Friday, 11 December 1998

"Happy to see me?" a grumpy voice sounded from behind him.

Draco tensed slightly and slowly turned around to look at the girl standing behind him. Granger was glaring coldly down at him. She looked better than she had in the Hospital Wing a few days ago: she wasn't as pale and she no longer had any bandages wrapped around her head.

"Positively thrilled, Granger," he told her in a cool, bored voice. In reality, he was happy to see her. He had been quite worried about her state and the consequences it would have for him. On top of that, over the past few days he had fully realised for the first time just how many responsibilities Granger actually carried, and covering for them had absolutely exhausted him. Feeling a little uncomfortable with her towering over his chair, Draco slowly rose from his chair and turned around to face her. "How is your head?" he asked her hesitantly.

"It's sore, Malfoy," she replied sharply, and he noticed a flash of anger in her eyes. He looked away and bit back a reply. As much as he hated the tone in which she was speaking to him, deep down he knew he deserved her anger and that he had to accept it in order to keep her from reporting him. If she would do that, everything would be ruined. He couldn't have that.

Granger walked past him and sat down on the couch, sending him another glare as she watched him sit down again as well. "We need to talk," she announced coldly.

Draco stared at her, making sure he kept up an unimpressed demeanour, though he had to admit that her cold attitude slightly unnerved him. He didn't know this side of her; he barely recognised her like this.

"I spoke with Professor McGonagall earlier," she continued, after which she paused, looking rather irritated as she seemed to struggle to find the words. "She somehow suspects you, but she doesn't have any evidence that links you to the… incident." Granger looked up and narrowed her eyes. "Malfoy," she hissed, "just what did you do?"

Draco sighed quietly and looked away again. He didn't want to tell her but he knew he had to; he had to make her understand. "I didn't mean for it to happen," he started defensively. From the corner of his eye he saw that his tone wasn't appreciated. He let out a frustrated groan.

"I was angry, which I'm sure you had noticed already," he continued in a slightly less hostile tone. He turned back to look at her. "I was worried about Pansy. You said the wrong things at the wrong time and I wasn't able to control my anger. I didn't realise what I was doing until it was too late."

Granger had her eyebrows raised in a sceptical manner but said nothing, so Draco took that as a sign that he could continue. "When I was thinking straight again, you were lying on the floor in a puddle of blood." He winced at the memory. There had been so much blood, and the puddle had grown rapidly. "I panicked, I didn't know what to do," he very uncharacteristically rambled. "It's not like I'm bad at Charms, but healing spells have never really captured my interest. I was afraid of doing a bad job. It's not like I didn't realise what kind of trouble I was in. Imagine the headlines, Draco Malfoy expelled after injuring Head Girl and war heroine Hermione Granger. No, thanks."

"Just get on with your story, Malfoy," Granger said, sounding tired. "Parkinson mentioned that I was found in the library. How did I end up there? It was well after your curfew. One toe out of this common room and—"

"If you would stop interrupting me I might eventually get to that part," Draco snapped, instantly regretting losing his composure. He took a deep breath. "The blood made me lose my cool. So I sent a memo down to Nott, and when he got here he had brought Greengrass…"

Greengrass had not been amused. She had glared down at Granger's motionless body for a moment before whirling around and snapping at him. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" she shouted. "Do you miss Zabini so severely that you want to be expelled as well?! Because you've just done a fantastic job at achieving that! The Head Girl, Malfoy, are you serious?!"

"Daphne, calm down," Nott countered quietly. "He didn't call us here to be reprimanded, he called for help. Make yourself useful and fix her up before burning him down to his socks."

"Don't you tell me what to do," she snapped. "How can you stand there so calmly, anyway? He just made you an accessory by getting you here! You — actually, we — could get in some serious trouble."

"We just have to make sure we won't get caught," Nott answered calmly. "Now, will you please fix her up? We don't want the Head Girl bleeding out in our company while we think of a way to get Malfoy—and ourselves—out of this mess, and you're the only one among us with adequate healing skills."

Greengrass shot Nott a cold glare as she took out her wand. "Playing the flattery card, how utterly pathetic of you."

She made her way over to the unconscious Gryffindor on the floor and kneeled down beside her head, moving the curls out of the way to inspect the wound. "Merlin's beard, Malfoy, what did you do to her? This wound is ridiculously deep, I cannot heal this," she said, an anxious edge to her voice. "Not entirely, at least. I can stop the bleeding but that's all I dare to do."

