A/N: This was going to be longer but this seemed like the only appropriate place to end this chapter without making it excessively long. I'll be off until the new year with exams, but hope you enjoy this chapter and give it a review if you have a spare moment! I love hearing from you guys.

Ginny was braiding her hair the morning of the Hogsmeade trip, which Hermione knew she only offered to do because Ginny was worried. She sat at the foot of her bed reading a trashy muggle magazine, as Ginny sat on a pillow behind her, beginning to part her hair. Hermione had agreed to go with Harry and Ron, not because she was particularly enjoying their company at the moment, but because she was another one of Slughorn's star students. If it was just Harry and Ron, they were less convinced of the fact Professor Slughorn would join them – but with the 'smartest witch of their age' and the Boy Who Lived, who could resist?

She had rolled her eyes at the thought, but had to admit that Ron was right. Harry was a collectible, and apparently she had made a name for herself too.

So they were going to Hogsmeade together, and Ginny decided to tag along. She was not in on the 'let Slughorn collect Harry' plan, but she had used the arrangements to avoid a number of invitations from boys she would never be interested in. She had waited for an invite from a newly heartbroken Dean Thomas, but that had never come.

"Do you need me to spell out why that is a bad idea?" Hermione said, almost laughing at her friends ability to be completely reckless with her feelings. She picked up the mirror and looked at her friends progress on her French braid, and caught Ginny smiling at how much Hermione worried over what Ginny thought were the silliest things.

As impulsive as it was, you had to give it to her – Ginny just didn't give a shit about what other people thought. Dean and Seamus had broken up, and Ginny had taken that opportunity to test the waters with Dean. Ginny had kissed Thomas one night last week, when they were the last two students left in the Gryffindor Common Room. Everyone knew Dean fancied girls, even if he didn't speak about it much when he was with Seamus.

But everyone and their mothers also knew that 'Dean and Seamus' were an institution here at Hogwarts, never one without the other. Even if their break up was 'mutual', everyone knew Seamus had started the conversation with Dean. They lived in the same dormitory, Seamus' mother was not best pleased about his relationship with Dean, and they were best friends who were growing up to be very different people than when they had got together. Hermione was surprised it had lasted as long as it did.

Nothing had really changed between the two boys. They were both hurting, yet they were still best friends. In ordinary circumstances, Hermione would have hoped that they would stay together – they seemed to settle into a calm sort of familiarity whenever they were around each other. But these days, nothing felt ordinary, or normal. The war brewing in the background made everyone in Hogwarts more tense; sides were taken, scuffles between purebloods and blood traitors happened more frequently, and friendships and relationships everyone thought were strong were tested.

With this in mind, Hermione thought Ginny was playing a very dangerous game. Ginny liked Harry, who was so in his own head about things that he didn't even notice her sometimes. Dean would want Ginny to be a balm to his wounds, as he recovered from his very recent heartbreak. Ginny was not a balm. She was more like an emotional sucker punch, and Hermione was not sure Dean could take another hit in his current state.

Ginny on the other hand, would never be happy with someone like Dean – he was too kind, too optimistic, too hopeful and too forgiving of her faults. But that didn't stop her.

"Oh bugger off," Ginny laughed. "I just want to snog him, I know he's emotionally unavailable after the whole Finnigan thing. I'm not blind."

Hermione quirked an eyebrow at her through the handheld mirror she had been holding up to inspect Ginny's work. "What about your lack of emotional availability?" Hermione said softly.

She felt Ginny's hands pause in her hair for just a second, shocked that Hermione had picked up on her ever enduring crush on Harry.

Shakily, Ginny laughed and asked, "What are you on about 'Mione?"

"I know I'm not the most emotionally perceptive person around, but Ginny come on – its me." Hermione pulled a loose curl behind her ear, and continued quietly, "I know you still like Harry."

"Bloody hell." Ginny looked a little pained as she got to the end of Hermione's plait, and grimaced. "Is it that obvious?"

