Meet Your Match

10. Now You Know

Hermione slumped in her chair. She was tired. Tired of having this same conversation. Tired of replaying the moment Malfoy pushed her away. Tired of wondering what it meant that she hadn’t seen him in weeks.

“I really don’t know how I can say this any more clearly,” Shannon said frustratedly, leaning across the kitchen table at her. She punctuated her next sentence with little claps on every word. “He. Wants. To. Shag. You.”

Hermione’s chair scraped over the floor as she pushed away angrily. “That’s worse! Can’t you see that?” She got to her feet and paced in front of the counter, looking miserably over at her friend.

She knew Shannon meant well. There was no way the other woman could know that she was only further cementing Hermione’s worst fears about the situation. The tension between herself and Malfoy had clearly escalated to the point where she could no longer deny it, not if it was apparent even to other people. But when she had reached out to him—when she had needed him—he had rejected her. 

If he was attracted to her, there was only one reason she could think of to explain why he had stopped her in that moment of intimacy. Only one explanation for why he might want something physical without that emotional connection. As difficult as it was for her to wrap her mind around it, it would be even more challenging to explain it to Shannon.

“If that’s even true, it’s not about me,” Hermione said, struggling to find the right words. “It’s... a fascination. A curiosity. It’s subverting expectations, rebelling against his parents, and probably a dash of wanting to tarnish the ‘Golden Girl,’” she finished with a grimace.

She turned and fixed the full weight of her attention on Shannon as the term finally came to her. “It’s slumming.”

Shannon shook her head in disbelief. “You’re barking. In what world would shagging you qualify as slumming?”

“His world.” Hermione sighed and sat back down at the table. “The world we went to school in. His family is important there. High society, arranged marriages, political alliances—all of it. And they look down on people like me.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he told me!” Hermione could feel the prickle of tears then and swiped angrily at her eyes. 

She took a deep breath knowing that once she said her next words, she’d be unable to take them back. 

“Because he bullied me.”

They had the impact she’d known they would. She could see the exact moment Shannon registered them. Her voice was quiet then, serious. “About what?”

“Anything. Everything.” Hermione put her head in her hands. “My hair, my teeth, my friends, my parents, my personality, my marks.” She met Shannon’s eyes again. “He called me filthy.”

“Why didn’t you tell me back then?” The hurt was clear in Shannon’s voice.

Hermione looked beseechingly at her friend and reached across the table to take her hand. “How could I with what you went through? It doesn’t compare. I had no room to complain.”

Shannon pulled her hand away roughly. “It does compare! You had room to complain because we were best friends, and that’s what friends do. You don’t think I would have wanted to know that I wasn’t alone? That you were being bullied, too? You don’t think I would have wanted to know that you understood what it was like?”