Mercury's POV

We started spending more time together, usually we'd spend our evenings in the library and occasionally we'd eat lunch together. There was only a month left of our fifth year at Hogwarts and I hoped my relationship with Draco wouldn't end when the summer began.

We'd started sharing books about half a month ago. Draco had been getting annoyed with me for always interrupting him with lines from my own book so we'd come to the conclusion that we would simply read the same one. He would sit a little behind me since he was taller and could read over my shoulder. It was nice to feel the warmth of him near me and sometimes he would rest his head on my shoulder. I didn't even think he realised he was doing it sometimes.

It didn't always work out, sometimes I turned the page too fast and Draco would get mad because he hadn't finished reading, other times I was too slow and sometimes the books were just uninteresting for either of us. We sat in the library on a Tuesday evening, the same table we always sat at, we weren't doing homework, we weren't talking, we were just reading. I guess I was being too slow to turn the page because Draco broke the silence.

"You seem distracted today, what's the matter?" He asked and at first I wasn't sure I'd heard him right, he almost never asked how I was. In fact we didn't really talk unless it was about school work or to comment on a line in a book.

"Nothing," I murmured and pulled myself out of my seat, closing the book we'd been reading – It had been boring anyway. I wandered over to the stacks to return it to his place. Draco followed me.

"C'mon, you can tell me." He said as I placed the book back on the shelf, he sounded sincere, like he actually cared what I had on my mind so I told him.

"My friends think I spend too much time with you," I told him and he smiled, then his smile became a laugh.

"Is that all?" He asked and I nodded, scowling at him a little since I didn't understand why he was laughing at me. "My friends think I shouldn't even be speaking too you." I frowned at him sadly.

"Why do you?" I asked and he looked at me, the corner of his lip turned down and his eyebrows pulled together a little, the way they did when he didn't understand a question. "Spend so much time with me, I mean."

"Well if you don't want to meet with me at all, you can always stop coming." He said a little harshly and he walked out of the shelves back to our table. I hadn't meant it like that, I hadn't meant to offend him I was just generally curious as to why a pureblood who is known to despise muggle-borns would spend so much time with a said muggle-born.

I told him this as I retook my seat at our table, he'd moved his chair away from me I noticed. His eyes softened as I explained and I felt his foot nudge mine under the table, I dint know if it was maybe by accident but I suspected it wasn't.

"I don't despise muggle-borns," He began to explain, "That is what my father taught a very impressionable young boy who didn't know any better." He said, "I'm not my father, I love him dearly but I am not him." He said this firmly, like he was trying to reassure himself of the truth in this statement, not me. I nodded, I understood what he meant.

"Tell me more about your family?" I asked, curiosity would probably kill me one day but I wanted to know. He looked at me like I must be joking but upon seeing I was totally serious he began to tell me about his parents.

"My father is a little distant, I guess." He began, "He expect so much from me but at the same time he almost forgets I exist." I felt sorry for him, I could tell from the way he talked about his father that he loved him beyond words and it must be hard that his father is so distant. "My mother," He carried on, when he talked about his mother he actually smiled, a real smile. "My mother is the most loving woman I've ever known." He said, "She would do anything for me and she has. I don't know how a woman like her ended up married to a man like my father." He shrugged, "They're both great in their own ways but they're different, too different to work really but it does, I guess."

"It's just the three of us, Malfoy Manor is so large we hardly see one another except for dinner." It sounded cold to me, I didn't tell him this though as I didn't want to offend. He surprised me again after a brief silence.

"What about you?" He asked, "What are your parents like?"

I shrugged in reply, "They're muggles," I said and he cringed ever so slightly at the word before he gestured for me to elaborate. "Mum was a teacher," I said trying to be careful with my words, I didn't think he was all that interested really so I didn't want to bore him.

"Was?" He asked and I nodded.

"Yeah, she uh, died when I was eight." He looked like pained, like I'd just stabbed him in the leg.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have-" He began, this was everybody's reaction when they found out, to apologise like it was their fault and act like it was something that wasn't okay to talk about.

"It's okay," I told him, "It was a fire, she couldn't get out and died from inhaling too much smoke." I shrugged it off, yes it was tragic but I'd come to terms with it and I didn't let it make me said anymore, even so I moved the conversation along. "Dad's a scientist, I'm not actually sure what he does specifically since it tends to be a lot of smart person mumbo jumbo when he talks about it but he's the best dad in the world. We live on the outskirts of a little village, it's not a manor but it's a big house." I laughed a little thinking about home, "It's so cluttered with stuff that you'd think we didn't have enough room though." Draco smiled at me and I smiled back, I liked talking with him about real things, it was better than all the silences and school work.

Draco's POV

I could tell she missed home by the way she smiled when she talked about it, it was a sad smile.

"My parent's are very anti-muggle." I told her, "My Father more than my mother but still both of them agree to a certain degree that muggles aren't worth anything." I looked down at the table, drawing circles on it's surface with my finger for a moment before looking back up to her, he green eyes were like oceans, I could drown in them if I looked for too long. "I'm sorry," I told her and she looked a little confused, "For all the times I've called you a mu-" I stammered over the wood a little, "A Mudblood." I finished. I called her it more than a handful of times, it slipped out too often when we would argue and she would always hit me or throw something at me – though never as hard as that first time.

"It's okay," She told me but her gaze had lowered to the table and I knew it wasn't okay, it would never be okay. We sat in silence again for a while and I wished that I had never brought it up until she nudged my shoulder with her own – I hadn't noticed her move her chair closer after I moved mine away – and she was smiling at me.

"What do you want to do when you leave here?" She asked me as she pulled her feet up onto her chair, like she was an owl sat of a perch. It was a common question that many of us had been wondering the last few months what with O. this year then our N.E. in two years time but when she asked it, it seemed to mean more.

"Well my father has his own plans for me," I explained, "But I really want to be a healer, you know like a muggle-doctor but without all the cutting and stitching." I didn't think much of muggle doctors, they couldn't do better since they were ill-equipped but the idea that cutting people open and stitching them back together was somehow helping them made me feel a little sick.

"I can see that," She said and I thought she was joking, I couldn't always tell from the way she said things but looking up at her I could see she was quite serious. "Who knows, maybe one day you'll save my life." She teased, a smirking almost smile on her lips.

I thought about what she might want to be, perhaps something to do with magical creatures since she was quite fond of them and always scored high marks in class, but I didn't know for certain so I asked her.

"I want to take pictures." She said like it was exactly the answer I was looking for.

"Okay, but what job do you want?" I asked and she rolled her eyes at me, I liked watching her do that, she always managed a perfect circle, like she spent half her time practising it in the mirror.

"It doesn't matter, I'll be fine doing whatever." She said, "I just want to take pictures." I must have looked confused because she went into this long spiel about how much she loved to take photos, capturing moments forever, it was kind of boring but her enthusiasm about it was enticing so I let her talk about it for as long as she wanted. It wasn't an answer that I expected but there was something very Mercury about it.

After that night we didn't get to see each other too much, O. took over and we were working nonstop, our exam timetables didn't match up enough to give us free time together, so by the time school ended for the summer I hadn't seen her in two weeks and strangely I missed her.

Two chapters in one night, are you proud of me? - I'm proud of me. Hope you enjoyed it, they're getting to know each other a bit more now which is good I think. Anyways, thanks for the read, leave a review?