Hello everybody!
I don't know if you've heard, but tonight was the night of the legislative elections in France and everyone was very afraid because the RN (the far-right party, i.e. the racist fascists) had won the first round, and fortunately the French people mobilised against them and the left passed! So I'm very relieved, I was dreading the idea of writing a note here to say that the fascists had won and the country was in chaos!
Anyway, about the chapter. I think you underestimated Pansy in the comments last week... You've forgotten what she's capable of!
I'm sorry for those of you who aren't fans of the Pansy/Draco friendship, because this is a chapter very much focused on that. It wasn't intentional, but I think I needed to develop that side of their friendship and burnish the reputation of poor Pansy, who got her head handed to her in the last chapter hahaha
I'll leave you to your reading :)
tw : blood, non-consensual kiss
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Draco
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Draco had kissed Pansy dozens of times in the past.
He'd memorised the shape of her lips without even realising it. He'd kissed her so many times in the dark that he'd memorised the outline of her mouth and the way her breathing quickly became jerky. It always started the same way, with the violence of the first touch, as if one of them wanted to show who was in more of a hurry.
Pansy's lips were fresh and they met his with force. He felt her teeth pierce his lower lip in surprise and he grabbed her neck with his left hand to hold her closer...
He knew Pansy's kisses. They were familiar, comforting. Draco felt a wave of satisfaction, for this kiss was nothing like the one Granger had given him. Pansy was cold, her skin icy against his, and the contact finally extinguished the fire that had been burning inside Draco since he'd left the stairwell.
He had expected Pansy to melt into his arms, but the first second he kissed her, he realised that this kiss was nothing like the previous ones. Pansy's lips were too cold, too closed. Normally, she automatically opened her lips to let him in, pressed against him and wrapped her arms around his neck. Now, she was stunned and shocked.
And Draco had just enough time to pull his face away from hers before she gave him the second biggest slap he'd ever received in his life.
Draco's head was thrown to the side with such force that he groaned in pain. He felt as if Pansy had dislocated his jaw with the force of her blow. He massaged his cheek, where Potter had given him a bruise that morning, without daring to look at Pansy. The surprise of the blow was almost more painful than the slap itself.
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" cried Pansy in outrage.
Draco stood up awkwardly, completely disbelieving, the palm of his hand still resting on his cheek.
"I don't know, I thought..."
"YOU THOUGHT WHAT? THAT BECAUSE I WAS WORRIED ABOUT YOU, YOU COULD KISS ME HOWEVER YOU WANTED? WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM, DRACO?"
Draco tensed as he saw the pure rage written on every feature of Pansy's face. She was shaking with rage, an anger far more icy than he was used to feeling. Draco often had unexplained fits of rage, but when it happened to Pansy, she was simply unstoppable.
She might have been eight inches shorter than him, but right now, she was terrifying him.
"Pans, I..."
"THERE ARE NO FUCKING "PANS'", DRACO MALFOY!" she shouted, shoving him violently. Draco caught the edge of the bathtub and barely held on to the bathroom wall to keep from falling backwards. "I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR YOU ALL DAY! I CRIED AND TRIED TO FIND YOU WHEN BLAISE AND THEO TOLD ME TO FORGET IT! I WORRIED ABOUT YOU, I WAITED ALL DAY FOR YOU TO DEIGN TO COME BACK, AND I TREATED YOU, AND I WAS KIND, AND YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF ME LIKE THAT?! DID YOU REALLY THINK I WOULD KISS YOU BACK? THAT I WAS GOING TO SUGGEST THAT WE GO TO YOUR BED SO YOU COULD DO WHATEVER YOU WANTED, SO YOU COULD RELEASE WHATEVER EMOTION YOU WERE FEELING?"
"No, not at all, I don't know why I..." stammered Draco, but Pansy wasn't listening. Tears of rage ran down her cheeks, making her coal-coloured pupils glow.
"WHAT DID YOU THINK? THAT POOR PANSY, THE POOR WEEPING LOVER WHO'S JUST WAITING FOR A SIGN FROM YOU, WOULD GIVE IN TO YOUR EVERY WHIM? DID YOU THINK OF THE PAIN IT WOULD CAUSE ME? DID YOU THINK FOR ONE SECOND THAT MAYBE I HAD MOVED ON, THAT I WAS DESPERATELY TRYING TO FALL IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE ELSE AND YOU'D JUST RUINED IT FOR ME?"
"Pansy, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."
"YOU'RE AN ARSEHOLE, DRACO MALFOY!" she screamed, her voice shaking with sobs. She pounded Draco's chest with her fists. Draco barely felt them, but seeing her in that state broke him far more than any slap she could give him. "You're an arsehole! You only use me when you need to, just to think about something else, without even considering how I might feel... You disgust me! I can't even look you in the eye! GET OUT!"
"Pansy, let me explain..."
"GET OUT!"
She pointed at the bathroom door, but Draco wouldn't leave. He wanted to explain. When she saw that he wasn't moving, Pansy started for the door, but he grabbed her arms to stop her running, and she struggled to free herself.
"GET OFF ME, DRACO!"
"PANS, LET ME EXPLAIN!"
But before Draco could calm her, the bathroom door flew open and Blaise appeared on the landing. He stared uncomprehendingly at the scene before him: Pansy, crying and screaming, and Draco holding her tightly against him.
Blaise's eyes widened in horror.
This was a nightmare.
"Blaise, I..." Draco began.
"What the hell are you doing?!" shouted Blaise, his deep voice dominating Pansy's screams.
Draco immediately let go of Pansy, who ran to the opposite wall as if to get as far away from him as possible. She put her hand over her mouth to cover her sobs and Blaise gave her a panicked look.
"What happened?" he asked.
Draco opened his mouth to formulate a proper answer, but Pansy pointed an accusing finger at Draco and shouted:
"He kissed me!"
Blaise's eyes widened even more and he turned his head towards Draco. There was no trace of sympathy in his expression. At that moment, Draco didn't even recognise the boy in front of him.
"WHAT?! What's got into you?" asked Blaise.
Draco put his hands in front of him and took a step back:
"Blaise, I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to..."
Pansy's cries redoubled. Blaise's eyes darkened. There was no longer a caramel glint in them, only hatred, which made the hairs on the back of Draco's neck stand up.
"You didn't mean to kiss her?! ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?"
Blaise stalked across the small bathroom and punched Draco in the nose. Next to him, Pansy's slap felt like a gentle breeze against his skin. Draco's nose cracked again and he lowered his head with a groan of pain.
It was much worse than the wound Potter had given him. For the second time that day, Draco felt the bleeding run down his neck.
"Blaise, stop it!" cried Pansy.
"How could you do something like that?" growled Blaise, ignoring Pansy who continued to sob against the wall. "You know what she went through! You know how she felt about you! And you, you kiss her however you want? When she clearly didn't WANT to?"
"I wasn't thinking!" protested Draco, holding his nose as best he could, "I thought that... that..."
"That WHAT?" asked Blaise. "That she'd agree? That she's an object you can use whenever you want? Fuck, Draco! It's Pansy!"
"I know it's her!" cried Draco, swallowing his blood.
"Why did you do that?" asked Blaise, his voice deep and menacing. "Do you want to get back together with her?"
"I don't, but..."
