He was back.

For the first time in four years he was back to the place he's considered a home since he was eleven. Now, he was twenty two years old and the place still felt more of a home to him than the Manor ever did.

He walked the same halls, looked at the same moving paintings, and jumped over the same false step on the stairs. He did all that while trying to keep his memories of this place from flitting back to his last three years here. Those years were the worst of his life, having been forced to become a death eater for two years, watching his friends and classmates die, then after the war coming back to be the biggest social pariah at the school. Everyone giving him looks of disgust and looking as if they would be ready to hex him the minute he made the wrong move or said the wrong thing. He kept to himself that year, he lost his friends, his reputation, and worst of all, he lost her.

He didn't have to worry about anyone judging him as he walked around Hogwarts, it was two weeks into the summer vacation and the students have all gone home while the Professors were most likely at the biggest wedding of the decade: the Granger-Weasley Nuptials. He got an invitation of course, but he couldn't bring himself to be there. He'd already let her go, watching her be happy with another man would just bring about unnecessary pain for him.

Before he realized it, he was standing in front of a very familiar ordinary looking wall. To any other person, this would have seemed like just another boring wall, but he knew better. Beyond this wall was a treasure trove of memories for him, he's been here so many times he swore he'd already memorized every brick, every crack, and every bump on this wall.

This was where he spent most of his 6th year in, fixing that damned cabinet as his first assignment. This was where he watched one of his oldest friends die in a fiery inferno, his screams chasing after him as he fled with Harry Potter. The room was probably destroyed by the same spell that took Crabbe, there was no point in trying to access it now.

But...he just had to try.

He had to because despite the bad memories, this was also where he was happiest with her. This was where he felt like a regular boy without his father breathing down his neck demanding perfection. This was where he pictured a life with her.

In the Room of Requirement was where he had and lost Hermione Granger.

Closing his eyes, he paced three times and thought of the times he was here past curfew with her. Maybe the room would show him their room, where they stayed until sunrise hidden from the rest of the world and safe in each other's arms.

When he opened his eyes, the familiar door that spawned an argument between them appeared before him. He remembered when he told her how dirty and old the door was, how it was so beneath what a Malfoy should touch.

OoOoO

Hermione huffed at his argument, "Well it's a good thing then that only one of us is a Malfoy."

"Not for long." He said it so quietly so she wouldn't hear, but by the blush on her cheeks and the lack of comment, he knew she had heard him.

OoOoO

Taking a deep breath, he slowly pushed open the wooden door and stepped inside. The second he saw the room, a heavy wave of nostalgia crashed through him. Everything reminded him of her, from the various books on the shelf along the wall, to the brown couch in the living room, and the crumpled white sheets on the bed at the far end of the room. It all looked the same, as if it had only been yesterday that he was here discussing the day's Transfiguration assignment.

Draco was the one who chose this room when they were fourteen after Hermione told him that she's always wanted to live in a small cozy cottage by the beach where she could just curl up with a good book and not have to worry about Voldemort or the war. So after the Yule Ball where he watched her dance with Viktor Krum, he brought her here to surprise her and ask if she still felt the same way. After all, she spent most of the night dancing with a world famous Quidditch player while he couldn't even beat stupid Potter in a simple inter-house Quidditch match. She just laughed at him and kissed the tip of his nose.

OoOoO

"Of course I do you idiot. I love you Draco Malfoy, and one dance with Viktor Krum isn't going to change that."

He smiled and pulled her closer so their foreheads were touching. "If I remember correctly, it was more than just one dance."

"Only because a certain blonde from Slytherin house didn't ask me."

He sighed and pressed his lips to hers gently, "You know I wanted to. But we can't. At least not yet."

They spent most of the night dancing to the beat of their hearts, neither caring that it was late and they still had to sleep. They just enjoyed the moment and thought of nothing else except how genuinely happy they were. That night, he promised her that one day he would get her a cottage just like this one and he'd fill the shelves with all her favorite books even if they were written by those awful muggle authors she liked so much. She smiled at that, until he told her she would have to pay him by spending everyday having endless sex on every surface of their cottage. She slapped him and called him an idiot and a pervert.

