script.
He carried it with him always, the insulting, yet endearing words always close to his heart.