Hearing this, Blaise's fist shot out impulsively. It hit Draco right on the left side of his face, above his ear, and Draco fell backwards from the force of the blow. He slumped against the bathtub, and took the metal towel rack with him, which collapsed beside him with a deafening crash.
"FUCK!" yelled Draco.
He wanted to be angry, but he couldn't. He didn't want to fight Blaise. He knew he was right, he knew he'd just made a huge mistake. He knew that kissing Pansy was a stupid idea and that he'd only done it to make himself feel better, without considering her feelings.
He didn't want to fight with Blaise because he wasn't angry with him. He was angry with himself, and it was a kind of anger that couldn't be soothed by physical violence.
And as if that moment wasn't catastrophic enough, the dormitory door opened and Theo came in, humming happily.
"Is anyone there?" he called into the dormitory.
No one answered, but when he saw the bathroom door open, Theo approached curiously. As he came into Draco's field of vision, he realised that he must have just come back from the Library, because he was still holding his course bag, which was overflowing with parchments.
Theo stood in the doorway and his eyes went from Pansy, crying and shaking and huddled against the wall, to Blaise, on top of Draco, his body animated by such rage that it was simply frightening, and then to Draco, covered in blood, on the floor, frightened.
Theo dropped his course bag, which hit the tiled floor.
"What the fuck?" he asked, stunned.
"Theo, it's not what you think..." began Draco in a hoarse voice.
"Draco just kissed Pansy and she didn't want to." Blaise said bluntly, no expression in his voice.
Draco saw Theo take in the news and his face flushed with horror. He let a few heavy seconds pass before entering the room. He didn't dwell on Draco's condition, or even turn his head in his direction. Instead, he walked over to Pansy and approached her cautiously.
"Come on, Pans'." he said gently, holding out his hand.
Pansy ran into Theo's arms and cried into his neck. Theo gave Draco a dark look, one he wouldn't soon forget, and led Pansy away from the bathroom. Blaise and Draco heard the dormitory door slam and Pansy's sobs died away.
Blaise and Draco stared at each other for a few seconds in dead silence. Draco couldn't take his eyes off Blaise's face. It was so often inexpressive that to see it animated by rage would have been almost mesmerizing if Draco hadn't been so scared.
"Blaise, I swear, I don't know what came over me." Draco assured him in a low voice. "It was stupid. I don't know why I did it, I was lost and she was right there and... It was stupid."
Blaise rolled his tongue over the side of his cheek.
"Were you going to sleep with her?" he asked coldly.
"No, fuck no!" Draco yelled immediately.
Blaise looked at him as if to see if he was lying, then sighed.
"You've got to pull yourself together, Draco." Blaise warned in a calmer voice. "You need to sort out the mess in your head. You can't react like this every time you feel something strange. You can't break your foot when you're afraid or your nose when you're angry. And you can't take Pansy with you in your fucking mess."
"I know." he stammered pitifully.
"I'm serious, Draco." Blaise continued. "You can't go on like this, you're going to rot from the inside if you keep doing this. You've got to stop. And if you do anything like that to Pansy again, I swear on everything I've got, I'll have you committed to St Mungo's myself. Is that understood?"
Draco nodded and Blaise sighed a second time. The anger seemed to dissipate from him as the seconds passed. He looked at him with an air of sudden pity.
Blaise leaned forward and for a moment Draco thought he was going to punch him again, but he just held out his hand to help him up. Draco did the best he could, leaning against the sink. Blaise's hand was immediately stained with his blood, but he did nothing to get rid of it.
"Blaise... I'm sorry." Draco said in an overwhelmed voice.
He raised an eyebrow, surprised to hear him apologise.
"You don't need to apologise to me, Dray, you need to apologise to Pansy." Blaise replied briskly.
Draco nodded. Blaise jerked his chin at the blood on Draco's neck:
"You should go to the hospital wing. There's no way I'm fixing your nose and you can't do it on your own."
Draco struggled to swallow his saliva. He didn't want to go to the hospital at all, but he had no choice. Blaise would never fix his face after breaking it himself, Theo was probably far too angry with him to help him right now and Pansy... Pansy wasn't even an option. Crabbe and Goyle would probably disfigure him even more...
And he couldn't ask Granger, because he'd screwed everything up by kissing her.
Draco had no other friends in the Castle. He realised at that moment how much he'd ruined everything. How much he had messed up his own life in one day.
So he left the dormitory and crossed the Common Room with his head down. He didn't want to meet Pansy's tearful gaze or see Theo. He walked out the door and no one stopped him.
He struggled up the stairs, leaving little drops of blood along the way. He didn't meet anyone.
As he opened the double doors to the hospital wing, Pomfrey was busy clearing the bedside tables of the empty beds. She looked up to see who had entered and her features fell when she saw Draco's broken nose.
"Again, Mr Malfoy?"
Draco just nodded. Pomfrey sighed deeply and pointed to a bed with a wave of her hand. He sat down without saying anything.
The nurse went back to her desk and returned with a white potion.
"I'll tell your Head of House, Malfoy. This can't go on. How many times are you going to fight like this? Is this about that bloody Quidditch again?"
Draco shook his head, but didn't elaborate. He certainly didn't feel like confiding in Pomfrey, of all people. She made an annoyed hiss between her pursed lips and set the potion down roughly on the bedside table.
"It's not advisable to put an Episkey on a wound that's too recent, so you're going to have to take this potion. It will be painful and it will take a long time, so you'll have to spend the night here. I hope this will teach you a lesson."
Draco read "Skelegro" on the label, but didn't react. Pomfrey poured him a large glass and watched him drink. The potion was foul, the acid almost burning his tongue, but he didn't flinch and handed her the empty glass.
"Rest, Malfoy." the nurse ordered in a stern voice before leaving the room.
All the events of the day came back to haunt him the moment he set his eyes on the white ceiling of the room.
He'd been hurt by four different people, twice in the nose, he'd felt anger the likes of which he'd rarely felt, he'd been slapped by Pansy, he'd made her cry after kissing her against her will, he'd shouted at Fred Weasley and been shouted at by Pansy, Blaise and Granger, he'd lost the most important match of the year, he'd revealed his feelings to a Weasley, and he'd probably lost the three friendships he held most dear.
But still, the one thing he could think of, the one thing he still couldn't quite wrap his head around, was that he had kissed Granger.
He'd kissed her.
And he'd fucking loved it.
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Hermione
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Harry had been staring out of the darkened window overlooking the Castle grounds for a good five minutes when Angelina said, for the hundredth time that evening:
"Banned. Banned for life. No more Seekers, no more Beaters... What the hell are we going to do?"
All the Gryffindors sighed in unison, including Ginny, who seemed very affected by the injustice, even though she wasn't part of the team.
"It's so unfair." Alicia said in a daze. "I mean, what about Crabbe and that Bludger he hit after the whistle had been blown? Has she banned him?'
"No." Ginny replied dejectedly in Harry's place. "He just got lines, I heard Montague laughing about it at dinner."
"And banning Fred when he hadn't done anything!" exclaimed Alicia angrily, pounding her fist on her knee.
"It's not my fault I didn't." Fred assured her with a fearful look on his face. "I would've pounded the little scumbag to a pulp if you three hadn't been holding me back."
He turned his eyes to Hermione and she lowered her head so he couldn't see the shame she felt at that moment.
