Order Only - Private message to Hermione

[alt_hydra]

I've just seen Draco. He's going to bring Jack over to Justin... Well, that's not why I saw him, we've just had supper at Nanella's. It's really more duty than celebration, and no one lingers for long after the table is cleared.

I - I'm not sure how to say this, because for all I know, you may not want to talk to anyone at all. Thats for you to decide. But then again, you can't know who to talk to unless someone makes it clear that they're willing to listen. And thats what you did for me, after Justin and I broke up. Which seems so long ago and yet like it just happened, and I still don't know what I can say about it. What is there to say? We've made our decision and that's the end of it. But even though I didn't feel like talking, I appreciated it when you said that you'd listen, if I needed someone.

The thing is, Draco has been occluding around me for ages. I could feel it, at first, but now he's gotten better and I couldn't really tell, but I assumed that he was. For practice. I had no idea he was actually hiding something.

And today, even though he didn't really ask me to do anything, as soon as we were alone at St. James to get Jack, I could feel him drawing me in, intentionally, so I looked. And I saw.

If I was surprised, well, I can only imagine how you must have felt.

He didn't want to talk about it, but he thought you might need someone. He might be right, he might be wrong. I don't know. But here I am, if you do.

Comments

[alt_hydra]

Yes, I suppose you're right. About Justin, I mean. What an odd thing to ponder, though.

That's interesting, about the 400 some days ago. I had forgotten that you asked me about his jerking away from you. You were showing him how to do the wand movement, weren't you? I suppose it must have been around then that he started to think of you differently.

This isn't legilimency, just a guess, but maybe he thinks he needs to do something deserving of tenderness before he can allow himself to have it. He's so fanatical about infiltrating the council and acts as if he wants to be the one to kill Voldemort with his own two hands. Voldemort didn't even do that much to him, comparatively speaking, but Draco acts as if he did. Do you reckon maybe Draco thinks he would have been a different person if Voldemort had never risen to power? That he would have started out seeing muggleborns as no different, for starters.

But if you don't feel that way about him, and he knows it already, then what happens next? Do you think you can go back to being friends, or whatever it is you were?

By the way, if I had known that Justin was a secret muggleborn when he was showing interest in me, I probably would have assumed he was just getting close to me because it would be a secret thrill to sully the daughter of Auror Lestrange; a goal, as you might say. Which wasn't at all true, of course, but that probably would have been my assumption.

[alt_hermione]

It might not have been something you noticed because he didn't seem different from any of the other students when they came over, but the thing was, when he first joined the ISS, Justin was really apologetic to me and Terry because he was getting the education we should have been able to get. But it was never anything I resented, anyway, and I don't think Terry, either, because it was actually harder to think of him as a muggleborn than as a pureblood. Well, except for when he didn't know things but mostly he did a good job covering that up and most people figured it was because he was raised in France.

I can see how you'd have thought he was deliberately seeking you out because he wanted to twist your mother's nose but of course, that would have been completely unlike him.

It's funny how he says he resisted fancying you for a long time, when that's just what Draco said. Only somehow it wasn't a compliment when Draco said it. (Honestly he really doesn't know how to talk to a witch, except when he's pretending to flirt with Daphne or something. Did you know that his and Harry's first year he had a crush on Lavender Brown? I mean, really, Lavender Brown.)

Anyway, I do think he thinks he has to prove himself but I think it's because he's sure the Order don't really trust him and they're just waiting for him to go tell his father all about us. But mostly I think that's because he's so closed off about everything and apart from Mr Snape, he hasn't really given the adults a chance to get to know him, so all they have is his reputation. And his sarcasm.

I don't know if we really were friends. I don't know what I'd call our relationship before all this. But I would like it if we could at least go back to being comfortable with each other. I don't want him to hate me or to pine for me or to think I'm flirting when I don't hate him and I'm not trying to make him interested or anything.

I'm just not sure how to get there, except to give him time to get over it.

[alt_hydra]

No, I don't know if I ever saw Justin be apologetic to you and Terry, but I know that he was. We talked about it later, but just knowing him, I could guess that's how he would be.

It's funny that Draco's so committed when I'm just going along with the council challenge, and my Mother's tutelage, because I don't know what else to do. Because the only other option would be to run away to Moddey, or something. And the Order would lose a lot if I did that.

I guess giving him time is all you can do, then. Do you want me to tell him anything? To leave you alone for a while?

[alt_hermione]

Maybe.... Tell him I'm not cross, or upset, or anything, and if he wants to talk to me it's all right, and if he doesn't for a while, that's all right, too.

[alt_hydra]

Okay, I'll tell him that.

Just wondering, but do you want to talk to him?

[alt_hermione]

Well, I don't want to argue with him. But--yes, for my part I don't have any reason not to want to talk to him.

[alt_hydra]

So do you or

I think you have plenty of reasons, but sure. Alright. Goodnight then, Hermione.

[alt_hermione]

Goodnight and--thanks.