19. An Approximation of Normality

Eight and Eighth—Chapter 19—An Approximation of Normality

Draco celebrated the New Year by foraging through Weasley's things. He didn't notice anything new, though that might have had something to do with the fact that Weasley had spent very little time in their dormitory lately. Draco did spend a few extra minutes perusing the photo album his copied photograph had come from.

He'd been neglectful before, he realized. He hadn't looked at any of the more recent ones.

He found himself staring at pictures from Bill and Fleur Weasley's wedding. How a Weasley had managed to nab a veela was a question Draco was far from able to answer.

Granger looked beautiful, her hair sleek as it so rarely was and a floaty lilac dress hanging elegantly off her form.

And she was dancing—dancing with Weasley, but that couldn't be helped.

He made a copy of this photograph as well.

O

Hermione stood with her nose pressed against a window on the first floor, staring out at the rain that was coming down in torrents. The problem was that there was a good foot of snow outside, which was now turning into slush. Her plan to go sit in Puddifoot's and read with a nice pot of tea and a raspberry cream cheese scone was quickly going to pot.

Too bad. It would have been so peaceful considering no one else from the school was about to brave the weather.

Her breath had left a mist on the window, and she leaned away, watching it slowly dissipate.

"The elusive Lumbricus libris makes its appearance at last, eh?"

"That the scientific name for a bookworm?" she asked, not bothering to turn around. Her back stiffened, though.

"You catch on fast. I like that." He moved to lean against the wall beside her, and she turned her head slightly. "Must they all come back again tomorrow? I could really do without the snoring."

She was about to tell him that he should just cast a silencing spell, but she caught herself. "Pomfrey might give you some earplugs, if you ask her nicely."

"Aw, but Granger. When do I ever ask anyone anything nicely?" He smirked at her, but she ignored him, choosing to stare into the sleet instead. A flash of lightning crossed the sky, and she groaned, leaning her forehead against the glass. "But maybe," his voice was tentative, "maybe you're onto something there. Maybe asking nicely is the key to several of life's little puzzles."

From the corner of her eye, Hermione saw his hand move, and a moment later there was a slight pressure on her elbow. She flinched, turning to face him.

"For example," he continued, as if he hadn't just committed a taboo and touched her, "what if I were to ask you something nicely? The likelihood of your acquiescence might just increase, am I right?"

Hermione felt herself blushing. "What are you on about?"

Malfoy surveyed her critically, his chin resting in the cradle between his thumb and index finger. "May I kiss you, Granger? Please?"

In the three seconds it took before and during his question, Hermione's heart rate had sped up by a terrifying degree, and the roof of her mouth went dry. Her tongue stuck before she answered. "I… don't think that's such a good idea."

"That's a no, then?" he asked, and she was honestly just a little frightened by the fact that he suddenly looked terribly nervous.

She nodded.

"Yes, that's a no, or no, you meant yes?" he asked.

"Yes, that's—"

Draco Malfoy moved with an agility that Hermione had never really paid much attention to before, aside from the times when she'd watched as he and Harry sped toward the snitch in unison, and frankly, it was apparently an "objects in mirror are closer than they appear" type of situation. From afar, his speed was relative. Up close? Up close he was a blur.

Or perhaps it was simply that he knew she was more likely to fly than a snitch.

In a flash, his right hand had latched onto her left elbow again, and his left hand flew to her chin.

So much can happen in the space of a millisecond, and in that millisecond before Hermione could say, "a no," he was pressed against her, window glass at their shoulders, his gray eyes staring down into her brown ones.

But he didn't kiss her.

He remained a hair's breadth from her lips, and she could feel his breath blowing against the peach fuzz between her lip and nose: warm, but not malodorous, as the "Mal" in his name might suggest.

"A no," she finished, her voice sounding extremely off-kilter, probably from the ensuing hysteria.

His grip relaxed, he pulled away, and Hermione found herself sinking on weak knees onto the stone window sill, watching him walk away.

Except that none of that had really happened.

"Aw, but Granger. When do I ever ask anyone anything nicely?" He smirked at her, and a flash of lightning crossed the sky. "But maybe," his voice was tentative, "maybe you're onto something there. Maybe asking nicely is the key to several of life's little puzzles."

And he'd walked away, leaving Hermione to her daydream. No one ever said she lacked an attention to detail, even in her imaginings, it seemed.

There was a thunderclap.

O

Luna Lovegood bounded to the Gryffindor table, wearing a frilly rose-colored dress that made her look a little like a Christmas tree. Hermione momentarily considered docking points for being out of uniform, but considering this was Luna, that might not be entirely fair. The girl had problems, after all.

Hermione sat next to Harry, who sat next to Ron, who looked relatively chipper, but Luna had come up behind Dean, who sat at the other side of the table.

"I have news," she announced, not really looking in any one direction.