Hermione knew that the atmosphere in the Common Room was disastrous only because of Malfoy. She knew that everyone in every corner of the room hated him. Everyone must be thinking of the horrors they would like to inflict on him for taking Harry, Fred and George away from the team. She knew that without them, Gryffindor had no chance of winning the Tournament.
But Hermione felt something very different. A completely opposite feeling. She was thinking about Malfoy too, but she wasn't thinking about the places she wanted to hit him, or the insults she wanted to hurl at him. She thought of his cold palms on her cheek, she thought of the pressure of his lips on her, on her mouth, on her neck, on her jaw. She thought of the sound he made when she tugged at his hair, and she felt a vibration in her lower abdomen every time the echo of his voice played in her head.
Hermione tried desperately to put these images out of her mind. She wanted to be there for Harry at this difficult time. But every time she succeeded, the image returned to her eyelids and her palms grew sweaty.
"I'm going to bed." Angelina announced as she slowly rose from the armchair. "Maybe we'll find out that it was all just a nightmare... Maybe when I wake up tomorrow morning I'll find that the match hasn't happened yet..."
One by one, the team went to bed. Ginny was the last to go, after squeezing Hermione's hand affectionately to say good night. Hermione did the same, trying not to think about how undeserving she was of their friendship tonight.
"Have you seen Ron?" Hermione asked Harry in a quiet voice.
It was the first time she'd spoken since dinner. No one had seen Ron since the end of the game. Harry shook his head.
"I think he's avoiding us." Hermione guessed. "Where do you think he..."
Just then, the picture of the Fat Lady swung round and Ron entered the room. Snow covered his hair and shoulders, his complexion was extremely pale and his lips were almost blue from the cold. Hermione jumped at the sight of him. He was standing in the doorway, speechless, probably thinking that Harry and Hermione had gone to bed.
"Where have you been?" she asked in a worried voice.
He was still wearing his Quidditch kit. Hermione curled her lips as she noticed it clinging to his skin.
"You look cold..." she said. "Come and sit down."
Ron sat down in the chair furthest from Harry, carefully avoiding eye contact. He put his hands in front of the fire and Hermione saw that he was chattering his teeth. The Golden Snitch that Harry had caught flew over their heads.
"I'm sorry." Ron mumbled sheepishly.
"For what?" asked Harry.
"For thinking I could play Quidditch." Ron replied. "I'm going to hand in my resignation first thing in the morning."
"If you quit, there will only be three players left on the team." said Harry.
Ron looked at him uncomprehendingly and Harry explained mechanically:
"I'm banned from Quidditch for life. So are Fred and George."
"What?" yelped Ron.
Seeing that Harry wasn't going to give any more details, he turned to Hermione. Hermione told him the whole story in a hushed whisper. When she got to the part where Draco had provoked him, she avoided the details, not only because she didn't want to bring back painful memories for Harry, but also because she didn't want to think back to that moment.
"This is all my fault..." said Ron at the end of Hermione's story.
"You didn't force me to fight Malfoy." Harry replied angrily.
Hermione shuddered.
"If I wasn't so bad at Quidditch..."
"That has nothing to do with it."
"It was that song that upset me."
"It would have upset anyone."
Hermione stood up abruptly and went to the window to look at the snow. She didn't want to hear them. When they talked about Draco, it reminded her that they had kissed and her stomach hurt from the mixture of pleasure and guilt.
"Give it a rest, will you?" Harry shouted. "It's bad enough, I don't need to hear you say it's all your fault!"
Hermione concentrated on the snowy landscape and let her mind wander. She felt terrible, but at the same time there was this spark of joy that made her smile in spite of herself. It was a very strange feeling that she couldn't understand and it was driving her mad.
Her gaze swept across the valley and suddenly stopped at the outline of the Forbidden Forest. She blinked. Was that...
Was that light she was seeing, through the windows of Hagrid's house?
"I've never felt worse in my life." Ron said in an overwhelmed tone.
"Join the club." Harry replied bitterly.
No, Hermione wasn't dreaming. It was definitely light she was seeing. And smoke. Smoke coming from the chimney. She was sure of it.
She breathed a sigh of relief that she didn't know she was holding in.
Since the first day of school, something had been missing. Something had thrown her off balance. But now everything would be fixed. Everything would be better.
Because Hagrid was back.
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Harry fetched the Invisibility Cloak from his dormitory, Ron went off to change, and Hermione dressed in something a little warmer for the snow. They walked through the Castle in the invisibility cloak, and Ron had to bend his knees because he had grown so much. Harry looked at the Marauder's Map at regular intervals to check that no one was loitering in the corridors, and Hermione thought of all the times she had braved curfew to join Draco on their bench.
They passed no one but Nearly Headless Nick, who was gliding over the floor humming music that sounded a lot like Weasley is our king. When they finally reached the park, they quickened their pace, taking care to remain well covered by the cloak so that no one could make out their silhouettes from the Castle windows.
The closer they got, the more Hermione's heart pounded with excitement. She had been so afraid that she would never see Hagrid again that the prospect of finally being with him eclipsed any feelings she might have had during that calamitous day.
With their feet crunching against the snow, they finally arrived at the door of the little house and Harry knocked three times on the door. Fang barked at once.
"Hagrid, it's us!" said Harry through the keyhole.
"I thought so!" replied Hagrid's gruff voice through the door.
When she recognised his voice, Hermione instinctively turned her head towards Ron and they shared a big, happy smile. Ron's face had brightened, and seeing Hagrid again was obviously making him forget his performance during the match.
"I've been back for three seconds..." said Hagrid, stirring things behind the door of his hut. "Get the hell out of here, Fang... I said get the hell out, you silly..."
He unlocked the door and his head appeared in the doorway. At first Hermione was still smiling with all her teeth, but when she saw the state of the gamekeeper's face she shrieked uncontrollably.
"Merlin's beard, keep it down!" said Hagrid, glancing frantically over their heads. "Under that clock, are you? Come on, get in, get in!"
"I'm sorry!" she said breathlessly.
They slipped in between him and the door and took off the cloak. A smell of cinnamon invaded their nostrils and Hermione inhaled it several times without realising.
"I just... Oh, Hagrid!" she cried in horror as he finished locking the door and drawing the curtains.
"It's nothing, nothing at all..."
Hagrid's face was swollen all over, with haematomas that oscillated between green and purple in every possible and unimaginable shade. His left eye was closed, and dried blood stuck to his hair against his left cheek. His hands and neck were covered in wounds, some still bleeding, and he moved cautiously, suggesting that he had several broken ribs.
"Hagrid, what happened to you?" asked Harry, staring at his wounds in bewilderment.
"I told you, nothing!" replied Hagrid firmly. "Would you like a cup of tea?"
"Don't try to fool us." said Ron. "You're in a terrible state!"
"I told you I'm perfectly all right." insisted Hagrid.
He tried to smile at them, but it was more a grimace of pain. He crossed the small room and picked up a huge steak from the table that Fang was watching. Hermione thought he was going to throw it on a frying pan, but instead he spread it over the left side of his face and sighed soothingly.
"Ah, that's better. It's good for the pain, see?"
"So, are you going to tell us what happened to you?" asked Harry with a hint of impatience.
"Can't, Harry. Top secret. If I told you it would cost me more than my job."
"Did the giants beat you, Hagrid?" asked Hermione in a timid voice.
Hagrid dropped his steak in surprise and it fell to his chest.
