Disclaimer: Nothing is mine.

A/N: um…sorry its been so long. I've been real busy w/ school. This chapter makes no sense and the real plot doesn't really come until later. This chapter sorta is just some random stuff and it's rather short…but oh well. It sorta has the plot of this one movie I saw like 5 yrs ago, but not really. Um…this chap is kinda boring but I hope the next one will be somewhat better. I'm kinda not in the mood to write cuz I have finals this week, starting on Tuesday. Can you believe it? Our idiot school has finals AFTER winter break so we can use the 2 weeks to forget everything we've ever learned. Ok, I'll stop complaining.

Thanks to the ppl who reviewed: Veronica*James, im2damnhorny, Book-Lover-210, Dark Fairy, SilverDragoness08, DMRox, glory, Emma, Serena, silver dragonfly, Moon Assassin 13, Kori Bischoff, animegirl-mika, depth, linnetjo, Late-Summer-Night, Alicia DeBroux, hermioneG89, CedricDiggory, Dalla, Rosa, Riverchic1998, AlyBaby, um…no name, AllyCatHerm19, Andrea, Slim-Shady-Modeling-Baby, Lulu, Anegel Trinton, cleavercat, draco-hermione-shipper, Romantic Fool, Karin, hannah, Major Malfoy, BlossomsthatCloudtheSky, Chelsea, and anyone I might have missed

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When There Are No More Tears

Chapter 2

"Oh, my God."

"I'm sorry, Miss. I'm not a burglar or anything if that's what you're th-"

"-Oh, my God!"

"I really am very sorry, Miss, if I scared you. I'm from -"

"-Oh, my God!"

"I really meant no harm. I came to-"

"What are you doing here, Malfoy?"

Her question was followed by a very pregnant pause. Draco furrowed his eyebrows, as he always did when he was confused.

"Is there something going on here that I don't know about? Because I don't know you, but you seem to know me."

"Is this your idea of a dirty joke, Malfoy?"

"Uh…I wouldn't know." He glanced around nervously, and felt very…unprotected. "I'm really truly sorry, Miss, but I don't know you?"

Harmony could tell that he was honestly bewildered, and her expression softened a bit.

"Open your eyes, Malfoy. Who do you think I am?" She had dropped the pan on the floor and now had her hands on her hips.

He scrunched his eyes and studied her closely in the poor light, but still could not find any familiarity. "Er…are you sure I know you?"

"Mudblood? Does that ring a bell?"

"Mudblood?"

"Do you need me to spell it out for you?" she asked, with a hint of sarcasm.

He leaned closer to her to get a better look, and then finally it struck him. "Granger?"

She rolled her eyes. "Pleased to meet you too. Now leave."

"What?"

"Do you need me to show you to the door?"

"No, I mean, is it really you?"

"Cut the crap, Malfoy. What do you want?"

"What happened to you?" he asked with disbelief in his voice.

Her face suddenly softened with a pained expression and her eyes became overbright. "What do you mean? Nothing's happened to me."

"You're-you're-"

She stared at her feet. "You mean, how I, Miss-Know-It all-Granger, ended up like this?"

"Yeah," said Draco, seeing the painful look she had on her face.

She forced a smile. "It's a long story."

"Well, I've got plenty of time."

Just then, a small voice came from behind her. "Mommy?"

"Come on out, Malfoy." She signaled for him to follow her out of the room. She walked towards the small fragile girl leaning against the front door. "Hey, Elle, baby, I think you need to go to bed now, alright?"

"Ok, Mommy," she said before she scrambled out of the living room and into the bedroom.

"Have a seat," Harmony said, motioning at one of the chairs around the table. Draco did as she said. "Would you like some coffee?"

"That would be great."

He watched her intently as she worked in the tiny kitchen. A strand of chestnut brown hair fell loose from her tight ponytail, and she tucked it behind her ear with one graceful move of her hand. The Hermione Granger he knew was never graceful. In fact, she was rather clumsy as he remembered. This couldn't be her, but yet, it was her. The Hermione Granger he knew was studious, and although he hated to admit it, she was very brilliant. So how did such an intelligent girl end up like this?

A few minutes later, she brought two mugs of hot coffee to the table and handed one to him. "Here's yours."

She sat across from him and began sipping slowly, and it was Draco who spoke up first.

"Harmony Grayer. Hermione Granger. Sounds close enough."

"Yeah, I thought so too. I wanted to be a different person, with a different identity, but at the time I was rather unwilling to let go of my past so I finally decided to compromise it."

"So what's up with Pheonix?"

She blushed. "So you went to the club. You see, all the employees hafta have use different name than their own, which is like, totally retarded in my opinion. They wanted to call me Nymph or something like that, and I was like, hell no!"

"And?"

"And I asked them if I could come up with something on my own, and they agreed, if you can believe it. It's kinda stupid, huh?"

"How'd you come up with Pheonix?"

She stared at the ceiling as if looking for a lost memory. "I dunno. I guess…well, at the moment, I just started a new life…like…when a pheonix dies and is reborn again. I guess I was sorta reborn again too. I'm sorry, I'm not making any sense today."

