A/N: I believe a mere “Sorry for the wait of all waits” would not even cover half of it, so I’ll just go ahead and say: enjoy! Not gonna be a particularly long fic, but a few chapters should do it.

Part II

In all honesty, it was beyond Hermione what Draco meant to accomplish after his threat to her in the deserted Divinations classroom. Nevertheless, despite his bleary means, it had caused a perpetual cycle of nausea and nervousness to wheel inside of her all day, more often than not drying out her mouth and causing her to become constantly dehydrated. She tried to focus on her studies, especially since Snape had them making a fairly advanced potion to prep them for their future courses – but even he looked as if he had grabbed a butter knife from the Hall and was plotting to soon stab her just as soon as she turned her back. Frightened and rather agitated with this whole mess, she stomped out of the class as soon as he had dismissed them, trying to shake away the gleam of silver she thought she’d caught a glimpse of inside his pocket.

“Wait! Hermione!” she heard someone call out. Hermione’s ears perked up at the familiarity the voice sparked, but instead walked faster.

“Hermione!”

“Go away!” she shouted, angry with the pair of them. “If I see your faces I don’t think I can hold back whatever hex erupts from my wand! So just stay away from me if you know what’s best for you!”

Just then, they appeared beside her. Harry on one side; Ron on the other. They had unjustly sandwiched her. Seriously. They each squeezed her right in the middle of them, Hermione’s somewhat petite body getting scrunched up, her shoulder blades poking out as she made a sour face.

“Look, Harry and I will forgive you if you just tell us what’s going on,” Ron said. Hermione found herself having to hold back her snort at this – as if anything could ever be that easy when it involved these two.

She tried to jerk away from them. “What’s going on is that you have no respect for my wishes at all!” she grunted as she tried to shove them off. “I told you to go away! I’m warning you two!” she cried, as she suddenly halted, and they stopped along with her.

“Tell us what’s going on,” said Harry seriously. “The article, that picture – it’s pretty clear, Hermione, that you’ve been hiding things from us. We need an explanation.”

“There’s nothing to say,” snapped Hermione.

Ron let out a very loud snort. “A-hah! Nothing to say my foot! Ginny getting a new jumper is nothing to say. You getting your groove on with Malfoy is—”

Hermione’s hand dove at his arm.

Ron yelled, his hand flying up to where he had felt the shoot of pain.

He looked at her incredulously. “Did you just pinch me?”

“Yes, I did, and I won’t hesitate to do it again,” she huffed.

He gingerly rubbed his arm, giving her a look of both fear and bother. “So I reckon it is true, then?” he said. “That article?”

“You read it?” Hermione asked.

“Well, no,” said Harry, a bit timidly. He glimpsed at Ron, and then at his shoes, then scratched his ear. “We sort of didn’t-didn’t want to.”

“Yeah, we didn’t want to throw up after we just had lunch.”

“But we did hear things from Ginny. But it’s true? That you were with Malfoy?” Harry looked serious, but at the same time Hermione could quite see that he was still quite hesitant about knowing. She couldn’t say she blamed him, either – the truth was a ghastly thing. “So – all those times you were in the library?”

“I was at the library,” said Hermione.

“With?”

“I don’t know,” she said lamely.

“So that’s a positive,” stated Ron. He sighed. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Because I knew how you two would react. You would try to protect me. And I don’t need your protection. Not when it comes to these things.”

“Well, obviously, you do,” snorted Harry. “Now you’re a media whore.”

“Hey!” Hermione cried. “That was a low hit!”

“You can’t blame the bloke, Hermione,” Ron said, as they began to walk again, with Hermione feeling as if her mouth had just been coated with something bile. “It’s the truth.”

If Hermione hadn’t known better, she would have thought Ron sounded a little scornful. She glimpsed over at him, his face drawn down into seriousness – highly rare for someone of his character, always spewing with jokes and jibes. This made her feel worse, but just a little. She’d have tried her hand at apologizing for doing what she did, but it wouldn’t have gotten her picture or that article off of Witch Weekly. It was really a sort of futile thing. So the three of them, reminiscent of all of those times before, just walked the halls, each of their eyebrows furrowed in thought, trying to make sense of the situation at hand – as well as simultaneously trying to figure out just how they were going to try to get their friend out of this butter-knife-wielding predicament.

