Blessed Release: The Pardon

Chapter Two: Why wouldn't everyone just leave them alone?

"Like the naked leads the blind,

I know I'm selfish; I'm unkind.

Sucker love I always find

Someone to bruise and leave behind."

Every you Every me, Placebo

Draco sighed. It was 8:47 on the dot and he was already bored.

He'd prefer it if everyone would just leave him alone and he could go crawl into a dark space and live forever on chocolate and coffee (although he would probably swell up like a balloon and never be able to look in a mirror again. Actually the dark space thing is a very, very bad idea.)

Mmm...coffee...

"Hi Draco," said some delusional fifth year who thought that Draco would

a) Remember who he was

b) Care and

c) Would take time out of wonderful world of hallucinations to acknowledge his presence with a smile.

Draco scowled at the now dejected kid.

Damn him! Why wouldn't everyone just leave him alone? Life sucks.

Just as Draco was thinking this when there was a kafuffle (man I love that word) at the door.

The weasel's (that's Ron for all those who have no idea what I'm talking about) equally annoying younger sister was physically dragging someone into the Great Hall.

Draco turned to stare like everyone else was.

"No, Ginny, I'm not going!" cried a familiar Mudblood's voice.

For a moment Draco was startled, thinking that Granger was so pathetic as to come to a fifth year's dance, until he remembered that she was Head Girl after all.

That is he was thinking this when he caught a glimpse of what Hermione....he meant Granger...was wearing.

His jaw dropped.

She cleans up nicely...said some crazy little voice in his head.

Hermione was wearing a black-and-white polka dot dress that came to just above her knees.

It was strapless and revealed a large expanse of very lightly tanned skin...Stop looking there! She's a Mudblood! Called a differently opinionated mind-voice.

To block him from thinking anything except bizarre thoughts that had nothing to do with anything Draco divided that word and tried to think of two good attributes for each.

Mud. Tastes good? No. Looks good? Not nearly as good as Hermione...

No! Blood. Tastes good? No. (It does in my opinion, but not Draco's) Looks good? Certainly. (Blood red is a great colour.) Smells good? I wonder what Hermione smells like...

Draco was jolted out of these thoughts when he realized he was being ushered to a table that already had some fifth years seated at it.

Hermione, who kept throwing murderous glances to where Ginny was seated, soon joined the table.

This soon became tiring though, because Hermione soon became obsessed with making her dress cover more of her legs but at the same time pull it up higher.

Draco watched her dazedly until he noticed he was getting some unusual stares from the fifth years.

She was blushing furiously but even though Draco felt mildly embarrassed his complexion remained exactly the same: pale, smooth, and altogether beautiful.

They turned to Dumbledore as he rose from the teacher's table, and waited while he made yet another boring and rather pointless speech, and then applauded politely when he was finished.

Then the fifth years began tentatively asking each other to dance. Draco stayed seated. He couldn't be bothered getting up, to tell the truth.

It was going to be a long night.

Hermione was desperate to get out. She felt naked in the dress; Ginny had found it at the bottom of her wardrobe and said it would look lovely on her.

Yeah right! She was awkward in her shoes (also supplied by Ginny) and felt completely ridiculous wearing so much makeup.

The dress revealed too much leg, and made her feel ludicrous (Draco thought it made her legs look a mile long.)

Plus Draco kept throwing glances at her.

Does he expect me to make polite conversation? If he does he's delusional. We've been enemies for years! A stupid dance isn't going to change anything!

She was surprised when there came a quiet "Ahem!" from Draco.

"Nice dress," he said, without a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

Hermione was dumbstruck. He'd actually said something civilised for once!

"Thankyou," Hermione murmured, more out of politeness than desire to continue the discussion.

"So," Draco said, and then trailed off. For once he couldn't think of anything to say.

"Mmm," answered Hermione. She also trailed off.

They sat there in awkward silence. Neither made another attempt to speak, they simply watched the younger students dance.

Ginny rushed up after three dances. Always willing to talk, she babbled on.

"Ohmygod this is so fun!" she said in one quick breath. "Why aren't you dancing you should you look great in the dress!" she then seemed to forget how much Hermione, Harry and her brother loathed Draco because she turned to him and began to ramble.

"Don't you think she looks great? Of course you do! I'm not supposed to be talking to you but I don't care what Ron says he's just a stupid wart but why aren't you dancing? I've got a great idea you both look so terrific you should dance together!"

Ginny then bounced off, ready to start dancing again.

Hermione stared at the redhead's retreating figure.

Oh god. What if he expects me to dance? Surely he wouldn't, he knew Ginny was joking, didn't he? But she did sound serious about that "You both look terrific" thing...oh god. Thought Hermione. I'm screwed.

She was just about to make up an excuse and disappear when she remembered she had to stay for the whole dance, god knows why, because there were so many teachers around you would've thought it was a dance for drug-taking juvenile delinquents rather than one for innocent fifth years.

