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Atonement	By : absumoaevum Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Draco/Hermione Views: 13723 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor to I make any money from this story. These characters are JKR's, I just play with them.

Chapter List
- 9
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- 11
Chapter 10

On This Side

Hermione tilted her head back against the stone rim of the gigantic bath in the Prefects’ Bathroom. The bubbles, a lilac hue tinted pink and blue at different angles, piled up around her like little candy-colored mountains. The water was steaming hot, but it felt good. And at least the aroma of the bath had overpowered the smell of the Gobstone stink-juice.

Everyone was at dinner, her homework was done, and she was more relaxed than she’d been for ages, but Hermione still couldn’t shake her encounter with Malfoy in the Owlery.

“Hufflepuff doesn’t think that way. They… like me. And not because I’m rich or because I’m a pureblood. They like me,” he’d told her.

How did Hufflepuff think, if they didn’t feel that Malfoy’s sudden appearance among them was, as she’d said, odd? They accepted him. Of course they had. Hufflepuffs were known for being accepting. But they weren’t pushovers. They weren’t gullible or stupid. Only Slytherins thought that way. So, what did they see in him that she didn’t?

She remembered him laughing and throwing the quaffle around at breakfast that morning. He hadn’t even looked like himself without his patented Malfoy sneer. Was he really so desperate for a break from the bullying, or was it something else? A voice whispered in her head that maybe Malfoy had just been waiting for his chance to get out from under the thumb of all those expectations. And there were expectations. His family expected him to toe the pureblood line. Slytherin expected him to… to what? Before, he’d been the height of Slytherin royalty, all narrow-mindedness and full of talk about wealth and status, but now they seemed to want him to slither off to Azkaban without a word in his defense. If there was even a defense for his behavior to be had.

And she expected him to hate her, to ridicule her and strut around with his nose in the air as he’d always done. But he’d defied all expectations. He’d laughed and offered thanks freely. He’d helped her. Maybe he was trying to put the past behind him, make a new start. Could that be true? Did he deserve it?

She spent a lot of time thinking about Malfoy lately. It made her feel slightly petty. She judged him so harshly, but she knew much more about him than just the evil, conniving things he’d done. He hadn’t actually killed Dumbledore, had he? He’d tried, yes. But hadn’t she said herself that his attempts to finish off Dumbledore with the necklace and the mead had been perfunctory at best? And from what Harry had said about Dumbledore’s conversation with Malfoy up on the Astronomy Tower, the old Headmaster had agreed with her. He’d said, “Forgive me, Draco, but they have been feeble attempts. So feeble, to be honest, that I wonder whether your heart has been really in it.” Whether his heart was really in it. Had it been? How could she find out?

Dumbledore had tried to persuade Malfoy to join the Order. He’d wanted to help Malfoy. He thought Malfoy was worth saving.

Kingsley Shacklebolt said it best in that secret radio program Potter Watch. “We're all human, aren't we? Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving.”

Shouldn’t Malfoy be afforded the same courtesy, or should they condemn him? No one was going to save him now. Maybe he was trying to save himself.

Hermione slipped under the water and tried to block out the world. She stayed under for a full minute before breaking the surface through a massive heap of bubbles. Her giggles echoed off of the stone walls, but their sound had been joined by something else. Someone else was laughing, too.

“Myrtle!” Hermione shrieked. How long had she been there?! The ghost of the girl who haunted the second floor girl’s bathroom was hovering around the stack of towels, her spotty face contorted with cackling laughter. Hermione gathered up all the bubbles she could reach and stacked them around her naked body. “What are you doing here, Myrtle?”

“I’m visiting,” said Myrtle simply.

“Visiting?” Hermione knew Mrytle could go anywhere in the castle, but she usually confined herself to her bathroom, thus making it much easier to avoid her. She wasn’t exactly good company.

“Yes. It’s boring in my bathroom, you know. No one ever goes in there.”

Hermione knew all too well why Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom was always deserted. It was an ideal place to hide because nobody would ever choose to go in there. Then Hermione had an idea. Hadn’t Malfoy confided in Myrtle two years ago? Harry had seen Malfoy and Myrtle together on the Marauder’s Map. Maybe she’d have some insight on Malfoy’s strange behavior.

Myrtle had drifted closer while Hermione was lost in thought. “I see your tale’s gone. That’s a shame. I liked it,” she said, suppressing another round of sniggering.

“Yeah,” said Hermione vaguely. How should she begin? “Listen Myrtle, do you remember a boy named Draco Malfoy—”

“What about Draco?” Myrtle was looking curious and – could it be? – protective.

“He’s back this year. Did you hear he’s in Hufflepuff House now?”

Myrtle flipped over onto her back and pretended to swim through the bath (though of course her arms moved right through the water without disturbing its surface) and said nothing.

“What… Harry said that you and Malfoy were friends. Is that true?”

“I think so. I think we had a lot in common.”

Hermione’s brow furrowed. “Like what?”

Myrtle turned onto her stomach and propped her head up on her hands to glare at Hermione. “Why should I tell you?”