OoOoO

Now he smiled at the memory and thought of the cottage he bought for her. He bought it as soon as he graduated from Hogwarts, hoping that he would get to live there with her but knowing that it was impossible. So he gave it to her anonymously, he promised her a cottage and Malfoys kept their promises no matter what.

Even if she didn't remember the promise he made.

OoOoO

It was two days after she and Potter went with their merry band to the Ministry, fought the death eaters, and put his father in Azkaban. When he asked her to meet him, he could tell she was nervous, even as she held her head high and crossed her arms across her chest.

"I did what I had to do Draco." She said as soon as the door closed behind them, "He would have killed us."

She expected him to yell at her, to tell her that he was still his father, to accuse her of betraying him, she expected them fighting and crying and having a screaming match. But she was surprised when he kept quiet and put his arms around her.

"I know love, I know and I'm sorry for what he did." It was after he said this that she hugged him back.

He held onto her as tightly as he could. For the past two days he has been a fucking mess. When he heard the news of the fight the following day, he wanted to storm into Gryffindor Tower and demand to know that she was okay, then yell at her for being so careless and acting like a damn Gryffindor, and then snog her senseless because he was just so relieved that she was alive. But he held himself back, until tonight when she was free from the Gryffindorks who wouldn't let her out of their sight.

"I'm just happy you're okay." He said

"You're not mad?"

"Oh I'm mad. I'm mad that you put yourself at risk. I'm mad that you didn't tell me. I'm mad that you got hurt yet again because of Potter's poorly thought out plans. I'm mad that I couldn't be there to protect you. But right now, I'm more relieved that you're alright and safe. That's all I care about."

That night, he asked her to stay the rest of the night. Then he spent the majority of it holding her closer than he ever had before, kissing her like there was no tomorrow, telling her over and over again how much he loved her, and asking her to say it as well.

"Draco, relax, I'm alright. You're acting as if you're never gonna see me again. I don't care what your father did, I love you and that's all that matters to me."

Her words almost made him forget what he was about to do. He was almost brave enough to consider the possibility of living a life where he didn't go through with his plan and instead just stayed happy with her as they fought side by side. He thought about being strong enough to keep her safe without letting her go.

But he knew how selfish that was. By entertaining those thoughts, he was only putting her in danger, he was putting a bigger target on her back. Right now, he was just Harry Potter's muggleborn sidekick, a thorn in the side but otherwise ignored. But after this summer, she would become much more than that, she would become a hindrance to his becoming a death eater. They'd kill her if it meant he would be loyal to the Dark Lord.

And he couldn't let that happen.

He would rather lose her now and have the slightest chance of winning her back when this was over than losing her for good all because he loved her. So he showered her with affection, listened to her laugh at his stories of Crabbe and Goyle's stupid antics, watched her tell him about her crusade for elf rights, he did it all and tried to hide the sadness in his heart.

He memorized everything about her that night, the freckles on her face, the different shades of brown in her big bushy hair, the sound of her voice, the feel of her skin against his, the way she curled up against him as if she couldn't let even a centimeter of space between them. He committed it all to memory because he knew this was the last time he would get to see these things up close. After tonight, he would never again have those smiles directed at him, he would never again hear her call him by his first name, and he would never again feel the warmth of her love.

He would lose it all tonight, so she could live a long and happy life.

When morning came, he made sure to wake up before her. After casting a simple Muffliato on the sleeping witch, he closed his eyes and asked the room to change into a library with a couch where Hermione would be sleeping. When it was done, he sat across from her sleeping figure and stared at her some more. Making sure he never forgot anything about her.

"I love you Hermione. So so much. I know I promised that I would be with you every step of the way, but I can't do that anymore. No matter how much I want to. And believe me I do, I want it all with you. I want to be able to tell everyone that I love you. I want to kiss you every day for the rest of our lives. I want to put a ring on your finger and marry you in front of everyone that matters to you. I want to live in that cottage with you, waking up to you every day. I want to hear you tell me how stupid I am. I want our children growing up to be rich, spoiled brats concerned in elf rights. I want a life with you Hermione. But I guess, fate has other plans. I hope you remember how much I love you, even if you can't remember me. And know that, even if I can't show it, know that I will always love you more than I've ever loved anything in my entire life."

With one last kiss on her lips, he wiped the tears in his eyes and cast the spell that would make her forget she ever loved him. Forget that she ever liked him. Forget everything about him except how much she hated the pureblood aristocrat who called her a mudblood when she was twelve.

