Hermione's Saturday morning was uneventful. She walked to her favourite coffee shop, read her favourite book and tried desperately to think of anything but Draco Malfoy.
As the sun started going down, she noticed a familiar head of blonde hair pacing outside her window. "Oh no." She murmured, not prepared to have this conversation after the day she had just had.
She opened the front door. "Rose!" She exclaimed, plastering on a big, fake smile and feigning enthusiasm. Rose looked at her strangely for a moment before smiling and replying "Hi Gra- Hermione! Can I come in?"
Before Hermione had time to answer, Rose stumbled in, seemly to have more trouble walking in her heels than she usually did. She took a seat in Hermione's lounge room and indicated for Hermione to sit with her.
What in the world? Hermione thought, dumbstruck by the audacity of Rose, inviting herself in and then asking her to sit in her own home.
"So... Rose. Why are you here?" Hermione said, taking a seat in her favourite armchair.
"Oh, you know." She giggled unnaturally, "just in the neighbourhood."
"Rose, don't you live on the other side of Lon-" Hermione was cut off when Rose held up her hand to silence her and giggled again. Blimey, how much time has she spent with Draco. Already picking up his obnoxious habits.
"Hermione, let's talk about you." Rose mused breathlessly, looking more uncomfortable by the second.
"Uh, okay sure. What do you want to talk about?"
"Let's talk about you and Draco! How do you feel about him?"
Hermione chuckled nervously at her bluntness. Getting straight to the point then. "Rose, you have nothing to worry about. Draco and I went to school together. We hated each other. There's nothing going on between us."
Rose shifted in her chair uncomfortably, "No Hermione, be honest with me. I have no interest in Draco, in fact, our date was horrible! Tell me the truth."
Hermione had the slight inkling Rose was fishing for information. She tried to skirt around the topic. "Oh, no your date was horrible? Are you okay? What happened?"
Rose seemed incredibly unconcerned that she had had a terrible date with the man she had spent so much time lusting over. She smiled at Hermione, big and fake and said "Oh don't worry about me! We just didn't have a connection. He spent all evening talking about you anyway!"
Hermione lit up. He did? Hermione was delighted at the news that Draco still thought of her, but she wanted to be cautious of what she said. She still cared about Rose's feelings.
"Are you sure Rose?" She nodded eagerly in agreement, pushing Hermione to continue. "Well, yeah, I guess I do sort of like Draco. I mean he's extremely intelligent, and he makes me feel wonderful. Oh, and he is kind when he wants to be." Hermione finished her short speech with a giggle, thinking about how every light-hearted conversation she had with Draco seemed to end in them insulting each other. "But he asked you on a date when I thought we had something together, so it doesn't matter what I feel anyway." Hermione looked up at Rose just as opened her mouth to say something but closed it again quickly.
"Anyway" Hermione continued, "Is there anything else you wanted to talk about?"
"Yeah there is actually," Rose beamed. Rose then spent the rest of the night quizzing Hermione on everything, from her favourite food to her best memory to her dream date. As she talked, Hermione noticed Rose's voice slowly start to change, like she was recovering from a sore throat.
"Hey Rose," Hermione spoke instead of answering her question about her preference for nice cars, "are you getting sick? Your voice sounds hoarse."
Rose suddenly looked up in panic. Giving a small cough she murmured, "Oh yes, I think so, I need to go. Goodnight Hermione." Before dashing out of her house without another word.