“Why don’t you call a press conference and just straighten things out?” suggested Harry.

“Oh yeah, a press conference in Hogwarts, good idea,” Hermione dryly remarked. “Besides, this is Skeeter we’re talking about here. If I give her the slightest bit of a chance to get near me—”

“Right, right,” said Harry quickly, marking that idea off. “You’re right.”

They thought some more. After a few minutes, Ron let out a large exhale of air from his cheeks.

“Merlin, this is harder than trying to figure out what Voldemort’s plans were,” he said. “At least he gave us clues, you know? A little trail of crumbs. But here all you’ve got are girls with butter knives wanting to slit your throat.” He looked contemplative. “And I don’t even know where the bloody hell they got the butter knife idea from. Seems to me like wands are looking to be too neat for what they’ve got in mind for you.”

Hermione’s stomach did an internal flop – a very violent one, at that. She started to feel more than just a little queasy at Ron’s suggested imagery.

“Gee, thanks. Your support and comfort have meant the world to me, Ronald,” she said sarcastically.

“No offense, Hermione, but sarcasm doesn’t save you from the hands of a hundred fangirls armed with butter knives,” said Harry, jumping in. “Why don’t we concentrate on trying to find a solution.”

“That, or force you into hiding under a plank in the Gryffindor commons,” muttered Ron.

Harry brightened up. “Actually, Ron, that’s not a very bad idea.”

“I am not going to go into hiding,” Hermione said through her teeth. “I can do this. Maybe if I just talk to Dumbledore, he should understand—”

Ron scoffed, his eyes wide with incredulity. “Dumbledore! No offense to the man, but when it comes to rabid teenage girls with sharp kitchen utensils I hardly think—”

“I think Ron’s right, Hermione,” Harry said, cutting in again, putting his hand on Ron’s face to stop him. “While I’m sure Dumbledore would express concern… maybe we shouldn’t involve him just yet. Maybe… maybe we’re blowing this entire thing out of proportion. Maybe we can just wait it out. See how it goes in a few days, if it calms down.” He sounded hopeful, if not a little nervous. At least, he hoped he sounded hopeful.

Ron swatted Harry’s hand off of his face, looking skeptical. “Whatever you say, mate. Whatever you say.”

“Right,” sighed Hermione, really wanting to believe her friend. “Right. Wait it out. It’s going to be all right.”

“In the meantime,” Ron said, patting her shoulder, “I’ll be looking for a loose plank in the commons.”

He shrugged at the sharp looks Harry and Hermione gave him.

“It’s better to be safe than sorry,” he pointed out, and sadly, neither Harry nor Hermione could disagree.

Thankfully, the rest of the day went on without any more events involving Hermione having to run away from girls with sharp metal dining sticks, though one couldn’t say the same for the hateful glares she’d had to take throughout the course of the day. Throughout all of her classes she’d been wary and on her guard, perhaps going even a little bit mad, jumping at every clang or twinkle she’d seen at the corner of her eye, thinking it was another butter knife aimed at her heart. It was ridiculous, utmost ridiculous, the sort of imprisoning fear she felt inside of her now. She’d try to focus on her lessons but could never, as she always seemed to catch the girls behind her mouthing foul language to her, accompanied by a lewd gesture.

While she was doing her essay in the library as a sort of free period, one of Malfoy’s stalkers had even had the nerve to walk by and “accidentally” tip her entire inkbottle all over her work. She’d just grinned and walked away, returning to her equally evil cronies, while Hermione glared at her back, wishing her skirt would fall down.

“I swear I think Malfoy’s got even Jesus working for him,” Hermione vehemently muttered as she tried to magic out the large puddle of ink on her parchment.

Ron and Harry looked at their friend pityingly.

