16. Inky Blobs Unblurred

8 & 8th—Chapter 16—Inky Blobs Unblurred

Hermione went Christmas shopping with Harry the weekend before Christmas break, despite the fact that there was a seriously large amount of studying to do for the end of term exams. It actually physically pained her to think of Malfoy using that time while she was in Hogsmeade to get ahead of her in studying. She'd taken careful note of where he'd left his bookmark in each of his texts while he'd been away from the Common Room grabbing a spare quill. She was still ahead of him. Marginally. The thing was that that margin was shrinking with every passing day. It didn't help matters that he had nowhere to go and nothing to do but study. He didn't have Quidditch, no extra curriculars, he couldn't leave the grounds, it didn't really appear that there was anyone he was particularly fond of spending time with, so other than going to class and taking the occasional stroll, he was left with ample reading time.

The truth was that he was starting to unnerve her. There was an excellent chance that he might, as the runner would say, lap her.

And that was why she walked so fast through Hogsmeade that Harry literally had to jog to keep up with her. They were done within half an hour.

O

Draco was beginning to wonder if his tear ducts still worked or not. Blinking felt like sandpaper against the rough side of Velcro, not that he'd ever have used such a Muggle invention.

The runic alphabet of the ancient clan of Bruckzen (c. A.D. 400) was contrived of the horizontal dash, the umlaut, and a series of circles of various thicknesses that determined the wit and measure of the writer, as the author with the most variation was considered to be the least lazy concerning the intricacies of the various sounds, as per the pronunciation in the pre-vowel shift era.

The sad part was not that he had reread the paragraph five times for content but rather that he was having trouble focusing his eyes on the individual, thankfully Roman, letters. He lifted his head up, and the room swam around him in a circle of double-vision.

It was high-time for a break.

One very petulant piece of his brain complained that the worst part about his situation lately was that he was neither buying nor receiving sweets, and thus there was little chance of snacking between meals. Of course, there was nothing actually preventing his mother from sending him a care package, other than the fact that she wasn't able to go shopping, or to Gringotts, either.

Warming spells had been placed all throughout the castle, though certain places below ground level were still left drafty. That is, the dungeons and their lovely dormitories. It would have been nice, he lamented, to have spent at least one year of his school career somewhere a little warmer, for a change.

And so Draco went up the spiral stairs to sink himself onto the rug before the fireplace. Patil was lounging on the sofa, painting her toenails red and green and not paying him the least bit of attention. He truly did wish he were attracted to her. Life would be ever so much simpler that way.

As he stared into the flames, each one having an identical twin due to his tired eyes, he felt a small weight bury itself inside him.

It was depressing was what it was. It was not necessarily that he wanted to go home for Christmas, it was that he wasn't even being given a choice in the matter. There was even a stipulation in his punishment saying that he wasn't allowed to talk to anyone via floo because his head would have left the grounds, so he really only was allowed to owl his mother for Christmas.

He almost wanted to use one of those things, those "telephones." Not that that would be possible.

Draco was not often someone who thought in unselfish terms. That is, he rarely gave a knut about anyone else's feelings. But he did take exception, especially lately, for his mother.

He refused to think of anyone else he might take exception for.

O

Hermione saw Harry, Ginny, and Ron off as they boarded the Hogwarts Express to spend the holiday at the Burrow and then went to the library to what was probably the most peaceful study session she'd had in months. What a difference there was when the library was completely empty and she didn't have any immediate deadlines. Not even her impending counseling session could ruin it for her.

By the time she'd decided to call it a night, it was nearly eleven. She'd been surprised that Madam Pince hadn't thrown her out earlier.

The Common Room was completely empty when she entered it, and she didn't give it much thought as she descended the spiral stairs and went into her dormitory for a good night's sleep before her appointment in the morning.

O

He could get used to this, really. No Weasley, no Potter, no snoring…. He took full advantage of the situation by taking a nice hot bubble bath—something he'd rarely risk because he wasn't quite sure he could handle it if any of his roommates found any bubbles at the bottom of the tub. Embarrassing.

He'd just pulled out the plug when something very odd occurred to him that, truth be told, made him feel like the biggest idiot ever to grace a loo.

