The Bracelet, Chapter 86
Title: The Bracelet
Author: AkashaTheKitty
Characters: Blaise Zabini, Draco Malfoy, Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Pansy Parkinson, Ron Weasley, Theodore Nott (whew)
Genres: Drama, Friendship, Hogwarts Years, Humor, Romance
Warnings: HBP Spoilers, although slightly incompatible.
Overall Rating: R
Summary: When Hermione Granger loses a bet she was sure she'd win to Draco Malfoy, it's the beginning of her own personal hell. And his.
Go here if you didn't read previous chapters. (Note: Changed to Hawthorn & Vine rather than IATQO)
This was a very boring day, Draco decided, staring at the common room fireplace. Blaise had run off to snog Tracey… for a change. Draco hardly ever saw Blaise on his own anymore and it was annoying him.
Girls weren't supposed to take over your life.
In his boredom, Draco had even gone up to the library to see if there was a Granger to bother. There wasn't. Then he'd gone outside, looking for her. No luck.
He was destined to spend the afternoon alone, it seemed, but… he didn't want to. He wanted to talk to someone. He wanted to stop feeling like he wasn't a part of the people he cared about's lives these days.
He wanted to-
"Sitting around brooding again, Draco?" a soft voice asked as his blonde and most favorite ex sat down next to him.
"I'm not brooding," he objected without any bite to it, "I am merely bored out of my skull."
"Then get a girlfriend," Pansy suggested, perhaps a bit coldly. Ok, so she needed to take the occasional jab at him after how he'd treated her. He could live with that.
"I've had girlfriends," he merely replied. "Apparently, I'm no good at it."
"Practice makes perfect?" She wasn't even looking at him but was rather studying her nails.
"Did you have anyone in mind?" he drily asked.
"As a matter of fact I do," she surprised him by saying. "Astoria Greengrass seemed to be good for you…. Why don't you give her another shot?"
The innocently voiced invasive suggestion had Draco's hackles rising. "No. Forget it."
And here he'd thought he didn't want to be alone. He'd been wrong.
"No, listen to me!" Pansy sharply reprimanded him. "Look at you! You're hardly the Draco any of us knew anymore. At least when you were with her you resembled him. I miss him, even if he could be a git sometimes. I say we bring him back!"
Draco shook his head. "You're insane, Pansy, and that's part of what I like about you, but you might as well give it up. Astoria seemed like a decent sort, but she was not for me."
Pansy sneered. "You fancy yourself in love with her, don't you? The effects from the ring and bracelet…." Her voice faltered at the remembered pain of him putting the bracelet on some witch that hadn't even mattered to him at the time. Then she seemed to shake it off as she continued, "It's not real, Draco. Besides, what do you expect will happen? Granger will fall in love with you? Your family will welcome her with open arms? Her friends will be accepting of you? You will all bond, and you will live happily ever after? You know that's not realistic. It won't happen."
Draco knew. But, quite honestly, he would be happy if he could just get Hermione to care about him. If her eyes would warm just a little bit when she looked at him, he believed that he could handle never having the rest.
Although 'never' seemed like an awfully long time to not feel whole.
He made himself sick with all this mooning. Pansy was right; he wasn't who he used to be.
He was really counting on getting over this. A few months, maybe a year, should be all the time he'd need to forget her after they all left Hogwarts, right? There would be other witches. Maybe even one that would fall for him.
"It's not natural, Draco," Pansy continued. "You are a pureblood, a Slytherin, a Malfoy, and she's… unworthy. At least if she'd been more attractive, I would have some understanding-"
"Did you have a point, Pansy?" Draco roughly interrupted. He'd be damned if Hermione wasn't pretty, and he was frankly more than a little disappointed that Pansy of all people couldn't seem to look past the lack of artificial enhancements. Hermione was real in a way that most girls he knew weren't.
"I think Astoria could help you get over her."
"Yeah? Sure you don't want to do the honors yourself?"
He immediately regretted his jab at her when she looked stricken. Great, why didn't he just mock the girl that had stood by him when few others would?
"Pansy, I'm-"
"A complete and utter dick, yes," she cut in.