Nott sat down in the closest armchair and rubbed his chin. "That would be good enough. I've got an idea."

"You dragged your classmates into this?" Granger snapped, pulling him back to the present. "You're the most irresponsible Head Boy I've ever had the misfortune of laying eyes upon!"

"Granger… Please stop interrupting," Draco sighed tiredly.

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Fine, get on with it, then."

As Greengrass finished up putting a stop to the bleeding, Nott jumped up again with more excitement than Draco had ever seen him display in all the years they had known each other. "We have to move her."

"Move her?" Greengrass asked, a sceptical tone to her voice.

"Yes. It would be plausible for Granger to have gotten hurt being too eager studying. If we successfully move her to the library and stage a fall—"

"The library? How the hell are you planning to pull that off?!" Greengrass interrupted irritably.

Nott turned to look at her, unfazed. "Disillusionment Charm, a bit of levitation. It's not that difficult. The three of us—"

"I can't leave this room after seven p.m.," Draco reminded them reluctantly. "McGonagall will know the moment I set foot outside the portrait."

"Right. That… makes it slightly more complicated."

"It doesn't have to be, actually," he replied immediately, feeling more hopeful. He turned to Greengrass. "Could you run up to Granger's dorm and see if you can find a cloak? It should feel like silk and look silvery." Upon seeing the confused faces of both Nott and Greengrass he gave them a small smirk. "Potter has an invisibility cloak. I'm quite sure he lent it to Granger. You can use it to shield Granger from view when you move her."

Greengrass muttered something unfriendly under her breath, but she still moved toward the staircase that led to the Head Girl's chambers and rapidly disappeared from view as she climbed the steps.

Draco looked up at Granger as the memory of the incident ebbed away and he once again returned to the present day. She was staring at him with a disdainful look on her face. "She found the cloak on the chair in the corner of your dorm and together they moved you and staged the fall in the library," he continued.

"Greengrass came back to return the cloak and then returned to the dungeons, and Nott undid the healing spell to make it seem real and hung around the library until you were found, which didn't take long. I'm told there was a lot of noise. Two patrolling sixth-year prefects alerted me with a memo which gave me a reason to leave the common room and go to the infirmary. Shortly after I arrived and had talked to Pomfrey, McGonagall arrived as well. She suspected me immediately, I could tell, but the prefects vouched for me. I wasn't anywhere near the library all evening and she knew exactly what time I left the Head's Tower because it was after my curfew. By the time I left the common room, you were already in the hospital wing…"

Draco trailed off and hesitantly glanced up at Granger, who wasn't looking at him and seemed deep in thought. He kept quiet for a little while longer, hoping she would say something. When she didn't, he sighed and, after a brief inward battle, abandoned his pride. "Granger, honestly, I'm sorry."

"Sorry it happened, or sorry I remembered it happened?" Granger countered instantly, though her voice sounded a little less hostile. She looked up and Draco tried to read her expression before he spoke. He concluded that her face seemed to have softened a little as well. His stomach turned and he took a moment to choose his next words carefully as he convinced himself to stay seated instead of storming out of the common room. It went against his very being to ignore his instinct to leave and to remain here instead to continue their conversation.

"Look, Granger, I know it's no excuse, but just like when you punched me in our third year, what happened on Tuesday was not really directed at you. I was worried about Pansy and the fact that you kept going on about my responsibility really hit a nerve. I know I'm a hypocrite, but you seemed so okay with Pansy being bullied… It crossed a line for me. I didn't mean to hurt you but I also couldn't control myself."

The common room went quiet for a while. Draco stared at the fire in the fireplace to avoid Granger's judgemental stare. He heard the Head Girl sigh and turned his head to look at her again. Her anger seemed to have vanished, and instead, she suddenly looked really tired. "Malfoy… I can't go on like this," she said quietly. "I don't like you and I don't think I ever will, and I know you feel the same, but here we are and I don't want to give up this position any more than you do. We have to find a way to tolerate each other. We have to stop fighting like this. I can't do this anymore. I really can't."

The honesty and vulnerability in her voice startled him a little. Even though he had been reminded of the fact that Granger, too, had a vulnerable side, he never felt comfortable witnessing it. Just when he opened his mouth again to respond to her, she beat him to it.

