Breaking Hermione

Heartbreaker

"Y-your girlfriend?" Shalini's face grew extremely red, her eyes widening to the size of saucers.

"Yes, my girlfriend." Said Tom carelessly. "We've been together since school resumed. I wanted to tell you earlier, but I was too busy."

With a wail, Shalini burst into tears and ran off. Mortified, I looked across at Tom who on the contrary gave a singularly mirthless smirk, and leaned back in his seat.

Heartless monster! Screamed my brain.

"That was easier than I had predicted." A cold, victorious smile spread across his lips. "She's been irritating me for so long, I was contemplating cursing her just to get her off my back."

"That's a vile thing to say."

Tom's eyebrows shot up. "What did you just say?" He said dangerously.

"I said that was a vile thing for you to say. And just to clear things up," I snapped, "I am not your girlfriend. I don't know what game you're trying to play here Tom but I'm not interested."

"That's funny." I froze as a shadow crossed Tom's features. "You say that like you have a choice in the matter."

Despite the poor lighting of the common room there was no mistaking those black eyes shining, just daring me to take one step further. Unsafe! My mind screeched.

He wasn't exactly the loudest type, but his words were cutting. I sat opposite gingerly in the seat opposite him, the sound of the water rhythmically lapping against the window my only comfort.

And that's when it hit me. If I pretended to be Tom's girlfriend I could have a solid reason to be wanting to dangle from his arm, which is exactly where I needed to be to thwart him.

"Who was Shalini to you? Was she your girlfriend?" I felt a little more comfortable asking him questions. Learning things was my forté. Learning about Tom Riddle couldn't be more complex than reading a challenging book, right?

"Shalini? My girlfriend?" I was surprised to see his mouth curl into a smirk. "She wanted to be. so imagine my delight when I found you standing right outside the common room, as pathetic the sight was, I knew I could use you as a means to get rid of her."

Oh right. So he was just going to use me to get rid of his wanna be girlfriend?

I guess I had to roll with it. He was right. I didn't have a choice. Not if I were to save the fallen modern day world at least.

"All you need to do is act the part convincingly." He said delicately. "And it shouldn't be hard. Just always make sure you're in close proximity to me during the time we share together. And no," he snapped after seeing the look of revolt on my face, "It doesn't go any further than that."

I stood, suddenly wanting to be alone.
Tom seemed to get the picture, although he didn't look up from his study.

"Your dorm is second staircase on the right." He twirled his quill in his long fingered hands idly. "The girls will show you where you will sleep."

"Thanks." I clutched my beaded bag and made my way over to the stairs, my heart beat pounding out of rhythm to the steady ticking of the Time- Turner. As foolish as the thought was, I couldn't help but feel as though everything was starting to go downhill. What was going to happen now? What did pretending to be Tom's girlfriend really mean for me? Would present day Dumbledore approve of this?