“I always thought this would happen someday, people hating your guts,” Ron commented, “but I never thought it would be because of some tryst with Malfoy.”

Harry nodded solemnly as Ron went on.

“I mean, I always thought people would just hate you because you’re bossy, and you yell a lot, and you’re a know-it-all. But I suppose the fact that you’re all those things – along with having been Malfoy’s secret lover – isn’t helping the situation, either.”

“You mean like how your insensitive remarks are?” she hissed, wanting to gouge his eyes out with her Travel-Pak quill.

“Well, forgive me if I’m just trying to put this situation here into perspective.”

“It’d be fine if you didn’t have to go about insulting me while you did it, Ron.”

“Then maybe you should have thought about that before you went off traipsing with the enemy then!”

Harry froze, looking tensely between his two friends. He’d heard the string snap when Ron had made his little statement and he was just waiting for the blow. He’d have tried to intervene like a good friend if he knew his two friends would hear him through their nonstop bickering. They fought like they breathed: too bloody much!

“At least he treated me better than you ever did,” she spat, quickly gathering up her things and shoving them into her satchel, her face red with anger – but not nearly as red as Ron’s after her little comment. After she was all done, she stood with her satchel on her shoulder, poised with a hateful look on her face. “You insolent pig.”

And then she turned on her heel and left in a huff. Before she reached the doors, however, Ron managed to yell out at her.

“I think you’re forgetting the fact that he’s the one with the butter knife army out to get you, smarty!”

She didn’t even look back – she just slammed the doors of the library. However, Ron did not even seem to notice that he had just yelled out in the library and that every single person in the room had heard what he’d said and was now staring in their direction. In fact, he was completely oblivious – even to Madam Pince’s painted scowl and the harsh “Ssssssshhhh!” she directed their way. Harry flushed a bright pink, before ducking his head down into his book.

Ron was still muttering under his breath. “Can’t believe she had the nerve… comparing me to that bloody bastard… can you believe it… bloody mental, she is… should ask Malfoy to buy her some sense… do us all a favor… maybe she deserves all that knife-waving… so bloody infuriating… what’d I ever see in her… going off with that ferret… swear I could beat the both of them to pieces…”

Harry looked at his friendly pityingly. Ron Weasley, still trying so hard to conceal his feelings for Hermione Granger. It really was the saddest thing he’d ever seen – and he was Harry Potter. He’d seen lots of sad things.

Hermione hoped the next day would be better – that the storm had calmed, the dangerous fangirls had extinguished all of their aggression, and that everything would be back to normal. No more scandalous pictures on Witch Weekly. No more running for her life. No more best friends turning on her. No more Malfoy’s smug prat face. And, most of all: no more butter knives! If nothing else, she wanted that the most. She’d been so traumatized that she’d even had a dream about oversized butter knives chasing after her. Obviously this whole affair had taken a large chunk out of her psychological and mental health! So, really, she was most eager to put this all behind her. Never even wanted to mention it or even think about it ever again.

Then again, if dreams were pasta, just for dreaming that alone, she’d have been a very fat girl.

Poor Hermione, she’d actually been shaking as she buttoned up her blouse. It seemed everyone was against her – even the Gryffindors, her own House, accusing her with their eyes of cavorting with the enemy. Ron hadn’t been lying when he’d said that particular comment to her – he’d just said what was on everyone’s mind. Hermione didn’t exactly know why she was furious at that, perhaps simply because she needed to take her frustration and helplessness out on someone and Ron had been all too eager to start the spark. Only Ginny had been sympathetic to her situation, giving her a few words of comfort yesterday, but then fleeing away when people had been coming. Even she didn’t want to be seen with her. Merlin, Hermione felt like a leper.

So it didn’t help, not at all, that as soon as she’d stepped into the Great Hall for breakfast she’d heard those mutterings again. She’d only caught a few words, each word twisting her stomach into knots until she was certain she’d lost her appetite altogether, but they were enough. She knew something bad was going to happen. There was something in the air, akin to the way you could smell rain just before it drops. Something foul was in the play.

