Draco tasted the aftermath of the words on his mouth. It tasted rotten, his whole system rejects it and if he had anything today he would have thrown up. He wiped his lips on the back of his hand, scrubbing i as if there's dirt on them. Disgusting. Unworthy. Filthy. You'd never kiss her again.
Snape's words rung in his head like a blare.
"I know more than you think. I know for one that the likes of them are not for the likes of us. Don't be a selfish coward, everyone already says you are. Must you follow them like a spineless clown?"
Maybe tomorrow will be better.
If not tomorrow then maybe the next or maybe the next...
He sat on a desk in the middle of the dark room, lips raw from friction. He stared ahead at the blackboard. Something, something, blah blah Wizarding History.
"You treacherous, conniving, gruesome mons--" she choked, "Monster." The sob escaped her. Her wand was pointing his way and even as the tears flowed down her eyes the wand was steady. She was shaking. Gods, he'd let her have him. Maybe that will be infinitely better for everything to just end.
Draco sat wearily in the desk and inwardly sigh. He has to play the villain even to her. Even to her.
Even as he wanted to hold her and just tell her all about it. Even as he was practically choking on sobs and biting his tongue from just talking to her like how he wanted. Even as his heart broke with every step. He pressed on.
He'll be the bad guy again when he steps out of the shadows.
"Well, well, well. Lookie here. Isn't this an unusual sight," he drawled silkily at her. It was the usual scenario, of her crying and him internally breaking but not letting it up. "Is someone too weak to let go? She knows she's dead to me. Did she become a ghost?"
"This has nothing to do with that," she said steadily even though her cheeks is already wet with shiny tears. "We ended that. What are you planning?"
"She thinks that she can simply just ask me about my plans. Who does she think she is?" He walked towards her. Trying his hardest to keep his eye contact, for his eyes not to skim and linger over places that he shouldn't look. But the dress that she was wearing, a pink sleeveless number, cut a bit too low in the front (around two inches below the collarbone), showing the fullness on her chest that might have grown this year adding to her already alluring frame, and falling just above her knees is making things more complicated. And her perfume.
That dainty sweet smell in the air.
It was a contrast to his own. His was overpowering-- you'd smell it if so much as stand in the same enclosed space, across the room. Hers-- you'd have to be close, you'd have to breathe her air. Suddenly he was too close to her again, like his feet were moving on their own accord, all that was separating them is the length of her arm and her wand. He felt her magic fizzle at the end of the wood. "Will she blast me to death? She did hear my plans. Or will I get her first?"
"What are you up to?"
She was refusing to believe that he will have a hand in someone else's annihilation, much more the very man that could save them all. And she's right. She's absolutely fucking right. But right now he'd do anything and everything to make anyone and everyone believe that he's a blood thirsty killer that will do anything to get on Voldemort's good favors.
Snape will kill Dumbledore but not before Draco kills Snape first.
But it takes conviction, he needs to have them believe that everything is just as they planned. And by them-- he means everyone-- and by everyone that includes her. First and foremost her.
He took a sharp in take of breath. "Is she about to hex me to death now? I think she should do it now if she really intends. I'd give her a fair chance. Let the living pity the dead for once."
He showed her his empty hands. This won't be like their fifth year.
"Draco, I believed in you."
Believed. Past tense. Not anymore.
His lips trembled. Her words got him unexpectedly worse.
"I thought we were in the same page. I thought that you asked me to stay away so that-- so that it will not be complicated when you had to deal with your family when in reality it was not your family you were worried about. You only want the glory and power V-Voldemort promised you. I should've known. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. You're your father through and through," he wished that she said this with anger and hatred as she battered his body with blows of magic and angry punches but instead she was broken and disappointed. Her voice raspy and soft, tears steadily falling.
He took an intake of breath and spoke as little as he could because if he said more, his voice might betray him or a stubborn tear may spill. "Isn't she clever?"
The heavy dark jacket that he wore was shed and discarded to the floor as he stepped ever closer to her. She didn't lower her wand, it was steady on his throat. The magic burned the skin of his neck as he slowly rolled the sleeve of his crisp white button down. It revealed the ugly Dark Mark against his snow white skin.
"No."
She whimpered.
"No."