"Just tell me what you want, Malfoy. What do you need to be able to continue this year as a respectable Head Boy without maiming me in the process? You said you don't hate me and I want to believe that, but I'm running out ways to stay optimistic."

Draco inhaled sharply and his inward battle continued. He felt sick to his stomach but somehow managed to breathe out the words. "I don't… I don't know who I am anymore." Granger didn't respond. He could feel her eyes on him but he was determined to not look at her. He wouldn't be able to continue if he saw her. With all his might, he had to pretend he was talking to no one but himself.

"The way I was raised… I'm supposed to be a certain way. I'm supposed to believe certain things. I was able to do that for years, but then…" he trailed off, struggling to find his next words. There was a lot he wanted to say but he felt he was physically unable to say the words out loud. "Here at Hogwarts… It's just easier to be who I've always been," he settled after a lengthy silence.

"I understand," Granger said quietly. She rose from the couch and hesitated for a moment. "Thank you for telling me the truth." With that, she turned away and disappeared to her dorm, leaving Draco alone in the common room to reflect on the horrible fact that he had just been more open and honest with Granger than he had with anyone else in his life ever.

Saturday, 19 December 1998

The week had gone by far too slowly for Draco's liking, and when he finally woke up on the last day of the semester, he was incredibly relieved that he would be going home soon and have a break from Hogwarts.

It had taken him the entire previous weekend to get over the conversation he had had with Granger, and he had tried to avoid her the entire week. She had the grace to allow this and didn't speak to him unless absolutely necessary and luckily, that wasn't often. The entire student body was looking forward to the Christmas holidays and in good spirits; creating trouble seemed the last thing their minds, and organising who would be going home and who would stay at Hogwarts during the holiday was a low-effort task, especially now that the workload was divided between the two of them again.

When Draco reached the Slytherin table in the Great Hall for breakfast on Saturday morning and sat down next to Pansy, he immediately had an icy-blue envelope pushed in his hand. Without opening it, Draco instantly knew what it was. He put it aside and reached for some porridge. Across from him, Astoria Greengrass was sitting next to her elder sister—a rare sight—both with those same envelopes in their hands, softly engaged in serious-looking conversation.

"I'm glad your parents resumed the tradition," he told Pansy after a few bites of his breakfast. "Last year was just not the same without it."

"Apparently throwing New Year's parties during a war is frowned upon," Pansy answered with feigned confusion. She then glanced up at him with a more serious expression on her face. "Gregory owled me yesterday that my parents invited him and his father, and that Mr and Mrs Crabbe are planning on coming as well."

Draco put down his spoon and looked her in the eye, remaining silent for a while to take in this news. "I didn't expect them to get back into society so soon," he said softly.

"Me neither," came Pansy's soft response. "Millicent won't come. And my parents don't seem to agree on whether or not they want to invite Mrs Zabini."

"We should probably visit Millicent then," Greengrass added, briefly turning her attention from her younger sister to her best friend. "The dorm is not the same without dear old Bulstrode and I haven't talked to her in months."

"I don't understand why you two like her," Draco muttered, frowning while he finished his porridge. "She really wasn't bright."

Pansy wrinkled her nose. "You're one to talk. I still don't know how Greg and Vincent managed to get past their first-year exams, let alone five more."

Draco put down his coffee mug with a bit more force than strictly necessary. Both the Greengrass sisters looked up, startled, but Pansy never broke off their eye contact.

"I'm sorry," she offered after a short silence before turning her attention to the Greengrass sisters, allowing him some time to compose himself.

He listened to them discuss their plans for the upcoming holidays and the guest list for the annual New Year's party at the Parkinsons, as well as the girly topics of what sort of dress they would be wearing. Just as Draco was ready to join the conversation again, Nott arrived at the table and quickly grabbed some fruit.

"The first people just left for Hogsmeade," he announced. "Shall we go?"

"Where were you?" Greengrass asked instead of answering his question. "You've been gone all morning."

Nott bit in his apple and leisurely chewed and swallowed his bite before he replied. "I helped out some fifth-years with their O.W.L. preparations per Slughorn's request," he answered. "Apparently it will get me a recommendation for a Ministry internship."

Greengrass whistled softly, looking impressed. "Nice job."

