requirement | dramione

0.07

october 17, 1996

By the end of Slughorn's lesson, three students would walk away from the Potion's classroom with their own vials of Amortentia. Hermione had always thought of Slughorn as unconventional, but awarding students for their potion brewing skills with illegal potions seemed beyond even Slughorn. Still, Hermione rolled the tiny vial between her thumb and fingers, impatiently.

She didn't dare uncap the vial until she was the lat girl left in her dormitory. She stared at the tiny thing– not enough to enchant a person, Slughorn ensured the winning students, just enough to strike desire.

She closed her eyes, uncapped the vial, and inhaled.

There he was all over again.

Vanilla. Fresh parchment. Clean hair gel, apple-like, and dark cologne, warm and full.

It was him. Without a single doubt.

She tired to swallow her admission, but her mouth was filled with confusion and laced with guilt. She felt it in her stomach. It was in her hands too. In her head, in her heart, in her breath, that anxious confusion that nearly made her wish she had skipped Potions completely.

How was it possible?

The brown haired girl threw the cap back on her vial, eyes wide open in an instant, staring at her empty bed. The empty bed where she had pictured him laying, less than twenty hours before. Her stomach turned over.

She straightened, rather abruptly, and shoved the vial into the pocket of her jeans as if she were hiding it from herself. Too much of a temptation. She stood, gathered her coat, and wandered back through the common room and into the corridor. Gryffindor was near silent now, everyone had gone to the pitch to watch Quidditch tryouts.

She had almost reached the bottom of the third staircase when there was a great creaking rumble and a shake that signaled that the staircase had begun to shift.

"You are joking!" Hermione huffed beneath her breath, clutching on to the bannister. The staircase swung to the right and, without any sympathy for her lateness, finally creaked to a halt.

A dark figure caught her eye, standing nearly twenty steps below her, closer to the mid of the staircase.

The brown haired girl had to do a double take to realize who was there. She stared, taking note of the boy below. He was clad in his school things, a crips white button down beneath a sleeveless jumper. He seemed preoccupied, staring at his waxed dress shoes. Hermione couldn't tear her eyes away from his silvery blonde head. 

He truly was a sight to see.

Evil, she reminded herself, but beautiful.

Hermione tightened her grip about the jacket in her hands and suddenly remembered why she was on the staircase in the first place. Both Slytherin and Gryffindor were meant to be down on the quidditch pitch for their team tryouts. While she knew Draco was a terrible sport, she'd expected him to be down there. 

Draco was the only seeker who had come close to posing a treat to Harry. He was talented, to say the least. 

As if he could feel her eyes on him, he looked up. Their eyes locked.His expression was blank and his skin was pale. There was no anger, no confusion, nothing.  Hermione continued to gaze at him, wondering why he had yet to say something.

Her mouth opened even though she hadn't told it to. 

"Missing quidditch tryouts?" 

She started down at him and he looked back, blankly and unbothered. Hermione loathed that look.