Chapter Text
So this was how he died.
Complete and utter mortification. An unworthy end for an infamous life; the final twig that ruined the broom. It would be laughable if it were someone else—anyone else, but the fact that it was him? The shame was unbearable, and Draco Malfoy had experienced more than his share of shame.
“Up you get, Weasley!” Pansy’s high-pitched exclamation and accompanying giggle was tinged with enough glee that Draco planned to torment her about it later. That is, if he survived the night.
He watched listlessly as Pansy and Ron enclosed themselves in the enchanted closet, then tipped his glass to his lips. To his dismay, it was empty. Again. Scanning around their circle, he spotted a bottle with a bit of Firewhisky left in it. Before he could Summon it to his side, however, a slender hand reached out and poured the remainder into a goblet. Glaring at the offender—that last drink was his—he was even more irritated to find that the meddlesome witch was staring right at him. Laughing, no doubt. She knew exactly what she’d just done.
From her position sprawled on a pile of pillows on the floor, Hermione Granger sent him a miniscule and sardonic toast before downing the last of the Firewhisky. Setting the now-empty glass aside, she curled herself up to a sitting position. Her movements were calculated, graceful; he hated her for it. Never mind the fact that she’d yet to be selected to enter the closet either—in this moment, she and every other person in this room was his sworn enemy.
And possibly witness to his untimely demise.
Knowing he was sulking but unable to stop himself, Draco let his eyes roam around the room again. It was a Friday night in October, and the eighth years’ common room had become the party space by default. A fair few of them had elected to return to Hogwarts; to a one they all seemed relieved to have been placed in a dormitory together rather than with their respective houses. At first a few seventh years had trickled in—close friends of the displaced students. But tonight their numbers had swelled with more guests than usual, including a select few sixth years. It was for this reason that Draco was slowly dying of humiliation.
Glancing at Astoria Greengrass yet again, Draco felt his interest tick up. She was pretty, of course, but more intriguingly, she had an air of exuberance about her that had somehow managed to survive being stomped out during the past few years. He’d grown up around the Greengrass family but had often found himself trying to avoid Daphne and her vapid chatter. Since returning to school this year, however, he couldn’t seem to tear his attention away from Astoria.
Unfortunately, she only seemed to have eyes for Harry Potter, despite his clear and desperate devotion to Ginny Weasley. Draco barely repressed an exasperated sigh. He’d hoped that this little game of Seven Minutes in an Enchanted Closet would present him with a chance to change her mind, but so far, the spinning wand had yet to land on him. He was starting to suspect nefarious undertones to the evening even though no one seemed opposed to him, at least not outright.
The closet doors opened with a bang and Pansy and Ron, both looking flushed, returned to their seats. Wondering how much longer this game would go on before he was either selected or perished from dismay, he wished again for one more glass of Firewhisky. He wasn’t nearly tipsy enough to endure this particular brand of social torture.
“...makes it Draco’s turn!” Once again, Pansy’s insipid warble broke into his thoughts. Blinking, he realized several of them were staring at him, while others were markedly not.
“If I must,” he drawled, hoping his tone conveyed disinterest and not disappointment. Giving the wand a strong spin, he tracked it with his eyes. Slowly extending two fingers out along his leg, he did his best to wandlessly nudge it in Astoria’s direction. He was congratulating himself as it came to a slow stop just in front of her, but then it slipped and landed squarely on the person next to her.
Granger.
Suddenly the room was silent, and no one was feigning disinterest.
For his part, Draco felt frozen. He knew he’d landed the wand directly at Astoria, so what had happened? How could it have possibly ended up on the most irritating person of his entire acquaintance? And what was he going to do now? The penalty for refusing to enter the closet was ten minutes of a Tickling Hex, and he hardly wanted to debase himself in front of this crowd that way, either.
Fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—Granger made the choice for him. Springing to her feet, she was in front of him instantly, extending her hand to pull him out of his chair.
“Think you can handle it, Malfoy?” she purred, her smug expression setting him off and making it impossible for him to back down.
“I think that’s a better question for you, Granger,” he retorted, brushing aside her hand and stalking to the closet ahead of her. The oohs and catcalls cut off the moment she pulled the Silencio’d doors shut behind her, and he rounded on her.
“What’re you playing at?” he snarled.
Unfazed, Hermione crossed her arms and met his gaze without flinching. “It’s obvious you only have eyes for Astoria, and it’s equally obvious that the others are avoiding you. Why?”
Affronted, Draco crossed his arms too. “Avoiding me—hardly. The wand just hasn’t landed on me yet.” Even to his own ears, the excuse was flimsy.
Hermione hummed, then let her eyes roam leisurely down his body. By the time her gaze found his face again, he was ready to hex her.
“Do you really think you’re the only one giving the wand a little extra direction?” she asked, and her pitying expression felt like a slap in the face.
“You pushed it away from Astoria,” he said, understanding dawning. “How dare—”
“Come off it, Draco,” she sighed, and her use of his first name was enough to pull him up short. “She isn’t seeing your potential, but we can fix that.” Uncrossing her arms, she took a step closer. “Do you trust me?”
His knee-jerk response of “Not even a little” lacks his former vitriol, and judging by her sudden grin, she knows it as well.
Then she’s untucking her blouse, and his brain stutters to a halt. He can’t help but stare dumbly as she undoes the top two buttons, twists her school skirt a bit sideways, then reaches up into her hair and gives it a few good musses. She starts to reach for him next, and he slams himself against the back wall.
“What the hell, Granger?” His voice is barely a croak, so he clears his throat but it doesn’t seem to help.
