"I was starting to think, maybe you need to feel your way more through life – just turn off the lights and follow your senses, even if you stumble once in a while. Maybe that's what falling in love is like. Just feeling your way through the darkness until you find something solid to hold on to."

— Katie Kacvinsky

________________________________________

"Granger, you really need to remove that stick from your arse," said Pansy, who was leaning back on her palm and sitting on the table, surrounded by large bottles and glasses of alcohol. She had a crystal glass in the hand she wasn't using to support herself and brought it back to her lips, guzzling it down noisily. Once finished, she held the glass out in front of her and studied it closely with a frown etched on to her features.

Hermione waited for her to make up her mind about whatever it was she was disputing over. Then Pansy burped, placed the glass clumsily on the table and (instead of refilling it with champagne as she had been all night) grabbed the bottle and began consuming it from there.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Just how are you going to get home like that?"

She tilted her head towards the exit. Hermione followed where she was gazing and stared – along the walls were sombre looking men in black robes.

"Who are they?" she asked, turning back to Pansy.

"They're the people who'll Apparate you safely back home," she explained, as if this was the most obvious thing in the world. "God, Granger. Get with the times." She giggled, slopping a bit of the drink down her front.

Hermione reached for a napkin and started dabbing here and there. This action was apparently hilarious to Pansy, for she swung an arm over Hermione's shoulder.

"D'you know where Blaise is?" Hermione wondered, searching the large room for him. "I haven't seen him at all."

"Oh." Pansy giggled again, swaying drunkenly on the spot. "He's been in the dining hall."

"All night?" Hermione asked incredulously.

"Ah, yeah. Duh Hermione!"

"But how can anyone eat that much?"

"Pfft, he's Blaise! You're his friend, you should know by now the two things Blaise's life revolves around is sex and food."

"But –"

"Sex and food, Granger," she repeated loudly so that a few people close by turned. "Trust me, I would know."

It wasn't her words that had Hermione staring at Pansy suspiciously, but more of the suggestive tone. "What?"

Pansy winked knowingly.

Hermione, who sincerely hoped she was misunderstanding what was being implied, asked hopefully, "Please tell me you just baked him a cauldron cake."

Pansy outright laughed this time, spilling more alcohol down her dress and shook her head vigorously. "Oh, no, no, no, no, no." She leaned down closer to Hermione. "No." Pansy slurped the rest of the bottle. "I slept with Blaise Zabini!" she declared gleefully.

Hermione gaped.

"Oh, and Granger? Have something to drink already. The alcohol isn't a snake."

"How – how did you – but –" Hermione stuttered. "Blaise is your best friend. How could you have been comfortable sleeping with him?"

Pansy eyed her from over the new bottle of alcohol she was examining. She wasn't laughing anymore. "You had no problems shagging Weasley."

Both women stared at each other.

Hermione was the first to break the contact. She hastily grabbed the nearest bottle she could find, ripped off the lid and gulped it down, jumping on the table beside Pansy as she did so.

Pansy clapped her hand on Hermione's back as if she'd made some great achievement. "That a girl."

When a quarter of the bottle's content was gone, Hermione felt the burning in her throat. She pulled it away from her mouth, coughing, and stared for the first time at the label.

Firewhiskey.

"Fuck," she swore.

"Ooh Granger!" said Pansy delightedly. "I don't think I've ever heard such a naughty word leave your mouth."

Hermione stuck out her tongue in disgust. "I hate firewhiskey."

Just then, a shout sounded somewhere off in the distance; the chatting paused.

"What was that?" she asked, looking over in the direction the sound had come from. There was a crowd beginning to form at the opposite end of the room.

"Haven't the foggiest," said Pansy, glancing up briefly before looking through the alcohol around her. She picked one up and frowned thoughtfully at it. "Granger, do I like wine?"

Hermione didn't answer, she was still sitting up as straight as she could manage, trying to see over the heads of the crowd.

There was another shout, this time followed by a scream.

"Pansy..." she trailed off unsurely. "I think something's happening."

The music stopped completely now.

"Hmm. Hermione, I tell you what, you pass me that bottle of firewhiskey and I'll hand over the wine, deal?"

Hermione absently handed it over, not responding when another bottle was thrust into her hands.

More screams. Some yells.

"Pansy..."

"Oh, thank Merlin. Firewhiskey is the best."

The crowd suddenly parted and into view came a ruffled Draco, shoving aside anybody who did not move away in time. Anyone brave enough to speak with him was shouted at.

"Oh hey, it's Draco," Pansy said casually, still drinking.