He didn't have much to say to that since she was just stating the obvious. Also, defending himself might just lead to more fighting and he didn't really want to fight with her.
"I'm completely over you," Pansy then informed him. "I don't plan on ever being with you again. I just can't stand seeing you be this… pathetic excuse for who you once were."
"You certainly know how to make a bloke feel good about himself," he muttered.
"Astoria could make you feel good."
"No." Maybe Astoria could make him feel better for a little while, but then it would just turn into what he'd had with Pansy. A relationship where he waited for her to get over him while she waited for him to realize he had feelings that he never would have. It would never be a good relationship, much less a healthy one.
"Damn it, Draco…"
Draco sighed. Apparently Pansy hadn't learned that lesson. "Just stay out of it, all right?"
"I'm just trying to help."
"Yeah?" His mouth twisted into a cynical smile. "Any more 'help' from you and I'll be forced to bring up the fact that Ron Weasley seems to fancy you."
So maybe he wasn't above poking her a little bit.
Pansy's eyes widened and pink splotches appeared on her cheeks. "What has that little rodent been saying now?"
"Not so little, though, is he? Actually rather tall."
She sniffed. "He has the brains of a tiny rodent."
Again Draco's lips twisted. "Won't argue there." He honestly didn't see what Hermione had once seen in that freckled poster wizard for disaster. Or what she still saw in him that made her so dedicated to their friendship. Draco wouldn't say he was jealous exactly, but he really didn't like the bugger and he was glad that at least Pansy didn't seem to fancy him. "So, what's going on?"
"I have not been encouraging him if that's what you think," Pansy was very quick to establish. "He's just… constantly there. He refuses to go away. It's… annoying." She frowned and muttered something to herself, which Draco could only assume was a less than nice term for Weasley.
He snorted with amusement. "What, he's still doing that?" So the idiot hadn't heeded his advice to give Pansy some space. He was never going to stand a chance this way. Nice!
"Well, I suppose he has been a little less enthusiastic lately," she conceded. "But it's as if he can't stop looking at me."
"Well, you are pretty," Draco said with a shrug.
"I know," she said, sniffing again. "Too pretty for some red-haired pauper Weasley."
Out of principle and general Weasley-hate Draco agreed with Pansy's statement, but he was suddenly realizing how shallow her reasons sounded. Furthermore, he'd never even had much better reasons than that for his hatred towards Hermione. It all seemed so incredibly stupid and childish that he could barely even understand it now.
If this was the kind of person Pansy wanted him to revert back to, he'd actually much rather not.
Hermione frowned at the clock and fiddled with one of the buttons on her shirt. He was late. He was half an hour late. She had better things to do than wait around for some tardy git. Maybe she should dock some house points from him-that might teach him a lesson about being on time! Especially since this was official business. Just because theirs were unpaid jobs didn't mean they didn't have to take them seriously.
The door opened, and she turned around fully prepared to give him an earful, when she saw it was the wrong person.
"Oh," she said before she could stop herself. Oh, what? So Malfoy sometimes used the office, she knew this. It was just a rare occurrence lately, since he hardly spoke to Theo these days. Besides, he didn't usually use the office on the nights she was here. They almost religiously avoided ending up on duty with each other, after all. Random meetings resulting in tension before they each went on their merry way was one thing, being stuck together for hours, having to make conversation, was quite another.
Maybe he'd misread the schedule and hadn't realized that she was due to walk the halls with a tardy sixth year Ravenclaw boy tonight? No matter, she would be leaving the office within minutes.
"Hello, Granger," Malfoy quietly said, closing the door behind himself.
"Hey. Um, did you happen to see Chambers on your way here?"
So maybe she could hardly make it any clearer that she wanted to get out of there. It was just that being around Malfoy sort of forced her to think about… them. She didn't want to deal with that. She didn't feel like she had the energy for it. Not tonight.
There seemed to be a brief hesitation as Malfoy leaned against the closed door, but when he spoke, his voice didn't reveal anything. "He's not coming."
She didn't like the sound of that. "What? He suddenly had to go to the Hospital Wing?" Her voice had sharpened and she didn't like that either. She didn't like how she always felt defensive with Malfoy around. Why couldn't he just leave her alone so she wouldn't have to be on her guard all the time?
