Chapter 10- Stuck (Part Two)
“All right Hermione, don’t panic!” Ron said in a high shrill voice, not exactly very sounding very calm himself. Hermione merely rolled her eyes at him.
Harry was pacing the front of the empty classroom in deep thought. “Hermione, you said the Love-Knot allows a maximum distance of three and a half feet between you and Malfoy, correct?”
“Yes,” Hermione said with a nod.
“That means if you need to use the bathroom,” Harry said with a frown, “Malfoy’s going to have stand outside the cubicle you use. So, Malfoy has to enter the Girls’ toilet with you, Hermione.”
“What?!” Draco exclaimed, jaw dropped. “No bloody way! I object!”
“We haven’t got time for your objections,” Hermione said stiffly, not quite liking the idea herself.
“Oh come on, going into the Girls’ bathroom?!” Draco exclaimed, his unease escalating. “I refuse! There must be another way!”
“Can you think of something, Malfoy?” Harry asked in a low growl.
“Well, no, but if you give me some time, I might be able to””
“Malfoy!” Hermione cried, exasperated. “Do you not understand the urgency of this situation?! There’s no other way! Do you not remember what happens if you walk more than three and a half feet away from me?”
“I’ll be pulled back to you again,” Draco recalled glumly the incident from Professor Dumbledore’s office. He massaged his temple as though he was having a really bad headache and gave a small moan of misery. “This day just keeps getting worse.”
“But we’ll have to make sure we use a deserted toilet,” Ron piped in. “We can’t have a girl traipsing in when Malfoy’s inside the Girls’ bathroom. Imagine the gossip that’ll be flying among the girls if word gets out. Especially if the girl who walks in happens to be Lavender or Parvati. It’ll probably be the headlines of tomorrow’s Daily Prophet. ‘DRACO MALFOY, PERVERT OF HOGWARTS’, that’s what it’ll say.” An evil smile formed on Ron’s lips. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea.”
“Shut your mouth, Weasley,” Draco hissed.
“Maybe we could use Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom,” Ginny suggested loudly, not wanting Ron to start arguing with Draco. “No one ever uses it. There won’t be a risk of any other girl walking in just like that.”
“No, we can’t use that toilet,” Hermione said, shaking her head wildly, causing her tamed brown curls to bounce about her shoulders. “Myrtle has a rather nasty habit of poking her head into random cubicles. I don’t want her poking her head into the cubicle that I’ll be using.”
“The fourth floor corridor’s pretty isolated most of the time,” Harry pointed out. “Besides, it’s the Holidays. Not many students will be around. Hermione can use the toilet there, Malfoy can stand outside her cubicle, and Ron, Ginny and I can stand guard outside the bathroom in case someone tries to get inside. We’ll tell them that it’s flooded or something.”
“Sounds like a good plan to me,” Ron said.
“All right then, can we head to the fourth floor now then?” Hermione said, an urgency tugging at her voice.
The five of them made their way up to the fourth floor in a hurry. Draco’s mood was getting from bad to worse. First, he had to sit and eat with Hermione. Then, the Dream Team shows up and the Weasley girl threatens to use her Bat-Bogey hex on him. Now, he had to follow Hermione to the toilet, the Girls’ toilet.
“Can’t we use the Boys’ toilet?” he asked as a last resort to save himself from the embarrassment of entering the female restroom.
“NO!” came the unanimous reply.
Draco made a face. If anyone were to find out about this, my reputation is going to go down the toilet bowl, he thought to himself.
They reached the fourth floor Girls’ bathroom in about five minutes. Hermione looked around first to make sure no one was seeing her go into the bathroom with Draco. After that, she slowly opened the toilet door and glanced around to check that there was no one inside. She heaved a sigh of relief when she saw that it was empty and entered the toilet, Draco close behind.
“This is so humiliating,” Draco mumbled as he stood outside the cubicle Hermione went into. The Love-Knot was thin enough to allow her to close the cubicle door and lock it.
Hermione stood in front of the toilet bowl for a moment, feeling really uncomfortable having to use to the lavatory with Draco tied to her wrist and standing right outside the wooden door. But when nature calls, you have to answer it. So she went about doing what she had to do and a minute or two later, she flushed and opened the cubicle door, returning the look of revulsion on Draco’s face with a forced smile.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” she said, forced smile still in place.
Draco snorted and waited for her to wash her hands before dragging her out to where Harry, Ron and Ginny stood guard. “I was just thinking how bad it would be when I need to use the toilet,” he said impassively, watching the color from Hermione’s face fade away. “In case you've never seen a boys’ bathroom, we usually use urinals,” he added for extra effect. When he saw Hermione grow even paler, he smirked for the first time in hours.
