The Shadows of His Past

He approached a window on the far side of the Tower and allowed the harsh, winter wind to brace his senses before shutting it behind him. The stars blinked behind him. I wish... He shook his head, he'd wished on so many stars he doubted there were any left.

The clock chimed. Ron counted nine times.

****

Raindrops pattered against his window. A reasonable excuse for weakness. If there was such a thing. He paused and threw his cloak unto his bed before pulling out a quill.

****

It was getting colder. The sharp cold thrust into every corner of her body and her thin robes offered little protection to the harsh winter wind. Why didn't I bring my cloak? A gentle tick-tock from her watch was the only noise to be heard. Tick-tock. Another minute. Where was he?

She looked again at the note:

-

****

A haunting melody drifted on the gentle breeze. Sudden stops when the high-pitched tone was carried aloft farther and farther away. Ginny licked her lips, but the song would not return; the wind, the chill, and a gentle pattering of approaching footsteps were all impediments- preventing her from whistling in the dark. "Hi Harry! So glad you could make it!" came Ginny's faintly disapproving voice.

Harry grinned, slightly sheepishly, "Well, I'm positive we didn't miss anything."

"We didn't miss what?" Ginny asked, reaching out for his arm, but shyly letting it fall slack to her side. Harry chose to ignore that. The air turned colder as the sun began its decent into the skyline. She shivered.

Harry gave Ginny another sheepish grin, "I'd lend you my cloak, but ...erm... I'm having it ...washed."

Ginny smiled. "I know all about the knarl." We may not be brilliant, but it's not hard to see someone's been attacked when they return from Hagrid's with a chewed up cloak.

She looked up. The sky's zenith was completely black, devoid of color and warmth. There were few stars visible in the city- not even Polaris was to be seen. Not a particularly romantic setting. Ginny shivered again.

Almost imperceptibly, she leaned nearer to Harry. Almost. Harry didn't seem to mind and he put his arms around her as the night grew chillier.

"What didn't we miss?" persisted Ginny.

He tipped her chin up to the skies. Her gasp of astonishment was lost to the wind. Shooting stars raced across the velvety black dome, their wispy tails criss-crossing in a tapestry of incandescent threads.

"It's beautiful," Ginny breathed.

Harry's faintly disappointed voice seemed almost anticlimactic, "Yeah, I guess. I expected something like fireworks."

Ginny gave a faint smile. "I'm sure the falling stars are trying their best." Then looked up and with unforeseen bravery, kissed Harry, rather clumsily, on the cheek. "I love you, you know that?"

Harry was unsure. His mind had formed the words, his lips had molded to their shape, his vocal chords were almost singing the syllables-

Yet, he said nothing. After all, he still hadn't told Cho that he loved Ginny. He decided to change the subject, "Love is a pretty complicated word, maybe I...?" Ginny immediately saw the direction, the faint lilt of his voice to a question.

"Love is like..." She paused to think, "You know that feeling you get when- when you hold out your arms, and you're spinning and spinning, for- for like ever and ever?" Harry nodded, although he had never done such a thing in his life. Yet, the nod was sincere.

Oddly enough, Harry had understood her.

Ginny was acutely aware of Harry's lack of response. Her self-consciousness and doubt peeked its pathetic little face at the corner of her thoughts. And soured her mood. She was automatically dismissive, "Anyway, are you always this philosophical when your watching shooting stars on a Friday night with the lady you love?" She waited for a contradiction.

But Harry loved her, Cho was a mere complication, and the hurt edge to Ginny's voice slapped him in the face. "Only when I've had too much butterbeer- or I've fallen in deep."

Ginny didn't bother to contain her sigh. "Butterbeer?"

"Love."

I'm spinning with my arms out, hugging the sky. "I feel very special."

"Maybe I just have a thing for red heads," Harry whispered into her hair, holding her closer.

"I should warn Ron."