"Giants?" he repeated. He put the steak back on his face and looked at the three of them with his one good eye. "Who told you about giants? Who did you see? Who told you what I...? Who told you I was... eh?"
"We guessed." Hermione replied in an apologetic tone.
"Ah, you did, did you?" said Hagrid.
"In a way, it was... obvious." Ron added.
Hagrid grumbled and got up to remove the hissing kettle. He filled four mugs with boiling water and put teabags in them.
"Never seen kids so good at knowing more than they should." he grumbled. "And that's not a compliment. We call them meddlers. People who meddle in things that are none of their business."
But strangely, Hagrid was smiling.
"So you've been looking for the giants?" asked Harry as he sat down at the small table.
Hagrid placed three steaming cups of tea on the table and Hermione recognised the scent of cinnamon. She glanced at the gamekeeper and couldn't help but smile.
Everything was back in place.
For half an hour Hagrid told them of his adventure with the giants. It was an exciting story, and Harry, Ron and Hermione were sitting on the edge of their seats, so enthralled were they. Hagrid told them about their first nights in the camp and the murders they had witnessed. He explained the hierarchy of the giants, and although Hermione had spent many hours studying the wars during her History of Magic studies, she had to admit that hearing it from Hagrid was much more interesting.
Hagrid had just gotten to the part of the story where he'd had his face slaughtered when someone interrupted him with three sharp bangs on the door. Hermione jumped so hard that her mug fell to the floor. Fang started barking again, perhaps to cover the noise Hermione had made. Hermione abruptly turned her head towards the window by the door and easily made out the small, stubby figure through the curtains.
"It's her!" whispered Ron in horror.
"Quick, quick, under there!" ordered Harry, pointing to the Invisibility Cloak so they could hide inside.
He grabbed Hermione's shoulder, covering her with the light fabric, and Ron jumped in beside them. Then they moved to a corner of the room, making as little noise as possible.
"Hagrid!" called Hermione in a half-whisper. "Hide our cups!"
Hagrid, seemingly at a loss to understand the strange turn of events, took Harry and Ron's cups and hid them under a cushion. Then he kicked Fang aside and opened the door.
Umbridge stood in the doorway, wearing a hat despite the late hour. She inspected Hagrid from where she stood, which was about the height of his navel, her lips curled in disgust.
"Well?" she said slowly, separating each letter as if Hagrid didn't understand English. "Are you Hagrid?"
She didn't wait for an answer and slipped through the door into the room. When she caught a whiff of Hermione's favourite smell in the world, she wrinkled her nose as if Hagrid's house was covered in dragon dung.
"Er..." Hagrid began, still on the landing. "I don't mean to be rude, but who the hell are you?"
"My name is Dolores Umbridge."
"Dolores Umbridge?" repeated Hagrid, looking completely confused. "I thought you were from the Ministry... Aren't you working with Fudge?"
"I was Senior Undersecretary to the Minister, yes." she said coldly.
Umbridge began to pace the room, looking for clues. She paused for a moment at the pink umbrella in the doorway and the rucksack Hagrid had placed on one of the chairs.
"Now I'm Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor..."
"Brave of you." Hagrid remarked. "You don't find many who want to do the job anymore."
"... And the Grand Inquisitor of Hogwarts." Umbridge added as if she hadn't heard him.
"What's that?" asked Hagrid, his eyebrows furrowed.
"That's exactly what I was going to ask you." Umbridge replied, pointing to the shards of Hermione's cup on the floor.
"Oh, that!" said Hagrid. "That's Fang. He broke a cup. So I had to get another one."
He pointed to his own mug, his other hand still holding the dragon steak to his eye. Umbridge stopped circling the small room and paused to study Hagrid's face without restraint.
"I heard voices." she said.
"I was talking to Fang." Hagrid said.
"And he answered you?
"Well... in a way, yes." Hagrid replied uncomfortably. "I sometimes say that Fang is almost human..."
"Outside, in the snow, there are the footprints of three people who walked from the Castle to your hut." Umbridge pointed out in a honeyed voice.
Hermione inhaled in surprise and Harry clamped a hand over her mouth.
"I just got back." Hagrid said, pointing his huge hand at the rucksack. "Maybe someone came to see me before when I wasn't here."
"There are no footprints leading back from your hut."
"Well, I... I don't know..." Hagrid stammered. He tugged at his beard nervously.
"What happened to you? How did you get those wounds?" Umbridge asked impetuously.
Hagrid pulled back the dragon steak, revealing more of his black eye.
"Oh, I had... a bit of an accident." he said awkwardly. "I... I tripped."
"You tripped." Umbridge repeated coldly.
"I did. Against... against a friend's broom. I don't fly myself. Have you seen my size? I don't think there's a broom that can carry my weight. This friend breeds horses, Abraxans, I don't know if you've ever seen them, big beasts with wings, one day I rode on one and it was..."
"Where were you?" asked Umbridge, interrupting Hagrid's stammering with an icy voice.
"Where was I..."
"Where you were, yes. The term began two months ago. Another teacher had to take over your classes. None of your colleagues could give me any contact details. You left no address. Where were you?"
"I... I was away for my health." he replied after a while.
"For your health..."
Professor Umbridge's eyes swept over Hagrid's swollen, mottled face. Dragon's blood was slowly dripping down his waistcoat.
"Yes." Hagrid said. "A little... fresh air, you see?"
"Of course, being a gamekeeper, you must be terribly short of fresh air." Umbridge replied with a narrow smile.
They stared at each other for a long minute. Hermione could see Umbridge's grotesque grin digging into every crease around her lips, and was struck again by her resemblance to a toad.
Then she headed for the door.
"You should also know that, as High Inquisitor, it is unfortunately my duty to inspect my fellow teachers. So I'm sure we'll see each other again soon. Good night."
She left, closing the door with a thud. Hermione saw Harry lift the Invisibility Cloak, but she stopped him:
"Not yet." she whispered in his ear. "She might have stayed behind the door."
Hagrid went to the window and watched Umbridge's silhouette disappear into the snow. When they were sure she wouldn't come back, they took off the cloak. Hagrid poured them another cup of tea and Hermione, Harry and Ron told him in detail how Umbridge had turned Hogwarts upside down since the start of the new term.
Hagrid remained as enthusiastic and confident as ever. He'd always been able to see the good in people, even a walking nightmare like Umbridge. When Hermione tried to warn him to be careful when she inspected him, he shrugged happily. Hermione wanted to insist, but it had been a long day, full of twists and turns, and she didn't have the strength. She preferred to return to the Castle with the boys.
They talked about Hagrid's return all the way home, the Quidditch feud completely forgotten. Hermione remained silent, her mind racing with thoughts and memories. She couldn't believe that the match had taken place earlier that morning. So much had happened since then...
Ron said the password and they wished each other a good night with reassuring smiles on their faces.
But as Hermione walked up to her dormitory, she could make out the shape of Lavender's blonde hair through the small opening in the curtain, and without knowing why, she suddenly felt terribly alone.
She had kissed a boy for the second time in her life and she couldn't talk about it. Yet she had always thought that if it happened to her, she would tell Lavender first. It was she who had first told her about boys. She was the one she turned to when she needed "girl advice". But she couldn't, because they weren't talking anymore, and if Hermione confided in her that it was Draco Malfoy she had kissed, it would be a huge scandal.
So Hermione took her pillow and went upstairs. She opened the door to Ginny's dormitory and approached her bed.
