Anyone But Me

Chapter Eighty-Eight

The silence that followed Draco's earnest inquiry was heavy. Neither of them breathed as she struggled to keep a straight face. His request for her judgment on his character was absurd. How much clearer could she make her feelings for the wizard? It was laughable, really. Nevertheless, she wasn't able to express her crestfallen amusement at his anguished vulnerability.

"All of the growth I have witnessed the past six months would be a good place to start..." Hermione suggested softly as she watched him pause in the middle of a particularly stubborn wrinkle.

"Growth?" He scoffed and glared angrily down at the insolent blight on his thigh. "What growth are you talking about, Kitten?"

"You haven't called me a slur in over a year..."

"Hurrah for me! As I continue to stand idle while my friends do."

"You no longer subscribe to the social hierarchy you were raised in..."

"Which I cannot vocalize or make any real change to."

"You have started to feel regret for your actions and the way they affect others..."

"And yet I kept attempting, knowing that innocent people could be hurt."

"Are you going to find something wrong with all my examples?" Her accusation provoked his lowered scowl to lift and meet her sympathetic gaze. "I'm sorry, Draco, but you are not exempt from the conscience that comes with empathy. It is an unavoidable part of being a good person."

"So that is it..." He shrugged with a nonchalance that was at odds with the wild perplexed look in his eye. "After everything that I have done, I can just decide to be good?"

She did not answer right away, instead, she crawled over to the spot at his side that had been offered to her earlier. Undaunted by his stiff movements to accommodate her approach, Hermione tucked herself into his chest and sighed. "That is a complicated answer... I would like to give the disclaimer that 'good people' are not some angelic archetype. They make mistakes. They even hurt others on purpose! The difference is, they don't revel in the pain their choices cause. Going forward, they choose to avoid that behavior whenever possible."

"It was a simple yes-or-no question."

"So, yes, I think you are no different than any being that can distinguish between right and wrong. You awaken every morning and are given hundreds of chances to do better. Or muck it up and have to deal with the consequences." She tightened her embrace around his middle in a consoling gesture. "Regardless, I highly doubt bad people lose sleep worrying if they are rotten to the core... Wait... Does Voldemort sleep?"

Draco's muffled laugh jostled her but his firm hold became ironclad when she went to reposition to look at him, "Point taken."

"You are not conceding to shut me up?"

"No." He finally relaxed and placed a quick kiss atop her head before teasing. "If I wanted to do that, there are better ways of distraction at my disposal."

Keen to divert his attention from the last difficult debate he had planned, she began to fiddle with a button on his shirt. "Such as?"

"Hmmm... Remind me to show you later." He shuddered under her touch as she traced her fingers down the fastened placket. Undeterred by the flagrant ruse, he reached over and readied the stereo while giving an explanation for his closing ballad. "I swear that this was written with me in mind..."

My lover's got humor.

She's the giggle at a funeral.

Knows everybody's disapproval.