He removed the Muffliato on her and quietly left the room along with any hope he had of a life with Hermione Granger.

OoOoO

That night was still the worst memory he had in this place, the cabinet and Crabbe's death were nothing compared to the despair and hopelessness he felt when he made the woman he loved forget about loving him. When he made her hate him in a way that almost rivalled her hatred for Voldemort. He did it all to protect her.

Everything he did in the years he was a death eater was all to keep her safe. Contrary to popular belief, he didn't accept the dark mark to save his own skin, he did it because he was still shit at Occlumensy at the time and the Dark Lord saw his memories of Hermione. The Dark Lord didn't say it out loud but the implication was clear to him: kill Dumbledore or lose the mudblood witch he was so enamored with. Harry Potter was the only other living person who knew about this threat.

OoOoO

"Don't you understand?" He cried as he revealed the dark mark on his arm, "I have to do this, or he'll kill her."

"Kill who Draco? Your mother?" Dumbledore asked as he sat on the ground watching the scared boy in front of him

"Hermione. He'll kill Hermione if I don't kill you. And I can't let that happen."

"You love her." It wasn't a question, it was a fact that Dumbledore couldn't help but point out.

"More than anything." Was his only reply before Bellatrix and the rest of his back up came to join him.

He didn't know it then, but after the war, before his trial at the Wizengamot, Harry Potter approached him and told him he would testify for his old classmate.

"Why?" Draco asked, never in a million years would he have expected Potter to come to his defense.

"I was there that night at the Astronomy tower. I heard what you said and I know you were the one who called for Dobby when we were at the Manor. I know you did it all for her."

If Draco was stunned to hear these revelations, he refused to show it, instead he put on the same mask of indifference he's mastered since he was a kid.

"I wasn't fast enough."

This time, he was even more surprised when Harry Potter reached out and placed his hand on the other man's shoulder to comfort him. "You did what you could. We owe you our lives Malfoy, and I'm not likely to forget that. Neither is she."

After his trial, when he was declared innocent, Harry Potter demanded to know everything. So he told him. From when he realized he fancied her after she punched him in their 3rd year to when he took away her memories of him.

OoOoO

Since then, Draco and Harry overcame their schoolyard rivalry and eventually became something close to friends. Harry became his source for news on Hermione's life. If she was okay, happy, traumatized, cared for. When Harry told him that Hermione obliviated her parents to keep them safe, he felt a bit touched to know that even when she didn't remember him, they still thought alike. But of course, those thoughts didn't last long as he immediately planned his trip to Australia to restore her parents' memories.

He did it before her 18th birthday, Harry told him how happy she was when her parents showed up at her birthday party, fully aware of who she was. When she asked them who restored their memories, all they said was that it was someone who cared for her very much.

Harry kept telling Draco to just restore her memories so they could both be happy. But he told him that she was happy now, he didn't want to confuse her. Especially since he saw her kiss the Weasel after the final Battle.

But despite all that, he couldn't help but wonder if somewhere in her heart she remembered him. Did she remember how he would rub her feet when she had a bad day? Did she remember how he called her Belle after she read Beauty and the Beast to him? When she smelled Amortentia, did she think of him, or did she think of Weasley?

Sometimes, late at night, when he had nothing to do, he wondered if there was ever a chance for them. Was there ever a future where he could have called her Mrs. Malfoy? Or were they never supposed to last after Graduation?

With a heavy sigh, he sat on their couch and from his jacket pocket, pulled out an old worn out photo. The only one he had of her. She was laughing in the photo, laughing as he nuzzled her neck and pulled her so she was sitting on his lap. He was smiling as well, his eyes were closed but he could tell how happy he was when this photo was taken.

Carefully, he traced her face in the photograph, wishing more than anything that he could do it for real. But he knew he couldn't. She was with Weasley now, walking down the aisle to say her vows and promise to love him forever.

His heart hurt at the thought of her marrying that weasel. It hurt more than the crucios he received at the hands of the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters. It hurt a lot and it was a painful reminder that he would never be happy again. He wanted to make it stop hurting. He wanted it all to end, and he knew that would only happen if he forgot.

