Here's a one-shot for you! Everything up until Half-Blood Prince, where Draco runs to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom is canon, but everything after is up in the air. I hope you enjoy this, even though it's pretty short and I don't plant to go anywhere else with it. Reviews always appreciated!

Draco rushed down the hallway as tears threatened to spill forward, desperate to get to the bathroom. He was just about to dart in - he knew Myrtle would at least be there, someone to talk to, to calm him down - when he felt eyes on him.

Potter. He'd followed him.

A split second decision led him to dart away from the second floor bathroom and down another hall. He didn't think, he just moved, working on instinct. He ran at a full tilt and slowly that feeling of someone following vanished.

Before he realized it, he was in front of the Room of Requirement. He'd been here so much lately for that damned vanishing cabinet, he didn't want to go in. But he needed somewhere, anywhere, to go where he could just let it all out. He closed his eyes tight and walked in front of the wall, back and forth, three times thinking: Somewhere safe. Somewhere safe. Somewhere safe. And before him appeared a door.

Hot tears poured down his face as he threw the door open and nearly fell in, catching himself on the back of a couch that sat in front of a fireplace. His chest heaved and he let himself lower his walls, the ones he kept up to make sure that nothing slipped out, that no weakness showed.

The door behind him clicked shut and suddenly he felt someone's eyes on him again. He spun around, wand out, expecting Potter, and there she was instead.

Hermione Granger, a look of fear on her face, stood, hands at her sides in fists, wand pointing toward the floor.

Draco stared at her, chest heaving, tears unleashed and coursing down his cheeks. Rage filled him up - that she, of all people, was seeing him like this. He felt his wand hand start to shake, felt his heart pound, and then, it all drained away and he was left with nothing but exhaustion.

His wand fell from his fingers as he fell to his knees, folding forward so that his face was in his hands.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, his breath hot on his hands where he held his face, eyes closed tight. "I'm so fucking sorry." He was barely whispering.

Her hands were suddenly on the back of his head. He thought he felt her shaking. Slowly she stroked the back of his head, as one might a small child. This only made him cry harder, shame filling him up.

"I'm sorry, Granger. I'm so sorry." His fingers clawed his face as he tried to curl in on himself more, to escape the hell that was his reality.

"Sssh," she said, as she moved closer. With hands that no longer shook, she maneuvered so that she was right next to him. She changed her ministrations, carding her fingers through his hair instead of petting him, and that simple sensation of her nails gently dragging against his scalp calmed it. It's what his mother used to do when he had nightmares.

After a few minutes, he could breathe again. Face burning, he slowly sat up and wiped his nose crudely on the back of his arm. He couldn't meet her eyes, but she didn't get up to leave.

"Are you all right?" she asked, quietly, and he couldn't help the rude, humorless laugh that escaped his lips. He gathered up what tiny bit of courage he had and looked at her, knowing his eyes were red and swollen, hollow and dark, knowing she'd be looking back at him with pity.

"Do I look like I'm all right?" His voice was gruff and he set his jaw, waiting for her to hex him or leave. Or both.

She watched him for a moment before she stood. He felt panic begin to well up again, though he knew this would happen.

"Malfoy," she said, and he looked up at her. She was offering him her hand.

He felt hollow as he reached up and took it, surprised to find her skin soft and cool.

She led him over to the couch, in front of the fire, and sat, then patted the seat next to her. Stiffly he sat, not sure what to do. He'd come in here to be safe. The fact that she could get in the room at all meant that she wouldn't hurt him.

"You apologized to me," she said, breaking the silence. Her eyes hadn't left his face. He looked at her and saw no judgement there. Her face was open and honest and it made something in him that was hanging by a threat snap.

Draco sighed so loudly it growled deep in his throat and he put his elbows on his knees and covered his face again. He brushed his hair back, roughly, and sat back, then looked back at her.

"I did." He took a breath. "I meant it." His voice was gravelly.

"Can you tell me - " she looked away for a brief moment and bit her bottom lip, then looked back at him with wide eyes, hands clasped in her lap. "Can you tell me what's wrong?"

He watched her for a moment, grimacing, and then closed his eyes as if in defeat. "I can't tell you," he said, brushing his hair off his forehead. "But, I can show you." He looked at her, his nerve endings raw. "If you really want to know."

"I do," she said without hesitation. She scooted closer to him, her knee brushing against his. "Please."

Like some final door slamming in place, hearing Hermione say please cemented a decision he didn't realize he'd been battling.

He would show her, show her everything, and let her decide his fate.

