Disclaimer: If I were J.K. Rowling, Draco and Hermione would be together!!
(A/N): Alright guys, this is how this fic is gonna work. I've already gotten the entire thing written (a whopping four chapters!!) and I'll be updating on Mondays and Fridays. But, hey, if I get a really good response, perhaps a sooner update is in the future?? Thanks for reading, I hope you all like it!
Chapter 1
She wanted to kill him. She wanted to just reach over the steering wheel and wring that lithe little neck of his, shaking it so that that shock of freakishly neat blonde hair would be a complete mess once and for all.
"I still can't believe this- you're planning Ginny's wedding, and she's marrying the one you're in love with."
And she would kill him, too, if the stupid ferret didn't learn to keep his mouth shut.
"Stuff it, Malfoy." Hermione barked. A surge of emotions had been welling up inside of her for the past several days and they were desperate to be released. She was stressed about the wedding plans and the enormous pile of work that had been neglected on her desk. She was angry about Malfoy's accusations that she hated to admit were true. Mostly, however, she was just broken-hearted at the thought of losing any chance she might have had with the love of her life to her so-called best friend.
"But it's all so amusing! You've pined after Harry for your entire life, and then Ginny shows up out of nowhere, and BAM! He's already planning a marriage and hitting you with the news with all the force of an avada kedavra. Forgive me for finding humor in such an ironic situation."
"Malfoy, I swear, if you don't-" Hermione started to see nothing but red, consumed by her anger.
"Granger, calm down, we're going to hydroplane-" Malfoy's attention snapped back to the road.
"We are not going to hydroplane, stop changing the subject!" Hermione barked, unintentionally jerking the steering wheel a little in her fury.
"The road! The road!" Malfoy started to panic. This was exactly why he hated traveling by muggle means, it was so likely to end up in disaster.
Unfortunately, this particular journey was no different.
"We're hydroplaning! We're hydroplaning!" Hermione screeched. The car skid across the watery road like a water bug gliding the surface of a pond. The road was nothing more than a dark blur of raindrops and occasional headlights, but Hermione valiantly attempted to navigate it nonetheless. She swerved and ferociously pummeled the brakes with her foot, but mother nature had other plans for the careening car. Caught in a storm no less violent than the one that had erupted between them, they would now be at the mercy of something as fierce as their own creation.
Hermione didn't stop screaming until the car came to a rather boring and anticlimactic stop at the bottom of a gently sloping hill. Raindrops continued pelting the windows and metal rooftop, the only sound that mingled with their terrified panting. Hermione relaxed, took a deep breath, and released a suffocating tension she didn't know she was holding.
Draco wasted no time once he had gathered his wits. "Are you trying to kill us both, woman? I told you this was a bad idea, I knew we were going to end up like this, but did you listen to me? Nooo, because Granger knows everything and never accepts help from those less intelligent than she!"
Hermione didn't even have the strength to retaliate. Her body had lost all of its energy, and she let her head fall against the headrest. She was still too much in shock from her near-death experience to think of a worthy comeback.
Draco ended his rant, rubbing his temples with his thumb and forefinger. He was honestly just as stressed as she was, but was more skilled at covering it up.
"Sorry." Draco vomited the apology like a rotten meal.
"What was that?" Hermione asked, too astonished at this sudden display of emotions to remember her previous anger.
Draco rolled his eyes. "I'm not saying it again, Granger.'
"I don't believe it. Harry said you'd changed, but…" Hermione scrunched her brow in deep thought, trying to decipher his unusual behavior.
"You didn't really believe that such a bloodthirsty Death Eater like myself could ever change, did you?" Draco said with a highly uncharacteristic sad smile.
"Oh, Draco, I didn't mean-"
"HA! Fooled you! You thought I was going to get all mushy on you, eh, Granger?" Draco pointed his finger at her astonished face.
Hermione put up her hands in mock surrender. "I don't even know what to do with you. Every time I get even remotely close you push me away. You have the gall to crack jokes in the middle of a situation like this? Harry and Ginny's wedding is two weeks away and we're supposed to be at the Dursley's in two hours, but instead we're stuck here with a car that won't start in the middle of a freaking tsunami!" Hermione's hair bounced forcefully with each emphatic shake of her head, right until the very end of her passionate speech.
Draco put both of his hands on her shoulders, attempting to calm the beast that had erupted. "Hermione, calm down. Their wedding will go on in two weeks, even if we are a few hours late tonight. It's going to be okay."
"It's NOT okay, Draco, don't even try to act like nothing's wrong!" Hermione fought the urge to calm down, embracing warmly her paranoid nature.
"Why, just because for once in your life all of your precious planning and schedules didn't save you?" Draco asked with all the sensitivity of a blunt axe.
Draco hit the nail on the proverbial head. Hermione's eyes widened in shock and disbelief, and the frightening realization that he was absolutely right. For her, it was just one more reason to hate him.
Or, dare she even think it, love him.
"Now is the chance for you to do something different, something that isn't written down on a schedule. You have the opportunity to do something crazy, ridiculous even, just for the sake of doing it."
The raindrops drummed on the roof like the thoughts bouncing around in Hermione's head. The temptation to give in and acknowledge his words as truth was strong. Even though he was, after all, Draco Malfoy, he understood something about her that Harry and Ron never had.
Her need to be set free.
A smile spread across her face at this new realization.
"Draco," Hermione spoke, demanding his attention quietly but firmly.
Grey eyes met hers, burning with a passion she'd never seen in him before.
"Dance with me."
Before Draco could even react to the command, Hermione was outside in the downpour and was dragging him along too. He was drenched within seconds, struggling to keep up with Hermione's demanding pull on his hand. His shoes squished, small pools gathering within their rubbery confines. He had to blink several times a second to keep the flood out of his eyes. His vision was blurred by the murky fog, the only distinguishable shape was Hermione's form before him.
Her eyes, suddenly so bright and alive, were what stuck out to him the most. They were the eyes of a girl who was forced to grow up too fast but was finally getting a piece of her childhood back. They whirled and twirled elegantly in the muddy grass, never taking their eyes off of each other. Draco felt like a completely undignified moron, and he'd never felt happier.
"So what now?" Draco asked above the roar of the downpour.
Hermione stopped in mid spin, looking at him with confusion written all over her features. "What do you mean?"
Draco pitched his voice higher, mimicking Hermione's earlier words. "Harry and Ginny's wedding is in two weeks, we're supposed to be at the Dursley's, nag nag nag!"
Hermione laughed light heartedly at his teasing. The sound was nearly snuffed out by the wrath of the storm, but her laughter and happiness refused to die now that it was alive once again.
"A few minutes out in the rain won't kill us, right? All of that can wait."
Finally, Hermione was able to relax.
Draco smiled at her, not smirked; he showed her one of the few true smiles he ever had. Despite the darkness and the fog, the sight of it took Hermione's breath away. A slight softness took over his eyes when he looked at her, a calm that no storm could touch.
"All of that can wait." He repeated her words in slight awe.
A few minutes turned into several minutes, but still they danced on. Maybe if it hadn't been raining, they could have heard the cell phone that was ringing relentlessly on the floor of Hermione's car, the memory filling up with frantic message after frantic message. But it was drowned out within their downpour, lost forever in blissful oblivion.