Pretty to pretend

thanks guys for commenting, i love you all, you rock a great deal. lol. roflmao. oh by the way when i write this or anything im listening to a collection of synth-pop. If you guys have good writing music let me know, or if you want to know what synth-pop is... either way, im trying with the spacing, tell me what you think is best. ~~~~~~**********muah


Chapter 3

Hermione Granger stood still as she watched her parents pull away from the train station. They had wanted to see Hermione all the way to the gate but she had said no, telling them that she would be ok, not to worry, everything would be fine. She was fine.


Lies. All lies.

She was depressed, down and disheartened, every terrible thought she had thought about her self had been true, she was right. She was a monster, she had seen it, the conformation was right there in his deep green eyes, the hate and disbelief that had flashed in those jade pools had been enough proof for her.

Turning away she paused with her trunk, standing on the sidewalk in the heavy rain, all those around her running, covering them selves with what ever was handy, open and exposed to the world, her heart there bleeding on her sleeve. What was she to think, considering?

Though through the rest of her summer she had received correspondences from Ron, Harry had not responded to any of her letters, all five that she had sent. When he had ignored her well wishes and birthday present she had finally given up.

Hermione pushed her hair out of her face, still having a hard time adjusting to her new hair cut. Though she had always had bangs before, they had always been little girl bangs, cut straight across her forehead, or as straight as you could get with hair like her own. Now her bangs were cut across her face, sweeping softly over one eye and down one cheek. No, no emo cut here, this was feminine and beautiful, her eyes bright and shiny underneath, staring out of the shadow of her hair and hood, for of Corse it was raining the last day that she would ever be boarding the Hogwarts express. She had been opposed to the change in hair style, saying what did she need style for, a bitter laugh caught in her throat as she saw the pained look in her ‘mother’s beautiful blue eyes. She had relented to a new cut but had drawn the line at highlights of any kind, her hair was naturally two toned from her summers out side of the house, running and walking the valley her parents owned.

She readied her trunk and taking a deep breath made her way through the throngs of muggles trying to maneuver her way to platform 9 ¾.

Leaning against the wall, looking as inconspicuous as possible she slipped through, bringing her trunk through with her.

She paused for a moment to take the sight of the train in, knowing that this would be the last time seeing it from this angle. It almost brought a smile to her face; almost.

She pulled herself forward, stepping through the children, noting that there weren’t as many as there would have been regularly, had this been years prior, but seeing how the last school year had ended, with the demise of their headmaster, she could understand why the numbers would be lower than earlier years had been. She was now under the awning, protected from the falling tears of the sky as she studied the future generations of Hogwarts students, wondering where this life and war would take them all.

She bumped in to something, lost in her thoughts, chewing her bottom lip, and clutching her hand to her wand as she fingered it delicately beneath her sweater. Almost tripping but preventing her self from falling she steadied her self by putting her hand out and planting it on the very thing that had knocked her unbalanced, looking up to see what had caused the hold up on her way to the strain.

Dark grey eyes stared back at her, disdain very obvious and apparent in them at being run in to, the rain causing dark blonde eye lashes to clump together, appearing darker still. Her long fingered pale hand slid down his soft, wool grey cloak front, slipping off to hang limply at her side.

Her breath was caught in her throat, her heart pounding in her ears as she stared in to his eyes. She stood face to face with none other that Draco Malfoy, barely a foot between their bodies.

He made a very dramatic show of brushing off his chest where she had touched him ever so lightly, sneering as he realized who it was that stood before him, who had broken in to his personal bubble of thought so abruptly .

“Mudbloods and their lack of manners. Always feeling the need to taint all that is around you. How utterly disgusting.” His famous smirk no longer playful as it had been in years prior, now held a truly hateful look of disdain, reserved all for her. How lucky she was.

Hermione only stared back at him, mouth shut, eyes open waiting for the larger retaliation against her being allowed in to his magical school despite her ’disgusting’ blood. She took in his appearance, noting that he had grown taller over the summer, not quite towering over her, but tall none the less. He was not the only one to have grown though, she was almost as tall as him now, only a few inches below his eyes. He no longer frightened her as much as he had in years past. She focused on his eyes. His would be beautiful grey eyes, had they not looked so mean and cold.

She shook her head and started to move on when he showed no signs of furthering his hostile behavior, getting bored rather quickly with the exchange. A large quidditch roughened hand shot out, wrapping around her bicep holding her in place when she would rather be moving on. Her eyes snapped back to his face, then lowered to look down at his hand, holding her so tightly, almost painfully. She still had made no noise, facial expression lacking any expression at all really, blank like his face so often was.