"Oh, do you?" Harry asked, a small smile on his face. Luna nodded, smiling vaguely off to one side.

"And what is that news, Luna?" Hermione asked.

"I have an internship," she responded. "But I worry that the gloss-footed willosnitchers might get in the way," she added, a small pout on her face.

Hermione frowned. "An internship? Where?" What respectable company would offer an internship to Luna? And especially while she was still in school.

"The Department of Mysteries," she replied. "I was told I have all of the necessary qualities for the ideal Unspeakable."

Hermione was about to retort, but she bit her tongue, realizing that Luna's statement was actually fairly true. If anyone could believe and work with things almost too imaginary to be spoken about, it was Luna Lovegood.

"When do you start?" Harry asked between bites of apple crisp.

"February," she replied. "Weekends until the end of term. Daddy was very pleased. He says I'll finally be able to prove the existence of weresnails for him."

"And what do you think, Dean?" Ron asked, the hint of a snigger in his voice.

"Sounds good to me?" Dean stated, looking unsure of himself. Luna leaned over and kissed his cheek.

"Oh, don't worry. My spirit-projector will keep you company." With that, she floated off to the Ravenclaw table before any of them could actually congratulate her.

"Spirit-projector?" Ron asked, trying not to laugh.

Dean shook his head. "You don't want to know."

O

"So, 1999. Next year should be exciting."

Draco sat in the library, trying to read but being continually distracted by what he deemed to be very poor flirting between a Third Year Hufflepuff and a Second Year Ravenclaw.

"Maybe we should party like it's 1999."

"What? It is 1999."

"I mean, like the song."

"Song? What song?"

The Hufflepuff shook her head. "Nevermind. It's a Muggle thing."

"Oh."

The small talk was driving him up a wall, and Draco finally decided that if they didn't pipe down or say something marginally entertaining—like professing undying badger-eagle love—in the next thirty seconds, he would have to find a new table.

The entrance of a different badger caught his eye. Moon walked into the library followed shortly by Ron Weasley. They walked off toward the back of the library together.

If today had not been a Sunday and the last day before spring term, he might have dismissed the fact that the two of them had just walked in together. He might have assumed they were doing an assignment. But instead he was forced to assume other things, and Draco stood to tiptoe after them.

"Thank your mother for the jumper she sent me," Moon said, and Weasley nodded.

"It's no big deal. She can finish one in two days."

"Still, that was really nice of her. And two days is a lot!" She crossed her arms, a small glare on her face.

"Oh, calm down," Weasley admonished. "I swear you take everything out of context."

"I'm surprised you know what context means," she grumbled.

Weasley placed a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry. Okay?"

She stiffened. "Fine."

Weasley smiled, and Moon smiled back reluctantly. And then—Draco had to squeeze his eyes shut. He did not want to watch those two snogging.

He was lucky his lunch wasn't revisiting him. Disgusting.

O

Hermione sat in the Common Room with a book propped up on her lap. The principle is based largely in part upon the Theory of Contiguity, in which two objects are aligned in parallel habitation for prolonged amounts of time until their magical properties create a chemical and polar attraction that drive them toward one another—

She slammed the book shut, blushing. Her thoughts were not going at all in the desired direction.

It was at this moment that the door opened, and August came in. She took one look at Hermione, her eyes went large, and she popped down the spiral stairs as if a herd of bicorn were after her. Hermione looked left and right, wondering if there was something in the room she was missing.

O

The end of the winter hols meant a return to Grief Counseling, House Unification and Tolerance, and Draco could not have been dreading it more. That class was absolutely the biggest waste of time he'd ever been subjected to, including Defense Against the Dark Arts with Delores Jane Umbridge.

The one bright side to the class was that he was partnered with a smart-aleck whom he desperately wanted to snog, her blood status and bushy hair be damned. The latter was actually starting to grow on him—not literally, of course.

And so, Draco made the inevitable trek to the classroom that had once been home to Quirrel, Lockhart, Lupin, Moody, Umbridge, Snape, and a Carrow, but was now that of someone far more sinister: Amorell. (Well, perhaps she wasn't the most sinister among them, but hyperbole did make life more interesting, in Draco's opinion.)

Today the woman wore what for her was incredibly odd. Black robes. Plain, boring, standard-issue black robes. She almost looked like she might be a normal professor, and indeed, to the untrained eye, she probably would.

Amorell sat at her desk with her hands neatly folded. Behind her sat another woman with a clipboard, a quill, and a tweed outfit that made her look twenty years older than she probably actually was.

A smirk was beginning to grow as a realization began to unfurl within Draco's brain.

Someone had come to check Amorell's progress and suitability to her post. Sweet freedom was only a few negative check boxes away.

O

"It seems," Amorell said in a professional tone, "that someone has filed a complaint against my teaching abilities, and as such, Madam Fitch will be observing our class today."