****

Draco watched as the owl soared on silent wings towards the Gryffindor Tower- where a certain bushy-haired Gryffindor awaited it. The peace of that moment where he contemplated the stillness of the night and compared it to the bustling confines of the Common Room was short lived, however. Quickly, disturbing thoughts intruded themselves, uninvited, into his mind. Opening a window. Allowing light in the dusty corners of his mind.

"Why did I ever send that to her?" What was with this desperation to see her? He was intrigued. Was this pointless charade a mere diversion- distraction from who truly was the apple of the other's eye? He laughed. Was he, for even a moment, harboring a thought; a romantic thought for the Mudblood Granger? He had long established to himself that the purity of her blood was of no consequence, but the purity of her soul? That remained undisputed- who was he to sully the immaculate perfection of flawless morals? Which was inevitably what he would do. He laughed again. How the tables had turned- was that Draco Malfoy fearing that he might defile a Mudblood with his mangled principles. But the laugh was hollow and the irony merely annoying.

He forced himself to stop thinking. The tumults of thoughts served only to confuse him, and the confusion was unwanted. The owl had returned. Despite himself, he had awaited the return of Heh-Heh- Headwing? Headwig? with anticipation. He quickly unfurled the torn piece of parchment.

I'll be there. Just make sure you show up too.

-H

He grabbed his cloak and applied his layers of clothing. He didn't have time to sort out his jumbled thoughts. All that mattered was that in few minutes he'd see her. It's a damn cold night out there. Yet, the feet that pattered down to the Forbidden Forest were eager and their footprints were a testament to his commitment.

He shivered, but thoughts of the weather also vanished when he saw her- shivering in the moonlight.

Yet surrounded by the unknown, where dwelt such creatures that could kill, Draco felt strangely at ease. He leaned against a the trunk of a convenient tree and allowed himself to assimilate into the obscurity of nightfall. The inconsistent shadows darkened his face so that his face was a mere echo of humanity. Bottomless features hidden behind a pall of darkness. A shift of the light and there was a nose. Another shift and an eye. He was just another person. Another drop in the flood of humanity. Perhaps, that was the way he liked things best.

Light was his judgment. His persecutor. He was condemned.

When he saw her, there was this blankness. The stunned feeling of- what was it? His old thoughts returned, but he refused their admittance. He heard her sigh. "I don't think he'll show up." In the semidarkness, he saw her shake her head. "No. Most definitely he wont."

Draco sighed. A little sigh, that might have easily been mistaken as a small gust of wind. You didn't think I'd show up, like last time? Well, the Mudblood Granger hates to be proven wrong. He merely lingered and watched. Memorizing every moment so he could recant them later and stun her. He would love to surprise her. To watch the play of emotions. He was content.

Suddenly, Hermione found herself recalling a verse from a book she had not read in a long time, "Love keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth."

Love. She had said the word. Draco promised to himself that he would never see her again.

****

A moment's pause before she grabbed her cloak. Meeting Malfoy at night by the Forbidden Forest- might lead to some unpleasant consequences. I might I loose my head and hex him. Or I might do something unforgivably stupid. Like fall in love with him.

Love. There, that irritating word entered, unbidden to the percolating surface of her mind. Therein, lay her irresolution. Her hand hovered over her neatly folded cloak.

Meet me in five minutes by the precipice. I await your answer by the owl.

Hermione laughed at the professional-ness of the letter. But her humor had quickly faded as she stood alone in the semi-darkness. Rather disinterestedly, she watched the cut-out pieces of moonlight that flashed across the Lake's surface like shards of a broken mirror afloat in an inkwell. Hermione was never one to put much trust in omens and such, but the bleakness of the night was distinctly ominous.

Cold engulfed her.

Above her, the sky was dark with a velvety smoothness with a gentle freckling of stars. The pale, watery light of the moon infused the air, illuminating her puffs of breath and Hagrid's snow thatched building beyond. She sighed.

