~Perfect Harmony~

A/N: Guys, I am soooo sorry! I haven't actually written a new chapter for almost a year now, even though I went back and updated the previous chapters and made them a bit better. But I'm back, and I will be updating new chapters much more quickly now that I have a bit more time on my hands, but I do have school and a job and, well…life. So sometimes I may take a little longer, but it definitely won't take a year this time around! So thank you all for your loyalty and patience. I hope you all enjoy!

Disclaimer: Though I took a year off, I still wasn't able to persuade J.K. Rowling to hand over the rights to Harry Potter so you'll have to deal. :P

~Christmas~

Dear Hermione,

How is your holiday getting along so far? Have Pothead and Weaselbee found anything new on this Nicholas Flammel bloke? Not likely. Even with two heads, those two are as dimwitted as can be.

My holiday is getting along well. What with the holidays approaching, Father has been gone at the Ministry more often than not. It is a stress reliever, I must admit. Although…Mum has been ecstatic having me home, and she won't stop talking about us. It's quite annoying, honestly. She's even trying to snoop around and see what I've got you for Christmas.

Not that I've actually gotten you anything. Or thought of getting you anything. I mean, Mum has been pretty adamant about it so I guess I've been thinking about it recently. But I have no idea what girls like. Though you aren't really a normal girl, so that would make it considerably harder to find something you would like. Why am I talking about this? It isn't as though you were thinking of getting me anything.

Were you?

Not that you should. It would be pretty risky if you sent me a present, anyway, what with my father being the way he is and all. So no, you should definitely NOT get me anything.

Unless of course you want to just give it to me at school. That would be alright, I guess.

But then, how would I explain it to my friends? That would be quite an awkward predicament. No sense putting that sort of pressure on me. Yes, I've quite a lot going on, so don't you dare!

...unless you think I'll like it.

Whatever! Anyway, I believe this letter has gone on long enough, so I'm ending it here. Have a good holiday.

Draco Malfoy

P.S. My mum was standing over my shoulder reading all the bits about the presents and making me write those suggestions down. I didn't feel like rewriting this, so I just thought I'd just explain that to you. Seriously, don't get me a present. And again, don't say I'm lazy. I will put you in a body bind, I swear to you.

Somehow, Draco's letters always seemed to brighten her day. They were always awkward and incredibly revealing. You would expect someone from his background to have the ability to portray sophistication through this writing. However, he was always a flustered mess when it came to writing personal letters to someone. Or perhaps it was merely because she was of a lower blood status and he felt he didn't have to try very hard. But then, why would you reveal your weaknesses, in a sense, to someone lower than you. After thinking on it, she theorized that it was because he wasn't used to having actual friends and that he felt he could just be himself around her. He didn't want to try to hide…well, not as much as he had to around others, anyway.

She took her time writing her reply, and no sooner had she sent it away with Draco's owl than her cousin Eliza was waltzing right on in. Eliza eyed the bird flying off farther away into the distance before turning to the bushy-haired girl sitting at her desk. "A friend of yours?" Hermione merely smiled and nodded. There was no way she would be telling Eliza about her newfound friendship with the pureblood who had made the beginning of her first term a living nightmare. She still remembered her cousin's reaction that time in Diagon Alley when she and said pureblood had collided with one another, him leaving rather rudely.

"Did you need something, Eliza?" she opted to say instead. That's when she noticed Eliza was wearing her wizarding robes. "Are you planning on going somewhere?"

Eliza shrugged and smiled. "I just thought we could go to Diagon Alley and have a look around. I wasn't quite sure if you had finished your Christmas shopping. They have some wonderful sales going on and they've decorated the entire place for the holidays. I thought you might like to see what the wizarding world is like outside of school. After all, not everything has to be textbooks and classrooms."

Hermione immediately jumped from her seat and pulled on all her outerwear, slipping into her shoes and dragging Eliza downstairs. Then a thought came to mind. "Eliza, will you be walking throughout muggle London with your wizarding robes on?"

Eliza smirked her Slytherin smirk before saying, "Oh, Hermione. There is still so much to learn." That day, Hermione learned the wonders of floo powder.

Young Draco Malfoy was becoming anxious. He had sent his fastest owl [his mother's] in the hopes that he may get a quick reply, but it seemed that the bushy-haired girl was taking her sweet time in writing him back. What was she doing, writing a book? Or was she doing this just to taunt him?

Not that it was taunting him! No, he just simply hated to wait on anything. And why should he? He was a Malfoy, and Malfoy's always got what they wanted with a snap of their fingers. There was no need to wait for some silly little letter when he could be spending his time doing more entertaining things such as—

"Young Master, your mother and father would like you to accompany them to Diagon Alley, sir."