The four of them rose from the benches and joined Nott toward the doors to the Entrance Hall. The girls made their way down to the dungeons to get their cloaks, which Draco and Nott had already brought with them. When they finally returned, the group of five made their way over to the long queue of students waiting to be granted permission to leave for the magical village, where they were joined by Astoria's friends Imogen Stretton and Amy Frome. Once they left the grounds and reached the carriages, the fifth-year girls left to go out on their own, and the four seventh-years rode in a carriage together.

Upon their arrival in Hogsmeade Village, they leisurely wandered around for a few hours, visiting some of the popular shops to do some Christmas shopping. Eventually, all of them lost all feeling in their fingers from the cold, despite wearing gloves, and they decided to warm up inside somewhere. They reached the Three Broomsticks, and Greengrass moved to the door, ready to go inside.

"Wait," Pansy called out. "We can't go here."

"Why not?" Greengrass replied irritably, turning back to face her best friend.

"Because…" she trailed off, glancing in Draco's direction with uncertainty.

He glared at the timbered facade of the pub in front of him, knowing that he would be thrown out the moment Madam Rosmerta laid eyes on him. On the other hand, his friends were freezing and he didn't want them to relocate to another pub for his sake. He didn't want their pity.

"You three go ahead," he said after a moment of considering his options, trying to sound nonchalant. "I still have some business to attend to."

As Nott and Greengrass moved inside, Pansy stared at him, clearly trying to gauge whether or not he meant it. He gave her a subtle nod, and after quickly kissing his cheek, she followed them into the popular pub, leaving Draco alone out in the cold.

Feeling a little sorry for himself, Draco turned on his heel and irritably made his way down the High Street back to Gladrags Wizardwear. After all, he really did have some business to attend to. He stepped inside and moved his fingers, acclimating them to the warmer temperature inside.

"Good afternoon," an older wizard greeted him stiffly. "How may I be of service today?"

Draco made his way past the racks of dress robes and cloaks over to the wizard's counter. "I requested some jewellery last week. I'm here to pick it up."

"Ah, yes, young Mr Malfoy." The wizard nodded, enlightened. He shuffled to the back of the store and reappeared a moment later with an expensive-looking, black velvet box. He placed it on his desk and opened it, revealing its contents to Draco.

Inside was a beautiful diamond necklace. The delicate chain was bejewelled with little diamonds, and at the bottom hung a medium-sized, teardrop-shaped, pink gemstone. The wizard put on some soft-looking white gloves and carefully lifted the necklace from its box, moving it around in the light.

"A platinum chain with one-hundred-twenty-five 1.3 carat diamonds," he spoke solemnly. "And here at the bottom, of course, as requested, the beautiful Poudretteite at an amazing 9.41 carats. Extremely rare. Extremely beautiful. The necklace is goblin-made and of the finest quality. It will last a lifetime."

Draco took a moment to appreciate the craftsmanship of the necklace. "Excellent," he announced. "This will do very nicely."

The wizard gently placed the necklace back in its box. "A beautiful gift, for undoubtedly, a beautiful lady," he offered generously. "The necklace's worth is estimated at five-thousand-eight-hundred-sixty-nine Galleons, five Sickles and thirteen Knuts, but for you, young Mr Malfoy, I have bargained it down to just fifty-five-hundred Galleons."

"Pleasure doing business, sir," Draco answered appreciatively. He took a little book from the inside pocket of his cloak and requested a quill. After he signed a cheque, the wizard carefully packed the black box and handed him the most expensive Christmas gift he had ever gotten anyone.

Once outside again, the sour realisation of his current lonely fate hit him again. His friends were likely having a great time in the Three Broomsticks, and here he was, alone in the cold, nearly deserted streets of Hogsmeade. The wind had picked up, dropping the temperature considerably, and most of the Hogwarts student that were still in the village had retreated to one of the pubs to warm up. Feeling rather miserable, Draco started moving back towards the carriages and returned to the castle.

After a cold and quiet trip back, he made a quick stop in the Great Hall to collect some sandwiches before making his way up to the Head's Tower where he reluctantly settled down on the couch with a book. Only three more hours of utter boredom to kill before dinner was served and everyone returned from Hogsmeade.

~ X ~

"Malfoy?"

He had fallen asleep. Great. Draco groaned and slowly opened his eyes, glaring in the general direction of his unappreciated wake-up-call. Granger was standing next to the furthest armchair, looking at him with a subtle frown on her brows.

"What is it?" he grumbled.

"Dinner is served," she answered neutrally. "I thought you might like to know." With those words, she turned on her heel and made for the portrait, disappearing to the adjacent corridor.

