Love's Potion [Dramione]

Chapter 17

"Are you going to eat that?" Crabbe asked Draco, pointing to all of the food on his plate.
Draco did not respond. He just pushed his plate forward in Crabbe's direction.

"Feeling okay, mate?" asked Blaise, who until now had been ignoring Draco ever since he'd arrived in the Great Hall for breakfast. "Something on your mind?"

"Sod off," Draco grumbled.

Blaise chuckled. "Sod off? You know, I should not have to put up with this kind of treatment from you. You're supposed to be my best friend."

Draco scoffed.

"Oh, hey, look!" Blaise pointed over to the Gryffindor table. "There's Granger." He grinned and waved to Hermione, whom Draco had noticed had been glancing over at their table. She smiled back and waved, but when her gaze fell upon Draco, her smile immediately faded and she looked away.

"So have you given any thought to our discussion this morning?" Blaise asked.

"No," Draco lied. In reality, that's all he'd been able to think about since he'd left the common room a little while ago - Hermione Granger. It seemed as though a lot of his thoughts lately had been about her, and he hated it. He hated her. Right?

"Good morning, Draco!"

The sound of a sickly sweet voice beside him made him jump. He looked over to see Sadie sitting right beside him.

"Sadie," he said, unenthusiastically. "I didn't even see you there."

Sadie's smile wavered slightly. "Well that's good," she mumbled.

"What?"

"Oh, nothing," she said quickly. "What happened to you yesterday? I was worried something happened to you."

"Oh...yeah...sorry about that," Draco said, even though deep down, he wasn't really sorry at all. "Something came up and I -"

"It's okay," Sadie said. "Really. Don't worry about it. Just promise me that we can go out again this Saturday?"

"Erm, well actually, Sadie, I think it would be better if maybe we didn't."

The smile never left Sadie's face. "Well," she said as she stood up from the table, "when you change your mind, you just let me know."

Blaise watched as the girl walked off. "Can you believe the amount of confidence that girl has? You just turned down her offer for a date, and she seems convinced you will change your mind." He shook his head in disbelief.

"Yeah," Draco nodded. He wasn't really listening, though. He was too busy staring across the room at Hermione who, much to his chagrin, had just gotten up from the table and headed for the exit to the Great Hall.

Okay, so...maybe he didn't hate her as much as he wanted to. And maybe yesterday, he apologized to her because he felt bad for what he'd said to her, and he wanted her to know that. And yeah...so, she wasn't the most unpleasant-looking girl in the world. In fact, for a mudblo – er, muggle – she was quite pretty. Plain, yes, but pretty. Naturally pretty. And she was interesting – unlike pretty much every other girl he had ever associated with. She didn't appear to be interested in discussing clothes or boys, or other petty subjects that other girls liked to discuss. And she was smart, too – the top in their class. Also, Draco had to admit that he had always enjoyed exchanging barbs with her, because she could always give him a run for his money. She was, in many ways, a worthy opponent – and not to mention a worthy object of his affection.

"Bollocks," Draco muttered aloud. Did he honestly just think of Granger as an object of his affection? Yes. Yes, he did.

"Problem, mate?" Blaise asked, giving Draco a curious look.