“No, Mudblood I don’t believe that I told you I was done yet.” He was smirking now, expecting her to become afraid, to shake and shiver in her boots and beg for his forgiveness and mercy. She did something altogether different though, something he was not prepared for in the least; she smiled. Quite possibly the first real smile that she had had all summer. It was as if the clouds had suddenly parted and the sun was staring him straight in the face, so blindingly beautiful that smile was.

She stood there smiling at Draco Malfoy as he stared at her in shock, not understanding what was happening and why. His venomous words forgotten, all intention of taunting her gone. He realized that his walls had fallen, his face showing the shock that he was feeling, ashamed he dropped his hand and stepped back. Eyes unblinking and locked on hers and spun away from her, striding away shoving his hands in to his pockets, thinking over the events that had just occurred. She, the Mudblood, had smiled at him, while he had been taunting her, trying to frighten her. Many things occurred to Draco at this point in time, the first being that Granger was entirely off her rocker, the second being he might very well be off his rocker to have tried to entice one third of the great Golden Trio in to a fight, maybe even a duel, and the third being how beautiful he thought she was at that point, when she had smiled at him, because she had never smiled at him before, sure he had seen her smile, but never at him, or because of him. He shook his head, he couldn’t be thinking these things, no, not he, Slytherin prince of Hogwarts, hater of all Mudbloods and Mudblood lovers. He tried to concentrate on other things, like the trunk he had left behind when he had fled Hermione’s presence, for that is what he had done, two embarrassing things, first to forget his trunk and to have run away from the Mudblood. Oh and lets not forget that lapse in sanity as well when he thought that she was beautiful, no, not pretty, or kind of cute, but beautiful, breath taking even.

Jesus Christ, Draco Malfoy was loosing his mind.


Hermione stared after the boy as he walked away quickly, leaving her there in that spot, she looked down in front of her feet when she tried to step forward, tripping yet again, as the ‘Slytherin Prince’ had left his trunk. This only made her smile brighter. What a silly thing to do. Hermione contemplated what this could mean, shaking her head decided not to think about it too much, instead opting to do a favor for him and levitate it aboard the Hogwarts express along with her own trunk, he had done something nice for her, albeit maybe not on purpose or even in a nice way, and completely unbeknownst to him… she figured she would help him out as well. She had needed a laugh to be honest and all his spouting about her Mudblood filth was it for her. She looked at this situation from a rather comical angle seeing as how they were actually related, her blood just as pure as his own, little known to him that it was, of course. The way she figured it, her and Draco had to be what… cousins, right?

Her mother, as vile as she was, was sister to Draco Malfoy’s mother, so yes, she was correct, they were cousins; at least, as far as she knew.

Pulling both trunks behind her now Hermione looked for an empty compartment, which of course did not take long, seeing as how she was a good hour early and not every one had even boarded the train yet. She got in to her compartment and closed the door pushing Draco’s trunk in the far corner and levitating her own up to the luggage rack above her head. She sat down heavily on the red padded seat and put her feet up on the seat across from her, not even contemplating the fact that her legs were long enough now to reach comfortably between the two seats. She pulled her hood down lower over on her eyes to block out the faint light shining through the windows, pulling her Ipod out of her pocket she put the ear plugs in and settled her self in to a comfortable position, readying her self for the long trip.

She slowly drifted off to sleep letting the sounds of Eric Prydz lull her off to la-la land.


!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~!

Draco was almost in a panic, he could not find his trunk nor the Mudblood any where, he had searched the entire platform and was now in the train looking for her. He was nearing the end of the train when finally peeking in to a passing compartment he saw her. He didn’t pause before throwing the door open ready to open the flood gates to his rants and fits when he noticed something peculiar. She was asleep.

He would never take Hermione Granger as the type to let her self fall asleep while in the enemies playground, for that’s what Hogwarts had become, she was not safe here.

He looked at her, really looked at her, at the legs long enough to reach between the seats, at the lines and curves of those legs, the soft, creamy and pale skin unmarred in any way. She was wearing some strange black and white muggle shoes, they had high tops on them and white lacing, the round emblem on the side saying converse all stars. What ever the hell that meant.

Her legs looked incredibly long because, he noticed, her black cotton skirt was hitched pretty high up on her curvy thighs, almost high enough he noticed to reveal her panties. Draco Malfoy caught him self biting his bottom lip as he stepped farther in to the compartment unsure of what he was going to do, letting the glass door slide shut behind him.

She stirred in her sleep a bit, reacting to something in her dream no doubt, uncrossing her ankles and letting one foot fall heavily to the floor, her hand sliding off of her lap to lie across the seat, knees slightly apart, her skirt hitching further up on her thighs from the action. Mumbling and sighing her face shifted to face him, eyes still closed, lips barely parted.