"I don't think he'll show up." She shook her head. "No. Most definitely he wont." And he didn't. Why do I bother? I guess, it's not like I have much better to do in the middle of the night. Except sleep. She didn't know what to expect. There was this underlying current of sincerity in every word he penned, that made her trust him, but she should have known better. Than to trust a Malfoy. She settled into comforting stereotype.

I do know better.

****

The wind crept up behind him and entered in the intimate crevices of his cloak like gentle fingers in a chilling caress. The wind tossed his hair. The wind billowed out his cloak. The wind blew away his footprints in the dusty snow. Only the wind knew he had left the warm confines of the Slytherin Common Room and it maternally guarded his secret until the light in the Gryffindor Tower girl's dormitory was extinguished.

Slowly, and with resolve, he walked back towards the confines of his bedroom. Reaching his dormitory, he noted that his bed was now made, looking inviting in the green and silver hangings; he eagerly sunk into the safety of his four-poster bed, into the rest of a tranquil and peaceful slumber, all the while, thinking of her...

He hated her. He hated her for throwing a stone into the glass encasement on his beliefs. She made his set of morals feel so insubstantial. And cheap. Probably, the cheapest thing he owned. The Mudblood destroyed everything. And made room for something new. He took a deep breath. "This is all stupid!"

He stood alone in the darkness inside of the Slytherin Common Room.

In the boys dormitory, he stood up, opened the window, and stepped towards the dying flames. He pulled out his wand, muttered, "Incendio," and moved his chair closer to the warmth of the now crackling fire.

****

"Are you using this book?" Draco held up Hermione's copy of Hogwarts, A History, "I need it for my History of Magic essay-" That was a lie. There was no essay. And there were probably enough copies of Hogwarts, A History in the school library (where they were at the moment) to wallpaper all of Malfoy Manor.

"That's my book!" She grabbed it back fiercely and hugged it protectively, lifting her Arithmancy book in front of her face like a hardcover wall between them.

Draco opened his mouth, but what was he to say?

"Don't bother me." Draco knew this was not just about the book. "Anymore." That bastard, Hermione thought, silently reveling in the infrequent swearword, how dare he come up here and talk to me?

"I know you're probably thinking, 'that prat how dare he come up here and talk to me?'..." He pulled off Hermione's voice with a rather eerie similarity.

She scowled.

"...And touch my Hogwarts, A History book? The gall!"

"Bastard. The word I used was bastard."

Draco immediately sobered and sat down at her table. Hermione was determined to ignore him. Totally determined. I am ignoring Malfoy. I will ignore Malfoy. Draco smirked to himself. She had been on that page for the last five minutes. Five more minutes that slid like mercury across the surface of time. Her hollow brown eyes bore into him, and he felt as though she were slowly siphoning out a bit of his soul with each sweep of them over his face. She gave him an unsettling feeling of vertigo. Like he was standing on the edge.

He'd had it. He was wasting his time, skating dangerously close to emotions that had lay dormant in his soul for a long time. He was dominated by unusual feelings- confusion and doubt. And he hated her for it. "What do you want me to do, Hermione?" Draco snarled suddenly, slapping his hand against the table, startling her out of her Arithmancy. "What do you want me to say? What do you want me to think? Should I hate you?" He snapped, "Should I?" He put both of his hands on either side of her and leaned closer still, so that Hermione could almost feel the anger radiating from him. "Should I? Is that what you want?" Not for the first time, Hermione found herself thankful for the solitude of the Hogwarts library.

She wanted to say something, but her confidence dissolved in his anger. "I-" To Draco's utter mortification, he found the words just slipping out, "I'm sorry."

Plan B, apparently. She paused- determined to believe him. Her anger quelled in his seeming sincerity. Silence.

"Do you realize that this is the first time I've ever apologized-"

"To a Mudblood?"

Hermione had interrupted with contempt that scalded Draco- in a dusty place in his upper chest cavity that he had always thought was a useless appendage. "To anyone."

Hermione was less surprised than expected. "I don't care anymore." She sighed and looked down sternly at her Arithmancy book, "Just go away, I've got work to do." As he left he heard her mutter, "I'm just wasting my time." He's not worth it.