Hermione couldn't believe it. It was like a belated Christmas gift. Her only regret was not being the one to file the original complaint. Why hadn't she ever thought of doing that?

"Today," the blonde woman continued, "we will be having an exercise in House Unification and Tolerance. Its goal is to teach you all more about one another in the hope that you will discover similarities between yourselves and your classmates." She produced a pile of parchment and diligently handed one to each of them. "Your goal is to find classmates who fit each of these classifications. When you find someone who, say, has the same birth month as you, you will have them initial your parchment."

Hermione had a vague memory of doing this exact same activity in her younger years before Hogwarts. She was really starting to tire of so many "getting to know you" exercises, and she groaned to herself.

"Of course, you will be doing this activity while under a silencing charm." With one of her trademark grins, Amorell swiped her wand in front of them all, said the magic words, and suddenly everyone was attempting to speak without any success whatsoever.

O

Very tricky, Draco mused. Render them incapable of speech and voila! Ministry official lady wouldn't be able to hear their complaints about a certain amoral professor. He gave Amorell a small glare before taking a gander at the parchment she'd handed him.

Find someone with the same first initial as you. That was a lucky break, he realized, wandering immediately to Thomas and gesturing to the line. His fellow D name gave him a skeptical look before reluctantly scrawling a quick DT. Draco returned the favor. Meanwhile, Weasley, Moon, and Patil looked rather cross about the first item on the list, while all three H names were gathered together in a huddle that made Draco slightly ill due to all the camaraderie.

Find someone with the same last initial as you. Draco eyed Lil' Moon at the exact same time she eyed him. They'd exchanged initials in a business-like manner and moved on without any (non-verbal) questions asked. Patil and Potter paired up, and everyone else gnashed their teeth. It vaguely occurred to him that if this were some sort of contest, he and Potter were tied for the lead.

He quite liked that.

It was when he started moving on to things like favorite color that everything started to get a little more hectic.

O

Hermione was trying to mime to Hannah that her favorite food was salmon, and she was very hastily remembering why she'd never enjoyed playing charades. She had to give up on that one, figuring everyone else was probably busy getting initials for liking chocolate most.

She'd just put a big X to the side when she felt someone tapping at her shoulder, and she turned to find Malfoy hovering over her. He mouthed a "hi" at her before pointing to the twelfth item on the list. Hermione blinked.

Find someone who likes you.

"What?" she mouthed. He shrugged, gestured broadly around the room, then pointed back to her. She shook her head.

No?

No.

He frowned at her, grabbed her parchment, and signed his own initials under number twelve before marching off in search of item thirteen.

She wanted to sit down.

O

He couldn't exactly blame her, but still. That hurt. Draco wandered the room, receiving initials with a much lessened speed now that he'd been reduced to silently snarling at everyone in the room.

What he'd really like to do was get the silencing spell removed and then promptly snarl at Amorell. He bet the Ministry official would love that.

The two in question were sitting and comfortably chatting with one another, and the woman in tweed didn't look to be marking much down on her clipboard. They were doomed unless something went horribly wrong in the next—he checked the clock—eight minutes.

O

Ron pointed to line seventeen, and Hermione absently initialed it for him. That one had wanted someone who'd been to France; Harry had already gotten her to sign that line for him five minutes prior. Ron smiled tentatively and scooped up her parchment to find something to initial in exchange.

Hermione watched as Amorell conjured a cup of tea and offered it to the Ministry official. "What a pleasant exercise. It really is a pleasure to watch them cooperating on such a perfunctory level," the latter woman said, accepting her tea.

Perfunctory? Either the woman was having a Mrs. Malaprop moment or else she really did think that acting routinely and without thought was a good thing in this situation. That could be, Hermione mused. After all, there was a time when getting them to cooperate at all with Malfoy would have been anything but "perfunctory."

Ron's right index finger jammed into her shoulder three times in rapid succession. She turned to look at him. His face was a brilliant shade of red, and he was pointing to item twelve on the list. More specifically, he was pointing to a certain D and M that were lazily scrawled below it. Ron's eyes bulged slightly as Hermione opened and closed her mouth, unable to think what to say and unable to say anything anyway.

O

There was a noisy sound of feet against floor just before the hand descended on Draco's shoulder. He made a roundabout turn, had just enough time to make out the irate figure of Ron Weasley, and then blacked out as a freckled fist collided with his nose, a crunching sound reverberating throughout the silent room.

That hadn't quite been what he'd had in mind.

O

A.N. Sorry, sorry, sorry! Both about the cliffhanger and the fact that this took an entire four weeks to finish. I've had a lot of other writing to do lately, and by the time I finished that other writing, I had mostly forgotten what I had wanted to put in this chapter. Forgive me?

Just to clear up any confusion, the almost-kiss in the second scene was in Hermione's imagination.