In front of them, a pensieve appeared. Draco searched for his wand, only to realize it was in the floor. Before he could retrieve, Hermione offered him hers and he felt his heart stutter. With a nod, he brought the tip of his wand against his temple and drew a long silver threat from it before depositing it in the pensieve. He did it twice more before offering her wand back. Three memories. He hoped they would be enough.

Hermione slipped her wand into her pocket and looked at him. With a deep breath, she turned and immersed herself in his memories.

The memories play one after the other.

Hermione stands, off to the side, while a thirteen-year-old Draco tells his mother about a witch that broke his nose. He goes on and on about how angry she was, about how his friends just stood there while she punched him. She didn't even use magic. His mother is smiling as Draco pauses, his head dropping down. "I think I like her, Mother. Really like her. But, she's muggleborn, and I don't know what Father would - " Lucius walks in, and both mother and son grow quiet.

The memory swirls and suddenly she's in the dungeons, in Snape's classroom. Snape is staring at Draco, digging into his mind. Trying to teach him Occlumency - how to keep someone out of. Malfoy is straining, and then in anger he rears back and smacks his hands down on the table. "He's going to see her if he looks. I can keep all the memories away, but not the ones of her. I can't do this!" He knocks a glass of water off the table and it shatters on the classroom floor. "He's going to see her, and he's going to kill her!" Snape looks at him with sadness in his eyes, something Hermione had never seen before.

"Have you considered just telling Miss Granger how you feel?" His voice is quiet, but the words echo in Hermione's ears as if he'd screamed them.

Draco laughs darkly. "Of course not." He spits the words out. "Besides, how would that, how would having the one tiny thing in my life that gives me hope, even if I know it's all fiction, make anything better?" Snape puts his hand on Draco's shoulder, and Draco sinks in defeat.

The third memory is the hardest to watch.

Draco is kneeling on a rug in what she assumes is Malfoy Manor. Beside him, his mother and father are on their knees, wands pointed at their foreheads by two men who terrify Hermione so much she backs up, forgetting for the moment that she's in a memory. Her eyes, wide and panicked, move back to Draco who is staring up at Voldemort. Draco's face is defiant, his hands in fists at his side, his jaw set.

"Young Malfoy," Voldemort's voice oozes through the room, "it is time for you to make a choice." Voldemort stands in front of him, and Hermione can't see his face, but the look on Draco's face lets her know she doesn't want to. Her eyes are glued to Draco's. "I will let you choose, which is a gift I've not given many others. You can choose to take my Mark, and you and your parents will live, or, you can choose not to take it, and I will kill them both." He shrugs - such a human gesture from such an inhuman thing. Voldemort puts his hand on Draco's shoulder, and Draco flinches. "It's up to you."

Draco looks over to his mother, whose eyes are wide and glassy. Tears trail shamelessly down her alabaster cheeks. He then looks to his father, whose face is blank - an expression Hermione had seen Draco wear so many times, it hurts her chest.

With a deep breath, Draco looks up to Voldemort, and with hatred in his eyes, offers the monster in front of him his left arm. When Voldemort's wand touches the unblemished skin there, Draco screams in agony.

Hermione pulled herself from the memories, and Draco was no longer beside her. She stood up, slightly disoriented, heart racing, only to find him a few feet away, looking toward the fire.

"Can I see the Mark?" she asked, her voice shaking with tears that she wanted to shed, but didn't. Now wasn't the time. Draco nodded, but made no move to come closer.

Hermione crossed the distance to him and stood in front of him. With a clenched jaw he shoved his arm out toward her, palm up.

Her fingers were steady as she unbuttoned the cuff of his shirt and rolled the sleeve up. There, just like she saw in his memory, was the Dark Mark. It was red and swollen, almost as if his body was trying to reject it, but there it was. It was ugly and hateful and she hated that it was on his skin.

Despite how it disgusted her, with cold fingers she reached out and touched it. He hissed in surprise, then sagged slightly when her cool touch soothed the perpetual ache the Mark caused. She ran her fingers over it, then covered it with her palm like a cool bandage.

After a moment, she pulled away, and Draco opened his eyes. When did he close them?

She looked up at him in the firelight without a hint of judgement in her ochre eyes. He felt the words bubble up without his consent, and without a hint of hesitation, he released to her all the things he didn't want her to even know.

"He wants me to kill Dumbledore." The words were heavy on his tongue. "I've come to this room every night for months trying to fix something, a cabinet, that will let them in to Hogwarts. And I don't - " tears threatened to choke him again. "I don't know what to do."

Hermione was still for a moment, staring down at his arm, which hung loosely at his side. Then she looked up, her eyes locking with his, and pulled him to her in a crushing hug.

Hermione was much smaller than him, but she didn't let that stop her from pulling his head to her shoulder as she wrapped her thin arms as far around his broad shoulders as she could.