She was nothing. Mudblood filth. But she was everything to him.

The thoughts tumbling and scurrying in his head, clamoring for attention-

the repressed feelings that screamed cruelly in his ears, high-pitched shrieks like a banshee. Coherent ideas unconsciously detached from him, leaving mixed-up and conflicting emotions behind, most of which he was unsure. Wasted minutes and nothing became clearer- all he had to show for it was a headache. Perhaps he'd owl home and ask them to ship over his Pensieve if these thoughts wouldn't stop rattling their cages. As looked at his reflection, he saw the flashes of emotion. He'd didn't need that kind of vulnerability. The façade he created was not to entomb him, but to protect him. Against what? His father had never been specific, but perhaps in the shadows there was an enemy waiting to attack. Waiting for a moment of weakness. Waiting in the dark. For him, when his defenses were down and his senses muted by...whatever this was- this confusion. This insecurity and skepticism that burrowed into his fundamental beliefs like a nameless parasite. Like her expression ingrained on his memory. And his confidence had vanished, along with his expressionless mask.

No one should have been able to see through it, he had a lifetime of practice, but...then how?...how had she...?

He let her.

He shook his head and only the thoughts of Hermione drifted and floated to his mind's surface. Then there was his ceaseless desperation to see her. To stare into her rather plain face and to hold her rather skinny arms in his. Just Hermione's well-put words were like a well-aimed flint, igniting the fuel of emotion long inside him. Even as he thought of her, he hated her for how one look into her eyes was enough to leave him questioning everything he thought he believed. He fell a little deeper into the trap that she had unwittingly set. His pride told him to struggle against his bonds, but his heart told him to submit. No! I- I have to talk to her... explain... Since when did that rotten Mudblood need explanations? Why should I care? But he knew; he knew he cared.

And weighing each word in his mind, he penned his thoughts.

On the North Tower stood a figure facing the Lake, black against the bright hues that emanated from the sun in sheer radiance. She was framed by waning sunlight. "I don't know why I bothered," she muttered to herself. Her eyes flickered to the lengthening shadows cast by the turrets and spires of the Hogwarts castle. She was alone.

****

He moved trancelike as though he was in a dream. Then he saw her, and he knew he didn't want to wake up.

He woke cautiously, his footsteps light and noiseless on the dusty, stone floor.

Hermione's lips moved slowly. "You came." She didn't turn around.

"I had to."

"I thought you wouldn't come..."

"I'm here and I'm not leaving until-"

"I don't know why I came- I mean I didn't expect you to show-" Hermione interrupted herself, "Why did you come?"

"Don't you get it, Granger?" Granger. It sounded distant to her. Alien. His voice was unchanged. It was an echo- a day on a precipice.

The moon was obscured by a drifting cloud and could not illume the all-consuming blackness that prowled in the wake of sunset. In that effervescent moment, only the horizon exhibited any color at all- a vermilion brilliance that to Hermione was suggestive of Ron's hair.

"Hermione-" She loved the way her name sounded when he said it.

"I...I..." she stammered. Granger. Granger. "I have to go..." Granger. "Dra-...Malfoy," and with that unreturned statement fluttering in the air and tainting all undisclosed emotion with a bleak and uncertain silence, she left Draco to his thoughts.

"Hermione...I'm sorry about the letters." She heard him whisper as she left him alone in the darkness of the North Tower.

****

"The Cannon's won!" Ron bounded into the Gryffindor Common Room his face as one who has reached nirvana. Hermione pitied him. Getting worked up about something so stupid-

She prepared herself for a cutting response to this effect, but she quickly stifled it. "Hello? Herm-oh-ninny?" His cheerful voice grated on her nerves and irritated her beyond measure.

"Yeah, great." The sarcasm was evident to everyone except Ron Weasley. And for that he should be thankful. So he plunged on, oblivious to her indifference, "A match to last the ages, I'm sure. I mean-"
Hoping that her bad mood could excuse her sour tone, she had no hesitation in interrupting him, "Yeah." The lack of inflection in her voice was lost on Ron.