That was a tough one. As Hermione tried to come up with an answer, Myrtle twirled her finger through the water to no effect. “I’m his friend, too,” she said finally.

“Then you can just ask him!” said Myrtle.

“He wouldn’t tell me something like that. I… I’m trying to help him, but he won’t talk about that year at all.” She was definitely lying now, and Hermione could tell that Myrtle was still suspicious.

“Help him how?”

The trial, thought Hermione. Should she tell Myrtle? Would that get her attention? Hermione decided it would. “He’s going to be on trial for everything that happened. For trying to kill Dumbledore and for being a Death Eater. Do you know anything about that? Anything at all? He won’t talk about it, and I need to know so… so I can help him.”

Myrtle sat up. She looked to be on the verge of tears. “On trial?”

“Yes,” Hermione said firmly.

“I promised I would never tell,” she said with less resolve, picking at a zit on her forehead.

“Will you help me help him, Myrtle? He needs our help.”

Myrtle pressed her ghostly palms into her watery eyes and bit her lip. Slowly, she nodded.

“Great!” Hermione said in excitement, then quickly tried to more look somber. “That’s great, Myrtle. Thank you.” Myrtle jerked her hands away from her face and started picking at her nails in her lap. Hermione took this as a sign she was ready to be questioned. “So… how were you alike?”

“He was lonely. People bullied him, made him to do things he didn’t think were right. He was under a lot of pressure to succeed. And he was vulnerable, sensitive, you know? ” Hermione didn’t know, but she nodded encouragingly anyway. Myrtle continued, “You-Know-Who threatened his family. He said that they were going to kill his parents if he didn’t… do Professor Dumbledore in.”

“Voldemort said he would kill his parents?”

“Well, yes!” said Myrtle aggressively. “He’s just a boy! I mean, he didn’t want to kill anyone, but he couldn’t see any other way out. What would you do? He had to fix something—”

“The vanishing cabinet in the Room of Requirement,” offered Hermione eagerly.

“Yes, that. He had to fix it and he was having so much trouble and he kept trying to... finish the job, you know? But he couldn’t do it fast enough but he had to do it and he couldn’t trust anyone to help him. Except me. He trusted me.” She looked proud then, defiantly delighted that the lonely, depressed boy who mistrusted everyone had vouchsafed her with his secrets.

“He told me everything,” she went on. “He told me how trapped he felt and how lost and lonely he was and how the world was against him. He just wanted to be safe. He wanted You-Know-Who to leave him alone but that awful tattoo on his arm was always hurting him and he said that was his Master ‘reminding him of the consequences of failure’. It was so overwhelming for him. Sometimes he’d visit me in my bathroom and just cry.” Myrtle seemed far away. Her transparent eyes streamed with tears and her chin trembled. Hermione could almost see Malfoy raked with desperate sobs in some old tiled bathroom – maybe even this very one—pouring out his heart to the ghost of a…

Hang on! Moaning Myrtle was a muggle-born! That’s why the schoolboy Riddle had made the Basilisk kill her! Hermione felt sure that Malfoy would have known this. He must have! Hadn’t it been common knowledge by the end of their second year? Hadn’t that been why he was so keen for the Heir of Slytherin to return, so that the monster could rid the school of mudbloods and bloodtraitors once and for all, so it could finish the job it had started fifty years ago?

And he’d confided in a muggle-born. What a change a year of desperation makes. Hermione could sympathize with that. She would have done anything, anything to save the people she loved. She still would. But last year was just… unbearable. She knew how Malfoy felt. Like he was tied to the tracks with a train barreling toward him impossibly fast and no one to save him. Because that was how she’d felt.

Hermione was numb. Her gaze travelled back up to Moaning Myrtle’s face lined with gray tears. She didn’t know what to think, how to feel. “Thank you, Myrtle. Thank you for telling me all of this.”

“Will it help him?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” said Myrtle. There was a long silence. Hermione looked down at her pruny hands and was surprised to find they were shaking. “When you see him again, could you tell him to come visit me sometimes? I’d like that.” She gave Hermione a watery smile which Hermione returned.

“Definitely.”

+++

James’ potion was on fire. Not boiling, or else billowing smoke. On fire.

Draco coughed, brandishing his wand and sputtering, “Aguamenti!” over and over, but to no avail. The rest of the Hufflepuffs had backed away from the table, trying to get clear the smoke and flames. James stripped out of his smoldering robes and yelled for Slughorn, who hurried over wearing thick dragonhide gloves.

“Out of the way, out of the way!” he shouted, popping the cork of a little potion bottle and dumping its contents straight into the cauldron. The potion fizzled and hissed then turned a placid shade of sea foam green. “Terwilleger!” he gasped, turning to face James, “do not – NOT! – add the dragon blood before the hyssop root. I was very clear on that point, Mr. Terwilleger! Were you trying to kill us all?”

“Sorry, professor,” James said, still distracted by his burned clothes. Draco could see angry red skin blistering under his charred shirt sleeve.