Now that was splendid, if not almost perfect, timing. Turning to Dobby, he smiled. "Tell them that I will be down in just a moment." Dobby bowed so low that his nose touched the floor before he disappeared. The young heir immediately put on his best robes, made sure that every white-blonde lock was gelled perfectly in place, and headed down to meet his parents at the fireplace. He was going to go have fun and get rid of this anxious feeling waiting for a silly little letter.

As they flooed to Diagon Alley, he couldn't help but wonder what she was doing at this moment.

Diagon Alley was more beautiful than her elder cousin had said it would be. Hermione couldn't help the smile that crept upon her face as she took in the magnificent sight. The snow-topped buildings glittered in the light, and strings upon strings of lights lined the entire path. There were marvelously decorated Christmas trees standing outside of every other store, and one humongous-sized tree stood proudly in the center of Diagon Alley. All throughout, there were children running around playing, carolers singing in gorgeous harmonies, and the smell of delicious pastries filling the air. It was more than anything Hermione could have hoped for. She had thought before that London was beautiful during the holidays, but nothing compared to this sight before her.

"What do you think?" Eliza grinned.

Hermione just continued to stare in awe as she murmured one thing only: "It's perfect."

They spent a good portion of the day browsing through all sorts of different shops, and Hermione even picked a few gifts for Harry, Neville, and the Weasley brothers. Eliza was delighted to hear that she had become best friends with Harry Potter, "the boy who lived", but Hermione just laughed and said he was merely "the boy". Period. Talented, yes, but still a relatively normal person.

They had decided to step into a book shop, but when Hermione pulled a book from the shelf she came face-to-face with a platinum-blonde head of hair and silver-grey eyes, and they were staring straight at her.

Draco Malfoy was staring straight at her in surprise, and she supposed her face looked much the same. It wasn't until someone bumped into her and knocked her against the bookshelf that they snapped out of it. Thankfully, nothing fell or they might have been caught as they snuck to the end of the aisle and met each other halfway.

"I didn't know you would be coming here. Today, I mean." If things hadn't been weird already, they had just spoken the exact same words at the exact same time. What were they becoming, the Weasley twins?

This was the first time they had seen each other since they had started writing letters, and neither was sure what to say next.

"Um…well…this isn't awkward or anything," she giggled.

Draco agreed. "Yes. Well…um…"

"Draco, where'd you run off to?"

"Hermione, dear, where are you?"

They both looked at each other in panic. They're families couldn't find them together. Instead of using their brains to reason that they could just walk away and be fine, they snuck out through the back entrance and ran to hide in one of the back alleys.

Once they turned to look at each other, the adrenaline rush peaked and they laughed until their lungs were burning. "I can't believe you pulled me out here!" Hermione said as her laughs finally began to die down.

Draco had regained his composure and smirked at her. He couldn't help but think that she looked a lot more alive like this, laughing and smiling and…okay, now his thoughts were getting creepy. "Well, we needed to get away, so I got us away."

"You realize we could have just pretended we hadn't seen each other and things would have been fine, right?" Now the Malfoy heir frowned. Why hadn't he thought of that? "I know you miss me but you didn't have to—"

"Miss you?! Why on earth would I miss you?" he exclaimed. He wasn't being cruel about it. He was legitimately baffled. Then he saw the teasing smirk on her own face. "Oh, you rotten little…have a taste of this!"

Before they knew it, they were engaged in an all-out snowball fight. A battle, more like, but who was being technical? "Missed me!" she screamed with laughter as she threw her own snowball at his rosy face. The cold didn't do well for such a pale complexion, but he wasn't too concerned about that at this particular moment.

He barely dodged said snow ball before running and tackling her into the pile of snow behind her. They had a good laugh, before deciding to call it quits. "Oh, I'm freezing now!" Draco whined.

"You started it," Hermione said, sticking her tongue out at him.

"Yes, I'm aware," he snarled, rolling his eyes. Then he smiled. He just noticed that today, she had smirked and he had been the one to roll his eyes. They were spending way too much time together if they were unconsciously picking up each other's habits. Not that he was going to say anything. He was too tired to care. "So what do little bookworms such as yourself fancy? I mean, just hypothetically if I were to get you something. I'm not, but I'm curious."

Hermione let out an over exaggerated sigh, as if answering was such an annoying thing to do. "I don't know, really. I like books, but not just any book. It has to be a good book, something both interesting and informative. And I like chocolate. And I like anything green—"

"Excuse me?" Draco was taken aback by that last one. "A Gryffindor's favorite color just so happens to be their rival's house color? This is a new turn of events."