"No…" Malfoy slowly said, "he had forgotten about an essay he had for tomorrow. I was his last hope."
Hermione crossed her arms protectively over her chest. Ok! She could do this! She could be civil. She could be polite. She could walk next to Malfoy without constantly thinking about how he was spreading tales about her, and how it was her own fault because she'd slept with him knowing that just sex with him-when he'd made it very clear that he didn't actually want more-wouldn't be just sex but rather a powerful weapon in his hands.
She could also manage to not keep blaming herself for thinking he wouldn't use that weapon. She should really be happy that he hadn't used it to try and crush Harry or Ron or herself. Yet. He'd 'only' used it to hurt Theo. Because he could.
But most importantly, she could definitely manage to not wish something would happen again in spite of knowing everything she knew. Having wishes like that made her feel so stupid. Like she was asking for it. Like she deserved his behavior for not being in better control of herself.
"Don't stare at me like that," he muttered, looking a little uncomfortable. "I tried to get someone else, ok? It was impossible with such short notice. And I won't try anything. We'll just walk this round like any other night… ok?"
"It's… it's fine," she said, looking away from him. "It's no problem. We're late, so let's go." She took a deep breath and with purposeful strides she went to the door and, careful not to touch him, opened it and went out into the hall.
She could do this. Being alone with Malfoy late at night didn't have to mean disaster.
Draco was a liar, but what else was new? He'd actually wanted to come here tonight and when Chambers had mentioned having to do an essay after this, Draco had been quick to offer to come here in his place.
Now, glancing at Hermione's rigid posture as they were-in his opinion pointlessly-wandering the halls, he wondered if it hadn't been a bad idea, after all. He hadn't meant to upset her. She was always avoiding him to some extent, so how was he supposed to know if she really needed her space this time?
The worst part was that he wasn't even entirely sure why she was acting this way. Did she still think that he'd rubbed their night together in Theo's face on purpose? If she did, he could sort of understand why she'd be mad, but she didn't really seem mad, more like… hurt? He wasn't sure.
"So, did you start your Potions essay yet?" she politely asked.
They were making casual chit-chat now? "No."
"You should, you know. It's always good to get things done early. It saves you from having to cancel your rounds at the last minute."
"Not if I forgot I had an essay in the first place. Besides, it's not me you should lecture."
"No, I suppose not," she muttered. "But I'm not lecturing you."
"Yeah, you are."
"Why do people always claim that?" She frowned. "I'm just saying-"
"But that's just it, Granger. You're telling people what to do because you think you know better. Nobody likes to be told like that."
Hermione opened her mouth, then closed it again, pressing her lips together in a tight frown. "Fine," she ground out. "I won't do that then."
Draco's lip quirked. "What's the matter, Granger?" he teased, obviously not caring very much about his own health. "Can't take a little critique?"
She seemed to make an effort to relax but remained more stiff than he liked. "No, I guess I can," she said. "But it's not very pleasant, is it? I try to help and get told off for lecturing people."
"I didn't tell you off."
"I meant generally," she murmured. "What do I care if everyone else fails their NEWTs?"
"You care," Draco calmly stated. "But maybe you should check whether your advice is actually wanted or needed first and then maybe be a little less blunt about it?"
Hermione stopped dead in her tracks. "I can't believe that you are telling me how to act!"
Draco grinned. "I know. Surreal, isn't it?"
"The world must be ending," she drily replied.
"So, if the world is ending anyway, why are we doing this stupid walking? Why don't we just go up the Astronomy Tower and talk instead?"
For a second he thought he'd tempted her, but then her expression became shuttered. "Is this how you usually do your rounds, Malfoy?"
"You know it's not."
She shook her head and began walking again. "Don't make me have to report you. If you want to mess about, do it on your own time."
Draco carefully kept his mouth shut as a few expletives ran through his mind. He'd never not done the damn dumb rounds, checking out shadows. He'd never actually wanted to spend time talking, or anything else for that matter, to anyone else he'd been partnered up with. "Never mind," he tightly said, following her.
He'd just really like to know if she honestly didn't realize that he had wanted to go up the Tower with her, or if she knew but simply wasn't interested in spending that kind of time with him.