"I wish I'd been there."

I wish you'd been there too. She opened her mouth to say exactly that, but her angry mood dissipated as she looked up at him. He was so happy,and it spread like contagion to the surrounding Gryffindor's. The Common Room was full of smiles. "I'm very happy that your happy Ron," she said with sudden warmth and sincerity.

He gave her a genuine smile and she felt her spirits soar a little higher. His whole self was hyperactive with pent-up enthusiasm and he bounded up, knocking over his chair. "Wait'll I tell Harry!"

Thoughts of Draco were a pestilence; they soured her thoughts and embittered her spirits. Last year, she could always see another reason to smile. All she needed was a carefree grin and a shock of freckles to pull her out of her pensive reverie. And she was glad that she had that for a best friend. For the first time in a long time, she allowed herself to be happy for no reason. In her opinion, she had precious little to be happy about.

****

Hermione bounded in the boy's dormitory, much as Ron had entered the Gryffindor Common Room earlier, "C'mon Harry- Ron; I'm in the mood for some Quidditch!"

"Hermione," Ron whined, "I wanted to tell Harry about-"

"The Chudley Cannon's won." She waved her hand listlessly, "Whoo. Now let's go."

Ron looked as though he wished that looks could kill. Hermione; however, refused to allow gloom to settle upon him. She decided to return the favor. "Feel better, Ronniekins." She hugged him, to Ron's confusion and delight. "Now let's go watch the match!"

"Yeah!" Ron sat up, suddenly enthused and brilliantly red. Harry didn't need an explanation for his full blush, but the Hermione looked curiously.

"Aww..." Harry wiped away a nonexistent tear, "What a Kodak moment..." Hermione laughed.

Ron refused to be the ignorant one. "What? You mean those symbols in the newspapers that Muggles use to tell the future-" Unfortunately for Ron, that role was tailored for him at the moment.

Hermione sighed and pulled both Harry and Ron up from their respective chairs, "No, Ron. That's the Zodiac. Kodak is a camera company that also makes and develops Muggle film."

Ron feigned understanding. "Yes, of course." Unfortunately for him, (again) he was also a terrible actor. Harry laughed, but Hermione was too impatient to wait any longer.

Ron leaned over towards Harry as they all hurried to the pitch. "You know what this means don't you?"

"What?" Harry raised his eyebrows.

"You owe me ten galleons. You said that the Cannon's would never win." In an unforgivable moment of immaturity, Ron stuck out his tongue and did a victory dance. Seeing the odd looks from the passing Hufflepuffs, he sped ahead to catch up with Hermione, who was moving with uncharacteristic vigor. Why the sudden rush? She was never a big Quidditch fan...

I hate Quidditch. Nonetheless, Hermione had yet to find a better way to let off a bit of steam after spending so much time thinking of that Slytherin prat. That's what he was and is. A prat. For all those times that he made her feel inferior. For those times where he tried to ruin everything. And especially for that moment when he said he loved her. How dare he...? No, she wasn't bitter at all.

She had become accustomed to his sneer.

For Draco, Hermione was willing to forgive everything, to overlook every instant that he had humiliated her and to tuck every unpleasant memory into the neatly partitioned cubbyholes of her mind. She wanted to forget every moment, but it was in times like these that they returned and the neatly organized library was in disorder again. Hermione hated disorder. She hated the constant chain reaction of her thoughts. The way her mind would lure her and ensnare her with thoughts of Draco. How her ideals, precariously balanced on their shaky pedestals, would all come tumbling down in their domino succession. Yet the daily, albeit hourly, tornado became a habit- the struggle was endured and enjoyed, because every resolution to stay away from Draco brought her closer to him. She loved the way her brain normally cooperated with her, how her mind and heart were separate, but equal entities- each with their own symmetry. However, her own contrariness accustomed her to the cause and effect. That the conformity would suddenly become unbalanced and corrupt. The way her heart could suddenly dominate and control with totalitarian vigor. But that too, became a habit. It wasn't as though she even had amiable thoughts of him; it was just the way her heart quickened when she saw him or how she was always searching for him in a crowd. Maybe, there's no reason to search anymore.