She ate breakfast by herself and avoided all eye contact with any and everyone – she just ate her porridge and read her book. She could feel everyone’s eyes on her, but she cemented her eyes on the pages of her tome. Sadly, she did not read past the fifth line. She just read it over and over again – and even after she’d finished her breakfast she couldn’t recall those five lines she’d read so repeatedly. That was how terribly chaotic and discombobulated her mind was right now.

She went to her classes with a firm goal: to get through the day. She was miserable and tense, but she looked forward to going back to her room in the evening without the feel of scalding eyes or the brutality of her peers’ gossip. In Potions Professor Snape again refused to acknowledge her existence and when she’d answered aloud the entire class hissed at her. And in Transfiguration Professor McGonagall kept sending her looks of pity through her little spectacles, as if she were a wounded puppy. So really, by lunchtime, Hermione had been reduced to nothing. She felt like a walking glob of everyone’s disdain and tried to fight the onslaught of hate notes thrown at her every time she passed by. All she really wanted to do was ask why it was such a big deal – so what if she’d been with Malfoy? So what? What did that have to do with any of them? It wasn’t as if she’d made the world a more dangerous place.

Well, she did. But only for herself.

However, it was during her walk from the Great Hall to the commons to drop off some of her things when she’d heard something peculiar. She’d passed by a Ravenclaw speaking to a group of her friends.

“Good grief, have you lot seen Malfoy today? Have you seen what he’s wearing?”

The girls’ voices rose. “Can you believe it?” one of them said. “I couldn’t!”

Of course this sparked curiosity in Hermione, as she admittedly slowed down as she heard the conversation, but shook her head anyway. She continued walking even though her ears burned to hear more. Fortunately, she didn’t have to go far to hear the rest of the story.

“Malfoy’s gone mental! He’s wearing—”

“I know! A SPEW badge!”

That was when she’d stopped. Her body was incapable of any sort of mobility for about three exact seconds as the words she’d just heard rolled around in her head, striving hard to make sense – but she didn’t know if she wanted them to, no, she didn’t. In fact, when it finally did settle, she found every muscle in her body tightening, like screws, her fingers clenching on her book bag. Her neck snapped up and with glinting eyes she began to furiously walk to where she’d spotted a mop of platinum hair surrounded by his Slytherin housemates.

They’d surrounded him like a horseshoe, with him right in the center, talking about something. It was amazing to her how she’d ended up taking the brunt of things – and he, the Slytherin God, stayed on top, as if he could do no wrong. In fact, it amazed her so much she wanted nothing but to congratulate him – by punching him in the face.

She stopped two feet from where he stood, her face sketched with vehement hate. As soon as she appeared his cronies had quieted down and he’d stopped telling his little tale. And – just as she’d feared – the people were right. Right there, on his robes, was a newly polished S.P.E.W. badge she remembered passing out a year ago. A S.P.E.W. badge on a Slytherin’s robes – there was nothing so incongruous than that. She wanted to rip it off his clothes and throw it at his face; maybe, just maybe, the blow would make him realize the stupidity of this little game he was playing.

“What in the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?” she hissed at him, not sparing any amount of emotion she had boiling inside of her.

He was smirking at her. “Well, hello, darling,” he drawled. “Have I mentioned you look stunning this morning? Doesn’t she, all?” he said, looking around at his friends, as if it was a show.

They sniggered and nodded, murmuring yes.

His smirk widened. “I do know how to pick from the garden.”

Her anger bubbled dangerously, her eyes narrowing into tiny slits. “Stop it,” she spat. “Just stop. This little game you’re playing – right now, Malfoy, just stop it.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about, Granger. I see no game I’m currently involved in. All I’m doing is standing before you and basking in your exquisite beauty.”

“Shut up!” she roared. “Stop it!”

