Hermione Granger bowed her head low over the short stake of papers on her immaculate desk, her quill scratching across the parchment as she wrote quick short sentences. Everything in the office gleamed with cleanliness from the small bronze nameplate on the desk to the perfectly filed papers and books which lined the walls. Shuffling through the papers, Hermione sighed, letting her head drop to hit the top of the desk with a hollow thunk.
“Hermione?”
She jerked upright at the voice, a faint flush of embarrassment appearing on her cheeks while Ginny Weasley surveyed her from the doorway. “I’m fine,” she responded automatically, not quite meeting Ginny’s eyes.
Ginny smiled wryly, letting herself into the office. “Of course you are. That’s why your secretary told me you’ve practically been living in your office for the past few weeks.”
“I’ve been busy,” Hermione lied, watching Ginny’s eyes skip over the unnaturally neat room before landing on the papers Hermione had been filling out before her interruption.
“Janitorial staff for the Irish embassy?” Ginny read incredulously. “You really are scraping the bottom of the barrel trying to find work to get done. For pity’s sake, this is why you have a secretary in the first place! Admit it, you aren’t getting anything done and you’re making yourself a nuisance to the staff.”
“I tried cleaning to stay busy,” Hermione said, before dropping her head back onto the desk with a groan. “I think I’m going crazy.”
Ginny snickered. “I think you’ve already passed that point.”
Hermione pulled her head up long enough to give the younger woman a nasty glare. “If Molly sent you to cheer me up, you’re doing a really lousy job.”
“If Mum sent me to cheer you up, I’d have brought cake. Besides, you don’t need cheering up, remember? You’re fine.”
“Shut up,” Hermione muttered half-heartedly.
Ginny grinned again, dropping contentedly in the chair opposite Hermione’s. “That won’t work, either. I do have brothers.” When Hermione’s only response was to droop her head deeper into her hands Ginny plowed on. “And now you’re simply being ridiculous. You may be the smartest witch of your age, but you can’t completely let yourself go over this mess with Draco.”
Hermione flinched visibly at the name.
“Yes, I said it. Draco. That stupid, smart-mouthed, git who you’re still in love with.”
Hermione’s wand flashed up with a speed that would have surprised any who didn’t know her. “Ginevra Molly Weasley, you take that back! I am no such thing.”
Ginny laughed, her hand flapping away the wand which had been pointed at her nose. “There’s the Hermione we know and love,” she gasped between her giggles. A moment later Hermione joined her, feeling that she had behaved rather ridiculously.
“Thank goodness you’ve stopped wallowing,” Ginny said weakly when she finally regained her breath.
“I tried not to wallow in misery too much,” Hermione protested ineffectually.
“You did a very noble job of trying not to wallow,” Ginny agreed, “so quite naturally everybody noticed but you.”
The two women sat in a companionable silence for a moment, each waiting for the other to be the first to speak. “You’re going to have to face it sooner or later,” Ginny said at last. “Either you can fight for him or move on.”
“He’s already moved on,” Hermione admitted wretchedly. “At first I thought he would come, but he never did, and then I thought he would write and he never did. Not even to tell me off, or row like we did that night. My heart leapt every time an owl came by for the first two weeks, Ginny, and it never was him. He doesn’t even care enough to tell me it’s over.”
“Do you want it to be over?”
“No,” Hermione whispered. And for a moment it looked as though her heart was shining out through her eyes. But then they clouded once more with doubt and fatigue, and her entire face seemed cast once more into shadow.
Ginny shook her head at the older woman in disbelief. “Then what are you moping around in here for? Fight for him, you dunce! What happened to the Hermione Granger who marched around with Harry Potter and my dimwit brother to conquer all the evils of the world?”
Hermione smiled at Ginny’s forceful words. “I’m sure Ron will be glad to know that he holds such high esteem with you still.”
“As long as he’s my brother, he’ll always be a dimwit to me,” Ginny replied, brushing her off. “And don’t change the subject.”
“All right!” Hermione threw her hands up in mock surrender. “I’m going, I’m going!” She allowed Ginny to hustle her to the door where she promptly ran into a rather frazzled looking young man. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” she gasped as he bent down to retrieve the thin slips of paper he had dropped.
“It’s quite all right,” he replied sourly, looking as though it was anything but. He squinted at her from behind a pair of large horn rim glasses. “You’re Miss Granger,” he stated rather disapprovingly, and Hermione could feel herself blush. “Mail for you.”
Hermione gaped as he pressed a small packet of papers into her hands and turned on his heel, muttering under his breath about “silly chits who can’t even watch where they are going getting cushy Ministry jobs they probably couldn’t even handle.”
“What a charming man,” Ginny muttered wryly in Hermione’s ear, “perhaps if things don’t work out with Draco....”
Hermione swatted Ginny’s arm with the letters. “He might hear you,” she chided.
“And wouldn’t that be fun.”
Hermione tried to frown at Ginny’s wicked look, but the corners of her mouth kept quirking up. “You’re impossible,” she declared at last, “now, hush, so I can read my mail.”
There were two papers, the first was rough and crumpled, the folds nearly worn through at the seams. Delicately, Hermione opened it, recognizing her own handwriting staring back at her. It was the last note she had written Draco. A smaller scrap of paper was folded inside. Her fingers visibly trembling now she turned it over to see his familiar, spiky scrawl. Several lines were crossed out, but Hermione barely noticed them for her heart leapt within her chest at the last word on the page. Yes.
“Hermione? Hermione, what is it?” Ginny pulled at the older witch’s elbow. “You’ve gone as red as a posy. Hermione?”
A look of wordless joy on her face, Hermione passed the opened papers to Ginny.
“Aren’t you going to open that one,” Ginny asked glancing at the large red “Urgent” scrawled on the unopened letter before turning her attention to the ones Hermione had passed her.
Hermione shrugged, but her fingers deftly tore open the paper. She fully intended to skim the contents, then chuck it on her desk, find Draco and beg his forgiveness. But with the first few words her heart went cold and she could feel the blood draining from her face.
Hermione,
I know you and Draco have not been on good terms lately, but I am begging you to listen to me now. We were tending a dragon today which got loose during the healing. Draco saved my life but only at a great cost to his own.
He needs you now. Please come to him.
We are at St, Mungo’s, first floor, critical burns is the third door to the left.
Please hurry,
Elaine