The cursed necklace almost kills Katie Bell. The screams still wake her up at night.

Hermione can't work out how it happened. Harry is convinced it is Malfoy, but she knows Dumbledore is watching him. Dumbledore wouldn't let Malfoy do that to another student. He was in detention anyway.

Dean replaces Katie on the Quidditch Team while she recovers.

Ginny grows genuinely fond of Dean, and asks him out after practice one day. Hermione is happy for Ginny - they seem happy together. Harry has to watch as the girl he forgot about falls for another boy. Hermione watches him realise he likes Ginny back. It's too late.

"Draco looks sick," she whispers to Harry as they walk down the fifth floor corridor in the first week of December.

"Let's hope its Dragon Flu," her friend replies, glaring at the back of Malfoy's head as they move.

Hermione makes a mental note not to raise concerns about Malfoy in front of Harry again.

She hasn't gone back for their meetings in the Room of Requirement since the incident.

Malfoy feels her eyes on him when he is sitting alone at dinner and looks up. He doesn't look upset or angry that she is avoiding him, and that makes her worry that her anger towards him is justified.

When she returns to her room, she closes the curtains around her bed and cries until Crookshanks paws at her cheeks. She looks up to see her cat tilting his head as if to say, Who do I have to kill?

When Bell is released from the hospital wing a few weeks later, Hermione feels as though she might be sick. Seeing Harry convince himself that it was Malfoy, and thinking that she will never really know whether it was him or not makes her nauseous. She excuses herself from the Great Hall, as she feels a feverish sweat rise under the collar of her school shirt. She almost runs into Professor Snape in her haste, and when he sneers at her she wonders how Dumbledore could trust such a horrid man.

Hermione concludes that Dumbledore only trusts Snape so far as his insights are useful. After consideration, she decides that she should treat Malfoy as Dumbledore treats Snape. Their Headmaster has demonstrated the value of building relationships with people on both sides, even those who only really work for themselves. As long as she remembers who he really is, working with Malfoy shouldn't be too difficult. She just had to navigate her way through these meetings, without getting lost in the act.

Malfoy was quiet when she first showed at the Room of Requirement again, and seemed to wait for her to begin conversation. Hermione had a feeling he had taken her failure to show as an accusation. She guessed, it almost was.

Ten minutes had passed in silence as they kept their eyes trained on the pages in front of them, diligently sticking to their old routine despite not having said two words to each other in weeks. Hermione had jumped when he had taken out his wand more suddenly than usual, and a flicker of hurt had shown on his face.

"Sorry," she had winced.

As she watched him, he pointed his wand at the grate of the fireplace behind her. He flicked his wand and she had felt a gust of warmth on her back as the fire crackled into life in an instant.

"Don't be," he replied, placing his wand back inside the left pocket of his robe.

It may have sounded dismissive, but Hermione knew what she had seen. He had shrugged it off well, but during his split second of confusion, he had a look in his eyes that seemed pained at her reaction. The rest of the school was avoiding him as he became more hostile and more erratic, and yet she was still here.

Hermione was not scared of Malfoy.

She had not flinched because she thought he was going to attack her, but because he had been sitting still as marble, and so his sudden movement after minutes of stillness broke Hermione's concentration.

Malfoy wasn't much of a dueller anyway, and in a fair fight, she knew she could win.

He wasn't a natural fighter – it was never in his instinct to send off a hex in someone's direction or jump into action at all. He would rather bide his time than hex you - it was always sneaky, which she supposed was just how he had been brought up in the Malfoy household. He would mutter under his breath to incite you into action, and then tell on you to whichever professor would hear.

But Hermione sometimes suspected it might be more than that. He seemed to actively avoid combative altercations out of a genuine dislike for confrontation, which Hermione herself had never fully understood. He was also so sheltered that unlike his father, Malfoy had never had to get his hands dirty and was often squeamish about violence. That was not to say he was not vengeful or malicious, but he didn't seem to enjoy watching his handiwork as it unfolded.