"I'm so sorry, Draco." Her voice, his name, ghosted over his ear and suddenly his arms were around her, too, holding on as if she were a lifeline in a storm.

Her arms around him tightened as he squeezed her and buried his face in her hair where it rested against her neck. His tears fell anew, hot and heavy, but now he let them fall freely, soaked up by her curls.

Her hands rubbed lines up and down his back, over his shoulder blades, and he absently realized she was standing up on her toes to hug him. He tried to pull away, knowing she must be uncomfortable, but she only let him lean back a little. She dropped to her feet from the tips of her toes and pulled him toward the couch.

She sat and pulled him to her, forcing him to lay his head on her thighs and lay across the other half of the couch. He settled on his side as if he were in a dream. She put one hand on his shoulder, giving it a squeeze, while the other carded through his hair. He looked up at her, and she stared off into the fire, her features pinched. He rolled so that he was on his back, and she stopped stroking his hair, her other hand absently moving to rest on his sternum.

After a moment she looked down at him, her eyes unreadable. "If you don't fix the cabinet, and kill - " she took a deep breath. "And kill Professor Dumbledore, what will happen?" her voice was quiet and she gathered a little of the shirt on his chest in her fingers.

"He'll kill my parents. Then he'll kill me after I watch them die."

Her eyes closed as if she were in pain, and then she looked back at him, her light brown eyes taking on the firelight in a way that made them burn.

"How can I help you?" Her fingers, clutching his shirt, tightened and he felt something in his chest. It was almost like a new door, one he hadn't realized was there, opened just a crack.

"I don't know."

She nodded, lost in thought again.

"I want to help you," she said firmly, looking down at him.

Slowly, he sat. Her hand fell away from him, but he took it back up and held it in his own. It was warm now and his heart raced. He'd imagined holding that hand so many times.

"You saw my memories," he said, gently cradling her small hand in his two larger ones. "You know how I feel." His voice was broken. "About my parents, and - " he took a breath, "and about you. And you know that I can't let them die, no matter what."

"I know." She laced her fingers with his and squeezed. "But together, we can figure out a way." Her other hand joined her first and she clutched him. "I know we can."

They stayed that way, holding onto one another, talking in bits and snippets, for hours. It was well past curfew by the time they'd agreed to meet back there the next day.

When Draco reached the wall where the room was, a door was already there. He steeled his nerves, straightened his shirt - when had his clothes gotten so baggy - and walked in.

Hermione was already there, books strewn over a table that had appeared in place of the couch. The fire roared cheerfully in the hearth.

Her head popped up when the door opened, her expression guarded. But when she saw that it was him, her features softened.

Seeing him had made her almost smile. The door in his chest opened wide. So wide, it hurt.

"I've been thinking," she said. He approached her warily, as if she were a frightened animal that might bolt. All of this was so bizarre. "What if we figure out a way to fix this cabinet so that the Death Eaters can get through, but then, just before they exit, it - " her eyes met his, fear blatant as she swallowed. "It kills them." She swallowed and clasped her hands in front of her.

"Granger," he whispered.

"I know it's a lot," she said, standing, wringing her hands. "But I stayed up all night thinking, and I just don't see another way." She paced in front of him and his hands itched to reach out and calm her, as she'd calmed him the day before. "I considered turning the cabinet into a trap, a stasis chamber of sorts, but then You-Know-Who would know that you'd messed it up on purpose. But, if we made it, I don't know, explode or something, it would seem like it was an accident." She took a deep breath and stopped in front of him. "It would protect your parents from his anger." She reached out and took his hand, which stopped his twitching fingers.

He felt a calm wash over him. It would protect his parents. It wouldn't protect him, but they would be safe. And if the Dark Lord killed him for failing, Granger would be safe, too, because The Dark Lord would never be able to see her in Draco's mind. His features calmed as he quickly - more quickly than he'd thought possible - accepted his fate.

He realized, belatedly, that she was still talking, and he zeroed in on the last of her words.

" - be a big change, but you'd be safe."

"Wait, what? I'm sorry. What did you say?"

Her eyes on his were wild, as if she were near panic. Something she'd said - she thought he was disagreeing with her.

"I'm sorry," he said, releasing her hands to rub her upper arms - something he'd imagined doing for years. He wasn't sure what twist of fate had led him here, but even if he died in a few weeks, it would be worth it to have had these few moments with her. "I was just thinking. Planning. I didn't hear."

