January 4th

Classes started up again today and, as I'd suspected, it was an absolute nightmare. Nobody talked to me other than Draco. Nobody sat with me or stood beside me during classes except for Draco. Everyone but the professors and Draco avoided me as though I would bring the plague down upon them if they got too close. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The morning started off relatively fine. Draco woke me with a warm kiss on my forehead and gave me a rather brilliant pep talk. It was enough to give me the courage to finally pull the covers off my face and get ready to face the day.

Unfortunately, that strength vanished the moment Draco let go of my hand to go eat breakfast at the Slytherin table, leaving me standing in the middle of the big doorway alone. The Gryffindor table was right in front of me, only a few steps away, but I couldn't make my feet move toward it. They had put down roots and no matter how I tried they would not budge.

Harry looked up at me and, for a brief moment, I thought I had imagined everything that had happened two days ago. His green eyes were unguarded and he looked generally interest in why I had yet to join them at the table. I very nearly got my foot to take a step before he seemed to realize just who he was looking at and it was if a door had been slammed in my face. His glare was enough to knock the wind right out of me. It was clear that his reaction to me giving Draco a chance hadn't been a dream. He was still rather angry.

The good news is that his baleful look uprooted my feet. The worse news is that I was moving in the opposite direction from the table, headed back out the doors and into the hall. I knew it was cowardly. I knew that I would be kicking myself later for not having eaten any breakfast—it is the most important meal of the day—and I knew that Harry would never see things from my side if I allowed one glare to send me running.

I sank onto the bottom step of the stairs leading up to the next floor and let my head fall lightly against the wall. Closing my eyes, I tried to fight back the tears. I'd shed enough of those over Harry and Ron. I would not go into another round over two people who obviously could care less about me. It wasn't working; the tears came anyway.

"Hermione?"

I shook my head, not wanting Draco to see my tears. Who knew what he would do to avenge my hurt feelings.

I heard him sigh and sit down beside me. Scooting closer, he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and pulled me to him. At last I couldn't hold them back anymore. His mere presence brought on a sense of relief, a feeling of comfort that tore at what was left of my resolve. I just let my tears come, knowing all the while that his robes could get soaked through and he wouldn't ever care. They were safe with him—I was safe with him.

"Shh," he murmured, rubbing his hand over my back in large circles. "It's going to be okay."

He sounded so sure that I wanted to believe him. I wanted to believe that anytime now Harry and Ron would come through the doors and everything would be perfect. They would accept my decision to allow Draco into my life. They would welcome him into our group and it would be as if he had always been a part of our lives. But I knew that it would never happen.

"No," I choked out, fighting to get my tears back under control. "No, Draco. It won't be okay."

A part of me wanted to pull away, to look him in his crystalline eyes and tell him it would never, in a million years, be okay without Harry and Ron. I didn't care that Ron had hurt me in a way that had broken my heart. I didn't care that Harry was siding with him, begging me to forgive Ron so that we could go back to the way it was when we were the Golden Trio.

And yet another part of me, the part I wanted to listen to, kept my face buried in his chest. It was the part of me that didn't care if Harry and Ronald never spoke to me again. It didn't care that they had cut me out of their lives because I was going to be a better person for it. It was the half that told me that, if they didn't treat me right, they didn't deserve me.

"Yes, it will," he whispered forcibly into my hair, pulling me closer than I had thought possible. "Hermione, I know that I sure as hell don't deserve you but, after seeing the way they've treated you, they deserve you even less. I'm not going to let them do this to you, love. They don't deserve these tears. Do you understand?"

I nodded against him.

"Tell me they don't deserve this. You need to say the words."

I took a deep breath, bracing myself. As soon as the words left my mouth, they would be true. As soon as I said what I felt aloud, it would be final, over, done with. Nothing could take it back. "They don't deserve my tears. They don't deserve me."

I gave him a small smile and he matched it, brushing the hair back from my face and drying my tears with the sleeve of his robes.

"Oh," I moaned. "Draco, I've ruined your robes."

He held my hands in my lap, stopping me from doing a quick drying charm. "Never mind my robes, Hermione. Let's nip down to the kitchens for some food. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day."

I allowed him to lead me down the halls. He really hadn't cared that I'd ruined his robes. I thought for sure that he'd at least make some sarcastic remark, trying to bring a smile to my face but actually making me feel quite guilty about it. But he was more worried about me skipping out on one meal than the condition of his robes. I knew I loved him for a reason…