By this time, everybody was in the ballroom: the men had emerged from the dining room and were closing into the centre of the room along with everybody else, even the 'designated Apparaters', to get a better look at what was going on without being too close to the rampaging Draco, who was thundering across the room very quickly now.

Hermione jumped off from the table and went towards him. A glance around revealed Narcissa and Blaise were doing the same thing.

Blaise got there first as more people began to crowd, staring and whispering.

"Draco, mate," he started calmly, "what's –"

It happened in the blink of an eye. One minute Blaise was courageously approaching his furious best friend, the next he was on the floor, clutching his bleeding jaw.

People screamed. Some retreated entirely. A few men bent over to help Blaise.

"Draco!" Narcissa exclaimed, shocked. She stood rooted on the spot. "What on earth do you think you're doing? Stop this instant!"

But Draco merely stormed past her in a blaze of fury.

He was getting closer to Hermione. Other guests almost ran away when he came their way, though she stayed where she was.

His cold eyes met hers for a split second as he passed, as if to just dare her to try and stop him. Hermione being Hermione, never passed up a challenge – she grabbed his arm.

Draco shoved her off with so much force she stumbled.

"What happened?" And she was surprised just how shrilled and concerned her voice was.

"Nothing," he snarled.

"Draco, stop!" Narcissa said again, recovering from her shock and quickly coming over to them. "Just where do you think you're going? You can't leave!"

But he could. Now that Draco was a good distance from everybody else, there was nothing to stop him from using Apparition.

And that was exactly what he did.

There was a deafening silence. Hermione's heart was hammering erratically against her ribs and she could hear the thumping behind her ears. She tore her eyes away from the spot Draco had last been and looked behind her. A few others were still staring, open-mouthed, at the place Draco Apparated from. Some picked up the chatting again, only this time it wasn't happy, but tense and whispered and barely audible. Blaise had two other men by his side, one checking his jaw, which left a crimson stain all the way down to his shirt, while Pansy looked on, still swaying on the spot and much less happier than she was before. Narcissa was watching Hermione.

When their eyes locked, she came over, her expression unclear.

"Hermione..." She hesitated, apparently uncertain about what she was going to say next. "I – I think it would be best if you spoke with him."

There was not much that frightened Hermione anymore, what with everything she'd been through with Harry and Ron. She'd seen dangers others couldn't imagine. So it didn't make sense for Draco Malfoy to frighten her. "What... what makes you think he'll listen to me?"

Narcissa smiled, but it was weak. "Look me in the eyes, Hermione, and tell me the thought to chase him hasn't crossed your mind."

It was something Dumbledore might say, had he still been around, and because of this it was hard not to stare at her in awe.

"Go," she whispered.

Before she could Apparate, however, Hermione caught sight of red. Derek was against the wall, staring at her. Looking over her shoulder, she saw that Narcissa had gone over to Blaise. Hermione briskly walked over to him, eyeing his bleeding nose.

"What happened?" she hissed.

"He got an earful of nothing less than what he deserved," he snapped. "I didn't say anything the twat didn't already know."

She seethed and turned on her heel when Derek seized her wrist.

"You're not going after him, are you?"

Hermione counted to three before she answered. "Yes."

"Why? He doesn't care about you as much as you do about him."

She pulled herself from his grip.

"You used to always call him Malfoy, remember?" he called after her. Hermione refused to turn. "And now it's Draco. If I were Weasley, I'd be worried."

She left with a crack, his words echoing through the ballroom.

***

Hermione appeared in the flat just in time to catch Draco walk from the kitchen, holding his right hand closely to his chest in a bloody messy of paper towels.

"What happened?" she gasped, feeling like this particular question was being repeated a lot tonight. "You hand wasn't bleeding before!"

He shot her a look so venomous it would have had a grown man running.

"Draco," she persisted, alarm flowing through her, "what'd you do?"

"I smashed a glass," he said through gritted teeth, not facing her as he tightened his hold on his hand.

Her eyes went wide. "With your bare hand?"

"It was accidental!" he said hotly.

"Well, why aren't you fixing it with your wand?" She took a step closer to him.

He stepped away. "A little difficult Granger, because this is my right hand! It's not exactly sturdy at the moment." Draco pulled out a chair from the table, and when he saw that she was also pulling out one, he stopped, glared, then pushed the chair back in roughly.

He didn't want to be around her at this point. He was still furious about whatever had happened back there, and a smarter woman who knew how to keep her nose in her own business would have left him to it.

"Granger!" he snarled, seeing her follow him into the living room. "I'm serious, go away." He tried to get up and leave again, but Hermione put her hand on top of his head and forced him down onto the sofa again.

She sat down beside him and held out her hand expectantly.

He looked from it, to Hermione's face, and back again.