A few months prior, indeed, the first time he'd taken a shower here, he'd cast a cleaning spell on the soles of his feet out of disgust at the hairs in the drain.

…He wasn't supposed to be able to use magic here. The fact that he'd just taken a bath with a large, and now slightly rusted, manacle flopping about his wrist was a testament to this.

Pulling a towel around him, he slipped into the dormitory and removed his wand from his bag, doing an experimental twirl. "Lumos." Nothing happened, and he didn't think it was simply that he hadn't cast it in a very long while. "Wingardium leviosa." Nothing. "Reparo." Zilch. With what was probably too much gusto, he aimed his wand at his unmade bed and muttered the cleaning spell, which was actually fairly stupid of him considering it was meant to get rid of dirt, not straighten. Yet, unless it was just his imagination, the linens did look just a tad whiter than they had before.

Purposely spilling a drop of ink onto Weasley's pillow soon proved that theory wrong.

He didn't understand. Had he only thought he'd cast it? Had he really just said the spell and continued to have all manner of Weasel, Potty and Thomas—for the life of him, he couldn't think of a nickname for the bloke—germs on him?

So there was really only one variable he could think of to change, and so he leaned over the bath, pointed at the drain, and muttered a vanishing charm at the few hairs clinging desperately to the porcelain.

He blinked.

For the life of him, he didn't know what kind of good it would ever do him to be able to do magic in the bathtub but nowhere else. But at least he knew that if he ever truly needed to do magic outside of class, he did have an option. A very un-useful and cramped option, but an option nonetheless.

O

Hermione awoke with a very stiff gasp before dropping her head into her pillow again. She could have sworn she'd heard something just now, but to her knowledge, she and Crookshanks were the only ones here. August, Padma, and Hannah had all left on the train.

She was either imagining things, or maybe Myrtle was causing mischief in the Common Room. She strained to hear anything, but all was silent.

Reminding herself very forcefully that there weren't any adolescent basilisks creeping around in the walls—unless some toad had accidentally sat on a chicken's egg—she rolled over and went back to sleep.

O

He'd officially gone mad. At two AM, he'd been struck with what might have been called inspiration if it hadn't been born of eccentricity, retrieved the photograph he'd admired from Weasley's trunk, went over to the bath, and used a replication spell to make a copy of it.

After he'd tucked the copy safely under his pillow and returned the original to its previous location, he very promptly collapsed into bed and went back to sleep.

O

Hermione groaned, rolled over, looked at her clock, and realized that not only had she slept in, but she was now due at Amorell's office in exactly a quarter hour.

Breakfast would have to wait, it seemed, but at least this way there was no chance of losing it—her breakfast, that was—just because of one professor.

She pulled on her clothes and did the only reasonable thing she could think of to do with her hair, pulling it into a loose bun at the back of her head. She scrambled her shoes, socks, and book bag into her arms, somehow managed to get the door open, and then she froze, barefooted and frenzied in her tracks.

Malfoy was standing at the foot of the spiral stairs, one of his feet poised as if he'd just been walking down them.

He was wearing his pajamas, was the first thought that went in a buzz of confusion around her head. The second was that he was here. The third was in answer to the second, that he was probably not allowed to go home for the holiday. The fourth was that they were alone.

The fifth was that her heart was hammering.

There were ten minutes left.

O

He'd known perfectly well that she'd had to stay for her make-up session with Amorell, and yet he'd still been under the false impression that he was alone.

Granger stood there in a kind of stupor, shoes, socks, and bag dangling from her arms as if she'd forgotten they were there.

The funny thing about this spot at the bottom of the spiral stairs was how utterly dark it was. Whoever had come up with the design had neglected to include a light of some kind, and it was with this thought that another came to mind. That from a distance and in a spherical shape, the two of them might be mistaken for inky blobs, shrouded in darkness. But now that the blobs were being defined into two distinct figures, Draco felt his feet drift forward until he was only about a foot from her.

She was still completely rooted to her spot.

His right hand drifted up to her face to cradle her jaw, and he honestly expected her to flinch away, but she didn't.