She was being publicly humiliated. He was humiliating her. By this time everyone had stopped whatever it was they were doing and were watching oh so carefully. She felt her anger and disdain for him accumulating, multiplying, and she even felt a little hitch in her chest, as if it had been bound by indestructible pieces of rope. She felt so frustrated. She just couldn’t believe what was happening – couldn’t believe the S.P.E.W. badge on his chest. He’d now degraded whatever “tryst” they’d had into the single most disgusting thing she’d ever done – not that it hadn’t been before. But at least she could still remember the good things that had come out of it. But now she couldn’t – all of them had just been swiped away by their cruel jokes and his smirking face, crucifying her in front of everyone in the hall. If she’d been a bigger person maybe she’d have just walked away. But she was too angry, too heated. The thing about Hermione is that when she was this irate, walking away was something she could never do.

“Now, Granger, let’s calm down, won’t we? I don’t want you to blow a vein, sweetheart. Here, why don’t we go for a walk—” He began to round her, but she backed away violently.

“Don’t touch me,” she hissed. “Don’t you dare.”

“Oh, now you’re hurting my feelings, Granger.”

“I swear,” she said, shaking, “if you lay a finger on me, I’ll—”

Then, suddenly, there came a loud screech of noise from the end of the hall, startling everyone.

“You!” screamed Pansy Parkinson, the sound coming from the very back of her throat, sounding like an angry vulture. She stomped forwards, a sharp pink fingernail pointed straight at Hermione as she came closer, with a grim Millicent trudging behind her. “You – you – you sleazy little Mudblood!”

The Slytherins chirped with laughter as Pansy’s looming face stepped closer to Hermione. Hermione, however, was too angry to be daunted by Pansy or the scent of her hairspray.

“How dare you stand so close to Draco?” she snarled. “I think someone needs to get put back in her place.”

Draco, however, was one of the few not laughing. It was apparent he was not amused with Pansy’s appearance and upon her little threat his expression noticeably darkened.

“Now, Pans,” he said lowly. “Let’s not get carried away.”

“Oh, what would you know?” she sneered at Draco. “You’re lucky your father’s dead, shaming him like you are. If he’d been around to see the cover of that magazine you can be sure he’d have disowned you. Cavorting with a Mudblood like her,” Pansy spat right in front of Hermione’s face. She looked straight at her. She snorted out of disgust. “And she isn’t even cute.”

“Why you” – Hermione started, her fists clenching, but Draco had stepped up and gotten in between them.

“Pansy, leave,” he said seriously.

“No,” she said stubbornly. “A crime’s been committed and punishment is due. Since it’s clear you’ve failed our house, it’s upon me to nurse its wounded integrity, and the first step would be to eliminate the root: her,” she said, pointing at Hermione.

“Bring it,” hissed Hermione, trying to shove Draco out of the way.

“Leave now,” Draco said again. “I’m warning you, Parkinson.”

“You don’t scare me,” she told him. “You’re just a little pretty boy. I’ve got Millicent,” Pansy declared. She motioned forwards. “Milly.”

Just then, Millicent Bullstrode, a boulder of a girl, stepped up to Draco.

“Hi Draco,” she grunted.

Just then, before any of them could have known, there was a loud noise and suddenly there was a loud shriek. They all heard a heavy thump as a body collapsed on the ground in the hall, the tip of Pansy’s wand smoking. She wore a winning smirk, lowering her wand once the damage was done.

People gasped.

Draco immediately moved to get to her but he felt a sudden blow to his face – a blow so hard even his stomach turned. He collapsed to his knees, clutching his face, still in shock of what had just happened. His vision was blurry and all he could see were fuzzy figures around him. Then the strong, rank smell of too much hairspray came around and he knew Pansy was in front of him, spitting.

“You’re not welcome anymore.”

Then, in a fleeting second, she and Millicent were gone, along with the other Slytherins, following after their new leader – Pansy Parkinson. Everyone else in the hall had not moved an inch, simply watching the events that took place, just as much in shock as Draco himself was. However, once he got his composure back and his head to stop spinning (he’d just been punched by Millicent), he scooped up Hermione’s limp body and wordlessly made his way to the infirmary.

“I don’t get it,” whispered Neville as they watched Malfoy walk away. “What the hell just happened?”

Ginny sighed. “It’s complicated."

Luna sighed dreamily. “It’s love.”