Malfoy was looking at the professor with an intensity she recognized as competitive. Sensing her gaze, he turned his own eyes to hers, and raised his head in a challenge he knew she’d accept. They were off to an interesting start.

Draco stalked towards her purposefully, grabbed her by the arm and dragged her, yelping, behind a couple pine trees at the edge of the yard. He released her and she turned on him, red in the face and fuming. “What the hell was that, Malfoy?”

He came to me the way the breeze hits you on a hot a summer’s day - sudden, unexpected, and gone before you knew it was even there. But you couldn’t help but treasure that small moment of relief you got from the fire that burnt around you.

Hermione hadn’t quite been able to figure him out, but he was quiet and determined, and she had no reason to strongly dislike him, so she liked to think she was ambivalent, and she didn’t think that’d change in the near future.

He knew the only way to get her attention was to annoy her. If there was one thing he was good at, it was annoying the hell out of Hermione Granger, and oh how he did love winning.

Although Hermione hardly reacted outwardly to that word anymore, she winced because, well, Draco wasn’t going out with a mudblood like her. She had officially been single for an hour and 43 minutes now. The hurt was still fresh.

She closed her eyes and leaned heavily against the back of her chair. This always happened around him. She knew where they stood when he teased her or when they were arguing, but then he’d go and say something nice and she’d be thrown off completely.

Well, fine then. She turned around and began to walk away. He didn’t deserve her apology. But even as she told herself that, the guilt over his problems with his father swelled up again. Mentally kicking herself, she turned around once more. HG/DM