A Little Piece of Sincerity
By: Provocative Envy
OOO
Draco let his head fall back as he closed his eyes and inhaled the damp air of the dungeons. It had been three long days since he’d been so ruthlessly dismissed from her life. Three long days of indecision and embarrassment, of vacillation and humility.
He’d been rejected, but he wasn’t sure what he’d been offering.
She didn’t realize that it wasn’t her affection he wanted: it was her respect. He didn’t care so much that she liked him as long as she admired him. He’d never so desperately desired clemency as he had when he’d chanced a look into those marvelously expressive brown eyes and seen her hesitate.
But in the end she’d sprinted away, unwilling to forgive him for the harsh words and cowardly actions that he’d delighted in for six years. She didn’t even stop and consider how much he’d given up to apologize to her: he’d forsaken everything he believed in just to get a nod of approval from a girl he didn’t even like.
Snapping his eyes open, he jerked his head forward, staring at the wall opposite him as he contemplated his situation.
He supposed that it had been a culmination of mixed emotions that had spurred him to act so rashly, so stupidly. He hadn’t meant what he’d said so much as recognized its power.
But she’d hurt him. She’d been so wrapped up in how it all made her feel. She’d been selfish and stupid and she deserved everything she got.
There was next to no chance he’d ever win with her, not in a way he could truly appreciate.
Hurting her right back would have to suffice. If he did it enough, surely he could come to enjoy it again?
OOO
Hermione had no idea what she was supposed to do. And as someone who prided herself on thinking clearly in any situation, she thought how fitting it was that Draco Malfoy would be the one to obliterate her common sense.
No on else elicited the kind of overwhelming emotions he did. True, they were primarily anger and agony, but she knew better than any that there was a very thin line between hate and love.
She remembered how she’d been so sure that the writer of those notes had been her soul mate. That someone who so clearly understood her own feelings would have to be her true love.
But now that she knew who it was, now that she could forever eliminate Draco from her heart, she felt…empty.
She’d spent so long disliking him that it seemed impossible to imagine life without him. If he were to die tomorrow and never say another word to her, it wouldn’t make her happy. She would miss hating him, simply because it was something she was passionate about.
She knew how love worked. She knew that it would make every other person around her pale in comparison. But while it was doubtful that she could ever come to like anything about Draco Malfoy, it was even less likely that anyone else could make her feel like he could.
She couldn’t risk trying to forget about him. What if he had meant everything he’d said? What if he had truly wanted her to know he was sorry?
Could whoever he’d suddenly changed into really erase six years of hell from her memory?
She had to know.
As she set off to find him, unsure of how she would broach the subject, she had the fleeting thought that there was no turning back after this. She’d either be in love or have her heart broken. Again.
OOO
She came upon him in the Astronomy Tower. He was leaning against the windowsill, his arms crossed over the rough surface as he breathed in the cool night air. He didn’t even hear her come up the stairs, so absorbed was he in the sky.
“Malfoy,” she said hesitantly, destroying the pleasant reverie he’d built up for himself.
“What the…Oh. It’s you,” he replied indifferently, turning his attention back to the stars.
“I…just wanted to ask you something,” she explained defensively, dumbfounded by his reaction.
“Do what you want, Granger. I’m surprised you think I care, though. You’ve made it abundantly clear that you don’t want me to have anything to do with you,” he answered apathetically, shrugging his shoulders and glancing coldly at her face.
“I…Well, that is…Did you mean it? Did you mean what you said?” she finally asked nervously.
He was quiet for so long that she nearly jumped when he responded:
“Are you serious? There’s no way you actually fell for that,” he laughed cruelly, the sound cutting into Hermione much like a knife.
She closed her eyes slowly, willing back her tears.
He hadn’t changed. That much was obvious. She had been so stupid to think he could be even remotely humane. He didn’t have feelings, not like normal people. It was all about him, all about how far he could get and how many people he could trample over in the process. As long as he won, it didn’t matter who got hurt.
As long as he won, it didn’t matter what he had to say to do it. It didn’t matter that she’d fallen for it.
It didn’t matter that she’d just walked into a trap.
All she wanted to do was run away, just like she had after their last encounter. She wanted to curl up in her dormitory with a pillow and a box of tissues and cry away her shame. He’d succeeded in being the condescending bully: and she’d let him break her heart once more. The difference, she knew, lay in that this time she’d had a choice, this time it was for real.
And that was when her pain was immediately replaced with unabashed fury.
“Of course not,” she snorted flippantly, “I was trying to see how far you’d go to win, Malfoy. Lucky for me you’re an underachiever.”
“Yes, and lucky for me you’re a terrible liar.”
“Well you’d think I’d have figured that out by now. Since I’m so good at being the victim, right Malfoy?” she seethed, not caring about what she said as long as she hurt him, just like he’d hurt her.
“So sorry for taking advantage of your numerous weaknesses, Granger. You make it far too easy.”
“And hiding behind a false apology is so much better?”
“At least I’m not as gullible as Longbottom,” he shot back.
“Oh, come off it! You’re trying to be evil, like Dear Old Dad, and it’s sort of sounding like teenaged petulance, Malfoy!” she shouted, her cheeks flushed red.
“Where’d you learn that on, Granger? One of the man books you substitute actual friends with?”
“Since self-absorbed Slytherins who fail to be loyal to their own elected Ministers are just such great friends?”
“Don’t talk about things you know next to nothing about, Granger. You can’t learn everything from a book, you know,” he whispered dangerously, advancing on her with a predatory grace.
“You’re right, Malfoy. You can’t learn the basics of having morals from a book. Maybe that’s why you sorely lack them,” she retorted heatedly, her rage preventing her from noticing his slow progress.
“When it comes down to it, Granger, let me explain one important fact: morals can’t save you.”
With that, he elbowed past her and stalked from the room, his teeth glinting in the moonlight as he smiled at the success of his ploy.
Who would have guessed he’d been acting?
OOO
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