Things Happen

As soon as Draco was completely out of sight, Hermione's will to keep her spell going wore off. Luckily no one but Ginny had passed by to see her crying.

"Oh, Hermione. I'm sorry. I'm a terrible friend. I should have never insulted Blaise like that. I didn't mean to upset you."Under different circumstances, Hermione would have laughed at this, and told Ginny that this wasn't about that, and given her a big hug; but Hermione just couldn't will herself to do that. It was like her brain had completely shut down. She couldn't feel any emotions besides pain and sorrow and didn't have enough will power to get up and go cry in the privacy of her dorm.

"Ginny, this isn't about you. I had no reason to ever be mad at you."

"What? The what else could have possibly made you this upset?"

Using all the strength left in her body, Hermione uttered two words. "Draco Malfoy." Just with that Ginny seemed to automatically understand. She wrapped her arms around Hermione and leaned her head on her shoulder.

"Okay, so here's what's gonna happen. I'm going to get you upstairs, to our dorm, and let you try to clam down a bit. While you do that, I'm going to go down to the Great Hall, grab two mugs of tea for us, and bring them back upstairs where you will tell me everything that happened. Okay?"

.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
By the time Ginny had come back to the dorm, Hermione had managed to at least slightly clam down. Hermione took a few sips of her tea and then told Ginny everything that happened.

"I just don't understand!" said Hermione.

"Well, I have a theory," said Ginny, pausing to sip her tea," but you're going to hate me for it."

Hermione stared at Ginny expectantly, willing her to go on.

"Okay. Well what if you really care about Draco. I mean, I want to think of a better explanation for you Hermione, I really do, but I just can't think of any other reason that you would be in this much pain."

Hermione fell back onto her bed and groaned, not because she was angry with Ginny, but because she knew she was right.

"But how can that be possible?! I have a boyfriend!"

"Who's to say you can't have a boyfriend that you don't really care about?"

"But I do care about him! How can it be possible two care about to people!"

"Well, maybe you just think you care about Blaise? So you won't care about Draco?" Hermione wasn't convinced, and Ginny didn't;t sound as if she was either.

"Maybe...maybe you should break things off with Blaise for a while. You know; until you can figure this out."

"No way," said Hermoine,"No way. Let's just say that I do love Malfoy," Ginny gave Hermione a look at the word love,"He would never ever love me back. So why should I break up with the person who maybe one day will love me?"

Ginny looked around uneasily.

"What?" exclaimed Hermione.

"Well...what if Draco does love you? I mean, you said it yourself Hermione. He looked genuinely upset in that library today. And he came out to look for you! And, well, when I went downstairs, he still was. He came up to me to ask if I had seen you. I told him no, but thank God that he asked before I got the tea. I doubt he would have believed that I was walking upstairs with two cups of tea all for myself."

Hermione laughed, but then went right back to be serious. "Listen, Draco Malfoy would never love me." Hermione kept telling herself in her head, as to convince herself of it. Because all of the sudden Hermione remembered a night about a month ago: a night when she had ran into Draco in the halls and he had claimed to have a dream.