Perhaps that was love. That over-emotional euphoria, that enveloped her like drunkenness, when she was in his proximity. The way her rationality would fade away as though it never existed and all that she could think about was he. She was intoxicated with thoughts of him. And she was content with that. At least that's how it works in the movies.

Her eyes sought him among the green bedecked Quidditch players. She expected to recognize him by his unmistakable platinum hair, but instead her eyes pursued hooded a figure who darted and dashed in and out of the Hufflepuff Chaser formations with ability that came not with raw talent, like Harry's, but with cultivated skill. A sudden burst of speed caused his hood to fall back and reveal his light blonde hair glinting in the cloudy sunlight. Draco totally absorbed himself in his search. He gave her a fleeting glance. Well, not totally absorbed. Again she saw him look back at her, narrowly avoid missing a particularly malevolent Bludger. She loved the pleasant turnaround- now she was distraction to the unreachable Slytherin.

She smiled. So he was Malfoy. If this is love, then I'm going to make sure I enjoy every minute of it. So when Draco caught the Snitch in practically no time, seconds shy of breaking Harry's record, she was the only Gryffindor who cheered. She didn't care. Love is great.

Ron watched Hermione's omnioculars dart around and follow a Slytherin who only could be Draco Malfoy.

****

Draco relished his loneliness because it was an undemanding companion who was both introspective and courteous. Loneliness gave him peace. It gave him the solace that human camaraderie could not. And could never do.

"Go away Crabbe- Goyle." He never referred to them separately, he kept them one entity because it was more convenient for him. He preferred things that way.

Things were easier. And then Hermione came, the cataclysmic variable. "There's nothing wrong with being a loner," he called to the retreating backsides of Crabbe and Goyle. The three had known each other forever, but the had never ascended to informality. They were and always would be Crabbe and Goyle.

A female voice called. He sunk lower into his chair, he preferred loneliness to Pansy.

"That's true." Suddenly, a voice was right behind him. "If you really want to be alone."

And he preferred Hermione to loneliness.

She had walked into the library, spied Malfoy, and quickly headed towards a rather inconspicuous table in the corner. He probably wanted it that way. Hermione wanted to tread carefully. She knew she couldn't, not with so much left unexplained-

She was always searching for explanations, reasons, definitions- "Define love, Malfoy."

What was it that my father said? "Emotional pollution. Hormones. More adolescent stupidity." I bet it's great. He hesitated. "I'd say love is a many splendored thing- but I think that's been said before." He looked to her and his normally unexpressive face, clearly showed his unasked question, What do you want me to say?

Hermione shrugged, "All I know about love is that it's all you need." I don't really believe that. Do I? Could it be that while Hermione has always prided herself on solitude and independence- Maybe all along, I wanted adolescent romance to giggle over. To gossip about with Lavendar and Parvati. To remember-

"All you need is love? Put that to a song and you might have something." Hermione gave him the strangest smile. Years later, Hermione would find herself remembering that moment, when they were so close and slowly she was becoming lightheaded on obsolete thoughts.

He cleared his throat and leaned forward- a the faintest trace of eagerness on his face, "Back to the question. Love is...?"

"How incredibly simple." He held out his hands in a gesture of partial understanding.

"Well... I left out all the boring stuff." Hermione muttered, rather sheepishly. Draco didn't voice the private thought, For a change, and instead said, "So, do you think you'll ever forgive me for being... not nice to you?"

"No. Don't be ridiculous."

Draco opened his mouth for what probably was a sarcastic comment, but nothing came out as Hermione had taken that moment to kiss him lightly on the mouth. And that was how it all began.

No, this doesn't complicate things in the slightest.