He stared in to the face of Hermione Granger, bane of his existence for the last 6 years of his life. He wanted nothing more than to feel hate for this girl, to kick her when she was down, to some how disturb the peaceful slumber that she had found, when he him self had not been able to sleep, really sleep, in weeks, months even. He noticed how clear her face was, how pale and clean the skin was, and rather soft looking. Her lips were full and poutey, softly pink and innocent looking. He stared at those lips, how soft they looked, he wondered, what would they feel like.

What the hell was he thinking? What had happened to him to make him feel this way, about this… person. ‘No,’ he told him self. ‘She is not a person, she is an It, a thing, a vile disgusting Mudblood.’ He pulled a sneer and looked away from her face, glancing again at her legs, the hitched up hem of her skirt, the delicate, long fingers of the hand that looked so pale against the red leather of the train seat. He found his eyes traveling the length of her body yet again. She raised her eyebrows in her dream, almost in question when he looked back at her face.

He shook his head as he stepped back, ready to make his exit when he saw his trunk in the corner, he crouched down, checking for signs of entry, finding none he quickly grabbed it and was preparing to open the door when it opened for him.

Staring face to face with him were none other than the greenest eyes in the universe.

Harry Potter stood facing him, a look of anger quickly covering his face and overpowering the temporary look of confusion than shock that had been there.

“Malfoy, what the hell are you doing in here?” He said menacingly low, eyes closing to angry slits. For Ron and him self and chosen that compartment because from the out side they could barely see Hermione’s sleeping face through the window, their shouts and catcalls not eliciting any reaction from her they had gone in search of their third of the trio on the train, guessing correctly which compartment she had been in.

Ron stepped forward, hate emanating off of him in waves, not waiting for a response as Malfoy sputtered. Grabbing the blond boy by his collar he pulled him in to the hall way, dragging him behind him, his trunk, yet again left behind. Harry watched them leave the compartment, not wanting to interfere with the ass kicking violence that was sure to ensue.

“I don’t even give a fuck why you’re in there ferret. I am going to break your face just for the sheer fun of it.”

Draco quickly broke the Weasley’s hold, bringing his hands up to shove his fists from his person. Ron waited for no invitation, that was enough for him, and swung his fist around and brought it strait in to Malfoy’s face, connecting solidly with his nose, there was a resounding crack as blood spurted from his face.

Malfoy felt the pain, but he had felt worse, much worse and laughed. He lunged at Weasley and brought him to the ground, pummeling him in the face and stomach. Ron had also felt much worse, but he didn’t laugh, instead he found his anger again, after momentarily losing it to the laughing bleeding boy.

Hermione woke to the sound of fighting, of crunching bones and swears, grunts of all kinds.
Pushing her self off of the soft seat she pulled her Ipod out of her ears and set it on the seat behind her. Looking up she found the back of Harry Potter leaning against the door frame, propping the door itself open with his body. She stepped forward, removing her jacket and throwing it on the seat across from where she had been, stepping around Malfoy’s trunk, wondering why it was no longer in the corner, she came up to Harry, placing a hand on his shoulder softly she peered around him to see what the commotion was.

The sight that she found shocked her.

Ron and Draco were on the ground, wrestling each other while beating each others faces to bloody pulps.

“Oh, my god, Harry stop them!” Harry turned to look at her face, the shock in her eyes only making her more beautiful, for she was beautiful, something Harry was finding harder and harder to ignore. He shook his head at her, and pulled a dark frown.

“No, Hermione, they need to do this, Malfoy deserves this.”
Hermione could not believe what she was hearing. Was this truly Harry Potter, her Harry Potter, loving and caring, the savior of the wizarding world?

“No Harry, no one deserves this, stop them now or I will.”

“Hermione, stay out of it, this needs to happen, it was bound to any way.”

“That doesn’t mean that its ok, Harry.” she went to step around him, but Harry stopped her, grabbing her around her ribcage, just below her breasts, he pulled her against his chest. She struggled. “Damn it, Harry, if we don’t stop them, McGonagall is going to come! Do you want Ron expelled?!”

“She’s not on the train this year Hermione, she’s at the school getting ready for us, she’s headmistress this year remember?” His voice was full of bitter resentment. She looked up in to his smirking face, noticing the harsh irony because if it weren’t for Dumbledore’s death she wouldn’t be, and if it weren’t for the boy on the ground fighting their best friend, Dumbledore wouldn’t be dead.