Author: AkashaTheKitty
Characters: Blaise Zabini, Draco Malfoy, Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Pansy Parkinson, Ron Weasley, Theodore Nott (whew)
Genres: Drama, Friendship, Hogwarts Years, Humor, Romance
Warnings: HBP Spoilers, although slightly incompatible.
Overall Rating: R
Summary: When Hermione Granger loses a bet she was sure she'd win to Draco Malfoy, it's the beginning of her own personal hell. And his.
Go here if you didn't read previous chapters. (Note: Changed to Hawthorn & Vine rather than IATQO)
This was a very boring day, Draco decided, staring at the common room fireplace. Blaise had run off to snog Tracey… for a change. Draco hardly ever saw Blaise on his own anymore and it was annoying him.
Girls weren't supposed to take over your life.
In his boredom, Draco had even gone up to the library to see if there was a Granger to bother. There wasn't. Then he'd gone outside, looking for her. No luck.
He was destined to spend the afternoon alone, it seemed, but… he didn't want to. He wanted to talk to someone. He wanted to stop feeling like he wasn't a part of the people he cared about's lives these days.
He wanted to-
"Sitting around brooding again, Draco?" a soft voice asked as his blonde and most favorite ex sat down next to him.
"I'm not brooding," he objected without any bite to it, "I am merely bored out of my skull."
"Then get a girlfriend," Pansy suggested, perhaps a bit coldly. Ok, so she needed to take the occasional jab at him after how he'd treated her. He could live with that.
"I've had girlfriends," he merely replied. "Apparently, I'm no good at it."
"Practice makes perfect?" She wasn't even looking at him but was rather studying her nails.
"Did you have anyone in mind?" he drily asked.
"As a matter of fact I do," she surprised him by saying. "Astoria Greengrass seemed to be good for you…. Why don't you give her another shot?"
The innocently voiced invasive suggestion had Draco's hackles rising. "No. Forget it."
And here he'd thought he didn't want to be alone. He'd been wrong.
"No, listen to me!" Pansy sharply reprimanded him. "Look at you! You're hardly the Draco any of us knew anymore. At least when you were with her you resembled him. I miss him, even if he could be a git sometimes. I say we bring him back!"
Draco shook his head. "You're insane, Pansy, and that's part of what I like about you, but you might as well give it up. Astoria seemed like a decent sort, but she was not for me."
Pansy sneered. "You fancy yourself in love with her, don't you? The effects from the ring and bracelet…." Her voice faltered at the remembered pain of him putting the bracelet on some witch that hadn't even mattered to him at the time. Then she seemed to shake it off as she continued, "It's not real, Draco. Besides, what do you expect will happen? Granger will fall in love with you? Your family will welcome her with open arms? Her friends will be accepting of you? You will all bond, and you will live happily ever after? You know that's not realistic. It won't happen."
Draco knew. But, quite honestly, he would be happy if he could just get Hermione to care about him. If her eyes would warm just a little bit when she looked at him, he believed that he could handle never having the rest.
Although 'never' seemed like an awfully long time to not feel whole.
He made himself sick with all this mooning. Pansy was right; he wasn't who he used to be.
He was really counting on getting over this. A few months, maybe a year, should be all the time he'd need to forget her after they all left Hogwarts, right? There would be other witches. Maybe even one that would fall for him.
"It's not natural, Draco," Pansy continued. "You are a pureblood, a Slytherin, a Malfoy, and she's… unworthy. At least if she'd been more attractive, I would have some understanding-"
"Did you have a point, Pansy?" Draco roughly interrupted. He'd be damned if Hermione wasn't pretty, and he was frankly more than a little disappointed that Pansy of all people couldn't seem to look past the lack of artificial enhancements. Hermione was real in a way that most girls he knew weren't.
"I think Astoria could help you get over her."
"Yeah? Sure you don't want to do the honors yourself?"
He immediately regretted his jab at her when she looked stricken. Great, why didn't he just mock the girl that had stood by him when few others would?
"Pansy, I'm-"
"A complete and utter dick, yes," she cut in.
He didn't have much to say to that since she was just stating the obvious. Also, defending himself might just lead to more fighting and he didn't really want to fight with her.