That was why he was here in the first place. It felt poetic to end things at the place where it all started, with the same spell that he used on her. So he set the photo on the coffee table, grabbed his wand, looked around the room once more, and pressed the tip of his wand to his forehead.

"Oblivia..."

Before he could finish the spell however, his free hand felt the small crack on the coffee table. It was from that first night after Yule in their 5th year, he was just so out of sorts after spending weeks in a house with the Dark Lord and the Lestranges he drowned himself in firewhiskey and fell on the coffee table. Hermione found him and took care of him in between reassurances that he was nothing like them, no matter what. They never did get around to fixing that dent, but he didn't mind, it was a reminder of how much she loved him despite how worthless he was.

It was that memory that pushed him to the limit and forced the tears to come out. He couldn't do it. He couldn't make himself forget the woman he loves. He couldn't make himself erase the happy memories they shared. He wanted to keep those memories forever so he'll always remember that once upon a time, the bravest, most amazing witch in all of Britain actually loved a death eater like him.

He cried and cried for the love he lost. For the woman who will never remember how much he loved her. For all the moments they will never get to share. In the midst of his grief, the door opened and he didn't have to look to know who it was and why they were there. Only one person knew how much this room meant to him and why he would be here of all days.

"I couldn't do it." He whispered as Harry Potter sat beside him, "I wanted to. It just hurts more every day, knowing she doesn't remember me and that she loves someone else now."

"You were going to erase your memories."

"It seemed the only way. She'll be happy with Weaselbee and I'll marry Astoria." He said the last part with the tone of a man who has given up all hope of ever being happy again. He would do what he had to do and nothing more.

"It doesn't seem fair to Tory that I would marry her while pining for someone else. Someone who will always hold a bigger part of my heart than she ever will."

"Then don't marry her!" Harry said, "Merlin Malfoy you're making everything so bloody complicated. Get up off your arse and restore Mione's memories. Quit moping about and fix your damn life!"

"What do I then huh?!" Draco was standing now, his heartbreak fueled rage forcing him to yell at the only man he can call a friend as the tears came back out, "What if she hates me when she finds out what I've done? I took her memories without her permission. I watched her get tortured in front of me and I couldn't do a single bloody thing! What if she still chooses him over me even after she remembers everything? I can't bear that Harry! I'd go barking mad and I'd throw myself in front of a bus if that happened. I already lost her once. I can't do it again."

Standing up, Harry placed his hand on the broken man's shoulder and looked him in the eyes, "She does remember you Malfoy. Not everything, but she remembers certain things."

"What do you mean?" Confusion, fear, hope they all battled for dominance in Draco's silver eyes.

Harry pulled him back on the couch so they're both sitting side by side.

"She'd say things sometimes. Things that Ron and I don't know about but she swore she told someone close to her. Like how she told Krum that they could only be friends when she went up to see him in Bulgaria for two days. Sometimes she'd tell Ron that he wasn't doing something right. That he wasn't rubbing her foot in the right spots, or how she could've sworn he promised her muggle books. They're little things that Ron and the others just brushed aside but I knew she was remembering you."

Each word pulled at Draco's cold heart and almost brought a smile to his lips, but he fought it because he was scared that it wouldn't be true. Scared that those fleeting memories weren't enough for her to remember how she felt.

"I'm not supposed to tell anyone this, but she once told me that Ron's kisses felt...wrong sometimes. That it didn't fill her with the sort of heart stopping, bewitching love that she'd expect. She said it almost made her lonely."

"Figures that the Weasel would be a horrible kisser." This time he did smile. This time he made himself believe that Hermione might actually remember him.

"What do you want me to do now?" He asked barely managing to keep the hope and fear from his voice.

"Aren't you wondering why I'm here and not at the wedding?" Said Harry with a familiar looking smirk on his face

"I just thought you missed me."

"Not likely. No, I and a few Professors are back at Hogwarts because there is no wedding."

"What?" Draco looked back at his friend, not being able to understand why the wedding was cancelled.

"Yes, apparently the bride was having second thoughts. She barely finished her walk down the aisle before she ran from the place and apparated away with tears in her eyes."

"What?! She apparated while she's distraught and you let her? What if she splinched herself or got lost? She's brilliant but if she's depressed then she's in no state to defend herself! There are still blood purists out there who would love a shot at her! Now she's gone and you don't even know where she is!"