"Yes," he replied. "Yes and now since she is such a clever girl she'd speak to no one about this or one student will snuff it. Dead. Gone. Destroyed. It could be in your house or in Ravenclaws or in Hufflepuff. I don't discriminate," he forced out a laugh.
She was silent. "If you go now then you really are the enemy. Tell me that all of this is a joke. That that is not a real mark..." She paused. He can feel her reprimanding herself for being so damn illogical.
No one said anything for a while. He summoned his discarded jacket to him and the sleeve rolled and covered the Dark Mark again. She had lowered her wand, head bowed low. So low that her chin was touching the spot between her collar bones. He wanted a glimpse of her face but it seems that he will not have even that. Maybe that's better-- he'll get to remember her smiling at him. Not this. "No more? Just empty threats? I thought so." He walked away with swagger in his steps.
"Draco."
He stopped.
"I loved you."
Loved. Past tense.
"Not anymore."
Yes. That's right. Good for you. That makes one of us. I'd rather have it you than me. I've done this before in my other life. What's another twenty years? Another two decades. Another two decades without you. Another twenty birthdays, Christmases, Easters, Halloweens... What's another seven thousand and three hundred days of waiting?
Yet the heart ached as it could not understand what the mind tried to justify.
He laughed out loud to hide the incoming sobs as he looked back.
"Of course, you did. You and every other girl who I claimed to be my first kiss, it was fucking boring, by the way, you were was so boring that I had to literally prick my self to stay awake."
"No, you didn't," she said, the tears have dried on her cheeks now and her voice was even. "You're already a prick right from the start."
The girl walked up to him. Her cherry tinged lips just inches from his skin, body heat emanated from her bare skin, his fingers ached to make contact-- it felt like instinct wanted him to run them over her bare arms, just like he used to. Feel the suppleness in his palm, the sweet subtle scent clinging on his own skin all day long like a part of her was with him. The baser part of him said that it was what was supposed to be, but logic and rationality said otherwise. She motioned as if she would touch his neck but her soft fingers just lingered in the air, as if frozen. He had to move his head to the side to look at her. Her amber eyes were dark, they were not sad-- they had a fire in them. Inextinguishable and powerful. Beautiful and dangerous. Like how they were supposed to be. Like always.
"If you plan to go down this road, I'll see it myself that you burn before you even reach the starting line."
She walked out of the room.
Draco just witnessed how she got over him.
----------------
"Are you alright, Hermione?"
Hermione blinked and noticed that she had not turned her page for at least the good half of an hour. Well, figuratively. "Oh, yes. Just sleepy, that's all," she replied. Even the scent of the dusty books of the library can't excite or energize her anymore.
"I think I'd be able to finish here by myself," Ron replied, "You should head to bed early." He patted her hand, absently. His hand was warm-- comforting and she didn't draw back. It was nice that Ron is giving all this special attention to her, going out of his way to keep her company, it was as if he never wanted her to be alone at all times.
They both knew why.
They both have 'his' name in mind but they have completely different reasons.
Sometime in between various students getting almost killed around Christmas time and thereafter Ron told him about his feelings. He wanted to be more than just her friend or one of her best friends. She asked of him to give her time. She used said time to tell Dumbledore of what she overheard Draco say. She told him about the Dark Mark. Everything. Later she told Harry and Ron. Now, Ron won't leave her alone no matter what.
It made her feel safe to say the least.
Yet...
"Good night, Ron," she said as her lips made contact with his cheek. It was the first time that she ever kissed him. The results were instant, his face got redder than his hair.
"Yes, yes," he cleared his throat, unable to look her in the face, "You too and sweet dreams. Awesome, yeah, great."
She smiled and walked out of the library.
Ron never did make her heart flutter like crazy, make her dizzy or make everything look topsy turvy with just a touch but he's Ron, she cares for him. He's alright.
Ron will never be him, but he's Ron.
Maybe it will be better...
Maybe a bath will clear things up. It has been such a long time since she had time to gather her thoughts, lately it had always been scheming and scheming and homework with Harry and Ron. And more scheming with Harry, Ron and the occasional cryptic advice from Dumbledore.
After gathering her things from the dormitory she headed to the prefect's bathroom.