Her best friend was asleep, but as Hermione walked up and her shadow moved across the quilt, Ginny opened one eye.
"Mione?" she called in a drowsy voice. "What are you doing up? It must be two in the morning..."
"Can I sleep here with you?" asked Hermione in an embarrassed whisper. "I'm not too... I don't want to sleep alone tonight."
Ginny nodded without hesitation and moved over to make room. Hermione slipped under the warm covers and hugged her pillow.
"What's wrong?" asked Ginny in a slightly worried tone.
"Nothing. I just... my head is full." Hermione whispered.
Ginny analysed every feature of her face, as if hoping to find the answer to her questions in it.
"Don't worry, I'm sure Pomfrey will be able to fix his nose in no time." she said, probably to reassure her.
Hermione nodded, although Draco's nose wasn't really the subject of her thoughts. Rather, it was his lips that seemed to inhabit every corner of her mind.
"Hagrid's back." Hermione announced to change the subject.
"Is he? Oh, good news at last." Ginny said with a yawn. "I'm going to see him tomorrow."
They fell into silence. Ginny had closed her eyes. Hermione had expected her sleepy breaths to gradually lift her chest as sleep overcame her, so she was surprised when Ginny whispered without opening her eyes:
"I can feel your brain overheating from here, Mione."
"Sorry."
Ginny sighed as she heard her say that and turned to get her wand from her bedside table. She closed the curtains and cast a silence spell around her bed.
Then Ginny placed a small, square, black device on the duvet, which Hermione could barely make out in the dim light.
When she tapped it with her wand, Hermione realised it was her witch's radio. Soft classical music was playing from the speakers, enveloping Ginny's canopy bed.
Hermione closed her eyes to take in the air. She didn't know what it was. She wondered if it was by the famous wizard composer Draco had once told her about.
"Just listen to the music and don't think about anything else, all right?" advised Ginny in a murmur.
Hermione took her advice. At first her mind still tried to escape to Draco, but she managed to concentrate on the music and forget everything else. She concentrated on every note of music that invaded the small room and seemed to seep into her as sleep overcame her.
And against all odds, Hermione fell peacefully asleep.
.
.
Draco
.
.
"Fuck... I fucked up." Draco groaned for the thirtieth time that day.
"Yes, you did." Blaise agreed for the thirtieth time that day.
They were both sitting at a study table in the Common Room. Blaise was doing his homework and Draco had his head in his hands, his shoulders hunched, his back bent, completely overwhelmed. He was still in his pyjamas, even though it was well past midday, but he didn't care.
He hadn't seen Pansy since the day before. It was like they were living in two different Castles: Draco had looked everywhere for her, but she was nowhere to be found. She wasn't eating in the Great Hall, she wasn't crossing any corridors, and she wasn't sitting on her usual sofa in the Common Room all day. Draco suspected that she had locked herself in her room with Daphne, who no one had seen either. Draco had even stayed until an indecent hour during the party on Saturday night, but Pansy hadn't shown up.
As if that wasn't enough of a problem, Draco also had to avoid Granger. He still hadn't worked out a plan for dealing with her. He knew he'd made a huge mistake kissing her, that it had been an impulsive gesture and that he regretted it bitterly. Now Granger had every reason to stop talking to him, and even though he knew she would have been right to do so, Draco felt a deep sadness when he thought about it. So he preferred to meditate and put the problem to the back of his mind. Right now, he needed to make up for the stupidity of his botched kiss attempt with Pansy.
"What should I do?" asked Draco, his voice muffled by his own hands covering his face.
"I've already told you." Blaise said, perfectly calm. "You have to apologise to her."
"And how am I supposed to do that without actually seeing her?" asked Draco grumpily.
"I don't know." Blaise replied. "That's up to you. I'm not going to give you any advice, I'm still angry with you, remember?"
Draco grunted and rested his forehead on the desk.
"Hey, what's the third ingredient for Weedosoros' potion antidote again?" asked Blaise.
"Billywig's sting." Draco replied immediately.
"Ah, yes, thank you..."
Draco heard him scribbling on his parchment. The door to the Common Room opened and Draco lifted his head so suddenly that he heard something crack at the back of his neck. But it was just Theo coming back from the Library, obviously very annoyed. He intercepted Draco and Blaise and put his things down violently on the table.
"I can't concentrate, the students are throwing snowballs at the windows every five minutes, it's unbearable."
"Well, at least you won't have that problem here." commented Blaise, who still had his head down on his parchment.
Theo mumbled something Draco couldn't hear and took out his Astronomy map, which he spread out on the table, then sat down in the last remaining chair. Draco was surprised: he thought Theo would be angry with him after what he had done to Pansy. He hadn't spoken to her since the day before.
"Well, you look cheerful." Theo remarked, seeing the defeated position he was in.
"I fucked up." Draco muttered.
"Yeah, I know." Theo said with a grimace. "Fucked up big time, I'd say. Where was your head?"
"In his trousers." Blaise replied sarcastically.
"No!" cried Draco indignantly. "That had nothing to do with it!"
"Then what were you thinking?" asked Theo.
"I was just... I was just upset about the match, and my head was... I wanted to think about something else, I wanted to clear my head, and I thought she'd be up for it." Draco summed up, stammering a little. "Obviously, I was wrong."
"Well, at least you've got a good sense of deduction." he replied with a smile.
"Have you seen her?" Draco asked Theo in a suddenly pained tone. "Since last night? Did she say anything to you?"
Theo frowned from behind his chestnut curls, which were starting to grow way too long again.
"Yeah, I have." he replied evasively.
"And?" asked Draco hopefully, rising slightly to lean towards him. "What did she say?"
"I don't know, she was crying too much for me to hear." the boy replied coolly.
An uncomfortable shiver ran down Draco's spine and he fell back down the table.
"What can I do?"
Blaise sighed loudly:
"You could let me do my Potions essay in peace, for example."
"Have you tried apologising?" asked Theo with a hint of irony.
"No, because I haven't seen her since yesterday." Draco explained dryly. "Seriously, that girl looks like she's been walking around in an Invisibility Cloak!"
"She's avoiding you." Theo explained seriously, as if Draco hadn't already come to that conclusion himself. "Give her some time and when she feels ready to see you again, you'll apologise properly."
Draco nodded. It was the same advice as Blaise's, but it was hard to hear. He was terrified that Pansy would never want to speak to him again.
In times like this, Draco usually sought refuge in the Library. It was easier to think there in his bubble of cinnamon and old books. He could have asked Granger for advice, she always knew just the right thing to say.
But he couldn't go there, because he'd ruined everything with her too.
In just one day, he'd managed to lose the two most important girls in his life.
He sighed for the umpteenth time and laid his head back in his arms.
"I'm still mad at you, by the way." Theo said, without taking his eyes off his astral map.
"I know." Draco mumbled.
"Good. Anyway, if you're not doing anything right now and want to make it up to me, feel free to do the homework on Crabbe's poison antidotes, I'm sure that would make me happy."
.
.
.
The next day, Draco had an idea. He knew Pansy wouldn't be at breakfast to avoid seeing him, so he got up early and wandered around the Hogwarts valley looking for snowdrops, Pansy's favourite flowers.
After an hour of searching, he found some in the shade of a giant tree. He picked them and arranged them as best he could into a bouquet. Back in the Great Hall, he asked Theo to transfigure a tray out of a newspaper page and placed the bouquet of snowdrops, some honey toast and the page with the day's horoscopes on it, taking care to circle the Scorpio's ones.