The idea of him attempting to hex her whilst sat in front of her was laughable. She looked back at his sunken eyes and spoke before she even thought about what she wanted to say.

"Look, I don't think you meant for that to happen, and you don't need to confirm anything. I don't need to -" she hesitated, looking for the right words to express what she had just been thinking. "Actually, I don't want to know whether it was you who did that to Katie, but I do know you wouldn't be stupid enough to try and jump me right now."

"You don't know that," Malfoy said, though his heart wasn't in it. Instead he held her stare and studied her, waiting for Hermione to falter or hesitate.

"You aren't a dueller Malfoy," she said softly, staring adamantly at her hands in her lap. "And I do know that you realise what would happen if the hex was traced back to you."

She heard him shift in his seat and looked up again to see his eyes had darkened.

"I would never," muttered Malfoy, his voice cracking slightly. His face had that same wounded expression as before.

His words were indignant, but the softness in his voice gave him away as he continued.

"Not to you, Granger."

It wasn't confirmation that he hadn't done that to Katie Bell, and it shouldn't have been enough for her to forget what happened. She knows that.

It was not rational, but she felt some strange attachment to this boy which made her feel better in spite of how awfully serious and stretched thin she felt in all other areas of her life. She would take this simple thing with Malfoy and ignore all of his red flags, just to give her some respite from being Hermione Granger, the girl who makes good and moral and sensible choices.

It was the Wednesday before the end of term. They were all preparing to go home for the Christmas holidays, leaving Hogwarts behind for a month or so. Hermione started packing early, so that she wouldn't forget anything.

Her and Ron were not getting along and so she decided to go home instead of to the Burrow for the holidays. Her best friend had gone all soppy for Lavender Brown and she felt sick every time she saw it. She had been meaning to ask him to Slughorn's Christmas Party for a while now, so that he wouldn't be left out, but considering the way Ron was acting recently – both to her and to Ginny - she was struggling to remember why she would want her friend there in the first place.

It wasn't that Hermione and Ron were meant for each other, but she had to admit she was embarrassed about how much everyone had been asking her if she was okay every time they ate each other's faces off. She had resolved to ask anyone but Ron in the hopes that people would stop giving her pitying looks. Unfortunately, she had gone a little too far this time, which lead her in a moment of rage to make a very regrettable decision – she accepted McLaggen's offer to be her date to the event.

Most irritating for Hermione was that Ron didn't seem to want Lavender around anyway. Ron raised issues with Harry instead of with his girlfriend, and called Brown clingy behind her back without acknowledging that he had encouraged this ridiculous lovey-dovey behaviour. It all built up to make a very irritable and exhausted Hermione even more irritated in the presence of Ron and his limpet.

Draco and Hermione had met for the last time before going home the evening before, and their last couple of meetings had been almost… pleasant? They had not managed to move the conversation beyond what each other's favourite classes were, or Hermione's various theories about the lesser known school ghosts, but neither of them seemed to mind.

Once Malfoy had let it slip that he was really interested in astronomy. She had told him about her love for anything that required logic and abstraction, half-explaining why she was so awful at Divination despite her attempts in third year. It felt like something innocent, sharing their likes and dislikes. The pale December moonlight covered everything in the Room of Requirement and smoothed over their sharp edges, and sometimes Hermione could almost fool herself into believing Malfoy was a different person. For a few minutes she could pretend she didn't know the damage that they had already done to each other, and would probably do in the future.

She was not sure you could call what they had friendship - there were far too many hesitant silences between peaks in their conversation, but it was at least something a step below. He seemed to change when no one else was around, dropping his shoulders as they sat sometimes and even loosening his tie absentmindedly. They were small, and even unconscious ticks, but she often found herself smiling at the thought of them when staring at the canopy of her four poster bed or when flipping through a book in the library.