Ron was about to smack Draco in the face, but Harry restrained him. “Malfoy, you forgot that there’re cubicles in the Boys’ bathroom as well. With Hermione around, you’ll just have to use them instead of the urinals,” Harry said as calmly as possible. “I didn’t think you were that thick.”
“Watch your mouth, Scarhead,” Draco warned, moving a step forward to Harry. “Otherwise I might get Crabbe or Goyle to stuff your face down the toilet bowl in one of those cubicles.”
“What a shame you don’t have the guts to do that on your own,” Ron said, his eyes narrowed at Draco, who glared at him.
“What a shame that you have such an ugly face the toilet bowl might actually spit you back out if you landed your face in there anyways,” Draco sneered.
“Why you””
“That’s enough!” Hermione shouted, coming in between Draco, Ron and Harry, who looked like they were ready for a duel there and then. “Malfoy and I have already landed ourselves in detention because of our bickering and I don’t want you two end up in trouble as well,” she said, staring at Harry and Ron hard.
The tension between the there boys subsided by a bit, but Harry and Ron were still glaring murderously at Draco, who glared back with equal lethality.
“I need to go to the library now for some research,” Hermione continued. “Malfoy, you're obviously going to have to come with me.” She turned to Harry, Ron and Ginny. “I’ll see you later then, during lunch. Bring some food up for us. We’ll be waiting in the same classroom.”
“We’ll come with you to the library, Hermione!” Ron said, obviously not liking the idea of leaving Hermione alone with Draco.
“I’ll be fine,” Hermione ensured him. “Honestly Ron, I can take care of myself, you know.”
Ron opened his mouth to argue, but he closed it again, deciding against it. “Fine, we’ll see you later.” He, Harry and even Ginny exchanged a look with Draco that Hermione interpreted as, ‘If you do anything to her, I’ll feed you to some really large, gruesome creature.’
Hermione gave a small smile upon seeing how much her friends cared about her. She ruffled Harry and Ron’s hair affectionately and gave Ginny a hug. “Relax, I’ll be fine. I promise.”
“Oh for crying out loud, she’s only going to the library with me, not to the other end of the world,” Draco said loudly before pulling Hermione off to the library, leaving the trio staring after them.
Hermione’s research in the library had not gone too well. She did find a number of books that contained pages on the Love-Knot, but they simply wrote about the basic properties of the Love-Knot, which really did not help her get any idea of how to get it off. She did not need to know things like the Love-Knot was waterproof and that it could scatter white light in the right environment. Information like that was useless to her.
Furthermore, Draco had provided no assistance whatsoever. He had sat next to Hermione with a highly uninterested look set on his face. Hermione had tried several times to get him to lend a hand with her research, but getting Draco to help was like teaching a donkey how to tap-dance”downright impossible, being the stubborn creatures donkeys are.
The highlight of Draco’s day was probably when he saw Madam Pince, the irritable school librarian, trip and fall over a pile of books some students had left on the floor while they were searching through other shelves for other books. Madam Pince, having a certain abhorrence for all the students of Hogwarts, sent them out with their books chasing after them and whacking them on the heads occasionally. Other than that, the day could only be described with one word: BORING. No, actually make that three words: BORING TO DEATH.
Hermione was as interesting as a fruit fly when she was busy with her research and study. Draco found himself almost wanting to irritate her on purpose just to see her reaction. Almost. But eventually he busied himself by reading a book on Quidditch.
The two had a brief lunch in the classroom, where they met up with Ginny, Ron and Harry. Hermione instructed them to bring food for herself and Draco during dinner and went straight back to the library again, despite Draco’s complaints about being bored out of his wits.
The rest of the day was spent in the library, but it was as unproductive as the previous part of the day. The most Hermione learnt about the Love-Knot was that it was a very effective hair-tie as well. I can only use it as a hair-tie if I actually get it off my wrist first! Hermione thought tetchily as she slammed the last book she was reading shut.
“Can we go for dinner now, Granger?” Draco asked for the hundredth time in the past half an hour. “Doesn’t look like your research went all that well. It was a complete waste of time if you ask me.”
“Well, I didn’t ask you,” Hermione said through clenched teeth as she got up to return the books to their shelves.
“No need to get all worked up with me just because you didn’t find what you were looking for,” Draco said, not bothering to return the Quidditch book he was reading to the shelf. “In fact, I was hoping you'd find something that’d help us so that I wouldn't need to put up with you for more than a day.”
Hermione stopped short of placing a thick book entitled Enchanted Entities In The Wizarding World and turned to face Draco. She resisted the urge of dropping the heavy book on his foot. “We’ve already had this argument,” she said in whisper only loud enough for him to hear. “We hate being stuck to one another, but nonetheless, you put me with me and I put up with you. We haven’t got any other choice at the moment.”
She quickly placed the book back where it belonged and made her way out of the library with Draco. Once outside, the both of them headed towards the second classroom on the third floor where Harry, Ron and Ginny were suppose to meet them with dinner.