Sure Harry had cleared Malfoy of all charges, but he still knew the truth, he still knew that it was Draco that had let the death eaters in to the castle.

“Hopefully he kills him Hermione.” Harry’s voice was low and sinister as he narrowed his eyes staring in to nothingness but his own memory, his hand splaying out against Hermione’s wildly beating heart, thumb just brushing the underside of her left breast.

“NO!” Hermione pulled her self away from her best friends chest, spinning around to face him, long redish brown hair spinning out in a fan around her, eyes blazing. “what the fuck is wrong with you Harry, no, that’s not ok, we don’t kill people, Ron is not a murderer, I’m not and neither are you, Harry!”

“Oh, yeah Hermione, is that right, I’m not a murderer, huh? IF not than what am I?” His green eyes deep and brooding, as he glowered at her, for they both knew that he, Harry Potter would indeed be a murderer one day.

“I don’t know what you are any more Harry, the Harry that I know, that I love would never say that, would never let this happen.” She spun around and faced the fighting boys, still going at it, even with the tiredness of their swings, they were still connecting and causing damage.

Hermione stepped forward and grabbed Malfoy by the shoulders pulling him back and off of Ron, he was too tired to protest really, just attempting to kick out at Ron who was still on the floor. Ron lunged for Malfoy’s foot but being so tired him self didn’t get really far.

Hermione pulled with a great heave finally disentangling the two bodies and sending her self back, pulling Malfoy with her, his body causing her to topple backwards and fall to the floor. He had landed on her half facing her half facing away from her, one knee implanted between her legs, the other draped over her thigh, his face on her shoulder, as he bled all over her grey tank top and chest, smearing blood over her neck when he tried to pull his face away.

Hermione had stopped breathing, realizing what position they were in, how Malfoy was lain across her body, and resting on her shoulder, his knee pressed tightly in to her crotch. What was this feeling? What was she doing, how had she gotten here? Her head was spinning.

Draco noticed two things at once, the first being he was no longer fighting with the Weasel, the next being that he was on top of some one. Looking up he saw long reddish brown hair splayed out over the floor, in a fan, a long pale neck, and a face. Hermione Granger, who he had just moments before been staring at asleep. Wasn’t that just a moment ago? He wondered to him self, trying to clear his head, smearing his face across her neck and chest, he had blood in his eyes, in his nose and definitely in his mouth. He brought his hand up and tried to push him self up.

Hermione watched him as he shook his head and looked at her puzzled than he brought his hand up, placing it on her breast and attempted to push him self up. Her gasp caused him to look down at her, noticing where his hand was he pushed him self up with more force, moving his hand to her shoulder, sitting up on his knees he noticed that her legs were open and he could see up her skirt. He was practically sitting between them, her panties were pink, just as he had supposed and very tight, bunched between her legs. Her thighs looked soft and welcoming. He shook his head again as she tried to force her legs together, pushing her self away from him.

She heard two things, firstly Ron and Harry yelling at her to get away from him and shouts from the other end of the hallway. She felt a pair of strong hands grab hold of her upper arms and drag her farther away from the bleeding Draco, she was pulled to her feet, an arm going around her shoulders as she looked up in to the green eyes that were now soft and full of worry, the hateful look washed away from earlier.

“Oi, Draco!” Running feet alerted her to the fact that people, lots of them, were running towards the group of students.

“Draco, oh Merlin, what the hell happened to you?” Pansy Parkinson whispered as she attempted to pull him up to her, but stopped when he shook his head, pushing her away from him. “Draco?” she asked him confused and hurt as he pushed him self up, spitting his mouth full of blood on the ground at his feet. Grimacing he stood up, proud of him self for standing on his own two feet, then he swayed and would have fallen had some one not been there to catch him. He looked up in to the green eyes of Blaize Zambini, which would regularly be full of mirth and happiness, now held with not but worry and slight panic.

“Oi, Draco, speak to me, mate, how are you feeling? What’s wrong?”

Hermione watched the exchange as she was held back by her friends, Ron and Harry were both holding her now, but it was no longer just the three of them, Neville longbottom was standing there beside them with Terry Boot, Seamus Finnegan, lavender brown, Michael corner, the Creevey brothers, Patil sisters, Ernie Mac Millan and Justin Finch Fletchley. Half of Dumbledore’s army stood there, staring down the future death eaters club. Their wands were all trained on their slytherin counterparts, outnumbering the Slytherins greatly.

Crabbe and Goyle stepped forward to help Blaize Zabini with Draco Malfoy.

“I don’t know what is going on here but it needs to stop.” Came the voice of one Auror Nymphadora Tonks. “Hurry up, Shacklebolt get that boy to Pomphrey at the front of the train!”