As he'd predicted, Pansy didn't turn up, so he took the tray to the Transfiguration courtyard, where he knew she'd be having her morning cigarette before the day's first classes.
He found her there, sitting on her favourite bench. She was accompanied by Daphne, who was wrapped in layers of thick clothing and looked frozen. Pansy was wearing nothing but her uniform, with its torn tights and crooked tie. She took a long drag from her cigarette and exhaled, the smoke rising in grey clouds that contrasted with the snow around them.
Daphne saw Draco first as he entered the courtyard. She elbowed Pansy in the ribs, not very discreetly, and Pansy turned her head towards the intruder. Even from where he was standing, Draco had no trouble seeing her eyes, red and puffy with fatigue. She was not wearing any make-up, which was extremely rare, and she had obviously not used any potions on her hair, as it was slightly wavy at the ends.
Draco crossed the courtyard in silence and stood in front of the two girls, who were both looking at him blasély.
"What do you want?" asked Daphne aggressively. "She doesn't want to talk to you."
"I noticed that, yes." Draco replied, trying to keep his voice from trembling with annoyance.
He turned to Pansy, who was deliberately looking everywhere but in his direction. He stood in front of her, but she stubbornly turned her head the other way.
"Oh, come on, Pans'!" exclaimed Draco.
"She doesn't want to talk to you." Daphne repeated.
She glared at him over her Slytherin scarf and Draco had to summon all his mental strength not to ask her nicely to fuck off.
"I know." he replied. Then he asked, emphasising every word: "Could you leave us alone for a while, Daphne, so that Pansy and I can talk in private?"
"Can't." she replied immediately. "She specifically asked me to stay with her all day, in case you had the audacity to show up."
Pansy nodded silently in agreement.
"And besides, I don't see why you couldn't talk in front of me anyway." Daphne continued without taking her eyes off Draco. "She told me everything. How dare you kiss her after leaving her like that, without any explanation?"
Draco winced and looked at Pansy again, but she was smoking and looking at the snow at her feet.
"Look Pans, I know I fucked up." Draco told her, trying to ignore Daphne next to them. "I messed up, I know that now. I wasn't... I wasn't thinking."
Pansy had no reaction. It was as if she hadn't heard him.
Undeterred, Draco carefully placed the tray on the bench, right between the two girls.
"Here, I brought you this." he said quietly. "I thought you'd like it."
Pansy glanced at the tray for a second, but there was nothing on her face to indicate that she liked this little attention. She continued to take puffs on her cigarette and looked out at the snow.
Daphne scoffed.
"How could that thing possibly cheer her up? Overcooked toast and lilies?"
Draco bit his tongue to keep from insulting her.
"They're not lilies, they're snowdrops." he hissed without looking at her. "Pansy's favourite flowers. And they're honey toast, the breakfast she has every morning."
Daphne eyed the tray again, eyebrows raised in suspicion.
"Pans..." begged Draco. "Come on, tell me something, anything... Just one word, please..."
Suddenly, Pansy turned her head towards him. Her whole face was frozen in that disinterested expression she had mastered so well, but her eyes burned with anger.
"Want a word, Draco?" she demanded in a voice so shrill that Draco took a reflexive step back. "Leave."
He felt a pain run through his veins and sting his heart as he heard this. Pansy looked away, threw her cigarette butt on the ground next to Draco's shoe and stood up:
"Come on Daph, we're going to miss Transfiguration."
Daphne hurried to her feet, but Draco wasn't sure if it was to get away from him or to get out of the cold. They passed him without paying the slightest attention, and Draco had just enough time to smell the cold tobacco before they were out of sight.
The frustration hit him so hard that he angrily knocked the tray over and it fell to the floor. He tore up the page and crushed the snowdrops one by one with the heel of his shoe. When he felt a few tears forming in the corners of his eyes, he stopped and angrily wiped them away. He couldn't cry.
He sat down on the bench and looked at the crushed snowdrops. Two owls landed on the ground to nibble at the honey toast in the snow, and Draco did nothing to stop them. A piece of the newspaper he had torn up was stuck in the snow, completely soaked. Draco bent down to pull it out.
Gemini: A difficult day for you! Tensions are rising around you and it's unsettling. Don't hesitate to take a step back and rest. By the end of the evening you'll be...
Draco tore up the piece of paper, letting out a sound that was half groan and half sanglish, then turned and walked back to the Castle.
Not so bad, this Celestia Valpan.
Draco had one of the hardest days he had ever had at Hogwarts. He didn't listen to a single lesson and spent all his time looking for Pansy, who was still ignoring him. She spent every minute with Daphne, and Daphne was probably on a mission to assassinate Draco with her eyes: wherever he went, she glared at him, making it difficult to communicate with his best friend.
In addition to Pansy's ignorance, Draco also had to deal with Granger's problem. If he was looking for Pansy's gaze, Granger was constantly looking for his own. She spent the whole day trying to get his attention in any way she could, and Draco had to physically restrain himself from turning his head in her direction. He had gotten so used to looking at her since his first year that it was like a reflex, second nature. He recognised her footsteps in the corridors and could smell the strawberry in her hair from his Potions table, even though she was three rows away from him. Every atom of his body screamed at him to look at her, to look at her day's haircut, to see if her cheeks would blush at the sight of him, or even to remember the way her fingers had grabbed his hair to hold him closer...
But Draco couldn't. He'd made a mistake. He'd kissed Granger, and now everything was different. He'd upset the precarious balance they'd been sailing in since the year before. He'd made it real. He had tried desperately to keep their strange relationship as nothing more than friendship, but he had failed and now he had to face the consequences.
Granger probably hated him. She hated him for what he'd done and wanted to scream at him the way Pansy had. But Draco didn't want to go through that again. He didn't want to see the disgust in her eyes, the same disgust that had been in Pansy's when she had pushed him against the bathtub. He didn't want to relive that scene with Granger, because he was absolutely terrified.
So, Draco did something very cowardly: he avoided her. Just like Pansy did with him.
The irony of the situation might have made him laugh if it had happened to Theo, or Blaise. But Draco wasn't laughing at all. He was devastated.
And as if his day wasn't bad enough, Snape chose this moment to train Draco in spontaneous Occlumency again. Draco felt the needle slyly pierce a few layers of his mind before he realised what was happening to him, and he had to Occlude at several points during the day to prevent Snape from reaching his mental library.
The latter was in disarray, with books on the floor and torn pages scattered everywhere. Draco didn't have the courage to put away his recent memories. They were still too painful to revisit.
In the evening, Draco's stomach was far too upset to have dinner. Besides, it was extremely difficult not to give in and watch Granger in the Great Hall, so he preferred to stay in the Common Room and mope. He tried not to imagine her sitting at their secluded table or on their bench, waiting for him to arrive so she could call him names.
Blaise and Pansy came back after dinner. Blaise sat in the armchair next to the sofa Draco had taken, while Pansy went to the dormitory with Daphne.
"Give her time." Blaise advised gently, following his gaze as he scanned the brunette. "She's not ready to forgive you yet. It'll probably take some time."
Draco sighed in despair.
"Has she forgiven you? Daphne?" he asked.
He saw Blaise's fingers tighten on the arm of the chair.
"No, not yet." he replied simply, probably not wanting to dwell on the matter.