"I'm completely over you," Pansy then informed him. "I don't plan on ever being with you again. I just can't stand seeing you be this… pathetic excuse for who you once were."
"You certainly know how to make a bloke feel good about himself," he muttered.
"Astoria could make you feel good."
"No." Maybe Astoria could make him feel better for a little while, but then it would just turn into what he'd had with Pansy. A relationship where he waited for her to get over him while she waited for him to realize he had feelings that he never would have. It would never be a good relationship, much less a healthy one.
"Damn it, Draco…"
Draco sighed. Apparently Pansy hadn't learned that lesson. "Just stay out of it, all right?"
"I'm just trying to help."
"Yeah?" His mouth twisted into a cynical smile. "Any more 'help' from you and I'll be forced to bring up the fact that Ron Weasley seems to fancy you."
So maybe he wasn't above poking her a little bit.
Pansy's eyes widened and pink splotches appeared on her cheeks. "What has that little rodent been saying now?"
"Not so little, though, is he? Actually rather tall."
She sniffed. "He has the brains of a tiny rodent."
Again Draco's lips twisted. "Won't argue there." He honestly didn't see what Hermione had once seen in that freckled poster wizard for disaster. Or what she still saw in him that made her so dedicated to their friendship. Draco wouldn't say he was jealous exactly, but he really didn't like the bugger and he was glad that at least Pansy didn't seem to fancy him. "So, what's going on?"
"I have not been encouraging him if that's what you think," Pansy was very quick to establish. "He's just… constantly there. He refuses to go away. It's… annoying." She frowned and muttered something to herself, which Draco could only assume was a less than nice term for Weasley.
He snorted with amusement. "What, he's still doing that?" So the idiot hadn't heeded his advice to give Pansy some space. He was never going to stand a chance this way. Nice!
"Well, I suppose he has been a little less enthusiastic lately," she conceded. "But it's as if he can't stop looking at me."
"Well, you are pretty," Draco said with a shrug.
"I know," she said, sniffing again. "Too pretty for some red-haired pauper Weasley."
Out of principle and general Weasley-hate Draco agreed with Pansy's statement, but he was suddenly realizing how shallow her reasons sounded. Furthermore, he'd never even had much better reasons than that for his hatred towards Hermione. It all seemed so incredibly stupid and childish that he could barely even understand it now.
If this was the kind of person Pansy wanted him to revert back to, he'd actually much rather not.
Hermione frowned at the clock and fiddled with one of the buttons on her shirt. He was late. He was half an hour late. She had better things to do than wait around for some tardy git. Maybe she should dock some house points from him-that might teach him a lesson about being on time! Especially since this was official business. Just because theirs were unpaid jobs didn't mean they didn't have to take them seriously.
The door opened, and she turned around fully prepared to give him an earful, when she saw it was the wrong person.
"Oh," she said before she could stop herself. Oh, what? So Malfoy sometimes used the office, she knew this. It was just a rare occurrence lately, since he hardly spoke to Theo these days. Besides, he didn't usually use the office on the nights she was here. They almost religiously avoided ending up on duty with each other, after all. Random meetings resulting in tension before they each went on their merry way was one thing, being stuck together for hours, having to make conversation, was quite another.
Maybe he'd misread the schedule and hadn't realized that she was due to walk the halls with a tardy sixth year Ravenclaw boy tonight? No matter, she would be leaving the office within minutes.
"Hello, Granger," Malfoy quietly said, closing the door behind himself.
"Hey. Um, did you happen to see Chambers on your way here?"
So maybe she could hardly make it any clearer that she wanted to get out of there. It was just that being around Malfoy sort of forced her to think about… them. She didn't want to deal with that. She didn't feel like she had the energy for it. Not tonight.
There seemed to be a brief hesitation as Malfoy leaned against the closed door, but when he spoke, his voice didn't reveal anything. "He's not coming."
She didn't like the sound of that. "What? He suddenly had to go to the Hospital Wing?" Her voice had sharpened and she didn't like that either. She didn't like how she always felt defensive with Malfoy around. Why couldn't he just leave her alone so she wouldn't have to be on her guard all the time?
