Merely Misunderstood

Chapter Nine

I whirled around to look at Draco, shock drawn all over my face. His expression, however, was blank, and he stared down at me darkly.

"Malfoy, I...." was all I could say, and he smiled humorlessly, shaking his head.

"Who's the one pretending, now?" was all he said, and he turned and walked away, heading back toward the common room.

Ron and Harry were staring at me nervously, seeming to stress over whether I was offended or mad at them for ruining my chance at a good grade. I turned to the three of them and apologized, feeling guilty for bringing them into it. Hermione, however, shook her head, and insisted it should be them apologizing, not me.

"What did Malfoy mean by, 'who's pretending now'?" Harry asked as they accompanied me back to the library. I shrugged, deciding to pretend I had no idea. I didn't know why, but it felt like the right thing to do. I didn't know how the three of them would react to the truth... but what was the truth? I didn't even know, to be honest.

I went back to the table Draco and I had been sitting at to gather my stuff, feeling suddenly dejected. Only moments ago we'd been planning to celebrate finishing a third of my extra-credit essay.

I shoved my stuff into my book bag, but then paused, realizing something was missing. I rummaged through my books and parchment and my heart stopped. My essay wasn't there.

"That evil —" I muttered under my breath, panicking about what he might do to the essay we'd worked so hard on. If he was mad enough, who knew what he would do? He might even go to Snape and let it slip that he'd been tutoring me, and then Snape would bring my grades back down to a fail.

I hurried from the library, shouting over my shoulder at Hermione, Ron, and Harry, "I'll see you at dinner!" and earning a fervent shush from Madam Pince.

I ran to the common room, bursting in to find Draco sitting by the fire where he always sat, this time not staring at a book, but at a long bit of parchment.

I stared at him from the entrance, breathless.
"What are you going to do with it?" I asked hopelessly after a moment of silence, knowing I wouldn't be able to convince him to give it back to me.

Draco glanced up at me for a moment, then looked back at the parchment and scribbled something down. He then stood up and walked slowly over to me, staring at the parchment all the while.

Once he stood before me, he finally met my eyes, and he held his hand out toward me, the parchment limp in his grasp.

"Take it," Draco said tonelessly.

I stared at him, wide-eyed and shocked. I took the parchment gingerly, still staring at him in confusion as he immediately turned away. He headed back to the couch and sat back down, picking up a book and flipping through it boredly.

I looked over the essay, surprised to see that he'd edited and improved it.

"You finished it," I acknowledged in surprise, and he raised his eyebrows without looking up from the book.

"Why?" I asked, frowning. "Why didn't you just burn it?"

Malfoy chuckled humorlessly, still not looking away from his book. "And waste all that hard work? Do you know how long it took me to convince Professor Snape to assign that essay to you?" he asked, and I looked down, feeling disgustingly guilty.

"Malfoy, I'm s—"

Draco stood abruptly, heading toward the corridor that would lead to his dormitory. I pressed my lips together, squeezing my eyes shut as I realized I'd ruined everything; he didn't want anything to do with me.

I moved away from the house entry, collapsing onto the sofa opposite to where Draco had sat, suddenly feeling horrible. Had I really started to become a friend to him? He looked upset when he found out that I wasn't a real friend... but was I?

Spending time with him was shockingly enjoyable; we actually got along. He wasn't anything like what he pretended to be in front of the rest of the school.

I ran my hand through my hair, stressed. It wasn't like me to use someone to my advantage; maybe I was pretending to be someone else, too.

"I know I'm a horrible person," I heard Draco say, and I looked up, surprised to see him staring at me from the corridor. "You don't need to tell me. Everyone knows it," he said as he shrugged a shoulder. "But maybe you shouldn't be so quick to judge me for pretending to be something I'm not until you've figured out whether you're any different."

And with that, he left me alone in the common room, feeling even more hopeless than before.

"Takes one to know one, right?" I asked myself, and an anger arose in my as I realized how true those words were — both his words and mine. Maybe I wasn't any different from him. How could I chastise him for doing the same things I did?

I stared down at the first foot of my essay, feeling sick to my stomach.

In a split decision, I threw the essay into the flames, deciding I didn't deserve it. But it floated pathetically to the ground just before the grate, and I stared at it irritably until I eventually left for my dormitory, leaving the essay where it had landed on the floor. Hopefully someone would find it and throw it in for me.

I pretended to be sleeping when Mirah came, and she didn't ask me why I wasn't at dinner; she didn't even try to wake me. Maybe she'd talked to Hermione.

But once her peaceful snores filled the dorm, I still hadn't fallen asleep. I stared up at the hangings on my four-poster bed, wide awake, and I stayed that way all night long.