Hermione just blushed and smirked. "Oh, shut it! It's been my favorite color since before I knew that magic and magical school houses existed. And even after I discovered that green was the house color for Slytherin, I decided that my favorite color wasn't going to change. If someone is going to get snarky with me because of it, so be it. I've already told you, I don't play that game."

Draco rolled his eyes for a second time that day. "Relax, Hermione. I was just poking a bit of fun at—what? Why are you looking at me like that?" She continued to stare at him with wide eyes. "Um…hello? Anyone in there?"

"You said my name." Draco was silent. "You just said my first name. I'm sorry, it's just…so weird hearing you say it out loud."

Draco stared at her now, only for a moment. Then he cleared his throat. "Yes, well…um…if it weirds you out then I can just not say it at all—"

"Draco, it's completely fine." Now he really stared at her. "Hello? Anyone in there?" she teased, tilting her head as she tried to get him to come back to his senses.

Finally he snapped out of it. "Oh, right. Yes. Good. Great. Yes."

Hermione couldn't help but laugh. "You really can be adorable sometimes."

Now he scowled. "I am NOT ador—"

"Anyway, what kind of gifts would you fancy?" she continued before he could finish complaining. "I've already told you mine. Good books, chocolate, and the color green. Although, simple jewelry would be nice too. Nothing too gaudy."

This girl…"Why on earth would I get you jewelry? Or anyone, for that matter? I'm only 11!" Hermione laughed once again as it took him a moment to realize she was teasing him. "Oh, one of these days I'm really going to hex you." He waited for her eye roll to cue him to continue answering the original question. "Well, this may take you by surprise, but I also happen to like a good book once in a while."

"Not surprised, actually."

"Stop interrupting or I'll put a Silencing Charm on you," he threatened playfully, masking his shock at her catching on to his reading habits. "I also happen to like simple jewelry, since we're throwing that out there. I'm not much of a chocolate person. I'm not a big fan of sweets, although I've been known to steal candy from other people and eat it just for the heck of it." Hermione glared and he smirked. "On a more serious note, though, I'm a big Quidditch fan. And I also like the color green, but you already knew that. Why are you asking, anyway?"

Hermione shrugged. "You asked me, so I thought it necessary to ask you, too." They smiled and had a nice laugh before finally deciding to part ways and find their way back to their elders. Little did they know a certain Slytherin had been watching their every move.

So they ARE friends…Things just got quite interesting. Walking back to his own mother, Blaise Zabini smiled lightly, deciding to keep a closer eye on those two to see how things unraveled.

Draco Malfoy took a nice hot shower as soon as he returned home to the Manor. The cold had chilled him to the bones, but it was worth it. He could try to deny it all he wanted, but the truth was there: he was quickly considering Hermione Granger to be one of his greatest friends. The fact that he didn't really have many good friends in the first place certainly didn't help. But he wanted to know more about her. If he knew more about her, maybe he could figure out why that stupid wand had chosen her and maybe he could even get over the fact that she was a muggleborn. Not a mudblood. A muggleborn.

As he walked into his room, he saw his mother's owl had dropped Hermione's letter on his desk before retreating to its perch upstairs. Making sure no one needed him for anything, he locked his door and opened the envelope.

Draco,

My holiday is going well, thank you for asking. I'm happy to hear yours is going great as well. I can only imagine the stress you feel when your father is around, no offense. He's a bit intimidating, even in the way he treats you.

No, HARRY and RON haven't been able to find anything on Nicholas Flammel as of late. Harry's last letter reported that he was nearly caught trying to find something in the Restricted Section, and then he started talking about some mirror with magical properties he'd stumbled upon while running from Filch. He never did give me specifics.

Why is your mother asking what you got me for Christmas? While I think it's extremely sweet of her, it would be dangerous if your father found out that you were buying gifts for…well…muggleborns such as myself. You don't have to be so awkward about talking about this, though. Hahaa xD You truly are adorable sometimes, I hope you know. Don't worry, your secret is safe with me. No one will know just how nervous girls make you.

I won't make mine as long. I don't think Malfoy's have the patience to sit through and just read something as boring as a letter from someone. So I will end mine here.

Happy Holidays,

Hermione

P.S. Don't assume things. What makes you think I haven't already gotten you something?

Draco stared at that last line, rereading it and smiling the smallest of smiles. Had she really gotten him something? And why did it touch him? He looked toward his desk drawer and opened it slightly, just enough to glance at the neatly wrapped box he had set aside in there. Dangerous or not…I got you something anyway, so you had better like it. He slipped the letter into the bottom drawer with the rest of the letters, letting sleep take over.

Alright, this ends Chapter 9! Thank you all again for your love and support and loyalty and all that jazz. I love you guys! Don't forget to review, favorite, and whatnot. Look forward to the next chapter!