She was so preoccupied with her thoughts that she didn't even remember saying the password to the bathroom, the doors opened and admitted her. She stepped in and discarded her bag and hang her towel and clothes by the golden hooks under the mermaid portrait. She removed her clothes and rolled a small white towel that she could use as pillow to rest the back of her head on. The taps opened with the flick of her wand and the room instantly smelled of lavender and chamomile. Small bubbles floating up in the air.
This brought a small smile on her lips.
It was the picture of heaven. When she was a child she always believed that heaven was a cross between a flower field and a foamy bubble bath. Like a sodding detergent ad. A laugh escaped her lips as she submerged her whole body in the water.
She closed her eyes and sighed.
Everything is at ease. Everything is still. Everything is al--
"Who the fuck do you think you are?"
Her eyes snapped open as she grabbed on to her wand.
Draco's steely gray eyes were wild and dark, wand pointed to her as well. He was in his element-- water. Hermione's eyes quickly looked around her, thinking of all the things that he could do to hurt her. There's water all around them, solid walls-- no one will hear her scream. Ron thinks that she's asleep, all her roommates thinks she's still with Ron in the library.
No one will come.
There's no way out.
"You ruined everything! I told you not to tell anyone! It's not going according to plan anymore!"
Hermione looked back at him in anger and annoyance. A snappy retort was hanging on the edge of her lips. She'll call him on his cock and bull, just wait. "You're being completely idiotic and nonsensical, do you know that?"
"Shut up!"
Hermione was hit by a wave of water.
"Do you know what you just put at risk? Do you know?"
She wiped the water from her face and looked up at him in defiance. "What? Am I supposed to know? I thought we read from the same page but you made it very clear that we don't. You told me that you'd kill someone if I told Dumbledore-- I didn't, right? But you almost killed two and what else is there, Draco? What else is there to do? If you expected me or even got as close to believing that I will just sit there while every single good thing in the world is blown to smithereens then you never really knew me."
He huffed. Anger still seeping from him, unappeased. He took breaths through gritted teeth.
"If you're so angry about it then tell me what you want!"
She shouted but it came out weak. Weak even for her. The adrenaline is going down and she's getting aware of other things. Very aware, as a matter of fact, that the soap bubbles are slowly dispersing and she's wearing nothing and he's just standing across the pool of water.
Draco seemed to feel this apprehension, without even removing his school shoes, he jumped into the water. It caused a wave in the pool as he started moving towards her, the water parting slowly for him.
She grabbed the nearest thing that she could find. The towel behind her head but in doing so her wand slipped from her fingers. It dropped in the soapy water, she tried to feel around for it with her foot but to no avail, it must have rolled farther away. "Accio wand!"
But nothing came to her hand.
She mentally berated herself. Draco's gaze was fixed on her, he approached her steadily, the water barely reached his chest as it covered hers, well almost covered it. She can only pray that the towel is thick enough. That it isn't see through. That she will have even that small leverage over him.
For he had everything against her now, he has a wand, clothes and the indifference that Hermione had the to fake every single day since. And she misses him. Every single thing about him. That stupid, god awful bleached blonde hair. Those eyes that reminded her of rain water, she hates rain-- figured it just now that his sharp gaze felt like razors across her skin. That snow white skin. And those lips. Those lips that she can't help but stare at. Those lips that she had dreamed about and hated herself afterwards. He was not smirking at her, his face showed no other emotion other than pure loathing.
Like he wanted to hurt her really, really bad.
And if there's one thing that she'll admit that Draco Malfoy is good at-- it's being bad.
She's suddenly finding it harder and harder to breathe.
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Aye! Had a pretty ace day. So, here's an update! :D Thank you for the 27.5K reads, fam! I can't even! You guys have been so supportive, my heart is swelling. *sigh* This is actually hella weird, guys. I usually have a shit ton of things that I save to say in this author's notes but I can't remember anything now that I am writing this! godddamnit
Song up top is 'i hate u, i love u' by gnash (ft. olivia o'brien). Aw yis, I managed to respect his wishes in keeping it all small caps, what's that about? Someone tell me? Hahaha!
Thank you once again! Next part will come Thursday or Wednesday :) Please don't forget to vote and comment just cause they make my day and I will try to reply to every single one. Kbye! x