Draco crossed his legs on the sofa and rested his forehead on his knees.
"I don't know what I'm going to do without her, Blaise." Draco said in a desperate whisper. "I hate this. I hate it when we don't talk. And I hate it even more when it's my fault, because I only have myself to blame for being such a git."
"You've been a real git." Blaise confirmed. "But... do you realise? The difference between the Draco of first year and the Draco of now?"
Draco looked at Blaise strangely, not sure what he was getting at.
"I don't know, the hair?" he asked sarcastically.
"Yes, there is that." Blaise said with a hint of a smile on his lips. "But that's not what I was talking about. Dray, just... two years ago you would have reacted very differently."
"What do you mean?"
"Two years ago, you said the word "sorry" as if it was contaminated." Blaise explained very seriously. "You blamed everyone else, even when you knew it was your fault. You got angry over nothing, you shut yourself off completely. If you'd done the stupid thing you did on Saturday in second or third year, you'd never have admitted that you'd made a mistake. You wouldn't have let me beat the shit out of you, you'd have fought back, you'd have defended "your honour", "your ego", your "Malfoy values".""
Draco winced slightly. How had he ever said those words?
"You would have failed, of course." Blaise continued. "I'm much better at fighting than you are. But I have to admit, when I threw that punch at you, I was sure you'd fight back. But you went along with it. You took the blows without flinching, because you knew you deserved it. The Draco of the past would never have done that. What changed?"
Granger. Draco's brain fused, but he didn't say it out loud. Yet it was obvious. She was the one who had taught him to apologise, without even knowing it herself. It was she who had shown him that hatred only led to violence, and that sometimes you had to step aside to keep the people you loved close to you. Draco hadn't realised that he had applied her advice to his life. But he must not have followed it very well, because he had lost two people he loved anyway.
Draco shrugged and Blaise's question remained rhetorical.
Draco had the feeling Blaise knew. He'd never told him explicitly, but there was no way he couldn't have guessed. He was the most observant boy at Hogwarts. He analysed the attitudes of the people around him and deduced all sorts of things about them without so much as opening his mouth. It was obvious that he knew how Draco felt about Granger, but he didn't tell him, and Draco loved him even more for that.
"You haven't changed that much." Draco commented. "You've always been wise, even at eleven."
Blaise laughed.
"I broke your nose on Saturday. You call that wise?"
"I deserved it." Draco said. "And even though you're mad at me for it, you still talk to me. So does Theo. Why?"
Blaise shrugged without losing his grin, the kind that implied he knew a lot of things he didn't.
"Well, I guess no matter how much stupid shit you do, it won't stop us from being friends with you."
"Even if I've done a hugely stupid thing?" asked Draco with a pale smile.
"I'll remind you that you provoked a ten foot hippogriff and disguised yourself as a Dementor to scare Potter." Blaise replied immediately. "Kissing Pansy is hardly your first attempt at stupidity. We're used to it by now."
Draco chuckled. Just then, Pansy reappeared in the Common Room. She was wearing fishnet stockings under her black skirt and had removed her tie to open her shirt underneath. Draco could see the top of her bra sticking out.
Carefully avoiding looking at Draco on the sofa, she walked over to the gramophone and turned it on. Metallic music came from the speakers and several people stood up at once, either to dance or to pour themselves a drink at the table that was constantly occupied by dozens of bottles of alcohol. Pansy did the same, and the crowd soon prevented Draco from watching her.
"What does Pansy think?" he asked Blaise, pointing to the space between them. "That you're still talking to me after what I've done?"
Blaise's face darkened slightly.
"Well, actually, she thinks I've been too hard on you." he replied, his tone clearly disapproving. "She says I went too far when I broke your nose. Needless to say, I don't agree with her, I honestly think you deserve a third."
Only Blaise could discuss this sort of thing so calmly.
"She's the one who asked us not to let you down. She said she wasn't ready to talk to you yet, but that she didn't want you to be alone. I think that means she still loves you. She cares about you, even when she's angry with you."
Draco felt a wave of relief when he heard that. If Pansy had really told him that, then Blaise was right. It was just a temporary fight. Everything would be back to normal soon.
Draco sat on the sofa for the rest of the party. He tried to go and see Pansy twice, but both times she subtly slipped away into the crowd just as he approached her, and he realised that she wanted to be left alone. So Draco just sat there, sipping the glass of green apple liqueur Blaise had brought him, and watching Pansy dance.
When Theo returned from the Library, he sat down on the sofa next to Draco with a sigh. He saw out of the corner of his eye that he was massaging his hand.
"Big session?" asked Blaise.
"Yeah. I've finished all the essays on those two idiots." Theo said, pointing at Crabbe and Goyle who were sitting on another sofa, obviously debating whether Pansy would allow them to dance. "I'm exhausted."
He turned to Draco:
"I was surprised you didn't come to work with me, by the way."
Draco got an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach at the thought of the Library.
"Didn't feel like it." he grumbled in justification.
"Have you done the Herbology essay due on Thursday?"
Draco nodded, even though he hadn't.
"And now? What are you doing?" asked Theo.
"Well, Draco's dwelling on his fate and staring at Pansy like a psychopath, and I'm trying to taste as many different meads as possible to choose my favourite." Blaise said.
Draco rolled his eyes at this summary, but continued to look at Pansy, who was bouncing around with Daphne on heels far too high for her.
"Oh, and?" asked Theo.
"Well, the honey one is definitely my favourite." Blaise said, pointing to one of the many green cups on the coffee table. "Second place would probably go to the apple one, and third... maybe the liquorice one..."
Blaise continued with his rankings, his voice getting fainter and fainter in Draco's ear, probably due to the far too loud music echoing around the room. Pansy stopped dancing for a second and shouted something into the ears of Daphne and Tracey Davis. The three girls burst out laughing and then started dancing again. Tracey pressed her hips against Daphne's and they laughed as they twirled. Pansy took a big swig from her green cup and for the first time in his life, Draco wanted to smell the foul odour of vanilla whisky. Merlin, he would even drink an entire bottle to make Pansy forgive him.
"Pansy said something weird to me last time." Draco said suddenly, rudely interrupting Blaise's ranking of his favourite meads.
Both boys turned to him.
"Right after... When... When she shouted at me." Draco explained, not wanting to use the word "kiss" out loud. "She told me I'd ruined everything because she was trying to fall in love with someone else... Did she tell you two about that?"
Draco turned to Theo and saw that he had raised his eyebrows in surprise.
"No, she didn't tell me anything."
He turned to Blaise who shook his head with the same confused look on his face as Theo.
"Are you sure she told you that?" asked Blaise.
"How could I forget? Do I need to remind you what Pansy looks like when she's angry?" asked Draco. "She told me she was trying to move on by falling in love with a boy, I'm sure of it. Who do you think it is?"
Theo, Blaise and Draco carefully analysed the crowd around Pansy.
"Well, I hope she chose better than last time." Blaise commented bitterly, pointing at someone with his chin.
Draco followed his gaze and found Leo Hills sitting in a distant chair. He was talking to a boy from his year, and despite the dim light in the room, Draco could see where Blaise had broken his jaw, like a kind of lump just below his cheek.
"Crabbe would be delighted to offer himself, I have a feeling." Theo said, pointing to the boy in question.
Indeed, Crabbe was watching Pansy dance as if hypnotised.