"I understand."

"And a pheonix gives you hope when you need it. And I really needed it, you know, desperately."

He stared at her before he asked his next question. "Tell me what happened."

"I don't know."

"Why did you leave?"

"Why do you care? Haven't you always hated us 'mudbloods' for supposedly tainting the wizarding world?"

"I'm not like that anymore," he said, although the truth was far from that. He had only been getting closer and closer to the dark side in the past few years. "I've been living in the muggle world for the past six years-"

A sudden laughter sprang from her. "The muggle world? Draco Malfoy living in the muggle world? What could be weirder than that?"

Her laughter angered him. After all, nobody made fun of a Malfoy. "I'll tell you what's weirder than that - finding Hogwart's brightest student making money off of - "

"Stop!" she cried, covering her ears.

Seeing her pained expression, his anger evaporated. Damn, Draco you're such a softie, he told himself. "Tell me - tell me what happened."

Hermione took a deep breath. "I was Head Girl, you know. And everything was so perfect. I had my whole life in front of me. And then in the middle of the seventh year, I lost everything."

"When Lord Voldemort attacked?"

"Yes," she said in a small, shaky voice. "I remember that day so well. It was night time, and the three of us were in the library. I remember telling Harry and Ron that they needed to study for the Transfiguration test. And then…there was this loud boom and everyone panicked. We were called into the Great Hall and Dumbledore told us…that the death eaters were on their way. And then when they came…they almost destroyed the school."

"I remember."

"The day after the attack, Dumbledore called me, Harry, and Ron to his office. He told us that he wanted us to help fight for the light side, because we were the three most powerful students in the school. How could we say no? So we were gone the next day."

"Why did Dumbledore not call on me? I was the Head Boy."

"Your family is much too far into the dark arts. The ministry couldn't trust you."

And they're right, he thought to himself. "Oh."

"Before even a week had passed, Ron was critically wounded from a blow to the head, and they sent him off to St. Mungo's. And then it was just me…and Harry." She swallowed hard, trying to push back all the tears. "Oh, God, I can't believe I'm sitting here talking to you about this. You're the first one I've ever told and you're Malfoy. Everything is so messed up!"

"What's wrong with me?" asked Draco, trying to look hurt. "But, continue."

"During the second week, I had heard that the death eaters were killing the families of many of the light side's fighters. Many families were going under protection because someone in their family was on the battlefield. I asked, no, I begged for them to put my parents under protection. Cornelius Fudge, he said no. Do you know what that bastard told me? He told me that my parents were not important enough. Only wizarding families could be put under protection, he said. He fuckin' told me that my parents weren't important enough to be protected. Can you believe that?"

"Seems like the thing for Fudge to say," he replied, snorting. Cornelius Fudge definitely wasn't his favorite person in the world.

Hermione paused and swallowed hard before continuing on. "They died a week later. Their bodies were found tortured and mutilated beyond imagination. I had lost almost everything."

"What did you have left?"

There was a slight pause. "Harry."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"Week number six we were winning. Harry supposedly had already defeated Voldemort, but the death eaters would not stop. They kept killing…and killing…and killing, even though their master was dead. Hell, I don't even know if he's dead. Maybe he's still out there somewhere, waiting to get stronger." She had a faraway look in her eyes, but then it slowly faded to guilt. "Then one day, just when we thought that the war was over…we were on the way back to Hogwarts…Harry and I stumbled into an ambush. I don't know exactly what the death eaters wanted…maybe they just wanted to kill us."

They thought he had the ring…Draco thought silently.

Hermione couldn't stop the tears anymore. They were now flowing freely down her face. "And…I watched…"

She licked her lips, as if to stall time. "I watched…as he died in my arms. I remember feeling so hopeless and stupid because I couldn't stop him from dying. Me, the supposedly smartest witch in Hogwarts for a century. And I couldn't help him…" her voice faltered.

"It wasn't your fault."

"You don't understand, Malfoy. It was my fault. After getting back to Hogwarts, I remembered I had missed a day of Advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts earlier in that year because I had overslept for some obscure reason. I learned that the curriculum that was learned that day was all about the curse that had killed Harry. And counter curse was so simple. It was so simple. Even Neville could have performed it without a single flaw. If I hadn't overslept, I would have learned about it, and Harry would still be alive," she said bitterly.

"Did you love him?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper.

"Yes, so much. More than anything."

"Why did you leave?"

"I don't know. I felt…betrayed. I had nothing left, nothing to live for. My parents were dead…because of Fudge, and I hated him. I still hate him. And Harry, he was gone too. And Ron, poor Ron, he was in a coma at St. Mungo's. The doctors said he would probably never wake up. I felt so betrayed by the wizarding world. I had done everything for the Ministry and then I had lost everything because of that. I risked my life to fight for the Ministry, and how did they repay me? By taking away the lives of everyone I ever cared about! So…I left."

"Dumbledore didn't stop you?"