“Now, get that arm under some water. I’ll get you a salve.” He directed his attention to the three other cauldrons at the table. “I’m sorry to say these are no good, boys,” he said to Draco, Prescott and Ryan. “You can barely tell they were Fire-Breather Brews. Shall we say ‘E’ for effort?” They all nodded. Prescott and Ryan were looking grateful and relieved, but Draco knew his own potion had been a solid Outstanding. “Mr. Terwilleger, I’d say that was a ‘T’, wouldn’t you?” Slughorn didn’t wait for an answer. He swept back toward his desk to retrieve the salve for James with a scowl.

“Sorry, Draco,” muttered James behind him.

Draco glanced back at him and shrugged. “It’s alright. How’s your arm?”

“You know,” said James with a small smile, “on fire.” They couldn’t help it, they all laughed.

“The rest of you,” Slughorn was saying from the front of the class, “take your cauldrons off of their fires and bring them to the cooling racks to congeal. We’ll pick up from there on Wednesday.” There was a flurry of movement as everyone did as Slughorn instructed. With a huff that made his walrus mustache billow, Slughorn made his way back through the shuffling students and thrust a little bottle into James’ hand. “Dittany,” he said.

James murmured his thanks and tipped the bottle over his arm, gingerly rubbing the dittany on his skin. It looked better at once, now pink and slightly raised. “That was stupid,” he said as he tried to pack up his blackened supplies. Draco and the others waited for him then joined the queue to leave the classroom.

“What happened?” asked Rory catching up to them with Susan Bones and Katarina Tildman.

“Poof!” said James simply, mimicking an explosion with his hands.

“Yeah, we’d worked that much out for ourselves,” countered Katarina.

“He added the dragon blood before the hyssop root,” Draco supplied when it became clear James wasn’t going to respond. They squeezed out of the dungeon room door and headed off down the hall toward the stairs. Draco felt a small pang of sadness as they passed the corridor to the Slytherin common room.

The girls were making tutting noises. James glared at them. “You headed to Muggle Studies, Draco?” he asked, clearly wanted to change the topic.

“Yep.”

“Have fun,” said Prescott.

“We can go together,” Susan Bones said.

At the Entrance Hall, Draco and Susan broke away from the rest of the group, who all had a free period before lunch, and continued up the marble staircase.

“So, how is it that you can take N.E.W.T. level Muggle Studies when you never took the O.W.L.?” Susan asked.

“I’m not getting credit for it. I just have to take it.”

“Oh.” Susan seemed to mull that over. “Why?”

Why? This question irked Draco. He thought it should be clear why. “Do I really have to answer that?”

Susan quelled under his annoyed glare. “No, I know why,” she answered in a strained whisper.

Of course she knew. Everyone knew. Because he was a muggle-hating, mudblood-smearing, evil evil git who needed his perspectives completely overhauled. That’s why. Obviously.

Susan tried again. “Do you like it so far? I know it’s a lot of work but—”

“It’s ok. Confusing. Like, how do airplanes stay up? How are televisions any different than wizarding portraits? Where do they keep all the electricity when they’re not using it?” Draco ran his hands through his hair impatiently, thinking that he had the utmost sympathy for muggles now that he knew how mundane and hard their lives must be. But he still didn’t see how taking Muggle Studies was supposed to somehow reform him.

“There’s a lot to learn,” said Susan. “I think it’s exciting. I want to work in the Muggle Liaison Office once I finish school. What about you?”

Draco didn’t know how to answer that. What was he going to do after school, assuming he didn’t get sent to Azkaban, of course. He shrugged. “I’m good at potions. Maybe I’ll do something with that.”

Susan nodded, looking as if she knew he was thinking about the trial. It was all over the Daily Prophet, after all. But she didn’t mention it. “Potion-making is an interesting profession,” she said, then launched into a story about her Uncle Edgar’s youthful potion experimentation that lasted until they were seated in the Muggle Studies classroom.

The new Muggle Studies Professor, Hitchens, was an elderly but energetic woman. Though she was patient and explained things well, Draco was still nearly always lost. Not many students had continued to N.E.W.T. Muggle Studies, so Professor Hitchens had plenty of time to devote to each member of the class.

Ginny Weasley was already there, sitting with two Ravenclaws Draco didn’t know. Professor Hitchens called for their essays and collected them before starting in on Chapter 2, Modern British Muggle Politics. It wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t exactly riveting stuff.

Draco caught the Wealsey girl staring at him during class more than once, but each time she looked away and busied herself with taking notes. Seeing her made Draco think of Granger, which made him think of the day before in the Owlery. He’d left in a huff. He shouldn’t have done that. What he should have done was beg her for forgiveness, but Draco was never one for heartfelt apologies. He just didn’t know how to talk to her. His fellow Hufflepuffs were one thing, they accepted him without judgment (for the most part). He didn’t have to win them over. They wanted to like him, so they did.

But Granger hated him. He knew that. And she was well within her rights to despise him. And there was nothing he could ever do to change that. No apology, no explanation, was going to change her mind. Why should it, he thought bitterly. As much as he wanted to tell himself that the bushy-haired walking library could go hang herself and her opinions, he wanted, really wanted, to make her understand.

The first step there was understanding all of it himself, and Draco wasn’t sure if he ever really would.
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Atonement