They laughed a little when they saw him, and the noise attracted Daphne's attention, who responded by glaring, not at Draco, but at Blaise. He immediately curled up in his chair as if she'd slapped him:
"Merlin, again?" he asked, suddenly panicked. "What can I do to get her to stop looking at me like she wants to throw an Avada?"
"I don't know." Theo said with a little sigh. "Anyway, I'm so glad I'm not in your drama, it sounds hellish."
And with that, he opened his book, oblivious to the pleading looks of the boys at the two girls dancing in front of them.
At two in the morning, Draco decided he wouldn't be able to talk to Pansy tonight and went to bed. His whole body ached with exhaustion, but he knew he'd never sleep. He hadn't stopped waking up since last Saturday and he refused to take a Dreamless Sleep potion. He considered it cheating. He wanted to suffer insomnia as punishment for kissing Granger and Pansy.
He arrived at his dormitory dragging his feet. Theo had been asleep for hours, and Blaise had already drawn the curtains around his bed. Draco took a cold shower, washed up and got under the covers without much conviction. He tried meditating, but couldn't concentrate long enough to enjoy it. He read a bit of his Potions textbook to try and fall asleep, then practised making it Vanish, but without Granger's high-pitched voice to tell him how, he couldn't do it.
Draco was about to Occlude to stop thinking when he heard the dormitory door open softly. He stood still, his heart suddenly racing in his chest. Who on earth could enter his dormitory at three in the morning?
The answer came quickly. Draco saw the emerald green curtains of his bed ruffle a little, and he made out Pansy's silhouette through the opening. She was pointing her wand straight at him, and Draco had to squint as the full light of her Lumos hit his face.
"Shit." Pansy muttered. "Thought you were asleep."
She switched off her wand with a Nox and was about to spin on her heels before Draco grabbed her arm to hold her back.
"No! Pans', don't go..."
She immediately broke free of his grip, but still stood by his bed. Looking down at her clothes, Draco saw that she was wearing a long black t-shirt that looked a lot like the one he'd "lost" the year before, and a pair of cotton Quidditch shorts that definitely belonged to Blaise. They were so big that they fell over her hips.
"What are you doing here?" he asked into the darkness.
"What do you think?" replied Pansy coldly. "I came here to sleep, I didn't think you'd be awake at this hour."
"I couldn't sleep." he explained, rubbing his eyelids.
"Neither could I." she replied. "I'm going to sleep with Daphne."
She turned, but Draco lunged forward to grab her arm again. She pulled away, but with a little less vigour this time.
"Stay here, Pans'!" Draco said pleadingly. "I won't do anything, I swear, I won't even talk to you if you want. But just sleep here. Please."
Despite the darkness of the room, he thought he saw her bite her lip thoughtfully.
"I don't think that's a good idea..." she murmured, more to herself than to him.
"Please." he repeated. "Do you remember the promise I made when you came to sleep here at the beginning of the year? I told you you could always come, that I'd never turn you away."
"You also said I'd always be safe with you." she reminded him sharply.
"You will be. I promise, I won't do anything more than sleep. Look."
He shifted enough on his right side to leave a large part of the bed for her, and showed her the thick blanket waiting for her. Pansy sighed, then agreed to lie down. Draco tried not to show her how pleased he was that she did. She rolled herself into the blanket, leaving only the top of her head sticking out, then looked at Draco sceptically.
"You can have a bit of the duvet though." she said, nudging the blanket with her foot so he could cover himself with it. "I don't want you to freeze."
Draco took it but said nothing more. She sighed:
"And you're allowed to talk, too! Merlin..."
He smiled.
"Do you often come here when I'm asleep?" he asked, purely curious and not at all bothered by the prospect of her doing so.
Pansy shook her head against the pillow.
"No. I wanted to do it tonight because I was having trouble sleeping, I thought you were already asleep. I wanted to leave in the morning before you woke up." she admitted under her breath.
"Where have you been sleeping since Saturday?" he asked.
"With Daphne."
She narrowed her eyes a little and Draco could tell she wasn't too happy about it.
"Actually, I've been spending all my time with Daphne these days." she explained, still whispering because neither of them had the energy to cast a Silence spell. "I like her, and I know I can rely on her, but sometimes she can be a bit..."
"Boring?" offered Draco.
Pansy smacked him on the arm, but he knew he was right when her lips lifted imperceptibly.
"A bit." she admitted. "I know she wants to help me, but I think she's having trouble understanding how I feel. She's a little too... extreme. Not that I blame her, I'm having a hard time understanding what I'm feeling myself right now."
"It's my fault." he said quietly. "Pans, I'm really sorry, I've been acting like such a..."
She put a hand over her mouth to cut him off:
"No, stop. I don't want to talk about it now. I haven't forgiven you yet. It's just to help me sleep."
Draco nodded and she withdrew her hand. Her eyebrows were furrowed, hidden by a lock of inky hair across her face.
"But... I only have one question." she said, clearly hesitating. "If you answer it, can we never talk about this again?"
"Of course."
"Why did you do that?" she asked immediately, as if the question had been on the tip of her tongue for three days. "I mean, things were getting better between us. I was finally moving on, and you rekindled... What were you thinking?"
Draco felt his insides tighten at the question. He hadn't expected her to be so direct. He didn't want to lie to her, but he couldn't really tell her what he'd done with Granger.
Just thinking about that moment sent a wave of warmth up his arms.
Granger...
He didn't think it was possible to capture that kiss in enough detail to put it in one of his mental books. It was impossible to describe the feel of her lips against his, the way they had melted together perfectly, as if they had been made to kiss all along. He couldn't remember the warmth that had emanated from every place he'd touched: her cheeks, her neck, her arms, her hands. He could never reproduce the sound that had come from her mouth when he had kissed her neck, it seemed unreal now, as if it had been one of his many dreams where he had let his mind wander and imagined the impossible: kissing Granger.
"I... I just..." he said slowly, trying to find the best formation so as not to hurt Pansy.
She shook her head to cut him off.
"You're going to tell me... about her, aren't you?"
Draco looked at her black pupils, which he could barely make out in the dark. He didn't need light to see jealousy. He nodded.
"Then I don't want to know." Pansy said immediately. "I'm not ready to... I can't hear you talk about it yet. Not yet."
"I understand." he said.
She moved slightly in the bed and Draco felt the mattress sag beneath him as he followed her movements. She grabbed a handful of the covers and pulled them up further under her chin. Draco thought he heard a sniffle but didn't ask if she was crying. If she was, she wouldn't want to talk about it.
"Why didn't you spend the night with Blaise or Theo if you're still mad at me?" he asked, without a trace of anger in his voice.
"I thought about it, but I've never slept in Theo's bed before and I was afraid he'd wake up and freak out when he saw me." she explained.
Draco chuckled as he imagined Theo's reaction. He would probably have jumped so hard he would have fallen to the floor.
"What about Blaise?"
"I thought about that too, but I thought..." Pansy bit her lip again. "Daphne would never have forgiven me if I'd done something like that."
Draco nodded. It was understandable.
He couldn't help but feel a small spark of comfort at the thought of her choosing him over the other two.
"And you chose to come here at the risk of me waking up." he guessed.
Pansy gave a small, sad smile.
"I guess that's the irony of falling in love with my best friend." she said in a whisper. "Sometimes I get furious with you, and the only person I feel like confiding in... is you."