Draco swung his legs over the couch and sat up, putting his book next to him on the seat, and rubbed his eyes, giving himself a moment to fully wake up. He felt pathetic. While his friends had been out having fun, as one should on the last Saturday afternoon of the semester, he had willingly isolated himself in this dreadful tower he so desperately had tried to get out of for some months now.

He rose from the couch, whipped out his wand and Vanished the not-consumed sandwich from the coffee table. Quickly moving his wand over his robes to remove the creases from his clothes, he left the common room through the portrait hole and followed the deserted corridors to the ground floor to join his friends for dinner.

Once he entered the Great Hall through the double oak doors, he immediately locked eyes with Pansy, who was not touching her food but was staring intently at the entrance, clearly waiting for him. A wave of relief seemed to wash over her when Draco smirked as he made his way over to where she and their friends were sitting. Pansy visibly relaxed when he sat down next to her and smiled at him when he briefly squeezed her knee to show his appreciation.

"There you are," Nott commented between bites. "We were afraid you never found your way back to the castle without us."

Instead of feeling offended for being teased, Draco couldn't fight back an amused smirk. "So kind of you to worry about me, Nott," he replied, rolling his eyes at the boy across from the table as he started loading up his plate with food.

"Unwarranted worry, of course," came a soft voice from his right side. "Draco Malfoy is a big boy now, who can take care of himself."

He turned to look at the brunette beside him with his eyebrows raised. "Don't you think that's a little bit too familiar a tone, little Greengrass?" he tutted mock-seriously.

Astoria smirked at him, her eyes glinting with amusement. "My bad, Mr Head Boy, sir."

As his friends started laughing, Draco found that he was unable to stop himself from joining in. After the amusement had ebbed away, the fifth-year prefect started a new serious-looking conversation with her elder sister, who was sitting across from her.

Draco turned his attention back to Pansy, only to find her studying him with curiosity.

"Why are you in such a good mood?" she asked him quietly, making sure their friends wouldn't hear. "I thought you'd be mere inches removed from cursing everyone who'd look at you wrong, considering the ending to our time in Hogsmeade earlier."

Taking a bite of his food, he considered the question for a little while as he chewed. "I was in a rotten mood after you went inside," he admitted quietly, "but joining you all here again was enough to improve that."

Pansy smiled at him. "Even though we tease you?"

Draco stared into her blue eyes again and felt his smile leave his face. He hesitated briefly. "Let's be honest," he said so quietly that Pansy had to lean closer to be able to hear, "no one will still look up to me or my family after what happened last year. Our imposing reputation is gone. I might as well enjoy the fact that I still have friends at all."

The dark-haired girl next to him seemed at a loss for words, and the longer they stared into each other's eyes, the more Draco was convinced that she was fighting to keep her emotions in check. He gently placed his hand on her lower back in an attempt to comfort her, which then proved to be the last drop to make the bucket overflow.

Pansy quickly sneaked her arms around his waist and pressed her face against his chest. Momentarily frozen in shock, he quickly recovered and embraced her, softly stroking her back as he felt a wetness spread on the front of his robe where Pansy had hidden her face, revealing that she was crying, though she made no sound.

He had never seen Pansy cry, and though, strictly speaking, he didn't really see anything right now, he could have gone his whole life without discovering this side of her if it were up to him. At the same time, he understood perfectly well why her emotions had gotten the better of her.

They weren't raised to have friends. Their goal had always been to make allies and to become leaders of groups of useful people of respected families. Friendship and love were secondary to status and building useful ties. That goal was dominant, but it had never truly stopped them from forming friendships. Draco's family had been the most strict and with the toughest expectations, and so Draco had always been the one with the best poker face. When his friends teased him, he couldn't laugh: he had to put them in their place and show them he wasn't to be messed with.

But the War had changed everything. The most respectable families had a dominant Slytherin background and ties to the Dark Lord. They had all been exposed now, and most of their great reputations were ruined. Draco had realised this months ago, but it was a tough reality to adapt to because it was all he had ever known, all any of them had ever known.

Those inherited expectations were now gone. There were new expectations now, and those were possibly even more difficult to live up to because they were behind on their classmates from other Houses by years. It was something they had all quietly attempted to get used to, and the fact that he of all people had just said out loud what all of them had probably been feeling for the past few months somehow gave them permission to come to terms with their new reality and mourn the way it used to be.