Hermione raised her eyebrows expectantly and nodded towards her hand. He groaned and rolled his eyes childishly, but complied, placing his hand gently in hers.

"Don't give me that look," she scolded. "All I'm trying to do is help –"

"No," he retorted, "you're trying to be in control, as usual."

She clasped his hand harder, not entirely accidentally, and he winced. "I'm going to ignore that," she said calmly, "because you're angry."

He snorted. "You must ignore me a lot."

"And it's taken you seven, eight years to figure that out?" she asked lightly.

Draco made as if to pull his hand away, but again Hermione gripped it tighter. She thought some of his anger was starting to subside because as the minutes wore on, his hand relaxed in hers and she felt his body ease off some of the tension beside her own.

"Draco?" she asked some time later, clearing the last bits of glass from the wound.

He grunted to show she had his attention.

"What did you want to be?" she asked curiously. "When you left Hogwarts?"

He didn't answer for so long, Hermione thought he never would. But then she heard a quite sigh and when he spoke, his voice wasn't quite as hard as before.

"I don't know," he admitted. "I..."

Hermione looked up from her healing at his sudden silence. He was still looking down at their hands and didn't appear to notice her gaze.

"I didn't expect to survive the war," he said at last. There was something in his expression she couldn't place. He looked older, somehow. Different from the boy who'd practically cried from a Hippogriff scratch. It was the same look Harry or Ron got when the final battle was mentioned, and Hermione wondered if she looked like that too.

It was Hermione's turn to fall silent, watching satisfactorily as the cuts began to disappear entirely.

"I always thought you'd do great in a job with Potions. Maybe not a teacher but you always beat me in that class."

"What's that, Granger?" he asked, mockingly moving closer like he hadn't heard her. "Are you admitting you thought about me? And that I was better than you?"

"And would you look at that!" she said loudly, in hopes of distracting him. "We're done."

"We're not. When I had my back to him, he hit me with this curse... I don't know what it did..." Draco turned slightly, giving Hermione a view of a dark, sticky substance seeping through his black robes.

"Why did Derek do this?" she asked quietly.

His gaze met hers, and it was the first time Hermione had ever seen his eyes this close without them clouded over by fury. It was also the first time did they notice how close they were, and not make any movements to scoot away. His eyes were not the gloomy grey she'd always thought they were, but rather silver – the kind of silver that reminded her of a Patronus. Flecks of light blues surrounded the pupil, while a darker blue circled the iris.

"Was it... something to do with me?" Hermione had no idea where the nerve to ask such a question came from, let alone where the question even came from. Why would Draco be mad over anything Derek might have said about her?

But when Draco abruptly cleared his throat, cheeks tinging pink, she suspected maybe it wasn't such a profound notion after all.

"Please," he drawled, turning away to conceal his blush, "don't flatter yourself, Granger. Not everything in the world is about you. I found some dirt on him, think his family was connected to good ol' Voldy."

Hermione nodded. "I've heard that about him. He claims all ties have been cut since the first war."

A muscle in his jaw twitched in annoyance. She wondered if he'd hoped for a stronger reaction.

"I'm a little surprised you're not with Armstrong now," he said after a moment. "You were dancing with him."

It was silent for at least a minute before she spoke again. Spoke the words that would define everything.

"But I'm not, am I?" she said softly. "I don't belong anywhere else but here, Draco. Right across from you."

He was staring at her intently, and she didn't think he wanted her to leave either. Something fluttered in her stomach. The feeling was familiar, the very same sensation she'd felt when she first saw him tonight in his suit.

Hermione told herself feverously that that was just the firewhiskey; a lie she could only use for so long before she'd have to blame it on something else.

Draco slipped out of his robes; eyes still on her and draped them over the armchair. Hermione felt her cheeks burning for no good reason as he stood up and untucked his while dress shirt from his trousers. Lord help her, she had this horrible soft spot for men in dress shirts.

He sat down on the coffee table, facing away from her and giving Hermione a full view of his back and a better angle to work with. The shirt was also spotted with blood.

With fumbling fingers, Hermione tugged the back of his shirt up, her breathing speeding up. It was oddly loud in the quiet room.

She moved her wand over his injuries for ten minutes, clearing up as much as she could. It wasn't nearly as bad as it looked, for which she was relieved. He sat perfectly still through the whole thing, and Hermione wondered how he did that. He looked so calm and collected, while she was a tangled mess on the inside. But really, she was just healing his back. This shouldn't have felt so... so tense. The air was thick enough she thought she might suffocate. She couldn't slow down her breathing – hot on Draco's back. Every time she let out a big one to calm herself, she would see goose bumps form on his skin.