"No…" Malfoy slowly said, "he had forgotten about an essay he had for tomorrow. I was his last hope."
Hermione crossed her arms protectively over her chest. Ok! She could do this! She could be civil. She could be polite. She could walk next to Malfoy without constantly thinking about how he was spreading tales about her, and how it was her own fault because she'd slept with him knowing that just sex with him-when he'd made it very clear that he didn't actually want more-wouldn't be just sex but rather a powerful weapon in his hands.
She could also manage to not keep blaming herself for thinking he wouldn't use that weapon. She should really be happy that he hadn't used it to try and crush Harry or Ron or herself. Yet. He'd 'only' used it to hurt Theo. Because he could.
But most importantly, she could definitely manage to not wish something would happen again in spite of knowing everything she knew. Having wishes like that made her feel so stupid. Like she was asking for it. Like she deserved his behavior for not being in better control of herself.
"Don't stare at me like that," he muttered, looking a little uncomfortable. "I tried to get someone else, ok? It was impossible with such short notice. And I won't try anything. We'll just walk this round like any other night… ok?"
"It's… it's fine," she said, looking away from him. "It's no problem. We're late, so let's go." She took a deep breath and with purposeful strides she went to the door and, careful not to touch him, opened it and went out into the hall.
She could do this. Being alone with Malfoy late at night didn't have to mean disaster.
Draco was a liar, but what else was new? He'd actually wanted to come here tonight and when Chambers had mentioned having to do an essay after this, Draco had been quick to offer to come here in his place.
Now, glancing at Hermione's rigid posture as they were-in his opinion pointlessly-wandering the halls, he wondered if it hadn't been a bad idea, after all. He hadn't meant to upset her. She was always avoiding him to some extent, so how was he supposed to know if she really needed her space this time?
The worst part was that he wasn't even entirely sure why she was acting this way. Did she still think that he'd rubbed their night together in Theo's face on purpose? If she did, he could sort of understand why she'd be mad, but she didn't really seem mad, more like… hurt? He wasn't sure.
"So, did you start your Potions essay yet?" she politely asked.
They were making casual chit-chat now? "No."
"You should, you know. It's always good to get things done early. It saves you from having to cancel your rounds at the last minute."
"Not if I forgot I had an essay in the first place. Besides, it's not me you should lecture."
"No, I suppose not," she muttered. "But I'm not lecturing you."
"Yeah, you are."
"Why do people always claim that?" She frowned. "I'm just saying-"
"But that's just it, Granger. You're telling people what to do because you think you know better. Nobody likes to be told like that."
Hermione opened her mouth, then closed it again, pressing her lips together in a tight frown. "Fine," she ground out. "I won't do that then."
Draco's lip quirked. "What's the matter, Granger?" he teased, obviously not caring very much about his own health. "Can't take a little critique?"
She seemed to make an effort to relax but remained more stiff than he liked. "No, I guess I can," she said. "But it's not very pleasant, is it? I try to help and get told off for lecturing people."
"I didn't tell you off."
"I meant generally," she murmured. "What do I care if everyone else fails their NEWTs?"
"You care," Draco calmly stated. "But maybe you should check whether your advice is actually wanted or needed first and then maybe be a little less blunt about it?"
Hermione stopped dead in her tracks. "I can't believe that you are telling me how to act!"
Draco grinned. "I know. Surreal, isn't it?"
"The world must be ending," she drily replied.
"So, if the world is ending anyway, why are we doing this stupid walking? Why don't we just go up the Astronomy Tower and talk instead?"
For a second he thought he'd tempted her, but then her expression became shuttered. "Is this how you usually do your rounds, Malfoy?"
"You know it's not."
She shook her head and began walking again. "Don't make me have to report you. If you want to mess about, do it on your own time."
Draco carefully kept his mouth shut as a few expletives ran through his mind. He'd never not done the damn dumb rounds, checking out shadows. He'd never actually wanted to spend time talking, or anything else for that matter, to anyone else he'd been partnered up with. "Never mind," he tightly said, following her.
He'd just really like to know if she honestly didn't realize that he had wanted to go up the Tower with her, or if she knew but simply wasn't interested in spending that kind of time with him.