The Slytherins sitting directly around them had all fallen quiet and didn't even attempt to mask their shock and curiosity at what was happening. Draco glared at the ones he hardly knew, causing them to quickly look away again. Their classmates and Astoria all looked at him with worry, but just as he wanted to speak up, Pansy let go of him and sat back up. Her face was remarkably dry, though her eyes were red and revealed that there had been tears. With a flick of her wand she dried his robes, with another one she re-heated her plate of food and with one glare she kept their friends from asking questions.

They all quickly resumed eating, waiting for Pansy to break the silence. After a few minutes, she threw down her fork. "This pork chop is about as dry as burnt parchment," she spat, causing the group to chuckle. The tension was gone, and conversation resumed.

Sunday, 20 December 1998

"Malfoy, could I have a word before you leave?"

Draco reluctantly halted in the corridor and slowly turned back to Granger, who was still standing in the prefect's compartment of the Hogwarts Express. They had just conducted the last meeting of the semester and the prefects that would be going home had been given their last assignments of the year. The Head Girl seemed a little uncomfortable. Her hands fiddled around with a folded piece of parchment and she had her lips pressed together in a thin line. Somehow she looked even more uncomfortable when he stepped back into the compartment and closed the door behind him.

"I want to give you this," Granger said finally. She offered him the parchment she had been holding. "It's my best visual description of the place where we will meet on Thursday. It's only a short walk from my home."

Draco frowned as he quickly scanned the contents of the parchment. "Why can't I just Apparate to your doorstep?" he asked irritably.

"Don't act like you don't understand etiquette," she replied in a snobby tone. "It's rude. And not to mention, impossible. I made the house and surrounding garden Unplottable." He looked up to meet her eyes and raised an eyebrow in disbelief. She met his gaze with a glare. "Don't look at me like that. Just because Voldemort is gone doesn't mean I'll suddenly leave my parents unprotected."

"Yes, whatever, Granger." He refolded the piece of parchment and stuck it in the pocket inside his robes, taking his time to conceal his uncomfortableness at her casual mention of the Dark Lord's name. "What time?"

"Noon would be good. We'll have Midnight Mass at, well, midnight, so that would be a perfect time for you to leave."

"What is—"

"I'll tell you on Thursday," Granger interrupted him impatiently. "See you then." With those words she brushed past him and left the compartment, only to return mere moments later.

"One last thing," she muttered, looking increasingly more uncomfortable by the second. "In the Muggle world, it is not customary for people—especially people our age—to call each other by their last name. So please try to get used to the idea of calling me Hermione on Thursday."

As Granger once again disappeared from sight, Draco turned away from the door and glared out of the window at the rapid flashes of scenery they passed. Calling Granger by her first name? He had never even thought her first name. It sounded incredibly foreign just saying it in his head. He didn't even call his friends by their first names. The use of last names was so ingrained that he could only think of one person he was comfortable enough around to break that habit, and that was Pansy. Then again, they had been close since they were children and he was pretty sure he would marry her one day. She was also the only one who was allowed to call him by his first name. It just felt wrong when most other people did it.

Draco slowly made his way back to his own compartment, deep in thought. Why did names mean that much to him? He suspected it all traced back to the way he and most of his classmates were raised. The use of last names meant keeping your distance. Allies, not friends; connections, not relationships.

He opened the door to the compartment where his friends were sitting and frowned again as he joined them. He really did consider these people his friends, and yet thinking of them as Theodore and Daphne instead of Nott and Greengrass felt uneasy; let alone address them that way out loud. It was an interesting realisation.

For so long he had just gone with the way things were, never once questioning why he did the things he did, never considering if another way might be better. He always just assumed that his parents knew what would be the right path to follow and he had blindly followed them. It was the only path he had ever known, and now that path was slowly unravelling.

Things were changing. Some rapidly; some more slowly, but change was in the air, and although not all of it was bad, it still felt wrong. He was quietly questioning things he had never thought twice about before, and he wondered if he was the only one, or if his friends experienced these things too.

Pansy put her hand on his knee and without looking at her, Draco knew he was being reminded of the fact that he was with company and that it was expected of him to participate in the conversation. He refocused on Nott's story as he put his hand on Pansy's, knowing that she would recognise this as a thank-you.

Even though he kind of dreaded it, there would be plenty of time to think once he was home.