Close-up, her eyes were not the same color he'd imagined them to be. They weren't as hazel as he'd thought, but instead they were the color of dark toffee. Without looking away from them, his thumb, with what might have been a mind of its own, ran a slow path first over the arch of her upper lip and then across the breadth of the lower one, and she gasped, her eyes widening as he very slowly lowered his head to replace his thumb with his lips.

He didn't know how long he'd been yearning to kiss her. Probably since that other time on the stairs. And at that moment, it didn't matter that they were both barefoot. Didn't matter who she was or who he was. What mattered was simply that he was a boy, she was a girl, and she made him happy.

His lips were a hair's breadth from hers when she snapped out of it, whimpered, and backed into her room, shutting the door in his face.

Huh.

O

Eight minutes. Eight minutes to get to Amorell's office. Eight minutes to clear her mind. Eight minutes to get the impossible out of her brain. Eight minutes to forget the honey scent of Draco Malfoy's thumb. Eight minutes to compose herself so that she didn't have to relive the experience by explaining it in detail to Professor Amorell. Eight minutes to dismiss the thought of what it might mean to kiss him and why something in her was desperate to go back in time and let him.

There was a misuse of a time-turner, if she'd ever heard one.

She was still barefoot.

Eight.

She abandoned herself completely to logic, pulling her shoes and socks on, straightening her bag on her shoulder, and checking the time. Six and a half.

He'd almost kissed her. He'd been about to kiss her. Was he still outside the door?

She had her wand, of course, and even so there wasn't anything to worry about. A kiss was nothing to be scared of. She hadn't been scared during her first kiss with Ron—just of Voldemort, that's all. She'd been a little scared with her first kiss with Viktor, but that had been her first ever and was to be expected. She'd just been bloody annoyed with McLaggen.

Five and three-quarters.

This was just silly. He wouldn't be outside her door still. He'd been just as shocked to see her as she was to see him. He would probably have run away, considering his reputation in the bravery department.

Five minutes.

To think he almost kissed her when she was at her most disheveled. She didn't know much about his taste in girls past Pansy Parkinson, but he didn't strike her as the kind of fellow who would go for a girl with morning breath, near-pillow-hair and no make-up.

Well, out of the egg carton, into the frying pan, to run away to the fire, she decided. She opened the door so fast that if he had still been standing there, she probably could have knocked him over with a feather. He was gone from the alcove, and she whipped up the stairs, didn't look to see if he were in the Common Room, and didn't stop until she slid to a halt outside of Amorell's door with an entire two minutes to spare. If it had been anyone besides herself, she would have awarded a detention on the spot for running in the halls.

O

Draco had gone back to his room to get dressed and was now wandering slowly to breakfast, trying to sort out in his mind what had just occurred. So much for disappointing Amorell, or Trelawney, for that matter.

So close. He had been so achingly close to kissing her.

She wasn't wearing lip-gloss today, either. It was funny, really, how girls wore such things to attract boys, and yet he, at least, preferred it when a girl's lips were not covered in any sort of sticky, smelly goop once he actually did kiss her. Just ask Pansy Parkinson.

Her lips had been dry and very slightly chapped, but not so much to find it discouraging in the least. Her upper lip had been especially soft and had that wonderful dip, and he admitted to himself that he would have loved to have explored every gummy bit of her lower one….

He stopped in his tracks, realizing how hopelessly hopeless he seemed.

Kiss Hermione Granger? Some serious analyzing was very much overdue if he found the prospect even slightly less than unappealing. And he definitely found it less than unappealing. Or, to clarify the double-negatives, he found it downright appealing.

There had been a sort of mouth-watering rush as he'd approached her, as if she were actually a very overripe nectarine. There had to be something wrong with him if he were comparing her to produce.

But the problem still stood that he had tried to kiss her and that Granger knew it, too. A flash of Weasley's wrath being turned on him as he slept angelically in his four-poster completely unawares passed fitfully through his brain. It was only too bad that Draco no longer had his black-mail about a certain other kiss. Then maybe he could be kissing the Weasel's girlfriend with his blessing.

…There really was something wonky with his line of reasoning today.