Why couldn't she just leave? Why would everyone just leave her alone?

Hermione suddenly realized Draco had been silent the whole time these turbulent thoughts had been rushing through her head.

Screw it; she was leaving.

She got up and walked up to Professor McGonagal to request permission to leave, when she found that this was a very bad idea.

Because the Professor turned around and smiled. Not a very pretty sight, when this one teacher hasn't properly smiled during her whole teaching experience at the school.

It was like her face muscles had forgotten what to do, and it ended up looking like she was demented and belonged in an institute for the certifiably insane.

"Miss Granger!" she exclaimed. "I haven't seen you dancing yet! You do know that it's compulsory for you to dance with the Head Boy? It's lucky that you came up to me. I couldn't see you anywhere!"

Hermione felt like screaming. Her table had been obscure, hard to find. She was safe there. But now she'd waltzed right up to McGonagal as if she was wearing a sign saying "Here I am, just begging to dance with DRACO MALFOY so why don't you make it compulsory for the Head Boy and Girl to dance?"

She might as well have asked Draco to dance herself.

But now she got it. He had almost certainly known that they had to dance, and had just been waiting for the inevitable to happen. Almost certainly.

Hermione walked stiffly back to Draco, followed closely by McGonagal, who obviously wanted to make sure she did dance with Draco.

When McGonagal simply explained he stood without a word. They moved to the dance floor, and Hermione was glad the fifth years had no sense of romance and didn't try to make room for them.

And they danced. It wasn't romantic; he held her as lightly and impersonally as one might hold a bar of soap, and Hermione did the same.

When the dance was finished she was given permission to leave, as was Draco. She rushed back to her Head Girl room, undressed and took a burning hot shower. She wanted to wash off all the makeup, to wash off the whole dance altogether.

After the shower she got into her pyjamas and jumped happily into bed, ready to forget the whole night and its events. She wrapped her pink comforter about her and drifted slowly off to sleep.

(Next Day)

Harry entered the potions class and looked around wearily. He took a seat next to Hermione until Snape laughed maliciously from the front and called out:

"The class is being divided while we study Belladonna and the effects it has on potions. We will also be making some of the more potent potions that have Belladonna as an ingredient. So, seating is as followed: Potter, Zabini; Weasley, Parkinson; Granger, Malfoy..."

Snape rambled on for a while longer, pairing up all the Gryffindors with the Slytherins.

Draco considered curling up on the floor and never opening his eyes again. After the embarrassing thoughts he'd been thinking about a certain bushy haired Gryffindor last night he didn't want to ever face school again.

But, god damn it, he had to. AHHHHHHHHH! Life sucks.

Hermione wanted to sneak off into the girl's bathrooms and create a secret stash of chocolate, cigarettes or drugs.

She still wasn't sure which one would kill her quicker. Possibly chocolate.

AHHHHHHHHH! Life sucks.

Harry was getting suspicious glares from Blaise Zabini, most likely because he had ruined her chance of sitting next to Draco for what could be the next ten weeks. (Belladonna is a very useful plant. ;)

Ron was also getting suspicious glares from Pansy Parkinson, but he was too stupid to figure out why.

But they all began reluctantly working with their partners, each copying out what Snape wrote on the blackboard (which are so much better than white boards.)

After the writing they moved on to a simple glue potion. It took five minutes to make, and then Snape stood up, an evil glare pasted across his face.

"Belladonna is not only used for household potions. It is a very poisonous plant when misused. We are now going to be making perhaps one of the most powerful drug potions in the entire world. I want you to be very careful so as we don't have any..." he glanced around the room, his eyes resting for a second longer on Neville than anyone else. "Accidents. It would be horrible if I had to write a formal letter of apology to your parents stating that you died because of your own stupidity."

As Snape wrote the ingredients on the blackboard the students began carefully collecting them. An hour later the potions were ready.

Hermione and Draco hadn't talked for the whole lesson.

Just as they were simmering nicely Snape turned, and called out:

"And be careful not to get any on or your clothes or skin. If you do, the drug is just as likely to kill you as if you drank it."

Hermione gulped quietly.

She went back to their desk with the last ingredient, a Belladonna lily bulb. She pierced it and let the poisonous juices run into their potion.

As the first drop hit the greenish liquid the whole cauldron it was bubbling in exploded.

Screams rang around the classroom.

Finally Snape called for quiet, and looked around to check that no students were harmed. He counted all of them, except one was missing. He immediately suspected Neville Longbottom, until he realized that he'd already counted the boy.

"Uh, Professor?" said a tentative voice from behind the cauldron's wreckage.

Snape stormed towards the voice, then stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Hermione Granger lying on the floor, covered in the Belladonna potion; which had become black, with a puddle of blood seeping from her head.

"Oh god," said someone. "She's dead."