"He didn't know. I packed up one night, slipped on Harry's invisibility cloak…and I was gone. What was Hogwarts like afterwards? Did he appoint a new Head Girl?"

"No, he didn't. Everyone wondered where you were. The magnificent trio, all gone. They looked for you, too. For months. And then they just gave up. Where did you go?"

"I had some money saved in my bank account in the muggle world. I took out all the money, bought myself a one way plane ticket for the U.S, and I never looked back."

"Wow."

"The ticket had eaten up most of my money, and by the time I arrived, I had virtually no posessions left. I was living on the streets, starving."

"What did you do then?"

"What could I do? I had nothing except myself. So I - I sold my body," she said, ducking her head in shame.

Draco stared at her in disbelief. "You were a prostitute?"

"I couldn't find any jobs, what the hell was I supposed to do?"

"Of course you can find jobs! They're everywhere!"

"No, for one, you need at least a high school diploma!"

"You went to school!"

"Of course I did! But what do you expect me to say at the job interview? 'I went to Hogwarts, and by the way, I'm a witch'?"

"I still can't imagine…you…a hooker? I'd never have thought."

Hermione laughed bitterly. "If someone had told me back in Hogwarts that I would one day become like that, I would have laughed in their face!"

"You were such a good student, so much potential, even I had to admit."

"I remember myself in my Hogwarts days. I was rather snobbish, you know. I thought I was the smartest and the best little role model for the younger students. I remember denouncing all those girls in school who were, well, loose. I remember looking down at them, and feeling and acting so superior to them."

"Life's quite ironic, don't you think?"

"Definitely. I never thought I'd lower myself to their level. Selling my body for money," she sighed

"Who's Elle's father?"

"I don't know."

"C'mon, you must know!"

"I seriously don't know. Do you know how many customers I had a day at that time? I can't remember. She wasn't supposed to happen. I was young and stupid. She was complete a mistake."

"I hope you didn't tell her that."

"I love my daughter," she said, defending herself.

"I'm sure you do," he said, unconvinced.

"After…her…I decided I needed to find a different job. I actually found a job at a restaurant, and I worked there for a while. And now, I'm just working a ton of various jobs, trying to earn money," she said and then added, "I need money."

"Which is why you applied for the job of a secretary."

She looked at him, shocked. "How you do know?"

"Uh…because I own that company."

"Oh, my God! Are you serious?" She began to laugh. "Draco Malfoy, owner of a muggle corporation?"

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing. So, why'd you track me down?"

"Well, I didn't know you were you! I thought you were Harmony Grayer."

"I see," she said. "It's funny. Here I am sitting, telling my archenemy recaps of my life that I've never told anyone about. This all seems like one big dream. I wish it was just a dream. But too bad you can't always have what you wish."

"So you're in need of money?" Draco asked, as a plan began to form in his mind.

"Yes. You wanna help me out?"

"How would you like me to help you out?"

"Well, if you told me that I got the job as a secretary, that would really be helping me out," she said, putting on her biggest smile.

"What do you need all that money for anyway?"

Hermione's face clouded over suddenly. "I…I just need the money. I really need money. I really do."

She jumped up from the chair and hurried into the bedroom and then came out a minute later with a wooden box. She set the box on the table, in front of a very confused Draco, and opened it. Inside was a thick stack of cash.

"This is all my savings. I have exactly six thousand, four hundred, and twenty seven dollars. I've been saving it for years."

"That's all?" he asked with surprise, and then immediately wished he could take it back.

She sighed slowly and her face fell. "I know it's not much, and I have so much more to go, but time is running out, and I don't know what to do!"

"What time is running out? What are you talking about?"

She swallowed hard and then shook her head. "Nothing, nothing. Just forget I mentioned it, alright?"

"No, you can tell me."

"You wouldn't understand."

"I understand."

"Well, I don't understand, alright? I don't understand why I had to end up like this. What the hell did I ever do?"

"You're not making sense."

"I told you not to listen to me."

"I want to listen."

She buried her face in her hands and her body shook as emotion took over her. "I need money, as much as I can get. I've been working my butt off for the past years and the amount I've saved up is pitiful!"

And then, suddenly, an idea hit him. "Tell me, Granger, how far would you go for money?"

She brought her face out of her hands and her red, swollen eyes stared at him. "What do you mean by that?"

"What would you be willing to do to gain enough money?"

"Everything and anything," she said without hesitation. And then, narrowing her eyes, she added, "Why?"

Draco's mouth twisted up into one of his infamous smirks. "What if I told you I would pay you any amount of money you desire if you would do something for me?"

There was a small pause in which Hermione considered this very carefully. "What do you have in mind?"

Draco's grin grew wider as he opened his mouth to reply.

"Will you be my wife?"

TBC

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A/N: ok, kinda boring, but next chap will be more interesting, hopefully. I'm kinda in a dreary mood, so everything I'm writing is going to be dreary and boring. Sorry to you ppl. Well, if you could take the time to review, that would be real nice. Well, ciao!