Crawling Back To You

Prologue

It's been six years since the war, the war that stole some of her closest friends, and absolutely devastated the wizarding world. It had been five years since she had seen him. Draco Malfoy. She loathed him entirely. His cocky attitude, that signature smirk that never seemed to drop from his face, and his incessant need to be right about everything. She couldn't stand it. He was more of a "Know-it-all" than she ever could be, not that he would ever admit that. He vexed her so much; he made her school years a living hell. "Well, all except for one" Hermione thought. Their eighth year, it was an elective year after the war had taken place. 

   No one was required to return that year, but for the previous seventh years, they were allowed to return as eighth years to make up for the time they had lost due to the war. Hermione of course had chosen to return; she couldn't let an opportunity like that pass her up. It was one of the best years of her life. She and Ron had chosen to stay friends directly after the war, what with the chaos of her going back to school, and with him having just lost Fred. They both needed time, and it proved to be helpful. At the end of that year, they started their relationship and everything was going great. Until recently. 

  Hermione and Ron had been arguing a lot more recently. She had chalked it up to them having been around each other for so long, but it just kept getting worse. She had started dreaming of Draco. Almost every night for a month. "Why!" She nearly screamed out loud. She couldn't figure it out for the life of her. She hadn't even seen him five years, and they hadn't even talked for that entire time. Not since the incident. He broke her heart, and since the year was almost over when it happened, she didn't have to see him again.  So why was he still so ingrained in her mind. It was going to drive her insane. 

Hermione jumps as her phone starts ringing. 

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He missed her. Draco never knew what it was that drove Hermione away, but recently she kept circling his thoughts and it was driving him crazy. It had been five years since he had seen her, five years since she had almost been his. "Merlin, I was such a stupid kid" Draco mumbled to himself, as he took another swig of Firewhiskey. Drinking was not a regular habit for him, in fact he usually detested the stuff. But with thoughts of her drowning his every thought recently, he needed it. 

Draco had returned to Hogwarts for his eighth year, along with a handful of other former seventh years. He had been so nervous to go back that year. He was a former Death Eater and everyone knew that. He went into his last year at Hogwarts expecting everyone to hate him, and he was right. No one even wanted to look in his direction, and if they did it was only to point and whisper to their friends about him or to throw an angry insult his way. He had never expected her, the Gryffindor Princess of all people, to show him any kindness, but she did. 

  He had hated it at first, they were what one could have called frenemies. Mindless bickering here, a snide comment there, but she wasn't ignoring him at least. The whispers died down after that. They would always be there especially after the things he had done. But he could live with that, it was the consequences of his actions after all. Being one of the only former Slytherins to return was difficult. Since there were so few of them, the eighth years had gotten their own dorms when they remodeled Hogwarts after the war. They thought it would promote unity among the returning students. It had worked, for the most part, but many of the former Slytherins had chosen to sleep down in the dormitory that they were all so familiar with, except for Draco. Maybe that was his mistake, but he at least wanted to try to integrate with others. 

That was the beginning of it all. Of him falling hopelessly for Hermione Granger. But why now have all of these memories resurfaced for him. She made it very clear at the end of that year that she wanted nothing else to do with him. Then she ran off with Weasel, he should have seen it coming, but he was absolutely blindsided. So he let himself forget. Forget the feeling of being with her, forget the conversations they used to have in their common room late at night. He threw himself into his work. He became a renown Potions Master and occasionally worked as a contractor for the Ministry. 

Draco finished off his glass of Firewhiskey and turned to the bartender to order another for himself and for his best friend who was sitting at the bar with him. "Whoa mate, you might want to slow down a bit. I know you may make your own hours but the rest of us aren't so lucky." said Blaise with a chuckle. 

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A few hours later Blaise is carrying Draco out of the bar, he had never seen Draco drink this much ever. "Are you going to be alright mate?" Blaise asks and Draco gives a drunken nod, somehow almost throwing the both of them off balance. "Well, you're in no state to take yourself home" Blaise says to Draco, as he guides them to the nearest floo. 

They end up back at Draco's flat in London after a bit of stumbling and a few slurred directions. Blaise drops him off on the sofa as he says "Alright, I'm going to go scour your cabinets for a sobering potion of some sort, hopefully you prepared for this". Blaise sends a quick message to his boss at the Ministry letting them know that he may be late in the morning. Thankfully, after the war the Ministry had picked up the use of some muggle technology. One of which being phones and cell phones, which had proved to be a far more efficient form of communication than owls. He set his phone on Draco's coffee table and disappeared into one of the rooms in the flat to find Draco's potion. 

Draco isn't thinking when he sees Blaise's phone light up with a notification. After Hogwarts he decided to take a year in the muggle world, away from the wizarding world so he could better understand things. A new perspective, he had called it at the time. During that year he became very proficient with muggle technology and had grown fond of it. So much so that his own Flat was a nice blend of muggle technology and the wizarding world. Draco opens Blaise's phone, and goes to shout for him, and then sees a familiar name. "No problem. Take the day off if you need to, Merlin knows you deserve it" from Hermione Granger. Draco's breathing stops for a second. He knew they both worked for the Ministry, but Blaise had never mentioned that Hermione was his boss. Draco hits the call button without thinking, partly from the alcohol, partly because he feels that if he doesn't hear her voice now, the thoughts of her may just kill him. 

The phone rings three times before she answers, "Hello Blaise, is everything ok?" Draco lets out a shaky breath "Mione?". He hears her gasp over the phone, as Blaise is walking into the room potion bottle in hand.