Out of Time

Chapter 41

And I have known the arms already, known them all—
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?

- The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T.S. Eliot

Hermione's hand stills over the bowl of muddy water and squeezes out the hand towel reflexively. It stays clenched in her fist, her knuckles white around it. The look on her face is apprehension bordering on fear, and Draco doesn't understand why. He's just here to have a chat, a little chat, about his expectations.

As if making words, her mouth moves but without sound. She tries again and manages a shaky, "Take that off."

Draco hardly hears this. "Stop giving him a naked fucking sponge bath and we'll talk about it."

Potter isn't naked that Draco can see, but then again, his lower half is hidden beneath a blanket. Maybe he is naked and Draco quirks an eyebrow at his girlfriend. "We need to talk."

"Why did you put that on?"

What is she on about? Annoyed that she hasn't put it down, he snatches the wet rag from her hand and slings it across the tent. The bowl of murky water drops to the ground as the rag slaps into the canvas with a flat squelch. Hermione flinches away, putting the chair between them. Her hands grip the back of it but not before he sees them tremble.

"Draco..."

"Oh, so you do know I'm here. While you sit here for hours, tending to this twat? What's he ever done for you, anyway? He doesn't give a shit about you. I do," he hisses, pointing a finger in her face. "I came for you. You're mine."

"Yes, Draco. I'm yours. I'm yours." The words tumble out of her in a mess of verbal vomit he sneers at. Is this the best she can do?

"So fast..." she murmurs to herself, wide-eyed with panic. He traps her in his gaze and pins her down with a closed-lipped smile. "Sweet fucking Christ, how -"

The Muggle swear he's never heard from her before tips him over the edge and the simmering rage escalates to a boil. He makes a sudden move towards her and she darts the other way, keeping the chair in the middle.

"Draco! I'm yours. I'm your girl and I won't touch Harry again. He can stay right there. He's restrained, remember? And he doesn't want me. He fancies Ginny. Ginny Weasley. She's his girlfriend."

This crystallises things he hadn't known he was thinking. She has no right to touch another wizard like she's been doing, but there's no possible way Potter has spent all this time with her and still fancies Ginny fucking Weasley. This contradicts his prior argument that Potter doesn't give a shit about her but he shoves this away. It doesn't fit now and Draco neatly rejects it.

"And yet here he is... with you. He's been out here with you for months. Were you even happy to see me when I showed up? You put on a good show of it but since then," he moves closer, as if stalking a rabbit in the brush, "you haven't so much as snogged me. Maybe you're not mine after all. Maybe you're his. Maybe you have been for a while."

Her breathing is rapid but this sets her jaw firmly in place. Her hazel eyes flash. She's rising to the challenge and Draco feels a solid twitch in his trousers. She creeps to one side and he follows, a step at a time.