Their status as childhood enemies, and then as teens who used to kiss each other, seemed to confuse things a little. Sometimes she could feel the way he looked at her as she read, and a pink blush would creep up her neck as she focused on not looking up from the book she was studying.

"What's home like?" she had murmured one evening during one of their silent periods. She lifted her eyes up to meet his, trying not to appear too curious.

"What do you want to know?" he said slowly, tipping his head to the right slightly and sitting up a bit straighter.

She wanted to ask what it was like to have Lucius Malfoy as a dad, and the Black family as close relatives? What was it like to live in a Manor House, and where did he go to school before the age of eleven? Did he feel any sympathy for the house elves his family worked half to death, and what did he get up to over summer on his own?

Instead she asked, "Where is it? Geographically, I mean."

He quirked an eyebrow, knowing that was definitely not what she wanted to ask him. "Wiltshire. You?"

"Hertfordshire."

After a moments more silence, she added "Are you headed home for Christmas?"

"Yeah, always do," he nodded, though he seemed to grimace at the thought. "Are you?"

"Same. I'll be pretty happy to be out of here once Slughorn's party is over," she looked back down at her book, and resting her head back on her hand as she read.

Malfoy didn't respond, and she looked up at him, a bit puzzled. He was staring adamantly at the book, and with the exception of the tense muscle in his jaw, she wouldn't have known anything was off with him. Her eyebrows furrowed, and she thought back over what she said – had she offended him in some way?

Suddenly, realising his silence was worrying her, he had asked who she was taking. Malfoy's temperament did not lend itself easily to light conversation, and though he tried to make it seem like a throw away comment, it seemed far from casual in the context of Hermione and him. Luckily it took more than that to get to her, and she was able to remind herself that she was probably, very likely overcomplicating things in her head.

"I was going to ask Ron as a friend, but I'm not sure Lavender would be the biggest fan now they are dating." He seemed to exhale as she said this, softening a little.

"Unfortunately," she continued, "I've ended up with McLaggen."

Malfoy seemed to be unable to withhold a sneer, as she said this, though he was at least fighting to repress a malicious smile directed her way.

"Only dating Slug Club members now, Granger?" he teased, seemingly unable to resist old habits. "Slughorn seems to really be scraping the bottom of the barrel with regard to membership this year."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Hermione replied, scowling at Draco.

"Oh come on, you know what I mean," Draco rolled his eyes. "The likes of McLaggen and a lot of the other members shouldn't have been able to buy their membership. There's obviously been a sparsity of talent in recent years."

"Well if there is a sparsity of talent for potions at Hogwarts, I doubt it's the fault of anyone in the Slug Club," she glared. "Maybe you and Ron and anyone else who has an issue with the membership should take it up with Slughorn, and not use it as an excuse to have a go at me."

With a huff, she returned to her reading, a furious blush spreading across her cheeks. How dare he suggest she only got into Slug Club because of the lower standard Slughorn was holding students to! How could he even suggest that when Malfoy himself had not made it into the club?

She hated his arrogance sometimes.

"I didn't mean you, Granger."

Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew that was true. He hadn't said that to insult her, rather to insult McClaggen, but with what Ron had said earlier this term about her snogging McClaggen and Malfoy's derisive comments about his paying his way into the Slug Club, she couldn't help but take it badly.

"Yes, well it still feels a little personal to me, Malfoy," she said stiffly. "He is one of the top in his class in Potions, unlike you, so lay off my choice of date."

She heard the wooden chair Malfoy sat at scrape along the stone floor as he stood, and listened to the sound of him swinging his satchel over his shoulder. Hermione heard him pick up his wand, and looked up to see his cold grey eyes glaring down at her.

"Where are you going?" she frowned, confused at his abrupt departure.

"Somewhere where non-Slug Club students are welcome, without having their heads bitten off," he scowled.

As he walked out, Hermione glared at the back of his head and decided that boys were awful and she hated every single last one of them.

A/N: The next bit should be posted at the end of January - so hopefully not too long of a wait! Thanks again for following, reviewing, etc.!