He slunk into the Great Hall, groaning as he realized that the House Tables had been combined into one. There weren't many empty seats, either. Astoria Greengrass carefully placed her book bag onto the empty space beside her, snubbing him with a quick lift of her left eyebrow. Not that he'd want to sit next to her today of all days. He took a seat between Professor Sprout and a Fourth Year Ravenclaw, whose eyes widened to the approximate size of mince meat pies.

O

"Ah, Miss Granger." Amorell was wearing her usual grin, accompanied by red robes, a red-and-white-striped jumper, green skirt, green stockings, and pointed shoes. She looked like an elf.

"Hello, Professor," Hermione answered cautiously, taking the seat in front of the desk.

"Peppermint Pig?" she offered, pushing a bowl of red-and-white-swirled pigs over, all of them wallowing in a chocolate mud puddle. Hermione took one for the mere sake of having the excuse of not being able to talk with her mouth full, though she hated the squealing sound it made when she stuck it in her mouth.

"Let's see..." Amorell said, tapping her quill against her chin. "We covered the bit about your parents in Australia, yes?" She looked up for Hermione's nod of confirmation. "Professor Dumbledore left you a book in his will?" Hermione nodded and then pointed to the wiggling bulge in her cheek, sending the professor what was not really a very helpless shrug. "Right, well, when you think etiquette will let you…" she said, with a wave of continuation.

Unfortunately, the pig's center was filled with cream, so Hermione was forced to speak much sooner than she would have preferred. "The Tales of Beedle the Bard."

"Good, good…. You must have been close to him?"

Hermione was reminded yet again that this was a Ministry-sponsored class, and although Amorell didn't really seem the Umbridge type, the questioning did. "I do believe that Scrimgeour performed an adequate investigation into this matter, already."

Amorell looked up. "Rufus Scrimgeour?"

"Yes?" Hermione asked, confused.

"Oh, I thought maybe you meant his cousin Archie. Good friend of mine in my First Year. But I must say, Miss Granger, I don't know anything about our former Minister's investigations, as you call them. Humor me?"

Hermione had the great urge to rub the crease between her eyebrows. "I liked Professor Dumbledore, and I got on with him, but I'm not sure if you'd qualify our relationship as close or not," she finished.

"Friendly… but… distant…" Amorell mouthed, making a note. She looked up. "I'd like to play a little game." What else was new? "I'll say a word, and you say the first thing that pops into your head." She made a little smacking sound at the word "pop." Hermione nodded slowly. "All right, we'll begin with an easy one: Christmas."

"Cheer." This might not be as bad as she'd been dreading, she realized.

"Snake?"

"Death." It tumbled out of her mouth quickly, and Amorell made a note on her chart.

"Young?"

"Goodman Brown." She'd been reading Hawthorne a few nights ago.

"One word, now," Amorell corrected, smiling. "Hmm… devil?"

"Beware."

"Soul?"

"Transmogrification."

Amorell raised an eyebrow at her, but Hermione didn't feel like going into the subject of Horcruxes if she could avoid it. "Dragon?"

"Bank."

Another weird look. "Slytherin?"

"Draco." Hermione blinked. It must have been because the previous word had been dragon. There was no reason for her to be using his first name otherwise. Her back stiffened.

Amorell made a hideously long note. "Love?"

"Marriage." Another surprise, considering her recent aversion to wedded bliss.

"Kiss?"

"Thumb." Hermione's cheeks turned to a brilliant shade of rouge.

Amorell set her quill down. "Just one more thing, then," she said, and Hermione was honestly surprised that she seemed to be getting off so easily. "The ink blot test." Too easily. "Just tell me the first thing that pops into your head, just as before." Amorell grinned before grabbing up a piece of cardboard, and Hermione stared into the two inky blobs.

The rouge hadn't faded from her cheeks yet, and it intensified severely. "Prophecy," Hermione muttered. Though she couldn't really say why, this picture was definitely screaming prophecy.

O

A.N. Hello, hello! Well, this chapter was rather… vignette-ful, I'd say. I was trying to work myself up to a certain, ahem, scene. Ahem. Now who sounds like Umbridge, eh? Well, I'd really like to hear what you all have to say! We're either at or a bit past the midpoint, probably.