“Hermione, wait!” someone called from behind them.
Hermione stopped upon hearing her name and she groaned inwardly when she saw Lavender and Parvati trotting towards her. The last two people she wanted to see right now. “Hi Lavender, Parvati,” she greeted, trying to act as normal as possible.
The two girls cast Draco a brief glance before turning their attention to Hermione. “Hi Hermione,” they said in unison, giggling.
“Granger, will you hurry up with socializing? I'm famished,” Draco said, giving Lavender and Parvati a jaded look.
“Don’t worry Hermione, we won’t keep you long,” Parvati said, hiding her eagerness with a smile. “We just wanted to ask you something.”
“It’s about the Love-Knot,” Lavender continued for her best friend. “We were wondering who gave it to the both of you,” she threw Hermione and Draco an amused smile, “and with what purpose.”
Hermione could almost see the excitement bubbling within the two girls with the prospect of new gossip. It was like they lived on gossip. And she was not about to allow them the satisfaction of obtaining fresh gossip to spread around the whole Gryffindor and eventually the whole school.
“Well,” Hermione said, carefully choosing her words, “apparently it was someone’s idea of a joke. We have no clue who it’s from and what’s its purpose.”
At once, the faces of the two girls fell. They looked like someone had announced that Christmas holidays had been cancelled. “Oh,” Parvati said, obviously disappointed. “The both of you have no idea at all?”
Hermione shook her head. “None at all,” she affirmed. “I mean, can you think of anyone who would want the both of us stuck together like that? That just seems preposterous, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose it does,” Lavender agreed.
“I guess we should get going then,” Parvati said, signaling for Lavender to follow her.
As Parvati passed Hermione by, she leaned in and whispered, “All the best putting up with him, Hermione.” She paused and flashed a toothy grin. “But he is hot, you know.” Then, she gave Hermione a wink and hurried away to the Great Hall.
Hermione was left staring after Parvati, dumbfounded. Malfoy? Hot?! How could she even suggest that?! Has she gone completely mad?! Hermione thought to herself, cringing at what Parvati had said.
“What did she say?” Draco asked upon seeing the look on Hermione’s face.
Hermione turned to him and she unconsciously examined him, head to toe. Well, maybe he is a little hot. Just a little itsy-bitsy bit, Hermione found herself thinking.
“Oi, Granger, didn’t you hear me? What did she say?” Draco queried again.
Her head snapped up upon hearing her name and she shook her head a little to get thoughts of Draco being hot out of her head. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” she said clearing her throat, praying that she was not blushing. “Let’s go get some dinner.”
Christmas dinner was fabulous. Harry, Ron and Ginny had piled heaps of food for Draco and Hermione, who greatly enjoyed the meal. The only regret Hermione had was that she was unable to enjoy the Christmas feast in the Great Hall, amidst her other friends and the wonderful Christmas decorations.
After dinner, Draco had refused to allow Hermione to have a decent conversation with her three friends.
“Look, I'm not going to wait around her while you have a chit-chat session with your dear friends,” Draco had told her grouchily. “My Christmas day has already been bad enough and I don’t need to sit here to listen to the four of you talk while I stare into space and try not to throw up my dinner.”
Ron had wanted to hex Draco there and then, but Hermione stopped him and thought it was best they leave for their respective dorms. After saying their goodnights (with Ron yelling, “If he tries anything funny at night, just kick him where it hurts!”), Draco and Hermione made their way to the Heads’ dormitory.
They walked along the hallways in silent, possibly still trying to digest the fact that they were seriously stuck to each other. Hermione stared down at her feet, trying not to notice the uncomfortable silence between them when she saw that the laces on her sneakers were undone.
“Hold on,” she said, breaking the silence and stopping Draco in mid-stride, “I need to do up my laces.” She bent down and took her time to adjust her laces before tying it.
Just then, Peeves floated along the corridor and stopped right in front of Draco and Hermione, a wicked smile pasted on his translucent face.
“Get lost, Peeves,” Draco told the poltergeist, who simply ignored his order.
“You've got to kiss her,” Peeves said, his grin stretching across his face.
“What?!” the two Heads exclaimed in unison, Hermione instantly snapping up to stare at Peeves.
Peeves’ smile was now occupying most of his face. He pointed up to the ceiling and sniggered. “Mistletoe.”
Hermione and Draco looked up and, to their horror, they realized that they were standing directly below some mistletoe.
“Who would hang mistletoe here, in the middle of a corridor that’s hardly ever used?” Hermione asked, though she knew it was certainly Peeves’ doing.
True enough, Peeves pointed at himself and did a small bow. “So, come on now,” he said in a singing voice. “Give her a little kissy-wissy.” He started making loud, obscene kissing noises. “One little kissy.” More obscene kissing noises.
