Hermione had not spoken for half an hour after Draco had shown her his, Harry's and Ron's memories. He had come to two conclusions the first being that it hadn't worked and the second being that it was just taking her mind a long time to adjust to all this new information. Needless to say Draco was exceedingly nervous that she hadn't spoken for a long time. Screaming he could deal with. Crying he expected. Shouting would have been welcomed. Anything but this awful silence would have been a relief. She just stared, blank. Draco didn't think she had even acknowledged his presence yet.

Draco considered reaching out to her but worried his touch might do more harm than good. Maybe she didn't even realise he was here. He would just have to wait it out and hope that when she finally came around that she wouldn't be too aggressive towards him. His fingers desperately wanted to hold her. It broke him to see her looking so small and fragile. A few moments ago she had been filled with such fire and passion. Now her shoulders were slumped forward and her head was bowed slightly. She looked defeated.

This wasn't the Hermione Granger he had known at school. This wasn't the Hermione he had loved for the last month. This was a completely different person from those two entirely and it unsettled him. Did he still love her? Did he love this Hermione? He wasn't sure. He hadn't had much experience with Hermione outside of Hogwarts. If the person she had been this past month was the same as the Hermione Harry and Ron had known then yes, yes he did love her. He just wasn't sure how much her memory loss may have affected who she was. Regardless of that he knew this Hermione certainly wouldn't love him.

He should have left her as she was. He should have stayed with her here. Left his job, his friends and family and started a new life with her. Draco knew he would have been able to cope with her episodes. He would have been able to hold her until they passed. He would have been able to be there for her and she wouldn't have been repulsed by him, but as good as that sounded Draco knew that at some point she would have remembered everything regardless. Her memories had come back in short bursts anyway. He would have had a year or two with her until all the barriers came crashing down.

Hermione's right arm began to move slightly, her fingers inching toward the scar on the opposite side of her. Draco watched as she gently began to trace it, and then push down on it, and then scratch it, and then it was open and bleeding and she was sobbing in front of him. The noise coming from her mouth was incomprehensible. He couldn't tell if she was speaking or not but the noise of her pain and grief felt like a punch to his gut.

Without thinking Draco grabbed her arm and pulled it away from the wound and then wrapped himself around her. She clung to him, her fingers gripping every inch of him as if to stop him from leaving despite the fact he was not going anywhere. He stroked her hair softly and hummed some sort of song he had heard on her radio a few days earlier hoping it would soothe her. Her tears didn't subside for a long time. Her body tensed and shook in his arms as if she were having a fit. She just wouldn't stop crying. He heard something scratching against the door and realised Boo was on the other side. Should he let the cat in? Would that comfort her? It was difficult to move away from her though as she'd embedded her nails into his back. Boo meowed. Hermione froze.

It was that moment that Hermione woke up. Her eyes glanced around the room frantically. She was alert and assessing the area around her. She stopped planning escape routes when her eyes finally landed on the other person in the room. Her mind pieced together his appearance, desperately trying to figure out who he was. She glared at the white blonde hair for a few seconds and then it clicked and horror filled her entire being.

"Malfoy?" She whispered, her voice hoarse from all the crying. Her eyes weren't filled with the love Draco had once seen there, but fear. "You've come to kill me, haven't you?"

"What? No-."

"DON'T LIE TO ME. I KNOW VOLDEMORT SENT YOU. WELL I'M NOT TELLING YOU ANYTHING."

It took Draco a while to realise what was happening. She was clearly confused. Her memories had just come back and it was taking her a while to get to the present day. He watched her as she frantically searched her body for something, her hands grabbing at her waist, her eyes filled with alarm. Her wand. Draco's mind began to race frantically too. Did she still have one? Had it been placed somewhere safe or just discarded?

"Where's my wand?"

Draco did not respond.

"WHERE'S MY WAND."

Draco remained silent. Hermione's eyes narrowed. Draco held his hands up for her to see he wasn't hiding anything. She racked her brain to figure out how to take him down. He was stood in front of the door and so to get out she'd need to get past him. Draco's arms moved down to his sides again. He didn't think she was a threat. He thought he would be able to keep her locked up in this room until Voldemort came to kill her. Well he was wrong about that. Hermione took her chance and lunged for him.

He fell to the floor instantly, head banging against the door as he was knocked back. She stood attempting to turn the handle but his hand shot out to grab her leg pulling her down. She crashed to the floor with a yelp and landed on her stomach, unable to see what Draco was doing behind her. He manoeuvred himself off the floor and grabbed both her arms pinning them behind her back. She thrashed around violently, kicking her legs out trying to get him off her but he refused to budge. Her energy began to slip and her eyelids battled against her attempting to surrender to the tiredness that had overcome her. She finally stopped moving and promptly fell asleep.

Draco waited for a moment and then carefully lifted her, placing her back on the bed. He watched her sleep acknowledging how peaceful she looked and then opened the bedroom door to let Boo in who instantly jumped up on the bed to curl up next to Hermione. Boo's paw stretched out to rest against Hermione's stomach. Draco thought it looked like Boo was trying to comfort her owner and stared in awe at the feline.