She turned around to face Harry, Hermione and Ron. “Wotcher you lot, what have you been up to?” She couldn’t help the smile that crept on to her face, watching her three favorite kids in the whole of the world. Though they were hardly children anymore, she noticed, not having seen them for the entire summer, they were much older, more mature, grown up, she realized.

“Come on you guys, lets get Ron fixed up.” She sidestepped the death glares coming from the Slytherins as they followed their leader who was being escorted by Shacklebolt to the front of the train. Ron sat down heavily on his seat and watched as the fearless Dumbledore’s army came pouring in, all of course wanting to hear what had happened to cause the fight.

Hermione tuned them out as she sat down in her corner, pushing her head phones back in to her ears and pulling on her jacket and using the hood as a pillow, she intended to sleep the rest of the ride to Hogwarts, but alas it would not find her. She stared out the window instead, at the passing landscape paying no attention to the storm that was brewing out side or the one that was surrounding her.

Oblivious to it all Hermione was startled when a hand was lain on her thigh. Confused she quickly looked up, pulling the headphones from her ears and snapped to attention.

“What, what, sorry, I wasn’t paying attention?”

The hand that was on her thigh belonged to no other than Ronald Weasley and he seemed perfectly content to leave it there as he stared in to her beautiful eyes.

“When we came in he was in here with you alone ’Mione?” His bright blue eyes bore in to hers, his palm hot against her leg. She shifted uncomfortably as she considered what he was saying.

“He was? I wasn’t aware, I was sleeping.” She shrugged trying in vane to dislodge Ron’s hand from her person but it was not working, she stared pointedly at his hand then up at his eyes, then back at his hand, cocking an eyebrow in a very un-Hermione way. “Ronald, please…?”

With a look of disappointment and beginnings of a very red face Ron, pulled his hand away from her, to stuff it in his pocket, as if she had burned him.

“Did you check to make sure that everything is alright, he didn’t go through your trunk or touch you inappropriately while you were out did he?” Tonks asked this, a very serious expression on her face and she leaned forward to see Hermione’s reaction better.

Hermione let out a hard bark of laughter shocking every one in the compartment, “Ha, very funny, really,” it didn’t sound like she truly thought it was too funny though. “We are all aware that this is Malfoy we are talking about, haters of all things muggle and un pure, do you really think he would debase him self in order to cop a feel on the Mudblood? Please, be serious.” Her tone was rough and again not like her self at all, Harry noticed again, that her actions were a little off, as if she were some one else entirely, which he supposed, she truly was.

Hermione looked out the window, again ignoring their question, her last statement having closed her part in the discussion. She scratched at her shoulder, it had been itching her for a while. Her fingers met the sticky mess of blood that Malfoy had leaked on her from his face. She pulled her hand out of her sweater quickly, how had she forgotten, she pulled off her jacket, the inside was white and was now stained with blood. ‘oh god,’ she thought. ‘How was he still alive after so much blood loss?’ She looked up in to Ron’s face to search for injuries, but found none, for Tonks was very talented in the healing spells department, how could she have spaced out so bad to have forgotten the blood and her friends safety?

Tonks was saying something to her again. “Huh, what was that?” she questioned, her eyes now looking directly at Tonks.

“I asked you if you were ok, that’s an awfully large amount of blood on your shirt, Hermione?” Tonks looked worry as she repeated her self slowly.

“No, I’m fine I suppose. It’s only Malfoy’s, I was only… wondering how he could be alive after such a blood loss?” She looked over at Ron as a wide grin broke out on his face, for he was the reason behind the loss of blood. She looked down at the blood on her fingers as she rolled it back and forth between her thumb and forefinger. This was her blood almost, this blood on her ran through her own veins, didn’t it?

“Would you like me to clean that up for you ‘Mione?” Tonks asked her.

“No, I’ve got it I think.” She pulled out her wand and vanished the blood off of her person. ‘Hold on‘, she thought. ’wasn’t Tonks a Black?’ “But… there is something I would like to ask you… later Tonks, if you would, when you have the chance. Please.” Hermione looked up in to her eyes as Tonks nodded her head.

“I’ll be staying at the castle tonight, so after dinner than if you would like?” She smiled. Hermione did not smile back, only nodded and said a soft thank you before looking out the window. Not missing the look of knowing that Harry gave her, he had been wondering when she would be working that little equation of who she was and was not related to.

She had left the blood on her sweater as a reminder to her self, to not forget again what she was. Who she was.

***********I hope you guys like it i was working on it for a while, fine tuning it and what not, and thank you again for reading. please comments, i need them to survive... bah