“You're disgusting, Peeves!” Hermione said, standing up after quickly tying her shoelaces. “Go away!”
Draco and Hermione started walking again, ignoring the ghost. But Peeves plucked the mistletoe from the ceiling and made sure it stayed above their heads as they walked by holding it out and floating above them. “You can choose, it’s either one kiss or four Dungbombs,” he cackled happily.
“I’d rather have the Dungbombs,” Draco said quietly, making sure Peeves had not heard him.
Hermione, however, had caught what Draco said. For some reason, she felt the tiniest bit hurt that Draco would rather have Dungbombs splattered all over himself than kiss her. But when she thought about it, maybe she would rather have the Dungbombs as well.
“Peeves, I'm going to call the Bloody Baron if you don’t go away,” Draco threatened. “And I know exactly where to find him.”
This seemed to an effect on Peeves. However, he still made loud kissing noises as he floated away.
“I'm going to kill him the next time I get my hands on him,” Malfoy said, frustrated.
“Peeves is already dead, Malfoy,” Hermione reminded him. “So technically, you can’t kill him.”
“Oh shut up, Granger,” Draco mumbled as they continued to their dorm.
“Don’t need to be rude to me, I'm just stating a fact,” Hermione said, crossing her arms.
“Keep your facts to yourself then,” Draco snarled.
“Honestly Malfoy, you need to take lessons on learning how to be nice,” Hermione said, rolling her eyes.
Draco snorted in response.
There was a second of silence, then Hermione asked suddenly, “Would you really be covered in Dungbombs then kiss me?” Immediately, she regretted asking that question. She did not know what had come over her that instant when she asked it.
Initially, Draco seemed slightly stunned by the question, but then the shock soon changed into amusement. “I’d rather do a lot of other things then kiss you, Granger.” He let out a bark of laughter. “Did you think I’d rather kiss you?” He started laughing even louder. “I always knew you had a thing for me. I never thought it’d be a secret fantasy to kiss me!”
“That’s rubbish! I was just asking,” Hermione defended herself. “I myself rather do plenty of other things than kiss you!”
“Sorry to burst your bubble, Granger, but these lips,” Draco pouted dramatically, “aren’t going to pucker up for you!”
“Even if they were puckered up for me by some weird coincidence,” Hermione said, fuming, “I'm not going near them!”
“Oh come on Granger, you know you want me,” Draco drawled, making snogging sounds that sounded uncannily like Peeves.
Hermione cheeks glowed red. “I want you just as much as I want the Giant Squid!”
For some reason, that just caused Draco to laugh harder.
After several minutes of arguing (in which Hermione did most of the bickering because Draco was too busy laughing at his own jokes), they found themselves in the common room of their dormitory. They were greeted by the portraits Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin, who wished them a Merry Christmas and then spent the next hour going on and on about the Love-Knot around their hands when they spotted it. They seemed very excited by it.
“Such a waste I wasn’t here this morning to see your reactions when it tied itself around your wrists,” Salazar Slytherin said with a hint of disappointment. “That would have been entertaining indeed.”
“Entertaining?” Hermione repeated incredulously. “This whole situation is anything but entertaining!” She sighed and sank back into the sofa. “We’re stuck together. It’s not fun when you're stuck with someone you detest.”
“I agree with her, for once,” Draco said.
Hermione sighed again. “I'm going to bed.”
“But who’s room will you be sleeping in?” Godric Gryffindor asked.
It was then it occurred to Draco and Hermione that they would have to sleep in the same room and quite possibly on the same bed.
“Oh no!” Hermione and Draco moaned in accord.
Hermione promptly racked her brain for a solution and finally, she came up with one that she found logical. “Malfoy, we can sleep in my room. I’ll make an exception for you under he circumstances. I’ll sleep on the bed and you can sleep on the floor beside me. I'm sure the distance between the bed and the floor will be less than three and a half feet, so the Love-Knot won’t draw us together.”
Draco grunted. “You can forget it, Granger,” he said icily. “You can sleep in my room, on the floor, while I get the bed. You don’t expect me to sleep on the floor for you.”
“I'm not going to sleep on the floor!” Hermione protested. “I'm a girl. You should give me priority!”
“Ha! Forget it!”
“Well, I'm not sleeping on the floor, neither am I sleeping on a bed next to you!”
“Same here!”
“Haven’t you heard of the phrase ‘Ladies first’?!”
“Haven’t you heard of the phrase ‘I don’t care’?!”
“Oh goodness,” Godric Gryffindor said, heaving a long sigh, “this is going to take a while.”
Author's Note: I'm so sorry about the long delay in updating guys! I had to edit a few things in this chapter because I realized that I rather use them in the later chapter. Plus, if I didn't edit, this chapter would have been super long! Anyways, hope you guys enjoy this chapter! And thank you so very much for all the reviews so far! =D