Just a Dance... (Book 1) [COMPLETE]

Epilogue

Hermione

It was the year after the Battle of Hogwarts when Headmaster McGonagall decided that the students deserved a proper graduation, where we would be handed a certificate of completion and academic excellency (for most of us) in front of all of our family and friends. Apparently, she had attended an outdoor Muggle graduation in her transfigured form and was suddenly inspired.

I loved the idea. We would finish our N.E.W.T.S, then be able to hang out for a week before we walked across a stage and left ceremoniously. I wished that Harry and Ron would have came back and finished school, but I knew why they didn't, and I understood. They wrote me letters all the time, asking how school was going and if the Quidditch team was as good as they were. I always told them that Ginny was a better captain than any I had seen, and I think that might have stung a bit with Ron.

Ron... He's such a nice guy. We've been talking more and more lately, and he even wrote me a sweet love poem last week. Well, as best as he could. His handwriting is worse than Hagrid's. But before and during the war, we seemed to have a budding relationship that never came out to bloom. We would flirt and talk and cut-up, but we never branched off into anything serious. The one time I asked, he clammed up and said, "Let's wait until things calm down, 'Mione."

Things have calmed down. It's been a year, and we're still just flirting.

I never asked Ginny what I should do, nor will I. Even if I do tell her everything, Ron is her brother. She'll be biased, and I don't want to hurt both of them. As for Harry... well, I think it's better to leave him out of this. He tries to help bring in the Golden Trio spirit, but I don't want there to be any tension between him and Ginny because of us.

It was the sound of slamming books that brought me back to attention. Where was I? I snapped back into attention and looked around only to find that the hoard of students that had filled the library earlier were gone, only to be replaced by the quiet whispers of few and the shuffling of Madam Pince. I stretched out my arms and yawned, hoping no one else had noticed that I had dozed off. Thankfully, I didn't see anyone looking my way, so maybe I was in the clear.

Or maybe I wasn't. Lying on the table top, covered in my drool, was my speech I was supposed to say since I was Head Girl and Valedictorian. The ink was now blurred and smudged, and the black markings covered the back of my arms.

"Dammit," I whispered as I tried to clean myself up and salvage some of the documents, but it was all in vain. My clothes and arms were stained, and my speech would have to be rewritten. Cursing quietly, I dug around in my bag in hopes of finding a spare piece of clean parchment to use.

"You're a mess," a familiar voice said smoothly as they pulled back a chair, sliding into the seat as if it were made for them.

I looked up to see the infamous Draco Malfoy reaching into his scuffed black messenger bag, revealing two scrolls of parchment with a small smirk. "Do you need one?"

I hesitated, trying my hardest not to glare. Draco Malfoy was the Head Boy, and was just behind me when it came to academics. Malfoy was smart and cunning, and we had a memory together that we never shared with anyone else. It was a wild night of failed revenge, but one of excitement and heartbreak. There were conversations I never told anyone about, and after the Yule Ball was over, we never really spoke again. Even when we were doing our rounds together, everything was strictly business. In fact, I can't say that we've held a conversation in years.

But Malfoy also was the person behind the slaughter of Albus Dumbledore. Malfoy brought Death Eaters into Hogwarts and watched as I was tortured by his Aunt Bellatrix Lestrange. I still bore the mudblood scar on my arm from the time he refused to step in. He became a Death Eater - even still bears the Dark Mark that he can't get rid of - and escaped Azkaban because Harry was kind enough to back up some of his statements. Harry agreed that the Malfoy's had acted stupidly out of fear, but that they didn't agree with their actions. And once the school year started up, McGonagall convinced Draco to return and finish his education - even gave him the Head Boy position. So he did, but he has since been a pariah. None of his friends returned, and anytime I see him, he's alone in the Head common room or silently sitting with a group of people.