When Hermione finished, she had no idea what to do. If he turned, he would see how inflamed her cheeks were. She wouldn't be able to meet his eye, yet subsequently she didn't want to seem afraid. Draco Malfoy sometimes daunted her of course, but never like this. Not in this way.

Her eyes ran across his defined shoulders in thought. As they did, Hermione noticed the scars from Harry's Sectumsempra. Without even knowing what she was doing, she softly tugged the collar of his shirt down to see more tracing down his shoulders and to his chest. Unconsciously, her fingers trailed down them, more goose bumps following in their wake. Draco shivered from under her, and before Hermione could pull away her hand, he caught it and faced her.

Her breath caught in her throat. She really should move. Leave. Go far away. Never come back. But she didn't and found herself staring back. There was something in his gaze Hermione had never, ever seen before. A darkening to his eyes he got whenever he was angry...

But he wasn't angry now.

He was something else entirely.

Draco's hand left hers to trail his fingertips lightly up and down her forearm, his gaze never wavering once. This time, it was Hermione who got goose bumps. His fingers were warm and inviting on her skin.

He took her hand in his again, leaving it there for a moment. Hermione thought he was waiting for her to pull back, but she never did. And perhaps that's what inspired what happened next. Perhaps she should have pulled away while she had the chance. It was the logical thing to do. Only Hermione didn't want to move away.

Draco stood up, using the hold he had of her hand to pull Hermione closer so she was also pulled from the sofa. Both were facing the other, breathing deeply.

The hand that wasn't holding his was clutching a fist full of his shirt now. It clenched and unclenched out of nerves. Draco's hand left hers and started its journey up her arm. He did it so teasingly and deliberately; it drove her mad. Hermione let go of his shirt and dragged her fingers along to his arm instead, gripping it tightly.

She then leaned in closer to him, and Draco responded by bringing his face down to her neck. She felt his hot breath, the familiar smell of spearmint. She shivered delightedly. This spurred him on – he pressed his lips just under her earlobe. A faint gasp escaped her lips as he kissed the sensitive spot gently, running his tongue along it. Her hold on his arm tightened; Hermione tilted her neck to the side to give him easier access and greedily he took it. Blissfully, his tongue traced circles, sucking and nipping. Before Hermione could stop herself, she moaned. Draco's lips curved into a smirk against her skin, and maybe if she wasn't so distracted, she would have called him a smug prick. She very nearly managed to do so, but that was when his lips became fiercer. Every inch of her neck was planted with hot, wet kisses, trailing up until he reached her jaw line.

The hesitation was there only for a moment.

Draco's lips ghosted over Hermione's, and softly he dragged his lips up and down over hers tenderly. In years to come, neither of them would ever be able to tell who it was that made that first and final move to seal the distance, only that it no longer existed, and the feel of his lips on hers was beyond anything Hermione could ever anticipate. He pulled her in, so that there was no space between them. She felt his heart hammering against her chest. It was hard to make out whose beat was whose anymore.

Her hands wound their way through his hair. One of his was placed gently on her cheek, while the other snaked up and around to her hair. He pulled out clip after clip, letting them fall to the floor forgotten. His fingers soon found what they'd been looking for, and slowly so as not to hurt her, he pulled the tie from her hair. Her brown hair fell down past her shoulders with Draco burying his hand inside her curls, deepening the kiss.

His tongue traced along the outline of her bottom lip to tease her. She whimpered and opened her mouth against his, granting him access, and he slipped it in, tasting her as Hermione's hands slipped under his shirt to feel the lean muscles there, trailing up and down just as he had done earlier. He made a low sound in the back of his throat and kissed her with a new hunger.

"Hermione..." he breathed against her lips.

That one word snapped them back into reality.

She suddenly, with a pang, remembered who he was and who she was. The way he froze against her told Hermione he'd realised the same thing. 

________________________________________

 Next chapter; as you can imagine, shit hits the fan.  

Hey, remember when I told you all this story would move faster than When Fire Meets Ice? Well... THEY KISS ONE CHAPTER EARLIER. Ha, so technically I didn't lie. Yeah, so if you haven't guessed, fast romances aren't my thing. I could probably do a Hermione/Ron romance for seven books like J.K. Rowling and wouldn't have a problem. 

OH. 

OHHHH. 

AND GUESS WHAT. 

IT'S MY BIRTHDAY.

Sixteen... I probably shouldn't but I feel so old. Anyway, lovely comments are expected. Nah, I'm joking. Your comments are always amazing. I hope the kiss here was okay too. Kiss scenes are both hard and easy to write. If I go into too much detail I feel awkward, and if I don't it doesn't sound good enough aha.