He turned and walked to the living room, grabbing one of her dining chairs. Draco dragged it into her bedroom and placed it next to the bed so he could watch over her as she slept. He sat down and laced his fingers with hers. It was her left arm, the one that was still bleeding slightly from her self-mutilation of it. He stood again and headed to her bathroom, grabbing a flannel and wetting it. He returned to his seat and grabbed Hermione's hand, flipping her arm over so he could clean the wound. He pressed down on it gently first hoping the pressure would stop it from bleeding and then carefully brushed it over the mark wiping away any dried blood. The word made him cringe and he glanced at his own mark in comparison. They were both branded with things that had once been proud of but were now ashamed.

"Ugly, isn't it?"

Draco glanced up to find her watching him and then returned his attention to her injury.

"Why aren't you using your wand to heal it?"

Draco stayed silent not knowing what to say to Hermione. He didn't feel like he knew her. Where would he even begin? I found you last month and pursued you and you fell in love with me and I bought you a cat and I wish you could forget me again so that we could be together because I know you're repulsed by me and the things that I've done.

"Why are you here, Malfoy?"

"The Ministry sent me. A few muggle born's had gone missing. You were on the list. Harry should have been sent but because of your friendship they decided to send me. They didn't want Harry's feelings getting in the way of the job. You know first-hand how headstrong you Gryffindor's can be."

Hermione would have opened her mouth to retort against that comment had she of not just attacked him on impulse a few moments earlier. Instead she lay there letting him clean her wound the muggle way and tried to work out how she felt about having her memories back. She remembered her mother and 'Mione and wondered how they were getting on. Had her sister shown any signs of accidental magic yet? Was there even a school in Australia she could go to if she was a witch? Would she figure out that they were related and attempt to get in contact?

It seemed Hermione was back to the start again. What was her place in the world? What should she do now? Firstly, she decided she would leave the Ministry. She wasn't happy there and so it was useless to stay there. She'd make it clear to Ron that they were never going to be together. She'd learn to let go of all the dead that she kept locked inside her and most importantly, she'd begin to live again.

"My father is dead." She said. She didn't care if Draco was listening or not. She just needed to speak, "I have a sister called Hermione. My mother doesn't remember me. I can't restore her memories now that she has a newer model of me. Ron wants to marry me. I don't love him. I hate my job. I don't want to die but I don't feel alive. I am drifting through a life that I do not deserve."

Draco moved from the chair to kneel by the bed, dropping the blood stained flannel on the floor. He grabbed her face in both hands and stroked her cheeks softly, "Stop thinking about everyone else, Hermione. Do the things that will make you happy. So what if you don't love Ron. Who cares about your job. This is your life. If you don't like something, change it. A woman once told me, 'Tomorrow.' Granger, your tomorrow's will be magnificent. Just let it happen."

She nodded softly and stared up at him, trying to work out why he was being so nice. Draco didn't do nice. He had never been nice. Not to her. She'd seen him at the Ministry a few times heading to the Auror offices and had been curious about him. Similarly to her, he had seemed like he was going through the motions of life without actually living it. They caught the others eyes from across the hall sometimes. Some days they would stare at each other, some days Hermione would look away first, some days Draco would. At the time neither of them had known how to feel about each other. Their hate had turned into indifference and then into unsureness and then curiosity. Hermione hadn't known how to feel about him after the war. She made sure to stand up for him during his trial. But she was confused as to what exactly he was to her. He was neither friend nor foe and yet he had been such a huge part of her childhood because of his taunts. How was she supposed to feel about him now?

"Hermione," His eyes looked desperate as his hands stayed clutching her face, "Do you remember anything of the time you've been out here? Anything at all?"

She searched through her newly returned memories for any inkling of Draco. She dug past images of them as children, him hurling insults at her and her mocking him back. She pushed past the scene of him looking lost and confused during the final battle realising the side he was on was the losing one. She lingered by the one of him at his trial and the hope in his eyes when she had defended his actions. That was the first time he had looked at her with something other than disgust. It was the day Hermione had realised she didn't know who he was any more, as he was no longer a school bully but a young man searching for his place on Earth.

Hermione found one memory that she didn't recognise. A memory of him as he looked now. Of the two of them in a kitchen she didn't recognise. They were dancing to an old disco record her dad had loved. Draco's smile was bright and clear on his face, his laughter filling the vision with such light. Their dancing looked ridiculous but the happiness exuding from them both was unmistakable. Their hands were clasped as he twirled her this way and that and then she was on the counter. She saw him lean over kiss her. Their kissing was as energetic as their dancing, tongues moving fluidly against each other. She pressed her lips together at the thought of it.

The memory faded and Draco's face came into view. He had taken advantage of her. Anger boiled up inside her as she stared at him and the words fell from her lips before she could think it through properly.

"No. I remember nothing."