"Malfoy relax. I know exactly where she is."

"Where?"

"When Hermione's feeling out of sorts, she always ends up home."

Draco wanted to wring the man's neck so badly! Hermione Granger was alone and in distress and here he was speaking in riddles.

Home. What could that bloody mean? Her muggle parents' house? Hogwarts? The Burrow? Where could she...

No. That can't be where she is. She doesn't even remember him or this place. How could she consider that a home?

But by the way Harry looked at him, he knew that's where she was. Even without her memories of their time together, she considered their place as home.

OoOoO

Before he knew it, he was standing in front of a small cottage by the beach looking at a very familiar looking door.

Heart beating wildly in his chest Draco reached out and pushed open the door feeling more scared than he ever had his whole life. Behind this door could either be his heaven or his hell. Whatever happened, this door would end his heartbreaking uncertainty one way or another.

Each step he took felt heavy with anxiety. Each step felt miles apart and at the same time it felt like he has taken no step at all. Each step felt like he was being pulled by an unknown force into something either great or terrible.

Then the sobs reached his ears. Heartbreaking sobs that he knew oh so well and made him want to wrap his arms around the witch he loved. But he controlled himself and instead went to the living room where he saw her curled up into a ball wearing a long white wedding gown.

"Granger." He said tentatively.

Hermione looked up at him. Tears pouring out of her chocolate brown eyes that he loved so much, her make-up ruined, and yet she still looked beautiful to him.

What happened next was something he never would have expected. The hate, the suspicion that should have been directed at him never came. Instead, he found himself raising his arms to defend against the punches sent by the crying witch.

"You utter arse! How could you do that to me? I loved you and you took away my memories! Who gave you the right to choose for me? Then you didn't even have the gall to show your face! To talk to me and make me fall in love with you again! Then you come around and you buy this cottage for me and another guy!"

"You remember?" His voice was filled with so much raw pain and hope that it almost hurt for the words to come out.

"Ofcourse I do you prat! I wouldn't be here if I didn't."

"Wh-how?"

"When I first saw this place, something clicked. It just felt familiar to me for some reason, I couldn't explain it. At first I thought I was going mad then I saw you for the first time weeks later in Diagon Alley and it all came back. I would have come to you but you were with Astoria Greengrass on your first public date as a couple."

"That was ten months ago." He said wiping away some of the tears in her eyes with a transfigured handkerchief, "Before your engagement with the Weasel."

The slap that came was much more predictable and pulled a smile to his lips, "I told you not to call him that. But yes. When he asked me to marry him, it took me days before I gave him a proper answer. I kept waiting for you. I'd come here everyday hoping that you'd come but you never did. And when your engagement with Astoria came out, I gave him my answer."

Draco sighed and pulled Hermione down with him so she was sat in his lap with his arms held securely around her. Absentmindedly, he played with her hair as she lay her head in his chest and listened to his heartbeat, the sound calming her more than Draught of Peace ever could.

"I thought you were happy." He said, "I never came here because it hurt to know that this would be where you took Weasley instead of me."

"I never brought him here. Didn't even tell him I have a cottage by the beach."

"I'm so sorry Hermione. I was weak and a coward and I hurt you. I let you get hurt. I'm sorry." He held her closer with every word that came out and every tear he shed. Almost crushing her in his need to let her know how sorry he was that he couldn't be strong enough for her.

This time, it was her turn to wipe the tears from his eyes. "You have nothing to be sorry for Draco. You kept me safe in every way you could and I can't hate you for that." She looked him in the eye and willed him to believe everything she said.

"I love you Draco Malfoy. No matter how many times you make me forget that, I'll always remember how much I love you. Because you are a good man and my heart will always remember that."

"I love you too. I'll always love you."

END

AN: You guys know when someone tells you that a story wrote itself and you're just like, "That's not true. Can't happen. What does that even mean?"

Well, it can happen. I set out writing this one shot with only the plan of having it be accompanied by 5SOS' Amnesia. So I plugged in my earphones and had the song on replay.

I sat for one and a half hours I think and I swear the only things going on in my head were the lyrics to Amnesia, and Dramione. I didn't think about the plot, about Harry or the coffee table, not even the ending.

The words just kept flowing out of me and it was different but also kinda relaxing.