“Let’s give them a different perspective to consider,” she replies, completely unaffected. “After all, they’d never assume that we would do anything in here other than hex one another.”
The fact that he’d had the exact same thought a few moments ago doesn’t help. This time, he stays still as she approaches, and she reaches up to tug at his tie. He feels a brief flare of—something that he doesn’t want to name—and then the welcome feeling of irritation. Next she sets his shirt askew and then grips her hands into his hair. He’s torn between shock and a growing sense of confusion, so he blurts out, “Why are you helping me?”
One side of her mouth kicks up and she says, “Hello? Gryffindor? We can’t stand seeing anyone in pain.” Apparently satisfied with her work, she takes herself back to the door. “Follow my lead,” she tells him, and then lets out a long, loud groan. A swish of her wand removes the silencing charm midway, and while he watches, she slams herself back against the door with an “Ohmygod, Draco,” that does indecent things to his nerve endings. He just stares, transfixed, as she rustles around against the door, more unbelievable sounds leaving her mouth. She gestures for him to do something or come closer, but when he just stares at her, gobsmacked, she grabs the front of his shirt and hauls him to her.
He doesn’t want to fall into her so he slaps his hands on the door to catch himself instead, and her wicked grin tells him that was a brilliant move. She nods approvingly and makes another whimper.
“Fuck,” he says, loud enough for them to hear, but mostly because she’s absolutely fucking ridiculous. Clever, yes, but ridiculous.
“Please,” she whines, then releases his shirt and makes more kissing sounds. He rolls his eyes, an incongruous urge to laugh blooming in his chest.
Instead, he leans close and whispers, “You’re deranged.”
She smiles, genuinely delighted this time, and whispers back, “Thank you!”
He shakes his head—they both know it wasn’t meant as a compliment—but then she’s glancing at her watch.
“It’s almost time for the grand finale,” she whispers. She reaches up to pinch her cheeks, hard, and then her lips. She bites into them, too, and he’s once again rendered mute. Before he knows what’s happening, she’s reached out and pinched his cheeks and lips as well—hard.
“Ow—ooooh.” He manages to turn it into a groan, but the glare he gives her is meant to convey his annoyance with her methods.
She simply pats him fondly on the cheek, though. “Good luck,” she whispers to him.
Befuddled, he isn’t prepared when she lunges and grabs him, pulling their bodies flush. Then she’s kissing him and he’s kissing her back, all sense of sanity fled like a thief in the night. She sucks his bottom lip into her mouth and he’s just about decided to enjoy this sequence of bizarre events when two things happen at once:
She bites down on his lip, and
the doors unlock and they tumble out, still wrapped around one another.
She’s knocked him off-balance literally and metaphorically, and it’s only when she breaks their kiss and winks at him that his awareness of their surroundings returns. He registers the catcalls and takes a moment to look around—the group is a mix of slack-jawed shock and knowing smirks. He swears money exchanges hands between Potter and Nott. Hermione blushes, pulling away and making a show of straightening her shirt. She wipes her mouth, her motions exaggerated, and turns to resume her seat amidst a volley of questions from the other girls. Pansy is giving them a slow clap, one brow raised at his audacity.
As she settles back down on the mountain of pillows, she exclaims, “I knew those hands had to be good for something other than potion-making!” The women cackle while Nott jumps up to slap him on the back, and he takes it as his cue to smirk. His lip stings where she bit him, but he realizes now that both their mouths look swollen and pink, and she’s once again lent him credence without a thought to herself. Surely her friends will be nagging her about snogging Draco fucking Malfoy, but she hadn’t seemed to mind the ruse.
He saunters insouciantly back to his spot, then finds the wherewithal to add, “Keep it in your knickers, Granger,” with his usual air of displeasure. His friends howl with laughter, and in his periphery he notices Astoria noticing him. In fact, Astoria’s next spin lands squarely on Draco, and as he disappears into the closet with her, he can’t help but be amused by Hermione’s exaggerated eyebrow waggle.
It takes him nearly a full week to gird himself for this conversation, but when he does scrum up the courage to wait for her outside the library late one night, he finds that the words come easily.
“Granger.”
She stops, looks up from where she’s juggling her stack of school things in both arms, and smiles. Smiles. At him.
“Malfoy.” Her tone is calm, welcoming.
“Thank you,” he says simply, perhaps the most genuine sentence he’s ever spoken to her.
“For what?” she retorts, resuming her trudge towards their common room. They walk in companionable silence for a moment, then she ruins it with her untameable mouth. “I heard Astoria’s asked you to the Halloween Ball, coincidentally,” she says, and he knows he should be offended at the pride in her tone but he can’t quite bring himself to care. She was, after all, instrumental.
“I have to ask...” he begins, then takes a deep breath. “You weren’t disgusted to be in the closet with me.”
“That’s not a question,” she points out, and he realizes that her swottiness no longer irks him quite as much. (It does still irk him a little. Just not as much.) She comes to a halt and turns to face him, letting out a snort. “Snogging you is no hard task. In case you haven’t noticed, the fall of Voldemort has been quite kind to you.” She dips and wiggles her head in a way that he interprets as meaning, Just look at you. And he finds himself blushing slightly.
Not wanting to lose the upper hand in this conversation, he smirks and says, “Yes, and three square meals a day has improved your frame considerably.” He means it as a jab—the way they used to interact—but she grins, wide and unfettered.
“Thanks for noticing, Malfoy,” she drawls. He shakes his head, bemused, and they continue their path to the dormitories, arguing over the assignment from Transfiguration that’s due later this week.