Eyes still wild, she stared up at him and set her jaw. "I said," her voice was strained, choked with unshed tears, "he'll hurt you, if you do this. Maybe even kill you." She choked on that word and cleared her throat, eyes closing a moment before she straightened her spine and met his gaze again. "But we could fake your death. When the cabinet is destroyed. We could fake your death, along with the others, and then hide you, and I know it would be a big risk, a big change, but you'd be safe, and - "

Draco crushed her to him in a hug, the open door in his chest beckoning, begging him to just step through.

He felt her arms slip around his waist. Felt her cheek against his chest. Felt her take a deep breath as she gripped the fabric of his shirt on his back.

He held her tightly, almost painfully, and forced himself to relax his grip a little. She didn't relax hers.

"Will you help me?" he whispered, the words slipping easily from his lips. He'd never asked for help before. She nodded into his chest and the leaned back just enough to look up at him, her face a mask of determination and something else he couldn't quite place.

"We'll fix the cabinet. We'll kill the monsters coming through. And we'll hide you." Her hands slid from his back to his chest and he thought his heart might burst. "We'll need to tell a few people - Dumbledore, maybe McGonnagall. They'll be able to help us hide."

"Us?" he asked, staring down at her with a heart that pounded almost painfully.

"You'll be in hiding. Alone." She straightened her spine and shook her head to knock her hair off her shoulders, lifting her chin. She rambled, "I know that, if he agrees to this, Dumbledore will want you to help. And whatever he decides, you shouldn't have do it alone. And I know I'm not your first choice for a companion, but you'll need someone, and you've had to do so much alone already, and - "

Draco crushed her to him again. Before yesterday, he'd watched her, dreaming of an alternate universe where maybe, just maybe, she'd care about him in some way. And now she was in his arms, telling him, rather sternly, that he had to accept her help. He felt a laugh bubble up and she pulled away, an angry expression on her face.

"The thought of working with me makes you laugh?" Her face screwed up in a way that let him know she was about to launch into a speech. He'd watched her lecture her friends often enough, watched her stand and deliver her speeches to listless classes, and she was about to speak to him the same way. As if she cared about him. A smile stretched over his face and she wrinkled her nose and opened her mouth to chastise him. He felt the wide open door inside of him beckoning, bright light spilling out.

And he stepped through.

His lips were on hers before he could process what he was doing. She froze, eyes wide, and then almost immediately, she softened. Her hands moved from his chest to the back of his neck and he moved his hands from her waist, into her hair. He cupped her face, his lips nipping at hers lightly, and against his mouth, she sighed.

The door closed, but he was on the other side now. In a new room that felt warm and safe. Somewhere safe. He'd asked the Room of Requirement for somewhere safe, and now here he was.

He pulled away from her and leaned his forehead against hers, his heart ricocheting off his ribs. When he was finally brave enough to straighten his spine, pulling away from her, and open his eyes, his breath caught. She looked up at him, bottom lip between her teeth, lips pulled into a smith, eyes bright.

"Are you sure?" he asked, hands still in her hair, hoping she knew what he was asking. Are you sure you want to help me? Are you sure you want me, as I am? Are you sure about all of this?

Her cheeks were tinged pink and she blinked slowly. Her bottom lip popped from between her teeth and she stood on her toes so that she was nearly eye level with him. With a slowness that made his heart seize she pressed her lips to his again, just once, before pulling back.

"I'm sure." Her breath teased his damp lips and he shivered before pulling her to him, attacking her mouth with a desperation he didn't know existed.

And to make it all even more unbelievable, she reciprocated. Her fingers found purchase in his hair as she licked his bottom lip, asking to deepen their kiss. He opened his mouth and groaned when her tongue met his. His hands disentangled from her curls and swept down her back, landing on her hips.

He was kissing Hermione Granger, and even more unbelievably, she was kissing him back. He knew that for her to survive, he would have to die - or at least, the Dark Lord would need to believe he was dead. Occlumency or no, he'd never be able to suppress the memory of this. Every breath spent kissing her was healing things in him he hadn't even realized were broken.

When he finally did pull away, they were both breathless. He stepped back a little, though he didn't want to, and looked down at her. Her cheeks were red, her curls were wild in the aftermath of his hands and their magics reacting to one another, and her lips were turned up in the most beautiful smile he'd ever seen.

"We only have weeks to finish. To figure this out," he said, giving into the desire of his hands and cupping her face, brushing tendrils of hair behind her ears. She leaned into his touch and nodded.

"We better get to it then." She smiled and stepped back, taking his hand as easily as if she'd done it a million times, and led him to the table.

They sat, shoulder to shoulder, and began pouring through the books she'd brought. And while Draco wasn't sure if this would work, wasn't sure if they'd be able to pull it off, he felt calm. He glanced at Hermione, who was already scribbling notes from a book called Magical Explosions and How to Avoid Them, and knew that, one way or another, because of her, everything was going to be all right.